Loch saw about a dozen Nidan. They were all dressed the same, all apparently male, but he couldn’t be sure. There were clubs made from wood and some made from ice. They walked around a small hill with a cave leading inside. The hill was covered in snow and large chunks of jagged ice. From where he was, Loch could sense the energy of a Dungeon coming from the cave.

  The Nidan Cave was similar to the Hob Mound down by the library. It was a Dungeon that also spawned roving monsters. Loch still wasn’t sure why there was so much difference between races, dungeons and everything else in the Connection. Why were some races like the humans, elves and giants? And others were like the gaunts, Hobs and now Nidan? Why were some Dungeons just the Dungeon? Others a Challenge Dungeon and still others having roving monsters outside?

  What was the criteria?

  Even Cerie hadn’t known. It either was not something the elves of the Silver Bark cared to learn or something they had never learned. There had to be a reason. Loch added it to the mental list of questions for the Connection, if he ever got a chance to meet someone that could answer them.

  And that would be in the brief time before he attacked. Loch hadn’t forgotten his promise to make the Connected System pay for what it had done to Earth.

  He watched the Nidan for a bit, the six moving around the hill or climbing up it. They looked like they were on watch. Loch wondered if these six had been there yesterday when the others had chased after the raptors or were they respawns to replace the others? He wanted to get an idea of what rank the Dungeon was. The only way to do that would be to deal with the Nidan. Which wasn’t a problem. They weren’t that strong.

  Loch stood up, shrinking Onyx down to throwing axe size. He stepped out from behind the tree, letting the weapon fly. It spun end over end, streaking across the distance, slamming into a Nidan on top of the hill. The monster was blasted back, falling down. Loch could hear it crashing through the snow as it tumbled down the hill.

  He Activated Windstep, appearing in front of another Nidan, Onyx back in hand. The axe grew to its default size, the weapon swinging down and cutting into another Nidan. Loch kicked the dead creature away, swinging and blocking the club attack from another Nidan. He stepped back, moving behind that Nidan, pushing the creature to block the charge from another. The two got tangled, Onyx finishing both off.

  The last two charged at him. Loch sighed, shaking his head. He threw Onyx at one, the axe cutting through the creature’s head. The other ran faster, thinking Loch was unarmed. With no weapon in hand, Loch sidestepped the charge, Onyx appearing as Loch swung it down to end the last Nidan’s life.

  Stepping away from the bodies, Loch moved to the Dungeon entrance as a small amount of the multi-colored sparks swirled up, dancing towards him. Reaching out, he held his hand a couple inches from the portal. He couldn’t quite feel the strength of the Dungeon, not like Cerie could, but he’d been around enough of them by now to be able to compare. This Dungeon felt like it would be good for Level Fifteen or so.

  It was close to the clanhold, a little too close for Loch’s comfort. He wondered if there was such a thing as seasonal Dungeons. Something else to ask Cerie when he got back to the school.

  Backing away from the Dungeon, Loch left the bodies where they were. Let the scavengers have them. He was curious if there would be six more Nidan outside when a party came by the Dungeon later.

  ***

  “It’s about right there,” Loch said, moving around to try to get his mental map overlaid on top of the one hanging on the wall.

  He got it to line up enough, the scale off a little. Marking the location with a thumbtack, he dismissed his mental map, looking at the large map of Northwood and the surrounding area. There were a lot of tacks representing Dungeons, a red line in the northwest by Bow Lake marking the boundary of the Silver Bark lands.

  Stepping back from the map, he moved around to the front of the desk, taking a seat. The room was small, built in the end of the building that covered the entrance to the school’s Dungeon, The Painted Caves. It was big enough for the desk, two chairs and the map on the wall. Alison sat behind the desk, making notes in one of Kristin’s notebooks.

  “NIdans, huh?” she asked.

  “Basically dwarfs made of ice,” Loch replied with a shrug. “Probably Level Fifteen range, but we can have Cerie go out later and measure it.”

  Alison waved her hand.

  “Probably not necessary,” she said, opening up another notebook. “Looks like Davis’ team will be available to run it tomorrow. They’re high enough that it shouldn’t be a problem. He can evaluate its strength.” She leaned back, turning her chair to look at the map. “Having that close by is great. Means they won’t have to trudge too far when the snow gets deeper.”

  “But they’ll also leave a trail that comes right back here,” Loch said. “Those Nidan ranged pretty far for being Dungeon-Made creatures. They could probably reach here.”

  “I can tell Darren to increase the guards along the fence in that area,” Alison said, making another note. “We’ve already done that on the side nearest the Lynxia Dungeon. Seen a couple of those creatures get pretty close to the wall.”

  “That’s four Dungeons right on top of us,” Loch said, sighing. “Painted Caves, Lynxia, the Blighted Grotto and now the Nidan Dungeon. All with apparently varying Ranks, except for the Painted that is variable.”

  Loch hadn’t run the Painted Caves in a while. He was thinking about doing it solo, seeing what kind of threats the Dungeon would generate for his Level.

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  “That’s great for training our people and really great with Winter now,” Alison commented. “They won’t have to go far and can still keep regular Dungeon runs.”

  “How goes the training for the guards and everyone else in the Painted Caves?”

  “Excellent,” she said, pulling out a third notebook and opening it. “We’ve got a regular rotation and been sending Level Ones and Twos in the Caves with a Level Five or Six escort,” she continued. “It took a bit of experimentation, but we found that Five and Six are low enough still to not really sap much experience from the Level Ones and Twos. The downside is that we’re keeping the Dungeon pretty active so don’t have many free slots for anyone else to slide into. Once they hit Level Seven or so, we send them to Lynxia.”

  “Have you been able to test out the Caves variance?”

  “Yeah and it is entirely based on the highest Level in the party. We’d send the Level Sevens and up, and even let Davis, Drew, Rogers and Josh’s parties into the Caves but don’t want to use up the time for them when we can use it for training.”

  “Makes sense,” Loch said, voice a little disappointed.

  Alison ran a finger down the columns in the book, looking up at him and smiling.

  “There just happens to be a spot open two days from now.”

  Loch chuckled.

  ***

  Walking out of the office, Loch started walking through the yard, heading for the entrance to the school. He wanted to check in with the girls. He’d been talking to them all the time since he’d left, using the magic notebooks, but it wasn’t the same. Loch wanted to hug them, needed to hold them.

  As he crossed the ground, walking along one of the shoveled paths, he saw a commotion at the gate. Guards were moving toward the gate, looking out over the killing field. Others stayed where they were, watching west. Others were all turning at the sounds. Loch quickly crossed the ground.

  “What’s going on?” he asked, reaching the guards standing just inside the gate.

  “A couple people working their way through the snow,” the guard replied. “Look to be in bad shape.”

  Loch stepped back, crouching down and leaping up to the catwalk. The wood shook under his impact, the guards all looking his way, recognizing him and quickly returning to their duty. Stepping up to the wall, Loch looked out over the field.

  Two people staggered through the snow. The clan had shoveled the snow out from the gate around twenty feet diameter or so, leaving some of the piles with gaps between them. No one had shoveled toward the road. The two people, man and woman, held each other. They looked battered and bruised. Tired.

  “Get a couple healers,” Loch shouted down to the guards.

  He grabbed onto the top of the wall, using it to vault himself over the top. He landed in the clear area, one of his feet slipping on ice, but catching his balance. He took off running through the snow. The snow had been trampled, but it was still deep.

  Reaching the two, Loch saw they were mid-twenties or so. The man had dirty blond hair that was long and matted, as was his beard. He was holding the woman up more than she was helping him. She had light red hair and brown eyes, looking tired. They were covered in bandages and dried blood. The man wore battered leather armor, while the girl was in sweats and a winter jacket. He had two swords at his hip, the woman using a staff as a cane to help her walk.

  They looked up at Loch as he approached, coming to a stop. The woman forced herself to stand, the man reaching down to the hilt of his swords.

  Loch held up his hands, showing he was unarmed.

  “You two look like you need some healing,” he said.

  The man shifted his feet, looking past Loch at the guards standing on top of the wall.

  “That’s Coe-Brown?” The man asked.

  “Yeah. We’re using it as shelter,” Loch said. “You’re welcome to come join us. We have warmth and food. It’s not much, but…,” he stopped, pointing at the woods behind the man.

  “That wall back there,” he said, nodding down the road. “Are those your people?”

  “Yeah. I’m surprised that they didn’t bring you to their barracks and give you food,” Loch said. “I’ll need to talk to them about that.”

  “We avoided them,” the woman said. “We weren’t sure we could trust them.”

  “We uh… we had some bad luck with groups of people,” the man said, still not relaxing.

  Loch nodded.

  “Understandable. I’ve heard there’s some a-holes out there. A bunch of people here came from a camp like that. I’m Loch Brady,” he said.

  Both sets of eyes widened. The woman looked at the man. They both turned back to Loch.

  “The number one ranker?”

  Loch shrugged, a little embarrassed. It had been a long time since he’d bothered looking at the Ranking Board, more worried about immediate survival than whatever the point of the Board was for.

  “Yeah, that’s me,” he said.

  The man looked past Loch at the school again, nodding.

  “We’ve been chasing a feeling,” the man said. “A feeling that there was something out this way. It’s been weeks… I’ve lost track of time,” he said, shaking his head.

  “That’s the holdstone,” Loch said, stepping back and motioning the two to continue. He looked at the gate that was opening, both Susan Turner and Julia Montgomery waiting to come running out. “I’m not sure exactly what it does, but it seems to lead survivors here.”

  “Is it safe?,” the woman asked, shaking a little.

  “As safe as anywhere in this new world,” Loch said. “Welcome to Northwood and Clan Brady.”