A few hours later, we found ourselves at the Hyke adventurers' guild. While the original plan had been to split the party after the dungeon, the assassination attempt had changed things. Daniel was now determined to break apart from me immediately, not even sparing the time to enter the dungeon.

  In fact, they were even going to let me head in to conquer it first, unwilling to find out exactly how my mysterious 'benefactor' was arranging to have dungeons empty at the point I arrived. The challenge was trivial, anyway; to collect the heartwood of a dozen treants and arrange them at a shrine prior to reaching the boss, which would change the boss battle from a D-rank aged treant to a C-rank elder treant.

  Daniel slapped down a bit of paper in front of a poor, unsuspecting receptionist. "Reporting completion of an insane compulsory quest," he grumpily declared.

  The receptionist looked at him—he'd taken the eye patch off his empty eye socket for the occasion—then glanced at me and my missing arm, then finally looked down to read the slip of paper.

  Her eyes bulged.

  "You... succeeded?" she asked hesitatingly.

  Daniel slapped down the ears of two orc chieftains, which he'd cut off at some point while I wasn't paying attention. The third was, alas, still in the first village, assuming something else hadn't come along and eaten it. I'd mostly ignored the corpses, on account of the way orcs had no valuable body parts, which was a pity given the number of them we'd killed. "Over a hundred dead orcs. All three villages wiped out," confirmed Daniel.

  "Wow," exclaimed the receptionist, glancing at me again. "Let me mark your cards. The situation must have been really desperate to send a young group like you on a B-rank mission, especially given that you have a kid with you."

  Daniel refrained from suggesting that the 'kid' was likely the entire reason they'd been sent on the mission.

  The receptionist marked our cards with the completion of the B-rank mission, rather than requiring us to touch anything like before I'd got the card, and then poked around under her desk for our reward.

  Pity. Not quite enough for another level, but it put me near the edge. Conquering the Enchanted Wood should be enough.

  The receptionist placed a handful of gold coins on the counter, which Daniel sorted, shifting a sixth of the pile to me. I could see why higher rank adventurers didn't feel the need to work on a daily basis; even split six ways, my share was more than what I'd looted from the bandit camp. Not that I intended to use it on a new dagger, now. I'd looted one from the earlier assassin that was forged from a black substance [Blacksmithing] couldn't identify, and it held an edge far sharper than the ones I'd taken from Leo's hut. It was also a fraction longer, which I appreciated with my increasing Stats and Skills. I already had my upgrade, which I accepted in exchange for sacrificing my share of the crystals we'd looted from the dungeons.

  Besides, with only one arm, I couldn't exactly dual-wield. No, the money was better spent on finding someone with stronger healing magic. I needed my arm back.

  "And now we'd like to remove Robin from our party, please."

  "Oh... I'm sorry to hear that. I hope the compulsory quest hasn't caused friction in your party."

  "I wouldn't call it friction, exactly, but I think it's the best decision for the future of the party," said Daniel.

  "And can you tell me where I could get healing for my arm?" I asked while the receptionist fiddled with our guild cards.

  "There's no-one here capable of restoring limbs, I'm afraid. There should be a few places in the capital, though. The temple's your best bet; they'll heal anyone, as long as you can afford it. The guild would be cheaper, but since they basically just put up a job request for a healer with an appropriate Skill, I'm not sure there'll be anyone available at short notice after the Harvent Disaster. The army and knights' orders have healers, but they won't heal anyone who's not in active service."

  "Temple it is, then," I agreed.

  Drat. That meant going back to the capital. If I'd met that assassin alone, I'd have died. Heck, if that assassin had correct information about our party and had started his attack by taking out Felicity instead of Ryan, I'd have died. It was some comfort that someone had probably deliberately arranged for him to have incorrect info, and thus if I'd been alone I might not have been attacked in the first place, but I had no idea just how thoroughly events were being manipulated behind the scenes. Someone might have slipped incorrect information to him after he'd located our party, for example.

  "Would you like to book a space on a carriage?" asked the receptionist.

  "No thanks. I'm going to clear the local dungeon first, anyway."

  "... Without an arm?"

  "After three orc villages? It'll be a walk in the park. Or a walk in the woods. Or something."

  "I really must advise against it..."

  "Advise, or order? Because if it's just advice, I want to get going. I don't want to hold up Daniel."

  "... It's just advice. I don't have the right to tell you not to. But now is really not the time for adventurers to be playing fast and loose with their lives."

  I snorted with laughter, despite knowing full well the receptionist wouldn't get the joke. Someone was playing fast and loose with my life, sure enough, but it wasn't me!

  Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

  "Don't laugh! I'm being serious!" complained the receptionist.

  "I know, and I appreciate it. I really do, but I know what I'm doing. Thanks for the help."

  "Take care of yourself," said Daniel. "I don't want to hear any news about your death."

  "You've made me want to push myself," said Felicity. "Even though it quickly became apparent that you have... advantages... and that I could never keep up, I still feel like we've been coasting for too long. We'll keep conquering dungeons even without you."

  "Will we?" asked Lee.

  "Yes," confirmed Ryan.

  Stacy bashed her gauntlets together in affirmation.

  Hey, I could kinda interpret her gestures now. I was learning.

  "Take care yourselves," I said. The feeling of not wanting to hear of their deaths was mutual, and I really hoped no-one decided they knew too much about me and had become liabilities. "Send me letters via the capital's guild from time to time and let me know how you're getting on."

  "Oh? Interested?" asked Ryan.

  "Obviously," I lied. Rather, keeping communications open would make it harder for someone to disappear them without me noticing. Although letters could be faked, so I'd need to check up on them in person from time to time.

  And with that, I bid them farewell and headed the short distance to the dungeon. While the guild hadn't been built directly on top of it, as with the Slime Pit, the location had still obviously been chosen with the dungeon in mind, so all I needed to do was exit the front door and cross the road.

  The dungeon was guarded, as all dungeons inside settlements seemed to be, and the guard was predictably unhappy about letting through someone of my age, solo, with a missing arm. Like the receptionist, he had no actual right to stop me, though—at least once I'd displayed my D-rank guild card—so I continued through.

  The place was beautiful. Tall trees grew densely, with appearances similar to—but not quite the same as—those from reality. Despite the time of year, the dungeon interior was warm, more like a humid summer's day than reality's autumn. Likewise, the trees were all green, with no lost leaves or yellowing in sight.

  Fireflies drifted silently around the trees in great swarms, but most of the light was provided by blue, yellow, and green crystals jutting up from the forest floor, which was clear of undergrowth.

  Something that didn't provide any light was the sun, on account of it not being there. Like the Fluffy Meadow and its eternal daylight, this forest lived within an everlasting night, an unchanging crescent moon pinned to the false sky above, mostly hidden by the canopy.

  Just about the only thing about the scene that wasn't overly scenic was the short, young, spruce-like tree that was attempting to kill me.

  This was, after all, a dungeon. Not exactly somewhere to take not-yet-unlocked kids for a picnic.

  Even with me down an arm, the treant proved a weak opponent. My Skills were vastly improved from the last time I fought one, but my new dagger really made a qualitative difference, too. [Dagger Mastery] might have tweaked reality to let my dagger cut more easily than it should have done, but small tweaks were nothing compared to an actual sharper, harder blade.

  It swung a branch at me, but I simply hacked it off. It sent a few thicker limbs at me in great overhead swings, but I sidestepped, the attacks uselessly slamming into the soil. With my Dexterity, the ground was eaten up by my steps, bringing me face to face-shaped-lump-of-wood with the treant. A few swipes carved out the heartwood before it could drive me away from its trunk.

  "Damn... No cart this time," I muttered.

  A bit of an oversight, but not a huge one. The weight of the heartwood no longer posed an issue. Only their bulk, especially given my arm situation. I was forced to drag them one by one, which was time consuming, but otherwise not a problem. Thankfully, the dungeon didn't consume them if left unattended for a few minutes.

  As expected, I didn't encounter anyone else in the dungeon, and it wasn't long before I'd gathered the twelve required heartwoods and reached the clearing before the boss. As written in the notes, there was a shrine there. A circular disc of wood, with twelve bowls carved into it. One heartwood went into each bowl, and when the twelfth was placed, all twelve caught alight.

  I jumped backward in shock, but the fire didn't burn. The wood remained brown, showing no sign of charring. The dancing flames weren't still: the fire spread from the bowls, tracing thin lines across the shrine, drawing out a symbol of a tree, with markings beneath that I didn't recognise.

  The entire construct flashed into green, shooting a bright beam of light into the air. Deeper into the forest, something creaked loudly. A green cloud of leaves expanded and rose, towering high above the forest's canopy.

  ... Maybe facing a C-rank monster alone and with one arm missing was a little rash. I wasn't coming in completely blind: I knew that an elder treant was bigger and tougher than its younger kin, but was no faster and was rooted in place. I'd taken out orc chieftains. I could deal.

  But perhaps it would be wise to spend the points from my level up beforehand.

  First, evening out Stamina with the other physical Stats.

  As for the mental Stats, the odd number of invested points in each grated on me in some small way, but this wasn't the time or place for fixing it. Rather, for this battle, Processing would be my only concern.

  That brought it into line with the physical Stats. The rest of my points, I'd keep, in case I needed a sudden boost mid-battle.

  That just left the final and obvious upgrade.

  I blinked at the System notifications. What in the hells was a Path?

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