"You are not more awesome than me," said Kelima.

"Of course, I am. I'm unleaded."

"I— What?"

"Unleaded is clearly superior. There's no arguing about it."

Kelima's eyes narrowed, and she asked, "You're making some reference to your old world that you know I won't understand, aren't you?"

"So suspicious. I would never do that."

"You do it all the time!"

"You must be remembering wrong."

"I'm not remembering wrong!"

Why are you gaslighting the jailbait? asked other-Terry.

You said she wasn't jailbait. Also, because it's funny.

Did I? You must be remembering wrong. I clearly said she was seventeen. Perv.

Ha. Ha. Point made. Shouldn't you be on my side?

Have you met you? I'm on the side of your survival only because my survival depends on it.

Well, that's comforting.

Looking at Kelima, Terry changed the subject.

"So, what did the stone do for you?"

Kelima frowned and said, "I'm not sure exactly what it did, but I feel like I'm stronger now."

"Terrific," said Terry with a gesture to the other stones. "Get to absorbing."

"Don't you want any of them?"

"Of those? No. They aren't strong enough to do anything meaningful for me. You, on the other hand, will probably need every bit of help you can get to survive this. If we get some bigger ones, I might take those."

"If you say so," said Kelima, obviously not convinced.

While the noble girl sat down and started absorbing the small pile of goblin gems, Terry picked up Dusk. He held her so they were looking at each other eye-to-eye.

"You can't go running off like that in here," he said in his sternest voice.

The cat's four ears twitched a little. Then, the cat reached out and batted the end of his nose. She just did it with the toe beans on her paw, so he assumed she thought they were playing.

Sighing, Terry said, "I'm glad you're taking this seriously."

Cradling the cat in one arm, he stroked her back. He could feel her purr in his ribcage. That made him pause. His bones were so strong now that a multi-story fall onto stone wasn't enough to even make his legs ache. Yet, somehow, the cat's purr was making his ribs vibrate. That was when he remembered that the kitten had brutally murdered dozens of monster snakes while he slept and frightened at least a few monsters just by looking at them. It was entirely possible that Dusk was in the least amount of danger in this dungeon. She certainly didn't look concerned. Once Kelima finished absorbing the source stones, he gave her a thoughtful look.

"If you start to feel any serious pressure around your core when you absorb one of those, it's time to stop."

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"Okay," she said. "Why?"

"It might damage your core if you push your growth too hard."

Kelima paled a little at that suggestion and nodded. Then, she looked down the corridor with a wary expression.

"Do they have dungeons like this on your world?"

"Only in books, manga, and anime."

The flat stare she gave him made him laugh.

"Just in stories," he amended. "There's no magic there."

"None? At all? I thought you were just downplaying it, like there wasn't much or something."

"If there is magic, the people using it aren't making themselves known. There are stories of people doing superhuman or magical things, but there's never any proof. It's probably safer for them to handle it like that."

"Why?"

"Mostly, so they don't get imprisoned, murdered, or dissected. Real magic, like the kind of stuff you take for granted, would be terrifying in my world. Governments would lose their minds trying to capture them. Normal people would panic. Someone would want to cut them up to see if they could figure out how it worked. It would be a shitshow," said Terry, shaking his head. "Anyway, we should get moving. I'd be surprised if there's food or water in here. That means we've got limited time to finish this and get out."

"Do you even need food or water?"

"I don't know if I need them, necessarily, but I do like them. And you strike me as the kind of person who gets hangry. I don't want to deal with that. So, forward!" declared Terry, pointing down the corridor.

Heeding his own advice, he started walking. Behind him, he could hear Kelima muttering.

"Hangry? What in the world is hangry?"

Now that he knew the dungeon monsters would disintegrate, Terry mostly let Kelima do the fighting when they came across roving packs of goblins. She needed the practice more than he did. That went on for several hours before they came across a big open room. Terry stopped them at the entrance.

"We should stop here for a little while. You should finish absorbing whatever gems you have left."

"Why?"

Terry nodded at the open space and said, "Boss room. There will probably be a goblin king or something in there, along with a bunch of minions. And, if my luck holds true, the door will seal behind us the second we enter. So, best for you to power up and take a little break before we go in."

"What are you going to do?"

"Gather some ammunition for my rock shotgun."

While Kelima sat down with her back against a wall and absorbed source stone after source stone, Terry punched the walls. Once he'd gathered up a bunch of rocks of various sizes, he started throwing them all just inside the door. Frowning at the pile, he decided it probably wasn't enough and went to get some more. More rock fell to the floor beneath the onslaught of his fist. Just as he was drawing back to punch yet another hole in a wall, Kelima spoke.

"Is it normal to be able to shatter stone by punching it like that?"

Terry looked at her, thought it over, and said, "Maybe? It probably is for rank two and rank one adventurers. Who knows? By the time we get out of here, you might be able to do it."

She looked from the badly damaged wall down to her own hand with a dubious expression.

"I don't think I'd dare to try," she finally said. "I'd be too worried about breaking something in my hand."

"Sooner or later, you'll find yourself punching a monster that's as hard as stone. After that, walls aren't that intimidating. They don't fight back. I can't say for sure, but I bet there are some cultivators up north who can punch through mountains."

"Really?" asked Kelima, her eyes wide.

"I am basing that on stories from my world, but yeah. You should be glad that they're fighting a war with something and not terribly interested in invading these southern countries. If they're anything like the cultivators from the books in my world, it would not go well for you."

Terry gathered up the fresh load of stone pieces and tossed them into the room before sitting next to Kelima. He took out a couple pieces of the now-precious jerky and handed one to her. They chewed the meat in silence and took small sips of water from a canteen. Terry could almost feel Kelima's apprehension ratcheting up.

"What?" he asked.

"I don't think I can fight a goblin king," she said, looking embarrassed and a little ashamed.

"Don't worry about that. I'll be fighting the boss. If there are any smaller minions, maybe try fighting them. Getting experience is good, but not dying is better."

"Does that mean I'm going to be doing most of the fighting in this place?" she asked, looking decidedly displeased.

"For now, yeah. It's not like I'd get anything from fighting these low-level monsters. Later, we'll see. It'll depend on how many floors this place has, and how strong the monsters get."

"Like minotaurs?" asked Kelima.

Terry resisted the urge to strangle the noble girl, if only just.

"Well, there are sure as shit going to be minotaurs now!" snapped Terry, glaring at the girl. "Why do you think I didn't name anything? I didn't want to give the universe ideas! But you just had to say it, didn't you?"

"I forgot!" shouted Kelima. "I didn't mean it!"

"It's too late," grumbled Terry. "It's in the air, now. You should just start mentally preparing for the idea that we're going to fight them later. Fucking hell."

After seething in silence for a little while, a possible silver lining occurred to Terry.

"Maybe," he said, "the boss on that floor will drop some ribeyes as a prize. I could use a good steak."

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