"Keep heading towards the exit. Just follow the red arrows and stay inside the red lines!" one of the Scimitar's crew shouted as they exited the beetle and headed down the stairs from the landing pad. "And pay attention to what's going on around you!"

Nar only had time to glimpse several other elevated landing pads across the rooftops of the large, wide building they had landed atop of, each with ships and crews busy with their own tasks, and in the distance, out of the corner of his eyes, he noticed at least three or four more such buildings, their rooftops similarly a frenzy of activity.

"Wow," Rel breathed as the inside of the port spread below them.

Nar nodded in agreement as they kept walking down the metal, rust stained stairs. Below them spread a chaos of shelves with boxes filled to the brim with goods and materials of all kinds. Squat cargo vehicles whined past the tight corridors in between shelves at a breakneck speed, ferrying goods to and fro, with loud beeps frequently rising from the confusion below, as well as shouts for people to get out of the way.

The air, perhaps resembling that of the aetheric conditions that had led to the formation of the Brightnight dungeon, was warm and humid, and they were soon sweating. And as they had been warned, tingles ran across Nar's skin from the high aetheric tide in that portion of the Labyrinth.

Sometimes the tingles felt more like a scratching, dragging across his body, but it was nowhere as painful as standing on the promenades and getting bombarded by wild aether, like they had during the confluence.

At least I don't think so, Nar thought. Crystal, I don't even have that skill yet and I'm alright like this. What's going to happen once I actually get that pain resistance passive?

He shook his head, and soon, they reached the ground floor of that enormous warehouse, and another crewmember ushered them to follow after the aforementioned red arrows again.

"That was a good haul!"

"We're going to need to find someone to replace him…"

"Ugh! I can't wait for these people to get their quest done and fuck the Abyss out of here!"

"But now there's Tsurmirel around too!"

"Careful… That's their apprentices right there."

That last conversation caught his attention and he turned around in time to glimpse a trio of people, dressed in what he had come to assume was the port's uniform in yellow and green. But when they noticed his stare, the three of them scurried off and disappeared into the maze of shelves.

Workers? He wondered, passing a hair over his sweat slick forehead. The air inside the warehouse was even damper and hotter, and just then, one of the loud, squat vehicles, filled to the brim with some sort of big, round, green fruit with spots of yellow beeped at them as it passed them by.

"Tuk, I swear to the Crystal!" Kur shouted. "Keep your eyes on the damn lines!"

"But there's so much going on…" Tuk muttered, his eyes hungrily taking in everything going around them.

"Just let him get hit," Mul said, grinning. "He'll learn then."

"Ugh," the party leader said, passing an angry head over his sweat slick pale hair.

Nar smiled as Tuk strayed dangerously close to the red line once more. He couldn't really fault the trugger. Even with the cracks, the stains, and the dirt, blackened ceiling high above their heads, the large storehouse was a chaos of sight, scents and noises to behold.

Here and there, clustering under light and fan combos that lazily spun in the heavy air, were groups of workers from species they had never seen before. These people carried out all sorts of measurements, examinations and other tasks across an endless variety of bright and colorful materials that had evidently came from the jungle domain. But what drew his attention the most, were the delvers milling about the gigantic shelves.

Clustering in what he presumed were their parties, the aethermancer delvers, obvious in their solid armors and gears, were as varied as the workers and the materials present in that frenetic storehouse.

A good few of these delvers wore armor of faded brown and, in stark opposition, of polished bright turquoise blue. He didn't even need to check their guild symbols, the knotted root in a triangle and the five-pointed star with the feral, roaring beast, to know that those delvers belonged to the Gathum Intertwine and the Blue Dn'Arrah Fighters guilds.

So those are the two guilds that joined together to trigger the war quest, Nar thought, easily matching the logos to the pictures that had come in their prep material. We're supposed to stay the fuck away from them…

And it wasn't hard to see why. Unlike the workers, who kept their heads down and their attention on their tasks, these delvers openly glared at the apprentices as they crossed the warehouse.

"They're not very happy to see us, are they?" Rel whispered.

"No, they're not," Nar muttered.

Fortunately, both guilds had their forces concentrated on the areas closer to the Lands of the Atlatl, and they shouldn't have any issues staying well out of their way…

Soon, the party left the noisy warehouse behind them and stepped back into the brightness of the outside. Above them, the Labyrinth wall towered like a gigantic presence, the ceiling only a tenue, almost imagined outline high, high above them in a faded mirage of light blue.

"Hub and Fot's party? Hub and Fot's party?" a man shouted, as he walked through the confusion of hundreds of apprentices gathering outside the warehouse, and causing a traffic jam that hindered all the vehicles trying to make it in and out of the storehouse.

The shouting man wore a simple garb of brown-gray clothes, and the logo on his chest, mirrored by a much larger version at its back, gave them all an idea of who he might be.

"That must be one of the guides," Viy said. "The contractor people."

Nar eyed the diamond shape split into dozens of straight lines that adorned the man's back.

The Avrishimnara Consultancy, he thought, as the guy disappeared into the crowd, still calling for the parties he was no doubt about to lead into the Brightnight. No armor though… Or is he an auramancer like us?

The prep material had let them know that the guides they would be working with would be a mix of auramancers and aethermancers. This was done to get them used to delving alongside non-combat aethermancer delvers, something that could become a common occurrence for them once they became full delvers under Tsurmirel's employ and depending on their future assignments. For that reason, at least one of the two guides accompanying them would be an aethermancer.

That's gonna be interesting, Nar thought, as he scanned the crowd and spotted more and more guides trying to not only find their parties, but also to get the apprentices moving from the large entrance into the warehouse, and onto some kind of shaded sidewalk beside it. Some of these contracted guides wore armor, and some did not. I guess we'll finally see the difference between us.

While there were plenty of aethermancer lecturers aboard the Scimitar, his exposure to them thus far had been incredibly limited to Professor Thim alone. Even TSA was taught by Senior Instructor Buj from the Tanks Hall, an auramancer, and even the rocky Professor T'Nash, who taught Kur, Jul, Mul and Jasphaer about gathering, harvesting and how to make XP from it was also an auramancer… But living with one, or potentially two aethermancers, for months on end, was going to be an interesting, and definitely enlightening experience.

"Kur, over here!"

Nar looked over the gathered heads, and found Row with her party. And beside the red-haired party leader stood two women in consultants colors. One wore cloth, and the other wore some kind of flexible light-armor, and as soon as Nar laid eyes on them, he immediately picked the auramancer amongst them.

This book's true home is on another platform. Check it out there for the real experience.

It was just like Mok had told him. There was no way to hide one's origins when it was so plainly written on their bodies.

The woman wearing light-armor, considered them all with dark ashen, yellow eyes set in black sclera. Her hair was a short, light ashen gray, and her skin had a touch of ashen dark blue. However, he was hesitant to decide on her species. On one hand, she looked completely human except for her eyes and skin color, but on the other hand, he had come to learn that the vast majority of species ranged across a varied spectrum of colors and even features. It was just that he was used to humans looking a certain way because of his limited exposure in the cubeplant.

As for the other guide, the one wearing a tight fighting outfit of though looking cloth, she had reptilian features. Her scales were a shimmering emerald green with motes of cerulean, and a long tail swished at her back as she considered Kur's party with a neutral expression as they approached.

No way to tell for sure if she's an auramancer or aethermancer, Nar thought, examining her round muzzle. But my XP is on aether. Her colors are so bright!

When the lizard woman blinked, he noticed that not only did her eyes blink horizontally, but that there was also transparent membrane of some kind underneath her eyelids as well.

Creation really is endless, Nar though, as they approached.

"We're always waiting for Kur's party, eh?" Jaz said, grinning at them. "How come you're always so slow?"

"You're just too fast!" Tuk said, beaming at the short human, and the two of them greeted each other with a loud clasp of hands.

Row and Kur shook their heads in unison at their antics, and as both parties greeted each other, Nar found himself approaching the guides alongside Kur and Gad, his curiosity pulling him over.

"It's nice to be going into this with you guys," Row said, making a face.

"For sure it is," Kur said, blinking to clear the sweat from his eyes. "Trust them to throw a last-minute surprise at us!"

"Yeah… Anyways, Kur, meet Sej and Sarke, our guides for this delve," Row introduced. "Sej and Sarke, this is Kur, party leader and leader of our domain party, and Gad, his second in command and tank. And that is Nar, who basically takes over when shit hits the fan and is the de facto third in command."

Nar shot her a half frown, half glare, but nodded at the guides as Kur shook their hands.

"It's a pleasure to meet you," he said, smiling brightly at the two women.

"Same," Sej said, smiling back just as openly. "But for now, we're blocking the entrance, so let's start heading towards the dungeon. There's a spot there where we can stop to have a chat before we head in."

"Sounds good. Please, lead the way," Kur said.

The two parties bundled together with easy conversation, and they followed after the two guides, heading into the town proper.

"And how are you this fine morning, Leta?" Tuk asked.

Leta? Nar thought, frowning. He didn't know anyone with that name.

"Same old, same old, Tuk," a rich, female voice said. "Thank you for asking."

"Aren't you going to ask me?" Tuk said, though his tone spoke of easy joking.

"I don't have to. I can see it," the voice sighed, but with a hint of laughter. "How many times are you going to repeat this? Do you do it to Jasphaer too?"

"Jasphaer just ignores me now," Tuk said, with a pitiful tone.

"With good reason…" Jasphaer muttered.

Nar glanced behind him.

As expected, Tuk walked beside someone he had never met before, and he hadn't even seen her species before either.

Leta had quills going up her forehead, her scalp, coming down her neck, covering a line in her back, the back of arms and the side back of her thighs. The quills were a soft and warm mix of browns, and her skin was a darker shade of the same color, while her eyes were black and mischievous as she made to jokingly sooth Tuk's wounded feelings.

"Anyways, guys, if you haven't met her yet, Leta is Row's party healer!" Tuk introduced, catching the many confused looks from his party being thrown their way.

"Nice to meet you all. The name's Leta and I'm a cooline. I'm a proud second-gen, and my family operates an auramancer clinic in the Minus!" she declared proudly, raising four clawed fingers. "So you can trust me to keep you all healthy alongside Jasphaer! And I just know we're going get along fantastically great!"

"Damn right we will!" Tuk said, and the two of them burst out laughing.

Nar greeted her alongside the others, but inside he felt a little seedling of unease.

Oh no… She's another one for the loud group, Nar thought, mentally adding her to the Pile that comprised Tuk, Viy, Jaz, Lim and Mul. But his attention was soon drawn to the town around them.

In the light of day, the creaking wooden porches and the cracked, gray concrete buildings looked like a completely different town to what Nar had seen from above in the previous night.

Gone were all the crowds, leaving the streets empty and quiet, and strew with trash. Only the endless stream of flat cargo vehicles beeping at the lines of apprentices to get them to clear the roads showed any signs of life in town, and they rattled loudly by as they zoomed past them on the uneven, broken cobbled road, eliciting screams as apprentices got splashed by all sorts of questionable pools of juices.

The neon signs, previously bright and filled with life, now hung limp and bowed from the leaning facades of the buildings they passed. Closed down barracks and three wheeled vehicles of some kind lined the streets, and in its darkest recesses, he was sure he caught the side of rough clothed people passed out across shadowy entrances and corners.

The uneven cobbled floor they walked upon was sticky, and caked with the remains of food and several other questionable piles of debris alongside the aforementioned mysterious, dark puddles of liquid.

"It's something, isn't it?" Sej asked, noticing his expression.

In fact, most in their group were similarly twisting their noses at the look and vile stench of the place, the only exceptions being Tuk and Jaz, who were shouting like happy children and pointing at everything and waving at the few grumpy people they came across.

"Ehrm…" Nar made, unsure of what to say.

Sej burst out laughing.

"It's not for everyone, but it's not so bad once you get used to it," she said, her eyes sparkling. "When you get back in a few months' time, you'll look at it very differently!"

Nar nodded awkwardly.

I actually don't doubt that… he thought, just as someone opened a window on the second floor and leaned out to empty their stomach onto the street below, narrowly missing the column of apprentices. Or will I?

"There's a lot of stuff being moved around," Kur said, as they had to get out of the way of another vehicle for perhaps the thirtieth time.

"The Brightnight, as an almost purple dungeon, is an incredibly rich domain," Sej explained. "It has an insanely high refresh rate for a dungeon in the Outer Edges, and that, together with the huge variety and quantity of stuff you can harvest and gather from the jungle, makes it one of the top delving spots within a million miles. For that reason, the delving never stops, and neither do the cargo ships."

Nar glanced back the way they had come from, taking in the dozens of large ships assembled behind and around the Scimitar. Some of those large, bulbous or blocky looking sips were even bigger than theirs.

"Has the war quest affected things around here?" Row asked, spotting a party of blue clad delvers in one of the side streets. "The workers in the warehouse didn't seem very happy about them being around… Or us."

"Well, yeah…" Sej said, wincing. "There's a limited capacity in the domain, and whenever someone decides to bully their way into taking up over half of the slots out of nowhere, it makes things hard for everyone around."

Sarke sighed heavily.

"What? It's good for the kids to know how things run in the Nexus," Sej said, then she smiled at Row and Kur. "I'm an ex-Climber too. I know how confusing things are when you first get out!"

"Yeah…" Row said, casting another glance at the aethermancer delvers. "Is that why they keep glaring at us? Did Tsurmirel… Bully its way in?"

Sej burst out laughing.

"Their guilds forced the local guilds and corps into selling them their tickets, and then, just when they were finally about to trigger their precious war quest, something the size of Tsurmirel shows up and demands the same out of them," Sej said, wiggling her eyebrows in obvious amusement. "They had no chance but to hand over the tickets and hope that Tsurmirel won't take their quest away."

"Would they do that?" the red-haired leader asked. "I mean… Us. We."

"It's a tough reality out here," Sej said. "You're either the top beast around or you're prey. And if you're prey, your best bet is to scurry around and hide, hoping you don't draw the attention of something bigger than you that wants what you have."

"Sej," Sarke said, shaking her head.

"Oh, relax!" Sej said, jumping behind her and squeezing Sarke's shoulders affectionately. "What are they going to do? Pick a fight with Tsurmirel in broad daylight?"

"Ugh…"

"Besides, these kids are all elites!" Sej said, winking at them.

"We're still level 40," Tun rumbled. "Some of us bellow that."

"The way you say that makes me think that you would still put up a fight," Sej said, nodding appreciatively at the morsvar.

Tun looked at her, blinking in confusion. "Of course?"

Laughter bubbled out of the guide, making the morsvar frown in even deeper confusion.

"Please don't mind her," Sarke said, in a quiet but serious tone. "Despite her behavior, she's capable though. I promise."

"Booo! Always so serious!" Sej said, rolling her eyes.

"Ooohh, I think they're together!" Nar heard Tuk whispering from behind.

"I think so too!" Leta whispered back.

"Right?" Viy pipped in.

Guys, please, Nar thought, rolling his eyes. Everybody can hear you.

Still, he couldn't deny that he had the same suspicion given how closely together the two of them walked, and the light that shone in Sej's eyes every time she poked fun at Sarke. They gave off the feeling of a couple that had been through thick and thin across many years already.

"I wonder how they kiss though…" Jaz whispered. "Wait, Gad! I'm sorry, no need for viol… Ow!"

Nice one, Nar thought. With Tuk, Jaz, Viy, Mul, Lim, and now presumably also Leta, all bunched together in the same party for months on end, chaos was bound to ensue.

"Over here," Sej called.

And at last, Nar laid eyes on their destination.

The four cubes loomed above him, rising far taller than the buildings that surrounded them. Compared to the ramshackle constructions, the dungeon entrances looked ageless and eternal, which made sense, given how nobody actually knew how old the Brightnight was, other than that it had been there since the last Great Reset at the very least.

"They're huge!" Lim said, craning his neck to look up.

Row turned around with a menacing glint in her eyes.

"I didn't say anything!" Jaz pleaded.

"I can hear it in your mind!" Row shouted. "I don't want to hear a single dumb joke while we're this fucking jungle! You hear me?"

"Yes…" Jaz muttered, sullen.

"I think we've got ourselves a good party!" Sej said, elbowing Sarke. The reptilian just sighed.

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