"*Wheeze, wheeze*, that was too close..." - Garami

  After a good 5-or-so rope bridges, we had finally fled the "bst zone" for those falling crystal blocks. That was the worst welcome party EVER! And I've pyed some seriously shitty games in my gamer carrier, so that's telling something.

  "Agreed, even if one part of me wanna point out we're far from 'close' to our entry point at the moment." - Rolf

  "Put a sock into it. Like we could do some exploring in an area with something that gigantic waltzing around." - Garami

  "Ehm, fair enough. Had that thing stepped on me, I'd look like gum under some poor dude's shoe." - Rolf

  And that's a scenario I don't wanna experience. Rolf shares the same sentiment, if that shuddering of his is from the fear of his idea.

  "Besides, our goal here's not to explore the area. We're here to find that whatever-their-name-is group Ronandart recommended." - Garami

  "Oops. That had completely slipped from my mind..." - Rolf

  I wanna be mad at him for forgetting something so important, but after a tough climb, being distracted by that "Pioneer" quest, THEN getting attacked by what looked like a giant ankylosaurus that liked pying golf with the giant crystal blocks it created through magic or whatever, it wouldn't be strange for anyone to get hit by a slight degree of forgetfulness.

  We decided to sit down and look through the map properly. Or, I left all that to Rolf. I had something else that had caught my attention before that hammer-tailed dinosaur freak started attacking us. My quest tab had started to blink like a faulty light bulb ever since we finished climbing the "Darknd Cliff". And blinky stuff equals gaming opportunities.

  Quest:Secret Sanctuary of the Sisterhood of DistariaQuest Giver:Ronandart, 4th Branch Leader of the BckmarketRequirements:High affinity with the 4th Bckmarket Branch, especially with the character "Glock".Have a Personal Epic reted to a Divinity of Ruin. Quest Description:As a favor, the Bckmarket has decided to grant you an audience with one of their bigger business partners. To curry favor with these curious individuals, you will have to show your merit to them. Locate their hidden hideout using the map provided by Ronandart. And be aware. "Ruin" can strike at any time.

  Quest Content:Reach the "Darknd Pteau" area: 1/1.Locate the Secret Sanctuary in the "Darknd Pteau": 0/1.Provide the "Proof of Friendship: Bckmarket" to the leader of the Secret Sanctuary: 0/1.Rewards:Fast Travel access to the "Secret Sanctuary of the Darknd Pteau".Positive correction to affinity with the "Sisterhood of Distaria" cult.No, not this. This is the quest from Ronandart, the one that's the whole reason why we climbed that stupid cliff in the first pce.

  Besides that, we have the "Pioneer: Darknd Pteau" blinking, but it's not that different from the Cliff-reted quest we unknowingly cleared. The difference here seems to be that we need to find a..."lighthouse" of sorts instead of just doing a massive climb. The rewards are a tad different, but other than that, it's your common pioneer quest. Rolf probably has it on his quest tab, too.

  This st one that's blinking with a "bck light" on my menu screen... I doubt he has access to this one.

  Personal Epic:Discovery of Ruin IRequirements:Clear specific World Epics.Quest Description:A mysterious end, a fleeting life,The bells toll for everything and anyone, yet their purpose remains uncertain.Young explorer, traveler of worlds, gazer of stars, embrace the darkness and chart a path of light.

  Quest Content:Travel to an area where a "Grand Shrine of Ruin" is located and reach its inner sanctum.Clear Rewards:Advanced Personal Epic to Part "II".Bonus Rewards:10 AP.5 AP to any Tamed subordinates.??? (Depends on how one completes the Epic.)The "Personal Epic" quest, the one that was unlocked during the incident with the vampire mansion, has finally graduated from being a bunch of question marks and corrupted text into something that you can read without wondering if it's the text from some Necronomicon.

  I've got no clue where or what this "shrine" is supposed to be, but I have a good guess that the "sanctuary" mentioned in Ronandart's quest is it. Even if it isn't, looking for clues there is a good start.

  Regardless, now I've got an "epic" to have fun with after we finish the Dungeon Battle stuff with that bsted "the Author" guy. And since I'm not keen on climbing up the Cliff anytime soon, it's all the more important to unlock this fast-travel option to this "Secret Sanctuary".

  "You done yet?" asked Rolf right after I had closed the system menu and was going to say the same to him.

  "Pretty much. How are things?" - Garami

  "We're in luck. Our mad dash turned out to have positioned us pretty close to where the map points to. Point X should be just a stone's throw away." - Rolf

  "Please don't use that saying again. At least until my head's forgotten all about throwing, giant crystals, and monstrous ankylosauruses." - Garami

  "Whoops! Sorry!" said Rolf before taking the lead. Despite Slimes having a bad reputation for being turtles when it comes to movement speed, Rolf here is breaking the stereotype easily. Maybe building racing vehicles affected his SPD somehow.

  Thanks to this Gods-knows-where speed, reaching our destination didn't take too long. It seems it's not only the golf ball crystal meteors that don't like this area, but any other type of nefarious creatures that would wanna gobble us up too. Must be why this "sisterhood" set up camp here.

  However, it seems that reaching the X on the map is far from everything we need to do to clear this quest. The reason why I say this is because we've reached our goal...yet all that awaited us here was...well, nothing. No rge walls that could hide secret doors, no weird magic circles in the ground that could teleport us into a heretical church, nothing. Just a ft open nd, covered in mist. I had Echo take a sweep over the area, but she could find nothing.

  "That's weird..." - Rolf

  "Remind me never to trust you with any more maps from now on." - Garami

  Rolf looked at me with his mouth wide open, making me think I heard the sound of a piano dropping. However, we can do some cartoon comedy ter. There's no doubt this is the pce on the map, so I can't bme Rolf entirely. The entrance must be hidden somehow. And I have an idea on how to bring it out into the open.

  "Let's try this." - Garami

  Saying that, I retrieved the "Proof of Friendship", a bck letter Ronandart gave, and tried waving it around. Nothing happened at first, earning me a weird gre from Rolf, but that stopped when the ground started to shake. At first, I thought the ankylosaurus jerk from before had chased after us, but to our luck, that idea was wrong.

  Instead of a giant dinosaur coming out of the fog, a rge, spider-like mouth came up from the ground. It looked like a mouth, but it was more like a gate to the underground—or the "underworld," from the feeling it gave off. The intimidation this gate gives off is bonkers! Scary...

  "Ehm, we're not going down there, are we?" - Rolf

  "Unfortunately for you, and me, we are." - Garami

  Inside the "mouth", there was a rge door embzoned with a symbol that could be seen on Ronandart's bck letter. It looks like a five-pointed star, with several symbols of freaky-looking animals and bugs around it. Oh, wait. I can see a spider there, too. In that case, freaky-looking animals, bugs, and arachnids. You can't sck off with these kinds of details.

  There was also a rge lock in the center of the door, right below the emblem, but it unlocked itself the moment I pressed the letter onto it. After it finished opening up, squeakily and slowly, the door revealed a long, dark tunnel of stairs that went further down. This isn't leading us to the underworld, is it? We don't have time to tango with the Grim Reaper; the Dungeon Battle is just a few days away! We've got a schedule to keep here!

  While walking down the stairs, torches on the wall glowed in reaction to our descent, glowing with eerie, purple fmes. The vampire mansion had its share of horror elements, but I feel it would be rude to compare the two locations. That pce was just blood-sucking gore horror. This pce here has an allure of mystic to it, something I like.

  We reached the end of the tunnel after not too long, being greeted by yet another door. When I went to present the letter to it, I could hear a squeaking sound from the dark behind us.

  "Did the first door close?" - Rolf

  "...Aha. It's that kind of trick." - Garami

  "Trick? I'm not good with this stuff, so give it to me in pin text." - Rolf

  "This is just my idea, but what if these two doors needed different keys to open? If there were intruders that managed to steal the first type of key but didn't have the other..." - Garami

  "Then this ****ing stairway would become a ****ing tomb! Should I do the suicide-escape first or will you?" - Rolf

  "I've got no desire to return to the Guild Home (read: spawning area) after coming so far. Besides, there's probably no need for that." - Garami

  And as I expected, the bck letter worked like a charm once again. Either I was completely off with my theory, or the Proof of Friendship works as a skeleton key. Regardless of whether my theory was right or not, the view that revealed itself for us sure wasn't something I had in mind.

  To keep it simple, we're inside some underground ruins. It feels like a temple of sorts, but what catches my attention is the ceiling. It's easily three times higher than the distance we traveled through the stairway before, but let's chalk that up to game logic. Other than that, there's a fancy pnetarium show going on up there, though the "stars" look pretty nasty. There are only dark stars of various shades of purple up there.

  The "temple" itself is made from various kinds of bck rocks and marble, sorted in fancy patterns. We came out in an open area, sort of like a pza, with various doors and gates of different types on the other walls, other than the one where the main entrance is located. Different hieroglyphs and murals were pced on the sides of each gate. I have no idea what they mean unless I do a proper examination of them, but my guess is that they're reted to quests of sorts. The "ancient trial" type.

  Else, we have other staircases that seem to lead to the "upper" floors of this underground temple. Unlike the gates, which have quite the "colorful and unique" designs, these stairs seem more at home with the temple. Maybe this underground temple acts as a sort of "hub area" where one can rest and recover before challenging a trial?

  "Hey, boss dy? We've found the Sanctuary." - Rolf

  While I was admiring the scenery, Rolf had looked up the quest and discovered that we had cleared the second task of Ronandart's quest. It had already hit me that this temple was the "Secret Sanctuary" mentioned there, but getting confirmation is always nice. Now then...

  "Huh? What are-?" - Rolf

  "EXCUSE ME!! IS THERE ANYONE HERE WITH CONNECTIONS TO RONANDART OF THE BLACKMARKET? WE HAVE A LETTER FROM HIM!" - Garami

  Searching through this dusty old sanctuary would take all day, so I took a shortcut and shouted out for Ronandant's acquaintance.

  "Hey, is that so smart to do!?" - Rolf

  "Guess we'll find out now." - Garami

  Rolf's question got answered by a bunch of bck-robed figures that came walking down the other stairways. They must be the infamous...sister...hood... Holy ****.... This should lead to some "interesting" negotiations.

  Greydra