Rolly had a hold of Ozzy's arm and was pulling him in the direction of the Sphynx's lair.

Squirmie was fluttering around Suzette trying to herd her in the same direction.

Neither was having much luck."New Dungeon, Ozzy! Let's just take a little peek."<Don't be so selfish two-legs! Even if you fear a new dungeon with its easy experience and riches, at least you should consider the fragile mental state of your nest-mate.

Look at poor Rolly? Won't you take pity on my poor little pet? He longs for new adventures!>Suzette rolled her eyes at the bug and refused to move, "Your impatient little pet is probably the most resilient of all of us.

He'll survive a couple of more hours until we complete some preparations and pack up a few supplies." Rolly quit pulling on Ozzy, "Prep work? As in snacks? She's right, Squirmie! We need snacks.

We should pack a big basket of food.

We need to keep up our energy in a dungeon.

Let's get started on that."The Shepherd and his butterfly went off to the village to begin packing a full picnic basket for the trip to the ancient zoo.

Suzette took Ozzy's arm in hers, "How about you escort me home? We could use a couple hours of sleep and then we can fill up your bag with potions, bandages and anything else we can think of."Ozzy was in favor of that idea.

"A nap sounds good.

The last day's work wasn't hard, but I've never used up that much mana before and I had to recharge over and over with potions.

It wears you out in an odd way." Suzette patted his arm, "We'll make a proper wizard out of you yet.

How is the smoke magic going with Joe?"Ozzy took a deep breath and exhaled a large amount of smoke.

With intense concentration it formed into a vaguely humanoid form that waved slowly and then dissipated, "Slowly improving.

Joe said the better I get with the basics of smoke and heat, the easier the real lessons will be.

He said I was almost ready to go visit Old Smoke, whoever that is.""When does that happen? Do you go alone?”"I'm assuming I have to make the trip pretty soon.

He said it was best to do it before moving up to Tier 3, and all of us are almost there.

Maybe after a successful raid on a new dungeon? If we manage to kill a couple of bosses and score some points, we should all be ready.Joe said having Smoke Magic would give me a better chance at a good upgrade to Butcher."Suzette held up her hand and made a ball of light dance across her fingertips.

"That's why I keep practicing my little cantrips and wild magic spells.

I want to keep pushing into magic and get better spells." She gestured and two insubstantial hounds stalked from the shadows near them, "I love this spell.

They don't do a lot of damage, but they get in the way of things trying to kill me.

Didn't you say that Joe had some sort of smoke-dog he could summon?"Ozzy produced something that might have been a dog made out of smoke.

Suzette's shadow hounds pounced on it and it dispersed.

Ozzy laughed, "That's all I can do right now.

Joe's spell produces something more like an 'insane-smokey-murder-wolf'.

It's mostly teeth and claws and a vague outline of a big animal.

He has me working on it, but so far, I can just make the outline of it.

Good for kids’ birthday parties.

Maybe I should learn to do bunnies and ponies too?""Hopefully you get something that's more 'cooking' and less 'slaughter the orphanage'.

" Suzette was a little worried about the influence of the huge dungeon in the city - filled with the latter type of butcher.

"If it looks like you may be gone a few days, I might take some time off from being Mayor to train my skills.

I've been given some strong hints that some sessions in Hermes’s Realm would help me out a lot.

Now that Layla and I are Butchering Buddies, I'm sure I can work it out with her.""You never have said much about what you're learning up there.

Secret Hermetical tricks or something?" Ozzy had brought the subject up before, but Suzette was always hard to pin down on things.

She'd spent four decades playing roles as a spy or assassin in other VR games.

Not answering questions or giving away information was a habit with her.

Ozzy was good at gathering information, and she was good at not giving it away.

They'd played this game forever.

She had to remind herself that this time was different.

They were working together.

Still, her actual class was off limits.

Secret classes stayed secret.

Even Hermes thought she was a Barmaid.She pushed down the bit of guilt and focused on what she could talk about.

She thought for half a minute, "Some is, some isn't.

You technically became a lay brother when I became your teacher.

Plus, you've met Hermes more than a couple of times and he still likes you for some reason, even after you got him beat up in the fight with Leroy."Ozzy objected to that, "Hey, I didn't beat him up, he was just collateral damage.

I got hurt worse; it was just instantaneous."Suzette laughed, "I pointed out the paradox to him: You nearly killing us all while trying to save us from Leroy, who only got in trouble because he saved your life by accident when he stole your place using Ben's contraption.

He appreciated it more after his black eyes faded.”

“But as to what I'm learning, a lot of it is tied to the original skills I got access to when I unlocked Hermetics.

I'm getting better at poisoning and making it not look like poison, some specialized alchemy, the different types of Hermetic Seal spells, and I've been learning more about rune lore.

Astronomy I've barely touched.

That has to be done in the normal world, and it's really difficult without a telescope or something like Stonehenge to work with.""Talking with Hermes and other people in his realm can be like talking to the Sphynx.

Lots of riddles and paradoxes.

It's like always being in a philosophy class.

I do have one tutor who is fairly straight forward.

He gives you a goal along with a penalty for failing.

You have no idea how fast you can work with the Sword of Damocles hanging over your head.

He's fair about it though.

He's usually right next to me when it falls."Ozzy nodded, "That does seem fair.

If you don't learn something, it's as much his fault as yours."The two exited the Beastwoods and continued up the road to the gates.

It was a hauntingly beautiful time of night, with dawn still a ways off, but a little light coming over the horizon.

The sputtering oil lamps along the road illuminated a narrow strip of land with deep shadows on either side.

Some of those shadows were moving, slowly following the two workers who were walking arm in arm up the roadway.

It was the Shadow Hounds that saved them.

The spell-created beasts began barking and lunged at the ghouls that surged up the embankment to attack.Suzette took two steps back from Ozzy, leaped to his shoulder, then leaped again.

At the top of her jump, she cast Levitate, leaving herself hanging in mid-air above him.

The Butcher tossed his bag to the side.

It broke two of the paving stones as it hit the ground and he winced.

He'd forgotten how heavy the bag was.

The shadow hounds were already gone, clawed out of existence by the onrushing undead.Ozzy dropped his Ancient Billhook to the ground and drew his cleavers.

He was going to be swarmed by these things and needed to be able to fight them at knife range.

The two ginzu cleavers began to give off a bit of smoke and heat.

Ozzy slashed out at the first ghoul that made it to him.

It had been a long time since he had used cleavers as a weapon, but he used them for hours a day on dead meat.

And that's what these things were; still moving but dead meat.

You have struck a Carrion Ghoul with a cleaver, twice.Cleaver base damage = 60Bonus for STR of 25 = 125Bonus for Hack Undead = 130  (Skill: Butcher rank 10 + Skill: Hack Undead rank 3)Bonus for perk: Might = 10Total Damage = 620You have killed a Carrion Ghoul! Total Kills = 1.

Kill 10 Carrion Ghouls to gain a reward from Mama LaveauYou have gained 60 experience in the skill: Hack Undead.