The Infinity Dungeon [LitRPG]

"That's the big boss, huh?" a young man, perhaps in his late twenties, asked.

They were sweeping through the Site, as ordered.

"That's him," the leader of the team of three said.

"He must be what, twenty?" the third person said with a scowl. "You're telling me we have to listen to what he has to say?"

"Have you taken a look at yourself lately, Jackson?" asked the first.

"Ah fuck, you're right. Shit, I almost forgot." Then he narrowed his eyes, "But he's not like us, is he? He actually is young."

The two men suddenly found themselves a few paces ahead of their leader. They turned around, about to ask why he had stopped, when they saw his eyes.

"What is that supposed to mean?" he asked. He had not raised his voice, but it had been laced with enough venom and… something else, to make them almost piss themselves.

"I'm sorry, David, boss man, but—"

"Clearly," David hissed, "the rejuvenation has done you wonders given the fact that it also made you fucking stupid!" he yelled the last word before squaring them up and down, "I didn't choose you two because you're retards. I chose you two because you were among the best. No, not among the best. The fucking best. Jackson, you outmaneuvered entire armies, and Miller, you were the only man to walk out of the Obsidian Gate. People don't even know that operation existed. What's with the informal chit-chatter and all that bullshit? You're veterans, dammit, not some fresh-faced idiots. I know that this is different, but—"

"It's also not." Jackson said somberly, "It feels like we are Privates again."

"Michael fucking Lexington, your boss." David said, "not only is he actually older than you two thanks to time dilation, but the only reason he looks young–younger than he had been before all this–is because he's so powerful he could turn you two into goop with barely a look. The moment he thinks bad thoughts about you, you're dead. Shit, you've seen the sort of power I have? He can turn me into a pretzel with his pinky. Now that is who your boss is. You are Privates again, in here. This time, however, you have me, and your past gives you advantages that the randoms of Candle Light don't have. Don't let them close the gap. Focus and earn your fucking power!"

The two looked at him before chuckling. "Shit, we really are Privates. Yessir, drill sergeant, sir."

After the little moment, they refocused on the task at hand. They had been assigned together with David to scout the wilderness close to the sabotaged jet.

"It's a fool's errand. Whoever has been here is long gone." Jackson said after a while.

"Yes, but this is the most crucial part. All three of us have detection capabilities, there might be some clues."

"Privates again…" muttered Miller. "We are here to prove ourselves, then?"

Jackson looked at him with a shit-eating grin, "Guess who's the one we need to impress?"

David wasn't amused, "It's not a game."

"About that," said Jackson, now all serious. "I remember you telling us that Michael doesn't care about these games. In fact, doesn't he actually despise them? Perhaps we'd better follow his example and not play."

David nodded. Despite the earlier banter, the man was not stupid. "I thought about it, but we need to take precautions before Travis turns Unity into his own pet project. He has good intentions, but there need to be checks and balances."

"Well," snorted Miller, "beats being in that shit-ass VA Community Center."

"By a long shot. Wait. What's that?"

A sudden noise accompanied by a flash of… something. The three fell quiet in an instant, old instincts taking over.

"What was that?" Miller asked again after several minutes and no movement.

"Elemental Energy fluctuation," whispered David.

As they got close, their tension grew. Until eventually, with the target entering David's detection range, he groaned. There was a strange iridescent stone on the ground, warping in and out of reality.

"Don't touch it," he commanded.

Jackson stopped mere inches away from it. While David's perception was nowhere near Michael's, he had been training it to the limit. Besides, he knew what he was looking at.

"I fucking hate spatial anomalies. This, gentlemen, is your first sighting of an anomaly being born."

He notified Icarus and then they left, giving the stone a wide berth. While they surveyed the nearby forest, David told the two veterans the story about the team trapped in a pocket dimension, as well as his own experiences in the expanded house back at Redbud Ridge. The more he spoke, the eerier and quieter the forest seemed to become. To the two veterans' eyes, the bountiful colors and swirling energy took an ominous tone, as the duo was now aware of the hostile nature of magic.

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"Not hostile," David corrected them, "it just doesn't care. It's random and indifferent, which also happens to mean that it's dangerous most of the time. Not always. Sometimes it's funny."

He told them about the backward-steering jeep.

"And did it happen while someone was driving it?"

David thought about it, "I think so, yeah."

"What happened to the driver?"

"Hit a tree. Michael was there to heal him, though."

It went without saying that had he not been there, the driver wouldn't have made it out with just a laugh.

"Yeah," Jackson shook his head while making a face, "not funny."

David waited until the cold reality had settled over the two vets. Their mind had been a rollercoaster of emotions: the sudden rejuvenation, being able to walk and be autonomous again, then being thrown into the thick of it in an alien and strange environment where magic, of all things, was real. It sounded, for a moment, like the incipit of a rather cliche book.

Then, he grinned.

"Without magic, you wouldn't be able to do this."

He turned around and punched. Only after the fact did the other two realize that he had stopped some sort of deformed animal in mid-air as it lunged at them from above, sending the creature into a tree with enough strength to cave its trunk in. The veterans had already seen fighting and magic, but it had been limited to the first floor of the Dungeon for the time being.

When they made their way back to the HQ tent set up for the search, they both had their eyes thoroughly opened.

Michael was waiting for them in the tent. Seeing him, they blanched, giving him a wide berth and retreating to a side of the tent under David's orders, walking like they had seen a ghost.

"What's up with them?" asked Michael.

"I dared them to look at you with their magic sight," David said with a grin.

"Oh yeah," Travis said, entering the tent himself and waving at the two veterans before promptly ignoring them. "You brought fresh meat. Allow me, then."

With a hand motion, two of the four men making up Delta Squad joined them. It took so little time for them to arrive, and in full tactical magitech gear, that David knew for a fact Travis had planned his move.

The two veterans looked thoroughly out of place, but it was fine. It would change with time, and today would be a good opportunity to show the first two out of hopefully many Vanguard members what real business looked like. Plus, they were freshly rejuvenated still, and he knew from experience that the first few days had you acting like a teenager high on hormones all over again. He had yet not fully managed to get over this phase himself, but hoped that being close to Michael and the others would help speed up this process. It wouldn't be proper for the vets to embarrass themselves or worse, to start acting entitled and arrogant due to the drug.

Michael actively ignored the theatrics in a way that communicated without a shred of possible misunderstanding that he was choosing to do so, but was also rather annoyed. Seeing it, David knew he had done the right thing for the vets, but it was also costing him some political capital. Travis seemed thoroughly unfazed, although David knew from reading the Italy mission report that the man had just waded through some muddy water before getting here.

"You might want to reel your aura in," Travis quipped.

The two veterans, who were already white in the face for being too close to a power too strong to handle, were soon joined by the more seasoned Delta Squad members. Michael's aura flared and then folded on itself, leaving the room utterly empty but not before transmitting through unknown means just how annoyed Travis' quip left him.

The thing that unsettled everyone the most was that he actually laughed. Not at Travis, but with the man, with David joining soon after. It was the kind of laughter filled with mirth that one shares with old friends, leaving the outsiders confused about the dynamics in the strange trio.

Then a woman joined. Everyone knew who she was, of course.

"Why do you have a shield up?" Johanne asked with an arched eyebrow. "Does your aura bother the men?"

It was a simple question, without a second motive. Yet, somehow it hurt more than all the banter before. Now the veterans, but also the two of Delta Squad, understood why they had been brought here. To play the power games of the strong, yes, but also to learn an important lesson.

"Enough of this," Michael said, commanding the whole room to silence with a statement. "My Sanctum is fucked up, leaking Aura left and right. It's either a shield or these four pass out. By the way Travis, David, your chosen are here but where are Trevor and Jennifer?"

"Busy," Travis said, "they deal with the day-to-day shit around here, not the emergency stuff."

"Yeah, no." said Michael, "call them."

They made small talk while they waited. Small talk that still left the veterans and Operators feeling rather queasy.

"How much Aura leakage is there?" Johanne was asking.

"About 5% of current max. Which itself is less than 20%."

From the rest of the conversation, it transpired that Michael was down to 20% strength due to some injury. It didn't seem to bother anyone, and everyone expected him to somehow recover from something that had crippled four-fifths of his power like it was a walk in the park. They might have thought that perhaps it was, with magic, but repeated delves had taught both parties that it was not the case. Even with Johanne and a certain Doctor Kavins' concoctions, which were supposed to be some prototype healing potions, getting hurt hurt like hell and magical wounds were even worse.

Michael was the freak here. Then the realization of what they had overheard earlier hit them.

"Are you saying that we nearly passed out after being exposed to… 5% of 20% of his power?"

"Of his passive power," David whispered back to the two, "yes. You understand now?"

At the other side of the tent, Travis was whispering to Michael. "He's still playing power games."

Michael rolled his eyes and nodded towards the half of Delta Squad that was in here. They averted their gaze. "You started it. And you also did not call Trevor and Jennifer. What, they escaped your leash? Play all you want, but not when there's important stuff going on, okay?"

"I'm not playing anymore. I… outgrew it. The Delta squad men are here because they are needed."

Michael shot the man a look. Right at that moment, David joined in, strolling to them and jabbing a finger at Travis, "You didn't outgrow shit." he said. His height gave his words power, but his voice and face were just too different to Old Dave's. This, the new David knew very well. "You have never once stopped playing the games. How does it feel when someone else plays your games?"

The air between the two seemed electric. Johanne, reading the room in her own strange way, smiled at the four onlookers. She didn't seem to notice that her simple action had frozen them stiff. "They are just pretending to hate each other," she said sweetly, "they have always been at each other's back. But you'll see, when push comes to shove, how things really are." She then glared at them, and space itself seemed to constrict around them, "And you'd better remember that at the end of the day, they are all working for the same goal. We all are. As long as it's silly little games you all play, feel free to play them. But the moment my lord is forced to step in, oh, then it's going to be pain for everyone."