[Corruption Wielder] Chapter 145: Pre-Dungeon Prep

They didn’t go immediately, of course. Everyone was at least a bit beat up from the events of the day, and none of them were so eager to run a potentially depowering dungeon without taking a proper break first.

Regina was willing to post them up for a while, which Will appreciated. While he’d been thinking about establishing a more permanent place for him and his people, he also didn’t have the time nor the skills to create that place himself. He remembered the community that Lev, Ally, and other members of his college had created for themselves in the monster-infested forests near what had once been his university. Just like so much else, it had been overrun by complications resulting from the beginning of the cycle and was no longer active.

Building something that lasted was so much harder than breaking it down, and Will wasn’t especially well versed in the former. He wanted to get better at it some day, but the role of a Dread Executor wasn’t exactly to form long-lasting homes. It was to eliminate threats to them.

For the time being, he was content to spend time in a creation someone else was maintaining.

“Newer” York was a city with a name bad enough Will had to wonder if he’d wandered into an alternate timeline where they’d handed over the ability to name important things to himself. Name aside, though, it was a fairly well designed city—as far as Will could tell. He had been a computer engineer, not a city planner.

He’d only been to New York once or twice before the apocalypse had come and the one time he’d come afterwards had involved killing a whole bunch of gold-rank monsters that had wrecked the city. Will wasn’t sure how faithful the recreation of the city was to its old self, but he could tell that Regina had done some great work in rebuilding it since the last time he’d seen it.

When he’d come hurtling out of the sky like an evil meteorite—okay, bad analogy, but close enough—Will had come into a bombed-out husk of a city, skyscrapers collapsing on themselves and each other as monsters had overrun the place. Now, though, Regina had cleared the dungeons out and reconstructed a good portion of it. Though they didn’t stretch nearly as high as Will was sure they once had, she’d done a great job of working with what she had.

He didn’t exactly have access to the same resources she did, but he could tell that a good deal of the construction had been done magically. There was an aura emitting off some of the materials that Will was fairly sure spoke of artificial synthesis and assembly.

Not that he was complaining. Although Newer York wasn’t quite as big as the city whose bones it had been built on, it looked for all intents and purposes like a high-tech modern metropolis, albeit with a fair few details that were a bit out of place. The subway system had been removed due to how thoroughly infested it had become by dungeons, and most people were now traveling either via short-range portals or launch devices that literally threw them from one building to another, a second magical item catching them there. It wasn’t quite as efficient as a train system, but it was also much less susceptible to monster attack.

Living arrangements had also been changed. Every building had living quarters within them, spacing out the population so that there would always be someone ready to respond in case of sudden monster manifestation while also minimizing the casualties if something big broke through.

Since they were one party and had a direct connection to the Supreme Commander, Will’s group got assigned a pretty solid building—thirty stories tall and built out of the remnants of what Nathan was reasonably sure had been the Chrysler building.

Will neither knew nor particularly cared about what the building had been pre-apocalypse, but it was now a bustling multipurpose shopping center with some areas cut out for training. Most places were like that, with a few buildings centralizing around certain specialties. Will had specifically requested one more suited towards active Users like them, and it showed. All the shops here—even the ones meant specifically for non-combat purposes like restaurants and clothing stores—were imbued with silver-rank magic or above, offering items that were significantly more expensive than they would be elsewhere in the city.

While Yui, Wisteria, and the Australians decided to hit the training facilities immediately and a couple of the others went to get some proper rest, Caiyeri didn’t seem like she wanted to do either.

“I’ve never gotten to explore a proper human city,” she told Will. “I’m going to walk around this one for a while.”

“This isn’t exactly what I’d call a proper human city,” Will said. “Actually, it might be. I think there’s a few normal cities out there that made it out mostly intact, but I imagine most of them are broken mash-ups like this one.”

“It has enough of the trappings your friends led me to believe it would,” Caiyeri said. “Do you think there’s a casino in here?”

Will sighed. “Of course you would go to that first.”

“I’m going to go look,” she announced. “Care to join?”

“That might be the first time you’ve invited me to do something that didn’t involve violence,” Will said, putting a hand to his heart. “I’m touched.”

“Fuck you too. Are you coming?”

“Yeah, I am,” Will said. “Hopefully this one stays more intact than the last one I explored.”

Though they’d stopped in cities from time to time, that had always been a brief visit. Usually, his purpose in being there was specifically to meet up with the people he knew or had been assisting, and he typically didn’t stay for long.

The last time he’d actually stayed somewhere… that probably would’ve been Geneva, and he’d accidentally glassed a fair portion of that city on his way out thanks to the measures he’d taken against Peace’s sigil-holders.

This was different, though. Will wanted to trust in that. He had Sen monitoring the entire place, occasionally sending out bursts to check for hidden Peace sigil-holders, and none of his allies who normally would have noticed an issue bothered him. Even Ayla had been quiet about what to expect when he’d transported everyone through the Beyond, which was usually a good indicator that he was actually safe for a while.

Despite all of that…

“You’re doing that thing again,” Caiyeri said.

“What thing?” Will asked.

“Existing outside of yourself,” she said, waving her fingers around. “Thinking about the step after the step after the step after taking a break even when you’ve just come off a fight. You do it a lot.”

“Do I now,” Will said. “It’s been pretty reasonable so far.”

“There’s a thousand early-warning systems that will trigger throughout the entire party, yourself included, before something actually hits you.”

“Didn’t when we got nuked from orbit.”

“That’s what her defenses are for,” Caiyeri said, pointing a finger in the general direction they’d come from. “You can’t operate like this all the time. There’s more to life than being a weapon.”

“Funny for you to say,” Will said.

“I think it makes more sense coming from me,” she said. “I was made to be one, and I’m the only one left. Part of that is because I took the time to be my own elf instead of just another blade.”

“By gambling.”

To Will’s surprise, she nodded emphatically. “Yes, among other things. Now are you coming or not?”

“I suppose so,” Will said. “Is there anywhere in particular you want to see? I have the place mostly mapped out.”

“Do a lap,” Caiyeri said. “The point of seeing the city is to see it, not to scope it out.”

She approached this venture with a strange childlike curiosity that Will had only seen out of her a few times. It was a stark reminder that despite how well-adjusted and snarky Caiyeri was, she’d spent the majority of her life in a series of dark tunnels learning how to be the most effective killing machine possible.

Trying to keep as much of his attention off his various perception skills, Will joined Caiyeri in exploring the city.

While there were a good deal of silver-rankers and even one or two golds within the building they were in, the distribution was significantly different throughout the rest of the city. While it was still largely silver-rankers, the majority of them were core users. The effect of the cores on them was less than Will would have thought, which led him to believe that the ESNA had some way to mitigate the rot that they put into a powerbase—either that, or they were using cleaner monster cores somehow.

There were also a significant chunk of bronze-rankers. Most of them were slowly progressing, very few using monster cores, but they were behind the wave. There were no unformeds anywhere, which was interesting but expected. Anyone who was still at that rank was either dead or had been pressured into using monster cores to rank up. They were liabilities if they couldn’t defend themselves at all.

Stores were mostly owned by silvers and non-core-using bronzes, though the latter tended to sell less magical equipment and more practical stuff. Most of the people with item crafting classes had long since ranked up to silver thanks to the sheer amount of use they’d gotten out of their skills.

The crafting economy here had been capable of replicating old Earth technology, which made for a bit of a disconcerting experience for Will. He’d gotten used to the system being the most advanced piece of technology he typically witnessed, but while he was inside, he would have been hard-pressed to tell the difference between some of these places and a normal shopping mall on pre-apocalypse Earth.

Well, Caiyeri made a good bit of the difference, and he made up the rest. While some people had chosen to shift races, it had been a very small minority of mankind, so Caiyeri naturally drew attention as an elf—a visibly high-ranking one at that, even if she was suppressing her aura. 

Will, on the other hand, drew attention for all the wrong reasons. Even with his aura suppressed, the effects of his various titles slipped through, disquieting the people around him.

There was one shopping area in particular that caught Caiyeri’s attention. This building was less populated, mostly only by high-level silvers who were carrying specialized equipment and walked around like they owned the place.

“This place looks like it has some fun stuff to do,” Caiyeri said. “No gambling, though.”

“Probably didn’t set up anywhere to do that,” Will replied. “None of the games you can usually play are very fun when everyone has a unique way to cheat.”

“That’s just unimaginative,” the elf complained. “I will say that it’d be nice to get some food and equipment for our dungeon run.”

Will didn’t disagree. Strictly speaking, he could sustain himself off of system rations—and after reaching gold rank, he wasn’t sure he even needed those anymore. That just wasn’t the same as a good meal, though, and magically prepared food had some benefits besides.

They approached a small food court—if you could call it that. Each of the establishments had the facade of a Michelin-starred restaurant, though they weren’t quite as expansive as Will would have expected one of those to be. Tantalizing scents floated this way and that, almost surely enhanced by a skill of some kind.

This place was absolutely filled to the brim with magic if the lines Will’s demonic eye was showing him were any indication, which was possibly promising in terms of the quality of food offered there.

Caiyeri seemed particularly drawn to a place that advertised exotic meat skewers. Not having any particular preference himself, Will decided to go there with her before he could get paralyzed by the number of decisions here.

A system screen popped out as he got closer, though it appeared in such a way that Will was reasonably sure it was either a skill or custom item doing so instead of an actual system prompt.

Matt’s Monstrous Meats. 1,000+ positive reviews!

Choice cuts of deluxe meat from exotic monsters sliced into cubes and roasted over hellfire with onions, peppers, and mushrooms. What’s not to love? This meat isn’t just the tastiest you’ve ever had, though—we only use the finest fresh kills, and that magic doesn’t just run off. Bronze, silver, and GOLD rank temporary buffs available!

In addition to that sign was a menu with a dizzying array of options.

“You two,” a man that Will assumed was the titual Matt said, appearing at the counter. “What can I get for you fine silvers?”

Will and Caiyeri looked at each other, doing their best not to burst out laughing. They’d both suppressed their auras so as to not overwhelm anyone they were passing by.

Will: I swear I used to better at doing this.

Caiyeri: Suppression gets harder at higher ranks. Shouldn’t that be obvious?

Will: No?

Caiyeri: Humans.

“I’ll have the… flaming landshark skewer,” Caiyeri said. “The gold-rank one, please.”

Matt, a middle-aged man who looked exactly like what Will would expect out of a redneck who’d gotten into exotic meats, scratched the back of his neck. “You did check the price, right?”

“Two hundred gold, right?” Caiyeri asked. “It’s got to be pretty good if it can provide a temporary skill.”

“I’ll take the gargantuan raven one,” Will said. “Same rank.”

“Uh, I do have those orders, but…” Matt said. “Sorry to ask, but I will have to ask you to pay—“

Will flipped him a pair of platinum credits from his inventory. “Yeah, yeah, got it. That enough?”

Matt’s eyes bugged out. “That’s… five times what I needed…”

“Eh, whatever,” Will said. “Consider it a measure of trust.”

After all, the man’s aura had been wavering this entire time thanks to the passive effects of Will’s own. He’d still sold them his wares in good faith even as some of the other places around them had tried to subtly alter the auras in front of their stores, looking to drive them away.

“If you say so, sir,” Matt said dubiously, tacking on the honorific at the end almost as an afterthought. “I’ll get on it right away.”

While Matt dipped away to make their food, Will messaged Caiyeri as he spoke.

“So,” he said aloud, “Do you think you’re going to want to do the challenge dungeons alone or together?”

Will: You sense them, right?

“Alone first, for sure,” Caiyeri said. “I know what’ll happen if we do our first run together. I’ll have to see you claim credit for everything all the time.”

Caiyeri: Of course I do. I didn’t figure it was worth mentioning. Not everyone is an actual threat, Will.

“That’s not fair,” Will said, replying to two sentences at once. “I would never. Still, I do think it’d be a good idea to run it alone first. Just to see how it goes, of course.”

Will: I mean, they could be suppressing their power.

Caiyeri: I figure you’ll see in a moment. Here they are.

A trio of high-leveled silver men sauntered into the plaza with the exact same swagger Will had seen in far too many arrogant dickheads—with the crucial difference that these people did not, in fact, have that much power.

“Oi,” one of them called out towards Will and Caiyeri. “You there. Deathy guy, yeah?”

Will regarded him with disinterest. Silver 8. Poison Archer. Not a bad class, but inflexible. “I assume you’re talking to me?”

“Oh, so he does speak,” another one of the silvers said. Silver 9. Rogue Healer. His aura wavered in a way that Will knew indicated some level of inebriation. “Hey, my guy. How much for the elf? Don’t see chicks like that around here much.”

“Please,” Caiyeri snorted. “I’d pay you to take him off my hands, but no amount of money would convince me to spend more than a couple minutes with you.”

“The fuck’d you say?” the first silver shouted. “Do you know who I am?”

Caiyeri looked at Will, who shrugged.

“Wait,” Will said. “Lemme check what we’re allowed to do.”

Will: Hey, Regina. Got a couple of dicks here. Uhhh… lemme send over their names real quick. How mad would you be if I killed them?

Regina: Don’t kill my people. No harm that’ll last more than a day, or we’re going to have problems.

Will: Roger that.

“Aw, that’s no fun,” Caiyeri said. “I’d punch them out or something, but I think our food is almost ready and I don’t want to get my hands bloody. Can you deal with them?”

“Hey, bitch,” the healer snarled, aura pulsing outwards. “You don’t just deal with us. We’re the motherfucking—“

Will stopped suppressing his aura.

A second later, he started pushing it out through Sen, redoubling the effect of his aura just on these three specifically.

All three of them froze, though whether that was because of fear or the Stunned condition was anyone’s call.

The first one dropped to his knees, blabbering something incomprehensible. The second seemed to have pissed himself.

The third one, the one who had yet to say anything, was the only one who managed to stay standing.

“That’s—you’re—shit.”

“Wait, you know who I am?” Will asked curiously, stepping forward.

The standing silver nodded frantically, scrambling back as Will approached. “Dark angel. Reaper. The fucking end of days, man. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m so—“

Will snapped his fingers—not strictly necessary, but it looked cool. He didn’t use any offensive magic, instead just swarming them with his hunger phantasm and intensifying his aura yet again.

When they stopped screaming, he presumed that he had successfully knocked them unconscious and shut it off.

“Got them!” Caiyeri said cheerfully, holding up two massive skewers, each of them almost as long as her arm and twice as broad. Behind her, a somewhat terrified-looking Matt looked on in silent horror.

“Awesome,” Will said, looking disdainfully at the random silvers who’d been a bit too full of themselves. New Yorkers, I swear.

The meal was delicious.

#

Relaxing was nice, but there was only so long Will could feel comfortable chilling out before he needed to get something done. They spent a total of two days recharging and restocking. Caiyeri ended up buying about a dozen more of those skewers—both just to eat and so she could use them in a fight if necessary—as well as half a hundred hand grenades with various effects, a strangely large amount of nonmagical flour, and a few magical odds and ends to make her potion economy more manageable.

Every last person in Will’s party had decided to take the challenge dungeon on, so Regina had flown them all out to Boston.

Now, they stood in front of an ominous gate carved into the side of a now-derelict skyscraper.

“You first,” Caiyeri said to Will. “If this is an elaborate trap, you’re definitely the only person here stupid enough to bullshit your way out of it.”

“I both appreciate your confidence in me and dislike how sure you seem that this could be a trap,” Will said. “Regina could’ve stabbed us in our sleep if she wanted to.”

Regina: I can hear you, you know.

Caiyeri: He knows.

“Welp,” Will said, opening the gate to reveal a dark portal behind it. “Here we go.”

Welcome, [William Li-Brown]. You are challenger number [4859] of this Challenge Dungeon and challenger number [93501] of Challenge Dungeons worldwide.

Entering Challenge Dungeon - Boston.