“Rivergate is one of the handful of gate-centric cities of the eastern continent of the Surface. Established in 452 R.E by the Dawnfield Great House and named after the numerous rivers that crossed its lush hills on the way down toward the nearby sea, it became a powerhouse of agricultural and pastoral activities under the stewardship of the Dawnfields for nearly two hundred years, until the Bread War of 639 R.E. Having lost many of their holdings and being braced to lose more, the Dawnfields elected to give away control of the city to the Registry, guaranteeing its neutral state and depriving their rival and up-and-coming House Cornvale—which hadn’t earned its Great House title just yet—from laying claim to the city.

  In the centuries that followed, the agricultural output dwindled. Breadbasket families refused to invest without outright control of the land, while the guilds and noble houses increasingly turned their gaze downward into the Dungeons. Yet Rivergate’s decline in grain and pasture came with its own form of prosperity. Free from constant power struggles, and under the protection of the Registry, the city evolved into a crossroads of politics and a haven for the young. Boarding schools and academies flourished, taking in the children of absent delvers until they came of age to descend themselves. Though disputes are not unknown, given the many factions with representatives within the city’s walls, Rivergate has long been considered one of the most stable settlements of the Surface, often spared the territorial disputes and wars that threatened most other gate cities.

  That reputation has gotten a touch… rumpled in recent years, thanks to a growing number of incidents—most of them, oddly enough, traced back to a cheerful little spot just outside the city walls by the name Brew and Crumbs.”

  —Seeker Herovir, addressing a full lecture hall during Histories of the Gates, Thalosmere B-Campus, 11th Floor, Hall Three.

  Shutting the door behind him, Miles recovered the Custodial key and watched the thick door dissolve back into the thin, flimsy plank that used to be his room’s door. Behind him, the trio were quiet, and they kept quiet until they were almost out of the abandoned village. As he took in the signs of decay and overgrowth as they walked, Miles had been wondering how he’d address its state without souring the mood too badly, when Brie cleared her throat.

  “Miles? Could we—I mean me and Lott—hang back for a couple of minutes while we walk? I want to ask his advice about a personal matter.”

  Miles looked back over his shoulder, a little frown on his brows as he blinked once. “Er… I mean, I’m not sure why you’re asking me. You two can do whatever you want.”

  Brie chuckled sheepishly, rubbing the back of her neck. “Oh you know. I felt it’d be polite. Plus you two can catch up! Come on, Lott,” she said, grabbing him by the wrist and dragging him back.

  Lott did not look too happy about it, but Miles just shrugged. If the Shadow didn’t want to be involved, he could just say so. Turning his attention back to the disused road leading them back to the main one, Thalia nudged him with an elbow.

  “So… I wanted to ask this but I didn’t want to make a big deal out of it,” she whispered, glancing behind to make sure the arguing duo were out of earshot before she looked up at him with a raised brow. “That door Skill? You said it was Transcendent?” she probed.

  Miles winced internally, but he still nodded. While he could admit he was pretty fast and loose with his secrets in general, mentioning the Custodial stuff was off the table for more than one reason. Suffice it to say, as far as anyone could tell, all of his abilities were Transcendent or Legendary at most.

  When he nodded, she leaned forward, still whispering. “How did that happen? Did you have it from the start?” she asked, then her lips twitched. “And should we start calling you a hero, now?”

  Miles groaned, mouth pressed in distaste. “Ugh. Please don’t. And of course I didn’t have it from the start. You know it wouldn’t have been missed in my Initiation. It would have been a whole thing. Even Heroic Torchbearers get attention.”

  Thalia straightened back, brow raised. “Still don’t like ‘em huh?”

  Miles gave her a mock-glare and found her smirking at him. He sighed and shook his head. “It’s as if… it messes with their brains when they get a Transcendent Skill on Initiation. It blows up their egos and they get way too confident before the Dungeon shoves their faces down in the dirt. Obnoxious little shits,” he grumbled. “Not all, but most are annoying.”

  Thalia’s step faltered in fake shock, and she grinned at him when he narrowed his eyes at her as she teased. “Huh. The old you would have lumped them all together. You’ve changed.”

  “Har. Har. I grew up. Mainly,” he mumbled. A whisper-shout caught his ears and he glanced back to find Brie poking Lott in the shoulder as she hissed something at him, while the Shadow refused to meet her gaze. The scene made his lips quirk. He didn’t know they got that friendly.

  “Thanks for giving her a chance, by the way. I know that she can be intense but um… she helped me a lot. And she’s always there when things get rough,” she said, eyeing her friend with a smile. But before Miles could respond to that, she turned back at him and poked him in the shoulder as they joined the main road that led to Rivergate. “Before I get distracted again, how did you end up with a Transcendent Skill, then? I’ve heard Skills can be upgraded as rewards sometime, but I’ve never heard of them becoming Transcendent. I’d love to get my hands on one. Could you imagine the offers I’d get from the guilds? Not that I’d take any. But it’d be nice to see, you know?”

  Miles chuckled. “I can see how they’d be foaming at the mouth to try and lock you in a golden cage. They’d give you everything you want so long as they make sure you wouldn’t fall in their competitor’s hands. Depending on how useful your Transcendent Skill would be, of course,” he said, as he remembered the headhunters he often had to dodge. With the occasional kidnappers. And even then, they hadn’t know the extent of his Skills. “As for how… I promise I’ll help you. But don’t rush it, okay?” he said, slowing down as he looked her in the eye. Thalia’s eyes sharpened, and she gave him a nod.

  “That dangerous?” she asked.

  “Very much so. You’ll need to challenge the bosses. Alone. And more than once,” he said, voice low, and he could hear the breath catch in her throat. It was an understandable reaction. For anyone without his looping ability, such a course of action could legitimately be qualified as suicidal. But there was a logic to it. “Less people around means the loot doesn’t need to be divided as much. And Skill upgrades are the second rarest drop. Or more like third.”

  “They don’t tell us this stuff in class,” she grumbled, and that got a laugh out of him. “What’s the rarest?” Thalia asked.

  Miles hummed. “I’d say it’s a tie between new Skills and Soulbound items, honestly. And it’s not that neither of those would happen if you’re in a larger party. It’s just that the more there are people in the fight, the less odds of something great showing up. And of course if it does show up, then it’s a whole other thing to decide who gets what.”

  Thalia hummed in understanding, and there was a quiet beat as the whisper-shouting continued behind them while the city walls grew larger and larger in the horizon.

  “Thalia. What… happened? To the village? To uncle Auren?”

  The question had been present ever since he’d met her, but considering neither of them had wanted to address it, he was almost sure it was nothing pleasant. Thalia tensed and took a few seconds to collect her thoughts and then—she deflated. A sigh escaped her lips, and she shook her head. “I… I don’t want to get too deep into it. Plus, we aren’t that far from the gate. But we need to talk about it sooner or later. So how about this,” she said as the voices of the duo behind them approached. “I’ll give you a quick summary. Then take the rest of the day to settle in. Tomorrow, we’ll talk more. And the day after tomorrow, you come say hi. What do you think?”

  The narrative has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

  Miles agreed. “I could work with that. And if it’s too difficult to speak of now, then I’d understand.”

  Thalia shook her head. “It’s never pleasant, but you deserve to know,” she said. She took a deep breath, then spoke. “There was a Dungeon spill a little more than two years ago. It was… a mess. Tier-13. Redmane boars. The delvers pissed them off somehow. Then without losing them, they triggered an escape relic. Three boars escaped. There were only a couple of tier-15s around, and neither of them could hold up three boars. All the Vanguards, Wardens, and Seekers rushed there to prevent the boars from making it to the city to buy time for help to come, and with the Wardens being literally there to slow the monsters down… it didn’t go well. Dad didn’t come home.”

  She took a second to catch her breath, and Miles wanted to tell her to slow down, but she seemed to want to rip the band-aid off in one shot. “The party had been on House Varwell’s ticket. The backlash was swift. There’s not enough gold and influence to quell the outrage from nearly causing a disaster. Varwell had been the one leasing the territory of the village and paying the wages and all of that, so with the fallout, they lost the rights to work the plots. The village’s status got lost in limbo, until someone else takes over. I hear there’s fighting over it, but I couldn’t tell ya much there,” she said, with a pained shrug. “Mom… didn’t handle things well. But we’ll talk about that more tomorrow,” she said, glancing behind as the others joined.

  Without delay, the conversation moved on to more pleasant subjects. Thalia just jumped in the chat with Brie, eager to move the conversation while Miles milled over what he heard.

  They continued talking about random Dungeon stuff as the city gates loomed closer, at which point Miles got started on tweaking his Veil. Lott had mentioned Seekers with identification rings and who knew if there’d be sensitive Shadows around, so it was better to get started. Especially considering Lott’s next words.

  “There’s a checkpoint,” he spoke, voice low. “Sir Miles, are you sure you’ll pass their notice?”

  “Stop calling me sir,” Miles bit back, eyes staring vacantly ahead as a slight frown drew itself on his brow. “And I’m working on it. Give me a second.”

  Miles had a way to fake checkpoints without drawing too much attention to himself. A long time ago, Quinn—a Shadow who’d beaten the juvenile anger and bad habits out of him—had told him about it, and it had taken him years to master the technique. And just like everything else, it needed a little focus to get used to his improved core now that he’d gone up another tier. With his first attempt done, he turned to Lott. “Scan me. What tier do I feel like?”

  Thalia and Brie frowned, while Lott just stared at him for a second, blinking, then nodded. The Shadow’s brows furrowed, then his eyes widened. “… a little more than me, si—Miles. I’d put you at tier-16 or 17. How…”

  “Too far,” grumbled Miles, cutting the man off. “Give me a second,” he quickly added, turning his attention inwardly toward the three mana-layers tightly surrounding his core. Focusing on the one immediately next to his core, he tightened the vents he had created, allowing even less mana to leak through, which then would get diluted in the space between the second and third layers before he allowed the mana to waft out of his Veil. Miles pulled his focus back away from the core, gave it a once over, then turned his attention back to the world around him.

  “How about now?” he asked.

  Lott slowed down a little, then shook his head in disbelief. “Around tier-8. Maybe tier-9,” the Shadow said, an excited glint in his eyes. “I didn’t know one’s tier could be obfuscated in this manner…”

  Miles nodded. “I told you guys earlier. When you get good enough with Veils, you can pull a few useful tricks like this. Especially with how much identification rings and core scans are trusted. It’d be too suspicious if I walked up to them and they couldn’t sense anything from my core. That’d be just as alarming as them sensing me as a tier-20 or above.”

  By now, the gates were only minutes away, and as they approached the high walls, Miles was a little taken aback at how massive the city was. Having not been around for decades, he’d forgotten the sheer scale of it. Tall gray walls stretched to his right and left, their curvature barely visible from this angle. Beyond the walls, he could peek some structures of the higher parts of the city. The wealthier districts, he recalled, but even that was soon hidden behind the thick gray masonry and even from a few yards away, he could feel the hum of mana that coursed within the structure, empowering the walls.

  They hadn’t needed to wait long for their turn, especially with Lott standing in front of them. As for the checkpoint… it ended up being underwhelming. Maybe even a little disappointing. Not that he hoped for trouble or anything. Deeper in the Dungeon, checkpoints were a much more intense affair, with all the politics, plots, schemes and whatnot. The guards didn’t even ask questions once they saw Lott around. They quickly checked his Delver’s Card, asked him a couple of questions of why he was coming to Rivergate—to which he said he was looking for a new base to delve from—and once a Seeker in tailored, blue suit-like uniform gave him a once over, they let him through.

  “That was easy,” Miles chuckled once they were a few minutes past the entrance and finally joined the thoroughfare proper. The streets were busy, even though these were closer to the gate. It was still a little early in the afternoon, so there were plenty of food stands with people eating and talking while the rest went about their business. This specific area seemed to have a heavier Watch presence than he remembered, but they didn’t dally and kept making their way toward the deeper parts of the city.

  Minute by minute, the sights and scents grew more familiar, and Miles felt a dumb smile stretch on his face, which occasionally faltered when he’d noticed a business he knew had disappeared, or when a familiar home looked particularly dilapidated. Six years wasn’t a long time, but it still affected a city deeply enough. For him, it had been decades since he’d seen any of this, so he was getting hit with nostalgia wherever he looked.

  Then the smell of fried dough hit him and Miles’ head whirled toward a neighboring street.

  “Do you know where you’re staying?” Thalia asked, not noticing him drifting away for a second. “Wha—where are you going?”

  “Follow me,” Miles called out as he slunk between two carriages, eliciting a shout from the one he cut off.

  “Watch it!”

  Miles just ignored the man, focusing on the intensifying smell as his mouth literally began to water. The smell of sweets and roasted nuts reached him next as he passed by a few groups of clamoring students in pressed uniforms, until he was finally in front of the store.

  There were way more people than he would have usually tolerated, as Miles hated lines. But for this, he could wait. In fact, the noise of shouting teens was almost pleasant, considering he hadn’t been around this spot for years. From where he stood, he could see the pots of fruity spreads, ground and crushed nuts, honey, and plenty of other toppings that’d go on the crunchy, airy disk of fried dough and beyond them, a middle aged couple, assisted by two teenagers. The small team were bustling behind the counter. Taking orders, cleaning up as they went, pulling the dough out of the large pot of oil in which they were browning.

  Thankfully, Miles wasn’t the only adult around, though they were definitely a minority. Miles had been wondering whether he’d get something nutty or sweet or both as his eyes drank in the painfully familiar sights when a wizened old voice caught his ear.

  “Gods below… Viv! Look!”

  Miles looked up to find the widened eyes of Talissen staring at him, a fried, wrapped pastry hanging limply in his hand. There were more crinkles on the side of the man’s eyes that Miles remembered. His beard was close shaved as always, and a few more gray hairs were visible from the sides of his head. Miles guessed the hair under the toque might be just as gray, which pinched at his heart.

  The signs of aging were showing up too fast.

  From the back of the store, holding a long, metal rod in hand as she turned the thin, square-shaped dough in the oil, Viv shot back, slowly turning, her gray hair tied in a bun. “I’m busy with the damn dough, Talissen. You can’t be asking me to…”

  Her voice cut off, then her annoyed visage melted away as she beamed at him. “Miles! You little scamp! Where have you been! Watch the dough,” she ordered one of the apprentices, handing him the poker as she hobbled closer to the counter. “Do you know how long it took me to find a courier to replace you?”

  Miles gave her a guilty smile, and it almost looked like her eyes had misted over. “Come over here, let me look at you. You lot, move to the side,” she shot to a group of four teenagers in crisp red uniforms.

  One of them, a young man with wavy blond hair frowned for half a second before a sneer began forming on his lips, only for three different hands to shoot up and slam on his mouth lest he got all four of them banned.

  Miles chuckled. It was good to see that Viv was still terrorizing her customers.

  yes, but it will be within the Dungeon delves. The longer response in the spoiler tag, as it feels a little spoiler-y