Every dungeon is a thinking entity with its own temperament and personality. Despite their tendency to take lives, dungeons are considered a force for good in the universe, as they provide intelligent beings with the tools and means to defend themselves from interdimensional rifts and the resulting monsters. There are exceptions, however; dungeons so insane and dangerous they're shunned by all who know of them. The most notable of these exceptions is The Children's Dungeon.

  Excerpt from scholar Ze Cante's treatise on the dungeon universe.

  Jeremy activated his Sneak skill but didn't see any monsters to hide from. He stood in the passageway. The floor of the red path was made up of five-sided rusty-red stone tiles, each large enough to contain one of his feet if he avoided the edges. White arrows on the walls every twenty paces pointed him forward.

  He looked back. The cavern was gone. The only thing behind him now was a stone wall. He touched it. It felt real.

  Nothing to do but keep going. He tried to activate Detect Traps and realized he was out of mana from using Sneak.

  He started walking.

  He walked by several passages and forks in the dungeon, feeling no inclination to explore. The last thing he wanted to do was fight monsters. In fact, he'd be happy to run away from them if that was what it took to get home. He started to think he might have a chance of doing so.

  If Boggan was telling the truth, all he had to do was keep going down the red path and he'd make it home in a day. Two days at the most.

  A brightly lit solitary piece of orange candy sat on a narrow stand coming out of the stone wall. If it was possible for a piece of candy to look sinister, this one did. Surrounding the candy, above and below, was a wide open metal jaw.

  Jeremy activated his Detect Trap skill, not because he had the slightest doubt it was a trap, but to determine if his Detect Trap skill worked. The candy and jaws took on a faint red glow. Yep. Definitely a trap. He waited to recover and activated his Identify skill.

  A Low-Level Trap. If you fall for this trap, you are an idiot.

  He obviously had no intention of reaching for the candy. The jaws would close on him, and he'd lose an arm. But he was already sick of dungeon rations, and he'd just arrived. Grabbing a dungeon ration from his pack, he threw it at the piece of candy. He wasn't the best thrower, but he wasn't terrible either. The dungeon ration bar hit the candy, knocking it off the stand and sending it rolling down the passageway. The metal jaws slammed shut. A minute later, the jaws opened again, dropping the dungeon ration onto the floor beneath.

  With a triumphant grin, Jeremy grabbed the candy, unwrapped it, and licked it cautiously. It had a sweet, medicinal taste. He wasn't sure if he liked it.

  Something twisted in his gut and he fell to the ground, throwing up everything he'd eaten for the past week. All he could do was curl up on the stone dungeon floor, moan, and hope for death. He felt something change on his stat sheet. The words--YOU HAVE BEEN POISONED!-- rested above his name in big letters. Jeremy groaned again. He was an idiot. Good thing he'd just licked the thing and hadn't put it in his mouth. He'd heard inducing vomiting helped with poison sometimes, but he'd already vomited everything, so there was no point in that. For what felt like an eternity, all he could do was stare at his stat sheet and watch his Health stat drop. 4-3-2. As it went down, the number turned from yellow to red. If it went down to 0, was he dead?

  His health held at 2 for a while, then dropped to 1. After that, his stomachache slowly went away and his Health stat started going up again, changing from red to yellow and then to black.

  Whew! He pulled out his water bottle and washed his mouth out again and again, spitting the water on the dungeon floor, where the water and vomit were promptly absorbed by the dungeon as if nothing had happened.

  The poison effect vanished, and on his stat sheet under Passive Skills, there was

  Poison Resistance: 0

  Interesting, he thought.

  Once he felt strong enough to stand, he stood up and carefully put the candy back in its wrapper, packing it away. In a dungeon with poison candy, poison resistance might come in handy.

  He kept walking until he encountered a section of the floor checkered with red-and-white tiles. When he activated Detect Trap, the white tiles glowed faintly. Not seeing any way around the tiles, he nervously stepped forward and crossed, careful to avoid the white tiles.

  Nothing happened. Fortunately, there were enough red tiles that getting across wasn't a problem.

  Once across, he reached into his pack and pulled out his damaged shoe. He was wearing his new leather boots, but he'd put his old shoes in his pack just in case. He threw the shoe at a white tile.

  Nothing.

  Maybe he didn't throw it hard enough?

  Nervously, he crept out onto the tiles, avoiding the white ones, picked up his shoe, and crept back again. This time, he threw the shoe as hard as he could at a white tile.

  Boom! An enormous six-foot-high stone block crashed down on the tiles, blocking off the passageway, crushing his shoe and anything else it might have landed on. The side of the block smiled at him, a smiley face next to a bright, shining sun and rainbows.

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  Good thing he hadn't stepped on the white tiles.

  Since the stone block showed no inclination to go away and return his shoe, he turned around and kept walking.

  Now it was clear the dungeon was trying to kill him. He proceeded with caution, alert for anything that looked different and might spell trouble. Detect Traps: 0 became Detect Traps: 1, and Mana went up to 3.

  In one of the side passageways, something looked shyly up at him with its one large eye. It was two feet tall, bright yellow, had eight stubby legs and a big smile. It looked like a stuffed octopus he'd seen in the toy store. Seeing Jeremy, the stuffed octopus creature squeaked happily, its eight legs propelling it in his direction.

  Uh oh. They seemed cute and friendly, but so had the monster bears before they'd nearly killed him. He walked faster, hoping it would give up pursuit and leave him alone. Instead, other octopus creatures, each a different size and color, came out of side passageways. The smallest was one foot tall, the largest at least three feet. They were all brightly colored and wore big smiles.

  He ran. He found another red and white tiled section and rushed across, careful to stay on the red tiles. The creatures followed. Unfortunately, like him, they knew not to step on the white tiles, but... He reached into his pack for his remaining shoe. Waited until the first monster was a few feet away, then he threw the shoe at a white tile as hard as he could.

  Boom! The block came down in front of him. Green blood squirted out from under the stone, covering his feet and pants, like stepping on a green slime-filled water balloon. A stubby tentacle poked out from under the stone block from where the lead monster had almost made it across.

  Whew! That had been close!

  “Squeak.” An octopus monster crawled towards him over the top of the stone block, dropping to the dungeon floor in front of him, its smiling mouth opened, the large mouth and shark-like teeth showing a resemblance to the evil teddy bears from earlier.

  More monsters followed the first, crawling over the six-foot-high stone block and dropping to the dungeon floor.

  Jeremy ran.

  A white door appeared in the distance. Not seeing much choice (he had over twenty of the things behind him now and was almost out of breath), he ran for the door, praying it wasn't some kind of trap, pushed the door open, and ran inside, slamming the door shut behind him. There was a thudding as the octopus monsters pounded on it.

  The sun was high in the sky, and there were sounds of a fountain nearby. What?

  “Rarrr!” A hairy, apelike humanoid creature carrying a large club charged him from the side.

  “Eeee!” Jeremy backed away from the large club-wielding humanoid, reaching for his knife before he noticed something. The humanoid wore armor and a dungeon backpack lay on the ground nearby. This was an adventurer like him.

  Jeremy held still.

  The humanoid stopped and waited.

  Jeremy reached into his pack, pulled out a dungeon ration bar, and offered it to the humanoid.

  The humanoid lowered the club and looked him over. Apelike was the wrong term to describe this humanoid. Maybe a bigfoot or yeti? Obviously intelligent. The long brown hair on its head was braided with strings of small orange beads, and it wore armor made from the skin of an unknown animal that looked like a thicker, heavier version of Jeremy's leather armor.

  The hairy being was a head taller, twice as wide, and looked like it could tear him in half without breaking a sweat.

  It solemnly took the dungeon ration from him, then reached into its pack and gave him a flask full of blue liquid. The flask fit neatly in his palm.

  What was the liquid? Was he supposed to drink it? He'd already been poisoned once today.

  He made a questioning gesture.

  The humanoid motioned for him to drink it, then opened his gift, the dungeon ration, and took a bite.

  The last thing he wanted to do was offend this being. Not seeing much choice, he pulled off the stopper and poured the liquid into his mouth. It was tasteless, but warmth filled his body, and his wounds started itching, healing as he watched. He removed his leather boots and makeshift bandages and watched his right foot and calf heal in front of him.

  “Wow. Thanks!” he said, embarrassed—all he'd given the humanoid was a crappy dungeon ration. Suddenly starving, he grabbed one of his rations and crammed it into his mouth, ignoring the sawdust taste.

  The humanoid sat down in front of him. Not sure what else to do, Jeremy did the same. Now that he wasn't afraid for his life, he could look around. The walls and ceiling gave the illusion of a sun in a peaceful forest setting. In addition, a fountain rested in the center of a large pool.

  The humanoid spoke, “(Click), UrgMiZinNeh Pos,” it smacked its hands together. “(Click click) urk pinta.”

  At least that's what he heard, but he somehow understood it. “I am Urg Mi Zin Neh, hunter-warrior of the forest people.”

  “I can understand you?” Jeremy responded.

  “In dungeons language same,” the humanoid said. “You not know that?”

  “I'm Jeremy Wilkins of Earth. I didn't know dungeons existed before my brother pushed me into one.”

  The humanoid grunted, “Hmmph.”

  “What is this room?” Jeremy asked.

  “Safe room. Adventurers can stay until sun makes full journey around world.”

  So twenty-four hours. Maybe? Were days different in the different worlds?

  “I'm not an adventurer,” Jeremy said. “I just want to get home. Can you help?”

  For a time, there was silence. The humanoid stared straight ahead, eyes moist. “I gather food with Mother. Saw dungeon entrance, elders couldn't see. They say I chosen, must fight for Forest People, must be brave warrior, but did not want to go. Too young. I want to go home too.”

  For all his new companion's size and strength, Urg was as frightened as Jeremy. It seemed they had more in common than he'd thought.

  Jeremy jumped to his feet, smiling for the first time since he'd been pushed into the dungeon. “Let's be friends, Urg. We'll help each other get home.” He extended a hand. “My people show friendship by shaking hands.”

  The humanoid stood up, grabbed his hand, and squeezed. “Friends.”

  “Ow ow ow, too hard.” Jeremy, laughing, pried his hand from his new friend's iron grip. Something popped up on his stat sheet.

  “You may join me if you want,” Urg said.

  You have been invited to form an adventurer party with UrgMiZinNeh. Do you accept? Yes/No

  Jeremy immediately picked Yes.