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  Congratulations! You have entered a Dungeon.

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  Congratulations! You earned an [achievement]!

  =====

  Entering her first dungeon felt rather anticlimactic. Because at first glance, Kiki's surroundings hadn't changed in the least.

  Gravel paths still lead in all directions, framed by hedges that looked the same as always. The Sky was still surprisingly blue. Surprisingly, because living in Germany usually meant grey skies and rain. Not always and forever of course, but enough that a blue, sunny sky was a pleasant surprise.

  And the Hedge Hounds? They were still suspiciously absent.

  Only once Kiki started to pay closer attention, when she began to look at the details, did she notice the differences.

  The sky was blue, but way too uniformly, like someone color-picked a single shade of blue and painted the entire sky with it.

  The gravel of the paths looked like it should, until she looked at if from a wider perspective and repeating patterns seemed to emerge, as if a single patch of path had been created, and then copy-pasted next to each other over and over again.

  And the hedges? Curtsy of her honorary grandparents, Kiki knew at least a little bit about gardening, and these hedges weren't any kind she had ever seen before. Sure, the possibility that she didn't know this specific type of bush was rather high.

  Is what she would have said, if there wasn't so much wrong with them. Sure, there were plants with more than one type of leaf. But there weren't any where no two leaves looked the same. Sure, the leaves had similarities and regularities. But if anything, it looked like some image generation AI had been tasked to provide the image of a leaf over and over again, each a representation of what a leaf might look like, but Kiki had doubts that any of them actually existed.

  With the surroundings, at least for now, free of enemies, Kiki looked over her shoulder, seeing the same colorful whirlpool as they had used to enter.

  It only took a minute for them to test, and confirm, that they could leave whenever they wanted. At least in theory. Who knew what would happen once they got deeper into the Dungeon.

  *****

  "Now, come at me!" Kiki screamed, drawing the Hedge Hounds towards herself. She wouldn't allow any of the monsters to pass through her, not with the two men being busy taking care of a much larger group coming from behind Kiki.

  Despite her provocation, however, be it because she had tried to do so one time too often, or because that individual was simply resistant, one of the Hounds ignored her, trying to jump past Kiki and into the mens back.

  "Oh, no! You don't!" Kiki yanked her staff out of another hounds maw, slamming it into the jumping hounds back, breaking whatever serves as its spine.

  "Jack!" Kiki called out, warning the man.

  Thanks to Kiki's warning, it took him all of a moment to turn around, fire five shots, and deal with the Monster, while behind him a wave seemed to travel through the ground, tripping everything that would try to use the chance to jump on his turned back.

  *****

  "Well, that isn't a hedge," Elias quips.

  It certainly wasn't, Kiki could agree with that. Instead, what they saw was a fountain. At first sight, it looked actually quite nice, like an artistic rendition of a dragon spewing water into a basin. But just like the leaves on the bushes, once Kiki took a closer look at it, it also looked like something generated by AI. The dragon's scales weren't uniform and patterned, but overlapped in seemingly random ways, sometimes even changing directions, while most of the carvings on the basin looked like... something. At first sight, they might appear to make sense in some way, but the closer one looked, the less sense it made.

  "So, Video Game logic dictates that we touch it, and try to find the loot or hidden mechanism." Elias says.

  "And common fucking sense?" Jack asks, seeming stressed out by... Well, everything.

  "Common sense says that this is still a point of interest, since it's the only place that's even slightly different. There is at least some chance that this is related to clearing the Dungeon." Kiki decides. "Do you want to stay guard while Elias and I take a closer look?"

  "Sure..." Jack says, turning around to look at where they had come from, before turning to the side and circling the fountain clockwise.

  For the next ten minutes, Kiki and Elias searched every square centimeter of the fountain, Elias focusing on the area inside the basin and around it, while Kiki took a closer look at the statue in the middle.

  She spent at least half that time pressing on every scale that looked even a little out of place, slowly losing hope in the process. Until, finally, she decided to put her hand into the dragon's mouth where the water was coming from.

  There, she finally found what at first felt like a small slip of paper. Pulling it out, she had no chance to even look at it before it seemed to dissolve into a small shower of golden light.

  =====

  Congratulations! You found a [Loot ticket Level 3] (common)

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  Congratulations! You gained an [achievement]!

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  What? Kiki wondered, immediately prompting the System to tell her what the hell this was supposed to be.

  =====

  Loot ticket Level 3 (common)

  Can be used after clearing a Dungeon to redeem 1 piece of level 3 Loot out of a collection of 2.

  Tradable

  =====

  "I just got something called a 'Loot Ticket'... Apparently I can trade it for Loot once the Dungeon is cleared." Kiki explains.

  "Only once it's cleared? That's a curious way to do things. But good that we now know that they exist, so we can be on the lookout for them from now on." Elias considered.

  "I also got another achievement for it. It gives me... some Stats. Well, once I can apply it, that is." Kiki adds.

  "Damn. That puts you at four again, right? I guess I gotta put in a bit more work myself." he says with a bit of jealousy in his voice.

  "Are you two done there?" Jack interrupts, clearly ready to move on.

  "Yeah, I don't think there is much point searching for much longer." Elias decides.

  "Sure, let's go. We still gotta finish this Dungeon if we want to get the Hedge Hounds outside under control."

  Of course, she was now also curious about this ticket she found.

  *****

  "Jack! We need to keep these damn hounds off Kiki!" Elias called out while switching back and forth between his magic and gun, killing the hounds he had a clean shot at, while tripping and slowing the rest.

  "What do you think I'm trying to do!?" the larger man called back, not once taking his finger off the trigger of his gun.

  "This isn't working!" Kiki chimed in, fending off two Hedge Hounds coming at her from the left and right. Just as she slammed her rod into one of their heads, finally killing it, she saw one of the hedges in the corner of her eye start to shift and change.

  A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

  "Another one!" Both her, and Jack call out at the same time.

  Just about now, Kiki wished she had taken her Zweih?nder instead of the rod, as the much faster and nimbler sword would have let her deal with the last Hound much more quickly.

  "Watch your backs!" She calls out, warning the two men as she abandons her position to rush down her second opponent, hoping to finally get an edge on what she assumed must be the boss monster, and the one that kept creating more Hounds from the hedges around them.

  The fight had been going on for a few minutes already. The men were still in it since using guns, or magic, wasn't too stamina intensive compared to swinging around ten kilos of steel, while Kiki had to rely on her Skill that allowed her to rest in the middle of the fight.

  She stabbed the rod at the Hounds face like a spear, but these Hounds were much smarter and better fighters, allowing it to move aside just enough that the blunt end glanced off the side of its head without doing any critical damage.

  Not letting off, Kiki stepped in and swung the back end of her rod at the Hound again, not hitting, but giving her a chance to finish the fight as the hound lost its footing. But just before she could capitalize on the opportunity, she noticed the new Hound that had been summoned come at her from behind, forcing her to whirl around and fend it off.

  "Back!" she barked, shoving a pulse of intimidation at the Hound, making it flinch and buy herself the time to turn back and finish the Hound that was downed, but by the time she got back to it, it had long stood up again.

  "I will try something, but then I will be all out!" Elias warned them that they would no longer be able to rely on his magic to bail them out in the worst case.

  It only took a moment before the earth beneath Kiki began to shake, heave and move, and like it had suddenly turned to quicksand, the two Hounds Kiki had to deal with, already destabilized by the moving ground, had their legs sink into the ground.

  Taking advantage of their immobility, Kiki swung her staff around, missing her opponent on the first pass, but nailing it in the head on the second, dropping it like a sack of potatoes. Spinning back around, she quickly dealt with the newest opponent in a similar fashion, leaving her finally free to deal with the actual problem.

  For a moment, Kiki focused, creating a fitting mental image of a dog cowering beneath her foot and trying to get into character as much as she could. "Come out, you coward!" Kiki called out, projecting a challenge towards the boss. She had learned early into the fight that just drawing attention to herself was far from enough to make it come out of hiding. All it would do was summon more minions to send her way.

  And while doing so gave the men the freedom to hunt the boss, so long as it was hidden in the hedges, it was impossible to tell where it was. Sure, Jack had managed to hurt it by throwing three Molotov's at the bushes surrounding them, but not only had that used up all the ones he brought along, it also didn't stop the boss from diving into the nearest Hedge that wasn't burning. And when they got a glimpse of it the next time, all the burnt parts of its body seemed to have disappeared.

  Except, of course, if it was a different Hound, but she didn't think that was the case.

  No, if they wanted to deal with the boss, they somehow had to draw it out of hiding, and then keep it away from any Hedge while they dealt with it.

  And challenging it the way Kiki had done this time, seemed to finally be what did it.

  With a warbling cry that grated at Kiki's ears, the boss jumped out of the nearby hedge and rushed at Kiki. It was still a hedge Hound, all right, but one significantly larger than normal. The usual ones reached with their shoulders up to around Kiki's hips. But this one? It was about twice the size, its shoulders at the same height with Kiki's. And that was after considering how much Kiki had grown from her levels and Stats. She had gone all the way from her original 180 centimeters, to almost matching Jack 190 centimeters.

  Seeing the massive thing rush at her, Kiki did the only reasonable thing she could. She stood her ground, the metal rod interposed between herself and the Monster like a spear. She couldn't waste this opportunity and risk the boss going into hiding again. Not with how they were slowly but surely losing to attrition.

  "Hah!" Kiki screamed, stabbing at the monster's head as it rushed her. The rod, being blunt, wasn't exactly the optimal stabbing implement, but until now it had been enough, the force it carried being sufficient to reach the crystal inside the monster's head and damage it enough to kill the smaller creatures. And the Hounds, at least the ones created by this boss, knew that, trying to dodge such blows whenever they could.

  This time? The Boss seemed not to care at all. And Kiki quickly found out why. The boss body was, surprisingly, a lot less robust than the smaller Hounds, the blunt tip of her staff pushing through the Monsters muzzle and into its head even as it got ripped out of her hands, the Boss momentum letting it bowl right into Kiki.

  It was pure luck and snap decision making that allowed her to jump at and hold onto the monster's neck, as its notably very normal jaws were prevented from biting at her due to the massive metal rod stabbed front to back through it.

  Kiki did her best to hold onto its Plant-like fur as the beast slowed down and began to shake its head, almost hitting Kiki with her own weapon as it tried to get rid of it.

  Shots fell, hitting the Monster's back end in a shower, the men not daring aiming closer to the front in fear of hitting Kiki.

  Kiki meanwhile, having lost her footing while getting dragged along, finally managed to get her feet back under her. And without risking to let go of its neck, she capitalized on the Hounds distraction and wound up as strong a kick as she could, given her situation.

  The kick hit it in the knee, causing the monster's legs to shake. It wasn't quite enough, but a second and third kick finally broke its knee, making it bend sideways in a way it wasn't supposed to. With that, Kiki felt sure enough that it wouldn't get away and let go of its neck, instead reaching to catch the end of her staff that was still whipping through the air, stuck in the Hound's shaking head.

  The Monster tried to jump away, but with its lame leg hindering it, it was long too late and too slow.

  Using the staff as a lever, Kiki let herself drop to the ground, forcing the boss' head to turn, and when the head could go no further, its entire body.

  In short order, she had forced it sideways on the ground and held it there.

  "I don't think the weak spot is in its head!" Kiki called out, making the men change the focus of their guns on the monster's body, methodically pelting all of it with bullets. Still, it wasn't enough as the Monster kept moving, trying to escape. It almost succeeded when Kiki noticed that the rod seemed to have almost ripped out half of its head and neck, apparently not really needing them for anything but to look like a living being.

  Elias seemed to have noticed the same, as moments later he stopped shooting, and instead pulled out his machete, beginning to hack away at the monster's back legs from behind its back where it wouldn't be able to get at him.

  For a few moments, Kiki got nervous as the Monster finally managed to get itself free from the rod. But as much as its inner working seemed to defy normal biology and logic, at least its outer shape was still within reason, and with one leg in the front broken, and one in the back chopped off just as it was trying to struggle back up, it failed, falling back to the ground.

  From there, it was mostly an exhausting affair as the three took turns with the machete, slowly hacking away at the monster's body in search of its weak point.

  They never found it, the creature only stopping to move once they cut it into sufficiently small pieces. Even the entire leg Elias had cut off first had not stopped moving on its own, becoming a separate entity trying to make its way back to the closest Hedge. They had almost missed the sneaky limb, Jack catching on to it as it was only half a meter away from its target.

  Whatever would have happened had it succeeded, Kiki didn’t want to know. Though she could guess.

  "Well." Elias commented, "That was some pretty fucked up shit. Let's hope other monsters aren't going to be this bothersome to deal with."

  Kiki nods. Silent. It was one thing to kill a monster in one, or maybe a few clean hits of a sword...

  But this...

  It had helped that the Monster hadn't been very vocal, and when it was, it had not been sounds of pain. But then again, that same fact had made it even worse in completely different ways.

  She tried her best to play it off, to not think about it and fight back the reflex to vomit.

  It wasn't easy.

  =====

  Congratulations! You earned an [achievement]!

  =====

  =====

  Congratulations! You have cleared a Dungeon.

  =====

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  Congratulations! You earned an [achievement]!

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  Please trade your Loot Tickets now.

  Then, [Proceed] to the next step.

  =====

  "I would like to use a ticket." Trying to find something to distract herself with, Kiki called out to the System.

  Quickly, another menu popped up, showing the entire list of her Loot Tickets, which was exactly one.

  Making her choice mentally, the ticket appeared in front of her for a moment, a new menu appearing only asking her for confirmation.

  Rolling her eyes, they fell on the metal rod she had used to fight this time. It was good, but...

  "Ideally, I get a new weapon out of this..." She voiced her thoughts.

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  Loot ticket Level insufficient to set restriction.

  =====

  "Huh..."

  "What?" Elias asked her, apparently having noticed Kiki's reaction.

  "So, apparently you can set restrictions on what kind of loot you get with a ticket. But this one is too low level to even restrict it to a weapon type." Kiki explained.

  "Really? That's certainly good to know. I wonder what the limits are, though..." Elias wondered.

  "Just use it without restrictions." Kiki decided.

  Once again, the ticket burst into a golden shower of light and disappeared. For a moment, Kiki feared she had done something wrong, before two pedestals rose out of a pair of colorful clouds, reminiscent of the Dungeon entrance in appearance.

  Above the pedestal on the left floated a sword. It was large, about the same size as her Zweih?nder, though with a slightly thicker and wider blade that left her worried about the weapon's weight.

  Above the pedestal on the right was...

  "A crystal ball?"