What in the Abyss are you doing? Sej asked herself.

  In the distance, flames the size of aetherships lapped at the great tree, hinting at the insane blaze roaring within. The wind serpents flew in erratic patterns above the soaring flames consuming the canopy that housed their nests, and while many of the smaller ones clutched onto eggs within their coiled bodies, frantically beating their wings to stay afloat, most of the eggs would be devastated in the fire, to say nothing of the rats.

  Such a sight would’ve gripped her heart, had she just left the B-Nex, like the powerful yet naive auramancers that she now guided. But years in the Minus had stripped her of such naivete. All she saw was the great XP making and attribute point gaining opportunity this was.

  She was not an elite delver, and the kids she guided had long left her measly 39.87 point average density in the dust, shooting past her to heights she would never experience. The dungeon guardian hadn’t given her the [Survive the Fall] quest, so to gain a huge boost to her attributes now, thanks to Mach’s quest, was not something she could afford not to do. A stronger guide earned higher commissions, and maybe if she had more money she could stay with Sarke for longer…

  “Here’s something you don’t see everyday,” her lover said, her cerulean eyes lit up by the roaring pyre the tree had become.

  “That is crazy,” Tuk whispered.

  “Isn’t it always?” Viy asked him.

  The faces of Kur’s party glowed a stunned orange in the night, and across from them, to the left and right, holding their positions for the fight about to unfold, Sej found the other two parties also watching the raging flames. The blaze was already beginning to spread to other trees. It was likely that the guardian would send some rain to stop the fire before it grew out of control. But the destruction would still carve miles of the Canopy.

  You’re risking everything, putting everything on the line, and trusting a bunch of kids you’ve only met a couple months ago, the voice continued in her head, and all so that you can prolong a love that was always doomed to fail?

  She scoffed at herself. Risking her life for love? What was this? A crappy 2NET drama?

  And was it even love, or had she just latched onto the first person that hadn’t tried to get something from her. The first person to open her hardened and disappointed heart to the beauty that indeed was all around her outside the B-Nex?

  An excited smile at the sight of a blooming, white-pink innocence. Soft fingers interlaced with hers as Sarke pointed out a growth of deadly, deep blue glowing mushrooms… But the beautiful, smart, and caring reptilian was capable and deserving of her dream job, and a companion that could step into a proper shower with her. Plus, Sej was a combat delver, and already the difference between their [Constitution] would ensure she would outlive Sarke by at least ten to fifteen years… If they didn’t both die out here tonight. Or somewhere else in another guide job.

  She gritted her teeth and gripped her gun tight. Tight enough that it shook.

  Maybe it was time to wake up. Maybe it was time to face reality and stop holding Sarke back from returning to the Nexus. Time for herself to move on past that damned jungle as well, and return to proper combat delving…

  THUMP.

  THUMP.

  THUMP.

  “Is-Is that him?” Jaz asked.

  “Yes,” Sej said, pulling her eyes away from the blazing trees to stare into the purple darkness at her back.

  “Is it starting?” Calli said. “Is that him coming?”

  “No. That’s just him accepting the challenge,” Sej said.

  “What?” the strategist mumbled.

  “It’s beating its chest, to signal that the challenge has been accepted,” Sej clarified.

  “It’s beating its chest? From all the way to its own tree?” Row whispered.

  “I warned you not to underestimate its strength,” the guide said.

  “Holy Azzin be with us tonight,” Calli whispered.

  A rumbling of thunder rose to a crescendo at their backs, as though a mountain range had woken, rising to its feet and marching at them. It was a wave of sound that pressed hard against Sej’s ears, as though it were giant digits squeezing her tiny skull to shrapnel and bloody goo.

  Silver Fists roared into the night, declaring his superiority and might to all the beasts of the Canopy.

  Listen to me. Hear me. I am the Lord of the Giants. And the challengers will die, his roar said. No. It promised.

  Winged beasts took flight from their nests, the air filled with tens of thousands of cries but which were all muffled by the Great Ape’s mighty roar. It seemed to never end.

  Sleeping beasts crawled out of their hideouts, seeking to ascertain which way the lord would go, so that they could get out of the way and avoid getting caught in his rampage… But three parties held firm, foolhardily ready to face a beast that inspired fear in every giant creature that strode, crawled, climbed, swam, or flew throughout the land of the giants.

  THUMP!

  THUMP!

  THUMP!

  THUMP!

  THUMP!

  Silence crashed upon them so suddenly Sej reached for her [Hearing] on reflex, worried she had gone deaf. But no. The challenge was accepted, and now the entire Giant’s Canopy was holding its breath.

  “Now he’s coming,” Sej whispered.

  She stretched her [Hearing] outwards, through the silence…

  A snapped branch.

  A ponderous thud.

  Shaking foliage.

  Effortless movement.

  Behind them, the jungle lit up in a cacophony of explosions as Silver Fists ran headfirst into all of her traps. The great beast didn’t cry out in pain nor shock. It plowed on, heading their way.

  “It’s here,” she whispered.

  The branches exploded to allow the passage of a great silver shadow.

  **********

  “Have you found one yet?” Eum shouted, above the roaring gales storming the egg chamber.

  “NO!” Mach snapped. “Hold on! I’m looking!”

  Fucking look faster! Nar thought, as he ducked under one of the young wind-serpents wing attacks. The youth serpents might only be 10-foot long, but their wings were already powerful enough to cause small gales, and the blue-scaled ones could already shoot edges of razor-sharp. The green ones glided effortlessly through the cramped quarters of the egg chamber, snaking through the air to aim at Nar and Eum’s back, ankles and neck.

  Mach had abandoned all pretense at care and was flinging anything that wasn’t blue, or blue enough to match his requirements, out of the nest, filling the wooden floor around the construct of dried leaves and branches with cracked eggs leaking blue and green shimmering goo.

  This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.

  Mul just bonded with the first cub he met! Are aethermancers really this picky? Nar thought. Pile! I hope he doesn’t regret tossing out all of those eggs just to find that he doesn’t like any of the others.

  He side-stepped a green serpent’s lunge from behind, and elbowed it in the face. Then, while it was stunned, he bent under an air blade that sliced open its scales. With a quick thrust into the already exposed belly, the creature crumbled in a heap with Nar’s [Lingering Aura] ravaging its insides.

  That’s the end of that! Nar thought, as he leaped forward to fight another serpent.

  These young ones had likely just hatched, so they weren’t much stronger than the rat guardians they’d slaughtered earlier. The real problem was the bigger shadows darting outside. And the more eggs Mach broke, the less of a reason those much bigger serpents had to be careful and not simply burst into the chamber.

  The chamber was also filling up with smoke, flames already lighting up the passage they had come in from. If they stayed much longer, there would be no way out, and no amount of fire-resistance potions or self-healing was going to change that.

  An immense eye suddenly filled the gap to the outside. Nar’s heart sank as he immediately realized this must be one of the nine matriarchs that ruled the nest. She must have flown over herself to ascertain what in the Pile was going on with the egg retrieval in this specific chamber.

  Her great, dark blue shimmering slit-pupil slid from Eum to Nar, and then to Mach, who chose that exact moment to toss out another egg from the nest. The beast blinked as she eyed the goo leaking from the cracked egg, and Nar’s blood turned to ice.

  “Mach…”

  “Yeah?” the vanore asked, pulling out another egg.

  “Pick. One,” Nar said. “Now.”

  “I already—Oh!”

  The chamber turned cerulean as lightning flashed from the serpent’s eye and scales, and the huge eye disappeared. Across the chamber, all of the dark blue aelix also began to glow blue, crackling lightning snapping across the room. However, instead of just grabbing an egg, any egg, Mach divided deeper into the nest.

  “Dude! We’re about to die here!” Eum shouted.

  Lightning zapped across the room, and Nar did all he could to dodge around those streaks of deadly blue aether. Wherever they crashed, splinters flew, telling Nar all he needed to know about the level of damage he could expect. Not to mention, he still remembered damned well the status effect that had paralyzed him the first time he’d come face to face with electricity aether, way, way back to those stealthy spiders in the B-Nex.

  “Hold on! This is actually helping! I can see all the strongest storm eggs. Hang on! Please!” Mach begged.

  “Ah for fuck’s—Nar! Don’t let those touch you!” Eum warned him. “These kinds of attacks can easily inflict [Paralysis].”

  The tygaris fought claw, fist, kick and teeth, transformed in his upgraded [Bestial Shape]. His thicker legs, akin to those of the dark gray and blue striped tigers they’d fought in the Canopy, propelled him around the room in quick bursts of speed that almost matched Nar’s [Aura Quickening].

  “I know! Don’t worry!” Nar said.

  “And best to hold off on the aura for now. This place is filled with aether!” and having said so, Eum added his own blood red, dripping aether claws to the light show going on in the room.

  “Got it!”

  Nar cycled all of his aura from his blade, and its crimson, burned surface gleamed purple at the touch of all that blue light. Without aura, he was slower in DPS, but a few well timed [Aura Quickening]s allowed him to over-speed through the young beasts, leaving great trails of green and blue blood in its awake.

  That’s when one of the bigger serpents finally lost its patience.

  “Eum! Get back!” Nar shouted, warned by his [Instinct].

  The tygaris ran away from the opening, no doubt warned by his much weaker [Primal Instincts]. But even transformed to his new [Bestial Shape], it didn’t look as though he was going to make it in time.

  “Eum! Further! Behind the nest!” Nar shouted, a hand reaching out to the tygaris as it ran for his life.

  Behind Eum, the greater serpent unhinged its jaw, liquid lightning dripping down the sides of that impossibly huge maw… The world turned a searing white.

  Nar pulled Leon out of the way just in the nick of time, but he felt the tygaris tense in his arms.

  “Are you okay?” he shouted, once the lightning breath was over.

  Eum groaned, baring his teeth, but he rolled off of Nar and stood on bent, shaky legs.

  “Fuck…” he panted. “It grazed me.”

  “Shit!”

  “I can still fight,” Eum said, standing to his full, enhanced height, and shaking his arms. “MACH!”

  “I-I got it!” Mach shouted. “Look! Isn’t it perfect?”

  Nar looked up, leaning his head against the nest. Mach held an egg that glowed with powerful deep blue sparks dancing across its surface. Up close, and with his [Sight] still active, Nar noticed that what had appeared to be a smooth surface from afar was actually thousands upon thousands of overlapping shapes that resembled scales.

  “Are you sure?” Nar found himself asking. “There’s no do overs…”

  The feathered aethermancer grinned down at Nar. Upside down, Mach’s smile radiated a goofy, beaming joy, and for a moment, Nar’s irritation at how long the guy had taken seemed to melt away.

  “As long as you’re happy,” Eum said, gruffly, but without much intention behind it. “Then, let’s get the Abyss out of here! Come on!”

  The wind serpent’s electrical breath had vaporized the remaining youngling serpents, and it also smashed through the opposite wall. Flames roared through, ascending from the blaze consuming the tree’s innards, but Eum guided them straight into that breach.

  “Down there!” he shouted, as the searing wind forced them to squint. “The other passages are blocked, but that one still looks okay!”

  “Got it! You have to cover me, now. I have to keep holding onto it,” Mach said, motioning to the large egg, his arms embracing it tightly.

  “Yes! Yes! Just go,” Nar said. “I’ll cover the back.”

  Eum didn’t want to be told again, and he leaped over the knee-high flames to land on a ledge about 10-feet below the egg chamber. Mach jumped right after him, and as Nar was about to follow, he picked up on the whoosh of something enormous.

  Glancing back, he found that same, deep blue serpent eye. It ignored him, focused on the ravaged nest, and the broken eggs littering the floor. Something in that gaze gave him pause, his heart tightening in his chest. Grief was grief, and even on something like a giant, winged snake, it was evident for what it was.

  “Nar! Are you waiting for an invitation or something?” Eum called from below.

  I really don’t get these dungeons, Nar thought, as he turned his back to the grieving mother, and leaped down past the flames. The way they’re built. The reason why they were built… For making us stronger, and for feeding the Nexus? For some reason that still sounds so weird to me.

  “You okay?” Mach asked him, clutching onto the egg as though his life depended on it. As though he hadn’t just smashed and shattered and pushed through all the other eggs to find one that please him…

  “Yeah,” Nar said. It really was weird. And so was the aethermancer’s attitude, even if it was the prevailing one in the Nexus.

  The three of them sped through burning corridors, this time on their way down. Nar had heard the giant challenge of the great gorilla, and now, their domain chat was filled with panicked, chaotic chatter. The battle against the strongest Lord of the Brightnight had begun, and after managing to escape the blaze they themselves had set, they would also be joining it.

  Hang in there, everyone, Nar thought, as Jul cried a loud warning that pierced through the mental chatter. We’re on our way.

  SKREEEE!

  “To our left!” Nar shouted, pulling his mind back to the present.

  “On it!” Eum said, and he flung a series of dripping red, aether claws flying down the side corridor.

  A thunderous heartbeat later, Nar glanced over to find not only a shredded spiny rat, but several of its companions laying still, the flames greedily feasting upon their charred flesh. The place looked like the egg chamber up above, and Nar pulled his eyes away before he spotted dozens of little dead rats.

  His body burned from the searing heat surrounding them in that smoke-filled mad dash, but his mind plunged into an icy, foggy coldness… He recalled a wooden, misshapen construction, supported by a pillar of wood. It had been carved and worshiped as the fake god of forest goblins, and around it, lay dozens of goblin children.

  Tuk had struggled back then, and had vowed to never harm a monster child. Throughout their journey in the Brightnight, they had slain many, many beasts, some of them youths, and they had harvested them and collected their eggs without much concern. So why was it that now, this fiery destruction seemed so wrong to him? They had cut down through dens and nests, matriarchs, patriarchs, adults, younglings, and anything else in their search for gains and XP, and it hadn’t bothered him before.

  I mean, I never took pleasure from it either, he thought, as he leaped up onto another ledge and cut down a trio of rats before they could even decide if they wanted to attack the delvers. But he couldn’t risk Mach and his egg, now could he?

  In the end, was he picking and choosing which blood was okay to spill and which one wasn't? Wasn’t that just a hypocrite?

  Nar shook his head to clear the thought, but it persisted. As he jumped back down to rejoin the others, he noticed how Mach hid behind Eum’s back, letting the bestial delver handle their enemy while he clutched onto his prize.

  Is that what it is? He wondered. We did all this, and killed all these beasts, for just one egg. And we didn’t fight them either. We set their house on fire while they slept, and snuck in to break and steal their offspring.

  Nar was not as naive or joyful as Tuk, and he believed he had mostly embraced the mindset of a delver, but what sort of fighting was this?

  Could we break our paths by doing this? But none of the aethermancers was worried about it, he realized. Still, there was something that felt wrong somehow. Not cowardly… Just not quite right, even though he couldn’t put his finger on it.

  His [Awareness] alerted him to the danger then, but there was little he could do.

  “The floor is breaking!” he shouted, just as the cracks got louder.

  “Up there!” Eum shouted.

  “Watch out!” Nar cried, but it was too late.

  Eum’s luck kept him from smashing into the fleeing rats jumping down from the passage above, but Mach wasn’t as lucky. The vanore was clipped by one of the beasts, and spun in the air, disappearing into that corridor with Eum.

  Oh, no, Nar thought, horror seizing his breath.

  He jumped up, but Mach’s ravaged scream told him everything he needed to know before he landed… and saw the crack on the egg. It was about a handspan, and a fine trail of shimmering blue droplets was already forming across the crack. Mach’s eyes were so wide at the sight of the drops, that they must have hurt.

  Crystal, dammit, Nar thought. I knew that something was going to happen!

  He glanced back to where they had come, just in case the path was still there, but his hope died an immediate fiery death. There was nothing but a vortex of flames blowing up that cylindrical passage, and unless they wanted to risk it all and end up lost and burned to death, there was no way to head back up to the egg chambers.

  “Mach, no!”

  A deep cerulean shone behind Nar’s back. The storm aethermancer held a hand over the crack in the egg, and it and his eyes shone blue as sparks linked both egg and aethermancer.

  “What’s happening?” Nar shouted, above the roar of the flames.

  “Fucking idiot,” Eum mumbled, gripping handfuls of his mane. “He started the bonding.”