Cutting down the last enemy with a resolute horizontal strike, Kaitlyn came to a stop, catching her breath as the slash continued, leaving a deep mark against the dungeon wall. 

Her breathing heavy, Kaitlyn returned to the others, her eyes regaining sparks of life as she sheathed her swords, greeting the others with a hollow smile. 

Now joined up with the others, Kaitlyn listened in as they discussed their next plans while drinking water. Seeing that there was only one way forward, they decided to continue pushing forward once Kaitlyn’s breathing was no longer ragged. 

‘At least this fight has... more of a purpose,’ Kaitlyn told herself, reassuring that she wasn’t just back to her days after the war—days she just plowed through monsters to no end, spilling oceans of blood—, ‘Pretend it’s like before the demon king was killed.’

Following the others as they led the way forward into the next room, Kaitlyn, along with the rest of the party, seeing how the room was suspiciously empty, spent a moment studying the patterns on the wall. Spending this time, the party hoped they could decipher what family of dungeons this particular dungeon might belong to. 

“Could be an ancient elven stronghold that became a dungeon,” Sasha theorized, tracing a finger against the carvings that decorated the walls, “Though it also seems like there are dwarven markings, so I can’t be sure.”

Repurposing their fidgeting to a noble cause, helping the party by pulling out all the vines and weeds that blocked the markings, Alix called the rest of the group over seeing that their current section’s markings had a drastic change in pattern. 

Rushing over, Sasha knelt at the markings that Alix had found, taking careful note of the markings and the gap that was between it and the other marks. 

“I have a theory...” Sasha ruminated, her eyes unfocused as she concentrated on her thoughts, not noticing Dexter, the other expert, sitting down in front of her, “This might be an ancient elven stronghold instead, when the elves were one of the most dominant races. Then, they would’ve obviously collaborated with the dwarves. However, obviously, this dungeon doesn’t have the elaborate layout others of this type had.”

Clearing out some more weeds before taking a moment to study the patterns himself, Dexter asked, “Do you have something to address that hole in your theory then? The ancient elven dungeons are quite famous for two things really, having elaborate layouts and having a lot of nice treasure. So far... this doesn’t really have any...”

Her eyes still distant, Sasha nodded, having processed Dexter’s words but not the fact that Dexter had sat down in front of her, “If you look at the walls between the changes in marking, you can see they’re not as smooth. There’s a chance that the layout’s just been blown open. That would explain the massive room we were in earlier, those don’t naturally occur. However, of course, this is still quite a large leap in assumptions, but it’s good enough to work with I’d say. Also... yeah, the treasure has probably been looted by whoever is responsible for the deep voice Kaitlyn reported.” 

“That would certainly explain the lack of riches to be had and the massive amount of monsters we fought through just now,” Dexter agreed, pushing himself off the ground. Then, stretching himself a bit, bending over and touching his toes like a hulking oversized ballerina, Dexter waved everyone over, “Let’s continue forward then, we might not find treasure, but we might find a big bad guy to beat up and then rob.”

Pausing for a second, Dexter laughed, scratching the back of his head, “Did I say rob? I meant... ‘re-purpose for the wider populace’ of course!”

Feeling their image of Dexter as a stone-faced intimidating righteous guild leader shattering, Nao and Alix could only laugh along with awkward smiles while hoping that Dexter wouldn’t just run off with all the riches they might find.

Having stayed quiet during the earlier exchange in an effort not to disturb their thinking session along with still feeling a little worm of discomfort wiggling around in her own mind, Kaitlyn now piped up, trying to feed that worm to a bird and ignore those thoughts for the time being, “I’ll report you to Marie if you do that, old man.”

With Kaitlyn’s words, Dexter froze in his tracks, almost as if a reaper of death was now looming over him, his previous jolly expression crumbling as he sighed, “Alright... I’ll make sure all the things we find are properly reported to Marie...”

Letting out a sigh of relief in his own head, Nao thanked Marie in his head while being glad that everything would be distributed with full fairness.

Next to him however, Alix let out a long sigh of relief, muttering under their breath just loud enough so everyone could hear, “Thank you Marie... for ensuring that everything gets distributed fairly... My broke ass needs it.”

Staring off into the distance with dead eyes, Nao lamented Alix’s lack of a filter while suppressing laughter at the irony of the situation. Then, half a moment later, Nao turned to Alix with a suspicious glint in his eye, “Wait a second, you should be so rich! I use my money to help run a school so I should be the poor one! You’re single, live in a literal shack, have parents who are rich business people, and are super stingy with your money! How are you broke??”

Thinking for a moment, Nao lowered his voice as his eyes narrowed, bending down to meet Alix in the eye, “Do you... have a gambing problem?”

“N-No, nononono,” Alix denied, their eyes darting around and their hands waving like a duck under the relentless pressure brought on by Nao, “I actually~, send it to my paren... wait a second you already knew I have rich parents...”

Watching Alix let out a long sigh, their shoulders slumping, Nao felt guilt rise up in his heart, did something change? Had something happened that he didn’t know about? Was he a little too harsh just now?

A moment later however, Nao forgot about all those thoughts as he felt a vein burst in his head hearing Alix confess, “I’m actually just a money loving gremlin! I love seeing the glint of those coins! Love seeing those numbers go up!”

Nodding with an amused and impressed expression, Kaitlyn, who from even her vantage point, the one was the farthest from Alix, could almost see two coins replacing Alix’s eyes. 

‘I wish I had that type of passion towards money... Maybe I’ll give them some of mine when I have the chance, not like I’m spending it...’

Esiyx

Thanks for reading~!! Please leave a comment~!!
you all ever confuse ducks with geese? idk why i do it a lot...
also like... gay penguins in zoos are so cute... gayguins

...sorry
anyhow please take care all you reader people!!