Master Fatty Chunk walked over to the chest and tried to open it, but the lid did not budge.

  He planted his feet and strained, yet nothing happened. That same warping presence he had exuded earlier rolled off him again as he did whatever it was, he did. The trees around him bent and the air thickened until we dropped to our knees under the pressure.

  I was already on my knees, still wrecked from the healing, so I pressed my face into the dirt as the weight crushed down on me. It felt like the world was trying to fold itself in half, and even then, the lid did not open.

  He pulled the presence back in as quickly as he had unleashed it, and the pressure vanished.

  He turned toward me. “Azolo, get off the dirt and come open this chest.”

  I pushed myself up without hesitation because I wanted to see what was inside just as badly as he did. “Do you think it’s trapped?” I asked.

  “No,” Master Fatty Chunk replied. “Dungeon chests are not trapped. There is no need for them to be. After you complete something that dangerous, it makes no sense for the dungeon to produce something life threatening afterward, at least not that I am aware of.”

  I stepped forward and lifted the lid easily.

  He looked at me, then at the others. “So, what have we learned, children?”

  I wiped dirt from my face. “People who weren’t involved in the fight can’t open a reward chest?”

  “Yes,” he said. “Now move back. Now that it is open, I want to see if I can pull something for myself.”

  He stuck his hand into the bottom of the chest until his fingers met wood. He frowned slightly and tried to reach deeper.

  “Huh. Not what I was expecting, but not unlikely.”

  He withdrew his empty hand.

  “Azolo, grab whatever is in there for you. Then each of you grab whatever the chest has for you and put it in this bag.” He dropped a heavy sack at his feet.

  We stared at him.

  “Why aren’t we going to keep the rewards?” Winnie asked.

  “You might,” he said calmly. “After I test them. Unless it is a book or something you can keep that stuff. I want to check what the items do first, and I do not want you gaining a crutch for your future. You already rely too heavily on the items you are wearing.” He nodded to Clarice's quiver.

  Then he glanced at my loincloth. “Although I do want you in armor. If you find armor, Azolo, we will identify it and you will wear it if it is suitable.”

  I nodded and reached into the chest. My fingers closed around glass, and I pulled out a clear jar with a tin lid. Inside floated what looked like a severed finger.

  I almost dropped it out of sheer disgust.

  “Put it in the bag,” Master Fatty Chunk said. “We will see what that is later. Next.”

  Meka stepped forward and reached into the void. She did not have to search long before she pulled out a pair of earrings shaped like little triangles made of twigs.

  “Oh,” she breathed, excitement flickering across her face.

  “Put them in the bag,” Master Fatty Chunk said.

  She hesitated, then dropped them in.

  “I was really excited to get an item for myself for the first time,” she muttered. “Everyone else got one and I got a book. I really like my book, but it would have been nice.”

  If you discover this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the violation.

  “You will get it later,” he replied. “Next.”

  Clarice stepped up and reached into the chest. It took her longer. When she finally pulled her hand free, she held a piece of cloth. It looked too small to be a scarf, though it had the right shape.

  She turned it over in her hands. “What even is this?”

  “Put it in the bag,” he said again.

  She obeyed.

  Winnie went last. She reached in and pulled out a rock.

  She stared at it. “You have got to be kidding me.”

  “Put it in the bag,” Master Fatty Chunk said.

  She dropped it in with a scowl. “Why do I always get shitty items?”

  “We don’t know that it’s bad,” I said. “It could be completely and utterly amazing.”

  “Yeah, but I still got that stupid helmet that makes you go berserk,” she shot back. “We don’t even know how to use it properly, and it sounds like it’ll end up killing one of us if we do.”

  “What helmet?” Master Fatty Chunk asked.

  “It’s a helmet that makes you go berserk, but also removes all magical effects from you,” Winnie said. “It doesn’t even explain if the berserking expires, so it’s seems pretty shit.”

  “Mmm,” he murmured thoughtfully. “We will see how bad it actually is. Perhaps you are able to gain an immunity to the enraging effect over time or maybe its more manageable than you think. We will have to test it and determine the edges of the enchantment. These new dungeon spawned items are vague on what they actually do.”

  We all nodded.

  “Master, what do we do next?” I asked.

  “We clean up this mess,” he said. “Azolo, get your chickens out of that damaged cage.”

  I looked over and saw that the cage was smashed, but the two chickens inside had somehow survived.

  “Those are some lucky chickens,” he said. “You cannot let them go to waste.”

  He pointed at my pack. “You also need to attune to your bag. You did admirably with improvising, but having the items you are looking for at hand would be more useful than digging blindly through the backpack.”

  I nodded.

  “I think I can get them out of the cage,” Clarice said, already moving toward it. “But what do we do with them after?”

  “I can make a vine cage for them,” Meka said. “If you give me a minute.”

  “That is fine,” Master Fatty Chunk said. “You four stay here. I am going to check these items. I will be back in an hour so Azolo can attune to his backpack.”

  He nodded once and vanished without another word, disappearing like a fart in the wind.

  I sat down and slipped the backpack strap over my shoulder properly before settling into a cross legged position. Attuning to an item was not complicated, at least not in theory. You sat there and meditated on the concept of connection, on the idea that the object was an extension of you and you of it, and eventually something clicked.

  So I closed my eyes and reached for that sense of connection.

  It took less time than I expected.

  The click was not a sound, but a shift. The pack stopped feeling like an object resting against me and started feeling like a limb I had simply forgotten how to move. I became aware of the space inside it without opening it, aware of the supplies, the food, the cloth, the books. The weight vanished entirely.

  When I opened my eyes, Master Fatty Chunk was standing a short distance away with the others, already prepared to leave. He held a vine cage in one massive hand with the two chickens inside it, both clucking indignantly.

  “I guess I got distracted,” I said as I stood, adjusting the strap even though it no longer needed adjusting. “Sorry about that.”

  Master Fatty Chunk nodded once. “Here. Hold this.”

  He tossed something toward me.

  I caught the jar with the floating finger inside it and stared at him.

  “You are honestly lucky that belongs to you,” he said. “If it did not, I would have taken it.”

  I blinked. “What is it?”

  He flipped the item card toward me. I caught it one in the other hand and looked down at it.

  “That thing is insane,” Master Fatty Chunk said. “Not for combat, but by all that is holy, I want it. If it didn't belong to you, it would already be in my pocket.”

  The more I read, the more I understood what he meant. There was no way this thing was given to me by accident. I was almost certain the God of Iron had tipped his hand to place this finger in that chest for me, because by all that was right, there was no way in all the heavens and all the hells that this item should be in the hands of someone like me.

  The item card read:

  The Forbidden Compass.

  This compass, when attuned to the user, grants the following abilities.

  Find North. No matter whether the compass is in the user's hand or inside a container, as long as it is attuned, the user can always find true North.

  Change Direction. Once per day, the user may redefine what they perceive as North. That direction may be a person, place, object, idea, or concept. From that moment until the next sunrise, that chosen target becomes North to the user.

  Divine Direction. While looking directly at the jar, the user may scry upon whatever the finger currently identifies as North. The image, location, person, object, or concept will reveal itself through the glass.

  Utility Item.

  I lowered the card slowly.

  My heart raced at the implications of the item. I held the glass jar in both hands and concentrated, trying to attune to it immediately.

  Master Fatty Chunk watched me for a moment, then nodded. "We will wait," he said to the others. "That is a good idea. You lot should do the same."