Chapter Thirty-One: Hostages of the Tutorial

Nathan let out a thin, humorless huff. “Oh yeah. This is gonna be fun.”

CHIME

“Fuck,” Nathan yelped, snapping his sword up on instinct.

Kieran already had his wooden blade raised, shoulders tense. “Another message?”

Nathan squinted at the blue screen hovering in front of him.
“Oh, come on. What is this?!”

Kieran didn’t relax. His eyes tracked the corridor. “Draegor.”

“It—” Nathan jabbed a finger at the panel. “It is not what I was expecting. No stats. It lied. Is it broken? It took my mana away. The only cool thing I had going. No Bob. No stag. And then—”

Kieran’s posture loosened a fraction.

“Draegor, you are speaking too fast,” he said more evenly. “What does it tell you.”

Nathan inhaled through his nose, long and steady, then looked again at the screen.

Designation: Trainee
Type: Hollow
Condition: Stable
Interface: Enabled
Mana access: Temporarily blocked
Reason: Mana presence detected — overload risk

Hollow? What the hell does that mean? Skip it. Not explaining that.

He read everything except the “type” line to Kieran.

“What does that mean. About the mana.”

“I forgot to mention. I can’t use my mana. Haven’t been able to since we arrived here.”

Kieran stared at him, then glanced at his sword, then back.

“What is it?”

“There is no augment.”

“This gets better and better. At least you still have brute strength,” Nathan said.

“Brute strength.”

Nathan sighed. “It was a compliment. Let’s just read the rest.”

Designation: Companion
Type: Mana
Condition: Stable
Interface: Inaccessible
Reason: Suppression lock engaged
Notice: Access will resume when tutorial instruction concludes

Kieran didn’t speak at first. Then, “What does that mean… suppression and interface.”

“No idea about the first. I’ll explain second later.”

The next section scrolled:

Map: Active
Region: Tutorial dungeon
Boundary Expansion: Locked

Hint: You may now pull up your map.

Nathan tapped the pulsating icon. A small mini-map unfolded beside his main panel, hovering like a second screen.

Well, that’s something, I guess.

CHIME

Objective: Defeat all enemies on Level One

“Yeah. Great.” Nathan deadpanned. “Says defeat the enemies on this level.”

Kieran stayed in a defensive stance. Ready.

CHIME

Added: Gelsie
Classification: Physical gelatinous being
Behavior: Consumes living and inorganic material

A tiny bar appeared at the bottom of the screen, silently ticking down.

11:59:42… 11:59:41…

What the hell is that for? Tutorial takes 12 hours?

He squinted at it.

Great.

Ploop. Ploop.

Chhh. Chhh.

Nathan stared in disbelief at the wobbling shapes approaching them.

And doubled over laughing.

“Fucking slimes. Gelsie is a slime!”

“All the things I’ve faced… slimes.” Tears rolled down his face. “Five little slimes.” He pointed with the tip of his wooden sword, utterly losing it.

More text appeared:

Hint: Destroy their core.

“Oh—oh stop. Fuuu—where were these when I was up against literally everything else?” Nathan wheezed, hands on his knees.

Kieran lowered his sword, expression stuck between insult and confusion.

“Why are you laughing,” he asked.

Nathan tried to breathe. “I can’t even explain. Even if I did, you just… wouldn’t get it.”

Kieran eyed the jiggling blobs. “We are simply meant to kill these.”

“Yeah,” Nathan sniffed. “The hint says ‘destroy their—’”

Kieran didn’t wait.

He walked forward, wooden sword hanging loosely at his side, reached the nearest slime—

—and stomped on it.

It exploded.

Wave One: 1/5

Nathan made a sound that was not dignified.

Kieran looked back, one brow raised.
“…Was that not correct.”

Nathan collapsed into another fit of laughter.

“Draegor.”

Nathan straightened. “Yes, sir. Pulling myself together.”

“What now.”

“We kill ’em all.”

Kieran nodded like a man who had trained for war, faced death, lost comrades—
and was now being asked to stomp jelly.

PLOP-plorp.

Kieran lowered his sword and glanced toward Nathan, as if confirming that yes, this ridiculous task was actually what they were meant to do. Nathan gave the smallest nod he could manage. Only then did Kieran turn back to the wobbling blob and step forward.

Squish.

The slime flattened under his boot like a grape.

Soft chimes repeated with each elimination.

Wave One: 2/5

Kieran stared at the dissolving mess stuck to his foot.
“…This is insulting.” He wiped his boot on the stone floor.

Nathan choked back another laugh.

Kieran made a grunt that sounded like pure regret for every life choice that led him here.

Squish.

Wave One: 3/5

Pop.

Wave One: 4/5

Hss-pop.

Wave One: 5/5

He hadn’t raised his sword once.

Wave One Complete
(Wave 1/10)

A small glass vial materialized on the ground with a soft tink.

Item dropped: Slime Dissolvent
Hint: Add to inventory

Nathan froze.
“I have an inventory?!”

“Inventory.” Kieran echoed.

A new icon pulsed. Nathan tapped it. A small empty grid unfolded.

“…Okay. Sure.”

He pressed the vial to the screen. It vanished—appearing instantly in one of the tiny boxes.

Kieran tensed. “Where did it go. Are you able to use mana now.”

“Nope. Still blocked.”

Another message slid across:

Hint: To retrieve items from your inventory, click the item you’d like.

Nathan clicked the vial icon.
It popped back into his hand.

“…This is actually kind of cool.”

CHIME

Hint: Keep advancing

“It says we have to keep moving forward.”

“Is this a test. What does this prove,” Kieran muttered as they started walking.

“It’s a tutorial.”

“I’m unclear what we gain by doing this.”

“Same here. But if it lets us out for completing it? I call that a win.”

Nathan kept glancing between the corridor and his pulsing mini-map.

“Okay, this is actually kind of fun,” he murmured. “Like a real dungeon. A dumb baby dungeon, but still.”

Kieran made a low sound. “If you are finding enjoyment in this—”

“Oh, don’t ruin it.” Nathan zoomed the map. “Look, sir, it’s simple. Slimes show up, we kill them. We follow the path. If something blinks on the map, that’s the thing we need.”

“And if something dangerous appears.”

“I’ll see it before you do.”

Kieran’s head turned sharply.
“You are certain.”

“Yep. You’re the sword.” Nathan tapped his mini-map. “I’m the map.”

Kieran didn’t respond.

CHIME

Wave Two Approaching

These ones were slightly bigger, slightly faster, and somehow even more pathetic. Kieran kicked one so hard it splattered against the wall like pancake batter.

Wave Two Complete
(Wave 2/10)

The next four waves came faster, with larger slimes and one slightly more aggressive “big squish.” Between the two of them, it took minutes.

They kept moving forward.

Wave Three, Wave Four, Wave Five—
all variations on the same theme: slimes in different colors, sizes, and levels of enthusiasm.
Kieran crushed them. Nathan poked cores.
Between the two of them, the waves barely slowed their pace.

Wave Six started dropping from the ceiling.

Wave Seven came in clusters, like someone spilled a bucket of angry jelly.

Wave Eight made the map flash orange — supposedly a “threat indicator” — but the threat turned out to be a slightly fatter blob that wobbled indignantly when kicked.

Wave Nine was twenty tiny slimes zipping across the floor like angry gumdrops.
Kieran stepped through them like a man late for work.

Wave Ten led them into a small chamber where a single oversized slime rumbled ominously.

Kieran stabbed its core and it burst like a water balloon.

Wave Ten Complete
(Wave 10/10)

CHIME.

Objective Updated: Find the transport object to proceed to Level Two

He blinked. “Easy enough.”

On the map, a blinking marker pulsed in front of him.

“Well,” he said, “that was… pretty easy. Object…object…”
Oh, it’s in this chamber.

Kieran didn’t look impressed. He stood with his shoulders rigid, the picture of someone deeply insulted by the very concept of level one.

Nathan scanned the room. A small statue stood on a pedestal. I guess I have to touch that and it takes us to level two?

He walked over and touched it.

Light flared.

A blink later, they were standing in a stone corridor, that could have been a carbon copy of where they just were.

CHIME

**LEVEL ONE CLEARED**

Tutorial Progress: 1%
Overall Progress: +0.0002%

Nathan blinked.
“Oh.”

That's going to be a thing. Tutorial progress versus overall progress.

What's beyond this then?

Before he could think too deeply about how many decimals that could possibly require, another:

CHIME

New Skill Acquired: Basic Footwork I
Description: Congratulations! You are now slightly less likely to trip over your own feet.

Nathan stared at it.

“…Okay.”

He didn’t read that one out loud.

Kieran watched him. “What now.”

“Uh. It gave me… a skill.” He coughed. “It’s… harmless. Don’t worry about it.”

Kieran didn’t look convinced.

CHIME

Begin Level Two
Added: Caustic Gelsie

Wave One Approaching

Ploop. Ploop.

Chhh. Chhh.

Hint: They burn.

More slimes oozed toward them. It was a mix of what they'd just encountered on Level One and the new type. Nathan sliced one open with a bored poke while checking the glowing numbers in the corner of his screen.

The timer was still running.

11:14:30…
11:14:29…

Right. That thing. He’d noticed it earlier, but he’d also been busy watching a medieval war commander stomp gelatinous blobs to death with his heels. Hard to multitask.

He squinted at the progress bar. “Huh.”

Kieran took a step, then paused without turning.
“Draegor. Report.”

Nathan exhaled and stabbed another slime without even looking at it.
“Right—so, uh. I have a progress bar.”

Kieran looked back, expression sharp and unreadable.
“Progress… bar.”

“Yeah.” Nathan tapped the invisible UI. “It’s a meter that tracks how much of this tutorial we’ve completed. Level One equaled one percent.”

Kieran’s jaw tensed.
“This device quantifies our advancement.”

“Yep.”

Another slime hissed. Kieran crushed it like it had personally offended him.

“One percent,” he said coldly. “How many levels.”

“No idea. We’ll know after this floor if it bumps again.”

Kieran inhaled through his nose.
“How so.”

“If it goes up another percent, then it’s one percent per floor. And if the whole thing is out of one hundred percent then… maybe one hundred levels?” Nathan winced.

“One hundred levels. Unacceptable.”

He hurried on. “But there’s also a clock.”

Kieran turned fully.
“A what.”

“A timer.” Nathan gestured vaguely at his screen.
“There’s a countdown running while we’re in here.”

Kieran’s voice sharpened instantly.
“A countdown to what.”

“Uh…” Nathan scratched his cheek, half watching the timer flick from 11:12:05 to 11:12:04. “Not sure. It started last level. I just—forgot to mention it.”

Kieran’s head snapped toward him. “You forgot.”

“I finally got my slimes,” Nathan hissed. “I cannot emphasize how distracting that was.”

Kieran grunted. "Countdown."

“It just… counts down,” Nathan said. “Hours, minutes, seconds. Like there’s a limit.”

“A limit,” Kieran echoed flatly. “As in conditions. Constraints.”

“Yep.”

Kieran crushed another slime without lowering his gaze.
His jaw flexed—once, sharply.

“Look, sir,” Nathan said quickly. “I’ll keep an eye on it. If it does anything weird, I’ll tell you.”

Kieran nodded once—short, controlled.
“See that you do.”

Nathan swiped his map. More slimes burbled in the distance like boiling tar.

“Level two,” he muttered. "Let me guess, more slimes? And only slimes?"

Kieran stepped into formation beside him. “Let's move. Map.”

Nathan guffawed. Was that a joke? He looked at Kieran's face. Oh, nope. Not a joke.

CHIME

Wave Two Approaching

They kept walking. Killing slimes.

The corridor stretched on in a straight, stone-gray run. Torches at regular intervals. Occasional doorways to either side that Nathan’s mini-map didn’t flag as important, so he ignored them.

They moved through the early waves with almost embarrassing ease.

Wave Two was just quicker Caustic slimes that splattered brighter.
Wave Three dropped from the ceiling.
Wave Four clustered together like someone spilled a bucket of angry jelly.
Wave Five mixed sizes but nothing either of them cared about.
Wave Six introduced a bulkier Caustic variant that hissed like a cracked kettle before Kieran kicked it apart.

Nathan barely looked up from the timer ticking in the corner of his screen:

10:30:59…
10:30:58…

“Yep,” he muttered, poking out another core. “We’re speedrunning a slime petting zoo.”

Kieran ignored that.

Eventually, the path split.

On the map, their route stayed clear: a single pulsing line ahead, a small blinking mark farther down.

Something else glowed faintly red near the junction.

“What’s tha—”

Nathan’s boot came down on a stone that sank with a soft click.

Shit.

Kieran moved before Nathan’s brain caught up.

He shoved Nathan hard, sending him stumbling sideways just as a volley of arrows hissed through the air where his head had been.

They clattered against the opposite wall.

Nathan stared at the stone, then at the ruined arrows. “Whoa. Thanks.”

“You said you could detect danger,” Kieran said.

“My bad,” he said, heart still hammering. “I know what that is now on the map. Thanks.”

Kieran’s gaze stayed on the corridor ahead. “You are my map.”

“What?”

“You said it earlier,” he replied. “Without you, I have no path out.”

“Right.” Nathan huffed out a shaky breath. “My death would majorly inconvenience you. Would hate for that to happen.”

Kieran didn’t answer.

He simply adjusted his grip on the wooden sword and started forward again. Nathan followed, eyes flicking between the corridor and the glowing lines on his screen.

Not many routes.
Basic.
Avoid red.

“Easy,” Nathan muttered.

Kieran shot him a look.

They ran into more traps on Level Two. Nathan’s reward for clearing it was Dodging +1, which felt like the dungeon’s way of saying you’re pathetic, but we’ll try to help.

And everything after that went downhill fast.

Everything blurred into one long, miserable montage of floors that all sucked in their own uniquely handcrafted ways. The timer bled down. The waves got longer. The floors got larger.

Halfway through Level Three, Nathan was cursing himself for ever using the word easy.

He’d jinxed them.

Because the dungeon heard him. It ALWAYS heard him.

It wasn’t just more slimes—it was the variations stacking like some unhinged slime-enthusiast’s catalog. Sticky ones, hot ones, cold ones, jittery ones, ones that pelted things at them, and the horrifying ones that split into smaller versions if you stabbed wrong.
It was slime madness.

The thick yellow blobs came first, leaving glue-trails stretching across the floor like cursed caramel.

Nathan stepped in one.

His boot did not come out.

He yanked.
He twisted.
He lifted his entire leg.

Nope.

Kieran grabbed him under the arm and hauled him free with soldier precision.

Nathan panted. “This dungeon is horrible.”

Kieran didn’t respond. But the flat, unimpressed look he gave the slime said everything.

Then came the tiny, trembling blue blobs that froze anything they touched.

Ice bloomed across the stone with every hop.

Nathan slipped.
Kieran caught him by the back of the shirt without even turning.
Again.

“Watch your footing,” he said.

Nathan stared at the ice beneath him. “WATCH WHAT FOOTING?! THERE IS NONE.”

Kieran didn’t seem bothered, which somehow made it worse.

Toward the end of that floor, a drop appeared:

Item Acquired: Heat Pebble
Hint: Produces warmth for ten minutes.

Nathan hugged it. “I love you. I’m naming you. Oh—did you want to hold it?”

He offered it up, hopeful.

Kieran turned away slowly.

“Fine then,” Nathan muttered. “All mine.”

Floor Five introduced pale gray slimes that detonated into humid clouds of boiling mist.

One exploded near Nathan and instantly fogged his entire existence.

“I am completely just sweat,” he wheezed. “Sweat and slime goo. How is it everywhere?”

Kieran, soaked through, said only: “…My vision is compromised.”

“It’s just a little humidity,” Nathan said, pushing damp strands off his forehead.

Kieran grunted, deeply unamused.

Then came the floor with the lava pits—like someone had tried to redecorate with fiery death accents. Every time Nathan thought he’d learned the pattern, the room tried to kill him in a new and exciting way.

Next came the greenish slimes that multiplied the moment you looked at them wrong.

Nathan stared at the replicating horrors.
“Oh. So this is my punishment arc.”

Kieran stomped through the copies with escalating irritation.
“This is pointless.”

“Tell THEM that!” Nathan shot back.

Kieran powered through all of it. He didn’t complain. Not out loud.
But he also didn’t hide the look he gave Nathan each time—equal parts you are testing my restraint and I will personally murder this dungeon.

One floor featured vibrating slimes that jittered like broken animation frames.

Nathan poked one and it ricocheted off three walls before hitting him square in the chest.

He wheezed. “I’ve… been struck. By Jello.”

Kieran’s lips tightened. “…Are you injured?”
It sounded like an actual question, which worried him.

“Emotionally.”

The drops kept getting weirder.
A vial that “loosens gelatinous material.”
A single coin with no denomination.
A “Beginner Badge” shaped like a smiling blob.

Nathan pretended that one didn’t exist.

The skill rewards were even worse:
Improved Grip,
Basic Balance I,
and one called Sturdy Knees, which he refused to acknowledge on principle.

One floor was basically a maze of dead ends, blinking markers, and slimes that dripped acidic goo like dying candles.

Every step was a hazard.
Every dodge a little too close.

One flicked a droplet that singed Nathan’s sleeve.

“HEY!” he barked, clutching the burn. “That hurt!"

Kieran stepped in front of him with a calm, murderous stare fixed on the nearest Meltling.

Enough said.

The transport objects were never in the same place twice. Sometimes they were on a pedestal. Sometimes behind a wall Nathan had to circle three times before the map stopped being cryptic about it.
Then the objects started taking longer to spawn. Sometimes the floor refused to mark them at first. Sometimes the marker blinked like it was thinking about showing up.

The fights got messier.
They both snapped more.
Kieran was in full commander mode.
Nathan was in full “please stop spawning slimes in my face” mode.

The atmosphere was… tense.

By the time they smashed the miniboss on Level Nine—a massive slime that could shoot fireballs—the timer in Nathan’s corner read:

1:09:32…
1:09:31…

And he swore he felt his soul leave his body.

What happens when this hits zero?

The object this time was sealed under the floor. Nathan pried up a stone and touched it.

Light flared—and when it faded they were standing on Level Ten.

CHIME

**Level Nine Cleared**
Tutorial Progress: 9%
Overall Progress: +0.0010%
Reward: Digger +1

Digger.
Because sure.
What the hell else was he going to do with his day.

Added: Viscous Gelsie

Nathan looked ahead, then at his map.

A puzzle floor.

He could tell immediately.

Because of course it was.

Nathan groaned. “I can feel the bullshit.”

The corridor ahead branched into a dizzying web of narrow hallways, pressure plates, rotating walls, and glowing panels that blinked in no sensible order. His mini-map looked like someone had scribbled on it with neon crayons.

Cue the gauntlet from hell.

They sprinted down twisting corridors while slimes shot across sliding platforms like deranged bumper cars.
Nathan shouted warnings between gasps:

“Left—no RIGHT—no THAT LEFT—WAIT STOP—THAT ONE EXPLODES—”

At one point the floor dropped into a slow-moving conveyor belt of sticky green slimes, and Nathan got dragged halfway across like a toddler on an airport moving walkway.

Kieran grabbed him by the back of his cloak and dead-lifted him off it.

“I hate puzzles,” Nathan wheezed.

“I prefer straightforward killing,” Kieran agreed grimly.

They dodged swinging stone blocks.
They leapt over slime canals.
They solved two color-switch puzzles by sheer guessing.

Every failure spawned more slimes for absolutely no reason.

The dungeon was draining their life and patience by the second.

By the time they burst through the final rotating wall and into the boss chamber…

00:25:31
00:25:30

Nathan doubled over. “Oh great. Perfect. Twenty-five minutes until that timer runs out! What a luxury.”

“Let’s defeat it quickly then,” Kieran said.
“Yep.”

Hint: Find the object

“Yeah, yeah.”

The chamber erupted.

A roar shook the walls as something massive hauled itself out of the slime pool — an amalgam of every variant they’d fought so far. Yellow glue-trails, blue frost patches, green copies writhing together, caustic steam rising off its hide. A single wobbling titan made of every kind of slime the dungeon had thrown at them.

The boss lurched.

Smaller slimes appeared.

Nathan dove as a volley of smaller slimes launched from the titan’s body like artillery. They smacked into the wall and exploded into freezing mist.

Kieran charged straight through the fog.

He hacked at the main body — useless. The slime simply reformed.

And the timer in the corner blipped down.

00:15:09

“Oh you’ve got to be kidding me—SIR, HIT THE GLOWING THINGY ON THE RIGHT—NO, THE OTHER RIGHT!”

Kieran pivoted, slammed his heel into a pulsing knot of red sludge, and the titan shrieked — a sound like boiling tar.

Another chunk split off and multiplied on impact.

Four green copies lunged.

Nathan stabbed one in the core, kicked another, flailed at the third, and yelled,
“These things reproduce faster than my stress!”

The boss recoiled, reformed, and fired a jet of caustic slime across the chamber. Kieran shoved Nathan behind a half-collapsed pillar, taking the brunt of it on his arm. Steam hissed.

Nathan grabbed his sleeve. “That almost melted your skin!”

“It missed,” Kieran said flatly, stepping back out.

They attacked again.

Kieran went for brute force — smashing, kicking, stomping, ripping chunks free. Nathan scrambled around the thing, following the flickering core-indicators on his map.

Another cluster pulsed beneath a layer of ice.

Nathan yelled, “RIGHT THERE—BREAK THE FROST—GO!”

Kieran slammed his heel down, cracking the ice. Nathan stabbed through the gap with his pathetic wooden blade, hitting the core dead-center.

A shockwave burst out.

Slimes flew everywhere.

Nathan landed on his back. Kieran stayed standing — barely.

The timer ticked.

00:02:31

The boss flailed, cracking its own body into quivering sections. One last core flickered deep inside the central mass.

Nathan saw it.

Kieran did too.

No words needed.

They rushed together — Kieran carving a path through the sludge, Nathan following the map like a man possessed.

Kieran launched himself upward, brought his wooden sword down in a brutal, spine-cracking arc—

Nathan shoved his blade through the pulsing core from below.

The amalgamation froze. Swelled. And crashed down into a pile of hissing, steaming goo.

Silence.

Then—

A soft chime.

Hint: Touch the object.

Nathan muttered, “Yeah, yeah. I know. Touch the object. Move on. Got it.”

He scanned the chamber.
The map blipped the real item — the little bust sitting on a pedestal.

He headed toward it.

Another hint chimed.

Hint: Touch the object.

“Stop nagging,” he grumbled. “I know. I literally just said I know.”

“…Huh? Where is it?”

Kieran approached behind him, sword lowered but alert.

“What is it,” he asked.

"I can't figure out where the object is and the timer is almost at...15 seconds."

Kieran started pacing too, looking around. "What does your map SAY. What happens if we don't touch it in time."

"It's unclear!"

00:00:08

"MAKE it CLEAR."

00:00:07

"It's not in this chamber!"

He ran toward a wall.

00:00:06

There was some kind of puzzle there, shapes. Organize?

00:00:04

Rearrange? Line them up?

00:00:03

"Draegor!"

00:00:02

"Not enough time!" Nathan’s voice jumped.
“I think this means something is about to—”

00:00:01

FLASH.

They were standing in the village square again — lamps lit, sky orange with sunset, air warm and pleasant. NPCs strolled through the square.

"Evening, travelers!" One couple said in unison.

It made Nathan jump.

He looked at his clothes. No slime goo. Auto clean feature?

CHIME

Nathan’s stomach dropped.

Twelve-Hour Limit Reached
Returned to Safe Zone
Tutorial Progress: 9%
Overall Progress: +0.0010%

Note: Remember to hydrate, rest, and maintain healthy meal habits.

The fuck is this now?

Ongoing Objective: Return to the monument at first light to continue.

He stared at it, dumbstruck.

“Oh,” he whispered.
“…So that’s what the countdown was for.”

Nine percent? Fuck, do we need to repeat that level? Is the object like a save point?

Kieran grabbed his arm.
“What happened, Draegor. Why are we back here.”

Nathan swallowed hard.

“Sir… we hit the time limit.”

His voice was low but boiling.

“AND WHAT.”

Nathan was still processing the whiplash. “It only lets us go for twelve hours at a time, it seems. Then sends us back here...until the next day.”

Kieran's expression made Nathan want to jump out of his skin.

“We were advancing. We had not finished. Why are we back here?”

Nathan swallowed. "I know. It said.."
I'm not repeating that childish remember to hydrate bit to this man.

Fuck that.

“Okay, so… you know how I told you it’s a tutorial?”

Kieran’s eyes narrow dangerously.

“Explain,” he says. “Clearly.”

Nathan lifts his hands, trying for calm.

“Right. So a tutorial is like… uh… the beginner portion. Introductory training. Before the real thing.”

Kieran’s jaw flexes.

“I am no beginner,” he says, voice flat and offended.
“I have led armies. I have faced monsters words cannot describe. And now you say this”—he gestures at the ground, at the fake-perfect roads—“is an introductory lesson?”

Nathan winces.
“Yeah. I mean—basically.”

Kieran inhales sharply.
Not quite rage.
But the kind of controlled fury that vibrates under the ribs.

"And this… progress bar," he says the words like they are insults, "you say it shows how long this cage intends to trap us."

Nathan tried to smile. It came out wrong.

“It only counted nine levels. Nine percent completed.”

Kieran’s eyes flashed. "Nine levels? I'm positive we completed ten."

"Yeah, so about that."

"Draegor."

He's going to strangle me.

"I don't think it counted the last level because I didn't touch the object in time!" He spit out.

Kieran dropped his head, staring at the ground. "How long. How much more."

Maybe ten or eleven days? If it stays consistent. That’s—”

“Eleven DAYS.”

“Eleven. Tops. Even with the time limit they were pretty easy, right?”

Kieran stepped back, looking around the square again—as if expecting the illusion to flicker and show its true shape.

It didn’t.

“Unacceptable,” he muttered—low and cold.
“Absolutely unacceptable.”

Nathan rubbed his face.
“Sir, I don’t like it either. Trust me.”

Kieran shook his head. His whole body seemed to tremble. His gaze fixed somewhere far beyond the fake rooftops.

“I am the Field Marshal of this expedition,” he said, more to himself than Nathan. “People are relying on me. I’ve abandoned them all. Damn it. And now I’m traipsing through this cursed… illusion with you of all people.”

“Sir…” Nathan wasn’t sure what to say.

"You expect me to continue."

"I hate this, too. I have people. Beings that rely on me. I want to go back. I still believe this is the best way to get out."

Kieran turned, muttering under his breath, and started walking out of the square.

“Where are you going?”

“I will walk the boundary again and again,” he said. “And I will find a way to break it.”

“If… that'll make you feel better.”

Kieran didn’t slow. He moved with long, purposeful strides toward the outer street.

Not storming.
Not raging.

Just focused.
Determined.
Obsessive.
On mission.

Nathan called after him—

“Sir! Just… remember. The message said to return to the monument at first light. We’ll get through it as fast as we can.”

Kieran didn't turn. But shouted back. “This is an illusion, it can be broken.”

Nathan watched as he disappeared down the road out of sight.

Leaving Nathan alone in the middle of the square, exhausted, unsure, surrounded by cheerful NPCs and whispering to himself:

“…Fuck.”

He looked at the progress bar again. Nine percent. The map had changed as well to the tutorial village and the 'enclosure' that surrounded them.

Should be fine. I can handle eleven days of that.

He stared at it for a minute longer before deciding, "I'm going to go get drunk!"

Nathan trudged toward the tavern.

A drink.

A real one.

Anything to take the edge off twelve hours of jelly murder, and take his mind off whatever they might face tomorrow.

Warm-hued lighting hit him as he entered. A long counter. Wooden beams. The comforting hum of a place that should, by every law of fantasy worlds everywhere, serve ale by the bucket.

A woman with a friendly, static smile turned toward him.

“Welcome, traveler!”

Nathan exhaled in relief.

“Please,” he said, leaning on the counter, “tell me you have beer.”

The woman didn’t miss a beat.

“We do not serve that here!”

Nathan blinked. "But you are a tavern?"

"Yes. What would you like to drink?"

“Okay… wine?”

“We do not serve that here!”

“…Mead?”

“We do not serve that here!”

“…Cider. A shandy. Sangria. Cooking wine. Fermented goat milk. I am not picky at this point.”

Her smile never moved.

“We do not serve that here!”

Nathan stared at her.

“…Do you serve anything with alcohol?”

“We do not serve that here!”

A long beat passed.

"How are you a tavern? What do you have?" Nathan pressed both palms onto the counter.

She passed him a brown, fizzy-looking liquid in a mug pretending to be beer.

He looked down then back up.

Oh my god.
This is a dry village.
This is a dry tutorial village

He inhaled through his teeth, too tired to scream.

“Right,” he whispered, horrified. “This is actually hell.”

Nathan’s worst fears were confirmed the next morning when they did, in fact, have to repeat Level Ten.

Same entrance.
Same chime.
Same timer starting at 12:00:00.

The only difference was that this time, Nathan didn’t waste a single second trying to be clever with the puzzles. He followed the stupid blinking arrows exactly the way the map wanted, barked warnings, and let Kieran wreck anything that moved.

They beat the slime amalgam with time to spare.

The progress bar ticked up to 10%.

It felt like an insult.

Level Eleven handed them real swords.

Nathan nearly cried when his wooden toy dissolved in a shimmer of light and a proper blade appeared in his hand. Weighty. Balanced. A grip that didn’t feel like it was about to splinter in his fingers.

Kieran turned his over, eyes narrowing. “Still no augment.”

“Still no mana,” Nathan said grimly. “We’re on hard mode with training wheels.”

The enemies changed, but only in shape. No more slimes—now it was things with bones and teeth and too many eyes. Wolf-things that didn’t quite move like wolves. Goblin-like creatures with gray skin and jagged weapons. Something that might have been an orc if an orc had been designed by committee.

It was all physical. Flesh, bone, stone, steel.
Nothing with spells. Nothing that used mana.

Nathan noticed.
He hated that he noticed.

And the worst part?
They soon realized not every level counted the same toward the progress bar.

His one-percent-per-floor theory had been wrong.
Painfully wrong.

Because why would it be easy?

On Level Fifteen, they got their first “caster”—a hunched goblin shaman with a staff of twisted bone and crystal. The thing hurled crude hexes and illusions at them that felt almost like magic, except Nathan’s interface never labeled it as such.

When they finally brought it down, its staff clattered across the floor.

Kieran picked it up.

Nothing.

No surge. No reaction. No system prompt. It was just… a stick.

Nathan tried.

Also nothing.

“Okay,” he muttered, snatching it and shoving it into his inventory. “Congratulations, you’re joining the Museum of Useless Crap I’m Hoarding for Later.”

It sat there in the grid beside Slime Dissolvent, the Beginner Blob Badge, Heat Pebble, the single mysterious coin, and a handful of other “might be important someday” drops that did absolutely nothing right now.

After that, the floors blurred.

Twelve hours a day in stone corridors.

Wolf-things.
Goblin packs.
Something that looked like a cross between a boar and a lizard.
Creatures Nathan couldn’t identify even with the interface’s unhelpful labels.

And then the spiders.

Big ones.

The system called them “Silk Reapers.” Nathan called them “absolutely not” and tried very hard not to think about how many legs they had while they dropped from the ceiling and skittered over walls.

The puzzles got worse, too.

More pressure plates.
More rotating rooms.
Switches that had to be hit in order while monsters chased them in circles.
Dead ends that spawned extra waves when he guessed wrong.

Every time they thought they were getting ahead, the floors stretched. Longer corridors. Larger maps. More backtracking. Transport objects that refused to spawn until they’d cleared some hidden condition.

Each “day” ended the same way: the timer smacking into zero, white light, and then—

The village square.

Sunset sky.
Warm air.
Cheerful NPCs.

Rinse, repeat.

Every night, as soon as the dizziness faded, Kieran left.

He’d walk the wall.
Then the inner fields.
Then the outer streets, tracing the same lane past the same houses, through the square, to the edges of the enclosure. Nathan watched it become a ritual: checking the same corners, the same invisible boundary, pacing the limits of a cage he refused to accept.

By now, Nathan was pretty sure the man had covered every reachable inch of the village ten times over.

He didn’t try to stop him.

It was either that or watch Kieran boil over.

Sometime over the next stretch of dungeon days, it had become painfully obvious that Nathan’s optimistic “eleven days, tops” estimate had been a joke.

They weren’t even close to being done, and Nathan couldn’t guess how many levels this thing had anymore.
Every floor felt longer than the last.

There was no catching up. The math wouldn’t bend, even for him.

He knew Kieran knew, but he felt they should talk about it.

Kieran had been impossible to pin down outside the dungeon lately, always vanishing the moment they reset.

But later that evening, after the latest miserable return to the square, Nathan finally spotted him standing alone in the fading light, silent and motionless.

“Sir,” Nathan approached him.

Kieran didn't turn. "What."

"You are aware our progress isn't as fast as I anticipated." Nathan had been bracing for the explosion. He just didn’t expect it to begin so… quietly.

“Yes,” he said, voice low and lethal. “I'm convinced there must be another way out. People are waiting. I can't allow myself to be stuck here without trying everything in my power to escape.”

Nathan whispered, “I know.”

Silence stretched.

Then—
Kieran inhaled sharply…

“I am checking the perimeter again tonight.”

“Yes, sir.”

He didn’t look back.
“There must be a flaw in the illusion. No trap is perfect.”

Nathan watched him stride away, heart sinking.

He’d known this conversation was coming.

Just… not this soon. Really thought we'd be through it quickly.

Monotonous days passed.
Wash, rinse, repeat.

By day twelve—after a particularly miserable dungeon run where he once again failed to touch the stupid transport object on Level Twenty-Five before the timer zeroed out, condemning them to yet another redo—
something in Nathan simply broke.

Not dramatically.
Not loudly.

Just… cracked.

He walked into the restaurant, ignored the polite NPCs, and began whistling under his breath as he swept plates off a table with one arm.

Clatter. Crack.
Another plate spun across the floor.

A smiling server NPC tilted her head.
“Traveler, are you quite alright?”

“Just peachy,” Nathan said brightly.

He grabbed the edge of the large wooden table and dragged it across the floor.
Hard.
Loud.
Scraping grooves into the planks while the NPCs watched with perfect, unblinking hospitality.

He wrestled the table toward the door.

I wonder if this will evaporate if I take it outside.
Let’s find out.

He angled it left.
Then right.
Then shoved.

It squeezed through with a violent scrape, legs popping free of the doorframe.

Nathan blinked.

The table did not disappear.

“Fabulous,” he declared.

A couple NPCs strolled by.
“Lovely evening, traveler!”

“Mhm.”

He planted the table in the middle of the cobblestone street like he was reserving the world’s worst patio dining spot.

Then he walked back inside.

Grabbed a chair.
Plunked it down outside.
Walked back again.
Ordered food with the hollow-eyed resolve of a man experiencing his villain origin story.

Then he went to the “tavern”—the dry, cursed, joyless tavern—for something pretending to be what he actually craved.

Just a beer.
Was that too much to ask?

Overall, it wasn’t so bad.
It was a nice dinner.

He returned to the inn that night without ever seeing Kieran come back.

The next morning, he was gutted to discover the table and chair had vanished.

That evening he learned the truth:
the village simply reset itself.
His stolen furniture returned to its “proper” place inside the restaurant like nothing had happened.

Nathan stood there in the doorway, devastated.

“Well. Damn.”

***

On day fourteen, he finally caught a glimpse of whatever coping mechanism Kieran had been hiding from him each night.

Nathan had discovered Kieran’s natural predator.

Nice people.

Not monsters.
Not soldiers.
Not Hollow Gate horrors.

No—
illusionary cheerful civilians.

And they ambushed him the second he returned from his nightly perimeter walk.

Nathan sat outside the restaurant, at the table he now dragged out every evening, watching the spectacle with the dead-eyed fascination of someone narrating a nature documentary.

A merchant waved warmly as Kieran passed.

“Good evening, traveler!”

Kieran barely flicked an eye his way.
“Tch.”

He didn’t slow. Didn’t pause.
Just walked like a man cutting through a cloud of gnats with pure force of will.

A child held up a wooden toy sword.

“Look! I’m a hero!”

“Tch.”
He didn’t even break stride.
A fully formed weather system of “leave me alone.”

Two elderly women sweeping their porch held out a basket of pastries.

“Would you like one, dear?”

“Tch.”
Translation: no and also please never speak to me again, I am perishing emotionally.

A horse swished its tail and neighed cheerfully.

Kieran: “Tch.”

Nathan blinked at the horse.

…Had that even been real?

He sipped his drink, which almost tasted carbonated if he leaned into the delusion hard enough.

Another villager waved at Kieran.

“Evening, traveler!”

“Tch.”

Automatic.

Nathan popped imaginary popcorn into his mouth.

God. He’s going to implode.

“Sir! Find anything?” Nathan called, waving.

Tch.

He tch-ed me?

Kieran stopped. Turned.
Nathan went rigid.
Oh no. Now what?

Kieran stormed up and slammed a fist onto Nathan’s table.

“You should be helping, Draegor! We are hostages!”

“I agree. Truly. But look—I have the map. We're encircled. I don’t think there’s a way to turn this off from the inside.”

“Why should I believe you?”

“…Because we aren’t dead?”

Kieran struck the table again. “Tch. Map. The invisible map. Floating messages. Timers. Progress bars.”

Oh yeah. Complete mental spiral.

He turned and marched off, muttering “insufferable” like a curse.

***

On day fifteen… seventeen? Hard to tell anymore.

Time was a flat circle full of monsters, puzzles, and trauma.

That evening, after they returned, the man snapped.

Kieran stood in the square, shoulders tight, gaze locked on one of the decorative lampposts lining the perimeter.

“There is something I haven’t tried,” he said calmly.

Too calmly.

Nathan’s stomach dropped. Nothing good ever followed that tone.

“Sir?” Nathan asked, wary.

Kieran grabbed the lamppost.

With both hands.

Nathan’s voice cracked. “OH MY GOD—WHAT ARE YOU DOING—”

Kieran planted a foot and ripped.

Metal shrieked.
Stone cracked.
The whole damn lamppost came free like a daisy being plucked.

This man is NOT okay.
But also—wow.

Kieran stalked to the obelisk, raised the lamppost like a warhammer, and swung with enough force to intimidate physics.

CHIME

Unauthorized Force Detected.
Protected object.
Defensive barrier active.
Please cease.

CHIME
Please cease.

CHIME

Nathan watched for several long, fascinated seconds.

Then sighed.
“Sir! It won’t let you damage that!
It’s literally protected—
Sir??”

Kieran roared, “DAMN. INSUFFERABLE. SHIT.”

CHIME
“Let—”
CHIME
“me—”
CHIME
“OUT.”

Nathan considered the situation.
Then nodded to himself.

Ah. He’s got this.
I should bring my table and chair out here with a ton of food and drinks.

Which he did.

And somehow, that became their nightly routine.

***

Days blurred into chaos.

Daytime meant twelve hours of dungeon hell.
Nighttime meant table theft and Kieran creatively destroying a new piece of village infrastructure.

Every morning, everything returned to pristine order.
No broken lamppost.
No shattered crates.
No gouged cobblestone.

Nathan was ninety percent sure the NPC horses even respawned.
It had been an accidental kill.
Kieran hadn’t meant it, and he even looked a little sad.
Sort of.

Nathan also discovered he could get musicians to play.
Because why not add ambiance to their nightly breakdowns?

Some nights Kieran tried smashing benches.
Some nights barrels.
Once he attempted to uproot a tree.

Nathan pretended not to see that one.

One evening, Nathan sat at his usual stolen-outdoor table, doing his best impression of someone enjoying a charming summer night in an illusionary Italian village.

Warm lamplight.
Bread smells and roasting herbs.
NPC chatter.
A bowl of hot stew.
Music drifting through the square.
A cold drink in his hand.

Nathan sighed peacefully.

Behind him:

CHIME
Unauthorized Force Detected.
Protected object.
Please cease.

CHIME
CLANG
CHIME

Nathan did not turn around.

He knew exactly what was happening back there—
a six-foot-six medieval Terminator attempting murder with whatever object had been selected as tonight’s weapon.

Villagers strolled by.

“Good evening, traveler!”

Nathan smiled pleasantly.
“Lovely night!”

In the distance, Kieran’s furious snarl echoed: “TCHHH.”

Another villager beamed, holding a basket.
“The lantern festival is in three days! You must stay, dear.”

Nathan laughed weakly.
“Oh! I’ll… consider it.”

CHIME
Unauthorized Force Detected.
Protected object.
Defensive barrier active.
Please cease.

CHIME

The villagers didn’t react at all.

Another NPC couple chimed in, “Did you hear about the festival, dear?”

A metallic CLANG rattled the stones.

Without looking, Nathan answered, “I most certainly did.”

“Enjoy your evening!” they chirped.

Nathan waved as they wandered off merrily.

He took another long, resigned sip.

Behind him:

“THIS. IS. INSUFFERABLE.”

CHIME
Please cease
CHIME

Nathan squinted at his stew.

I’m living in a sitcom.
We are hostages in a sitcom.

He stabbed a piece of roasted mystery-meat and let his brain drift to the one place the dungeon never let him go:

Home.

His job.

God, his job.

He actually liked it.
Liked his boss, a miracle in L.A.
Liked the actors who came in sweaty and apologizing because parking was impossible.
Liked organizing binders and callback sheets and color-coding audition schedules like a tiny, determined office rodent.

He was so close to getting hired full time after vacation.
His boss had practically hinted it: “We’ll talk when you’re back.”

Nathan huffed.

Jacob definitely stole it.

He could picture it perfectly:
Jacob, sitting at his desk, eating his granola bars, messing with his meticulously labeled binders like a raccoon digging through recycling.

Smug little desk-goblin.

Nathan scrubbed a hand over his face.

And the play—
the spring play he was supposed to star in—

David probably took his role.
Smiling that stupid know-it-all actor smile.
Probably bragging backstage like:

“Oh, Nathan? Yeah, he vanished on vacation. Anyway, I’m the lead now.”

Nathan’s stomach twisted.

I actually liked my life.
I liked my stupid job and my stupid desk and my stupid upcoming show.
I liked my boss. I liked being valuable. I liked being part of something.

He swallowed hard.

Now he was here.

Definitely, absolutely fired.
Definitely replaced.
Definitely recast.
Didn’t even get to finish his vacation.

My grandparents… are they okay? My brother?
If Mason is in my body… I’m just going to believe they’re all okay.

He took another drink.

It didn’t help.
It never helped.
Dry tutorial hell.

Nathan slammed the mug down.

CHIME
CHIME

“Sir, dinner?”

Kieran didn’t stop swinging the lamppost, but he snarled over his shoulder,
“How can you sit there quietly eating while we are still hostages?”

“Yes, yes, hostages, dire situation, endless suffering, I know.” Nathan waved a hand. “Come on, sir. I see you take bites here and there. You definitely need to eat more.”

Kieran froze mid-swing.
He actually couldn’t argue.
“…I do need to keep up my strength.”

“There you go.” Nathan offered a metal plate with a roasted leg of… something. “Protein. Probably.”

Kieran accepted it.
Took one enormous bite.
Inhaled the rest like a starving soldier.

At least he lets me feed him.

Then, still chewing, he picked up the lamppost and resumed trying to bludgeon the obelisk out of existence.

CHIME

CHIME

CHIME

Nathan wiped his mouth with the back of his hand.
“Oddly enough… I think it’s actually working.”

He stared at his table.
At Kieran.
At the lamppost carnage.

Our weird rituals.
The table.
The perimeter walk.
The obelisk assault and battery.
It’s like—
coping by mutual insanity.

He pulled open the blue panel. Funny how that had become second nature.

Tutorial Progress: 60%
Overall Progress: 0.0061%

Nathan blinked.

“…Huh. Not bad.”
A beat.
“At least we’re almost done with the tutorial.”

Why can't I access the inventory in the village? Oh well.

He took another bite of mystery-leg.
It tasted… surprisingly good.
As always.

CHIME
CHIME

Nathan sighed.
“Maybe I’ll be able to mute that someday.”

We are going to be a fantastic duo in that dungeon tomorrow.