Tom and Jeff both perked up as soon as the dungeon was cleared, excitement surging within them.

  "We were the first!" Jeff shouted, pumping his fists to the ceiling. "We got it!"

  Tom smiled. "We did. Thank you, Zoe. We couldn't have done it without you."

  Zoe looked at the wanton destruction outside, beyond the solid stone walls of the tower that the boss rested within. "Really?"

  "Of course," Jeff looked at Zoe with palpable confusion. "Even if I could destroy the dungeon, it's not like we'd have any way of knowing if that would work to our favour or not when we can't see the monsters we're fighting. Most of the time that's a really stupid thing to do. And most of the time, the entire dungeon is much better defended against it so it doesn't work nearly this well anyway."

  Tom nodded. "If they had anything that could fly, Jeff would have just made it harder for us to find them. And if this thing," he thumbed at the remnants of the crystal on the ground. "had any more intelligence, Jeff wouldn't have been nearly as effective."

  "Yeah, but... you could have just done it and then left if it didn't work, right? Feels like you could just wander around conquering dungeons easily." Zoe posited.

  Jeff shook his head. "As much as I'd like to, that's a really stupid idea. It's going to take a long time for this dungeon to reset to a point where the rewards would be worth anything, which ruins us even thinking about attempting it again. It was only worth trying because we could have gotten the trailblazer feat."

  "Which worked out in our favour. Honestly if we found this without you, we probably would have entered and immediately died, not even knowing what killed us. But we should accept this before the dungeon shunts us out." Tom gestured at an invisible notification counting down in front of him.

  *Ding* You have accepted the Latent Power dungeon reward. Soul will reform in 60 seconds… 59… 58… 57…

  Zoe smiled and felt the urge of acceptance come from her two companions as the system drowned them in a wealth of treasure. There was the usual abundance of basic rewards — coins and various different niche storage rings. Quite a few for a dungeon so high level with the added bonus of it being the first clear as well.

  But there were two rewards that stood out to Zoe more than the rest. One was a crystal sphere almost identical to the one Tom had destroyed, oozing both power and a strange absence of power at the same time. And the other an almost physical manifestation of mana itself. Solid colourful wisps invisible to Zoe's eyes but blinding to her Omniscient Beholding.

  "So how are we splitting this?" Tom asked. "Is there anything you want, Zoe? This wouldn't have been possible without you so you can take your pick."

  Zoe pointed at the two treasures that had caught her eye. "All I care about are these two. You two can have the rest, if that's alright?"

  Jeff's eyes shot open. "Really? We can have all of this?" His grubby hands wrapped around the floating pile of wealth. "All of it?"

  Zoe nodded. "I don't need money, but these are interesting to me."

  Tom shrugged. "Works for me."

  "So where to now?" Jeff asked as Zoe teleported them back out to their campsite. "We can't keep running the dungeon, so my plan of looping isn't going to work out that well. Unless we can find another dungeon like this somewhere nearby."

  "I was thinking it was about time for me to split off after I helped you loop, honestly." Zoe said.

  Tom and Jeff looked at each other then nodded.

  "Well, it was fun while it lasted." Tom said. "We'll be fine from here, I think. Thanks for the adventure."

  Zoe nodded to them. "When this dungeon's done rebuilding itself or if you find another dungeon we can use to help you loop, send me a message. And stay safe out here, it can be dangerous." She said.

  Jeff grinned and bowed deeply. "Thanks, O' Great Verdant Watcher."

  "Thanks, O' Great Verdant Watcher." Tom copied the bow.

  Zoe chuckled, then teleported away as far as she could, several times until she was confident Tom and Jeff were far enough away that they'd be on their own.

  Time with mortals was always a strange thing, Zoe found. This wasn't her first adventure out with the younger folk, but the sense of time was difficult to get used to. Tom and Jeff no doubt were frustrated with her slow pace — even if she was going well out of her way to try and speed it up for their sake. Days spent in boredom, waiting for her classes to reset. Waiting for her to examine her skills, to learn everything she'd gotten.

  Were she alone, the dungeon may have taken several years to conquer. It would have been methodical. She would have experimented with each of her new skills, mastered them all. Understood every one as intimately as she understood her Meditation.

  But when she travelled with people like Tom and Jeff — people whose lives were limited in scope, there was always a biting anxiety in the back of her mind. Don't take too long. Don't spend too much time on one thing. Don't let their short lives be wasted by her.

  So many classes in such a short time. So many skills with so little importance given. She'd expected to have gotten a few more familiar classes under her belt before her time with them was finished, too. But as it was she wasn't powerful enough to try and visit a wanderer — and grinding through classes she'd already seen just didn't excite her without the prospect of a new dungeon to push her along.

  Zoe pulled out a piece of paper and summoned a small table in front of her, floating in the sky above the forest.

  Hey Eliza. I've got a few new things to test out whenever you've got time. System stuff.

  If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the violation.

  A pulse of magic shot through the paper as it was shunted through the system space to Eliza's notifications.

  Zoe waited a few minutes. Most of the time Eliza would reply quite quickly — at least if it was about a discovery Zoe had made. In all her life, the one thing Eliza had never lost was her deep passion for the strange and unusual happenings.

  *Ding* You have received a message from Eliza.

  I'm a bit busy today, damned politics. I think I can get away soon though. How long do you have? Are you busy? Can I come tomorrow? Is this an immediate thing?

  Zoe summoned another piece of paper to write on.

  There's no rush, I can do tomorrow. New classes to check out and they have some very interesting skills.

  The paper vanished with a pulse of magic. Seconds later, Zoe received another message from Eliza.

  Okay. I'll be a few hours.

  Zoe giggled to herself and teleported further up into the sky, forming a small earthen platform just large enough for her to stand on and let the hours fly by.

  Several hours later, a surge of magic rose next to Zoe as space twisted and bent, bringing Eliza's form through. She stepped through the twisting anomaly and began falling to the forests below.

  "DAMMIT ZOE!" Eliza shouted as she caught herself with a pillow of rushing winds.

  Zoe laughed.

  "It's cold up here. Get us down there." Eliza drifted back up towards Zoe and pointed at a small cave in the cliff walls.

  Zoe nodded and teleported the two of them into the cave. The sounds of skittering and grinding could be heard from deeper in — likely the home to some swarm of bugs or herd of flying animals. Maybe both, Zoe thought.

  "So what's new?" Eliza poked Zoe's shoulder. "You finally looped?"

  Zoe nodded, and caught her friend up on all of the new classes she'd just ran through.

  "Hmm," Eliza hummed to herself as she paced back and forth over the dusty earthen ground. A small flame rose around her feet, licking up the sides of her legs with each step and even reaching up to the tips of her fingers that clung to her waist.

  "I can try using Beholden Bestowed on you?" Zoe asked.

  Eliza shook her head. "We'll get to that. But I'm wondering if I could get the class, so you can see it too, it would be much better if we could compare each other. Or if we could compare looking at the same other person. It doesn't work on you at all?"

  Zoe shrugged. "Not that I can tell, at least. Doesn't seem to do anything, doesn't even feel like it's activating when I try to use it on myself."

  "That's just strange. Does the system not consider you to be an ally of yourself? Or do you not consider yourself to be an ally?" Eliza asked.

  "I think I'm an ally." Zoe said. "I think. I'm pretty sure. I'd call myself an ally. Maybe."

  "You're not confident?" Eliza asked. "You think it's plausible that you aren't?"

  "I guess, I mean it makes sense to me that the system wouldn't consider it at least. But before I would have definitely thought that I'm an ally, at least." Zoe said. "It's just that the system doesn't, so it feels like my definition of ally was wrong, at least according to the system."

  Eliza nodded. "But you would have considered yourself an ally before you used it? You expected it to work?"

  "I guess I didn't, now that I think about it. I didn't try it on myself at first, I tried it on Jeff." Zoe said. "It said ally, so I tried to grab an ally to use it on."

  "Interesting," Eliza said. "That doesn't mean it's definitely going on your own definition, but I wonder if you could use it on something that is definitely antagonistic? Something you definitely don't recognize as an ally. Maybe it doesn't work on only allies, but only on people that aren't you.

  "But then that also raises the question of whether or not it would work on you if I had the skill. Maybe you're just a special case, for some reason." Eliza rambled.

  "You think that's likely?" Zoe asked. "Feels like it makes more sense that it would just not work on the user."

  Eliza nodded. "I agree, but we don't have enough to go on. Okay, use it, I want to see this."

  Zoe pushed mana into her skill, filling Eliza's eyes with the dense mana. Eliza grinned as she did, walking around Zoe staring at her like a statue on display at a museum.

  "Fascinating," Eliza said. "It looks like mana. Can you spend your mana on something for me, dear?"

  Zoe pushed all of her mana into her Scrying skill, viewing the distant tree canopies from as far away as she could manage.

  "Incredible," Eliza said. "I think that's your soul."

  "My soul?" Zoe asked.

  Eliza nodded. "Or at least the visual representation of how the system believes I would imagine a soul to look like, yes. But what's truly interesting is that it looks identical to mana. Does that mean that our souls are just manifestations of mana? Or that mana is made up of old, desolate souls?"

  "That's a terrifying thought," Zoe chuckled. "All of this colour and power is just... dead people?"

  Eliza shrugged. "Maybe. Does this buff have any proximity restrictions? If I leave you, will I keep the buff?"

  "I think so," Zoe said. "Probably. Doesn't say anything about that, and there's no constant drain of mana. Just has a time limit, so you should be fine."

  "Okay, then I'll be right back." Eliza said, vanishing with a pulse of magic a moment later.

  Several seconds passed, before Eliza appeared next to her again.

  "They all looked different sizes. The shape seems to be the same regardless of the person, but the size of it. The intensity of it is so drastic. Yours is the most intense one of the few I've seen now — though I'd be interested in comparing you to myself if we can figure that out. I wonder if it's related to age, or looping. Maybe class potency? Feats?" Eliza questioned.

  "Maybe it's related to the amount of junk stuff in your soul?" Zoe asked. "I've got a tonne of skills, and more feats than most people. The system just keeps expanding the container to fit everything it stuffs in there?"

  "But how can the system expand your soul? I don't know much about souls, but this feels... strange. It's what we've been considering our souls, I think. The container of our skills. When you cast your skill, I could see your mana being channelled through a particular point in this container. I think if you set up one of your enchanted mirrors, I would see you poking around inside it. Maybe, with enough practice." Eliza explained. "It's fascinating, but is it your soul?"

  "Maybe it's an intermediary layer? Like when we want to use something, we can channel it through this, and then this thing would contain all of the instructions to make that impact happen to our actual souls? Or maybe actual souls aren't real, and this is just some system construct." Zoe said.

  "Maybe," Eliza nodded. "Try to disable one of your skills."

  Zoe obliged, disabling her Frost skill.

  "Hmm," Eliza stared at Zoe's elbow with passion. "It's just gone."

  "Gone?" Zoe asked. "Pretty sure my elbow's still there."

  Eliza rolled her eyes. "The part of your soul that is whatever skill you disabled. It was here. Now it's gone. It's hard to tell, the whole mass is just blindingly chaotic. And I definitely wouldn't notice that anything was off if I hadn't been paying attention. But the skill you disabled is right here, I think." Eliza poked Zoe's elbow. "And now, that small section of mana that made up your soul is gone."

  "So disabling skills removes them entirely from your soul?" Zoe asked.

  "It seems like it. The hole is being filled up by everything else now, I think. Bits of mana flowing back in to the void that was created." Eliza said. "Turn the skill back on, now."

  Zoe flipped the switch to her Frost skill back on.

  "Hmm," Eliza's gaze moved to the back of Zoe's knee. "Now it's down here. Something just appeared, shoving everything else out of the way. Does it feel like it's in a different place to you?"

  Zoe shook her head. The skill hadn't moved, at least not to Zoe's perception within her self.

  "Fascinating. So this is either a system construct containing all of your skills, with an intermediary between your mind and it. Or it's truly your soul, with the system modifying it on the fly at your command. But either this," Eliza gestured her hands around Zoe's form, "thing is real, or the thing you're using to interact with it is."

  "Right, because if both were a part of the system, they wouldn't have to be so separate like this. They could just be integrated more seamlessly." Zoe nodded.

  "Exactly." Eliza said. "The only question is, which one is part of the system and which one is part of nature?"

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