Rebecca was terrified, but she would keep it together for Leander and Flint. She was the oldest, it was her job to be a good role model. They made it through the first hall without anything happening. Instead of calming her down, that just added to the sense of dread. It was like something was watching them, waiting for the moment they relaxed in order to pounce. The chittering had come and gone. Sometimes it sounded closer, sometimes further away. The hallway was curved, so they couldn’t see very far ahead. Everything in this place only added to her anxiety. Leander was diligently tapping everywhere, keeping their pace glacial. She didn’t understand how he was so unaffected. Every time something insane happened, he just dealt with it, then would say later how it was making him a better cultivator.

  The end of the tunnel came as a surprise. The curve they followed abruptly cut off, opening into a larger cavern. It looked more natural than what they’d seen so far. Instead of precisely carved tunnels and smooth walls, the cavern was rough and uneven. A few parts of the ceiling poked down like the rock was dripping onto the floor. They could have been anywhere except for the hints of magic. Glow stones were emitting the same blue light from above and around the edges. A soft trickling led them to a narrow stream with moss-covered banks, tucked to the side. There were a few glow stones in the water, enough to illuminate a school of darting fish. It was beautiful and idyllic and Rebecca trusted it even less than the creepy hallway.

  “Keep focused, let's look for any exits,” she said to Leander.

  He got into their formation and they circled the entire room before getting back to where they started. There were three ways out so far. Two empty doorways, leading to more curved halls to the left and right from where they entered. There was no opening on the far wall, but there was another hidden door. This time they didn’t try to open it. Returning to their starting point, Leander pulled out his daggers to stand guard while Rebecca sketched a map of what they had seen so far in the tiny notebook she had packed. Last night, when Laurel was preparing them, she had mentioned over and over that only an idiot goes exploring without recording a map. Rebecca did not want to be on Laurel’s list of idiots.

  As she was finishing up, a grinding sound started on the other side of the chamber. Rebecca scrambled to shove everything back in her pack. Leander was in a ready position, eyes scanning back and forth. The chittering they had heard on and off since entering the dungeon grew louder and louder until three things came out of the now not-so-hidden door across the chamber.

  Rebecca had no word for what she was looking at. Rats, maybe, if rats were the size of a dog and had six legs. Laurel told them to expect monsters, that the Core would use the ambient mana to defend itself. She had figured she would face those monsters from behind Laurel and a few trained soldiers. Now sharp claws and teeth were coming straight for them. She took a deep breath and stepped up next to Leander. After the fight on the island, Laurel had been giving them lessons on how to fight as a team. They fell into that formation now. One more moment before the monsters would be there. Rebecca flooded her staff with mana, and felt Leander do the same with his knives.

  “We can do this.” They didn’t have a choice. A feeling welled up as the monsters bore down on them. For a heartbeat, Rebecca was back in the clearing with the battling spirits beasts, freedom and survival and savagery and life. Her mana coursed through her body, carrying with it all those feelings and a thousand more, then she was back in the cavern and the monsters were coming.

  The rat-monsters charged straight at them. When they got close enough Rebecca swung her mana-infused staff at the right-most beast. The contact was almost enough to rip the staff out of her hands. She held on, and knocked the monster into the one next to it. The third leapt at Leander. She saw him dodge and slash out with his dagger, but that was all before she was facing down the other two. Her staff jabbed out but she missed the head of the beast she was aiming at. The blow to the shoulder still sent it stumbling long enough for her to block the other’s charge.

  The monsters grew cautious. They leered at her from outside her staff’s range. She could lunge to attack one, but the other would have an opening. Screeching and thuds were coming from Leander’s fight, but she couldn’t turn to see for herself. The rat-things edged closer. She could see hatred in their beady little eyes. They would keep coming until she was dead, or they were. She shuffled back a step to keep the distance. Two at once was more than she could handle. All the months of training but she was still unable to do anything against these monstrosities.

  A blur swept past her left and hurtled towards one of the beasts. Taking the opportunity, Rebecca leapt forward. With Leander engaging a second monster, she landed a hit strong enough to leave hers limping. With one more swing at its head, it stopped moving. She turned to help Leander finish off the last one.

  When they were able to breathe, Rebecca looked Leander and Flint over. The latter had spent the battle on a ledge, pelting the monsters ineffectually with pebbles. Leander was worse for wear. He had a few scrapes and one concerning wound on his stomach from the beast’s claws. Blood was already soaking into his shirt as he stumbled towards her and sat heavily.

  “We won.” Rebecca was stunned.

  Leander was meditating and ignoring her. At least Flint sounded happy, making his little clicks. She trudged over to where their packs had been tossed aside. Hers was intact, but Leander’s was ripped open, the contents spilled across the floor. It made it easy to find the bandages and healing ointment. Kneeling beside Leander, she pulled at his shirt to expose the wound. Instead of helping he batted at her hands.

  “Stop it! You need a bandage.”

  He shook his head with a mulish expression but didn’t deign to otherwise comment.

  “Is this a ‘cultivators can heal their own wounds’ thing? Because cultivators can also fight infection.”

  When his eyes slid away from hers she knew she was right, and went back to the first aid. A smear of the awful-smelling unguent Annette made them bring and then bandages wrapped around his torso and tied off. It was ugly but it would have to be enough. Her hands were shaking too hard to try anything else.

  They had almost died. Down here in some secret magic cave no one had ever heard of before. It wasn’t like this was the first fight they’d been in. She wasn’t even injured. When she joined the sect, there had been long lectures on the dangers of cultivating. Laurel had told her stories about dangerous situations her friends ended up in. But that had sounded like fun most of the time. Laurel and her friends had always made it out of those adventures. Even fighting the Laskarians, that had been frightening but not like this. After all, Rebecca didn’t really think Laurel would let anything bad happen. But Laurel wasn’t here.

  The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

  A firm hand on her shoulder knocked her out of the spiral her thoughts had been taking. Leander was looking at her, resolute. His other hand was on Flint’s shoulder. The little scamp had mirrored the action and was touching her leg.

  “You’re right. We can do this. Everything will be fine.”

  *******

  Leander wasn’t entirely sure about that, but Rebecca wasn’t breathing weird anymore so he counted that as a win. The whole adventure was going well. They were braving the unknown like true cultivators. They had done battle and emerged victorious. Sure, he was injured, but he was beginning to think that was normal. He was also beginning to resent the daggers that meant he had to get up close with the spirit beasts he fought.

  Laurel told them stories about how danger made better cultivators. That meant they would be the best. When he got back Eric and the others would be shocked at how strong they were. Even Flint was improving. He had tried to help out with the fight, and Leander swore he was getting smarter.

  Leander stood up, and almost fell right back down again. He refocused on circulating his mana. A cultivator should be able to heal from a simple scratch. Laurel told them she’d walked off a bullet wound in Laskar. He had even seen her when she practically died in the valley and was fine a few days later. The fact that no one had taught them how to do that yet was not important. Every lesson they had was about moving mana, so he would try that. Rebecca took pity on him and collected the contents of his spilled pack while he focused. They might need it, plus it had his treasures from their adventures so far. At least Laurel hadn’t made him bring the plants into the dungeon.

  They stood in a triangle in the middle of the room. The same faint tinkling of the stream and unchanging glow made it seem like no time had passed. If it wasn’t for the corpses they’d dragged to the side, Leander could believe they’d been down here for an hour or a week.

  “Which way?” Rebecca asked the question they had both been putting off.

  He had no idea. He couldn’t feel the tug that had brought him to the dungeon in the first place, so either door was a good guess. He shrugged. Rebecca seemed to understand his point. A coin appeared in her hand.

  “Heads left, tails right.”

  It spun in the air and landed back in her palm. When she flipped it onto her opposite hand, he saw the king’s head revealed. Left it was. They crept into the hallway. The first had been fine, if a little dim. This one though was downright creepy. Now that they’d had the reprieve he was much less eager to enter the dark. Collapsible stick leading the way, he did it anyway.

  Their pace earlier had been slow. With injuries and a new lesson in the dangers of this place, they were barely creeping forward. Every meter they moved without seeing a trap had Leander more on edge. He could tell Rebecca felt the same from the anxiety coming off her in waves. Ever so slowly they arrived at another room. This one wasn’t as bright as the first but was a break from the oppressive hallway.

  If he wasn’t so focused Leander might have called the cavern beautiful. Soft moss covered boulders were strewn about. The glow this time only came from beneath the small stream, making it waver and move and give the whole room an underwater feeling. Colorful mushrooms dotted some of the surfaces. Orange gills and electric blue caps, they grew in small clusters. Luckily even city kids like them knew enough not to mess with strange mushrooms. Leander had only made that mistake once. His usual haunts for scavenging food had been slim that spring, and he’d decided to eat some mushrooms he found to tide him over. The agony of that week had been the worst experience of his life before opening his meridians. And he hadn’t eaten mushrooms since, until Esther had put them in some dinners where he couldn’t avoid them.

  They stayed in their formation for a few moments. Last time, when they let their guard down, they ended up facing off against the rat things. As the minutes stretched on, nothing happened. The anxiety was still there but maybe the dungeon had safer areas. Or hadn’t Laurel said this was all brand new? There were probably only a few rat things and not any left to fight.

  “Let's stop here and eat a bit.”

  Leander jumped at the sound of Rebecca’s voice. It was the first thing either of them had said since they left the last room. His stomach agreed with the idea, so they pulled out some of the dried food Laurel insisted they carry at all times. Jerky and some weird horrible bread for them, some dried fruit for Flint. If Leander had a few pieces of fruit, well, this was a very stressful day and he had earned it.

  After finishing up they continued to relax. The tension of the last few hours melted off their shoulders as he took what felt like the first deep breath since they’d walked through that first door. They could rest here for a while. Laurel would come find them, and she would be proud of how far they had come. The dungeon really wasn’t so bad. Rebecca leaned back on the moss while Flint curled into a little ball, his tail wrapped around to cover his eyes.

  Leander was about to join them. He just had to pat his pack into some reasonable semblance of a pillow first. Pleased with his efforts, he went to lie down. As he was closing his eyes, one of the mushrooms across from him popped up off the floor on its own.

  Leander was frozen, half lying down. The other two mushrooms in the cluster popped up off the floor as well. He rubbed his hand across his eyes. That wasn’t possible. The mushrooms were walking. Tiny arms and legs wiggled out of the stalks, allowing them to move around. With a jolt, Leander realized they were coming towards him. He turned his head and saw other clusters creeping towards Flint and Rebecca. Why had they decided to go to sleep? That didn’t make any sense, but he still felt something pulling him to lie down and relax. He staggered to his feet. He could barely keep his eyes open but he needed to protect the others. Inspiration struck, and he started cycling his mana. It helped, barely. He didn’t want to go to sleep anymore but he wouldn’t be able to use his mana for his daggers or anything else.

  Leander stumbled over and nudged Flint and Rebecca with his foot. No reaction from Flint at all. Rebecca’s hand swatted at him and she turned over without waking up. He kept at it. The mushrooms paused when he started moving but were coming closer again. He glanced around. They were tiny, coming up to his knee at most. The daggers wouldn’t help unless he was bent over. Rebecca’s staff was lying right next to her. She still wasn’t waking up so he grabbed it. It was awkward in his hands, like it didn’t want to be held by him. Too bad. The mushrooms were close. No time to plan, he swung the staff as hard as he could at the closest one. It was lighter than he expected. The mushroom flew through the air and impacted the wall with a wet thud. It didn’t get back up.

  Victory was short-lived. Seeing him lash out at one of the mushrooms made the rest focus on him. There was a moment of stillness. Then the mushrooms charged. More were popping up and running towards him. That was all he had time to register before he was fighting. He swung the staff, kicked, punched, but it wasn’t enough. As many as he stomped or smacked, there were more coming. They jumped at him, latching onto his limbs. That was when he learned their feet had tiny claws at the ends. They bit into his flesh. He dropped the staff to rip them off, but even more latched on. Any one of them would be easy to beat, but Leander was slowly being overcome by a wave of fungi. Desperate, he dropped to the ground. He screwed his eyes shut, held his breath, and began to roll.

  The mushroom men exploded under his weight. He felt goo and mushroom bits coating his clothing, itching where it seeped through to his skin.

  At least the number of monsters was dwindling. He was able to get back on his feet and scrambled to pick the staff back up. The few remaining mushroom men he chased down, one had even started to gnaw on Flint. Leander took great pleasure in crushing that one to paste. Some time later, the onslaught ended.

  His teammates were starting to stir, so he jogged a lap around the room, crushing any rooted mushrooms he came across and stomping the moss in case it was getting any ideas. When he returned to his friends, Rebecca was blinking owlishly and petting Flint. That changed when she got a look at Leander.

  “What happened?”

  He reached up to pull out his necklace, only to realize it wasn’t there. Frantic at the loss, he knelt and started sifting through the mushroom pieces that remained. Rebecca recognized the issue and went to help him. She found it, covered in orange flecks and held it out to him. Leander tried to wipe the stones off on his shirt, realized that the shirt was even worse, and used a bare patch of moss instead.

  “Evil mushrooms. Magic sleep. Fought them off.” He deeply appreciated the stone that Laurel made him, that translated his thoughts to words. But the fatigue was bone deep, and he couldn’t muster up the effort for more than that. Guilt flashed across Rebecca’s face at his words.

  “And we slept through it. I’m so sorry Leander.”

  It was okay. He was falling asleep too, it was only luck he’d been able to jolt himself out of it. Rebecca was still talking.

  “-- you rinse off and change clothes. Then you can rest for a while while Flint and I keep watch.”

  Yes, that was perfect. He did his best to scrape off the dead monster pieces and splashed water in the stream. He quickly changed outfits and settled in for a nap. The last thing he noticed before falling asleep was Flint taking up position on his chest.