They spent the next week brewing elixirs.

  “This is sooo BORING!” Circe flopped on her bed.

  Penelope took a deep breath as she looked up at the ceiling from her place on her own bed. This is going to feel like I’m torturing her in a couple loops, won’t it?

  “Such is the burden you have to carry.” Jeru floated above her.

  She’s not getting anything out of this, which makes it feel a little worse. Penelope rolled over on her side to look at the other woman. “You’ve moved on to woodworking?”

  “Mostly logging.” The brunette made chopping motions with her hands. “How many different ways can you cut down a tree?”

  “Don’t you learn about angles and how to predict where you’re going to drop it?” Penelope began counting on her fingers. “Plus you get experience for cutting off all the branches once the tree is down, and then you have to trim the wood into the usable lengths.”

  Circe blew a raspberry. “It’s not like we’re really learning how to do more than read a laser.” She pointed randomly around the room. “Cut here, like this, and it’s going to go there.” She rolled over, then propped herself up on her elbows. “Using the laser saw is fun though.”

  “I have a feeling the Dungeon is going to look a lot different on the fifth floor than the third.” Penelope mused. “Based off of everything we’ll be able to bring down there, we’re going to have much better living spaces.”

  “Nochi said that they’re going to put gates down there inside the Dungeon so we don’t have to keep moving where we’re sleeping every few days.” The other woman blew a stray lock of brown hair out of her eyes. “Have you learned that in enchanting school?”

  “All I know is the bare minimum of enchanting and I don’t see us leaving alchemy any time soon. We’re still learning how to not burn the potions.” Penelope groaned. “It’s not as simple as dumping everything into a pot and warming it up.”

  “I thought you liked technical stuff.” Circe chuckled as she layed back on the bed and stretched her right hand up at the ceiling. “You’re probably in heaven in the lab every day.”

  The thought had crossed her mind, but there was a big problem with that scenario.

  “Maybe if I was the only one working on the potions.” Penelope grumbled. “But we only have one station for the three of us, so we have to take turns and help each other out.” Frustration crept into her voice. “We don’t get much experience from just watching, so Professor Nellebrie has us each working on a portion of whatever we’re brewing, but that means that none of us ever figures out if we can actually do the whole process by ourselves!”

  “Sounds like you need more material.” Circe mused as she twirled her index finger at the ceiling like she was directing an orchestra. “The Centaurs spread us out enough that we won’t drop a tree on anyone but ourselves, then they turn us loose.” She snorted. “I see the horse in charge in the morning and sometimes at the end of the day. It’s just a good thing that some of the more experienced lumberjacks didn’t want to go down into the Dungeon. They keep an eye on us and let us know little things we can do to improve.” She turned her head to look at Penelope. “It’s a million times better than skinning fish.”

  “We’re still going to have to raise our skinning even more.” Penelope sighed.

  “Nope!” Circe sat up, shaking her head rapidly. “Lady Husley came by the other day and told us that they were getting our jobs to ten, then cycling us to the next set of stuff.” She smirked. “No more fish!”

  “Okay…” Penelope looked at her menu and flipped through the tabs until she got to the jobs. “My alchemy is level seven. At the rate I’m going, it’s going to be four more days before I hit ten.”

  “Logging and woodworking are both nine.” Circe laughed. “Maybe I’m just a genius!”

  “Sure…” Penelope sighed. “Did Lady Husley say anything else?”

  “Pat put together a report on all the skills and passives they’ve encountered so far.” Circe shrugged. “She wants us to write out what we think are the best options to take before we go down to the fifth floor, but otherwise, the rest of the Mebope are on their own.”

  Penelope glanced at the closed door. “Is that why Nochi doesn’t come in here anymore?”

  “Probably.” Circe groaned. “She’s already pestered me about all the good combat stories I have. I showed her a few things with a bow, but until she starts leveling, there’s not a lot left for me to show her.”

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  “You’re not missing the afternoon target practice drills, are you?” Penelope teased.

  A pillow flew across the empty space between the two. Penelope brought up her arm to keep it from hitting her in the face.

  “Practice drills in the Dungeon was one thing. At least most of them were able to see what the monsters are capable of and knew that they needed to learn how to fight or they’d die, but you’ve seen it. These people act like as soon as they get a few levels, they’re going to be masters at slaying monsters!”

  “Not all of them.” Penelope thought about the students they had. “Findo puts a lot of effort into your lessons.”

  “That’s just because he thinks I’m pretty.” Circe glared at the other woman. “You’ve got guys drooling over you too. You’re just too dense to notice.”

  “What?” She switched to her internal voice. Seriously?

  “Humans are supposed to be easy.” Jeru shrugged. “Plus you’re exotic. So of course every chest-beating male is going to think they are going to sweep you off your feet.” He laughed. “Some loopers got caught up in the celebrity and spent way too much time at this stage working on non-system skills.”

  How is that even remotely moral? Disgust carved a pit in her stomach. A relationship is about the bond you form with someone. Once you reset, they lose all memory of what happened, and if you’re never going to build on the relationship with that person again, then anything you did during the erased loop was just… violating that person.

  “That’s a little harsh.” Jeru bobbed his head. “But I can see how you’d see it that way considering how you started this loop.” He took a deep breath. “It’s definitely a moral quandary, because on one hand, who wouldn’t want to test out a relationship and then have the ability to start over without all the messy breakup stuff if it doesn’t work out? But what about the people who use what they learn in the loops to find out exactly how to woo someone into a one-night stand or are just out to have a relationship with someone for a single loop so they can add that to their ‘conquest’ list?” He shrugged. “Casual relationships aren’t necessarily a bad thing when both parties know that it’s just a fling on the front end and they’re in it for the enjoyment in the present, but is it still just as moral if one of those consenting adults is going to have the memory erased?”

  Are you playing devil’s advocate or agreeing with me? Penelope squinted. Because I can’t tell.

  “What’re you looking at?” Circe hopped on Penelope’s bed.

  “Both?” Jeru shrugged. “There’s not really a good answer.”

  “I thought I saw a spot on the ceiling.” Penelope shifted on her bed, moving closer to the wall and putting Circe’s pillow between the two of them.

  “Oh.” The brunette snatched up the pillow and cradled it against her chest.

  “Do you know what you’re going to be working on next?” Penelope pushed the conversation with Jeru out of her mind.

  “The rock eaters are taking us underground next.” Circe sighed. “I mean, the laser drills sound like they’ll be fun to use, but it’s just going to be more of hitting stationary things. At least you’re making stuff.”

  “You’re telling me that you don’t think breaking things is fun?” Penelope eyed the other woman. “Who are you and what have you done with my friend?”

  “It is fun for a little bit.” Circe smacked Penelope in the face with the pillow. “But after a while it gets old.”

  “Then I guess you’re glad that you only have to do it for a week or so at a time before you swap to something new.”

  “I just want to build something.” Circe pulled the pillow back into her lap. “I can break things all day with my skills, but when do I learn how to make a cool leather jacket that you can enchant to make me fireproof?”

  “I don’t even know if fireproof is a thing…” Penelope glanced at the blue Elf hovering beside her.

  “It’s a thing. You can become immune to freezing, blindness, electrocution, burns, drowning—”

  I get it; heat is just a status effect. Penelope sighed. “I’ll see what I can do to learn some good enchantments to put on your gear.”

  “Really?” Circe’s eyes widened. “I made a list! Let me grab it!” She bounded off the bed and hurried over to the dresser they shared and dug through the top drawer.

  How am I going to learn all of the spells and passives to enchant things with?

  “Once you learn how to transfer spells to spell paper, you’ll be able to get spells and abilities from people to put on gear.” Jeru took a deep breath. “It’s also possible to enchant your own soul so that you can start the loop at the beginning with extra spells and abilities, but…” He took a deep breath. “You can add three at most right now and if you mess up, you could really hurt yourself.”

  Don’t try it until I get a lot better at it. Penelope chuckled at the sheet of paper Circe pulled out of the drawer. It was a diagram of a person with lines pointing at each piece of gear as well as descriptions of the enchantments that she wants on each piece.

  “According to Findo, all of these are a thing, so I want you to pay close attention.” Circe grinned as she sat down next to Penelope. “Now for the boots…”

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