Mouseion's invite-only grand-scale beta test had been going on for longer than anyone anticipated. When the original invitation went out to the selected gamers, the general public thought that meant Dungeons Below would go public quickly. Yet, six months had passed in the real world, which was two years of in-game time, and no new players had been added since the initial beta bump.
There had been four major code updates during those six months, each coinciding with half a year passing in the game, and for the first three there had been no visible changes since the beta test started. There were changes being made on the back end but the players missed there for a plethora of reasons. The first reason being that the creators of Dungeons Below had finally picked what the world outside of the dungeons themselves would feel like.
At the beginning there had been a few options for the players that completed their starting dungeons. The first option was that they could teleport right into the next dungeon after completing one, like warping to the next game world. The second option was that they could teleport to a hub zone, a grand corridor connected to a vast array of doors that led to new dungeons.
The final option was a more open world approach where upon completion of their starting dungeon, they were teleported to a hub city and from there they were free to chase down rumors to find new dungeons or follow other players to the entrances to those dungeons. When the beta test went live, and nearly twenty thousand new players joined Dungeons Below, Mouseion Entertainment removed the first two options. It was entirely an open-world game now.
That was the extent of the changes until the most recent code update. Now Dungeons Below was starting to feel less like a game and more like another world entirely. Unfortunately, Merrick had learned that the game was not a game and that it was not another world either. He had peered off the edge of Atborea, the game's continent, and instead of an abyss, he saw his own city.
It had taken Merrick the full two years of time passing inside of Dungeons Below to regain what he had lost due to Alex Drea resetting his account. He had given up on blaming her immediately afterwards. His account had been completely broken by the fact that Xerxes left open a vein to the game's underbelly in his dungeon. Since he was a Mage, the simple exposure to that energy was enough to boost his growth.
Not everything was lost, it seemed, and that helped as well. The game seemed to recognize him even though his account had been reset. When he summoned a Dust Mephit to his side, he instantly recognized that it was Crudle. The original augmentations that Merrick had given the Mephit were still there, but the additional power from the Pure Earth Elemental was gone.
Merrick's notes inside his Mage's Journal were gone, but the spellwork that he had figured out was still inside. There were even knew entries for the spells that he had figured out and a few others that must have been developed by other players during the early tests. The journal was starting to feel more like a beginner's spellbook than the vague notepad that it had been. The one thing that he did not have in the game anymore was the relic dagger: Spell Stealer.
It seemed that there was only one of those and Merrick had taken it out of the game. Despite the fact that he tried to find another one, he had no luck. No one, not even the city's best information brokers, had even heard of such an item.
In fact, Merrick had become practically the same Mage that he was when he confronted Xerxes. Except that now he wore better robes with magical working laid into the fabric. He carried a good slew of consumable items that he had learned to craft. Most importantly, he had started carrying a delving pack; it was mostly to help easily carry loot out of the dungeons.
A few weeks after the most recent code update, Merrick walked into the lobby of his new home base. He had helped another player start a Faction as a way to get access to more resources, so that he could recover what he had lost. Factions had been added to Dungeons Below during the beta launch but they did not have much use until the most recent update. They had seemed like a pointless version of Guilds, but now they were central to the current in-game event.
As Merrick walked into the Faction Office, he walked over an ornate crimson rug that held their painted shield and the words: The Curious Glades. It was a typo during registration that stuck and helped everyone have a laugh when they saw it. As he was walking, one of the Faction members interrupted him, "Oh, excuse me, Vice-Leader, what brings you in today? Our schedule shows you clearing a dungeon for the whole day with the faction's new recruits."
"We finished up early. They are a good pair and the dungeon was fairly simple."
"Fairly simple?" The Faction member asked. "I don't think we've had a simple dungeon before."
Merrick shook his head slightly, "I mean that it was standard. Very gothic, if you're a fan of old games. Dark mausoleum style with torches and the monsters were mostly rats, bats, and slimes."
"Should I mark it as a training dungeon and try to buy the weekly rights?" The Faction member asked.
Merrick sighed, "Yes, but all parties will need a spell caster. It would have been a fight with the difficulty slider set to insanity with just a Knight and a Rogue, especially with limited magic items. The boss was a Chimera."
The Faction member's face went pale. "Are they…?"
Merrick laughed and pulled a pair of Chimera Horns from his pack, "We all survived. They handled the Chimera perfectly once I silenced the goat."
The faction member was relieved. Merrick returned the horns to his pack and continued on his way, "I've got to report in. If you get the weekly rights for that dungeon, add it to the schedule and I'll try to lead the next few as the spell caster until the others are up to speed on magical duels."
The person that Merrick had to report to was the Faction Leader. His office was at the end of a hallway, directly across from the Faction's Coffers, and right after Merrick's own office that had mostly been turned into an overstuffed laboratory. Merrick's office was not the only one that was filled to the brim, the Faction Leader's was no better.
The only difference between them was that where Merrick had books and ingredients for spell casting and item crafting, the Faction Leader had letters, papers, notes scribbled with rumors, and various tomes all relating to the location of hidden dungeons in the land of Atborea. Each rumor, folk tale, or whisper in the game could lead to a new dungeon and the Faction Leader of The Curious Glades took it as his personal mission to find the best of them.
That was the kind of leader that Thom was and Merrick had always appreciated him for that. Even when they met, competing for rights to delve a dungeon, Thom had been straightforward and dueled Merrick for the right. Merrick won but Thom did not give up, he badgered Merrick to start a Faction with him and serve as his second in command. Since then, they worked well together.
When Merrick came into Thom's office, it seemed like the Faction Leader was working up into a frenzy. Merrick could barely say hello before Thom launched into a tirade about how the game was changing.
"I don't even know if it's a good thing. It's definitely more social. It's more… adaptable. There seems to be a better player engagement… but I don't know… It's weird to PVP here. I know, we all knew they would add it eventually, but like this…?"
Thom was talking about the Faction Wars, the most recent addition to Dungeons Below. The fourth code update had started a six month in-game season where the Factions were competing to come out of top. Merrick was already overwhelmed by Thom's tirade. It reminded him of the -conversations- people would have with him when they were upset about something and he was just trying to study.
Merrick tried to get ahead of it before it spiraled off any farther. "Jones and Alric did really well in the dungeon."
Fortunately it worked. If there was one thing that could pull Thom out of a spiral it was news of his newest recruits. He really cared for the whole Faction. "Did they?"
Merrick nodded, "Everyone is doing really well on their own but working together is still a struggle. Plus a lot of the new recruits are lower-tier players that are not used to working with good gear, proper supplies, and facing down elite monsters."
"What happened?"
Merrick shrugged, "Nothing serious. Alric panicked when we reached the boss. It was a Chimera."
"A Rogue's worst nightmare."
Merrick nodded, "Jones covered him while I silenced the goat. Then they killed both the lion and the snake."
Thom nodded, "So you got the horns, Jones got the pelt, and Alric got the…"
"Fangs." Merrick finished the sentence that Thom left open, "He picked the fangs, I bet he's going to pay Muster to turn them into a pair of daggers."
Thom smiled widely, "Wicked."
Merrick nodded, "So to finish my report… Jones is a dependable Knight, he is worth investing in. Alric is a good player but you should convince him to re-skill into a support class so that he could be more comfortable on the field."
Thom matched Merrick's nod and then said, "Good, report accepted. Now... we just got our lottery numbers and they came up already, we've got another Faction War..."