The news was convincing enough that the Librarian agreed to consider releasing some information “depending on how the future goes”. It wasn’t what Serenity hoped for, but it wasn’t a complete loss, either.

The Librarian was not nearly so reticent with information about the man who tried to buy his books. Indeed, he seemed to take a positive joy in sharing it. Unlike Frank, the Librarian had more than a phone number that was no longer connected; he had a name and an address. It was back in the States, so Serenity couldn’t follow up on it himself. All he could do was send it to Russ.

The news from home when he called Russ wasn’t good. Phoebe still wasn’t recognizing Jacob. On its own that wasn’t surprising, but Rissa told Serenity that she was sure there was something Russ wasn’t telling them. Something bad.

Serenity wanted to head home to do something about it, but he knew that wasn’t the best plan. He was doing something about it: he was working towards the removal of the curse. Phoebe had been cursed her entire life; surely she could stand a little longer.

As they left the Librarian’s doman, right after Serenity stepped into the lower-magic University Library itself, the Librarian had one last parting comment. “Ask D’Nehr to visit Navi when he can.”

Serenity turned around to say something, only to find that the door he’d just come through was gone and there was a bookcase behind him instead. Whoever the Librarian was, he was strong. He also didn’t seem to care much about ordinary humans. At least that meant that while he wasn’t going out of his way to help, he also wasn’t trying to harm anyone.

Serenity could understand the Librarian’s preferences. It didn’t mean he wouldn’t ask the Librarian to do what he easily could, but he was certainly going to respect the man’s boundaries.

Escape from the Museum was a far more traditional dungeon than the Quiz Maze. The reviews painted it as somewhere between a traditional dungeon and the very old movie Night at the Museum; there was no giant T-Rex, but there were many, many different hostile exhibits. From the descriptions, Serenity thought the dungeon was far larger than anyone actually saw; it seemed to be orchestrating which rooms each party went through to keep things fresh and exciting.

It wasn’t as safe as the Echoes of Big Ben, but it was close. Very few people had died, though a number had been carried out, badly injured.

Unfortunately, it was also the most popular of the four London dungeons, and there were no slots open for the next week. In fact, by the time they arrived, every group with a slot that day had finished. Serenity ended up Visiting the core; like the Echoes of Big Ben, Escape from the Museum was happy to have someone to talk to.

Serenity kind of wanted to come back; it looked like a fun dungeon, even though he knew it wouldn’t be anything even approaching a challenge. It wasn’t something he thought he’d actually get to do.

Escape from the Museum ended up being their shortest stop.

The last London dungeon was at St. Paul’s Cathedral, but unlike the previous three dungeons it didn’t have nearly as strong a connection to its surroundings. Instead, it dropped the participants into a city on the brink of war. The descriptions were intriguing; apparently the city’s residents were predominantly human, but there were a number of other species present and the same was true of the attackers.

It was clearly an event-based dungeon; depending on what you did and where you went, you could trigger different events. They could even vary in time, but the minimum seemed to be three days, from the initial announcement to the city of the attack through two waves of attackers. If the city was lost at that point, any survivors would be ejected from the dungeon, possibly with rewards. The longest was a week; if the city managed to hold out that long, reinforcements arrived and ended the dungeon run.

There was one report of a group that spent the entire three days in the Effra Gaol. It was the only place Serenity could find even a possible name for the city; it was likely that more information existed and simply wasn’t available. No one had even mentioned the dungeon’s name!

It was the only one of London’s four known dungeons that wasn’t open to the public. It didn’t take a psychic to guess why: the London Mayor’s office had publicly announced that it was considered too dangerous for civilians; instead, it was reserved for the British military. Serenity wouldn’t have been surprised to find out that a few police units had also gone through the dungeon.

Serenity was worried it would be hard to get close to the dungeon, but it wasn’t fenced off in any way; there wasn’t even anyone waiting at the entrance. There was a table sitting near the entrance, but other than that the area was abandoned.

When he touched the dungeon’s entrance, it was obvious why.

[Dungeon: Siege at Effra]

[The enemy has arrived at the gates of Effra. Help is only a few days away, but will it arrive in time?]

[Status: Stable]

[Tier: One]

[Type: Event, War]

[Group Size: 1 to 30, One Group]

[Entry available only to defined groups]

[Status of Current Group: approx. 0 days, 18 hours elapsed]

[Effra: 19 healthy (assigned to Wall Defense), 7 injured (3 assigned to Wall Defense, 4 in Infirmary)]

[Outside Effra: 4 healthy]

[Scenario Status: Effra under Siege, Walls Intact, Reinforcements Unaware]

[Alliance of Current Group: Travelers, Allied with City Defense]

[Enter Dungeon?]

[Override Group limit?]

It only let one group in at a time, and the group that was there wouldn’t be out for quite a while. Serenity wasn’t certain why the group that was in there had entered at slightly after midnight; perhaps that was when the last group had emerged or perhaps the dungeon had a cleanup period.

Either way, it was obvious that they weren’t expected out soon. Serenity was still more than a little surprised the place was abandoned; perhaps they simply were trying not to disrupt the area? Actually, that might also be a good reason for a late-night dungeon entrance. There might well still be disruption if they kept a large group at the entrance, but if they knew roughly what the group’s status was and when they would probably be out, they could minimize it.

The entrance didn’t have the option to visit the dungeon core; instead, it had an option Serenity had never even heard of: it would let Serenity add a second Group to a Group-limited dungeon. Serenity turned to Rissa, who was leaning against the table. “Want to go in the dungeon with me?”

“I can? I thought for sure you’d be doing the visit-the-core thing.” Rissa sounded surprised. “There’s no way there are extra slots, and doesn’t this one take a week anyway?”

Serenity grinned. It was nice to surprise Rissa sometimes. “The Visit option isn’t available, so it’s go in or skip. It should be fine; this is an event dungeon. The three-to-seven days is from only two events, it means no one’s figured out how to trigger them early or trigger an alternate set. It’s the base scenario. I bet there’s an alternate event set where you offer to act as a messenger to get the reinforcements. That’s the one I think we should aim for; it’s likely to be the fastest. There may be some other possibilities as well, but we won’t know until we get in there. Event dungeons are often mapped, so that people can trigger the scenario they want, but there’s always some give in the events; I think the dungeons don’t like being completely predictable.”

“Raz and Aki would probably agree. With that said, what did you say the dungeon’s name was?”

Serenity didn’t think he’d mentioned it yet. “Siege at Effra.”

Rissa pulled out her phone and sent a quick text. Serenity noticed that she included the entire team, even him, and added Mr. Williams.

Heading into the Siege at Effra dungeon. Serenity thinks we have a shortcut, likely under a day; maybe only a few hours. Max time is seven days.

Rissa touched the entrance, then looked disappointed. “It doesn’t give me any entry options. It says the dungeon is currently being challenged.”

Serenity touched the door and found the same options as before. He selected Override Group Limit and Rissa gasped in surprise. “It has the option to enter the dungeon now.”

Serenity nodded to himself; that made sense. What didn’t make sense was that he shouldn’t have any control over the dungeon, so why did he?

He’d have to ask once he got to talk to the core.

Enter Dungeon

[Group: Serenity, Rissa Latimer]

[Confirm Group?]

Yes

[Advanced Entry]

[Select Faction to Join:

Unaffiliated:

Travelers (default)

Defenders:

Effra City Guard

Effra Citizen

Effra Underworld

Effra Noble

Mercenary (Effra Affiliation)

Reinforcements:

Aval Kingsguard

Aval Soldier

Aval Royal

Aval Noble

Mercenary (Aval Affiliation)

Attackers:

Hessi Varan-te (Sworn Ones)

Hessi Soldiers

Hessi Noble

Mercenary (Hessi Affiliation)]

That was an unexpected choice. The note about Advanced Entry made Serenity wonder if it was an option that was normally available only after having previously completed the dungeon; that did happen in some dungeons.

Serenity turned towards Rissa. “You didn’t see anything about being able to choose the faction, did you?”

Rissa shook her head. “No, and I’m pretty sure that would have been mentioned. Do you have the option?”

“Yeah. We can work for - or maybe even command - either side, plus the reinforcements. There’s also an underworld faction in Effra; I bet it’s an entirely different set of events. The default is unaffiliated travelers, probably lets you trigger any of them if you put in the work.” Serenity frowned and looked over the list again. He didn’t want to make the choice on his own, so he’d better give Rissa his opinion. “The easiest is probably one of the mercenary options. I don’t want to take command of the entire battle, so the noble and royal options are out, and the soldier and guardsmen options aren’t likely to have that much freedom of movement. The Kingsguard or Varan-te might, but they’re more likely to be near their respective rulers. Or we could go with the default Traveler.”

“Nah, let’s choose something that will help with the goal of finishing it quickly. You think we’ll have the most freedom if we choose Mercenary? Wouldn’t they have a specific group of scouts or something?”

Serenity shook his head. “If they do, it’s not listed. That’s why I’m thinking mercenary; they’re the most likely to have scouting duties. May also be the messengers, though that could be soldiers too.”

“Or guardsmen, I see the problem.” Rissa sighed. “Fine then, let’s go with your first impulse. Mercenaries, working for the reinforcements. That gives us the best chance of being believed if we need to tell them about the attack at Effra.”

“The reinforcements are the Aval, and the attackers are the Hessi. I have no idea what the relationships here are, but the only royals listed are Aval, which has interesting implications.” Serenity didn’t think any of that would change Rissa’s mind, but it would be good to know.

“Got it. I see what you mean; Effra probably belongs to Aval, but the Hessi could be invaders or rebels or … who knows.” Rissa frowned for a moment. “Maybe we can find out while we’re in there.”

Mercenary (Aval Affiliation)