Dungeons and Dalliances

Of course, the universe didn’t cut Natalie a break.

“Sixteen monster cores,” Ana said. “Natalie collected eight, Sofia six, and Jordan two. Sixteen total. Then there’s the ring, the gloves, the cloak, the ore, the herbs, and the bag of coins.”

“Bag of coins?” Jordan asked.

“Elizabeth found it,” Ana said.

“And the cloak?” Natalie asked. Clearly, in her misadventure with the vines, she’d missed a few discoveries.

“Reduces the chances of a monster focusing on you,” Jordan said. “Probably something for me or Liz.”

The two squishiest—rogue and healer. Though Ana was probably in contention, too. Sofia, though physically weaker than most fighters, still could hold up better than a rogue or healer. She was the second most durable in the group, though by a large margin to Natalie.

“Didn’t have time to talk about it in the rush,” Jordan added. “And what kind of coins?”

“Found them beneath a ridge,” Liz said. “Silver, about thirty of them, it’ll sell real well. Honestly, though, I’m surprised we didn’t find more. That last room was pretty big.”

“We didn’t have time to properly search it,” Ana said. She glanced Natalie’s way, unconsciously, though not accusatorily, putting the blame on her. Which was fair. Natalie’s debacle had cut off the rest of the team’s search efforts as they scrambled to help her. “Regardless,” she continued, “how are we handling the split? Equal cores, then have the rest appraised? For that matter, how are the raw resources working?”

Natalie supposed it was time to get this out of the way. She rummaged around in her pouch as Ana talked. A moment later, she said, “Eight? I’ve only got seven cores.”

The group looked at her, and Natalie’s skin crawled. She didn’t consider herself a poor liar, but that didn’t mean she liked doing it. Especially to her team. These were about the only circumstances she could imagine being forced into it. It wasn’t, obviously, greed guiding her, but a need for secrecy. She simply wouldn’t be able to explain away a monster core stuffed with infertility potion.

“You collected eight,” Ana said. “I’m certain.”

And wasn’t that unfortunate? Ana’s apparently impressive memory, and scrutinizing attention to detail, was an invaluable trait down in the dungeon, but in this case? Highly inconvenient.

“Only got seven,” Natalie said, frowning as she made a show of rummaging around and tapping her hand against her other pouches, feeling for more. “Look.” She held out the orbs. The hidden core tucked into her boot burned against her ankle.

Ana frowned at her.

Liz, in return, frowned at Ana. “It’s not like she’d lie. It’s one core.”

“She could have hidden something valuable in it.”

Liz’s eyes widened at the accusation.

“Hey, now,” Jordan said. “I don’t think—“

Natalie waved the protest away. “She’s not accusing me. She’s just pointing it out.” It had taken a second to recognize that, but it was pretty obvious. Ana was just, in that continued fashion of hers, stating things without consideration for tact.

“Obviously,” Ana said, looking around at the group, confused. She’d been totally oblivious to how most people would interpret what she’d said. “What could she possibly have found that would be worth earning that sort of reputation, so early? But a core isn’t necessarily ‘just a core’, and that was worth stating.” She turned to Natalie. “You need to check your pouches for holes or faulty buckles. Or handle them more carefully. You picked up eight.”

“I didn’t count,” Natalie said. “But I also don’t think I lost one.”

Ana searched Natalie’s eyes with a slight frown, and it took some effort not to squirm. The dark-haired, expressionless girl had a surprising intensity to her.

“Okay,” Ana finally said.

“It’s fine,” Liz insisted. “Really, it’s not a big deal. One core is nothing, big-picture wise.”

“I’d hope it wouldn’t be,” Sofia agreed. “We’ll need magnitudes more to get anywhere—even as freshmen.”

“The split,” Jordan suggested, corralling them back. “Honestly, it’s good we have fifteen instead of sixteen. It’s three each, that way. Easy.”

“Maybe it was fate,” Liz joked.

Ana’s lips pursed, as if she disagreed with everyone’s nonchalance, but had at least the tiniest bit of ability to read the room, and so didn’t push the point.

Natalie would have to figure something out if getting lewd rewards became a common thing. She couldn’t just rob the team every time an item aligned to her class popped up. Infertility potions, while strange, would go for a decent sum on the Exchange. She was, frankly, stealing a decent chunk of monster cores, when viewed from a raw value standpoint.

“Three each, then,” Natalie said. She passed out the spare cores, and Sofia did the same. As the frontline, they’d been naturally the ones to pluck them from corpses. It hadn’t been an agreed-upon thing, simply what happened.

“And handle the rest, tomorrow,” Jordan said. “Gotta get everything appraised.”

“And we’re doing fifty-fifty with resource gathering?” Liz asked.

“If everyone’s fine with that.” It’d been what they agreed, but there hadn’t been a particular focus on how to handle loot. As Liz had said, early earnings, especially a first-time exploratory delve, simply weren’t that important. And there was a standard “default”, so to say.

Fifty-fifty with resource gathering meant that half of the resources gathered went to the team, and half of it stayed with the gatherer. It was a way to equalize the earnings of the gatherers, since the team had to fight to get them to resource-rich locations, but at the same time, a person who focused on getting a harvesting skill to a high level deserved a more lucrative cut compared to those who didn’t. How that was handled varied by team, but fifty-fifty was what people generally went by.

The group looked at each other, and after a collection of nods and shrugs, it was decided. They would handle splits and who got what item tomorrow.

Shortly, they headed to their respective barracks. Jordan trailed after her, even though hers was in a different direction. Sofia and Liz—being in Natalie’s barracks—they let go ahead.

When they were safe from being overheard, Jordan asked, “So. What was that?”

Natalie grimaced.

“You hid a core,” Jordan guessed.

“I …”

“I’m sure you had a reason.”

Like usual, no judgment. It wasn’t a surprise, and it was returned one-hundred-percent, but it still made Natalie’s heart skip a beat. She almost blushed at the total display of trust.

“Yeah. Explain later? It’s a story.”

“Guessing it has to do with your class.”

“Good guess.”

Jordan gave her a sympathetic look. “I’m curious, but yeah. Better saved for later. Maybe we’ll get put together for kitchen duty tomorrow.”

“We can hope.”

“See you then, then.” She smiled, and Natalie’s heart skipped a second beat. “Good delve, by the way. We’ll be in the big leagues in no time.”

Natalie smiled back, then returned the wave as Jordan split away, headed for her own barracks.