I stand in the middle of The Great Plains Dungeon rolling the black coin-sized gem around in my right hand while watching Ember flap his wings high above me.

“This must be a Strengthening Fragment”

I turn my head to see a massive crater on the dungeon’s floor. It stretches nearly 50m in diameter, and the debris is scattered even further away on all sides. This is where I knocked down that Titan, and fell into its domain almost a full month ago. It seems like In the end, I won the battle and made it back in one piece.

Activating my telepathy skill, I call out to the shimmering jet-black dragon in the sky. It descends gracefully through the air to greet me.

“Jay, you’ve awoken.”

Ember hits the ground with a light thud, sitting obediently with his head held high and long tail waving behind him. I look the creature up and down curiously for a moment. It doesn’t look like he’s changed at all. The 3rd rank-up must have ended with an incomplete result.

“It seems you haven’t evolved any further.”

“That’s correct. Once the Titan’s Domain couldn’t handle my absorption rate, along with the attack you threw to disrupt the connection between realms, I was forced awake. We were thrown back into this dungeon hours ago, right after the Void Creeper’s link was severed from its pocket dimension. You’ve been unconscious ever since.”

I smile.

This reunion is nice and all, but I need food, water, and rest. My dry lips and caved-in stomach can’t take it much longer, I’ve lost almost 12kg over the last month. I struggle to stay on my feet as I reply.

“I need to leave this dungeon and heal up from our ordeal…. It may be your first time contracted to a human, but I assume you realize things are going to be a lot different this time around. We don’t have a labyrinth to protect, so you’ll have to serve me in a much different way than a demon.”

Ember bows his head as I continue.

“No one can know you’re here.”

“Of course, humans are quite troublesome creatures. If they were to see me in their realm I- I meant troublesome in a-“

I chuckle out loud.

“I agree. Humans are a bit troublesome aren’t they.”

Coughing, while activating my perception skills while preparing my dungeon walker ability, I continue.

“Stay at the back of this dungeon and don’t come out for any reason. I’ll be back as soon as possible with a plan for us to leave when I have a clearer head. It shouldn’t take more than a few days. No attacking monsters or hunters while I’m gone. If you die, I die. Got it?”

“Understood. I’ve waited decades to come back to this realm, a few days is nothing to me.”

With a majestic flap of his wings, the 7m long black-scaled dragon shows off its crimson underbelly as it flies into the open sky. With a thin smile, I teleport away.

I decide to go back to the Alpine Starter Dungeon. It’s a last-second decision, but the thought of walking through the Dungeon Hub and all the way through the capital seems like a bad idea right now.

Plus, I’d need to get a hotel room and everything, I might collapse before that happens. Going back to my hometown seems like the most logical move. I just hope my landlord isn’t too mad… It’s been well over a month since I’ve paid rent.

Moments later, I find myself right next to the entrance of the blue-skied goblin dungeon I know so well. Luckily, it’s the middle of the night once I step through the portal back to the outside world.

The soft light of the moon shines down on me as I slowly walk toward the village market. I can see a few of the shop lights on from a distance. One or two 24-hour stores will be open for sure.

I was really hoping for a nice hot meal, but I guess this is just a blessing in disguise. I’ll need to slowly rehydrate and feed myself at first anyways. A full plate of food would have been suicide if I tried to scarf one of those down.

My mouth waters and my body shakes at the thought of real food and cold liquids after so long in that white-walled jail cell.

I walk into the first convenience store I see to grab a few fresh fruits, electrolyte drinks, and assorted nuts. It may seem bland, but to me, it looks like a 9-course meal.

Slowly sipping on one of the drinks, I make my way back to my apartment. My feet drag and a grunt comes out every few steps. The nutrients filling my body do make me feel slightly better, and some energy is returning for me so I can utilize my self-regeneration skill, but it’s not helping much…

In the dead of night, I finally make it back to my building, walk up the steps, and open the door to my apartment. Letting out a long sigh, I collapse onto my bed.

Over the next few hours, I finish up a full bottle of electrolytes, and scarf down the fresh fruit and nuts. I continuously regenerate my muscles and deteriorated flesh with my self-regeneration skill slowly building back some of my body mass.

I fall into a deep sleep. Right now, this is the most comfortable bed in the world.

I wake up the next morning to the rising sun feeling incredible, but still starving… Looking in the mirror as I get ready for the day, I can tell that I’ve lost a considerable amount of weight. Last night’s re-feed and regeneration session definitely added a few kilograms back to my frame, but I need a lot more mass to get back to my normal weight.

I grab a few pairs of extra clothes and throw them in my item storage, then leave a handful of silver out on the floor with a note apologizing to my landlord just in case he stops by and tries to evict me…

I walk to a local breakfast spot and dig in. I start off slow but get my fill, I feel much better than I have in weeks. I’m able to put on a bit more weight but am still easily 7kg down from when I started this extravaganza. It’ll take me a while to gain this last bit back. Thanking the waitress and leaving a considerable tip, I head off to the goblin dungeon filled with excitement and dread.

Another odd sensation won’t stop nagging at the back of my head since I woke up either… The feeling of near-unlimited mana all around me is no more. I’m inching to be full of power again, but I suppress it for now.

My heart pounds in my chest as I near Alpine Square. I’m heading back to the capital to see my teammates and check in with the Hunters Association. This could go so many different ways, I’ll have to prepare for the worst…

After stepping into the starter dungeon I teleport to The Great Plains and step out of the portal immediately. I ride the train back to the main Dungeon Hub and take the moving stairs ups to the surface.

As I exit, one of the familiar-looking guards waves and smiles.

“Welcome back, an all-nighter in a C-Class dungeon. You’ve got guts, man!”

I give him a firm nod and smile while continuing my walk Into town. The morning sun is rising steadily, it’s just after 9 am if I’m not mistaken, maybe closer to 10.

As I make my way toward the Hunters Association HQ I think about what that guard said to me… An all-nighter? What did he mean by that?

He must be confusing me with someone else….

Moving that thought to the back of my mind, I approach the Association’s tower at the center of the capital. The lobby’s sliding door opens and I’m greeted immediately. Arie’s smooth low toned voice rings out the moment I step into the building.

“It’s about time you showed up, we were about to leave without you.”

The tan-skinned archer has his hood up with Abby and Maria by his side. Tripp stands close behind pacing back and forth. Both the blond and green-haired girls perk up as they see me, while Arie smirks with his arms crossed.

“I…. Uh-“

“We’ve been waiting here for almost an hour. You ditched us at the party yesterday to hunt and you slept in late this morning. You sure do know how to make a great first impression on the Association.”

I blink a few times, staring at my teammates in awe. Arie just said I ditched them… yesterday…

My mind spins as I reply slowly.

“I… Sorry… I must have had a long night, I lost track of the time.”

With a loud gulp, I shift my gaze to the rest of my team. Maria laughs and points to the sliding doors that are about to close behind me.

“Come on, let’s go! You weren’t even that late, it’s fine!”

Maria’s reassurance makes me feel a little better, but the absurdity of this situation is overwhelming. I smile and nod while turning to the door. In my head, the thoughts are running wild…

The only explanation would be that time moves differently in whatever realm between realms I just survived an entire month in.

Another connection clicks in my head.

The spacial magic that I’ve been using as item storage has a similar effect. Whenever I put an item in there, time seems to stop. The realm that these Titans create must work in the exact opposite way, everything outside ceases to continue while time goes by for eternity in the void.

Abby brushes my arm on the way out the door and looks up at me with a concerned look.

“You seem different today… Is everything okay? It even seems like you’ve lost some weight.”

I let out a sigh after a long pause.

“A-As I said, it was a long night… I’ll be fine. Thanks for asking.”

Tripp doesn’t say a word to me, he just stays behind the 4 of us as we make our way back to the Dungeon Hub.

This is not at all what I was expecting our reunion to be like today… but I don’t think it could have gone any better. I’ll just put this traumatic event behind me as a lesson learned, maybe I’m not invincible.

Or… maybe this just proves I am….

I wide grin creeps across my face as we walk further into town. I stop at a street vendor selling D-Class items and stock up on a gold’s worth of mana crystals. It’s about 10,000MP worth. It’s not even enough to charge one of my ultimate attacks with both daggers, but it will do for now.

That room of free mana really spoiled me. I probably won’t need to charge up any attacks like that again in the future, but if I ever want to continue my mana control training I’m going to need a whole lot of gold to do so…

We make it to the Dungeon Hub and greet the new guard on duty. We go down to the platform and enter The Great Plains no more than 10 minutes later.

My teammates take in the view of the vast plains. Tripp speaks up as we begin walking into the dungeon.

“All right. This is your first mission together as a team with the Association. We won’t be going too far in. Today will just be a trial run to make sure all of you are leveled enough and able to handle the base-level mobs. If we have the time, we’ll try for some mutants.”

We all nod, and continue walking forward. I activate my enemy detection skill and sense a few monsters, but nothing out of the ordinary. Tripp continues talking.

“There will be no reason to continue into this dungeon more than 10km. The potential for a Titan attack increases drastically after this point. Many lives have been lost by those creatures. Trust me, it is not worth the risk. I don’t care how strong you think you are, new C-Class hunters have no hopes of defeating one of those. Association Elites even have trouble sometimes.”

Arie smirks and takes out his bow.

“I hope one shows up, these Titans sure are getting a lot of hype.”

Maria and Abby excitedly draw their weapons.

“Yeah, I’m ready for a good fight.”

“Bring it on!”

Tripp looks over at all of us with a disappointing glare, but I keep my mouth shut. It’s out of character for me, but I can’t even fake being excited about fighting another one of those monstrosities.

Our blond-haired guide for the day takes out his silver daggers and points to the back of the dungeon, then speaks up in a firm tone.

“Kill yourselves on your own time. While training with me, you’re not fighting one of those creatures. Got it?”

With shrugs, nods, and a few disappointed exhales we all agree with Tripp’s order. The 5 of us venture off into The Great Plains Dungeon for our official first day of Association training.