“He moved! Fast and far!” Mary shouted to the inquisitors.

  “You said he’s been in roughly the same direction for the last several hours, why would he move now, girl?” The disgruntled, gore-covered lead inquisitor questioned her.

  “I don’t know, but it kind of feels like he isn’t in the dungeon anymore,” she responded softly, afraid of being struck again for omitting information. She knew for a fact that Merrick had just left the dungeon but she didn’t want to let the church know the specificities of her innate skill.

  Under most circumstances, that information was considered a private right and she wouldn’t have to be worried about being pressed or punished for withholding it. She found out shortly after being knocked into the cobbles by a gauntleted hand earlier that Merrick’s ability was apparently an exception due to potential stronghold security concerns.

  The inquisitor eyed her warily, his truth detecting skills likely picking up a whiff of falsehood from her statement of ‘feels like’ rather than outright saying he’d left the dungeon but decided to let her off the hook that time and called out to his cell. The six other inquisitors finished off their opponents and turned to fall back as ordered.

  As they walked back, Mary spent time wondering how exactly things had escalated to such a severity. She’d wanted an expeditious response, which is why she’d done what she’d done, but she hadn’t expected for the church to dispatch a cell of inquisitors.

  She wanted to blame James, the dumb sycophant who fancied himself a suitor for herself, but she knew it wasn’t entirely his fault.

  She’d known that something was wrong with their trip from the moment their landing zone had them appear in a room that she didn’t recognize. The first thing she’d noticed was that the entire place had felt like old-growth, something that was fleetingly rare even in the more advanced entrances for the dungeon let alone the newbie rooms.

  The low risk entrances usually led to rooms that were almost entirely empty, picked clean by urchins and apprentices who made their pocket change off of scraping any bit of greenery and offloading it to various stalls who could recognize the low-quality harvests for what they were and make use of them.

  Not even it being the day before the apogee could explain the level of growth she’d felt in that room and she was still kicking herself for not calling off their trip right away. She could have faked feeling ill and offered to compensate James and Merrick for the trip. Surely, they could have used the money to buy whatever they’d gone there seeking.

  She’d been too excited to explore, though. Curious what had changed and excited to spend more time over one of the few young men who wasn’t tripping over his own feet at the chance to kiss her skirt.

  When Merrick found the hidden twinned-violet everdew bells, she’d felt like the risk she’d accepted on behalf of the entire party had already paid off.

  Those damned everdew bells.

  From there, the trip had felt like a dream. Combat, a little bit of loot, watching her crush look dashing as he helped her combat the little critters that inhabited the floor.

  She’d gotten a reality check when Merrick naively revealed his innate skill’s ability to their group. Why he’d shown something so obviously valuable to an antagonist like James baffled her still, doubly so since it was over something so stupid as a loot dispute. Merrick needed only say the word and she’d have offered to cover the market value of the berries to split them out to James.

  When they’d split up to collect other harvests before returning to the surface she’d stayed close to James, suffering through his awkward flirting in attempt to peer into the man’s plans and see if he had any thoughts about revealing Merrick’s skill to untoward parties.

  Naturally, when they discovered their exit blocked by a strata boss her priorities shifted and the dream quickly turned into a nightmare as the plantaconda attacked their group.

  She was still unsure of the creature had shown up because it was directed by something, if it had been lured to their group by the sound of combat even though the strata transition should have been several rooms away, or if the boss monster had just started wandering the area due to a lack of foot traffic over time.

  Regardless, the massive snake had chased their group into a dead-end and nearly killed them. James was only doing what he could to save their group from certain doom when he shoved Merrick to his death, and Mary was sure that James had pushed Merrick no matter how many times the man insisted that Merrick had lost his footing.

  Much to Mary’s frustration, she couldn’t even blame James since it had worked, the plantaconda had descended the hole that Merrick fell through rather than enter the chamber where they were busy combating the pewlips that were bombarding them with their blood-drinking seeds.

  By the time they’d cleaned up the little creatures, the sound of Merrick’s shouting and the snake’s body sliding over stone had long faded away from the tunnel.

  Rod quietly picked up Merrick’s discarded blade and the three of them had left the dungeon with heavy hearts. Thankfully, the exit rune in their initial landing zone wasn’t sealed shut like the dead end had been.

  At least, it hadn’t been sealed all the way. A crack in the runic circle that the church had painted over the exit was clearly visible, somehow interrupting the seal enough to allow the party their entrance and three fourths of the party their exit.

  Before leaving the dungeon entirely, Mary and Rod had been forced to endure listening to James insisting that he hadn’t party killed Merrick, that the other young man had lost his footing and slid into the tunnel of his own volition.

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  ‘We can even tell the guards at the exit that it was a noble sacrifice. Just tell them Merrick threw himself down the tunnel to distract the boss. The church would probably mention his sacrifice at the next mass and he could become a heroic tale for the children. They might even sent a siphon to his parents,’ James had insisted.

  ‘He wouldn’t need a siphon if you weren’t such a coward,’ Rod had replied, before explaining that he didn’t think they were ever in danger at all. According to Rod, the dungeon couldn’t just sic a boss on a random party and they’d likely just had to avoid the snake for it to descend into the hole that Merrick had fallen down all on its own.

  When asked why the dungeon would have a strata boss chase them down if it couldn’t attack them, Rod only looked at Mary’s pack in response. Rod had recognized the value of Merrick’s skill, just as Mary had.

  She reached into her pack and fished out the counterfeit coin she’d confiscated from Merrick, and it was only then that Mary remembered the everdew bell.

  She brushed the coin aside and pulled out the bell, unsealing it enough to use her innate skill [Sympathetic Herbanectere] in a way she hadn’t before. She knew that the two flowers shared a powerful link due to their innate nature and attempted to piggyback on that bond with her skill.

  She was surprised to see that it was successful and that she was able to get a relatively accurate gauge of the other flower’s location despite the fact that it should be sealed up with what felt like miles of stone between them.

  ‘He’s alive,’ she had declared, interrupting Rod and James as they got closer and closer to exchanging blows before leaving the dungeon due to disputes over what their story to the guard should be.

  Rod had looked at her with sympathy in his eyes and James had merely laughed at her. Rod eventually agreed to James story of events, if only to rush Mary to a grief counselor as she insisted that she knew he was alive and was unwilling to tell them how she knew that.

  She couldn’t just tell them that she could feel that the other plant was moving around at a normal speed, as if it was in a backpack of a person walking around. Not even Rod could know, even though he shared part of his ancestry with her family. If anyone put the pieces together on her family’s bloodline skill, the innate skill passed down through the family, it would bring ruin down upon her entire neighborhood.

  She was low on options if she wanted to save Merrick, unfortunately. She’d resealed the everdew bell and replaced it in her pack, making sure she could still follow the link, before exiting the dungeon with the other two. They’d given the guard their version of events, with only minor inconsistencies that could be chocked up to stress.

  When the guard had looked at Mary for confirmation, she knew she had to flip the script.

  ‘I’d like to report a counterfeiter,’ she’d said to the man as she pulled the bronze coin out her pocket and handed it over. ‘He accidently exposed himself in the dungeon and is now hiding out on a lower floor to avoid legal consequences.’

  The look on James’ face told Mary that he’d likely planned to do the same thing if Merrick had exited the dungeon with them and she scoffed at the man.

  The guard had sent a runner to the barracks, who sent a runner to escalate the issue up their chain of command, who then sent out a few runners to gather experts to examine the counterfeit coin.

  Within an hour, the church had taken over the case and dispatched a cell of the inquisition, making it clear to all parties involved that there would be no more talk of counterfeiting.

  ‘Do you know how the man made this coin?’ the inquisitor had asked her, before slamming his armored hand into her face when she’d said no.

  ‘Do you know if his innate skill works on anything besides the coins?’ Mary got another taste of the cobble stones as her head started swimming.

  ‘Did he actually flee into the dungeon?’ She told the truth that time, that he’d likely been pushed by their fellow party member in an attempt to distract a rogue boss.

  That led to an entire line of questioning where she didn’t have to lie as she explained the events of their entry into the dungeon, the broken and unbroken church seals on exits, the goodberry bush located on a floor too high, the boss monster, everything but the everdew bell.

  ‘Do you have any way to track this Merrick? Is that how you know he is still alive?’

  Her attempts at deflection that time had her beat so badly that the inquisitors had to stop and heal her on two separate occasions and gave her a lecture on matters of national security.

  She’d gotten away with saying she was able to track him due to her innate skill and wasn’t pressed for the details. They were fine with her keeping secrets as long as she helped them locate Merrick before he expired. In that, their goals were aligned.

  They’d spent nearly twelve hours delving before the bond swapped directions and led to the surface, which she’d quickly informed the inquisition since he’d been asking for hourly updates, and she knew that she’d be beat for withholding the information.

  Their ascent back to the dungeon exit was much faster than their decent, to the point that Mary had been scooped up by one of the six standard inquisitors and carried as they sprinted at speeds that made the surroundings blur.

  By the time they’d exited the dungeon, only two hours had passed compared to the twelve they’d descended, and Mary was forced to lead them exactly where the inquisitors feared she would.

  When they’d burst into the teleportation square the lead inquisitor cursed under his breath as he observed the teleportation frames glowing brightly with portals leading to destinations unknown.

  “He’s still here somewhere,” Mary spoke without being prodded to, elicting a nod from the leading inquisitor as he started looking around. She was thankful that she’d convinced the man that she could only feel the general direction of Merrick.

  Mary locked eyes with a figure as it moved through a portal and her innate skill started returning a vague response of ‘the bond exists’ rather than pointing in a specific direction. She let out an exhale of relief as she knew that Merrick had likely made it to safety. Now it was only a matter of how much confusion she could cause to cover his tracks.

  Each of the seven portals cycled a few times before the head inquisitor walked back to Mary to ask if she could still sense Merrick’s direction.

  “No, my skill stopped working that way at some point. I have no way of knowing where he is anymore,” she’d replied, prepared for a beating that she’d preemptively determined was worth it.

  “Do you have any idea where he went?”

  “No,” she didn’t know where the portal was leading, so it was the truth.

  “Do you have any reason to believe your skill will be able to lock onto his location again?”

  “Nope,” She’d replied. How could it, when she knew she’d never ask it to point toward him again. He was long gone, safe and sound.

  “You’re dismissed, citizen. Stay in town incase we have anymore questions over the next few weeks. Two and Three go check for coordinates for any teleports that have already happened, Four prepare a draft message for local chapters of the inquisition for any of those locations and send them out.”

  Mary could only stand there as the inquisitors all leapt into action and left her standing there, used and disposed of.

  Tears filled her eyes and she wasn’t sure if they were tears of relief for her and Merrick or tears caused by the knowledge that she’d likely never see Merrick again.

  They continued to fall from her face as she started her trek home, ready to sleep after a long day and night of chaos, unaware of the Nexus Teleportation Framework beginning to slow and fail.