Administrator Command, Zenos repeated in his thoughts. How did an NPC wield the power of the arkitects? It was the following day and he sat alone on a hill overlooking the birch-wood valley. Barren trees towered like bone-white skeletons over a pale-yellow quilt of leaves. What automatons Zenos had left remained idle and there were no leaf piles to mark …

Fiona drew back her bowstring, laced a mithril arrow between her fingers. The four remaining DPS in our group, two wizards and two rangers, joined the attack. Spells and arrows were flung at once. “Fireball!” Leo shouted again. “Level 5!” The barrage hammered the dungeon ruler’s back and broke its stone skin. Shards of rock hurtled to the floor. It …

So, the raid had reached the door to the lair of the dungeon ruler. It was a large portal of wrought iron, embellished with art of golems—what you called the dwarfs—on its face. Khelero turned to the raid that waited anxiously behind him. “It’s time,” he said to us, “activate your con-links.” The subconscious link. It’s a small device of …

We gathered in the morning, just after first light, and waited before the iron face of the dungeon door. Khelero stood head-to-toe in his steel full-plate. His beak visor was locked upright, so I could see his face. He looked calm with his kite shield strapped firmly to his left arm. It was emblazoned with a Baru noble crest, a …

  It was about this time last year. A cloud of ash had blown in from the west and brought an early snow, blanketed the Adderhorn in gray and white. Despite the cold, our raid fared well. We had setup tents down to the bottom of the hill, along the road that brokered the dungeon ruins. The day before the …

Four days remained, but Zenos had slept poorly. He had suffered bizarre dreams of black halls and moon-lit chambers, where white light scattered on pools of infinite depth. In those dreams, he was chased over the pools by an invisible force. If he hid, he would be found; if he ran, he would be caught; and if he fought, he …

The sky was richly colored in orange and pink. Its lavender clouds drifted eastward, far above tall pines and dark-green firs. In the breaks of the forest, where the trees were short and the mountain was steep, one could see the ocean horizon, marked by the white-cap waves of rough seas. A cool breeze brushed Zenos and fluttered the campsite …

There were many dwarf statues. They were attached to the walls, where they hung from their arms as prisoners in stone chains. They were in the water, some beneath the black, and others rising above it with their heads upturned toward the stalactite ceiling. They were even among the black trees, tangled in their gnarled roots or captured by their …

Zenos awoke before first light, early enough that frogs still croaked among the whistling statues. He crawled out of his tent to find the fire cold. Mad’s own tent was open and a cursory glance proved the bedroll was empty. “How early did he leave?” Zenos wondered aloud. He had put himself to bed not long after sundown. An early …

Less than two weeks remained before the dungeon break. Zenos kept exercising, even if it did nothing for his stat total, because he looked forward to spars with Mad. Practical fighting experience was always important, and he could still learn from Mad’s tricks. However, the seasoned adventurer had begun excusing himself from morning training. Eventually, he stopped coming all together. …