Her father got down on one knee so he could look her in the eyes. “Daichi has reported what happened. He takes responsibility, but surely you agree that it was a bad idea to leap from a tree, even with wings, without having first discussed it with your mother or me. We are thrilled to learn about all the cool things that you can do, but there is a right way to learn about them and a wrong way. Can you agree not to do that again till we can work out a plan?”

  Sara looked from Daddy to Mommy and wasn’t sure what was going on, but she was smart enough to say, “Of course, Daddy. I’m sorry. It wasn’t Daichi’s fault.”

  “Good, I’m glad you took responsibility. Now we can get on with the excitement,” her mother said.

  “Excitement?” Sara asked, confused.

  “She doesn’t know what today is?” her father asked.

  “Apparently not. Well, come with us so we can talk about it.”

  Sara tried a line that she had heard Mira use before. “So wait, am I in trouble or not?”

  “Not, but come with us now, we want to show you something,” her mother said.

  Sara followed them with Daichi a short distance behind. They headed for the mess hall. Besides her house, it was one of her favorite places. The cooks who worked there all would go out of their way to get her little treats.

  When she walked in through the doors, though, it was dark inside. Even the windows had been covered somehow, and no light was coming in. Her nose started to twitch, though.

  There were people hiding in here. She could smell them. A sense of worry came over her. Maybe it was a trap for her parents. Maybe it was another man like the one with the dagger who had attacked her weeks ago.

  Yet she felt safe with her parents. Even Altracia said that her father was powerful. So she waited.

  No sooner had the door shut behind her than candles came to life, and the room was filled with noise as people jumped up and shouted, “Happy birthday!”

  The covers came off the windows, and light streamed in as she looked from her father to her mother, who said, “That’s right, sweetie. It’s your birthday. If you were able to check your character sheet, you would know that you are nine now.”

  Sara could feel the grin on her face. She was bubbling over. There was cake and presents and a few hundred people from the town all milling around waiting to say something nice to her. She cried a little because she loved this place so much.

  “What’s wrong, sweetie?” her mother asked.

  “Nothing.”

  “Then why the tears?” Daddy asked.

  “I’m just so happy. I love this place. I don’t want to ever leave.”

  “I think that you have a bright future ahead of you, so I can’t say that you will never leave, but for now, this is home, and we are glad to be here,” Daddy said.

  The next morning, Sara woke up. She smelled something delicious cooking, which was unusual enough because her parents were normally always talking about how important it was for them to be seen in the community.

  Still, the smell was heavenly, so she stumbled out of her room and into the kitchen after putting on her elven leathers. The garb had become a second skin to her, and she was accustomed to wearing it, even though this was not her original set. She had outgrown that and gotten a new one.

  This set wasn’t even that second one. Instead, this was a birthday present from Mira and her enchanting master, Hiroto. It was an even higher quality than the normal garments. They had refused to tell her what it was made of, but she felt an immediate connection to it. She was pretty sure that it was made from some part of the drake that they had slain in the dungeon to rescue her.

  Sara, on Earth, would have been horrified and cried about it, just like she had when she learned what hamburgers were made of. Jackson had insisted on taunting her about that discovery. Now, though, she was at peace with it. There was a part of her that she got from Krinnk and which her other monster friends reinforced that made her understand the virtue of utilizing all the resources available.

  It was more durable, and her dad said it increased her armor class by more than double, whatever that meant. The part that she liked though was that it had been prepared with enchantments that would make her lighter and better able to cling to things. Hiroto had called it a flight suit, which her parents seemed to find funny for some reason.

  Looking at the stats didn’t mean that much to her, but she still found it kinda cool.

  Sara’s Flight Suit

  Quality: Epic

  Weight: 2.4

  Defense: 22

  Passive Effect 1: Reduces body weight by 75%.

  Passive Effect 2: Reduces wind resistance by 50%.

  Active Effect 1: 3/moonrise. Latch—allows the wearer to cling to most any surface for up to 1 hour. Duration: 1 hour. Cooldown: 15 minutes.

  The only problem with it was that it wouldn’t accommodate her wings. Upon hearing about that, Hiroto’s wife spent the next several hours modifying the stitching in back to allow for slits her wings could push out of. Now, as she ran to the kitchen, she felt like she could practically walk on the air.

  Now, though, she had reached the kitchen and confirmed her suspicion. Her mother was cooking bacon. It had always been one of her favorites, and her mom had refused to allow Jackson to tell her where it came from.

  She wasn’t a baby though, and she had figured it out. No matter how cute little piggies were, bacon just tasted so good. Now after bonding with Altracia, she couldn’t seem to get enough meat to eat.

  The other surprise was that Daichi was sitting at the table, talking to her father and sister while her mother cooked. It was odd enough that he was here, but that he was sitting while mom worked was also shocking. The old elf was always trying to tell her mother that she was Lady Emiri and couldn’t be seen by the villagers doing mundane chores.

  Sara jumped into the empty chair at the table and soon had bacon and eggs on a plate in front of her. It was like back on Earth when Mom would make breakfast for her. While she ate, Daichi started to speak. “Lady Emiri has asked me to train both of you girls in my style of the dragon fist. She tells me that you both had some training in your old home, but that it was more of a sport than about actually defending yourself.”

  Mira started to grumble about not needing to train with her hands because of her magic. Without a word, Daichi’s hand shot out as fast as a striking serpent and stopped right before the edge struck Mira’s throat. “Your magic is powerful, but it has limits and is hard to use if an opponent has crushed your throat.”

  Sara sat back, waiting for the fireworks display that Mira was about to put on. She saw her sister’s face grow slightly flush and could smell the increased perspiration just as well as she could hear her pounding heart. Then the most surprising thing happened. Mira said, “You are right. I shouldn’t be too narrow-minded in my development.”

  Sara felt her eyes go wide. Mira never apologized, and she never admitted she was wrong. Dad said, “Good of you to realize that. Master Daichi will customize a plan for you that fits with your abilities and doesn’t take up too much of your time, since you have other studies with Hiroto.”

  “It is as Baron Nelson says. I will provide training that is appropriate to each of my three new students.”

  “Three?” Sara asked.

  Mom answered for him, “Yes, Master Daichi has agreed to induct you, me and your sister into the ways of elven fighting. It pains me, but I should have asked him to do this sooner. I can’t fight against the seasons, and it is clear you will have a life of adventure, Sara.”

  She was thrilled and shocked again, because Mom was agreeing to the idea that she could train. Maybe she shouldn’t push her luck, but she couldn’t help it. “Does that mean that I get to train with Altracia too?”

  “The details still have to be worked out, but yes, you will get to train with her. I still want to keep you safe, but I am willing to admit that I haven’t been seeing things the way I should. So be patient with me, okay?”

  Nodding eagerly, Sara said, “Thank you, Mom.”

  “What about me?” her dad asked.

  Sara was confused at first, but then started to thank him too. Her mom cut her off though before she could get out two words. “It is strictly forbidden by the Throne to teach even our closest human allies the fighting arts of the elves. So I will petition Yua for special permission, but for now it would be best if you trained with the paladins. It would be good for us to learn as much as we can about both sides of our people.”

  Sara saw her dad frown, but then pretty much blocked out the rest of the conversation. She was just so thrilled that she was going to get to train. She had so many things that she wanted to learn. School back on Earth had never bothered her, but this was going to be more like recess than actual classwork. At least that was how she viewed it now.

  Mom said, “So I have a schedule worked out for you. You are going to have morning and evening training with Master Daichi, and your late mornings will be with Balayria. For your afternoons, you will rotate around learning about various crafts that are practiced in Eris’ Rise. When you aren’t doing that, we will have Aloysia, Talvenicus’ daughter, teaching you about what is expected of a young woman in Albia. We will also find a young elven woman to teach you about what is expected of young moon elves.”

  Sara sighed. Maybe this wasn’t going to be like recess.

  Mom just smiled at her very audible sigh. “Now, now, everyone has been after me to adapt to life here. So, if we have to adapt, we are going to jump in with both feet.”

  Chapter Nine

  “Sometimes the darkest nights are those of inner struggle. Lose not your resolve, for it is in those times that your identity, character, your place in the world, and even your very soul may be on the line.”—Bishop Marcus Schoenhals, Church of Mishpat

  Eris’ Rise—David Nelson

  Dave grinned as he walked out of the kitchen. Emily was a true tiger mom, and becoming an elf didn’t seem to have changed that. They had spent a great deal of time over the last couple of weeks discussing their adjustment to this society. He had been relieved by how she was finally coming around to really adopting this as their home and changing to match it rather than making it change to match her.

  That was truly a bright spot in life now. There really were a tremendous amount of positive changes in Eris’ Rise. Despite that, he couldn’t shake the feeling that the weight of the world was resting upon his shoulders. He put on a strong showing and a bright face for the people who depended on him, most especially his children, but he was worried.

  Worried to his core, in fact, about so many things. He was worried about the impending goblin army. From all the scouting reports, there were thousands of goblins coming, and that didn’t even include their troll and ogre allies.

  Worse than that was his worry about Seimion. The man or monster, whatever he was, had handled Dave so easily. Dave was confident that the next time they fought, and there would certainly be a next time, he would be better prepared. He was slowly gaining, although it was so much slower now that he was Tier 4.

  Importantly, and Dave had to constantly remind himself of this, he wasn’t in the fight alone. Daichi, Rak’kar, Jaselm and certainly some others were or would hit Tier 4 soon. Yet only a fool doesn’t think that their opponent will also be planning and improving. Seimion wasn’t some boss in one of his games, who stayed the same. He couldn’t just practice until he got the raid tactics down.

  The darkest part of it though was the voice in his head. He felt tempted by Seimion’s offer, or rather the offer from Seimion’s master. That was a scary thought. That monster had a master and one that he revered and feared. What kind of power would that require? Dave could only wonder and worry.

  Dave had to admit that he liked the power he had now. He felt like he could keep going. He felt like given enough time he would become strong enough to shape this world, to fix its injustices. It was all noble intent.

  Would it really be so bad to take Seimion’s offer? It only required him to wipe out the goblins, something he was planning anyway. He would gain a powerful ally and power to protect his family. Dave was afraid to let himself dwell on it too much. There was a part of him that would let the rest of the world burn if it would save his wife and children.

  He pushed that out of his mind, though. He wouldn’t be the man that he was if he did that. The temptation wouldn’t stop tormenting him. The little voice in his head kept pushing him to seize power, to demand respect. The ugly truth was that some of those things were necessary. Dave just needed to make sure that he didn’t lose sight of his core identity.

  The best way that he had found to push the temptation aside was to focus on all the good that had been occurring in the past two weeks. The negotiations with the dungeon were intense. The monster that ran it wanted samples.

  It wanted new kinds of metals, plants, clothes, worked goods, even food. Those things were simple enough and a no-brainer. The dungeon had the ability to duplicate all the materials that were brought into it. So Dave worked out a deal to guarantee that they would get sufficient quantities of rare materials for their craftsmen to work with in exchange for supplying the dungeon with an ever-expanding selection of new materials. The biggest problem would come when they could no longer find new material in the area around Eris’ Rise, but Dave decided they would cross that bridge when they got there.

  The second category of new that the dungeon wanted was new forms of magic. It was open to any form—potions, scrolls, items, enchantments and even more spells. This was a bit more complicated because the power that such things would give the dungeon was nothing to sneeze at. The upside, of course, would be that if the dungeon could learn to reproduce those items, it would produce a huge benefit for Eris’ Rise.

  Even harder was the last thing that the dungeon core wanted. Dave had trouble thinking of the dungeon core, which was so cold and methodical, as Altracia, the drake whom he had witnessed being so protective of Sara. Objectively, he knew they were one and the same. The core was the mind, and the drake body was only a creation of the dungeon’s power, a throwback to what it had apparently been before becoming a dungeon core.

  There was still much that Dave didn’t understand about the dungeon core, and none of it seemed to work quite like the books he had read. In the past two weeks almost all of his time had been spent inside the dungeon, at least sixteen hours a day. He left for the dungeon every night after Emily fell asleep, and returned in the afternoon. Due to the time dilation, the last two weeks had equaled more like five and half months to Dave.

  That time was allowing him to forge a bond with the core. Altracia, the core, was ultimately a selfish creature, with Sara being the only exception to that. That shared love for Sara was a starting point. From there Dave built up a relationship based upon the mutual benefits that they could provide to one another. He respected the dungeon’s power and utility, and the dungeon recognized in Dave information and knowledge that couldn’t be obtained from other sources in Eloria, even if it didn’t quite understand why.

  Still, Dave wasn’t willing to give it samples of other sapient races. He arranged to bring in samples of monsters and various other animals, but not any of the races. If one died in the dungeon, that would be different, but Dave wasn’t about to just offer them up. It had been a sticking point in the negotiations, but they eventually got past it.

  The dungeon wouldn’t promise safety in the dungeon, but agreed that the scavenger and survival modes of the dungeon would be fair without unexpected surprises. The raid dungeon, though, was fair game and would be where the dungeon could place its newest and deadliest traps. This meant that they wouldn’t be able to run groups of villagers through the raid, but the other two floors would just have to do.

  The other benefits were beyond useful. The dungeon had turned the lobby and adjacent area into workshops for the various craftsmen. It further added enough refined ore to the scavenger dungeon to require the miners to start developing new careers.

  This had resulted in a number of developments. The blacksmiths had increased their productivity by leaps and bounds. Soon the entire village would have weapons and armor, not to mention that the mechanisms for ballistae, catapults, and the town gates were all underway.

  Not only that, but by providing samples of mithril, the dungeon had been able to produce twenty times the amount that they had before. Mithril, the enchantments, and magical items took longer for the dungeon to learn to produce and required more of her power. Still, it was far better than their limited supply. Now they had a collection of mithril weapons and armor to be used as incentives for the best of their up-and-coming warriors.

  Beyond that, Dave was working on a few engineering projects, everything from making smooth roads to building efficient indoor plumbing and a power-transference system using wires made from mithril and magicyte for the purpose of eventually being able to power heating and cooling units. Many of his intended designs were lost on the native Elorians, but he didn’t think it would be hard to convince them of the value once they had working samples. The cooks, for example, were already thrilled with his promise of an icebox that could keep foods cold year-round.

  Thinking about the craftsmen made Dave decide to do a last minute tour around the town. Even at this early hour, the industrious citizens of Eris’ Rise would be up and about their business. It would be a good chance to check in and see if any of them needed him to bring back any supplies from the dungeon. It was surprising how odd it would feel for him to go into the dungeon now and come back twelve hours later to the townsfolk when for him, eight and half days would pass.