Lilac was an Explorer. Of sorts, at least. Living in London, she never had much opportunity to explore above ground ruins. Sure, there were a few disused buildings that gave off an almost Liminal feeling, but usually, if she wanted to explore, she had to sneak underground to it. This is probably where her fascination with underground spaces had begun and over the years it had evolved into a near-obsession with caves, bunkers, tunnels and a while host of assorted topics. There was on occasion some confusion when she mentioned her love for the underground world, as most people would assume she meant the trains, not the tunnels. Lilac also enjoyed this ambiguity, as usually Lilac was the one making assumptions in conversations. Out of necessity, that is. She never really understood people all that well and often struggled to understand some aspects of conversation so had to guess some of the supposedly obvious unspoken bits.

  It stands to reason then, that when Lilac and her Sister had gotten their System invite a month or so before their 18th Birthday, she'd been overjoyed. Sure, the System wouldn't let her actually register until she *actually* turned 18, but it was arguably the best gift she could have gotten; The System and it's Dungeons would give her the ability to actually go on adventures and find all kinds of things.

  So when her first 'Dungeon' was just a burning forest, she felt a bit cheated.

  Of course, it didn't take much effort to work out that this wasn't just a burning forest, but some kind of stable ecosystem. The Trees themselves weren't even burning, the sap was. Lily was taking notes here and there and did seem a little excited when Lilac pointed out her observations. Lilac saw the appeal of it, but well. She was biased. She wanted caves and ruins. And so when the group found a cave to rest up in, she decided to study the cave as best she could. The cave was wide and just about tall enough to stand in with a downward slope. At first glance from the outside, given the opening's position on a relatively short cliff, Lilac had assumed the cave to be rather small, but she was pleasantly surprised once she stepped inside; the cave going both deeper and lower than she first expected. The floor on the inside of the cave was littered with stones of various sizes and the whole place was filled with speleothem of various types. Something about it seemed off to Lilac though, but she just couldn't but a finger on what it was.

  Deciding not to worry about too much, Lilac made her way towards the pool of water at the back of the cave. The water was clear and allowed her a view towards it's bottom. It wasn't, arguably, that deep, only perhaps about 8 feet down to the bottom of the pool, at a guess. That wasn't the end of it, however, as at the bottom of the pool the rock had given way, causing the pool to break into what appeared to be another cavern underneath. She saw something glinting in the hand of what looked to be a statue within that lower cave, just barely illuminated by lights she couldn't see. lilac gave the water a quick test. Unexpectedly warm. 'Oh well,' she started taing slow, deep breaths, 'Won't be the first time I've swam underground, won't be the last.' Lilac had already made her rather impulsive decision when she saw the glinting metal. With one - hopefully not final - deep breath, Lilac dived into the water and began to swim down.

  Before leaving home, Lilac had placed a fair amount of her 'Exploration' gear into her System inventory. Most of it wasn't all that useful for moving through a well lit forest, but down here it could be used to a greater effect. She summoned her divelight, a gift she had gotten for a Christmas present from an uncle who she went caving with once or twice, and shone it forward. It wasn't long before she was at the point where the two caves intersected and now she was certain of what she had suspected. The lower cave was a Lava Tube. Which made absolutely no fucking sense; why would there be clear and obvious Primary Cave right under a what was a cave that was formed via dissolving soluble minerals over a long time period. It just felt wrong.

  No time to dwell on it, though; she didn't exactly have one of her Uncles' Oxygen tanks on her, and she had a goal. And so, into the Lava tube. The tube was surprisingly large. There was also clear evidence of a path along it's bottom. Again; this place was fucking weird. The path was illuminated by something but it was too far down for her to go check. Instead, she went straight for the hand and picked up the Gold...ish necklace in it's palm. Lilac picked it up, and poked the nicely cut ruby on it's front.

  The System notification was a sudden affair; very sudden indeed. And it did make Lilac jump and almost drop what she was holding. Almost. Thankfully, she still held onto the necklace-amulet-thing and her divelight was secured about her wrist via strap. The young woman felt herself smile as she slipped the chain of the Rare Item over her neck and started to swim back up; her Sister wold be jealous of the find.

  At that point, Lilac heard something that made her shiver, even within the surprisingly warm water she was submerged in. Two horrid screams, muffled by the water but still audible at her relatively low depth. She swam faster. Another scream echoed in her ears as she neared the surface of the pool. Finally, not a moment too soon, though perhaps a moment or two too late if one was feeling petty, she broke the surface and saw a nightmare of a scene; one that would likely live rent free in her head for a long time to come. All three of her party members were wounded and bleeding on the blood-soaked floor; Ashley and Chloe lie in a pile, the bear having shredding through the Martialist's Gambeson and breast alike. Ashley lie atop her, defending her with her own body as their blood mingled beneath them. A few feet away, sprawled out on the floor, Lilac saw her sister, unmoving. She saw the bear that had done this to them and let out a scream, loosing a [Fire Arrow] at the creature. The murderous beast turned to her and Lilac felt her blood run cold. It was clearly hurt, she could see the arrow still stuck in it from her Sister's attacks. Chloe probably also got a hit or two in. And yet, even after her [Fire Arrow], boosted by her new amulet, made a solid hit on it, it was still moving. Just now towards her. Lilac froze like a deer in headlights

  Thankfully, she didn't have to wait long for something to happen to snap her out of that state. A glowing rock flew across the cavern and embedded itself into the skull of the bear. Yes; into. There was a cracking sound and the bear fell. Then, there was a sudden rush as Lilac was hit with messages informing her of her level-up. Growth screens and a few other things she filed away for later. She noted the blood had stopped flowing from her companions as freely as it had been and surmised that whatever vitality the level up had given the group, it had been enough to pull them from deaths door. The relief was instant but mixed with and tainted by all the other emotions that Lilac was feeling. She pulled herself from the water, quickly checking the conditions of Ashley and Chloe before storing her flashlight and running over to help her sister.

  Lilac collected her sister's bow and handed it back to her, watching her store it away as she helped Lily into a sitting position. Her arms wrapped around her sister before she could stop herself, only lightening up on the pressure she was applying when her sister complained. Lily rested gently on her shoulder and Lilac started to gently stroke her hair. There was still a fair few wounds on her sister, and it made Lilac's heart beat a bit faster. She didn't want her sister to be in pain. "Ashley, heals?" The words were spoken out of full concern, a concern that increased when her sister let out a groan in her arms. She was probably in quite a lot of pain, after all.

  Ashley started casting her healing magic as she spoke her thoughts "It might be worthwhile to set up camp here. After all, it seems like we have already dealt with the occupier and we could all use a rest." Lilac felt that was a good suggestion and was about to agree when her sister giggled softly in her arms. Lilac was even more concerned now, was her sister's brain damaged by the fight? Her worries compounded more when Lily started to frantically scan the cave "Huh? What's wrong sis?"

  "That bear was EqL 3!"

  That made Lilac suddenly alert. EqL 3; the strongest level a creature in the Tutorial should be, usually the only thing at that level was the Boss. Lilac joined her sister in scanning the Cave. There was nothing. She knew there was nothing. She had seen nothing appear when the Bear was defeated and she had arguably the best view of the group when it was taken down. Lilac was just coming out of her thoughts when she heard the end of Chloe's statement

  "... Eql 3's off in the distance earlier, steered us clear of 'em"

  Lilac felt the heat in her face drain, dimly registering her Sister swearing next to her

  "You know, there was that Error Message when we entered"

  The cave went silent.

  Lilac went over the events in her head. Entered the Trial Antechamber. Met her fellows. System Error... Then wasn't it resolved? Wait, no. No, it wasn't. The System said the Error was Bypassed. Meaning whatever it was was still there. Wait, hold on... Ah, System Log. Those King's Shield guys sure knew their stuff.

  "I'm... looking at the System Notification Log on my end. It says "Unknown Error Bypassed. Trial Generation... Complete%. This whole thing... I think it might have been glitched from the start"

  "System... Log? It has one of those?" Chloe Tilted her head in confusion. She looked a bit like a lost puppy. Lilac kind of wanted a puppy. She'd have to see if she could get a puppy at the Guild Dorms she'd be moving into. Maybe someone else had a pappy and she could help out? Wait no, Focus. System Glitch now, puppy later... hopefully. Thankfully, lily had explained the whole log thing while Lilac was lost in her own thoughts.

  Ashley cleared her throat "So, if the Tutorial is 'Glitched' somehow, what do we do? Are we stuck in here?"

  "Surely not? There must be a way out. There must still be a boss somewhere to beat, right?" Chloe seemed sure of it

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  lily responded "Probably, but I'm worried about that. After all, if a normal mob can be EqL 3, does that mean the boss will be higher?"

  "I mean, when I was leading us through the forest, I did see some other EqL 3's as I said, but it wasn't like there was a lot of them, and I didn't see anything higher"

  "Are you suggesting that EqL 3 might still be the strongest there is?"

  "I mean, I can't really say for sure but... everything still seems well structured. But you're right, we can't go basing our actions off of theories."

  Lilac thought on everything. There was no telling what other beasts might be out there. No telling what might be lurking in this strange... She didn't feel comfortable saying Tutorial, it felt too distinct. Demiplane. She'd go with that. Just take it right from some game she'd played a week or two ago. A simple realisation hit her. The group was thinking about what to do, there was an underlying panic here. Her Uncle had always said that, in an emergency, you need to stay calm. Panicking leads to mistakes, Mistakes lead to injuries or worse. "We should stay here"

  "huh?" All three of the other women seemed shocked

  "We should stay here, there's only one... two entrances; the front and the water. We can hold up and defend ourselves while we recover and figure out our next move. Push comes to shove, waiting out the timer isn't the worst option."

  "what if the timer is glitched? What if it's counting down to our doom?"

  "Like you said, Chloe; we can't base our actions on hypotheticals. Normally, the timer running out means we get to leave. We need to remain calm and work out the best course of action"

  Lily smiled sadly "... Uncle Dan..." Lilac nodded and returned the smile

  Chloe looked like she was about to say something, but Ashley beat her to it "That makes sense, I think. We lack information and we don't have a lot of energy left anyway. Fortifying this position isn't the worst idea at least, and it's a good first step regardless"

  With that, the quartet had finally settled on their gameplan and Lilac began to move to prepare things when she was stopped by Lily. "By the way, what's up with that Necklace?" The other two also turned to her and Lilac felt a tad nervous suddenly. She looked down towards the floor and summoned the System's description for the item. As she went to read it to them, she noticed something strange, the three of them where staring at the description box, then back at her. "... Sis, how did you do that?"

  Lilac blinked. "Do... what?"

  "You're showing us a System Screen"

  "Oh, I am? uh... Well, I um, summoned the window with the intention to share it with you... maybe the System read that?"

  Chloe was the first to jump onto that "Ah, like this?"

  Chloe beamed with pride "Ah, judging from your looks, I'd say that's a yes? That wasn't too hard, much easier than customizing your stat screen"

  Customizing... your stat screen? That wasn't something she and Lily hadn't been told about. Chloe grinned and went into a deep dive about how she'd wrangled her display. Lilac only payed half attention, instead just opting to try and mess about with it herself. It was strange. There wasn't any real controls or guide... and there was no presets, either. Lilac decided to try something really out there. She created an MP bar for herself. It took her a few minutes, but she succeeded. "YES!"

  Everyone blinked, Chloe spoke first "... alright, I'll bite; What's up?"

  And just like that the focus was back on her. Lilac couldn't help but blush in embarrassment as she explained to the group what she'd managed to do. Chloe seemed... excited. "I wonder if you can create, like, a heads up display or something? I think I'll give it a go"

  "not so fast!" Ashley stopped Chloe "Before anything else, please do tell me something important"

  "... sure?"

  "So, You showed us the Culinarian Skill. I just tested it, and you can't display skills you don't have. So, care to explain why you have Culinarian?"

  "err... Skill Gacha"

  Lily and Ashley stared dumbfounded at Chloe. Lilac didn't really see the issue. She'd forgotten about the Skill Gacha and, she was kinda tempted now. She opened the screen and decided to look at the skill list... and then just closed it. Far to big. so many skills. She opened up her level up skill selection. Also far too many skills. It was probably less, but it was still a lot of skills. There was a filter, so there was that at least. OH and the store... Also filled with a few skills, but also Items. Nothing above Common, mostly Mundane stuff. Mundane the Rarity, that is; items that aren't imbued with Mana. The Foundation Skills cost 100 Points, the Skill Gacha was 50. lilac shrugged. Honestly, why not? She was gonna be stuck here, and she didn't have a skill plan yet, so maybe the Random spin would help her out with that. She shrugged and rolled the dice.

  "..ac. Hey, lily to Lilac, you in there sis?"

  "H-huh?"

  "Oh good. What's going on? You looked zoned out. Chloe's cooking some food, are you okay with bear meat?"

  Lilac frowned "Is that even edible?"

  Lily giggled "There isn't much else to eat right now, unless you want to go out hunting"

  "I mean, my caving gear has some Energy Bars"

  "Not really a proper meal... also, I can't believe that I'm saying this, I'm glad you brought that junk with you"

  Lilac wanted to retort but before she could, the spin finished. "Oh... my Gacha spin..."

  "You too? Really, we should be saving those tokens, what if we need something!"

  Lilac shrugged "Eh, I'm sure it'll be fine..."

  "Well, not like you can go back on your choice I guess... what did you get?"

  "... I think you might be going diving at some point"

  "I mean, yeah."

  "Speaking of, that necklace. I didn't get a chance to ask, did you get it from the water pool?"

  "Ah, yeah it was uh... there's another cave underneath the pool that the floor has collapsed into. I got the amulet from a statue down there"

  "... Hey Sis. Do you think we'll make it out of this?"

  "Yeah. Just gotta not give up"

  The two sisters smiled at eachother, enjoying their peaceful company as the smelling of grilling meat filled the room. In this time, the two sisters iterated on their personal System displays, showing off each version to the other and getting some feedback. At one point, Lily had created a counted to keep track of her stored arrows. Lilac had some fun and turned her MP Bar into an MP orb. It really seemed like the possibilities were endless. Then, something odd happened. For a split second, Lilac saw something that she didn't understand. "... Bloodline?" Why would the system have a box for that? Why was it hidden by default. Lilac wanted to fiddle with it more, to force it out into the open. But at that point, she and her sister were called over; the food was done.

  The food Itself was nice, if gamey, and not long after, the others had gone to bed, leaving Lilac with first watch. Honestly, it was kinda boring. Nothing happened and, when she woke up Ashley to take the next watch, she found herself too twitchy to sleep. So instead, she just decided to look over her skill options. After all, it would only be her second all-nighter this week, she would be fine.

  The Skill list truly was massive. Even after filtering to the 'Mage' and 'Active' tags, she knew she wanted some new spells at least, there was so much to pick from. The five main elements were there; Fire, Earth, Metal, Water and Nature. There was even some other Primary elements; Yin, Yang, Chaos, Unaspected. Sub Elements and Secondary Elements weren't there, she assumed those were simply higher than Foundation Stage. Her hand reached down to the amulet around her neck. Flameplege... Lilac tried to filter to the Fire Element. There was a short pause before the System obeyed. It really was flexible. The list was shortened to three skills she could obtain. She didn't really take all that long considering. [Simple Fire Magic] fit her needs.

  It reslotted [Fire Arrow], yes, but that just meant she could take the [Foundational Elemental Magic] off later without losing access to it. The other two spells were lovely additions. Flaming Burst was basically a little fireball. And what good mage doesn't like fireball? Lilac watched the cave entrance, Ashley was taking her watch seriously, but was clearly still exhausted. The budding Pyromancer spent the rest of the night pushing, pulling and tugging at her system. If it was going to glitch in a way that caused her issues, she was going to try and break it for her own benefit. Yep. That was definitely her reasoning. And after an hour or so, she did it.

  It stayed there, the System seemingly haven given up on hiding it from her.

  Lilac giggled mirthfully into the night.