The adventurers gathered around the open chest, each one marveling at the reward they had received for clearing the Halls of Semla.

Balthazar stood a few steps back, observing. He had found a reward inside too, a skill scroll, which he quickly slipped into his backpack before the others noticed. Jack and Leah had distinguished themselves as somewhat less insufferable than most adventurers, but the crab was still not too keen on answering the questions the pair would no doubt have. Mainly, the awkward question of why a local crab had received an item from the dungeon chest when it’s only meant to produce rewards for adventurers.

Especially when Balthazar was so adamant about not being an adventurer, despite the system’s insistence on treating him like one.

“Oh, man, these are going to be great!” Rye said with a broad smile as he looked at the fingerless leather gloves on his hands. “So comfortable, and the arrow draw speed boost they give is amazing!”

“And an iron-bound shield is just what I needed after that battle with the skeletons!” said Leah while admiring the round wood and metal board she was holding.

Rye glanced over her to Jack, who was hunched over his reward item with his naked and scrawny figure facing away from everyone else, the bones of his spine protruding against his skin as he leaned further.

“Err, sorry that the chest didn’t give you something better, man,” the archer said with a slight wince.

The naked adventurer turned to face them, a huge grin spread across his face.

“Are you kidding me?!” he said with overflowing enthusiasm in his voice. “This is the best!”

In his hands, the swordsman held a singular piece of leather. A sun-crisped, weatherworn flap of cowhide that looked like it had survived a deadly sandstorm as well as a brief but passionate romance with a cactus.

“My loincloth was already so old and crusty, and it was barely holding on after that leap I took back there against the bone colossus!”

Rye leaned closer to Balthazar.

“Did he just say… crusty?” the blond adventurer whispered with an expression of slight discomfort mixed with disgust.

“But this one?” Jack continued, stretching his new piece of apparel in his hands. “This thing is sturdy! You can tell it was made to last!”

The archer and the crab stared at Jack with awkward grimaces as the swordsman brought the strip of leather up to his face and took a big sniff.

“Gotta love that new carriage smell! And it even comes with a +1 to Strength! How awesome is that?!”

“Who enchants a loincloth?!” the befuddled archer muttered between his teeth.

“Aaaand he’s putting it on right here and now,” Balthazar said while rolling his eyestalks away from Jack.

“Gah, not again!” cried Rye as he shut his eyes and turned away with a pained expression.

Balthazar gazed up at Bouldy, who was still carrying Jack’s weapon and looking down at him with a sad frown over his eye-orbs.

“What is it, big guy?” the merchant asked.

“Friend…” the golem replied, carefully moving one hand off the greatsword to pat the top of the crab’s carapace gently with a stone finger.

“I know. I’m sorry that monster destroyed the gift you gave me too,” Balthazar said. “But don’t feel bad. The flower crown may be gone, but what it symbolized is still alive inside me, and that no one can destroy.”

The living construct smiled at the crustacean’s words and the frown cleared from his expression. “Friend.”

“So, I guess this is the part where we leave?” said Leah as she attached her new shield to her backpack. “I’m sorry you couldn’t find the source of the chocolate like you wanted, by the way.”

“It’s alright,” Balthazar said, turning to the fountain. “I found something else almost as good.”

“What do you intend to do with it now?” Rye asked, nodding toward the whipped cream sprinkler.

“Why, I plan to harness this precious natural resource, of course!” the merchant said. “I’ll have Bouldy and Druma come back with as many containers as they can, and I’ll talk with Madeleine about how to best use it in her kitchen!”

The crab turned to the other adventurers.

“If it’s alright with you guys, I’d like to take a walk around the floor before leaving, now that there are lights.”

The swordsman and fighter exchanged a brief glance at one another before nodding.

“Sure, we wouldn’t mind seeing what else is there to this place either.”

The group left the fountain behind and started exploring the many halls around them.

Now that they could see everything around them, it became clear how big the floor really was. Rows of pillars stretched out into the distance as far as the eye could see, the ceiling they supported almost as distant as the world’s sky outside. The marble walls lining the inside of the mountain were so polished, one could see their own reflection on them, provided they wiped the thick layer of dust covering them first.

After less than five minutes walking, the group suddenly stopped as they spotted a pair of shambling figures up ahead—two savage skeletons.

One was dragging its feet as it slowly wandered the hall, wearing a grass skirt around its waist, the colorful strands swaying with each movement. The other had two party hats mounted on its skull like horns, and dragged a sledgehammer across the floor as it paced back and forth between two pillars, looking lost.

Upon noticing the intruders, the bonewalkers turned and started shambling toward the crab at the front of the group.

“Alright, it’s macing time again,” Leah said, rolling her shoulders as she drew her new shield along with the rusty mace the crab had given her earlier.

“Wait,” Balthazar said, extending one claw to block her path. “Something’s different.”

Hesitantly, the merchant took one step forward to meet the incoming undead. As they reached the crustacean, the skeletons simply stopped, gawking with their jaws partially dropped, as if they were waiting.

Putting his Monocle of Exposition on, the crab inspected them.

[Savage Skeleton - Level 31]

[Savage Skeletons - Level 32]

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Disappointed to find nothing new or different, Balthazar was about to remove the lens from his eye when a new box of system text appeared.

[Dungeon Manager Options]

[Savage Skeleton - Manage]

His eyestalks perked up, and he selected the highlighted manage option for the skeleton.

[Error]

[Required Dungeon Manager credential not found]

[Potential cause: incorrect or aborted core connection]

[Command cannot be executed]

[Please contact your local branch manager]

Balthazar recalled his first visit to the Halls of Semla, when his rushed exit interrupted his system’s link to the dungeon, and he rolled his eyes.

Yes, of course. More broken system stuff. What else is new?

“Huh. They don’t seem to want to attack anymore,” Jack said as he stepped next to the crab with an intrigued expression on his face.

The two skeletons tensed up as the adventurer approached, and the one with the sledgehammer let out a low snarl before taking a step toward him

“No, stop!” Balthazar shouted instinctively, raising a halting pincer between the undead and the human.

To everyone’s surprise, the skeleton froze on the spot, abiding by the crab’s command.

The merchant stared wide-eyed at the savage being for a moment before clearing his throat and speaking again.

“Don’t attack anyone, alright? We’re not threats.”

The skeleton quietly moved back to where he was, sledgehammer still in his grasp, and returned to his slack-jawed gawking.

“What the…” said Jack, looking at the two undead with a puzzled expression while scratching the back of his helmet.

“Maybe the skeletons become obedient to those who cleared the dungeon?” Leah theorized.

“Hey, you, give me your weapon,” Jack said to the bone brute carrying the sledgehammer.

The skeleton remained as still as a corpse, not even breathing or blinking—which, if one really thinks about it, is rather normal for their kind.

“Nah, I don’t think that’s it,” Jack stated while stretching a familiar strap of old leather taut with his fingers before slingshotting it at the skeleton’s skull.

“Erm, I think we should just keep going,” Balthazar urged, stepping away from the two idle undead. “Let’s count ourselves lucky we don’t have to deal with any more of those and move on.”

The adventurers shrugged and followed the crab, leaving the two skeletons behind—one of them now wearing a discarded loincloth draped over his impassive face.

After about fifteen more minutes of walking, the group figured out why there were no traces of the liquid chocolate that had spewed out of the Semla Volcano outside. That entire floor, huge as it was, was actually shaped like a ring, a circle wrapping around the conduit at the center of the mountain through which the torrents of chocolate had traveled up.

“That explains it,” the crab said to Rye after peeking through one of the open cracks on the inner wall that the young man had found.

On the other side, Balthazar could see rough stone and remnants of dark chocolate stuck to the rocks, evidence that an eruption had blasted through there recently.

“So I guess this means the reservoirs of chocolate, if any, will be further down,” the archer mused as he stroked his light goatee.

“Yes… further down,” the merchant muttered, staring emptily at a couple of partially broken pillars to his left.

“Hey, where are you going?” Rye asked as the crab skittered away toward the pillars.

The group followed Balthazar as he turned a sharp corner and came to a sudden stop.

In front of him stood a staircase, leading down. Flanking it were a pair of marble stands with tall torches mounted on them, crowned by two pure white flames.

“How did you know this was here?” Leah asked with a cocked eyebrow.

“I… had a gut feeling,” the hesitant crustacean replied without taking his gaze off the stairs. “Call it merchant instinct.”

Skittering closer, Balthazar looked down. The stairs seemed to lead into a dark tunnel after about forty or fifty steps, which were divided in the middle by a flat ramp portion with old rusty rails on each side—likely meant to drive some kind of carts up and down between floors.

The three adventurers and one crab traded glances between each other and the staircase.

“Sooo… We should definitely go back out to rest and restock before we even consider going down to the floor below, right?” Balthazar asked.

“Oh, yes, that’s the right call here.”

“Definitely. It would be unwise to go down right now.”

“Totally.”

The group looked around at one another in silence for a moment.

Balthazar idly pinched the air with his pincer a couple of times.

Leah put both hands into her pockets and rocked gently on the balls of her feet.

Rye rolled his eyes around the hall, looking at nothing in particular.

Jack kicked some dust off the floor with his foot.

“Alright, just a quick peek,” the crab finally blurted out as he stepped forward.

“Yep, good call!”

“Absolutely. It’s wise to get an idea of what awaits us down there first.”

“Totally.”

Balthazar stopped at the edge of the staircase and looked back. “You guys not coming?”

Jack crossed his arms. “Hey, you said it, you do it. We’ll be waiting for you right here. It’s just a peek anyway, right?”

The merchant frowned.

“You know what? That’s fine. I’ll show you who has the real guts here.” He turned to his three companions. “You guys wait up here too. I’ll be just a moment.”

Druma opened his mouth to speak, but one sharp glare from Blue made him stand back down with a nod.

Cautiously, the crab started descending the flat middle portion, avoiding his dreaded nemesis—the stairs.

After a couple of minutes of careful maneuvering, Balthazar reached the bottom and stared ahead at the dark tunnel.

Unlike the wide, open halls from the floor above, this tunnel felt cramped and claustrophobic. Instead of polished white marble, these walls were raw brown stone, like something that had been dug out instead of built.

[Mines of Semla discovered]

The apprehensive crustacean finished reading the notification when something caught his attention in the distant darkness.

Through the lens of his monocle, he could see a tiny line of text bouncing up and down, as if it was running toward him.

He squinted, trying to make out what it said, when a meaty sound of feet hurriedly slapping against the floor started echoing from the tunnel too.

“What does that say?!” Balthazar muttered, heart beating faster the closer the footsteps got.

Each one of his eight legs wanted to turn and flee, but stubbornness and curiosity compelled him to stay just a moment longer to find out what his monocle would reveal.

The mysterious figure was fast, and it was running quicker the closer it got to the light. The crab felt every bristle on his body stand up while he squinted as hard as he could at the bouncing line of text.

[?????? - Level 40]

“Oh, screw this!”

Balthazar bolted back up the ramp faster than any eight-legged crustacean had a right to, powered by a cocktail of panic, adrenaline, and bad decisions.

“Hey, Balthazar, what ha—” Rye started saying before the turbo-crab shot past him, leaving his eyes spinning.

“We’re leaving now!” the merchant blurted out, already twenty paces away from the staircase and still running.

***

“And you couldn’t make out what it was?” Rye asked as the group reached the dungeon’s exit tunnel several minutes later. “Only its level?”

“Yep,” Balthazar replied, still working on recovering his breath after his impromptu cardio session. “Only that they were definitely not skeletons. Those footsteps were way too meaty.”

“I guess we shouldn’t risk going down there yet, then,” the archer said with a pensive expression. “We barely made it through this floor against level 30 skeletons, there’s no way we will be able to handle level 40… whatevers.”

“Pfft, I’m sure we could pull it off with enough elbow grease!” said Jack, walking a few paces behind them.

“Last I checked, your elbows couldn’t even lift your sword anymore,” the crab said without turning to look at him.

Despite no word coming from the swordsman, Balthazar could hear the air being forcibly pushed out of his nostrils.

After another minute, the tired dungeon delvers emerged outside, under what little daylight was still left.

Balthazar squinted, trying to force his eyesight to readapt to the natural brightness of the outside after spending all day inside.

As his vision started to unblur, his eyestalks crossed inward to watch something float down in the breeze and land on the front of his shell—a tiny white flake.

“Is that ash? Is the volcano erupting again?!” Rye asked while rubbing his eyes and looking around.

“No,” Balthazar muttered, eyes wide and mouth slightly open in awe. “I think it’s…”

The crab focused his eyes on the pond and the surrounding land. A delicate mantle of pure white was settling over everything around him, fed by countless flakes cascading silently from the sky, like a dance choreographed by the cold wind itself.

“It’s the first snow of winter.”