I had tried to leave this dungeon once before.

  The first time, it had been desperation that drove me. Not curiosity, not strategy—just raw, mindless rage. I had slammed my fists against an invisible wall while the system sat back and politely reminded me that I was, in fact, trapped forever in this rotting underground tomb.

  That had been the day Grib died. And, technically, the day he came back.

  Now, months later, I stood in almost the exact same spot. Only this time, I wasn’t alone.

  Grib fidgeted beside me, shifting his weight back and forth in the way that usually preceded a disaster of some kind. "Boss sure?"

  "Absolutely not," I muttered.

  I reached out, grabbed his shoulder—and burned the spell.

  Teleportation wasn’t something I used lightly. Something I picked up from the system after killing Big Chief. Any floor I wanted. Any time. It was fast. Reliable. And iIt also cost more mana than reanimating a small army and made my bones hum like a tuning fork. So I barely used it.

  But today? Today I didn’t feel like walking.

  The magic hit like a punch to the ribs. The air folded, the floor disappeared, and for exactly one horrifying second, I existed in a state of wrongness—as if I had been deconstructed into a pile of bones and flung across the void like an extremely poorly packaged parcel.

  Then the impact.

  I landed hard on the damp stone, swaying slightly as my vision adjusted. The jagged tunnel stretched out before me, the distant glow of fungal light flickering against the cavern walls. And in front of us, barely ten feet away, was the entrance. The edge of my world. The place I had never been allowed to cross.

  I let out a breath and turned to Grib. "Alright," I said, stepping aside. "Go."

  Grib hesitated for all of half a second before bounding forward like a dog let off its leash. And then—he stepped outside. Just like that. No resistance. No recoil. No system alert screaming at him to get his reckless little goblin ass back inside.

  He turned back, ears perked. "Boss come?"

  I had already stepped forward before my brain fully caught up. And slammed straight into the wall. Not a real wall. Not something I could see or fight. But the same invisible force I had felt the first time. The unyielding, soul-crushing finality of a rule I had never agreed to and still could not break.

  I took another step.

  Notice: You are not allowed to leave your assigned dungeon.

  The words hovered in the air, calm and detached, as if this were a friendly reminder and not a goddamn prison sentence.

  Grib’s ears twitched. He hopped back inside. Then back out. Then back in. Then back out again.

  I watched, slowly curling my fingers into a fist. "Grib."

  "In! Out! In! Out!"

  "Grib."

  Grib paused mid-hop. "Yes, Boss?"

  "Stop. Doing that."

  Grib nodded solemnly. Then, ever so casually, stepped back outside one more time.

  I exhaled sharply, pressing my fingers against my skull. Alright. Alright. Deep breath. What did we just learn?

  I could not leave. That much, at least, was not new. My minions could. That was. The system did not care. No penalties. No warning messages telling me that Grib had been deleted from existence for violating dungeon law.

  Which meant…

  I clenched my jaw. I had always assumed that the dungeon itself was the prison. That every creature bound to it was just another piece on the board, unable to move beyond its walls. But no.

  The only thing trapped here were floor bosses…

  And then, for just a moment, a thin, cold thread of fear curled around my ribs. Floor bosses? Or just me?

  The realization settled in slowly, pressing against me like a weight I hadn’t noticed until it shifted.

  I had spent my entire undeath defending this place. Fighting, building, keeping things running. It had felt... inevitable. Like the rules of the game had already been written, and all I could do was play my part.

  But now? Now, I had minions who could leave. Who could go beyond these walls. Who could do things I had never even considered possible.

  And that— That changed everything.

  Grib, blissfully unaware of my full-body existential crisis, picked up a small rock and tossed it over the threshold. Then he clapped, very proud of himself. "Boss look! Rock outside!"

  I sighed. "Yes, Grib. Rock outside. We’re making incredible progress."

  And then, because the universe refused to let me have even one serious moment of contemplation, Grib gasped dramatically, as if struck by divine inspiration. “SLIME GO OUTSIDE.”

  Before I could stop him, he grabbed the tiny, wobbly blue creature from his shoulder, gently placed it onto the grass, and then—because apparently we were doing this now—picked up a stick and threw it.

  The slime did not move.

  Grib clapped his hands excitedly. “Go get, slime!”

  The slime, utterly unimpressed, gave a slow, wet blurble and jiggled in place.

  Grib stared at it. Then at the stick. Then back at the slime. His face scrunched in deep betrayal. “Slime…?”

  Another slow, moist wobble.

  Grib picked up another stick and threw it harder. “FETCH.”

  Silence.

  The slime jiggled once, as if considering the request, then gave a very deliberate, very dismissive blurble.

  Grib collapsed to his knees, clutching his chest like a man who had just been personally wronged.

  I dragged my hands down my face. "Yes, Grib. That's because it's a slime.”

  “But…” He looked down at the little blob of jelly, his expression crumpling as he scooped it into his arms. ”What if… Slime no like Grib?” He held it close, shoulders slumping as he turned back toward the dungeon entrance.

  I sighed. “It’s okay, Grib. Slime likes you.”

  I reached out and gave him a pat on the back. Too quick, too stiff, the kind of gesture that said I care but also please don’t make a thing out of this.

  He didn’t say anything. Just hugged the slime a little tighter and walked off, steps a bit slower, a bit lighter.

  I watched him go, and for once, didn’t try to analyze it. It was enough.

  My most loyal, most emotionally fragile minion aside… right now? I needed to talk to someone whose entire personality wasn’t held together by impulse decisions and goblin enthusiasm.

  Gorthor?

  For a second, I considered it.

  Gorthor was, objectively, one of the smartest orcs I’d ever met. He’d adapted to life under my rule faster than anyone—stepping down from warlord to become something else entirely. A trainer. A tactician. A leader who didn’t need the title anymore. And despite our less-than-ideal first meeting, I’d come to respect him. Maybe even like him.

  But he had enough on his plate already—keeping his orcs from tearing apart kobolds, training them not to explode, managing food politics with the delicacy of someone who could crush a man with one hand. Besides... there was another reason. A quieter one.

  Apparently Gorthor could’ve left the dungeon. Same as Grib. Same as Krix. Nothing stopped him. Not the system. Not a rule. Not some magical leash I didn’t know about. He just never had. Because I’d never told him to. And Gorthor—blunt, disciplined, quietly loyal—had never thought to ask. That thought sat uncomfortably in my skull.

  Krix?

  Krix was sharper than he let on. Less a scavenger, more a strategist with a hoarding problem. He planned ahead. Thought in layers. Always looking for angles. Which was... exactly the problem. If I told him that my minions could leave the dungeon, he wouldn’t be thinking about metaphysics or social implications or what this meant for dungeon-kind as a whole. He’d be thinking about raiding. And not in an abstract, theoretical way. No, Krix had a very specific fixation: sweet rolls. I didn’t know when it had started—only that, at some point, it had transformed from passing interest to full-blown obsession. These days, he spoke of them the way a man might speak of a lost homeland. Or a dead lover.

  I already knew how that conversation would go.

  "Krix, I made a major discovery today."

  "How many sweet rolls?"

  Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.

  That left…

  I turned to Grib.

  He was still sitting cross-legged, planted dead center in the dungeon threshold, staring out at the world like it had personally offended him. The slime jiggled faintly in his lap, letting out the occasional thoughtful blurble, but for once, Grib didn’t seem entertained. His ears twitched. His sharp little teeth worried at his lower lip. He looked like he was trying to think. That was always the danger zone.

  Yeah. No.

  I hesitated. Just long enough to know what I didn’t want to do. Then my gaze shifted toward the deeper tunnels.

  Isen.

  Still locked away. Still an unknown. But whatever else he was—slave, cynic, elf with the emotional affect of a dying lightbulb—he was observant. Sharp in a way that cut without showing the blade. And more importantly? He’d been outside. He’d lived out there. Walked roads. Slept under stars. Knew what the world actually looked like beyond bounty posters and adventurer boots.

  I turned back to Grib. “Come on,” I muttered. “We’re talking to the elf.”

  Grib perked up instantly. “Ooooh! Interrogate time?”

  “No.”

  He scrambled to his feet and followed anyway, holding the slime aloft like it had been chosen by prophecy. “Grib bring intimidation.”

  “No.”

  “Grib say nothing. Just stare. Real slow. Very scary.”

  “Still no.”

  A pause. “Maybe Grib tie elf to slime. Psychological tactics.”

  I kept walking.

  “Or—Grib build fake door. Say, ‘This way out.’ Elf walk in, just closet. Very sad.”

  I walked faster.

  Maybe Grib wasn’t coming after all.

  The storeroom door was open.

  It wasn’t supposed to be open. It was supposed to be locked. Wasn’t it?

  I frowned, running back through my memory. Had I explicitly told Krix to lock it? Or had I just assumed he’d understand that when one captures a prisoner, the standard procedure is to keep them inside?

  A pit settled in my stomach. Oh no.

  I stepped forward and pushed the door open the rest of the way, already bracing for the worst. Just an empty room, a loose pile of rope, maybe a smugly missing elf-shaped outline in the dust.

  But no. The elf was still there. Sitting. In fact, it looked like he hadn’t moved for hours. No pacing. No testing the walls for weaknesses. No attempting to tunnel his way out with a spoon he had carefully sharpened against the stone. Just sitting.

  His back rested against a crate, one knee bent, hands resting loosely on his legs. He didn’t look startled to see me. He didn’t even look particularly interested in seeing me. If he had been any more at ease, I might have assumed someone had swapped him out for an elaborate painting.

  I squinted. “You do realize the door’s been open this whole time, right?”

  Isen blinked up at me, expression unreadable. “Yes.”

  I waited for an explanation. Nothing.

  Honestly. I wasn’t sure how to respond to that.

  I opened my mouth to say something. Then closed it. Then opened it again.

  Isen watched this unfold with the mild indifference of a man eating a bowl of lukewarm canned soup.

  He spoke before I did. "You don’t seem much like a lich."

  I squinted. "Excuse me?"

  Isen exhaled through his nose. Not quite a sigh. But close.

  I had assumed his silence before was defiance, that he was keeping his cards close, refusing to engage. Maybe even planning something. But now that I was really looking at him… he wasn’t scheming. He wasn’t resisting. In fact there was almost nothing there. He just looked tired. Not in a physical way—not slumped with exhaustion, not on the edge of passing out. This was something deeper. A kind of quiet, settled weariness.

  It took me a second to recognize it. I used to see it in the mirror every morning before work. Not tired like no-sleep tired. Not even burnout. The kind of exhaustion that came from knowing this is it. That tomorrow wouldn’t be better. That the line didn’t move. Not for you.

  A flicker of something settled under my ribs. Sharp-edged. I shifted, clearing my throat. “Well,” I said, “I am a lich.” It came out more defensive than intended. “Last time I checked.”

  Isen tilted his head. “Are you?”

  That gave me pause. “...Yes?”

  A long silence stretched between us. He studied me—expression distant, but not empty. Then, without much ceremony, he looked away. “If you say so.”

  Something about that stuck. Not because it sounded like an insult. Because it didn’t.

  I let out a breath, slow and steady, and rubbed a thumb over my knuckles. Bone on bone. “You should’ve left.”

  Isen didn’t move.

  I nodded toward the open door. “You could have. No guards. No chains. You knew that. And yet... here we are.”

  He glanced at the doorway. Not with longing. Not with fear. Just acknowledgment. Like a man noting the weather through a window he wasn’t planning to open. Then he looked back to me.

  “And where exactly would I go?” His voice was even. Measured. Not bitter. Not self-pitying. Just… exhausted. “Up there. Down here. One cage or another. At least in this one, you might kill me outright.”

  The words settled like dust in the room. Heavy. I didn’t know what to say, so I didn’t.

  I’d never met an elf before. Thought they’d be more... mystical. Ancient wisdom, timeless grace, a touch of tragic nobility. Instead, I’d apparently captured an existential crisis in high cheekbones and passive resistance.

  “Well,” I said after a moment, “since you’re not leaving... maybe you can help.”

  Isen studied me. Long and level. Then unexpectedly he nodded. “Very well.”

  I blinked. “That’s it?”

  I rubbed the curve of my jaw. Not skin, not stubble, just memory of the motion. “Alright. Let’s start simple. What’s out there? The world, I mean.”

  Isen didn’t rush to answer. He just sat with the question a moment. Like someone who used to care about accuracy, but no longer believed it made much difference. Then finally, quietly: “What do you want to know?”

  Most people, when given an opening, just started talking. Isen didn’t.

  I folded my arms. "Let’s start simple. What’s actually out there? The area outside the dungeon."

  Isen exhaled through his nose. "A few villages. Small, self-sustaining. Farmers, hunters, people who don’t want to live under a noble’s rule. The closest large settlement is Braedon, three days west."

  I frowned. "And large means what, exactly?"

  "Relative to everything else," he said. "It’s not a city. No walls. No central ruler. Just a lot of people trying to survive."

  I tapped my fingers against my ribs. "Who’s in charge?"

  Isen gave a slight shrug. "Depends who you ask."

  That was interesting. A place where power shifted, where no single force held all the strings. Not lawless, but not orderly either.

  "And the guild’s there?"

  "A small branch. Enough to handle contracts and bounties."

  I let out a slow breath. "And this dungeon?"

  Isen studied me for a second before answering. "The third floor has a clearing contract."

  I gave a dry chuckle. "Does it now?"

  Isen didn’t react. "No one has completed it."

  I tapped my fingers absently against my ribs. "No one’s getting past the third floor."

  "You would know."

  "Yeah," I muttered. "I would."

  I’d spent months reinforcing that floor. Gorthor’s orcs, Krix’s kobolds, the undead, the traps—a relentless, grinding gauntlet. No one had gotten through. But the guild hadn’t escalated. No elite parties. No full-scale mobilization. Just… a bounty.

  I shook my head, refocusing. "What about the church?"

  Isen’s head tilted slightly. "Broadly?"

  "Specifically," I said, leveling a look at him. "Are they coming for me?"

  Isen didn’t answer right away. He tapped a finger absently against his knee, considering. "I don’t know," he said finally.

  I waited, but he didn’t elaborate.

  I exhaled sharply. "So they just aren’t acting?"

  Isen’s fingers flexed slightly, like he was sorting through details in his head. "The guild reported a lich here months ago. The church sent a knight to investigate."

  I leaned forward slightly. "And?"

  Isen met my gaze. "And nothing. The knight entered the dungeon," he said. "The church never followed up."

  I didn’t know much about the church. But Draemir… Him I would never forget. Steel and righteousness, stepping into the room like my obituary had already been written. Pompous. Vain. And utterly convinced that his divine mission was already accomplished. And for most of that fight I had been convinced of it too. People like him didn’t forget. And they didn’t let go. The church wasn’t ignoring me. They were controlling the story.

  I exhaled, shaking my head. "One last thing. I’m going to start raiding humans. Any thoughts?”

  His expression didn’t shift. "No."

  I squinted at him. "No?"

  "No."

  "I would imagine most people have some kind of moral objection."

  "Why would I care what happens to humans?"

  “Great point. Counter point: why wouldn’t you care what happens to humans?”

  Isen didn’t answer right away. His fingers drummed lightly against his knee, slow, thoughtful, more reflex than intention. Then, finally, he sighed. "I have been a slave for two hundred and eighty-three years." The way he said it—flat, matter-of-fact—made it land heavier than if he had spat it with venom.

  "Before that, I had a proper name. A home. A purpose." His head tilted slightly. "Then one day, a man put chains around my wrists, and I became something else."

  I shifted, unsure what to do with that.

  Isen wasn’t looking at me anymore. His gaze had drifted to the far wall, eyes unfocused, like he was seeing something much older than the room we were in.

  "I have spent centuries in human cities," he said. "Watching their kings rise and fall. Their wars. Their gods." His fingers flexed slightly against his knee. "And through it all, nothing really changes."

  I frowned. "Nothing?"

  "They take. They destroy. They build again on the bones of what came before. They call it progress." His voice wasn’t bitter. It was just stating a fact.

  He exhaled through his nose, a slow, measured breath. "Slave to humans. Slave to a lich." He finally met my gaze. "What’s the difference?"

  I cleared my throat. "Well. First off—uh—not a slave."

  Isen arched an eyebrow. "No?"

  I sighed and rubbed the back of my spine. “Look,” I said, “it’s not like I’ve got a pamphlet titled So You’ve Been Kidnapped by a Dungeon Boss: Now What? But I’m fairly confident it doesn’t open with ‘Congratulations on your exciting new career in unpaid labor.’”

  Isen didn’t respond. Not with words, anyway. His expression hovered somewhere between “mildly bored” and “strategically blank,” which I was beginning to suspect was just his default setting.

  I shifted again. Not out of defensiveness. Not exactly. Just that same old bone-deep feeling that someone had asked a question you didn’t have a good answer to—and the only way out was forward.

  “I mean, sure. I run a dungeon. I’ve got orcs, kobolds, zombies, the whole... dungeon hospitality package.” I folded my arms. “But we kill adventurers because they come here to kill us. That’s the deal. They step through the door with swords drawn and greed in their eyes, and we try not to get turned into loot drops.”

  I hesitated. The words sounded thinner out loud.

  “But you—” I stopped. Tried again. “You ended up here the same way I did. It wasn’t choice.”

  That got a reaction.

  He didn’t flinch or gasp or do anything dramatic. He just shifted. Like a sword sliding a fraction out of its sheath. Posture tighter. Eyes sharper. All the weariness still there, but suddenly with teeth.

  “You’re not from here.” It wasn’t a question.

  I blinked. “I mean… Yeah. I’m—yeah.”

  “You’re unmoored.”

  “What the hell does that mean?”

  “An outsider,” he said. “Someone from another world.”

  “That sums it up pretty well.”

  And then he laughed.

  Not a smirk. Not the sad little chuckle of someone too dead inside to do it properly. This was full-throated, shoulders-shaking laughter. Abrasive, involuntary, and somehow older than either of us had any right to be.

  He leaned forward, bracing an arm on his knee like the sheer weight of irony had finally buckled him.

  I stared. “Okay,” I muttered. “Not the reaction I was expecting.”

  He kept going. Shaking his head, wheezing slightly, laughing like someone who’d just lost a very long bet with the universe.

  It took a while for him to come back down. When he finally straightened, there was something behind his expression that hadn’t been there before. Like he’d just heard the punchline and it was me.

  “You,” he said, exhaling, “were left hanging when the goddesses tied your knot in the weave, weren’t you?”

  Holy Shit (which is how I spell “busy”), and most of my free time has gone into planning/writing Book 3 so we can stay ahead of the pack.