[D'sP] The Two Sides - Chapter 293 (Patreon)

Sometimes, the thing that hurts the most is when your life is crumbling and yet the rest of the world keeps moving. That was exactly how Tess felt. Sure, the town mourned and had a very emotional funeral a week after. Well, she didn’t want to think about it.

They had even suggested making a day of remembrance. Tess had been furious and turned that suggestion down. She had seen more than enough such days turn into regular holidays. The only people she wanted to remember were the other founders.

Of course, that didn’t mean she wanted Bill, the name still hurt even thinking about it, to be forgotten. Instead of a memorial, though, she wanted a legend. Well, not really a legend, but rather something closer to home. Tess wanted him to be remembered in folklore in the form of a tall tale, like a certain lumberjack and his ox, that one apple sower, or the man who out raced a steam drill only for his heart to give out.

Tess wanted him to be remembered fondly and for his story to be requested by children, not forced upon them by school. Though to even get to this point had been tough. Her first reaction once the diagnosis was clear, was denial.

There was literal healing magic, how could he actually be? Well, yeah. That even went as far as trying to figure out a way to bring Bill back. After all, there was magic and more than enough stories about the dead coming back to life.

Except she didn’t follow that line of thought too far. Jim had specifically made sure Tess got a good long sit down with some of the system provided helpers at the Guild. While there were ways to cheat death, they needed to be set up ahead of time and weren’t even vaguely possible for anyone on the planet right now. In fact, even True Immortals can have a hard time reversing death in any place where traveling back in time has been cut off.

All she would receive from such an attempt in the best circumstances? A new person who had some of Bill’s memories and less of those would stick around with every second. Worst-case scenario? Inviting something malicious into the world.

Oh sure, Tess didn’t accept this answer right away. It is just that with magic and the system there are ways to get certain Truths across that can't be denied. Not that everyone would even accept such knowledge despite on a deep and personal level knowing the truth of it. So yeah, classic tragedy necromancers having gone crazy with grief are out there.

Tess, however, was stronger than that. Her will had been tempered by what had happened since the system came. In a dark corner of her mind, though, she admitted to herself that it was close.

Of course, after that was settled, Jim and Ace practically had to hold her down for a day and a night. With Tess having realized that she couldn’t get him back, had instead turned to another form of keeping him, that of remembrance. The whole thing about how you aren’t truly gone as long as you are remembered?

Yeah, she was going hard on that one except for that first day she didn’t have the whole folk hero thing yet. Instead, she took one change that their new reality brought and tried to run with it. The fact that the stronger you are, the longer you live.

At first, Ace was worried she was trying to get to the dungeon to kill it. A reasonable enough assumption, except that was the farthest thing from Tess’ mind. Rather, she wanted to throw herself against it in a reckless attempt to gain strength. After all, Bill wouldn’t ever truly be gone as long as she lived to remember him.

Nevermind the fact that trying to face the dungeon as an individual was seeking death. Tess had shut off that part of her mind. Sure, she would have welcomed death if it came, but it wasn’t quite at the level of trying for it.

However, despite all that, Tess’ biggest hangup was with the future. A future where she moves on and continues to live. To personally forget Bill. Because she had seen it happen before. When she was nine years old, she lost her father. After that? It only took her mother four years to remove all the evidence he had existed from the house and hook up with a new guy.

Now, Tess wasn’t going to lie to herself and say that Bill had been her one true love. They had been together for a few years and things had been working out, but Tess herself had held back from taking that next step. Afraid to end up like her mom.

Except Tess was now faced with the fact that she had wanted to marry him. Too late, she realized what she had and too late did she realize how fragile life still was. Not that she was the only one suffering.

All of the founders had become close. Jim, in particular felt a burning pain. After all, it was him who kept allowing the group to push forward despite the resistance. It was he who had felt invincible and let the rest of them push to continue.

Not that the other three in the group didn’t feel similar things. Each one of them felt the pain of “what if”s and “I should have”s. Even the founder who hadn’t been in the dungeon felt some of this pain, especially Ace and Doctor. Both feeling that they should have pushed harder to have a healer on every team.

In the end, though, no matter how shaky your foundation might be at the moment, life goes on. They couldn’t even avoid the dungeon as they needed it to keep growing. After all, one of them died facing what, in the end, is a relatively predictable dungeon floor. Out in the wilds? You never know what might be brewing.

The only big restriction that Ace forced on Jim and those left of his team was that they couldn’t just go to floor eleven. They needed to first beat the tenth floor boss again, except without such recklessness and of course no losses.

Not that Jim had put up much of a fight over that. None of his team really felt they had earned their passage. Even if some would say they had paid for it in blood.

Now, while the trauma and tragedy faced by the town would have far-reaching consequences. Bill’s death had other effects. Things that happened a lot quicker.

Down in the dungeon just moments after Bill died, both Doyle and Ally had the same response. ‘Oh ****’

Both of them were worried that this might cause the town to turn hostile. After all, it was one thing for outsiders to die in the dungeon and an entirely different thing for someone so pivotal to die. Though their mood certainly wasn’t helped when right after the group left, Doyle got a message he wasn’t expecting for a while.

{Level Gained!

Level goes from 6 to 7, Strength goes from 64 to 72, Agility goes from 92 to 108, Constitution goes from 87 to 97, Intelligence goes from 74 to 84, Wisdom goes from 152 to 176, Presence goes from 67 to 75, Destiny goes from 124 to 137, Karma goes from 138 to 165, Luck goes from 103 to 120}

Doyle was less than happy about this level. He hadn’t even invested in any new paths since the last time. For such a low level, it was somewhat of a waste to have done anything with it. Though it also brought to the forefront that he doesn’t actually have all that much control over when he levels up.

Though such thoughts are pushed to the back of his mind as he worried about what felt like a more pressing matter. For you see, Doyle doubts he could stop Ace from getting to his core. Now, not even Lily was certain if they could even scratch said core yet, but they could definitely prevent him from growing until they can.

Ally closes her eyes, ‘We need new floors. Didn’t you plan on making the eleventh a maze at some point? What happened to that?’

Doyle sighs, ‘I guess twelfth can be the maze. While I enjoy what we got, I wish I had remembered my plan. It would feel a lot safer to have a maze in between them and me at this moment.

‘Though the worst part is I still have to make it like a normal floor! We don’t know how they’ll react to this and if I wait, I might not get the chance to do anything. Besides, no matter how complex the maze is, I doubt it can truly stop them since it will have to have an exit. At least the exit doesn’t have to be somewhere specific to work.’

Ally shrugs, ‘You’ll just have to lean into making a maze that moves. Sort of like what you did with the tiles on the sixth floor, except intending to confuse. Though honestly, I almost feel like we should rush the creation of the twelfth floor and move onto the thirteenth floor as quickly as possible.

‘That is when you gain access to that new bird monster and mithril. I doubt they will be able to properly defend against mithril weapons if it comes to it. You won’t even have to worry about them using the metal against you as magical smithing requires extra stuff to maintain the magic. The town won’t be able to start making mithril weapons for at least long enough to judge their stance on us.

‘Though if worse comes to worse, at least you’re a gate entrance style dungeon. It will be painful and we still might not survive, but as a last ditch effort, you can cut us off from the dimension. If we’re lucky, you might even manage to reconnect to another location before we drift too far into the void and lose your dimensions.’

Doyle nods, ‘It is good that we have that option. Would rather not use it, though. The void isn’t a place to float around unless you’re a blank soul.’

Ally, ‘I’m not even going to give you the rundown on how it works until the last minute. In theory, you could probably figure it out yourself, but not quickly enough without my guidance. However, I feel very hopeful about those bird monsters.

‘They start at level 20, which means they should be combat ready for that floor. Combine with the fact that even archers have trouble dealing with flying monsters, I feel we have a good chance.’

Doyle sighs, ‘We’re probably worrying too much, but I also agree with hurrying to the thirteenth floor so I can get to the new monster. I really wish it had been anyone besides Bill. Well, and Tess as well. Anyone besides the two founders who were together.

‘On one hand, I believe Ace and Jim will be able to keep things controlled. On the other hand, we really have no way to tell how he will react to one of his close friends dying. And that doesn’t even count the possibility of Tess going all vengeance on me.’

Ally nods, ‘I don’t think we can survive here if any of the founders end up having a grudge against us personally. There is so much they could do to us. Ace might not want to see it as such, but they basically run a dictatorship.

Doyle, ‘Well, I better get to work on the twelfth floor. I just hope my rush job on it doesn’t cause too much of a  problem later. Quick and dirty doesn’t let you choose to leave off the dirty part and I’m kind of afraid of what a dirty floor results in.’

Devastation - Chapter 292

The Twelfth Floor - Chapter 294