Chapter 272: Professional Work
When Hera touched the dungeon entrance, they noticed that the part of the notification talking about the number of attempts remaining had vanished. This could mean that the reset had just happened, or that it was a daily thing. There could even be an issue related to the dungeon being cleared for the first time. As far as Hera knew, dungeons in the same room would share their reset schedule when they took the same amount of time to reset. Today was still Thursday, which meant that the reset in the Wooly Plains wouldn't happen for a few days. This bode very well for Hera and Blue, but they were still cautiously optimistic.
After pushing the door open, the humans guided Naka, Telanz, Fethy, and Silah through the dungeon. That ended up being more troublesome than expected. It was like taking a first-grade class to a theme park. Fethy kept pestering every single person inside the dungeon about their life, their style, and basically everything she could. It was a good thing they were inside a dungeon, and the replies of some of the dwarves were limited. Otherwise, she wouldn't ever stop asking questions. Telanz was very interested in the vines and the pollen that was created by the flowers. He even walked inside the corridor to feel the effects himself. Thankfully, the healer's endurance was much stronger than Blue's. When the pollen covered the hallway, he took a deep breath and exited by himself. Even being at a high level, the flowers made Telanz get paralyzed, but the effect was different. Instead of being completely paralyzed, he only got some odd twitches that would bother him from time to time. That lasted only a few minutes while the healer analyzed the effects. After a while, he simply used a spell to remove all ailments from himself.
Naka and Silah caused other issues. The guard captain wanted to cut down all the vines, even those outside the venue. Her attacks chipped away part of the structure, giving the building an even more beat-up appearance. Silah would freak out every time she saw one of the guards, wanting to see their weapons and armor. According to her, the craftsmanship was outstanding, and each piece of their uniform was an almost exact copy of the others. To make something on this level, the blacksmiths responsible for it should be incredibly skilled, maybe even more than Kahala. Hera had to remind her that the dungeon took some liberties with its version of the story a dozen times.
All in all, it quickly became clear that Hera and Blue were far from being the best people to deal with a dungeon-like this. Fethy took charge of the decorations, and the difference between what she created and what they had done the previous day was like night and day. The dining room didn't have that high school prom feeling or stage. Instead, all the tables were set up in a circle, creating a dance floor in the middle of the room. The band would stay at the back of the room not to attract too much attention, and, unlike Hera and Blue, who made the room as bright as possible, Fethy's decorations used the natural darkness to their advantage. The only places that were well lit were the dancefloor and the table where the bride and groom would stay.
The ballroom was insanely different, too. Instead of the traditional setup, with a large aisle in the middle, a twisting path would make the princess walk by all the guests before reaching the groom. Naka had removed all the vines from the ceiling and replaced them with gashes made by her broadswords. To hide that, Fethy made a layered display with the tablecloths that covered the entire ceiling. She placed the lights above that, creating a unique type of lighting in the area. The last touch was a thin cloud created by Blue that would follow the path to the altar. The idea was that it would make the bride look like an angel walking in the sky.
With all that preparation, Hera and Blue didn't have a chance to search for the hard mode, but it was understandable. Vetek continued to be obnoxious, and the servers only used spells after being shown what to do. The ceremony came and went, and they all received the quest rewards. The dwarves got the same 25 thousand gold that Hera and Blue received, but instead of a Gift bag (C), they received a (B) one. Oddly enough, Hera and Blue also got the same reward, giving more strength to the theory that the dungeon was on a different reset schedule. Vetek complained a lot about the destruction of the venue, even if he never saw any of the marks himself. Interestingly enough, this time, Dwyn went straight to the dining room. Hera thought that the seer would only approach her when she had a tarot card in hand.
With everything done inside the dungeon, the group made their way to the exit. Everyone was still talking about what they had seen when Fethy said something that caught Hera's attention.
"I can't wait to return here. I can only imagine what ideas Levirna will come up with. I do hope that she takes my advice to heart."
Hera turned to the dwarf, "Advice?"
"Oh yes, we had quite a long discussion about party planning. She's a bright girl with an incredible future ahead of her, as long as she's willing to take some chances," Fethy smiled.
"Fethy… I think you are misunderstanding something. The people inside there... They are not real," Hera said.
"What are you talking about? They are not ghosts. I touched them, and they could bump into me. Of course, they are real," Fethy huffed.
"Yes, they are not ghosts, but they are… dolls. Things that are being controlled by the Voice of the Mountain. The moment we leave, everything inside here will vanish, or at least be reset and ready for the next group of people."
"But… They are so alive. The discussions we had, was that all fake?"
"I wouldn't say they were. Anything you said and heard still happened. Just… not for her," Hera said.
Fethy didn't reply. She just stared at the ground in deep thought.
"Hera, a question, if you will. If someone would, perchance try to bring something back, a small rock, for instance. Could that be an issue?" Telanz asked.
"You picked a flower, didn't you?" Blue asked.
".... Maybe."
"Yeah, he picked a flower," Naka sighed.
"Well, some things from the dungeon can't exist outside it. If that's the case, it will just dissolve when we try to cross the entrance. Others can go out without an issue, but they might be seriously nerfed," Hera explained.
"Nerfed?" Telanz asked.
"Oh, sorry. That means it will be weaker than what you saw inside the dungeon. We've been to this dungeon that had these pearls that could remove any type of poison from your body when inside the dungeon, but outside, they just worked as a weak antidote," Hera explained.
Naka and Silah were the least problematic of the dwarves. The captain only wanted to be there to protect everyone, especially Hera and Blue. As the humans walked around the city, Naka kept following them like a bodyguard. And Silah never left her girlfriend's side. Hera enjoyed that closeness, but she knew that she would have to talk to her later about this. They saw each other every day, and when she had to go outside the MAZE or back to Brinefront, she would have to stay away for a time. Considering that Silah lived her entire life with the idea that everyone would always be close by, Hera was worried about how she would deal with the change.
Still, there would be some time before she had to worry about that. They still had to find a way to trigger the dungeon's hard mode. After leaving the dungeon, Hera checked if the remaining attempted message would pop up again. Sure enough, there it was, telling her that there were 9 attempts left. She even got King Rutigan to confirm that the message would appear for him as well. Tomorrow, they could check that again to confirm if the dungeon was in a daily reset or not.
The group split off, and Silah even went home. She had spent almost an entire week sleeping at Hera's place, but now she needed to get a change of clothes and stay with her family for a bit. That gave the humans some time alone, and they remembered to take out the rewards from the gift bags. Hera focused more on the level up. She got 28 attribute points this time. It was the highest amount she ever got, which allowed her to get all her stats to 48, increasing them all by 2. She was getting very close to having all her attributes at 50, but that should still take a couple of levels since there was not a single point remaining this time.
There were also the gift bags. Hera and Blue ended up so swept up by the meetings and the discussion of the dungeon that they completely forgot about the rewards. At first, having received a (C) gift bag for their run seemed unfair. They made a beautiful ceremony, but after seeing what Fethy had done with the place, it became clear why they got a lesser reward. Still, they now had two of the bags to open.
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Gold Anvil
An anvil made out of solid gold. It can be converted into 10 000 gold or be used as a crafting material. When used as a material, the final product can receive one of the following effects:
Increased heat and electricity conductivity
Corrosion Resistant
Increased flexibility
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Kul Dorul Tarot
Five of Stone - Minor arcana
When activated, this card can increase the damage you deal to any type of stone by 20% for 50 minutes or your mining speed for 5 hours.
By adding mana to the card, you can trigger its effects.
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Hera got the anvil, which was roughly the size of a bowling ball, just much heavier, from the (C) bag and the tarot card from the (B) one. Blue also got an anvil from the (B) bag and some seeds for a wild cave flower from the (C) one. She agreed to set them aside and give some to Telanz and some to Risli since they were most likely to be interested in growing different plants in the city.
Blue also talked about the tarot card with Stormcloud, she had an idea that getting some crafting skills could help her mold her clouds better, and the herald agreed, but since they didn't know what type of skill she would gain, it would be hard to say if it would help. In the end, Blue decided to wait for a while before using her card.
The entire conversation annoyed Hera. It was weird seeing her friend talking to the air, and she constantly said the legacy's name. Not to mention that Blue was using the legacy for everything ever since she completed it. At first, it was just while she trained, but things escalated to the point where Blue was even using the clouds to dry herself after a bath or as steam to cover her body instead of a robe. Hera knew that the only reason she wasn't cooking or picking up dishes with the clouds was that they were too violent for delicate tasks.
The following day, Hera, Blue, and Silah went to the dungeon once more. However, they were surprised by the path. First, they didn't have to go through the palace anymore, but instead, there was a side road that would lead to the dungeon and the doorway. The king had changed the layout so that the dungeon wouldn't be hidden away anymore. Not just that, but several people were waiting for the humans in front of the stone door leading to the Weeding Disaster. Fethy and Naka had set up several teams to join the runs while keeping the apparent limit of 10 groups per day in mind. Most of the dwarves there were crafters, with at least one guard per group. This was all because they were all curious about the designs made by the old kingdom. Fethy herself already had made a shirt with large puffy shoulders. It was much more elegant than what Vetek wore inside the dungeon, but still felt out of place around so many people with more modern outfits.
Hera and Blue double-checked the dungeon one more time, and sure enough, the message saying the number of attempts had vanished. They had one team to head inside first, and the information that only 9 attempts remained already appeared. This would've been so much easier if they had done this before, but it wasn't something that occured to either of them
Now, with 10 groups per day trying to find the hard mode dungeon, it should only be a matter of time before the room would open. 13 days later, their efforts were rewarded. After Blue and Hera left the dungeon, Sevaris and his group walked over to the humans.
"We found out how to get into the hard mode."
CREATORS' THOUGHTS 
Perizou
Perizou Am I the weird one for liking the highschool prom idea better?
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