[A New Job has been assigned by your Employer - Nino's Pizza]

[Deliver the Pizza to the Customer - Time Remaining - 58:07]

[50 Credit Reward for Completion, along any and all tips from Customers]

[Customer: Scrum Lord Supreme – The Sprint Reaper]

"Scrum Lord Supreme?" Alex asked as not one, but two pizzas flew themselves over to land in his waiting hand. "What the hell is Scrum?"

"In the before time," Nino answered as he handed Francesca her own single box. "There was terrible, and I mean terrible culture called Scrum. Mama mia, company make you go to meeting about meeting, then schedule meting to review meeting, then big meeting to plan small meeting. Alway standing. Every morning, you stand. And chart of sadness!" He jabbed his thick finger into the air. "They call sprint! But sprint never end. You cry into board. Consultant come in, and they point, and check your status. High priority? How everything high priority? Whole day gone, no pizza deliver, only meeting."

"Ew," Francesca answered as her own single pizza box landed on her hand. "Yeah, he can have that one. I'll handle 'Go Kart Raver at MacDonalds. Qui eh, Mac Donald? Is scary Dungeon Boss?"

Last delivery of the night, and it was a Dungeon Boss with a name like Scrum Lord Supreme. His shift had been busy, portaling all across Toronto, raking up tips and Credits.

He'd handed off pie with quadruple raw meat to a lion-looking man in a tuxedo. The tip had been heavy and wrapped in purple velvet. Then it was up to Jane and Finch, where the local gang had insisted he dance with them for a moment before handing off a something wrapped tightly in dark plastic. After that it was a small gang of card players in a basement. Little faux Monsters rose out of their cards to battle. That place stunk terribly. Their tip was a greasy card with some black flower on it. The mouth-breathing card gamer had said it was rare. Probably worthless, but he kept it anyways.

And Francesca? She'd taken to delivering pizza like a mermaid in a clean ocean. Alex always came back sweaty and winded, where she came back laughing. Half the time she was a few deliveries ahead of him, teasing him with a smile or a comment about how his short legs made him too slow.

Snu and Alex hadn't spoken, but they had texted. It went…Ok. Alex didn't flub and actually admit that Francesca was attractive, but he did let her know she had kind of flirted with him, which went as one expected. The wall of messages could be summed up with the final few she had sent before his shift started.

Snu: If this bitch makes a move i will destroy her

Snu: and come to leather spires tomorrow

Snu: no one touches my man!

Snu: you're gunna be so sore she learns!😈

Snu: mwah be safe. movie night with gasha and giat. horror marathon!

"You gamble man, Alex?" Francesca asked as she walked up to the espresso machine portal. Her hair drifted lazily towards it. "Up for game? Maybe challenge?"

"Game? What do you mean?" Alex asked, padding over to wedge in beside her.

"Mmmmm," She tapped her lips. "We race. Both have Dungeon Boss for last delivery…What about, we play for tips? First back gets all tips. Loser get nothing."

It took exactly one second for Alex to make his decision. He was done with the badmouthing of his legs. Did he need to get another pair of sexy pants? Or better yet, sexy delivery shorts!? His tips would be out of control.

"You're on." He answered and leapt into the portal.

"Wait!" Nino yelled after him. Too slow, as Alex was already gone. Nino spun on Francesca.

"Why you do this?" He demanded. "He go to high end Silver Grade Dungeon! You go to medium Bronze! I was suppose give him advice! Nina supposed to give food buff!"

"Ah, crap…" Francesca answered, feeling terrible already.

"No underestimate him," Nino said flatly as she ordered her pots and brushes to smack against each other and clean themselves. The things really did get out of line sometimes. "You naturally fast, but Alex have few trick up sleeve. He be fine. No be so scare, Nino, and you," she pointed a wooden spoon menacingly at Francesca. "Stop be bitch." Even though Nina was just holding the spoon, it cracked and shattered in her hand.

And that was that.

Alex gritted his teeth as he travelled through the unspace. Having spent a few years as a street rat, with just Emilio there by his side, there was no way he was letting Francesca take his tips.

He passed by a bunch of glowing balls that bobbed and jammed to some music that sounded almost like trance from the early 90s. The black monolith was there as always, sulking in the corner of his vision. Alex zipped straight through the fuzzy interior of a colossal slumbering pillow monster thing. It snored, and as he shot out of its innards, a group of nightmares rolled dice on it's tongue for chunks of flesh.

Alex didn't enjoy this ride, even though it was one of the more fun ones. No way he was letting Francesca show him up. He was going to blitz this Dungeon in record time, and he wasn't just going to deliver the pizza, either.

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A slightly manic grin tugged at his mouth. Maybe it was his tie to the Lich, or his involvement with Emilio, or Snu, or his recent ingestion of Monster Cores. Most likely, it was his rips through the unspace and frequent use of his teleport Skills. Could someone be through the underbelly of reality countless times and stay the same? Some people went crazy after a few hallucinogenics, and decided that their real calling was cobbling shoes, but only organic ones. Alex's brain had been through more than that.

I'm going to steal something GOOD using my new Skill combo of [Burrow Sense] and [Shiny Snatch]. That was part of the upgrade poem, right? Something given, something taken? Put these Skills to real use. Let Francesca suck on that sun-kissed lemon.

He landed feet first out of the Portal and looked around.

Beneath Toronto was The Path, an underground labyrinth that spanned thirty kilometers connecting banks, food courts, and offices across all of downtown. Post System, it was much the same. Credit exchanges traded corporate blessing and curses, soup stalls dolled out slop with side salad, shoe stores hung on somehow, and young workers buzzed around demanding people sign up for this or that. The marble floors were buffed, always, and air scrubbers beat out all the nasty diseases that lingered. It was the kind of air that was too crisp and the kind of light that didn't let you become tired.

Everyone moved with purpose or the imitation of it. Shoes so uncomfortable that they must have been manufactured as some disablement fashion movement clacked on the floor. People wore ties that choked them on purpose and paid-up big time for the silk version. Nails shined with cuticle enhancements, because would you really buy something from someone unless they had perfect hands? Did you say 'um' in your presentation? Sorry, no promotion this year for you! No, why would you need a day off to go to your child's birth? There are OKRs to complete. Everyone walked seriously or laughed with hollow eyes with their coworkers, like predators circling in the same fishbowl. It was full of life, and people, Monster secretaries, and business, but it still somehow felt lifeless and sterile.

Smack dab in the hallway Alex had been delivered too was a black glass door with two words etched perfectly.

Scrum Center

[Scrum Center - Silver Ranked Dungeon]

[Current Occupants: 999]

[Time Since Last Defeat: 19 Years, 11 Months, 21 Day]

[Deliver the Pizza to the Customer - Time Remaining - 56:12]

Alex dashed off, weaving between corpos on their way for their eleventh meeting about meetings. They didn't even look at him. He left [Blazing Hot]'s flames off as the last thing he need was some Path security writing him up for looking like he was having a good time.

Nine hundred and ninety-nine occupants was a little too exact for his liking. Were they endentured workers slaving away? People were really working for a Dungeon Boss? Silver Grade was tough…but a thousand people should be able to overwhelm a Dungeon Boss. Plus, the Scrum Center hadn't been defeated in twenty years.

With a final breath of sterile, airconditioned air, Alex pushed in to the Scum Center.

"Pizza here!" He shouted to let the Dungeon know he meant business. "I got two pies here for Scrum Lord Supreme! Two piping hot pizza pies here! Smells like…every single kind of meet plus, is that extra everything? Two everything pizzzzzzzzzaaaa pieeeess!"

He was pissed off Francesca, but tradition was tradition. One must yell their pizza delivery, especially just to add some flavour to the place.

The entrance was not what he expected. There wasn't any clacking keyboard Monsters to phase through, or a mountain of post-it notes, and not even a cat poster with 'hang in there!' tacked next to a cubicle farm. Instead it was a sterile white room where the floors and walls and ceilings melted together into one endless void of dove-white. At the very end, clean block letters outlined the…values? Bs?

HERE BE SCRUM.

"Greetings, and thank you for arriving at Scrum Center," a recorded voice sounded from the walls. "Without Scrum, you are but chaos in human form. Please standby while we assess your parameters."

A whine filled the white void, and thin red lines snapped out. Laser beams crossed him over to trace his limbs. The recorded voice droned on.

"Optimizing sprint capacity, evaluating Dungeon synergy, reviewing bathroom efficiency logs."

The lasers felt like some gum-chewer that happened to have a degree in HR management rifling through his Core and text messages while logging his toilet breaks into an ancient spreadsheet.

"I'm here to deliver PIZZA!" Alex roared, eager to get moving, but the only way he saw to go was back out the Dungeon. "Did a Dungeon Boss order two pies or not?"

"I'm sorry, your signature has not been updated. We all need to maintain branding for the sake of unity. Perhaps a ticket? Have you submitted a – "

The lasers paused, then, with the voice being replaced with a chime. He wasn't sure if it was meant to pavlov him or what, but the artificial voice returned.

"Delivery acknowledged," the walls said together. "Proceed to Epics Planning session. Please note that upon entering the Epics Planning session, your calendar will be marked out of office. Please plan accordingly."

With the lasers snapping off, a space roughly the size of a person slid open against the blank wall to his left. It was dark in there, and all Alex could hear was thousands and thousands of fingers clacking against keyboards alongside mouse clicks furiously trying to select something. There likely wasn't any Cookie Clicker going on anywhere.

"Uhhh…Ok?" Alex started jogging towards the door with alert senses. So far, nothing had jumped out at him to stab him, but he had a feeling that this Dungeon was more nefarious than regular Monster spawn.

As soon as Alex crossed the threshold, the wall snapped shut behind him without a sound, throwing him in complete darkness. The keyboard sounds cut out, the mice stopped getting abused.

What he did notice was that the air was stuffier. Like the air conditioning hadn't worked right in years, and the tech that came to check it would unscrew the vent cover, only to screw it back in over the course of a couple of hours and claim it good as new. It also smelt like stale coffee and granola bars. Maybe they were free and part of the perks?

Those lights that every ancient office has, the long ones that hum like dying flies, flicked on one by one. Each came with a ka-chunk, stuttering across the low ceiling until the whole room blared in migraine yellow.

The first room was a cubicle farm. Endless rows stretching hundreds of meters in every direction. The dividers were pukey-purple, the kind picked by a year long committee to be "bold". At the far end of the room, he could make out an "EXIT" sign glowing above another door.

Inside the cubicles were workers.

The rose together with torn suits and yellow glazed eyes. Their ties hung crooked over grey skin that sagged and hadn't gotten enough vitamin D since graduation. Breath rattled, and every one of them exhaled out stale air of despair. For a long moment, they all just stared at Alex.

Then one with a perm, whose face sagged more than most, unlatched it's jaw, which leaked pus.

"HAVE YOU DONE YOUR BURNDOWN CHART TODAY?"

Dozens, then hundreds of voices aped the same line, over and over. The horde began to move. They clambered over their desks with clammy hands and jerky motions, shambling toward him and moaning about KPIs.

Alex couldn't help himself. He cracked his neck, grinned ear to ear, and made sure the pizzas were firmly set in his hand. He had a bit of frustrations to work out. The GoCoin wouldn't provide any help, and he didn't even bother with the Stone Sword. There was one exit, a bunch of shuffling mouth-breathers, and he had to beat Francesca.

Time to sprint this bitch, he thought before activating his flames and shooting off.

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