“Out of all people, you should know better,” Kleo scolded Frank from on top of Dennis’s rucksack. “You’re supposed to be the serious, responsible, boring one. A tryhard and second fiddle. Now’s the perfect time to put your insecurities first and be an annoying jerk everyone hates.”
“I’m not a stage actor following a script,” Frank said plainly. “I can hedge certain bets.”
Kleo looked him up and down. “You? Betting?” She scoffed. “What are you going to tell me next? You don’t fold your clothes in neat stacks based on color and types?” Kleo cut him off before he replied. “Don’t bother. We all know you’re the OCD one. The point is you’re doing it wrong by agreeing to this craziness. You’re supposed to jungle, then climb the stairway gauntlet, and maybe survive intact.”
She pointed a plastic fist up.
“But you’re going to throw all of that away and get yourselves killed for an impossible shortcut!”
“I understand the risks,” Frank muttered, leveling a glare at Mike. “Which is why I’m relying on others for their honest input before we… speedrun.”
“Ugh, hearing you say that makes me shudder,” Kleo said with a stiff cringe before turning to Mike.
“It’s somewhere around five thousand feet,” Mike said, collapsing the retractable telescope after using it. “I could be off by a few hundred feet since I’m eyeballing it. Let’s hope I’m on target with that estimate.”
Kleo laughed mockingly, but Mike continued unbothered.
“Since gravity in the dungeon reflects the gravity from our home dimension, and air resistance is probably similar, then we can factor everything with our combined masses,” Mike said, pausing for a few seconds as he crunched the math in his head. “We’ll get up there in less than thirty seconds.”
Mike stroked his chin. “Maybe twenty-five at the fastest.”
“Does that sound feasible, Luckrun?” Frank asked.
“I’m going to need all of the Good Mana Crystals,” Jay said, taking a deep breath. “Maybe a little more than that, just in case.”
There was a long silence. Everyone’s attention settled on Frank. Nobody had to admit it for Jay to know Frank was the leader. Jay wouldn’t want to be in Frank’s shoes, either. The shortcut could get them killed. That wiped the smile from Jay’s face earlier.
But he still wanted to try it.
Frank toed a rotten log. He propped his fists on his hips. He looked up, muttered something lowly to himself, and glared hard at Jay.
“Dennis, you’re carrying Jay’s rucksack. Mike, you’re handling Kleo. Jay, empty your knapsack and fill it with nothing but Mana Crystals.”
“How many?” Jay asked.
“All of them.”
***
The rucksacks were up off the floor. Mike held Kleo. Her body was light, so it wasn’t a difficult task for [Mage]. Everyone huddled close, trying and failing to contain their nervousness. Frank busied himself with tying the rope around each other’s waists.
Jay sorted through his knapsack, separating good mana crystals from the basic versions.
“Start with the good ones,” Mike instructed Jay. “We don’t know if there’ll be side effects from absorbing too many crystals too quickly. Good quality might mitigate that.”
“What makes you say that?” Frank asked.
“Gamer logic. It’ll be too easy for us to replenish ourselves if there wasn’t a limit,” Mike explained.
“We aren’t going to die if this fails, are we?” Dennis asked.
“Yes,” Kleo answered grumpily.
Frank turned to Mike, and the [Mage] nodded. Jay had no idea what that meant, but he didn’t ask for elaboration.
If he knew there was a Plan B between Mike and Frank, Jay would allow himself room for failure. There was no failing this, like jumping a gap between buildings hundreds of feet in the air. Failing was unacceptable, and Jay was okay with that. Knowing there were other lives involved intensified the moment, but the principles were the same.
“Time to fly,” Jay said, wearing a serious game face.
“Okay, on the count of three,” Frank started. “One.”
Jay sprung into a backflip.
He accounted for the little bit of slack he had from the rope, getting high enough to clear his head from the ground as his feet swung up. Activating [Dance Floor Relativity] was as simple as making a wish and feeling the field of his power extend five and a half feet in all directions. It was a small circle, but everyone was close to each side of him to be within range.
They lurched upward so suddenly that even Jay was surprised by gravity’s flippancy. At the same time, his skull flared with intense heat. His eyes felt like they were getting stabbed by needles behind the sockets. Blood pooled into his nose as he fell–rose through the air with his screaming, flailing, out-of-control party. The little flip that had counted as his dance did little to help. It was a huge strain to maintain focus and keep the Skill going, and account for five people at the same time.
In what felt like no time, his mana bottomed out. A headache hammered his skull. The speed of their descent–ascent slowed as they neared their apex. Jay squinted through his blurry vision while upside down. They still had plenty of wall to clear before reaching the second floor.
“Jay, we’re going to fall soon!” Mike screamed.
The [Freak] dug through his knapsack, grabbing anything within reach inside the jumbled apparel. He selected Yes when a notification asked him if he wanted to absorb the crystal.
The headache dulled. His vision cleared. He was still not okay, but he didn’t care. He pushed on [Dance Floor Relativity] again, restarting the freefall upwards with everyone in tow. He tried to track the seconds one Mississippi at a time, but the wretched disorientation from overdrawing on mana muggled his head badly. He was out of it again when the Skill cut off a second time, and they started to slow in their rise.
“Are we there yet?” Jay rasped.
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“No!” Dennis screamed.
He absorbed another mana crystal, answering the question on rapid crystal absorption side-effects.
You’ve been inflicted with mana sickness. Absorbing more mana crystals will reduce its mana replenishing effect and further the intensity of migraines, confusion, and mental deterioration. This will last for a limited time or until you have a full extended rest.
This time, Jay’s torment didn’t fade away much. It diminished, but it stayed on top of him like an evil ex. It was so bad that he didn’t realize Mike was shaking him while they were still midair, snapping him out of his stupor.
“One more, Jay!” his best friend begged.
“No problemmo!” Jay said sluggishly, absorbing another two crystals. It took every iota of concentration to find [Dance Floor Relativity] inside of him and squeeze it for all it got. One more time should do it, at least.
***
Jay started to wake groggily, feeling hella drained. One side of his body was cold. The other side basked in the glow of a fire. When he opened his eyes, he feared he’d gone blind from his vision’s blurriness. After a few seconds of blinking and panicking, things got into focus.
He shifted slightly. A dull headache warned him from moving too much. Jay groaned, laying still. He heard the crunch of boots nearby. Mike’s face appeared overhead, his best friend kneeling. His glasses were in his hands, keeping nothing from Jay while showing his full concern.
Jay cracked a weak smile. “Did I do the impossible?”
“Four times,” Mike said. “You pushed yourself four times to get us on the second floor.”
“I don’t remember the fourth one,” Jay croaked.
“You were in a semi-unconscious state by then. We were only a hundred feet away when I realized our continued vector would have us shoot past the second floor. I convinced you to reangle the Skill with a lot of shouting and begging. I managed to reach you by the grace of something beyond my understanding.”
Jay gave Mike a wink. “What can I say? You’re my boy. If there are a few people I’m going to listen to, you’re one of them.”
“That’s total crap, Jay,” Mike said, getting angry. “It was me that said we shouldn’t go to the party. If you had listened to me then, we wouldn’t have been here, would we?”
“You were lying to yourself,” Jay said. “You wanted to go. I wanted to go. It wasn’t a big deal. You just needed that push from me.”
“Well, it looks like my fears were warranted,” Mike grumped before softening. “I enabled you to hurt yourself. We shouldn’t have taken the risk. I thought you were going to die, man.”
Jay reached up weakly and grabbed Mike’s forearm. The little gesture was a lot for him, but he gave his childhood friend a squeeze of reassurance. They remained like that for a while until Mike patted Jay’s hand.
That was enough bromance.
“The others?”
“They’re scouting around the top of the staircase,” Mike explained. “You might’ve noticed by now it’s snowy up here. A little foggy, but not as bad as the jungle hallway below. Thankfully, it’s a Safe Zone all on its own. That comes with a host of interesting problems.”
“Like what?”
“Four giant doorways. Three of them can only be accessed solo. One requires all of the three solo-only rooms to be completed before it opens up, which suggests that’s the boss room.”
“Okay, but that doesn’t explain why we’re backtracking unless….” Jay trailed off, getting his brain to think despite how slow and laborious it felt. “Oh, ha, and I thought I was the only creative one. Your idea?”
“I thought about it, but Frank voiced it first,” Mike admitted. “Your speedrun attitude inspired him. He thought we might as well leverage every advantage we got since we’re putting the dungeon’s design in an awkward position.”
“Is Kleo freaking out?”
“Yup,” Mike said with a smile. “I think Frank realizes part of the reason we have her around.”
“Good, good, that’s still going as planned,” Jay said. “Or not going as planned. Can’t tell you how to say that. Brain still mush. Still might need to rest some.”
“Take your time. We still have a day’s worth of dungeon time.”
“Doesn’t sound like much.”
“It will be if we create more Safe Zones,” Mike countered.
“While we screw things up on purpose, level up, and–” Jay paused, a sudden but painful thought coming to him. He scrolled through his system notifications.
“What?” Mike asked in suspense.
Jay gave him a lopsided grin. “Killing monsters isn’t the only way to gain experience.”
“Now I’m afraid this is going to lead to more reckless maneuvers,” Mike said, “and I’m going to fail to discourage or end up encouraging more of this descent into madness.”
“Look at the bright side.”
“I pray to ask what the bright side is.”
“Madness is more fun,” the [Freak] said.