Max awoke to a soft gentle breeze and the whisper of long grass rustling around him. Opening his eyes, met the harsh glare of noon sun, directly overhead. Around him, calf high yellow grass waved in gently, rolling hills as far as he could see. Getting to his feet, he could see no sign of Dawn, Uffda, or the dungeon they had been in.

  “Hello? Can you hear me?” he shouted out.

  “Am I still in the dungeon?” he asked quieter.

  Examining the emblems in the corner of his view, he saw that the time till Ascension was still ticking down, but it appeared at least three hours had passed since he was hit by the dungeon boss. Next to it was a symbol of a box with a hand inside it. Focusing on it made a series of notifications pop up.

  “Really?” Max shouted at the sky. “You just entered me into a dungeon? I was freaking unconscious. How was I supposed to leave?”

  He paced back and forth across the hilltop, voice rising with every word.

  “And for another thing, what is up with these blessings and titles? Dawn's and Uffda’s blessings gave out great benefits, where it seems this one just increases my health so I can take more damage and then only slightly helps me when I survive. What the hell did I do to this guy for him to screw around with me like this.”

  “First, you eject me from my party, then you move me into a new dungeon, then you hold my rewards, and now I don’t even get any? This is rigged.”

  As the information slowly sank in, Max’s emotions surged like a roller coaster. Confusion over where he was turned into upset over getting the option to leave while still unconscious, then happiness and relief that Dawn and Uffda made it out of the other dungeon, turned to dismay over losing rewards and fury over the god’s playing with his fate.

  Finally, Max calmed himself down and forced himself to realistically look over the situation. Is there anything I can do about this? Weesa said the dungeons were created so maybe there is somebody to complain to, but I doubt I’ll find them in the middle of the dungeon. Well then, since I can’t see a door to exit the dungeon, my only chance is to make it to the boss of the second floor and beat it to get out. How on earth am I going to do that? These monsters must be much stronger, if it's recommended for parties that are levels 10-15.

  Thinking that made Max aware that he had yet to see a single monster. Being on the hilltop gave him a good vantage point and he could see for what was probably half a mile around him. There wasn’t a single monster in sight. Matter of fact, there wasn’t anything but grass and rocks. No door, no water, no walls, no path, no nothing. How was he even supposed to find the boss for this floor?

  First, Max drew his hand hoping it would give him something that would help. He drew his fallen tower, cloak of shadows, and hellfire. The cloak of shadows would increase his defense but if he put down his Fallen Tower to play it, he would lose the extra attack when he walked away from it. What was the optimal move? Tank up and stay here till he could draw his creatures or hold his cards till there was something to play them against? Looking out over the plains one last time decided Max, if he saw anything coming he could play cards before they reached him, but it would do no good to play cards and then possibly end up needing them. Which, when he considered the level of the dungeon, he was sure he would.

  With no better choice presented, Max set off west toward the setting sun, in hopes of keeping its light as long as possible. As he reached the base of the hill, he drew his gargoyle, giving him four cards in hand. Wandering along the base of the hills, Max started to consider what he was going to do with his cards. In a minute, he would draw his sixth card, surpassing his 5 in hand limit, and would need to discard a card. Should he play a card before that or cycle cards out until he comes across a monster.

  With his fifth card drawn, Ring of starlight, he came up with a plan. He would play the tower and ring right before he would have to draw his sixth card, dropping him to four in hand. Then he could use the mana the ring gave him to play something if he needed to while still trying to find the boss.

  Max was so caught up in going over plans and strategies that he almost missed the first creature. A small fox-like being was huddled behind a rock, peeking out at him. It was very at odds with its surroundings, being maybe a foot tall at most, with an almost two foot long bushy tail. Its eyes were abnormally large, giving it an anime look. It had a large cobalt blue scarf pinned around it, which clashed horribly against its bright orange fur. In one hand it held a small silver wand, the body carved so it looked like vines were wrapping around it, ending in a small pink jewel that sparkled in the sunlight.

  “Back, back, foul fiend” it squeaked at him.

  “Um, what?” Max replied confused. Looking around, it was clear it could only have been talking to him.

  At his words, it ran about 10 feet away where it hid behind a different boulder. After a second, its head popped back up, tilted quizzically.

  “Did it just talk? Can monsters talk? Rats, I should have paid more attention in Professor Redrear’s class, but it was just so boring. I mean who cares about the original form and habitat of a Skylorean Fangbeast, when you could be focusing on how each fang is worth a ruby coin, and it has 150?”

  Its squeaking seemed to be for itself, but was loud enough that Max could make out every word.

  “I’m not a monster.” Max stated, intelligently.

  “Prove it” it demanded, hopping up onto the bolder and fluffing its tail over itself so it appeared bigger.

  Max tried to think of something that would prove he was not a monster.

  “Oh right, I’m a Deckbearer, look” Max stated while playing his Fallen Tower.

  As the tower grew up out of the rocks at his feet, the fox followed it up with its head, until it lost its balance and fell over backwards.

  Immediately, it popped back up brushing the dust off its scarf.

  “Oh greetings, fine sir, forgive me for my poor greeting. I am Shpade of Clan Fearbringer, a level 12 adventurer of the PsychicMoon Party of Guild RubyAbyss. I’m a tank class Earth Deckbearer.” It gave a low bow, then looked up at Max in expectation.

  “Umm, Uhh, I’m Max Silver, I’m level 2, and I don’t have a party or a guild.”

  “You entered SteelBreaker as a level 2? By yourself? You must have some amazing cards and skills. I know legacy Noble families, like you must be a part of, don’t like to share your secrets, so I don’t wish to pry, but surely you could have brought a bodyguard at least?”

  “Oh, um, no, I’m not a noble scion, I was in the Briarthorn Dungeon and the boss on level two knocked me out of that dungeon and into this one.”

  Spades' huge eyes blinked in disbelief. “You jumped dungeons? I’ve never heard of that happening before. Wait, you’re just a regular level 2? This dungeon would be suicide for you, surely the safety restrictions would have prevented you from entering?”

  Max rubbed his head sheepishly, “I was unconscious when I entered, so I failed to leave in the five minutes it gave me, so it removed the restrictions.”

  Shpade gazed up at Max in awe. “You have to have the worst luck of anybody I have ever heard of. It’s so bad it could even get recognized by one of the gods. Can you imagine if Ihealdar or Niralsha blessed you because of it.”

  “I have a God’s blessing,” Max said hesitantly.

  “Really?”, Squeaked Shpade excitedly, “Which?”

  “Deakron” Max said dejectedly.

  “Deakron? The God of Pain? I’ve never heard of him blessing anyone. Is…Is it a good blessing” Shpade wondered.

  “I guess, it increases the chance that cards I draw will match my synergy.”

  “Wow, that’s a great blessing, the best I’ve ever heard of was a 15% chance for cards to match your element. Even a 1% chance to match synergy would be amazing, but I’m still not sure if it would be good enough to balance out having that God’s attention on you.”

  Well shit, I guess that blessing is a lot better than thought, but having his attention could explain how a boss just randomly yeets me into another dungeon. I thought nothing could be worse than Dalmart, but I’m starting to feel like this might be.

  “We should get a move on, if we want to get to the boss before night falls.” Shpade stated. Then he turned and led Max along the base of the hills off towards the north. His constant skittering, dashing, and random jumps seemed out of place in the straightforward environment of the plains, but Max found himself challenged to keep pace. Shpade kept this pace up for over several miles without stopping.

  Right as Max was thinking about asking for a rest, Shpade pulled out a small purple crystal ball and stared into it. Small lights flared and dimmed across its surface, swirling into strange runes then breaking up. With a satisfied nod, Shpade tucked it away again, into a small pouch sewn onto his scarf.

  Seeing Max’s confused look, Shpade stated, “It’s a communicator, my party broke up a herd into manageable portions. A small group is headed this way. We should get ready before they get here.”

  With a quick jab of his paw towards the nearest hilltop, Shpade set off climbing. He scampered through the grass, hopping over any boulders, making it look extremely easy. Max sighed and started climbing, immediately feeling the strain of the steep slope.

  I definitely would have gone to the gym more if I knew the Apocalypse was coming. Dang, no wonder I didn’t see Shpade from the hilltop, the only time he's not hidden by the grass is when he’s hopping a boulder.

  Reaching the summit, Max attempted to slow his breathing, while watching in wonder as Shpade pulled several items out of his small pouch. Man, it’s a Bag of Holding, I have got to get one of those. Shpade had pulled out four metal rods, each made out of a dark black metal that was inset with small red jewels at set intervals. Three of them lit up when he jammed them into the ground, while the fourth just emitted a faint buzzing.

  “Stupid nuthunting gnomes, always so freaking cheap” Shpade muttered as he threw it aside.

  “These Skasit Rods will keep the herd of us for a turn at least, so do what you can.”

  Max could tell that Shpade didn’t have any confidence that Max would be able to help, and he couldn’t blame him. With creatures that different in level, he doubted his attacks would be more than mosquito bites to them. Still, Max drew his first hand in hopes that he could do something. Hellfire, Black Banshee, and Hellhound, but no land to play any of it. If he could just get a land before the creature arrived, Black Banshee’s magic attack would be helpful, as he saw against the raptors.

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  Shpade first played a land, which faded into the grass around them, then played a card causing a small elephant to appear on the ground. At once it let out a plaintive wail and a second card flashed before a large female elephant appeared. Then he played another card that hovered over the grass face down.

  While he waited for the turn counter, Max asked about the terms on Herd Matriarch. Charge meant that if it did more damage than was required to kill a creature, the extra damage was transferred to the nearest target. Bulwark meant that it had to be attacked before any other creature on his field could be attacked. Looking over his cards, Max understood why Shpade had introduced himself as a tank, his deck looked to be focused on strong defense and ensuring he had creatures on the field.

  Drawing his next card, he received his Cloak of Shadows. Still no mana, so he was just sitting on his cards for another turn. Shpade played a card type Max hadn’t seen before, Infusion. This seemed to be a type of spell card that used Mana to increase a card's terms. The charge on Herd Matriarch now had a times 3 next to it.

  Comparing their cards, Max was starting to understand the vast difference between them. Most of Shpade’s cards were upgraded, and all of them played off of each other. Max had a couple combinations, but most of his cards were still very random, but at least the Blessing meant they should combine like this at some point, since they all matched his synergy. He was starting to see the benefits his Blessing provided, even if it was a lot slower to receive than Uffda’s or Dawn’s.

  A deep rumbling, followed by vibrations in the ground drew Max’s attention to the east where a large cloud of dust billowed over a charging mass of monsters. Sunlight glinted off steel horns, six thick and powerful legs thrust large bodies that radiated a dull red aura, incinerating the grass as they ran across it. It was hard to count as they kept darting in front of each other, but there had to be at least 15 of them. This was a small portion? How large was the whole herd?

  Drawing his last card before the monsters were upon them, Max was relieved to see he finally drew a mana, his Fallen Tower. He played it then his Black Banshee, and turned to Shpade. Shpade’s wand pulsed, its pink gem stopped glowing and he played the first rare card Max had ever seen.

  Now Shpade had four elephants out, two copies of the infused Matriarch and two copies of the baby elephant. Max waited for the elephants to charge as the ox reached the bottom of the hill and raced up, and waited. As he began panicking, Shpade’s face down card flipped up revealing a trap card.

  The ox came crashing to a stop as green light from the card formed a barrier that rippled from each beast charging into it, but held. The ox shook their heads, dazed from the sudden concussion, making perfect targets for Max and Shpade.

  Max drew his next card, Deakron’s Hymn, and played his hellhound, while his black banshee wailed, dropping the health of one ox. Floating forward, the banshee struck out with a claw, injuring a second ox. Even with their defense reduced we’re not going to get through many of them with health as strong as they have.

  Shpade played his next card, and his previous card flashed again, turning the four elephants into eight. Now the large defense of the elephants turned into an overwhelming attack, with the charge spreading the extra damage that would normally be lost among the rest of the herd. All four of the baby elephants attacked an untouched ox, then the Matriarchs attacked those same ox. It was like a bomb had been dropped into the middle of the monsters as red numbers flashed and red light burst out from one struck ox into another.

  After the dust settled, there were only four alive ox, all untouched, from the back of the herd. Dang, that infusion for charge made the extra damage splash out on three different monsters. Talk about over powered, if this is the kind of power that is expected for this dungeon, then Shpade was right, it’d be suicide for me to attempt by myself.

  The ox shook themselves off and charged again. Three of them were stopped by the rods which flared with red light before breaking. The fourth slammed into one of the Matriarchs dropping its defense but not leaving even a scratch. Then it was their turn again.

  Max drew his gargoyle, but seeing as it wouldn’t be able to attack this turn, he played Hellfire to buff his Banshee and Hellhound. The banshee wailed dropping one ox to 10 health, while the attacks of the banshee and hellhound dropped another to 16. That trap card giving them no defense was amazing, barely any damage is getting through from my creatures now.

  Rather than playing another card, Shpade attacked with his elephants. The babies charged forward barely doing more than removing defense, but they cleared the way for the Matriarchs to plow through taking out the oxen. When Max dismissed his cards and looked over at Shpade to congratulate him on the win, he saw the fox suspiciously peering at the horizons.

  However, after a couple minutes when nothing had appeared, Shpade finally let down his guard. “Have you learned about loot yet?” He asked while gesturing to the monster’s corpses.

  “Yeah,” Max replied, “One of my party members always does the looting for us.” Missing Uffda, he reached down and looted the oxen, getting five Sapphire coins for each of them.

  “Your party members didn’t follow you in here?” Shpade asked incredulously. “I thought since you were all alone that you didn’t have any party members. Aren’t they worried about sanctions from the Overseers?”

  Max found himself telling the fox all about the last day, watching as the fox went from mildly curious to downright flabbergasted.

  “Wow, a world undergoing Ascension! You always hear about them happening in the distant past, you have to tell me everything, I can get so many extra credits for Professor Oldhorn’s theory class with this.”

  After almost another hour of walking and talking, Max finally turned the discussion from him to the Overseers Shpade had mentioned.

  “They are famous retired deckbearers, all really powerful and old, who arbitrate the laws between guilds and civilians. Most of the time, you don’t actually interact with them, instead you're dealing with their support staff, but there's always the chance that if you mess up badly enough they could deal with you personally.”

  “What about the laws?” Max asked. “Don’t they have to answer to them too?”

  Shpade explained that in the distant past, so long ago that it was practically legend instead of history, rulers had tried to enforce laws on deckbearers. However, the vast difference between a civilian and deckbearer led to violent clashes. For awhile deckbearers built up guilds to train, and group together for dungeons. Over time, governments were either created by retiring deckbearers or wealthy elites from nations used their wealth to buy powerful decks for themselves and their children. Nowadays, most nobles were also deckbearers, but the history and perception of guilds kept them from being absorbed. Overseers were created to handle issues between guilds, issues between nations and guilds, and to serve as first responders to major issues.

  Shpade pulled a small stone out of his pouch. Its simple white stone almost glowed against the bright pink gem in the shape of a shooting star inset into it. He held it up proudly. “This is the symbol of my guild.”

  “Very nice.” Max commented.

  He was saved from making any more small talk by a loud roar, followed by thudding vibrations. Looking up, Max saw a large bird running by a hilltop near the horizon. It looked like a cross between a parrot and an ostrich, with long golden feathers that turned into ruby red at the ends. Its tail swooshed out behind it, part balance for its fast speed, part glittering fan. Oh yeah, and it was as tall as a t-rex, each stride carrying it over 20ft. Gawking at its sheer size, it took Max a couple moments to recognize two things. One of its wings appeared to be broken, dragging along behind it, with jagged gashes marking up the left side of its body. The other was that it was headed straight towards them.

  Shpade was already busy pulling cards, so Max drew his first hand, while trying to subtly position himself behind the small fox. Withering Gaze, Fallen Tower, and Gargoyle were his first hand, which he quickly played Fallen Tower then Gargoyle. Looking at the size of those teeth, he wanted a creature to block for him. Trying to gauge how fast the bird was running, he figured they would probably only have enough time for maybe one more draw before it was upon them.

  Shpade played all three of his cards, then immediately played a forth, bringing out his Matriarch. After reading Shpade’s cards, Max quickly played Withering Gaze off of Shpade’s land. As they watched the Sunstrider draw closer, Max could only hope they could get enough creatures out before the Sunstrider chewed through their defense. As it neared, the counter reset, so Max drew his next card, Ring of Starlight, which wouldn’t help him at all. Shpade played a new card, turning the ground in front of them into a muddy mess.

  The Sunstrider got bogged down in the muddy terrain and was barely prevented from reaching them this turn. His next card was Hellhound, which Max played immediately to get its summoning sickness over with asap. His gargoyle attacked, but even with his Withering Gaze debuffing the bird, it still just reduced its defense to 1. Shpade played a new card, then his Matriarch attacked, dropping the Sunstrider’s health to 86.

  The Sunstrider lunged forward and devoured the Matriarch as fast as if it was just an annoying lawyer. Reddish, orange light burst out of the bird destroying Max’s Gargoyle.

  “What the hell?” Max yelled, surprised.

  “If it kills something in one hit, it can automatically kill one other creature at random.” Shpade replied.

  Out of the tar pit emerged one of the elephant skeletons, bringing their side back up to three creatures. Max drew Hellfire, which he played to buff his Hellhound. However, it still only managed to do three damage to the boss. Max could only hope that Shpade’s draw was far more impactful than his cards had been. Shpade however, just played a card face down before directing his elephants to attack. The two elephants managed to carve a chunk off the boss’s hit points, mainly from the vizier.

  The Sunstrider attacked the elephant skeleton only for Shpade’s face down card to flip up. Purple waves spread out from the card reflecting the damage of the boss’s attack back to it. This obviously did far more damage to it than any attack they had made so far.

  Drawing his next card, Max wished for better luck, Deakron’s Hymn greeted him like the silent laughter of his patron. Screw you too. Max directed his hellhound to attack, so he could at least remove the boss's defense. Shpade directed his elephants to attack, dropping the boss to 3 health. Dang it, just a little more and we could have killed it. Max watched as Shpade played his last card, surprised to see that it was vastly different from the tank type cards he had played so far.

  The elephant skeleton vanished into a cloud of black smoke which then attacked the boss killing it. As Max watched the boss die, a notification popped up that surprised him just as much as Shpade’s weird card.

  Immediately after the notification, 8 cards swirled in the air in front of Max. Looking them over, Max saw right away that only 2 of them didn’t match his element, one being water and the other light.

  Inspecting the three items, Max was able to glean a little more information. The ration pouch would provide enough food and water for 1 person per day, refreshing automatically from ambient magic. The basic wand would provide 1 mana per day, also refreshing itself automatically. No further information was provided from the random gift except that it could be equivalent from a silver coin to an onyx. Max debated which would be better: the rations or wand, but in the end went with the ration pouch as he had cards for man, even if he had to trust in luck for them.

  Turning to Shpade, Max said, “I think this might work with your second element.” He handed over the Waterspout card.

  “Thanks,” Shpade said touched, “This is a nice card. I don’t have anything as good as it, I don’t keep Dark cards cause none of my party has that element. However, I can give you a basic card and a weapon. If your world’s ascension goes the way some in the past have, it can be a big help.”

  “Thanks, these are awesome.” Max said, looking over the new cards. “What is Basic?”

  “That just means it doesn’t have an elemental alignment so it can work for any element.”

  “Thank you so much for these, and for helping me get out of this dungeon. I don’t know what I would have done if I hadn’t ran across you.”

  “No worries, just remember the RubyAbyss guild in the future, you never know what the future holds in store. Also watch out for **********.”

  Halfway through his last sentence, a drone blocked out his words while restricted information in red letters flashed before his eyes. Huffing out a breath at how the system still was keeping secrets from them, Max turned and made his way to the exit. The short staircase down, put him out right where he had entered the Briarthorn Dungeon. In front of him were Dawn and Uffda, clearly just having exited their dungeon. There must be some kind of time warping going on here, as I spent a good couple of hours on that last floor after I got their dungeon clear notification.