The explosion of thoughts and worries from the Rank S Alchemy skill book caused Richard to be overloaded. And in order to settle down some he decided to try the age old adage of relax, don’t worry, and have a home brew. He had bottled a brown beer after finishing off the last of the cream ale. With the recipe he had used Richard had managed to balance the caramel flavors with a bit of fruitiness and it turned out not bad. It was a good beer for the start of fall.

  After looking at the mess in his kitchen for far too long he worked at putting away the books and things scattered over the table. Then he moved his carboys and other brewing equipment under the counters. He never left any dishes unwashed, but there were some that were dry to put away.

  When he finally felt centered again Richard decided to look up what information there was on crafting with Alchemy. From what he could find he would need not only several different ingredients, but also tools to process them. A simple burner for heating, potion bottles, a distiller, at the very least. As well as mounds and mounds of ingredients.

  One problem Richard found was that everyone was talking about how crafting worked, but no one was mentioning any recipes or schematics. Instead it sounded like they just tried things until they produced something recognized by the System. Then they would zealously guard whatever secrets they had managed to unearth.

  Which really meant that he was going to have to spend some money in order to make some money. Even assuming that he just waited for drops to come to him. He would need to cover the tax until such a time that he was able to produce a product worth selling. Which meant longer and more days in the dungeon. Ugh.

  Richard sat back in his chair, sighed and slouched down. It might have been better to just sell the book. Then he would have been set for life. With that though in his mind he tried to look up the prices of skill books. And on a certain auction site it seemed like the F Rank ones tended to go from 15 to 20 million. E rank ones were closer to 30 million. Not an amount of money that he would ever have just sitting around. What about S Rank? There wasn’t any information about anything of that level. Which suggested that it never dropped before or that it was snatched up by the guilds before it hit the market. Or used like in Richard’s case.

  He slapped his cheeks to recenter himself. The stinging pain helped to untangle his thoughts. He knew that it was unhealthy, but hadn’t found anything else to be as effective.

  Instead of worrying about the money he could have had, Richard worked out where to explore next. While there were other dungeons in his current city, Welf. They weren’t ones that were opened as ‘safe’. If he wanted that then the next closest was in the next city over, New Burl. Which meant that he needed to put in at least 4 hours otherwise the travel fees would need to be paid. There was also time that it would take travelling… but for $500 he could get there and back with a day pass. A monthly pass would cut the total cost by 15%. But that would be quite the investment, and might not make money if the dungeon was swarmed like the Slime dungeon was.

  The next morning Richard hopped onto a bus and started the hour-long ride to the new dungeon. He had decided during the night to at least check it out. Spending a day or two gathering information about the monsters, drops, and busy levels made more sense to him. And if things worked out then maybe he could get the monthly pass.

  Despite the hour long trip it wasn’t a bad one. The scenery between the two cities made up for it. Most of the land had been either forest or farm land before the dungeons appeared. And after it was abandoned to the monsters. A great number had escaped from the breaks. And the land became overgrown.

  In the years since mankind had slowly taken care of the monsters, and were now reclaiming the land. While it wasn’t as sterile as Richard's apartment building. The farm houses were single family dwellings. Square and mulifloored. With gardens wrapping around the buildings and swatches of color from the flowers in bloom. There was a feeling of life to the countryside that called to him. Not enough to move there, just enough to make him want to visit from time to time.

  The bus entered the fringes of the city and arrived at the ‘safe’ dungeon. Richard chuckled as the Dungeon Center looked the same as the one at the Slime Dungeon. Probably all done by the same unimaginative corporate drone. Focusing on cost reduction more than pleasing exterior. Since the dungeon was on the eastern side of New Burl it was unimaginably named the East Dungeon. It was also called the Bug Dungeon for a certain, and yet obvious, reason.

  Richard entered the DC, lined up, checked in and rented his equipment and found himself on the first floor again. Albeit at a different dungeon. It wasn’t an open field like at the Slime Dungeon. Instead it was a long and winding cave system. Pale moss hung from the ceiling and walls and it glowed with enough light to go by. As for the monsters they were something that many people had problems dealing with.

  Black Beetles.

  Richard thought that they should have been called Giant Beetles. The fact that they weren’t weighed on his mind. They weren’t much larger than a large house cat. They clicked as they walked on the ground and hissed as they attacked. Only their charges were easy to predict and dodge. More so if there was a back to the wall of the person being charged. As they just needed to step away and then dispatch the bug after it ran into the wall.

  Which was what Richard did quite easily. Though unlike with the slimes the beetles crushed as the club impacted them and splashed ichor and entrails around. He would probably need to pay for the cleaning fee…

  The body, unlike the guts, slowly disappeared and a hand sized piece of black carapace was dropped. From what Richard had found they were used in a set of low rank armor. Though it wasn’t very popular with certain groups as they couldn't get around the fact that they would be wearing bug skin all over them.

  Richard was proud of himself that it only took him several tries to find a way to club the beetles so that the guts sprayed away from him. While it hadn’t even been a day’s work and he was already tired of bug guts. It was easy to see why people had an issue with the dungeon.

  Towards the end of his first day Richard decided to try and see how much damage the beetles would do. Only instead of impacting him with its head like he expected, the damned thing instead bit him. It pinched as the mandibles of the beetle took a mouthful of his leg through the armored pants he had rented. A quick thump with the club took care of the little biter. While also dousing Richard with more guts. Would a sword be better? A quick check of his wound indicated that it was only a bruise and the skin hadn’t been broken.

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  Richard’s first exploration of the Bug dungeon came to an end and he had managed to find over 12 carapaces, though none of the rarer drops. When he traded them in he was surprised that the carapaces were cheaper than the slime cores at $1125 each. The price that he found online must have been out of date since it was listed at $1250. At a glance the Beetle Dungeon didn’t appear to be better than the Slime Dungeon. Combined with the longer travel time, the cleaning fees…, and the less value in drops it didn’t appear to be really worth it the trip.

  On the way out of the DC Richard checked to see what other drops there could be from the Beetles. There was a Black Beetle Stomach that was lacking a buy price. That could usually happen when there either wasn’t enough demand for them, or when they were too rare. The rest of the drops for the beetles seemed to be lucky drops from deeper floors. It really didn’t seem like it would be worth his time there.

  In order to fill his time on the bus home Richard opened his status. He confirmed that his level hadn’t changed and it was still at 3. It might be the limit of how far he can advance. And a quick internet search confirmed that higher levels required a deeper exploration of the dungeons. He sighed and looked forlornly out the window as he realized that his plan of becoming all powerful by putting in as little work as possible went out of the window.

  There was something different though, there was a little red dot that had appeared in his status next to the Alchemy skill. With a press of his finger it opened up into a new window along with a notice.

  Notice

  “New materials have been found, recipe list updated.”

  He didn’t even notice that there was a recipe list the last time that he checked out the skill. With a wave of his hand the notice disappeared and he found himself looking at a list of 3 recipes.

  Black Carapace Vial

  Blue Core Vial

  Healing Potion

  Richard left the System window up and tried to search if there were any mentions of skills giving a Recipe List. But he wasn’t able to find anything. Was it also hidden information that people hoarded? Or was it unknown to any but those with higher rank skills? At what level did one need before they were given the Recipe window? S rank? Or something lower?

  He forgot where he was for a moment and slapped his cheeks to center himself. Which caused several people on the bus to turn and look at him. The sudden attention caused Richard to flushed as he tried his best to ignore the inquisitive gazes that he felt boring into him.

  Richard pressed on the Black Carapace Vial recipe and a new window appeared.

  Black Carapace Vial

  Creates a vial with a solution ready for creating potions.

  Requires 1 Black Carapace.

  Insufficient materials.

  The Blue Core Vial had a similar description as the Black Carapace Vial. But the potion was something completely different.

  Healing Potion

  Creates a healing potion with suitable materials.

  Requires 1 Healing Flower

  Requires 1 Potion Vial

  Insufficient materials

  The recipe descriptions caused Richard to have so many questions! How was he supposed to create the vials? Where was the supposed solution to come from? Would it ooze from the sides of the vial? Or did he need to put some water in first? What would it taste like? Did it have any effect on the potion if he tried both vials with the healing flower? It seemed like he could make the potion with any vial, would the effects change between the two of them?

  Richard bit his finger to try and stop his mind from rushing away from him. The only real way to answer his questions was to try things. Which was to find the ingredients and see what happened. It was bothersome since he had just left the Bug Dungeon. And he was worried about Calvin and didn’t want to go back to the Slime Dungeon yet.

  Did that mean that he had to buy the materials? That meant he would have to continue grinding. And more days of grinding. Otherwise he was liable to go overboard and spend all of his extra money. With so many ideas appearing in his head Richard could only bide his time until he got his hands on the drops needed.

  ***

  Calvin got out of the car in front of the guild building. It had been built in a section of the city that had been ruined by the breaks that happened shortly after the dungeons appeared. Given that so many people were displaced and weren’t willing to live so close to a dungeon it had been cheap real estate for the taking.

  The building was painted in a garish red and black scheme and the Guild Master had liked. That and the guild name showed his taste, something that Calvin privately felt was a little 8th grader. Not something that would ever be uttered of course, less it made its way back to the Guild Master. At times he could be… unhinged.

  He pushed open the large glass doors, ignored the secretary, and strode into the elevator. There was a beep as Calvin scanned his id, and then he pressed the button for the 4th floor. Once the elevator doors opened he walked straight to the boardroom and found the team leaders were already waiting for him. “Report at once, make it brief for now,” he said before he even sat down in front of the guild emblem on the wall. It was a field of bloody roses growing out of bodies.

  One at a time they sounded off. Recruits are down. Injuries are up. Drops have been good. The government is increasing disability payouts that guilds are on the hook for. Bad, bad, good, and bad. Calvin shook his head. The guild had started well enough. But people kept getting in the way of progress. Those that got injured, those with morals, the Dungeon centers. If only they were able to properly monopolize a dungeon and the loot inside.

  “What about the mark that I mentioned the other day. Are those in the Slime Dungeon keeping an eye out for him?” Calvin asked.

  Glenda spoke up, “We haven’t seen him since that day. Either he is taking a break or got wise.”

  “I doubt that he is taking a break, considering that we observed him entering the dungeon every day for months.”

  “So then he got wise,” she said and shrugged. “The teams working there have instructions to invite him deeper as per protocol. Build up trust and all that.”

  “I swear that he got a skill book to drop. Too bad that they all look the same. Otherwise we’d know if we were chasing trash or not…” Calvin said and tapped his index finger to his lips. “Continue with the orders to suss him out more. If he doesn’t want to, then leave it for now. If he’s gotten anything good then he’ll show it off at one point in time or another.”

  “What if he joins another guild?” Eric asked. He was working the teams at the D rank dungeons in the area.

  “It seems like he’s too much of a loner for that. But there is always a chance. Keep an eye on the guild chatter about any promising newbies or anyone marking hard recruitment attempts. We’ll take care of them like we always do,” he said with a smile. One that slowly appeared on the faces of the others in the room.