The access ring for the Dungeon here has sand on each of the stones, in a line down the length of their tops, much like the grass on the stones for Grassy Plains Dungeons. Even though I know it won't really do anything, I poke the sand on one of the stones as we approach, watching as the sand fills itself back in. There are mini-dunes and ripples in the sand, and it will always return to that state. If someone were to brush the sand off, more would appear to fill it back in.

The access ring itself rests on the sandy beach, so there's already plenty of sand around, too. We had to walk about an hour to reach it, and the sand only started about twenty yards back. Because of where the access ring is located, it also has some water on it during high tide, such as right now. We're at the highest tide at the moment, and the water goes up about three inches on our boots.

As we approach the access stone, I notice that Drake keeps flicking his tail in the water just a little bit. It's moving around much more than normal, which makes me curious what's wrong. Because he'd begun doing that when we stepped into the sand, I'd assumed that he didn't like the feel of sand on his tail, but with his tail having dragged into the water, that can't be all, can it?

"Drake?" I ask. "What's with your tail?"

"What do you mean?" He asks.

"Why are you flicking it around like that?"

"Because I can."

Is he playing with the water? Then what was up with the sand stuff? Was he playing in the sand, too?

"Well, alright," I say. "Let's enter the Dungeon, then."

I place my hand on the access stone and a menu appears in my vision.

Would you like to enter the Zephyr Shores Medium Sandy Shores Dungeon? Yes No

I select Yes, and that menu is immediately replaced by the party menu. I add Drake to my party, mentally giggling at his stupidly-long name when I read it.

"Let's go, Naku-Naku," I confirm entry.

The runes on the stones glow, and then we appear in the arrival room, the sky within the Dungeon a clear morning sky with no sun, but plenty of light. The floor is made of sand, just like the beach we were just on, and the walls are made up of water. The thick walls appear to be of clear water, but we can't actually see beyond. Instead, it's as if there's some sort of brightness on the other side, creating a visual barrier. However, we can still see the sandy room beyond the openings on the western and northern walls.

As usual, we can't see if there's anything else in those rooms, but that's not really a worry. Whatever is here, we'll handle it. I push my hood back, then remember something and turn to face Drake.

"Drake," I say. "This is a beach-themed Dungeon. Most of the monsters will be shelled creatures, most likely crabs or turtles. If you attack their shells, it's better to use physical force over a sword. Your sword isn't durable enough to handle them, and powering through will just result in you damaging it."

"Okay," he says.

His tail is smacking the sand every few moments, and I really want to know the actual reason for it, because now I'm pretty sure it's not actually just because he can, like he claimed. However, it's Drake, and I've no clue the correct questions to ask to pull out the actual answer. The fact that he gave me the answer he did tells me he probably feels a little embarrassed about the reason why and doesn't want to say.

Rather than prying, which I know would eventually result in him telling me the real reason he's smacking his tail in the sand, I focus on my sensing magic. After a few moments of focusing, I'm able to sense the general direction of the exit ring. It's to the northwest. While I'm not completely confident in my estimate, I'd say it's probably one set of rooms west and then several north.

Even after a couple dozen runs of focusing on this, I'm still adjusting to it. It will probably take me dozens more to be able to pin down the exact room and path to go every time. However, that doesn't mean I won't train it now.

After trying to find the correct path to the end for a couple of more minutes, Drake waiting patiently, aware of what I'm doing, I stop. I'm not good enough yet, but that's fine.

We can always go with my usual method. I walk to the western entry and let Drake pass through it first. Inside are two crabs that come up to our waists, both brownish in color. Drake huffs, then charges at them, slipping in the sand and falling on his face.

Maybe we should have trained in the sand first, so that Drake can adjust to fighting on shifting terrain.

"Speed isn't the best here," I tell Drake as he stands, muttering angrily.

Whatever he's muttering, it's much too quiet for me to hear from a couple of yards away, but the expression on his face and the way he's brushing sand off of himself is enough to know he's annoyed. I suppose it makes sense he'd be annoyed, he did just fall flat on his face while attempting to attack a monster.

The crabs don't give him much time to finish brushing himself off, though, instead scuttling towards him.

"Move slower," I think back to my first lessons fighting on a beach. "Be more certain of your footing. Rather than just sprint or dash, walk more certainly and make sure you keep your balance. Smaller steps."

Drake nods, and when the first crab reach him, he pulls his fist back.

"Bash," he states firmly as he punches the crab square on the head.

His fist breaks through its exoskeleton as he buries his arm nearly up to his elbow in the crab.

"Argh!" He exclaims, quickly pulling his fist out as he stumbles back, the crab fading. I catch up to him and give him a light shove on the back to keep him from falling again. "Thanks."

He punches the second crab without using Bash, and his fist still breaks through, though he only goes into the monster a few inches past his wrist this time. These monsters are meant for people with 10-14 Strength. Drake has 23 Strength, which is more than double the lower end of that. Even without increasing his Strength by ten percent for a punch, he's a bit strong for this.

"Why did you think you needed to use Bash?" I ask as the second crab fades away, and he pulls a face. "What?"

"I got crab meat."

"Huh?"

Drake just stares at me, probably because I didn't directly ask what he meant. Before I can clarify, I realize what he's upset about. He received crab meat as a reward. I suppose he dislikes it.

"We can always sell it in town," I tell him. "Though it probably won't go for much, it's not in short supply."

"Yeah," he says, then looks around.

"This way," I lead him to the northern entry, the only way forward that's not backward.

Looks like this Dungeon run has an effect I heard that some beach-themed Dungeons have. The sand touching the walls is a little wetter than it was when we entered the previous room. Before, it was dry. Now, though, it's a little darker than the rest of the sand, with some signs of wetness.

Some beach-themed Dungeons can have an effect where they begin 'leaking' from the walls on some runs, soaking the sand. The longer the party is in the Dungeon, the wetter the sand becomes. It adds an extra level of difficulty to the Dungeon, as eventually, the area by the walls is more like a shore.

That is, there's a noticeable layer of water on the sand, and if the party's in the Dungeon long enough, every chamber has a layer of water that can go up to a foot in depth. With this added difficulty comes an extra reward.

It's not more Class Points, but an item. Since I didn't actually research the potential rewards in this Dungeon, I don't know what the item could be. I'd honestly forgotten some beach-themed Dungeons could do this until I saw the wet sand by the walls.

Drake's influence on Dungeons kicking the difficulty up to max probably affected this, which means we'll likely have to deal with this in every run of this Dungeon. From what I heard, it usually takes an hour or so to have an inch of water we'll be walking through, so we should be fine. We'll have to deal with walking in wet sand, but that would be it.

Looking at our new room after making those observations and conclusions, I see a giant turtle in here as well. It watches us from the center of the room as Drake slowly makes his way over to it.

As soon as Drake is within range, the turtle snaps out at him, causing Drake to stumble back. As the turtle begins to pull its head back in and Drake returns to his feet, I flick my wrist, sending a throwing knife through the air. My aim's a little off because I over-calculated the movement of the turtle's head, but it still strikes close enough. The blade embeds itself into the eye and halfway into the flesh on the side, the impact of the throw driving it all the way down to its hilt.

Drake jumps back again, falling on his ass once more as the turtle fades away, and he gives me a confused look. He's probably forgotten that I can fight, even though I train with him. I do avoid fighting in the Dungeon unless it's necessary, and he probably didn't notice me when we dealt with the bandits.

I walk over and pick up my knife and clean the sand off of it, then slip it back into its sheath before leading Drake to the western doorway. Entering it, we see nothing in here, and I sense Drake tensing up near me. He's pretty sure the room is trapped. There's only one other doorway, on the western wall. That means we'll have to walk all the way across while avoiding the trap if we want to make it through this room safely.

Sweeping my gaze across the sand, I quickly figure out the path to take to avoid triggering the room's trap.

"Come on," I begin walking.

Drake follows me to the other room, inside of which are three large crabs with yellow shells. I wait while Drake kills them, then he returns to me and we make our way back, since this turned into a dead-end.

"How could you tell the path through?" He asks once we're past the room with the trap again. "I tried looking for the signs, but I couldn't find them."

"There were shells in the sand," I tell him. "We've had some in the sand in the other rooms, too, but I noticed that the shells in that room had a slight arrangement to them once I started looking for a trap. I followed the path of a certain type of shell. While I couldn't see all of it from one end, I could still see enough to tell which way to go."

"Oh," he says, then kicks a shell in the sand. "I didn't notice them before."

"Yeah, I figured," I say.

We return all the way back to the arrival room, then take the northern entryway. I took a gamble when I sensed it to the northwest, and brought us to a dead-end. Then again, that wasn't my power of sensing that too my that way, but its lack of efficiency. Once I train it a lot more, I'll probably manage to know the right way to go every time.

The room we enter has a larger turtle in it, and I let Drake provoke its head out before I kill it with a throwing knife, my aim a little better this time. I retrieve my knife, clean it, and sheathe it, then we head into the western room, where a wooden treasure chest awaits, resting in the center of the room facing us.

Immediately, Drake becomes cautious but I approach the chest. There are no signs of any traps in the sand, and I trigger none as I approach the chest. I examine the lock, then carefully pick it before opening the chest.

Sitting in the bottom of the wooden chest is a deep, metallic, blue-green shell. While I don't know what type of shell it is, my treasure sense is tingling even if just a little bit, so I pull it out and send it into my Inventory, then pull up the information on it.

Salve Water Shell One of the shells of a mysterious creature, clean water placed within the scoop takes on a salve-like property, becoming able to soothe burns. It can hold a little more than a tablespoon of water a time, and can convert up to a cup of water.

Interesting. My treasure sense doesn't say it's very valuable, but I'm guessing it's still not a common drop. We've only had a couple of uncommon drops so far, and nothing truly rare. With all the stuff we already have, I could probably sell it in town, or maybe I'll keep it, since it doesn't have an expiration, only a limit to the amount it can convert.

For a moment, as I read the message and look at the image in the message, another image pops into my mind. A spring of clear water, surrounded by plants and mossy rocks, sunlight filtering down from above.

The image only lingers for a moment before it disappears, leaving me more than confused. What was that? Was that my psychic powers doing something? Why? What does that spring of water have to do with anything?

Rather than thinking about something complicated, I close the menu, then lead Drake into the next room, where a giant crab with a bright red shell awaits, the creature reaching up to my shoulders. Rather than having a couple of crabs, we're just fighting a really big one. I don't think it's a boss, though.

Drake carefully makes his way to the crab, blocking its first attack with its claws with one arm before punching it square on the head, cracking the shell. Then he uses Bash to punch it again, his fist going into the crab's head.

"Uh, Drake?" I say, and he looks at me as the crab fades away. "The Bash was unnecessary. You held back your first punch because you didn't want to feel its insides."

"I know," he looks disappointed. "I forgot."

I snort, then lead him into the exit room. The water level in the sand is more noticeable now, but with how strong Drake is, finishing this was just too fast for us, so it wasn't really a difficulty increase, just an annoyance as we walked into each room. We step into the access ring, and the moment I step into it, a message appears in my vision.

Dungeon Completed! Zephyr Shores Medium Sandy Shores Dungeon First Completion: +7 Class Points! Rooms Completed: 7 (+7 Class Points) Encroaching Shore: Pearl Necklace

"Encroaching Shore?" Drake asks.

"You noticed the water on the sand at the edges of the rooms?" I ask.

"Yeah," he says. "It wasn't like that when we arrived."

So he did notice that, at least.

"That's the Encroaching Shore," I tell him. "It's an additional difficulty some beach-themed Dungeons have, and it looks like this is one of the ones with it."

"So I caused it to happen," he says. "How's it a difficulty?"

"Newer teams," I say. "And teams that don't have someone strong enough to just take everything out that fast will need to spend more time in here. If the water keeps spreading, then they'd have to move through the water as well."

"Oh," he says. "Okay."

"We can sell the reward in town if we don't want it," I tell him as I pull my hood back on. "It will catch a fair price, though it'll probably not always be the same, the additional difficulty things usually have a list it pulls from."

"Okay."

I step up to the center stone and place my hand on it, then confirm exit for us. When we appear outside, there's another party in the access ring, a group of fifteen adventurers, all looking around our age from how much I can see with my head angled down and the hood obscuring part of my vision. It's a good thing I remembered to pull the hood back up before leaving.

"We have two hours until we can do this Dungeon again," I use a deeper voice as we walk away from the access ring. "Want to go do the Class Trial for our second Class? It will take about an hour to reach the Crystal Dungeon, so unless something happens, we'll be back not long after the wait period ends."

"No," Drake answers.

"Why not?" I ask.

"I want to get used to moving on the beach," he tells me. "Let's train."

That makes sense, I guess. We'll do the trials before we leave, just not today. It might be a good idea to look up what he needs to do for whatever he's choosing to take on second as well, since it's unlikely to be one of the few I actually know the Class Trials for.

"Alright," I say. "Let's do some training here."