"Reward?"

After Dirk and Ava were prompted, they looked at each other. Not long after, there was a rumbling in the ground. The two looked over.

In the center of the arena, a stone altar constructed of pearl white marble and clad with the most perfect engravings on its sides rose from the ground. The engravings were symmetrically beautiful and had gold accents to the curves, making the entire thing an artistic masterpiece. Atop this altar were two golden bowls, each with an item inside. Dirk and Ava were surprised before walking over together.

The two got a closer look at the items. In the left bowl was a necklace. This necklace held a blue gem that glowed and swirled with cold mana. This gem looked similar to a mana crystal and radiated the power of the water element.

In the right bowl, the two saw a ring. This ring was made from a black metal and embedded with a gem that swirled with gray mana, obviously the dark element.

"It seems these rewards are tailored to us."

"Mm."

Ava spoke as she looked between the two rewards. It was obvious who the rewards were intended for. Only Ava could utilize anything with the water element, and only Dirk could use anything with the dark element. The two took their rewards, stroking them with their fingers.

Dirk curiously looked at the ring. It wasn't an amazing piece of art, just a metal band that held the gem. He could faintly see runes on it though, signifying an enchantment. Without much thought, he placed the ring on his ring finger, but surprisingly it didn't fit. Taking it off, he slipped it over his index and then middle finger before finally putting it on his thumb where it fit snuggly.

After that, Dirk felt a bit of the dark element stream into his hand, as if calling out to him. Thinking, Dirk sent his own mana into the ring. At that moment, he felt some information pop into his mind.

An empty space. Dirk could see a spherical area about 4 feet in diameter. This spherical area was like a small ball of space, and through inserting his mana into the ring, he could understand what this space was.

"Pocket space?"

Dirk was surprised. He had read about this before. Enchanting was an extremely difficult job, especially at high levels. Enchanting with the elements posed various challenges of their own, and they all gave different effects. Many enchantment abilities and effects were exclusive to certain elements.

One of the most famous enchanted abilities was spatial storage. There were things called pocket spaces that could be created only by enchanting an item with the dark element. Not only did this require a dark enchanter, but also a dark mana crystal. Bring the two together, and you could create a pocket space, an independent space that could contain items.

The item that Dirk had was called a pocket ring, and it was exactly this independent space. While the space wasn't large, Dirk could already see how useful it was. He could store the bags and loot he didn't want to carry inside of this ring. He could also contain food and water inside, though the food could still go bad, so it wasn't like Dirk could prepare luxury meals beforehand.

Either way, this pocket ring was one of the famous items that was brought about by the enchanting profession, and its utility was obvious. Dirk pleasantly smiled.

"Is that really what I think it is?"

At that moment, Ava looked over at Dirk. He nodded to her.

"It's a pocket ring. The space is about 4 feet in diameter."

"Really? That's awesome! I can't believe you actually got one of those. Those rings are expensive."

Ava looked at the ring on Dirk's thumb with glowing eyes. The low level rings weren't exactly rare, but they really were expensive. It could cost hundreds of gold for a basic one, and the large ones could cost a dozen crystals. The one Dirk had was one of the most basic, and after working jobs for a while, they could probably save enough for one of their own pocket rings. Getting anything better though was a luxury for the powerful or wealthy.

Dirk agreed with Ava's excitement. The next moment, Ava raised her necklace and beckoned Dirk.

"Hey. Put it on me?"

"Alright."

Dirk smiled a bit as Ava handed him the necklace. After raising her hair and turning around, Dirk hooked it around her neck. She stroked it with a joyful expression.

"Thank you!"

"Sure. We should get going now. We need to get out and get back to our bags so we can take care of our wounds. If we stay too long then our bodies will weaken."

"Of course."

Ava nodded to him before weakly hoisting her axe. After that, Dirk went over to the lizard's body that gradually cooled over time. He grabbed his spear on its back and then his hatchet that was on the ground. Sheathing everything, Dirk was about to leave when he looked back at the lizard. Within its body he could sense a dense cluster of mana. It was a mana crystal.

"Looks like the body is our reward too."

Dirk smiled pleasantly as he went over to the lizard's head. Slicing open its tough muscle, he sifted around before plucking out the mana crystal. This one was bigger than the usual marbles and radiated a soft heat that warmed Dirk's hands. He nodded before playing around with his pocket ring, eventually figuring out how to place the mana crystal in the pocket space. After slipping the mana crystal in and out of the ring a few times, he hummed before walking back over to Ava.

With that, the two defeated the king of the dungeon and received their rewards. Normally Dirk would think that he could come back and continue defeating this king, receiving more rewards like this. But unfortunately, a reward could only be gained once. If Dirk wanted another reward, then he would have to go to another dungeon and defeat the king there. The only thing that could be constantly farmed was the body of the king, and there were in fact those who would constantly kill the king and harvest the body, gaining a steady supply of wealth.

.............

After settling everything, Dirk and Ava left back the way they came. They pushed through the large black doors and walked through the king's hall where the three skink bodies still lay. Then, they walked through the black portal before stepping foot back onto the desert.

The two moved steadily, both fighting the pain of their wounds as they headed toward the haven. While Dirk's wounds were worse than Ava's, she didn't have the nanites he did. His nanites were quick to seal the wounds and stop bleeding. But Ava continued to bleed for a while as her wounds were aggravated. Not only did she have bad bruises, but deep slices across her body. Nothing that would stop her from fighting, but enough to cause her plenty of pain.

Worse yet, the two encountered skinks on their way back. When these groups found them, Dirk did his best to fight them all, sparing Ava as much as he could. Though, he could only do so much against a group that outnumbered him and Ava had to raise her weapon to defend herself. Luckily, these skinks couldn't pose a threat to them, and they were all quickly killed.

Like this, the two arrived back at the haven. Dirk dug up their bag of loot before walking into the haven and finding their hidden bags. After finding a comfortable place to sit, Dirk took out all the medical items and had Ava take off her armor. He checked all her wounds before cleaning them and wrapping them up.

Normally, with how deep Ava's wounds were, she would have to go and get stitched up. However, after the situation with Casma, Dirk and Ava had taken precautions. Before jumping into the dungeon, they had refilled on medical supplies and also bought some adhesive strips that could be used to temporarily seal wounds that needed to be stitched. Before wrapping, Dirk pinched her lacerations and threw these strips on, sealing them.

After that, Ava insisted on checking Dirk's wounds. Taking off his shirt, she saw over a dozen individual lacerations that pierced into his flesh. These lacerations were caused by the lizard's teeth, and they created a line that went from his collar bone, down to his chest, around his arm, and then up around his back.

However, Ava was shocked when she looked deeper at them. All of the cuts were sealed, as if the teeth had never pierced through his skin. What was left were red lines. Ava looked at him questioningly.

"...It's a secret of mine."

Dirk scratched his cheek with that reply. He wasn't able to really explain his nanites to her, regardless of whether he wanted to or not. She just wouldn't understand. It was easier to call it one of his secrets. He had a bunch already, so one more wasn't that bad.

Ava looked at him conflictedly before sighing. After that, the two rested for a while. After Dirk set up a tent and had them eat, the two climbed onto their makeshift bed and went to sleep. The sun hadn't yet gone down, but after using so much anima to fight the king, both of them were exhausted. They fell asleep as soon as their heads hit their pillows.

............

After around 10 hours, both Dirk and Ava roused from their sleep. The surroundings were still dark, a result from them going to sleep so early and waking up even earlier.

This wasn't a bad thing though. The two didn't speak as they climbed out of their tent and started packing things up. After eating, Dirk used his nifty new ring to store all their bags. With that, the two left the haven and walked back toward the dungeon entrance.

This walk took two days. By the end of the second day, the duo stepped out of the dungeon and into the fresh night air of the town. After grabbing a room for the night, they slept before finding a merchant the next morning.

Unfortunately, Dirk and Ava didn't have much money on them. After scrounging up the remaining gold they had, Dirk still had to toss in a few of the extra mana crystals he got to pay for a ride. While there was still a small discrepancy in the price, the merchant didn't haggle and let the two ride with him.

With that, Dirk and Ava began their return home. The ride to the capital took two days, and during these two days, Dirk and Ava had nothing to do but be in each other's company.

At the end of the second day though, they finally arrived. The two were excited as they passed through the city walls. The sun covered them in golden rays as their wagon parked and they hopped off. Without wasting time, the two rushed to the academy.

Right now, both Dirk and Ava were a mess. All of their clothes had been torn and stained by blood, including the ones they had on. Not only that, but Ava was wrapped up in bandages as if she just got out of a hospital. They didn't care though as they walked straight toward the mission hall where they could turn in their mission.

"How can I help... you..."

A receptionist was stunned as she turned and saw the duo. When she went quiet, Dirk dropped a bag full of mana crystals on the counter along with a piece of paper.

"We finished our job."

"Oh?"

Seeing the items, the receptionist was surprised. She looked over the sheet of paper, reading the details and date of acceptance. This caused her to slightly frown though, and she took it with her to a back room.

After a minute, she came back out. Seeing Dirk and Ava's expectant gaze, she shook her head.

"I'm sorry, but this job has already been completed."

"What?!"

Hearing this, both Dirk and Ava were stunned.

"By who?!"

"A group of third years completed this job a bit over a week ago. Because your group took so long, we had reposted the job, and they took it before taking no more than 6 days to complete it."

"Third years... Wait, were they a group of four?"

Thinking for a second, Dirk asked. The receptionist nodded.

"Yes."

"Two men and two girls?"

"Yes."

"Damn!"

Suddenly, Dirk cursed. Ava looked at him weirdly.

"When Casma got wounded and we made it to that haven, there was another group there. That group took our job!"

"Wait, seriously?!"

Ava was stunned once more. She remembered that there was another group, but didn't pay attention to it. To think the group they happened to come across was actually the one who took the same job as them. They were competitors, and Dirk's group lost miserably!

Dirk felt quite a bit of frustration, as did Ava. There was nothing they could do though. There had been setback after setback, and they had taken almost a month to complete this job. Even Dirk knew that such performance was unacceptable, and they got burned for it.

Seeing their downcast faces, the receptionist felt bad. She knew that Dirk and Ava were only second years who had just started their dungeon diving career. Seeing their obviously wounded appearance, she knew things hadn't gone so easily either. They worked very hard on this job only to get it snatched from under their nose.

"Look, I can't give you the normal pay for the job, but we still buy mana crystals. You should have the 140 fire mana crystals. I'll take them for 100 gold. That's still higher than the normal conversion rate."

"Thank you."

Hearing the offer, Dirk could only nod. While it was 70 gold less than they should've gotten, there was nothing he could do about taking so long.

The receptionist quickly counted the crystals, and after finding a bit more than 140 crystals, handed Dirk and Ava 110 gold. With that, the two walked out of the mission building a bit downtrodden.

"Come on, let's get you taken care of."

Dirk glanced at Ava before turning in another direction. She walked with him into the hospital building where she was taken by a nurse to go get stitched up. After waiting for an hour, Ava walked out and went with Dirk to his house.

After arriving, the two took turns taking baths before making dinner. They ate a large meal that filled them up before Dirk handed Ava a healing potion. He also drank one, and the two ended the night sitting on the couch. After staring at the ceiling for a while, Ava turned her head and looked at Dirk.

"So what now? Take another job?"

"Let's wait a bit."

Dirk answered with a sigh.

"I'm close to advancing my tier and I need some time to practice. We also need to catch up with our classes. Mainly the magic ones. I don't think going to the anima one is necessary anymore."

"Mm. I'm also getting close to advancing my Tier. Hey, I heard the magic pyramid is good for that kind of stuff with their high density mana rooms. Maybe we should try going there."

"Maybe..."

Dirk pondered before nodding. As he practiced his runes more, he found that it was harder to do so when he didn't have a high enough mana density. The denser the mana, the easier it was to create and control runes. If he wanted to form the full rune for his mana heart, then he would definitely need denser mana. The magic pyramid was the prime place for getting a dense mana environment, so he quickly decided to talk to his father about it.

"Well, for now, let's just rest. We can go back to classes tomorrow, and no working out until you heal."

"Alright, alright."

Dirk poked Ava's cheek, causing her to giggle in agreement. After that, the two fell asleep on the couch, Ava using Dirk's body as a cushion.