My feet were locked in place.

  The scaled monster on the other side of the red barrier was at least six feet wide over most of its body with a head that was even wider. It helped that there weren’t any eyes, but that was a small consolation considering the serpentine monster was over twenty feet long.

  I’d seen snakes in the zoo, but this thing was one of those monstrous things that you saw skeletons of in a museum.

  “We have to help them.” I would have to be crazy to want to charge at such a huge monster with nothing but a sword with a blade the length of my arm. But despite the fear that I felt, the thought of safely standing here while that monster killed the other team was something I knew I wouldn’t be able to live with when I got home.

  “We’re not doing anything.” Arwel grabbed my arm and pulled me away from the barrier. “We’re lucky that the cats beat us here and tried to fight the top monster. Now we know to take the second one once they die.” She glanced down the hall behind her. “I doubt any of the other teams came prepared to fight a wurm, so we can rest easy knowing that we’ll still win.”

  “But what if we team up?” I pulled out of her grip. “Wouldn’t we have a better shot at winning?”

  The purple Elf pointed into the boss room. “The dead one was their captain, so they can’t make any deals.” She shook her head. “We walk in there now and we get nothing. Nope, I’m not throwing away our placement to help them get first.”

  “Throwing away our placement?” I winced as the scaled monster rammed into one of the males, knocking him across the room. It ignored the other two as it slithered across the stone floor and pounced on the stunned man, sucking him into its giant maw. In moments, there was no trace of him.

  “We become part of their team if we walk in.” Gnasher chuckled. “All risk, no money. Not fun.”

  “So we’re just going to stand here and watch them die?” My breathing was getting faster as I eyed the other three. I focused on slowing my heart and regulating my breaths. The frustration I felt was showing and I couldn’t go in there and help anyone if I started hyperventilating.

  “If they weren’t so cocky, they would have brought one of these.” Arwel pulled a green crystal the length of her finger out of her pocket. “Break this and you get transported back to the lobby.” She put it back in her pocket. “Any self-respecting runner should carry one.” She gestured at the boss's room. “The moment they saw what they were up against, they should have ported out.”

  “That’s what you would have done? Taken us all out of there?” I eyed her pocket.

  “These things only work for the individual that uses them.” She patted her pocket. “You should have brought your own.”

  Why don’t I have one of those? I stuck my hands in my pockets to make sure there wasn’t something like that in them.

  “I included it in the kit of supplies for you to put on your belt.” Grandpa fired back.

  What kit? And what belt? I patted my waist, but there was nothing there.

  “Ugh. It appears that Alistair put that in a different container and didn’t update me with the change.” He grumbled. “Well, without the kit, I would advise you not to do anything foolish.”

  Nothing foolish. I eyed the red barrier. Running in there to fight a monster that basically only had one weak spot would be very foolish. Especially considering Arwel and the others would be able to leave the moment I ran in there.

  The two remaining Cat Sith froze in place as the wurm lifted its head a few feet off the ground. The giant monster slammed its head down on the ground, shaking even the hall where I was standing.

  I braced on the wall as the others did the same.

  “What’s it doing?” I clenched my fists. This wasn’t a fight we were watching; it was a group of runners getting hunted down.

  “It doesn’t have eyes or a nose, so all it can do is feel them.” Arwel pointed at the pair. “As long as they don’t move, it doesn’t know where they are.”

  “Which is why—”

  The wurm slammed its head on the stone floor again, interrupting what I was saying as I struggled to stay upright.

  The male fell down on all fours. The monster’s head snapped to the right, pointing straight where he stood.

  My heart hammered in my chest as the monster slithered across the stone floor towards him. He ran towards us, locking eyes with me as he ran. “HELP US!”

  “MOVE!” I shouted as the head of the monster struck.

  He rolled to his right. The monster clipped his leg, spinning him into the wall as it slammed into the red barrier. The barrier cracked but held. Corbah and Gnasher backed away from the damaged wall, keeping the wurm away from us, putting the two of them between myself and Arwel. The cracks began to slowly fade as the barrier strengthened, but it was very clear that if the monster really wanted to, it would be able to break into where we were. The hall was barely ten feet wide and tall, so without the barrier, the monster’s head would take up most of the area past the finish line.

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  The wurm shook its head, then turned to the right, its head locking on the male as he scrambled to his feet.

  “PLEASE!” Urgency filled his voice as he dashed away from us.

  As the wurm coiled up to strike, I saw the inverted scale. The white, heart-shaped piece had just a bit of red the size of my fist between the arches. I reached my hand up to the hilt of my sword, but then my chance was gone as it slithered after him.

  Does it have any other weaknesses? I steadied my breathing as the length of black snake-body unwound in front of us.

  “If you had an explosive, you could throw it down the wurm’s throat and kill it from the inside.” Grandpa hummed as he thought. “I saw someone use a ball of cinnamon one time and that had pretty good results. Still had to stab it in the heart, but the thing gagged so much that it wasn’t able to hunt them.”

  Let me guess, those items were on the belt you forgot to make sure I was wearing. I grumbled as I thought about what I had in my pockets. Other than the handful of coins, I’d left everything else on the ship.

  “Maybe they have something, though they look like purists who believe that bringing items into a run cheapens the experience.”

  “Do any of you have any powder?” I looked at the three people with me.

  “You’re not seriously thinking about running in there?” Arwel scowled. “We forfeit any boss winnings if we do that and the few crystals that we’ve gotten so far aren’t going to pay for my gear to get repaired!”

  “He asked for help.” I countered. “We can’t just let them die!”

  “We can and we will.” Arwel glared at me as she pointed at the black-furred catman running away from the wurm. The tan female had a pair of daggers and was chipping away at the scales midway down the body. “Those two don’t stand a chance and they don’t have the authority to offer us anything. We walk in there and their sponsor is going to give us a public ‘thank you’, but we don’t get anything for our trouble.”

  “If we stay in here and that thing rams the barrier a couple more times, then it will kill all of us when it smashes in here.” I shook my head. “I don’t want to wait around to die by being crushed in a hole.”

  “Then port out.” Arwel challenged me. “If you don’t want to watch them die and you don’t want to wait for our turn, then port out. You can take your share of the winnings so far and we’ll get the rest of the loot from the next boss.”

  “You’re kicking me off the team?” I frowned. “I’m the team leader.”

  “And if you leave, then you get nothing.” Arwel straightened up and pushed Corbah closer to the barrier as she moved closer to me.

  The purple Elf was dangerous and I was aware of that. Challenging her wasn’t going to end well for me because she had a lot more combat experience and even if we weren’t in close quarters, Gnasher was the only one I was confident that I could handle.

  I didn’t back away from her and met her glare with one of my own.

  “Miss Orina told you that I was in charge once we walked in.” She fumed.

  “But it’s my token that you came in here with, so if I make a deal with another team, it doesn’t matter what you say; the deal stands.” I grinned. “And you can’t kill me yourself because if you do, you get nothing, and you want my runner token.”

  “I could just take it off your broken body.” She slapped her right hand against the wall by my head. She was about my height, so she was able to look straight into my eyes as she leaned forward.

  “Won’t work.” I chuckled. “The only way you get this…” I patted the pendant under my shirt with my right hand. “Is if I die fighting that thing.” A smirk pulled at my lips. “Which means Orina would want you to bring me in there, because what happens if we wait and fight something that’s weak enough for me to survive?”

  I could see the wheels turning in her mind, but I wasn’t going to give her enough time to think it through. As much as I wanted to help the Cat Sith, I knew I couldn’t handle the wurm on my own. I ducked under her arm and threw myself through the red barrier.

  “WHAT ARE YOU DOING?” Arwel screamed after me.

  “I could ask you the same question.” Grandpa rebuked me. “You don’t have a means of escape and this isn’t a boss that should have been at the end of an entry-level dungeon like this.”

  Wait, you’re saying that this isn’t a normal boss? I pulled out my sword and tapped the tip on the stone floor. “HEY! Monster! Over here!”

  The black serpent turned, the teeth inside its throat vibrating as the wurm breathed in and felt the vibrations that I was creating.

  ROAR!

  It turned away from the wounded male and slithered across the room at me.

  “Dungeons have star ratings, and while this isn’t a one-star, it was registered as a two-star beginner dungeon.” Grandpa’s voice took on a scholarly tone. “You wouldn’t expect to see a wyvern-class monster until the end of the beginner scale.”

  So someone tampered with something. I gripped my sword with both hands. I’d seen the rows of teeth charging at me not long ago, but there had been a barrier between me and it. Now my heart hammered in my chest as the danger barreled towards me.

  Corbah ran past me, sidestepping to the left and swinging his hammer at the creature’s head.

  BAM! CRACK!

  The monster’s head rolled to my right and the whole length of the monster slid sideways as it squirmed to right itself.

  “DIE! HE-HA-HE-HE-HA!” Gnasher ran past me and threw himself on the monster.

  I hopped backwards and tried to get ready to spring at the white scale. I assumed I would only get one chance, so I needed to stay close enough to strike but far enough away that I wouldn’t risk getting rolled over.

  The monster slowed down, keeping its weak side away from me as it coiled up and prepared to strike. Its head was focused on Corbah, which gave me a moment to check on the Cat Sith.

  The tan female was kneeling over by her downed ally on the other side of the room. Tears rolled down her cheek as I watched his body sink into the floor.

  “One more down.” Arwel stopped beside me. “And I don’t care how much you fancy the cat. She dies before this monster.”

  I watched the purple woman charge at the striking creature. Corbah smacked it in the face again. This time, the wurm twisted in an arc, lashing out with its tail to knock the Ogre across the room.

  Arwel stabbed the lip of the giant mouth, then rolled out of the way before it could bite her.

  Just try it. I clenched my jaw as I moved closer to the fight. If you want to kill her, you’ll have to go through me.

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