“I need your help,” Hans said, sitting on one of the stairs leading up and out of Mazo’s lab.

  “That’s always been true,” Mazo answered, finishing scribbling a note before closing the book to give Hans her full attention. “Which need are you talking about specifically?”

  “I want to experiment with new abilities, and I’d prefer not to kill myself in the process.”

  “Cave crawler phasing?”

  “Yes, and shapeshifting like a mimic.”

  Mazo’s grin was immediate and stretched beyond the boundaries of her face. “I’m honored that you’d let me study your attempts.”

  “I’d prefer you to participate more than observe. This stuff is outside my expertise, and I’d like to do whatever I can to bypass painful lessons. Deadly lessons too. I don’t want any of those.”

  “I wasn’t going to sit by and watch you suffer,” Mazo retorted.

  “Sort of sounded like it.”

  “Do you have any form of plan, or is that where we’re starting?”

  “I’ve not tried more than a finger with the crawler ability,” Hans said. “I have tried ‘forgetting’ that I am using the ability to see if losing that concentration turns it off. I don’t think I’ve actually gotten my mind to truly forget, so I’m hesitant to push any further than that.”

  “Are we starting this process now?”

  “If you’d like.”

  “Sit down.” Mazo directed Hans to a chair next to a mostly empty workbench.

  She dug around in one of her low cabinets and set a dark stone about the size of a cantaloupe in front of Hans.

  “This is a piece of the Gazer Temple,” she explained. “I thought that, perhaps, the gazers infused it with mana, given how much mana is in that section of dungeon, but the rock itself doesn’t store any. This is just plain old limestone. Phase into it, please.”

  Hans extended his left pinky and pressed it into the rock. Like a real cave crawler, Hans could exit the stone as easily as moving his hand through air, but entering the stone felt like pressing into a bucket of wet sand. The material let him pass but only if he exerted the proper amount of effort.

  “One finger?” Mazo asked.

  “I like having all of my pieces back. If I’m going to lose something, this is as much as I’m okay with.”

  “Fine. So you’ve done this before but haven’t broken your concentration to see if your finger fuses with the rock forever when you aren’t thinking about using the ability.”

  “Correct.”

  “I don’t see why you’d have to think about it. If it’s always on for a cave crawler, it should always be on for you.”

  “Devon’s Sense Truth ability is always on for him, but it’s not like that for me.”

  “So you want me to break that concentration for good and see what happens?”

  Hans nodded.

  A brief sensation of lightheadedness passed through Hans’ mind, like he had stood up too fast and become a bit dizzy, except this feeling was so faint as to be entirely inconsequential.

  Mazo frowned.

  He felt it again.

  “Looks like dying made you resistant to Sleep,” the halfling said. “That would have been the easiest way to shut your awareness off.”

  For the next several minutes, Mazo tried multiple tactics for distracting or spooking Hans into forgetting that his finger was inside of a rock. She tried loud noises, sudden flashes of light, summoning a demon behind him without warning, a few Illusion spells, and even playing a game of chess.

  She won, naturally.

  “You seemed distracted a few times,” Mazo observed.

  “I was, sure, but I don’t know if I was completely distracted.”

  “I think you were.”

  “I want to be certain.”

  Mazo paced back and forth across her lab. “Go get me a good water-skipping stone that’s about the size of a silver piece and bring it down here.”

  “You’re sending me on an errand?”

  “I’m not a ten-year-old boy. I don’t have a collection of water-skipping stones readily at hand.”

  “Alright.”

  Hans did as Mazo asked, returning twenty minutes later with a smooth, flat stone about the size of a silver coin. The edges were rounded as if they had been sanded down by centuries of passing water, and it was no thicker than a pencil.

  “It took you that long to find a rock?”

  “That was pretty quick, actually,” Hans replied. “A good water skipping stone isn’t just any old stone. You have to be really critical to get a good one.”

  Mazo rolled her eyes and held out her hand. Hans dropped the rock in her palm.

  The halfling walked to a vise grip at the end of a workbench and tightened it around the stone, holding it in place by its outside edges to leave the flat portion, the largest surface area of the rock, exposed.

  “Put your finger through it and only go as far as a ring would.”

  Hans did as Mazo instructed. She stepped away for a moment and pushed a stool next to Hans and the workbench. She climbed up on top of the stool, putting her eye level with the Guild Master.

  “Close your eyes and think about a-” Mazo slapped Hans across the face as soon as his eyes closed.

  His natural reaction was to step back and curse. “What the hells, Mazo?”

  “Look,” she used her eyes to point at his pinky.

  In jerking away with surprise, he yanked the rock free of the vise grip. The rock was still around his finger.

  “The vise was pretty loose,” Mazo explained. “I think you were distracted enough just now to prove that you won’t die if you phase into stone like a cave crawler, but wear your new ring for the next day or so. Even go to sleep with it on. You’re bound to lose concentration and forget about it eventually. If your finger falls off when you do, we’ll know what’s what.”

  “This is a waste of a good water-skipping stone.”

  “Get out of my lab.”

  “What about the mimic stuff?” Hans asked.

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  “Another time. We just spent two hours I didn’t have. If I didn’t have to teach, I’d have more spare time…”

  “Alright, alright.”

  New Quest: See if your finger falls off.

  The last merchant caravan before the Gomi Games arrived, and Hans expected many of the traders would wait the two weeks for the Games rather than leave and come back. Several adventurers traveled in with them, also intending to stick around until the contests officially began.

  The guild hall was lively. Hans had recently finished a session in the training room, and Mazo had recently completed a lecture on the way Mages should think about chemistry, so several adventurers from a range of ranks and classes milled about and talked with one another.

  With his attention squarely on Association paperwork, Hans wouldn’t have even known the merchants were in town had Quentin not told him. The update was appreciated, but Hans suspected Quentin had really come to talk about something else but didn’t yet have the nerve.

  “What’s up?” Hans asked.

  “I… Uhh…”

  “I think at this point you know I’m pretty reasonable. Generally. About most things.”

  Quentin cracked a smile. His nervous energy seemed to calm, and he settled into his chair across from Hans’ desk. He leaned forward, rubbing his hands.

  “How much do you charge for private lessons?”

  Hans cocked his head. “I haven’t done a private like that since Hoseki.”

  “Didn’t Donbia and Marrok pay to train with you?”

  “Sort of, but those were different circumstances. Are you asking me for private lessons?”

  “I’m not sure how many I can afford, but I’ll save up.”

  “What’s this really about?”

  “Well…” Quentin shifted in his seat. “When you died, I realized how much you had left to teach me.”

  “Ah.”

  “I don’t want to waste the second chance to learn.”

  Hans leaned back to think. “Rotations might mess us up sometimes, but we can do once a week if you don’t mind early mornings. You can also drop in on me here any time. Bring your questions about whatever is on your mind, combat or otherwise, and I’ll do my best to answer.”

  “How much?”

  “Stop that. Let me get with Tandis to coordinate schedules, but we can probably start this week, if that’s okay with you.”

  “Yes, it is. Thank you.”

  Hans’ usual merchant contact entered the guild hall, followed by two footlockers, each requiring two men to carry. A halfling man followed behind them, and Hans was embarrassed that he didn’t notice him at first. Overlooking a halfling around taller races was pretty rude, and he didn’t want to insult someone he had yet to even meet.

  Quentin saw Hans look up and deduced what was next. Standing to depart, he said, “Thank you, Mr. Hans.”

  “We’re square. I promise.”

  “Would you prefer more privacy?” the merchant asked when Quentin stepped away. The merchant rested his hands on his stomach as he twisted right and left to survey the small crowd.

  “Here is fine. Are those full of books?”

  The merchant smiled. “Absolutely.”

  “You can put them against the wall over there. Thank you.”

  The four men heard Hans’ instruction and did as he asked without the merchant having to command them. The merchant and the halfling both pulled a chair close to Hans’ desk to speak.

  “Mr. Hans, I’m pleased to introduce you to Ozzy,” the merchant began. “He is the writer I told you about.”

  “Nice to meet you,” Hans said, shaking the halfling’s hand. “Short for Osmond?”

  “Ozzymandias, actually.”

  Hans raised an eyebrow.

  “Yes, my parents had a love for literature. Ozzy is fine.”

  “Mr. Hans,” the merchant said, speaking carefully. “I heard that you passed tragically, and then I heard that you were in fact alive. And I see that you no longer need an eyepatch.”

  “It’s been an odd summer.”

  “So you never died?”

  “I definitely died. I was blessed with a Diamond boon that affords me a second chance at life.”

  “That’s remarkable.”

  “And improbable,” Ozzy added. “I mean that respectfully. The version of the story I heard included a fae queen and the appearance of a dryad.”

  “Which increases your skepticism,” Hans guessed.

  Ozzy nodded. “It does, indeed.”

  “Well, you wanted a story to tell, and there’s plenty of those here.” Hans sat up straight, struck by an idea. “It’s actually better that you’re skeptical. I know we’ve already made a deal about how this will work, but I’d like to add one more request.”

  “I’m willing to hear it.”

  “When you learn the full story about my death, I’d like a copy of however much you’ve written by the end of the fall to give to the royal family.”

  “I beg your pardon?”

  “I understand how important publishing is,” Hans said, “and I have no intention of cutting the line on that. One draft, clearly labeled as a draft and for the royal family’s eyes only.”

  Ozzy narrowed his eyes. “Why?”

  “It would help us address what happened here. You are not alone in your skepticism, and your account of the events would help us–by us, I mean Gomi–speak with the royal family about facts. We might not get anywhere if no one believes what we say.”

  The merchant stood. “Good to see you two are already working well together. I, unfortunately, have other business to tend to. I’m sure our paths will cross many times before the Games begin.”

  He inclined his head and made his exit.

  “I won’t lie to my readers,” Ozzy continued. “I can’t manipulate facts for any reason, even if those reasons are good.”

  “And I wouldn’t ask or expect you to.”

  Ozzy relaxed somewhat, allowing himself to lean back in his chair.

  “What else can I do to ease your mind?” Hans asked.

  “Is it true that Devontes and Mazo are living in Gomi now?”

  “It is.”

  “And the Ikari Dragons are with them?”

  Hans mostly hid his wince. “Izz and Thuz left for their Diamond quest. It’s hard to say when they’ll return.”

  “I’ve already seen that the dungeon stories are at least partially true. As are the griffons. I have to say, having a griffon shadow pass over you, rider or no, is deeply unsettling.”

  “I still feel the same way,” Hans said, chuckling softly.

  “A story about a Guild Master coming back to life in the dungeon he designed would probably sell as well as fiction as it would as nonfiction, but I hope you won’t be offended when I ask a lot of questions. And I mean a lot of questions. It’s hard to not feel like you’re being interrogated. I promise, however, that’s just me being thorough.”

  “I don’t mind, and I’ll communicate that with the other folks you speak to. Before you get much deeper, you should know that I’m not the main character here. That’s not me telling you what to write. That’s me being thorough.”

  “The resurrection of an adventurer is a compelling story.”

  “I see why you say that, especially since I was murdered, but-”

  “Murdered?”

  “Yeah. I was murdered by other adventurers. That’s not part of the rumors yet?”

  Ozzy shook his head. “This is not helping your case that you aren’t the most interesting subject here.”

  “Listen. I’m very proud of everything I’ve accomplished in Gomi, and I’m excited about the potential of the Borderless Association of Adventurers. I’m not denying any of that. That said, I’ve read stories about adventurers saving the day hundreds of times over, but that’s not what happened here. I stepped into Gomi’s story partway through, long after a family of tusks fled the pogroms in Kirai to start their lives over here. Today, what they built is the last bastion of tusks in the kingdom.”

  “Last bastion?”

  “There are only a few hundred tusks left from the war, and they were all persuaded to move to Gomi.”

  “I don’t recall reports of the war speaking to casualties of that number.”

  “We had an inquest visit, led by Prince Rodrigo. We got that information directly from them. Nearly every tusk left alive after the war lives here now.”

  Ozzy opened a small journal and began taking notes. “I have to verify all of this.”

  “I assumed you would. If you want to write something full of action and violence, you’ll get plenty of that here, but I think you’ll find the rest of the story much more interesting.”

  Hans looked down at the stone on his pinky. He had forgotten about Mazo’s test, and the reminder brought a smile to his face.

  “Hans?” Ozzy asked. “What is it?”

  “Sorry. I just realized my finger hasn’t fallen off.”

  “...congratulations?”

  Quest Complete: See if your finger falls off.

  Open Quests (Ordered from Old to New):

  Monitor for independently grown sections of dungeon.

  Complete the next volume (Bronze to Silver) for “The Next Generation: A Teaching Methodology for Training Adventurers.”

  Learn to help your advanced students as much as you help beginners.

  Relocate the titan bones to the dungeon entrance.

  Master your Diamond boon.

  Test the limits of the dungeon roots.