Chương 1: I Wasn't Planning to Become a Delver

It was Friday afternoon, and Matthew Hayes was putting his favorite coffee mug into a cardboard box. That was about as dramatic as the end of his eight-year career with the company was going to get. There were no tearful speeches, no security guards waiting to escort him out, and no CEO standing on a stage announcing that the company had gone bankrupt and everyone was screwed. Quite the opposite, actually. Business was good, and it had been good for almost everyone for the last fifteen years.

The company was profitable, the logistics division had just posted another record quarter, and the restructuring that had eliminated Matt's position had less to do with financial trouble than with management deciding that three departments could become two after installing a new mana-assisted routing system. The company didn't even particularly want anyone to be angry about it, so they had offered voluntary severance packages first.

Matt, twenty-eight years old and mildly indifferent to his mid-level logistics job, had opened the offer on his computer and done the math. The number at the bottom of the screen had been: $100, 000 He had stared at it for several seconds, tapped his pen against his desk, and thought: Yeah. I guess I'm quitting. That had been three weeks ago. Now his desk contained one cardboard box, a monitor he didn't own, and a suspiciously clean rectangle where his coffee mug had sat for the better part of six years.

"So, what now?" Matt looked up. Mark Lewis, one of the senior analysts and one of the few people in the office Matt regularly ate lunch with, was leaning against the cubicle partition.

"No idea." Matt dropped a handful of pens into the box.

"Travel a little, maybe. Sleep until noon. Do absolutely nothing productive for a while."

"Living the dream."

"For at least a month." Mark glanced at the box, then back at him.

"You becoming a delver?" Matt stopped taping the box.

"What?"

"A delver."

"I know what the word means."

"Then why'd you look confused?"

"Because I just told you I'm planning to sleep until noon." Mark shrugged.

"Wouldn't be the first guy to take the severance package, buy a pickup and a trailer, and disappear into the dungeon circuit."

"I'm not getting eaten by goblins, Mark."

"F-ranks are safer than walking." Matt stared at him.

"That's still the dumbest slogan in America."

"It's statistically true."

"Because there aren't cars inside dungeons."

"Exactly."

"And no motorcycles."

"Also true."

"And the average person isn't walking around with a supernatural health barrier and an emergency portal." Mark grinned.

"See? You already know enough to start." Matt threw a roll of tape at him. Mark caught it.

"For the record," Matt said, "I have absolutely no intention of becoming a delver."

"Sure."

"Why does that sound like you don't believe me?"

"Because my cousin said the same thing two years ago. He's in New Mexico now."

"Doing what?"

"Farming some D-rank ruin outside Albuquerque." Matt paused.

"Is he making money?"

"A stupid amount."

"Still not doing it." Mark laughed and tossed the tape back.

"Whatever you end up doing, good luck, Matt."

"Thanks." They shook hands. No dramatic goodbye, no promises to stay in touch forever—just two men who had worked together for years acknowledging that, come Monday morning, one of them wouldn't be there. Ten minutes later, Matthew Hayes walked through the glass doors carrying a cardboard box and became completely unemployed. He stood outside for a moment.

The late afternoon sun was bright, traffic crawled past the office complex, his phone did not buzz with an urgent Slack message, and nobody needed him to fix a shipping allocation problem or cared where he went.

"Huh." Matt shifted the box under one arm and headed for his car. Freedom felt remarkably ordinary. ◆ The drive home was equally ordinary. Fifteen years ago, that would have been a ridiculous statement. Dungeons had appeared across the planet without warning, visible cause, alien invasion fleet, or global announcement from a mysterious god. One day there were no dungeons. The next, there were thousands. Going by every movie Matt had grown up watching, that should have been the beginning of the apocalypse.

Civilization should have collapsed, governments should have fallen, and people should have been fighting over canned food while monsters poured into the streets. Instead, humanity had discovered mana stones. And then things had gotten weird in an entirely different direction. Matt stopped at a red light beside an enormous billboard. ZERO-EMISSION MANA GRID POWERING AMERICA INTO THE NEXT CENTURY The old coal plant beyond the highway had been converted into a mana-processing facility years ago.

A semi passed through the intersection ahead of him; its trailer looked normal from the outside, but Matt knew the spatially expanded cargo compartment inside could carry several times what its physical dimensions suggested. Across the road, a private clinic advertised: TRAUMA REPAIR WALK IN. WALK OUT. A smaller line underneath added: FINANCING AVAILABLE. Matt snorted. Some things never changed. The technology did. The bill did not. Fifteen years after the dungeons appeared, magic wasn't magic anymore.

It was infrastructure. Mana stones powered electrical grids, made rapid tissue repair possible, and enabled spatial expansion, instant crop cycles, high-density aquaculture, room-temperature superconductors, and half a dozen other technologies Matt only vaguely understood. High-rank mana stones were priceless, while low-rank stones were consumed by the millions because manufacturing higher grades required absurd quantities of lower ones.

The dungeons produced resources without any known sign of depletion, and humanity had responded by discovering an effectively unlimited number of new ways to consume them. Economists called it the Magic Stone Boom. Everyone else just called it the economy. Fifteen straight years of growth had warped the top end of global finance beyond recognition.

Dungeon corporations traded sums that would once have sounded like national budgets, high-rank delvers built companies that competed with century-old industrial giants, and a single exceptional drop from a top-tier dungeon could be worth more than a normal person would earn in several lifetimes. But groceries were still groceries, and rent was still rent. A hundred thousand dollars was still a hundred thousand dollars. And Matt had a hundred thousand dollars he hadn't possessed yesterday.

◆ The next morning, he woke at exactly seven and stared at the ceiling for several seconds before realizing what felt wrong. His alarm hadn't gone off. Matt reached for his phone, checked the time, remembered that he had nowhere to be, and rolled over. When he woke again, it was ten-thirty.

"Better." He made coffee. Out of habit, he picked up his phone and nearly opened his work email before his thumb stopped over the screen.

"Right." He didn't work there anymore. Matt opened his banking app instead. The account loaded, and the newest transaction sat at the top of the screen. SEVERANCE PAYMENT +$100, 000. 00 STATUS: CLEARED"Well." He took a sip of coffee.

"That's real." He had expected to feel liberation, terror, possibility—maybe some overwhelming urge to start a new chapter in his life. Mostly, he wondered what he wanted for lunch. Day one of unemployment was fantastic. Matt ordered takeout, played games until three in the morning, and went to bed without setting an alarm. Day two was also pretty good: more games, a four-hour nap, and half a season of a show he'd been meaning to catch up on.

On day three he cleaned the apartment, not because it desperately needed cleaning, but because he had run out of obvious things to do. Day four found him eating cereal at two in the afternoon while watching a video about a man restoring an antique tractor. Matt had no interest in tractors. He watched the entire thing. By day five, he was lying sideways across his couch, staring at the ceiling fan.

"Okay." The fan continued rotating.

"I'm bored." The fan did not offer a solution. Matt sat up. He was twenty-eight. The hundred grand would last a good while if he wasn't stupid, and his existing savings gave him an even larger cushion, but he wasn't rich enough to retire. Eventually, he'd need another job. The thought of immediately updating his resume, attending interviews, and finding another office where he could spend the next eight years solving slightly different logistics problems made him seriously consider lying back down.

Then he remembered Mark. You becoming a delver?

"Delving..." Matt picked up his laptop. It wasn't like he'd never thought about dungeons. Everyone thought about dungeons. There were kids who grew up with posters of famous delvers on their walls. Professional dungeon leagues, corporate teams, speed-clear records, gear channels, loot channels, build channels, and endless livestreams had become ordinary entertainment. Matt watched some of that stuff casually, the same way he occasionally watched football despite having no intention of trying out for the NFL.

He typed: DELVER BEGINNER GUIDE The search engine returned an absurd number of results. Matt clicked one of the first videos. A man with too much energy appeared on screen in front of an F-rank gate.

"If you're Level One, stay in F-ranks!" Matt lowered the volume slightly. The streamer continued.

"I don't care what your buddy says. I don't care that you've got an A-rank combat Unique. You're Level One. You go into an F-rank until you understand how your Life works." A Life bar appeared in the corner of the video.

"Keep your Flask charged. If your Life gets low, portal out. If your instincts say portal out, portal out. If you're asking yourself whether you should portal out, guess what?" The streamer pointed directly into the camera.

"Portal out." Matt smiled.

"Complicated."

"Do not be the idiot who dies in an F-rank."

"Encouraging." Matt knew the broad rules. Anyone who entered the Dungeon System gained access to Life, which wasn't exactly physical toughness so much as a supernatural protective layer imposed over the body. A monster could slash you across the chest, smash you with a club, or bite your arm, and as long as you had Life remaining, your actual flesh remained unharmed. The impact might hurt, knock you over, or make you panic, but your body itself stayed intact. Life Flasks restored that protection.

Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere. If Life reached zero, however, the System stopped protecting you. Everything supernatural that depended on that protective state dropped with it, leaving an ordinary human standing in front of a monster. Which sounded terrible until you remembered this was an F-rank.

F-rank monsters were weak—not harmless, but weak enough that even a completely unprotected adult would generally need to stand there and let one attack repeatedly before it became fatal. Combined with the ability to leave through an emergency Portal, deaths in beginner dungeons were extraordinarily rare.

"F-ranks are safer than walking," Matt muttered. He clicked away from the video.

"Still a stupid slogan." The next video was completely different. No shouting, no tutorial graphics—just a travel vlog. The camera opened on the door of a trailer swinging outward onto a mountain valley painted gold by the morning sun. A blue dungeon gate floated maybe three hundred yards away, while the man filming stepped outside wearing sweatpants and carrying a mug of coffee. His AR contacts overlaid a small menu into the corner of the recording.

PINE RIDGE F-RANK DUNGEON AVAILABLE INSTANCES: 6 INSTANCE 14 — 31 ACTIVE — BOSS ALIVE INSTANCE 15 — 22 ACTIVE — BOSS DEFEATED INSTANCE 16 — 9 ACTIVE — BOSS ALIVE The vlogger selected sixteen, finished his coffee first, then changed clothes, checked his gear, walked to the gate, and disappeared inside. The video skipped through several hours of exploration: a few monster fights, a small pile of mana stones, a Skill Gem—and then a Rare sword dropped.

The vlogger practically forgot he was recording while he examined it through his identification contacts. The numbers meant almost nothing to Matt, but the guy was clearly happy about them. A few hours later, the video returned to the trailer. The sword, Skill Gem, mana stones, and a handful of crafting materials were spread across a picnic table. The vlogger scanned prices, sold two items, put the sword aside, made dinner, and by sunset was sitting beside a small fire with a beer.

The last minute of the video was a time-lapse. Three weeks passed, the trailer was packed and hitched to the pickup, the dungeon camp shrank behind him, and the next shot was a highway sign welcoming him to another state. Matt paused the video.

"Hold on." He clicked the channel. The creator had done the same thing all over the country: a month in Colorado, three weeks in Wyoming, a low-population dungeon in Montana where he'd practically gotten his own Instance, then Arizona. Matt opened another channel and found a young couple who had started as Level One delvers six months earlier and were slowly crossing the country, moving whenever they outleveled the local dungeons. The girlfriend handled ranged attacks.

The boyfriend apparently had a Unique Skill that made defensive builds easier. Their trailer had a tiny kitchen, a cramped bedroom, and a rack near the door where they stored dungeon equipment. They complained about campground laundry machines, argued about whether to drive four hundred miles for a dungeon with a slightly better drop table, and celebrated when one of them found a Unique. It looked less like an adventuring career and more like somebody had turned the entire United States into a giant game world.

Matt sat forward.

"That's basically a road trip with loot." He watched another video. And another. Then he started reading. F-rank Dungeon Camps were everywhere. Some were enormous commercial sites with restaurants, gear stores, clinics, repair shops, gyms, and hundreds of RV spaces. Others were little more than paved parking lots with electrical hookups. Campground prices varied by location, but a thousand dollars a month would get him something perfectly serviceable in plenty of places.

Delvers didn't even have to stay at one dungeon until the exact second they outleveled it. Most didn't. Apparently the standard beginner advice was to get roughly five levels above a dungeon's ideal range before moving up. Experience efficiency dropped and loot became less useful, but nobody got a medal for rushing into a stronger dungeon before they were comfortable. People like not dying, one guide explained. Matt found that philosophy difficult to argue with. He pulled up a spreadsheet.

ROUGH STARTUP COSTS Severance — $100, 000 Pickup / Travel Trailer Beginner Dungeon Equipment Insurance / Registration Campground Fees Fuel / Food / Repairs He started entering rough numbers, then more conservative numbers, then deliberately pessimistic ones. Even if he bought a decent truck and trailer instead of the cheapest things he could find, he had plenty of room. If he tried delving for three months and hated it, he could stop. Sell the equipment, come home, find another logistics job.

The economy certainly wasn't short on those. He stared at the total.

"I could actually do this." That was the moment the idea stopped being a way to kill an afternoon. Matt opened the official state website. BECOMING A LICENSED DELVER Medical screening System registration Unique Skill Assessment Beginner safety course Dungeon access registration Matt reached the third item and blinked.

"Oh." He had never had his Unique Skill assessed. Everyone had one. That was one of the first things humanity had learned after the dungeons appeared. Children born into the new world generally manifested theirs around six years old and were tested almost immediately. Matt hadn't been six when the dungeons arrived. He'd been thirteen. Everyone above the normal manifestation age had awakened at roughly the same time during the first wave, and the first few years after dungeon emergence had been chaos.

Not apocalyptic chaos. Administrative chaos. Governments had been trying to understand what a Unique Skill even was while millions of people suddenly discovered they possessed one. Matt hadn't cared. He'd been thirteen, his parents hadn't been planning to send him into a dungeon, and his Skill had never done anything obvious in everyday life. No spontaneous fire. No mysterious objects appearing on his desk. No ability to fly. So the assessment had gone into the enormous pile of things that could be done later.

Later became high school, then college, then work. Fifteen years passed. Matt searched: COMMON F-RANK UNIQUE SKILLS The first result was a forum thread. F-RANK UNIQUE SKILL — ICE CREAM Effect: Once per day, create one serving of an ice cream flavor the user has previously eaten. Matt stared.

"That's not bad." He scrolled down. User18492: Free ice cream every day is absolutely not F-tier. GelatoDefender: Depends. Does it make gelato? ActualWizard44: Skill says ice cream. Learn to read. GelatoDefender: Coward. Matt laughed. Not all Unique Skills had anything to do with dungeons. A person could have one that cleaned stains, kept coffee hot, or told them whether a piece of fruit was ripe.

Some F-rank Skills were almost completely useless; others were genuinely convenient without being powerful enough to qualify for a higher grade.

"Mine's probably something like that." He opened the state booking page. There was an appointment available the next morning. Matt clicked it. ◆ The State Unique Skill Assessment Center did not look remotely magical. It looked like someone had combined a DMV with an outpatient clinic and then spent public money trying to make the lobby slightly less depressing. Matt checked in. The waiting room was moderately full. Across from him, a small boy swung his legs beneath a chair while both parents hovered nearby.

A high-school girl sat three seats down pretending not to be nervous, a middle-aged woman filled out paperwork, and a man in tactical delver clothing watched something through his contact lenses, occasionally making tiny eye movements to manipulate whatever menu was floating in his vision. A number flashed on the wall. The boy and his parents disappeared through a side door. Five minutes later they returned, the mother smiling while the father looked like someone had just given him a mildly pleasant tax refund.

"See?" the mother told the boy.

"E-rank is good." The kid didn't seem convinced.

"But it's boring."

"You are six."

"It just makes things warm."

"You'll appreciate that when you're older." Matt watched them leave. That was Unique Skills for most people: a personal oddity that might be useful, might become a career, or might be forgotten for days at a time. His number appeared. Matt walked to the counter. The receptionist looked at his file.

"Matthew Hayes?"

"Yeah."

"First assessment?"

"Yeah." Her eyes moved to his birthdate, then back to him.

"You waited fifteen years?"

"Never needed it."

"Fair." That was all. No shocked reaction and no lecture. People Matt's age were part of the transition generation; unassessed adults weren't common anymore, but they weren't unheard of. She handed him a digital form.

"Medical declaration, consent for mana resonance scan, standard liability acknowledgement. Sign the highlighted sections." Matt looked at the final page.

"Why does the assessment need a liability waiver?"

"It doesn't." She pointed.

"The chair does." Matt looked toward the hallway.

"Should I be worried?"

"No."

"Then why—""Government procurement."

"Got it." Ten minutes later, a technician led him into a small sterile room. The assessment chair looked like something from a dentist's office if dentists had access to glowing blue crystals. A standardized mana-stone array formed a semicircle behind the headrest. The technician checked Matt's ID.

"First one?"

"So everyone keeps reminding me." The technician smiled.

"Most of my appointments are six-year-olds."

"Sorry to ruin the average."

"Sit back. This should only take a few seconds." Matt settled into the chair.

"Anything I need to do?"

"Nope. Don't move too much."

"That's it?"

"That's it." The technician started the scan. Soft blue light passed across Matt's body. There was no pain, strange spiritual revelation, or voice from the heavens. The technician watched his monitor. Then stopped typing. Matt waited while the man leaned closer to the screen.

"That bad?"

"No." The technician frowned.

"…I need to run that again." Matt looked toward the screen.

"That good?" The technician didn't answer. He reset the scanner. Blue light passed over Matt again, and the technician's expression changed—not dramatically, which somehow made it more concerning. He checked something on a second monitor, then ran the scan a third time. Matt sat up slightly.

"Okay, three is usually where people start telling me what's happening." The technician slowly stood.

"I'll be right back."

"That's reassuring." The man picked up a wall phone and pressed a single button.

"Director? Assessment Room Three." Pause.

"Yes." Longer pause.

"Confirmed three times." The technician hung up and looked at Matt.

"Mr. Hayes, would you mind staying here for a few minutes?" Matt raised an eyebrow.

"Is that a request?" The technician hesitated.

"…Technically."

"Sure."

"Thank you." The man left with considerably more speed than Matt considered necessary. The door shut. Matt remained seated for several seconds before looking toward the holographic display beside the scanner. It hadn't been turned off.

"Well." Apparently nobody had told him not to look. Matt stood. The first thing displayed was his name. MATTHEW HAYES AGE: 28 SYSTEM STATUS: UNREGISTERED Then beneath it—his Unique Skill. Matt stopped. UNIQUE SKILL CARD COPY Rarity: Unique Skill — SSS Type: Passive Skill / Replication / Law Reconstruction Effect The holder of this skill possesses the authority to perfectly reproduce Unique Skills belonging to others.

After directly witnessing the activation of another person's Unique Skill, the observed skill may be copied at the holder's discretion. Copied Unique Skills retain the complete effects and properties of the original skill. There is no degradation in performance. Copied Unique Skills may be stored permanently. Stored Skills: Unlimited Current Maximum Copy Rank: C Active Copy Slots: 2 Additional functions will be unlocked as the holder's Level increases. Matt stared at the rank again. SSS"… What?" He leaned closer.

Still SSS. There wasn't another rank above it. F, E, D, C, B, A, S, SS, SSS. Everyone knew that much. S-rank Unique Skills made careers. SS-rank Unique Skills made international headlines. SSS-rank Unique Skills were the kind of thing normal people could name from news reports even if they didn't follow delving. Matt looked at the screen again.

"SSS?" Maybe that explained the technician. Then his eyes dropped to the current limitation. Current Maximum Copy Rank: C Matt exhaled.

"Oh." That was still ridiculous, but at least it gave the ability a boundary. At Level One, he could only reproduce C-rank or lower Skills, could equip two at once, and could store anything he successfully copied permanently. The part that bothered him was the word current. And the promise that more functions would unlock as he leveled. He could build an Archive. Potentially an enormous one. At Level One.

"… Oh." His gaze moved lower. There was another section beneath the mechanical description. He almost skipped it, but the heading caught his attention. FLAVOR TEXT Others are granted miracles. He remembers them. A Unique Skill is said to be the one thing that belongs to a soul alone—a law written once, for one person, never to be repeated. Talent may be inherited. Technique may be taught. Wealth may be taken. A miracle is supposed to remain unique. He disagrees. He does not steal the gift.

He does not weaken the original. He merely witnesses the impossible, understands that it has already happened once— and therefore sees no reason it cannot happen again. To others, a miracle is proof that they were chosen. To him, it is only the first copy. Matt was quiet.

"…Dramatic." That felt insufficient. He read the final sentence again. To him, it is only the first copy. Then he looked back at the SSS rank and the promise of future growth.

"Okay." The word came out very slowly. This was no longer an amusing possibility involving free ice cream. The door opened. ◆ The technician returned first. Behind him was an older man in an expensive but conservative suit. A woman in her thirties followed, carrying a secured tablet. Nobody looked terrified. Nobody had brought armed guards. But the casual mood was gone. The older man closed the door.

"Mr. Hayes."

"Hi."

"You've seen the result." Matt glanced at the still-glowing display.

"Kind of hard not to."

"Fair." The man extended his hand.

"Daniel Warren. Center Director." Matt shook it.

"Matthew Hayes. Apparently." The Director's mouth twitched. The woman introduced herself next.

"Laura Bennett. Federal SSS liaison office." Matt looked at her.

"There's an office for that?"

"There are approximately twenty reasons for one."

"Right." They sat. The technician remained near the wall. Director Warren folded his hands.

"Your Unique Skill has been confirmed as SSS-rank."

"So the machine isn't broken."

"We tested three times."

"I noticed."

"We also ran the result through the national verification system."

"And?"

"SSS." Matt leaned back.

"Right." There was a brief silence before Matt pointed toward the display.

"I have an important question."

"Go ahead."

"I'm not suddenly one of the twenty strongest people in America, am I?"

"No," Warren said immediately.

"Good."

"You're Level One." Matt nodded.

"Less good."

"Technically," Bennett said, "you aren't even a registered delver yet."

"Even better." That earned him the faintest smile. Matt gestured at the Skill Card.

"If it's SSS, why can I only copy C-ranks?" Bennett glanced at the display.

"Because your Unique Skill rank is not a measurement of your current combat power."

"Then what is it measuring?"

"The Skill."

"That's not much of an answer."

"No," she admitted.

"It isn't." She placed her tablet on the table.

"The grading system evaluates the nature of the Unique Skill itself—its authority, its scope, and the degree to which it overrides or modifies the rules the System normally follows." Matt looked back at the words Law Reconstruction.

"So the limitations are because I'm Level One."

"That is our current interpretation," Bennett said.

"The Skill explicitly describes them as current and tells us additional functions will unlock as your Level increases. We don't know the exact progression order, but comparable growth-restricted Skills generally expand as their holders develop."

"Meaning the copyable rank could go up."

"Very likely."

"Potentially all the way?" Bennett did not answer immediately. Matt looked at the giant SSS displayed on the wall.

"Eventually."

"Potentially," she said. Nobody needed to say the final possibility aloud. SSS copying SSS. Matt let out a slow breath. That made the last line of the Flavor Text considerably less funny. He looked at it again. To him, it is only the first copy.

"Does every SSS Skill talk about its owner like this?" The Director blinked.

"Like what?" Matt pointed.

"Like I'm a minor god preparing to violate the natural order." For the first time since entering the room, the technician laughed. Bennett covered a smile with one hand. Warren looked at the Flavor Text.

"SSS flavor descriptions do tend to be... assertive."

"Assertive."

"Yes."

"That's the government term?"

"No."

"Shame." The tension eased by half a degree. Then Bennett's expression became professional again.

"Because of the classification, there are several things we need to explain before you leave."

"There it is."

"First, the federal government automatically restricts public access to confirmed SSS assessment results." Matt frowned.

"Restricted how?"

"Your exact Skill information will not appear in public databases. If you create a standard delver profile, the Unique Skill field can remain hidden. Government employees with access to this assessment are subject to disclosure restrictions."

"Am I?"

"No." Matt blinked.

"No?"

"The restriction applies to us."

"So I can walk outside, post this entire screen online, and tell everyone I'm SSS?"

"Legally?"

"Yeah."

"Yes." Matt stared at her.

"That seems surprisingly reasonable."

"You are an American citizen, Mr. Hayes. Possessing an unusually powerful Unique Skill does not revoke your constitutional rights."

"Good to know."

"That said—""There it is again." Bennett ignored him.

"If you publicly disclose this particular Skill, you should expect significant attention."

"How significant?" She looked at the display.

"Major dungeon corporations, high-rank delver organizations, research institutions, investors, foreign interests, media, and sponsors." Matt nodded along until one category registered.

"Foreign interests."

"Yes."

"Ah."

"There will also be people who want you to copy their abilities, and others who will want you nowhere near theirs." Matt considered that.

"Actually, the first group might be useful."

"It might."

"Great." Director Warren stepped in.

"This is why an SSS liaison is being offered to you."

"Offered."

"Offered," Warren repeated.

"Not assigned against your will."

"What does that actually mean?"

"Legal assistance, security consultations, priority access to specialized assessment and medical facilities, help dealing with corporations if you choose to negotiate, verification services, and a government contact if you encounter an issue related to your classification."

"Do I have to join anything?"

"No."

"The military?"

"No."

"A federal delver program or government Guild?"

"No." Matt paused.

"I can literally just go home?"

"Yes."

"…That's surprisingly normal." Warren smiled faintly.

"You're SSS case number twenty-something in the country, Mr. Hayes." He lifted the secured tablet.

"We have paperwork." Matt laughed once.

"Of course you do." Bennett glanced at her notes.

"One question before we start drowning you in it."

"Go ahead."

"Were you planning to become a delver before today's assessment?"

"No." The answer was immediate. Bennett looked up.

"No?"

"I quit my job last week. I had no plan."

"You booked a delver assessment."

"Yesterday."

"Why?" Matt rubbed the back of his neck.

"I got bored." Bennett stared at him. Matt continued.

"A guy at work asked if I was becoming a delver. I told him no. Then I spent a few days doing nothing, watched some videos about people traveling the dungeon circuit in pickups and trailers, and..." He gestured vaguely.

"It looked fun." Recognition crossed Bennett's face.

"The circuit lifestyle."

"Apparently that's what it's called."

"It is." There was a pause. Bennett looked from Matt to the enormous glowing SSS Skill Card.

"You came here because dungeon camping looked fun."

"Basically."

"And discovered that you possess an SSS-rank Unique Skill."

"Apparently." The technician very deliberately looked away. Matt glanced back at the screen. Yesterday, delving had looked like a decent way to spend a few months: see the country, get some exercise, collect loot, maybe make some money. If he hated it, he could quit. Now there was another question sitting in front of him. A much more interesting one. Additional functions will be unlocked as the holder's Level increases. Bennett watched him.

"And now?" Matt thought about that. He could still walk away. Nothing forced him into a dungeon, and yesterday that had sounded perfectly reasonable. Now? Matt smiled.

"Now I really want to know what happens when I level up." Director Warren exchanged a look with Bennett, then opened the secured tablet. A truly unreasonable number of files appeared: registration procedures, SSS disclosure information, security recommendations, insurance, delver licensing, dungeon safety, and federal contacts. Matt stared. Warren cleared his throat.

"Now, before you enter your first dungeon, there are a few things we need to discuss." Matt looked at the list.

"How many?"

"Quite a few." Matt sighed.

"…Of course."