"I'm here, brother."

  When Marsh arrived at Leo's cottage just before the rooster's first crow, the door was already ajar.

  Sera was moving around inside the house, going through their gear for the third time. A leather satchel y open on the table, its contents id out: the new rope coiled neatly beside a clean stack of bandages, and the boiled potatoes sat next to their waterskins, each filled to the brim.

  "Still prepping, Sera?" Marsh’s gaze settled on her, a smile tugging at the corner of his lips.

  "Someone has to make sure we don't die because you two forgot something important," she shot back without looking up. "Dar actually allows you to go?"

  "Slept like a log. Slipped out like a shadow," he barked a ugh, obviously pleased with himself.

  Leo stood apart from them, leaning against the wall by the hearth. He had the upgraded crossbow in his hands.

  "You quiet over there, little brother," Marsh said, turning to him. "Got your killer face on already?"

  "Just checking the gear," he chuckled, trying to act normal, but even he knew that he was failing.

  After all, this was his first time going into a dungeon. Even when having old Leo's memory and experience with a crossbow, Leo was still himself - a young man raised in peace and comfort.

  This will take some time to get used to, he thought.

  "I've got this," Sera said, shouldering a small pack. "Water. Bandages. Flint. Rope. Food."

  "I've also cleaned it till it shines," she gestured to the spear resting against the wall. "You two got your heads on straight?"

  "My head's always on straight," Marsh chirped, hefting his axe. It was an old, heavy thing with a head darkened with age. Though it looked ready to fall apart, it was solid, heavy, and brutally effective in Marsh’s hands. "Can't say the same for you two. Look like you're attending a funeral."

  "Shut it, Marsh," Sera snapped back.

  Leo finally shouldered his own simple pack, crossbow held loose and ready at his side. He met Marsh's smirk and Sera's scowl with a smile of his own.

  "Alright, let me repeat the pn. First floor of the Pit. The monsters on the upper levels should be thin and predictable, good for getting a feel for how we work together. We stick together. No splitting up, no heroics."

  He looked at Marsh pointedly. Then Sera, but his gaze softened a lot when it met hers.

  "We watch each other's backs. That's it. That's the whole pn. Questions?"

  Neither Sera nor Marsh spoke.

  "Good. Let's go," Leo said, pushing open the cottage door.

  The world outside the cottage was hushed and gray.

  The trio bypassed the empty vilge center, heading northeast toward the scrubnd that separated the tamed fields from the wilderness. The familiar scent of damp earth and morning dew was soon joined by a faint, peculiar smell - something like rich mulch, and sweet rot. The closer they got, the stronger it grew.

  Then the trees thinned, and they saw it.

  A semi-circle of ancient, crumbling stonework jutted from the hillside like the fossilized jawbone of some long-dead beast. Thick, waxy vines spilled over the stones and out of the maw of the entrance.

  The entrance itself was a doorway to absolute darkness. The faint breeze that drifted out carried that same scent of rich decay.

  A set of stone stairs, worn smooth in the center and slick with a film of moss, descended into the gloom. They vanished into darkness within the first ten steps.

  The three of them stood there for a long moment. There was no one else around. The delvers usually go in after the sun had risen.

  "Well," Marsh said, breaking the silence. "This is definitely not a pce for a picnic."

  Sera, her knuckles white around the shaft of her spear, didn't say a word. Her eyes were fixed on the dark maw.

  "Let's not stand here advertising our arrival," Leo said.

  Marsh reached into the leather pouch at his belt and pulled out a torch and his flint. After a few tense moments of striking stone against steel, a spark finally caught. The wick fred, casting long dancing shadows that made the crumbling stone look like jagged teeth.

  "After you," Marsh gestured with the torch, a half-smile on his face that didn't quite reach his eyes.

  Leo took the lead, crossbow held at a low ready. His boots found the first step, and the texture changed immediately beneath him. It was no longer dirt and rock, but a carpet of dead leaves and damp moss.

  The air changed too. It grew colder, heavier in their lungs. The smell of rot and damp soil intensified, clinging to the back of their throats.

  One by one, they descended the steps, the light from the world above shrinking to a distant square behind them.

  At the bottom of the stairs, the passage opened into a wide, circur chamber. Marsh held the torch high, its light pping at the stone walls.

  "Look at these stoneworks," Sera murmured, her voice a little breathless.

  Leo could see what she meant. They stood in what had clearly once been a pce of order. The walls were still lined with the crumbling pnters - long, rectangur troughs carved from the stone itself. Overhead, the ceiling was supported by the rotting remains of thick wooden beams.

  Thick vines, the same bruise-purple as the ones outside, covered every surface - coiling up the pilrs, draping from the ceiling, cracking the stone floor in an effort to force their way up.

  "Gods," Sera whispered, her previous tension easing slightly as she took in the sight. "It's... eerie."

  Clinging to the walls and growing in thick clusters along the floor were patches of fungi. Some were ghostly whitecaps that glowed with a soft, ethereal blue light, while others were broader, ftter growths that pulsed with a steady, phosphorescent green.

  "But it's also... kind of beautiful, isn't it?" She continued.

  "It is," Leo nodded his head. This wouldn't be a bad tourist pce, if it wasn't for the living things in the shadow that wanted to eat you alive.

  "The sooner we get what we need and leave, the sooner you can go outside and see some boring old sunflowers," Marsh said, his voice a low rumble. But even he was staring.

  He turned, sweeping the torch in a slow arc. Besides the way they had come down the stairs, two other tunnels opened into the chamber, promising more of the same overgrown ruin.

  "Right. Right it is," Leo decided, gesturing toward the opening directly opposite them. The corridor seemed slightly rger than the other, less choked with hanging vines. "Let's keep to the tunnels. Less pces for things to hide in."

  "Suits me," Marsh shrugged.

  He then took the point, his heavy axe held loosely in one hand, the torch held high in the other. His steps were deliberate, watching the floor for trip hazards and the walls for anything that moved.

  Sera followed a few paces behind him, her spear held ready. Her gaze flickered between Marsh's back and the oppressive darkness ahead. The bioluminescent glow painted her face in shifting shades of blue and green, making her eyes seem to glow.

  Leo took up the rear.

  The weight of the upgraded crossbow in his hands was a small comfort. His gaze swept constantly from side to side, covering their back, the darkness behind them feeling heavier than the darkness ahead.

  They walked in that tense formation for what felt like an eternity, while keeping an eye out, but saw nothing that resembled either loot or a monster.

  "Think we'll find any of that Sunstone Herb Kerrin was talking about?" Sera's voice was a welcome intrusion into the silence, though it sounded unnaturally loud.

  "Depends how deep we go. The good stuff is always deeper. Where the things that want to eat you live," Marsh's replied without looking back. "Why? You want to get rich quick in one trip?"

  "I want to not be dirt poor," Sera retorted. "I've heard a single leaf of that can go for ten silver. Ten. Do you know how much food we can buy with that?"

  "Easy there. Don't go spending money we don't have yet," Marsh chuckled, a rough, pleasant sound in the gloom.

  Leo just listened, a small smile on his face despite the tension. This back-and-forth was what he'd been missing in the hospital room. It made the fear feel a little more manageable.

  The crunching and squelching of their boots through the undergrowth continued. Then, it stopped.

  Or rather, it was joined by something else.

  Click. Click-click. Click.

  The sound was quiet, barely discernible over their own footsteps.

  "Stop. I heard something."

  Leo froze, his crossbow snapping up. Sera and Marsh stopped instantly, falling silent.

  They stood there, listening.

  The clicking grew louder. And now it wasn't just one source.

  Click. Click-click.

  It was like the sound of dry wood being tapped with a fingernail, coming from the thicket of glowing fungi directly ahead of them.

  "Don't move," Marsh breathed, his knuckles white on the handle of his axe.

  The foliage at the edge of the light rustled. A creature scuttled out from under a broad, pulsing green cap.

  It was built like a dog-sized armadillo made of dark wood. A slick, segmented shell of chitin, a patchwork of browns and grays. Six jointed legs ending in hooked cws skittered on the stone floor. Its head was a wedge of armor-pte, with two multi-faceted eyes that glimmered in the dark. Protruding from its back and legs were wicked-looking thorns, as long and thick as a man's finger.

  From the same thicket, two more appeared. Then a fourth.

  "Ah, shit," Marsh said. "Thorn Beetles. Never fought them myself, but old Peterson's son lost two fingers to one of these things. Don't let them jab you."

  At the sound of his voice, the nearest beetle's head tilted. The tapping stopped. It let out a low, wet clicking that was answered instantly by the others. As one, they lowered their heads, the thorny shells on their backs bristling.

  They surged forward.

  "Spread out!" Marsh roared.

  Leo was already moving, backpedaling to give himself room. He brought the crossbow to his shoulder in one smooth motion, the stock settling perfectly. His eye found the lead beetle, aiming for the gap between its head-pte and its thorax. A kill shot.

  "Leo, now!" Sera yelled.

  Leo's finger tightened on the trigger.

  And then Marsh was there.

  He didn't move to the fnk as Leo had expected. He charged forward, swinging his axe, trying to drive the creature back.

  "Marsh, move!" Leo shouted, the crossbow's sight wavering.

  "They're too close for the bow! Get back, you overgrown woodlouse!"

  The lead beetle sidestepped, and in doing so, stepped into the line of Leo's shot again.

  "Hold your fire!"

  A beat too te.

  Thwack!

  The bolt flew, not striking Marsh, but harmlessly cttering off the beetle's armored back.

  "Goddammit," Leo snarled, already fumbling for another bolt from the quiver at his hip.

  Sera, seeing the creature's fnk exposed, didn't wait for an order. Her training with her father took over. She lunged forward in a practiced thrust, the point of her spear aiming for the softer joint under the beetle's front leg.

  The beetle twisted, far faster than something so bulky should be able to. Her spear scraped harmlessly across its hard shell, kicking up sparks.

  "Fnk it!" Leo yelled, trying to nock a second bolt while keeping his eyes on the two other beetles skittering in.

  "I'm fnking!" Marsh bellowed back. He had abandoned the torch, now wielding his axe two-handed. He brought it down in a vicious chop on the beetle Sera had engaged. The heavy bde struck its shell with a sharp crack! but didn't penetrate.

  "No! Get to its side!" Sera cried out, yanking her spear back as the beetle lunged for her, snapping with its surprisingly agile mandibles.

  "You two, fall back! Let me draw them!" Marsh yelled, taking a heavy swing that forced the lead beetle to scuttle back. He was standing squarely in front of Sera, blocking her as well as the beetle's advance. "Form a line!"

  "A line's useless! I need a clear shot!" Leo's shout was ced with frustration. He finally managed to get the second bolt nocked, but the chaotic fight made a clean shot impossible.

  Calling their cooperation a mess was an understatement.

  The narrow tunnel erupted into a chaotic ballet of shouting, the cng of Marsh’s axe, the panicked shuffling of boots on mossy stone.

  "For the gods' sakes, Marsh, give me a shot!" Leo yelled, stumbling back as the third beetle, a smaller, twitchier specimen, skittered around and came straight for him. He didn't have time to aim properly, just throwing the crossbow up and pulling the trigger.

  Thwack!

  The bolt flew wide, ricocheting off a wall with a pathetic pling before tumbling into the darkness beyond.

  Leo backpedaled furiously, fumbling for another bolt as the beetle closed the distance, its thorny carapace a wall of impending pain.

  "Leo, down!"

  Without hesitation, Leo dropped to one knee. Sera unched herself over him. She used her spear like a vaulting pole, pnting the butt in the ground and swinging her body sideways in a powerful kick. Her boot connected squarely with the beetle’s side, right in the softer gap between its shell segments.

  The creature was knocked off its feet, its legs filing helplessly in the air for a second before it righted itself, momentarily stunned.

  Behind them, a sickening crunch echoed through the tunnel. Marsh, ignoring Sera's advice to fnk, had simply chosen brute force. He’d pinned the first beetle under one boot, and brought his axe down again. And again. And again. A spray of ichor and a cloud of musty, fungal-smelling dust filled the air. He’d smashed its shell, pulverizing the creature into a broken husk.

  "Dammit, Marsh! You'll ruin the carapace!" Sera shrieked, her focus yanked back to the rger beetle she and Marsh had been fighting. A minor gash opened up on her forearm as one of the creature's thorny legs swiped past her guard. She barely grunted.

  "Would you rather I got chewed on?" he roared back, kicking the corpse of the beetle away as the one Sera had kicked lunged for him.

  Seizing the opening, Leo finally managed to nock another bolt. While Sera and Marsh tied up the st two rge beetles, the smaller one shook its head, its multifaceted eyes finding him.

  Click-click. Hiss.

  It came at him again. But Leo was calm. He ignored the chaos to his left and took a breath, aimed just above the creature's head-pte, and squeezed the trigger.

  The bolt flew true. It punched clean through the beetle's neck joint with a wet thump. The creature skidded to a halt a foot from him, its legs spasming once before it went still.

  Leo breathed out, a long, shaky gust of relief.

  Sensing their pack dwindling, the final two beetles became more frantic. They tried to scatter, to escape down a side tunnel. But Marsh and Sera finally managed to find a sliver of that rhythm they'd cked before. Marsh’s axe no longer aimed for the impenetrable top shell. Instead, he used its ft face to shove the beetles, to create an opening.

  "Sera! Now!"

  Sera darted in, her spear finding the exposed underbelly Marsh’s brute force had revealed. The tip slid in with a sickening ease. She twisted it, a brutal, efficient move her father had drilled into her countless times, and the beetle went still with a chittering gasp.

  The st beetle, seeing its companions fall, turned to flee.

  "I've got it!" Marsh yelled, but he was too far. Sera, however, was quicker.

  With a big leap, she jammed her spear into the monster's exposed back as it scuttered away.

  The creature shrieked, a high-pitched sound. It thrashed wildly. Sera held on, pushing and twisting with all her might. There was a wet, popping noise, and the beetle went limp.

  Silence descended, broken only by their ragged breathing.

  They were standing amidst the carnage. Four broken bodies leaked a thin, greenish ichor. Marsh was bleeding from a shallow cut on his forearm, where a thorn had scraped past his guard. A thin line of blood on Sera’s arm. Their clothes were spattered with filth. Their ears still ringing from the chaos.

  Marsh spat on the floor, prodding the nearest carcass with the toe of his boot.

  "Well, that was a fucking disaster."