“I’m glad Tyler made this decision.” Konohora suddenly said, looking at me. 

We were still walking down, down, down into the dungeon. The pure amount of underground space this place was taking up was… impressive. It’d look insane if someone just dug the whole damn thing out of the ground. I kinda wanted to do that for fun now but sadly, I was neither immortal, insane, or an earth mage or some combination of. I’d have to find out if anyone ever tried though, there’s got to be at least one history book over it. 

Tyler walked forward a little with Riary, talking quietly. I’d grilled him a little bit while Riary had glared at me. That was fine but she’d have to get used to it. I’d only discussed the bandits and the cultists for now, but we’d be going over a whole lot between me and Tyler. Morals are great, I still had plenty, the core of my mind was focused on it. Hell, The Line was practically an immovable object in my mind. Made from the time when my mind had fallen apart and then put back together by my… soul I think? Hard to say. But anyway, the point, was that Tyler was putting us all in danger by establishing a team code of ethics, one that meant murder was mostly off the table unless we had to. 

“You worry me.” Konohora said suddenly. 

I stopped for a moment, before continuing to walk with her. 

“What about?” 

“You have gotten… strong.” There were a lot of veiled messages in that, over things we’d chosen to bury hard in the sand. “And you killed those men and women like they were nothing. You were smiling when you turned around to us. I remember you once mentioning you didn’t want to kill anyone, that it made you uncomfortable. That doesn’t seem to be the case anymore.” 

I glanced over at her and then looked back in front, thinking about my words for a while. The silence continued on for a few minutes between us, our steps the only sound in the underground. Finally, I answered her. 

“...You were right to be scared of Tyler. Or at least worried about what he may do. It may relieve you to know I have a solidified code of ethics ingrained into me but I doubt it.” 

“...Why?” 

“A lot of it basically all but demands I kill and destroy anyone committing an Atrocity. For example, rape. I’ll be murdering anyone we find who does that, by the way, regardless of anything the team says.” 

Konohora frowned. 

“You are correct. Your code of ethics does not put me at ease. What else do you consider an Atrocity?”

“Don’t know.” I said clearly. “It’s related to a few things, a large part my own views before coming to here, to this world, but the overview is… I didn’t pick it. Don’t ask more about it. But rape seems to be the only thing to have triggered it so far. I assume a genocide might as well. Murder seems to be more flexible than I’d like.” 

Konohora was silent for some time after that. 

“It is better than not having one.” She eventually said. 

I nodded and that was that. What else could I really say to relieve her? At least she now knew that the one thing I could never be was a rapist. I would have destroyed myself before taking her by force while under the effects of those drugs in the jungle. Still, there was more to say.

“I have changed. I’m not like Tyler. I’m going to keep changing. Be colored hard by this world but… I’ve always been like this. I can genuinely say that when I’d read books of… heroes and villains, there was a… recurring theme I always hated, despite it producing great characters. The idea of a bad guy who becomes a good guy. I never thought they deserved it. Never once. Don’t worry, I can see nuance, Riary isn’t evil. I’m just saying, those guys made it their mission to kill Tyler and tried twice. I am not going to lose an ounce of sleep over it. I didn’t after killing the baron’s men so long ago or the baron himself. I was actually surprised, that I only felt anger for their victims after they were dead. They crossed The Line. Those guys might not have… but they still didn’t deserve to live.” 

“Armies will come for you.” Konohora said and I blinked, turning my head to stare directly at her. “If you continue to live, continue to grow stronger… I am sure of it. Especially with your morals. There are more than a few Kings and Queens out there who rape. With soldiers just following orders, I worry about the results.” 

My face morphed into a look of bitter hatred. 

“...Many, many great Atrocities have been committed by those ‘just following orders’. I’ll try not to destroy any armies, I really don’t want to for multiple reasons, but I will not promise you anything there. I can at least promise I’ll try not to kill anyone that attacks me under false pretenses, thinking I’m some evil monster.” 

That finally seemed to cheer Konohora up and she smiled and nodded. I sighed. This woman, seriously. She put too much on herself. She took her guide role seriously and it seemed to hover over me too now. …I suppose it was for the best. A few months ago, while I was still human and on earth, the idea of a man being able to kill armies and world leaders, because he disagreed with them, would’ve scared me shitless every night. Superman was only fun in a comic book. My Analyze, my Power Gauge, they were causing my world view to shift. I could feel my power, and all power, all the time. It made everything feel so normal sometimes. 

I was not normal. I apparently was almost able to take on armies. Hell, after B-Rank, I probably could if they wielded nothing but spears and bows and were made of regular humans. I frowned. I’d be fucked by a gun but… how many people could I kill right now if I limited myself to medieval earth? That was a scary thought… I’d practically be invincible. 

Yeah, Konohora was right to worry about a possible dictatorship or singular world leader. 

We continued to travel on and I was starting to get seriously concerned and amazed. Before we even reached the B-Rank areas, we decided to set up camp for the night. There wasn’t ‘exactly’ a day/night cycle in the dungeon, but that’s what small clocks were. I felt uneasy sleeping here but we needed rest and took turns guarding. 

Come morning… more travel. At least it was more interesting now. For a while, the area had gotten bigger but the density of monsters hadn’t. It was utterly eerie walking around a massive dungeon floor, unable to see the walls, unable to see the roof, with absolutely nothing around it. It felt unnatural, even for a dungeon. 

Finally though, some monsters came out of the woodwork and Tyler was the first to shout the second he saw what we were fighting. 

“Are those raptors?!” 

He was wrong, they were Deinonychus, but I bet he was going off jurassic park. Still… I was left in just as much awe. I may have jumped off a freaking T-Rex but that was when things were hectic and very, very serious. I wasn’t doing okay then. Now? Now I was staring at three foot tall raptors- Deinonychus, running at us. They even had feathers like scientists thought! My god… my jaw dropped. 

And then Riary burned them to ash. 

“”Riary!”” Tyler and me called. How could you?! They were so cool! 

Riary just looked at us in befuddlement while Tyler and I clutched at our hearts. But my mind was a step quicker even than my heart. Raptors! Old time lizards! This… I hadn’t researched the dungeon due to… exsanguinating circumstances. But was this dungeon… 

A dinosaur dungeon?! 

My heart soared. The kid in me was hopping up and down screaming. A whole dungeon full of dinosaurs?! That’s so cool! Tyler was still heart broken while I was too amazed at what was going on. 

“Tyler! Are we in a Dinosaur Dungeon?!” 

“Huh?!” Tyler answered, utterly unhelpfully. 

Konohora shook her head and smiled. 

“This dungeon primarily has Pre-historic monsters, animals, and fauna. This is well known. Something that we had plenty of time to research.” She says, while looking at Tyler who can only scratch his cheek. Ha! I have an excuse, what have you been doing for the past month? 

We continued on after that and more packs of rap- Deinonychus’es attacked us. The novelty… never wore off. By the time we reached the next floor, we’d had to stop Riary from just killing every single dinosaur she saw before we even had a chance. Fighting an actual dinosaur was amazing! Too bad they seemed to be monsters, entirely bent on killing intruders. Still, it was an actual dinosaur! 

“Stop playing around already and just kill it!” Riary said, getting impatient. 

As the blood of a dinosaur soaked my shoes, I felt that demon bloodlust rise up in me. This time, I didn’t care about holding it back. I wasn’t fighting humans, these were mindless creatures made in an awesome style. I could fight to my demon heart’s content without going crazy. Well, morally crazy. God, yes. 

Tyler seemed to enjoying himself even more than me. I’d been grilling him on his morals and everything from mind control to hostage situations. It wasn’t only good for setting morals, it also was an amazing start to running through situations we might find ourselves in, with Konohora and Riary beginning to pitch in. Now though? All he had to do was block and slash. No thinking, no begrudging compromises, no deep thoughts. Just kill the mindless monsters. 

I knew coming to the dungeon was “Probably necessary to gain the strength to survive.” But I had no idea it was going to be so fun. God… I’d probably do this for a vacation. This is so awesome. I imagined being alone, being able to just run through what had turned into massive caverns and wide open areas, seeming to build up to something. Just running through this place would feel great. 

We descended and finally… I knew we’d reached the B-Rank areas. I could practically feel it long before we got here and more importantly… I could feel the power radiating from below. But it was nothing compared to what my nascent sphere of perception was telling me. My eyes opened wide in stunned awe, not truly ‘seeing’ but more so getting an odd power flash of what I was looking at. I didn’t hold back this time, running ahead. 

“Hey! Wait up!” Tyler yelled but he was already long past. 

I stared out into an opening. Not a door or a tunnel, but a massive hole in what seemed to be a wall. Down below… was a massive open vista. Green fields, sky, what even looked to be mountains despite me knowing that was impossible. And what I could see below… there was a town. Another town beneath the ground and monsters all around. Out in the distance I could see a massive dinosaur, a brachiosaurus I think? I had no idea. It was just… eating some leaves from some massive trees. I could see what seemed to be a volcano far, far off in the distance. 

“...Wow.” I just took it all in, staring outwards. Part of me regretted not doing way more research on dungeons… but another part, another part was feeling that part of my soul that called to wanderlust fulfilled. A whole new land, new monsters, new animals and plants. New people to meet, new places to explore. I could feel my heart beating in my chest. 

I wanted to see it all.