Graverra bounces down the hallway with a high-pitched squeal after every impact - More or less given the metaphorical boot after her stunt with the withering blasts. She guesses that was fair and technically accomplished what she’d meant to, but…

“Ow.” Graverra groans once she’s stopped bouncing, rubbing her poor behind as she crawls over to rest against the wall. The same wall she’d been passing for hours before. She whimpers to herself and summons back her grimoire.

Name: Graverra Graeme

Title: [untitled]

Race: Human - Drethiaq

Class: Necromancer

Guilds: [none]

Level - 7

EXP. - 33%

Health: 385/400

Mana: 85/700

Stamina: 125/400

So that had hurt a little bit, but eighty-five measly mana couldn’t have been worth the effort of killing her now. And it certainly wasn’t going to regenerate very quickly even with the buffs from her gear - Her stamina was getting too low.

“Hah…” It isn’t much of a laugh, but she at least tries as she remembers her argument from earlier. At least she wasn’t a useless vampire like Val.

Graverra flips pages until she pulls up the one that lists her party members. Just Branimir and Valerea. They had all tried to keep a proper fourth before- Well, if Graverra were being honest, Branimir had tried. Branimir belonged to a real guild; One that had stupidly rejected Graverra’s own offer of membership. Why he still went out adventuring with herself and Val, Graverra wasn’t big enough to question.

Beside either of their names sat their current locations. The same one, of course, and not at all where Graverra had left them. They’d gone on without her. Graverra shuts the grimoire and hugs it again.

“And I mean, I may just be a skull without no body, but what’re you gonna get out there that you can’t down here? You heard the core. It’s like your own little world down here.”

Graverra gets the feeling she’s zoned out of a telling off from the skull affixed to her hat.

“Capo, how long have I been down here?” She asks, still committed to feeling sorry for herself for reasons besides rejecting the core’s offer. They’d just… left her. Sure, some of her acknowledges that maybe there really wasn’t anything they could have done and that she would have been truly mortified to be rescued from all that, but… They’d left her.

“Oh, gee, I don’t know, girlie.”

“I’m going to get hungry…” Graverra says glumly. Technically, she already was; Eating would get her stamina regenerating much faster than simply sitting there, though she could eventually gain it all back by just doing that.

“That’s too bad.” The skull wriggles above her in that sort of shrugging motion.

Graverra’s frown deepens. “Are you upset with me?”

“You shoulda said yes.”

“What difference does it make to you if I do or not?” Fine, maybe without her Capo would be left to sit all alone for who knew how long until the core had mustered up enough to open his doors to some lower level adventurers, but that just meant the skull should have been grateful to her, anyway.

“What difference does it make to you? I saw that roster, girlie. Two party members? Is that all you have to get back to? And I know you adventuring types. There’s no way you’ve got a family back up there either. No title, no guild…”

“Stop it!” Graverra slams her grimoire down so hard it unsummons itself. “I know, okay? How come I have to stoke some unreleased dungeon’s core ego while you get to sit there and embarrass me?”

“I’m just reading off the facts, girlie. He’s offering it all; Who needs a guild when you’ve got a dungeon full of minions? Title, mana, power… Companionship. I mean, you saw that tentacle…”

Graverra feels her cheeks go red again.

“He’s the total package, girlie. What’re you holding out for?”

“I don’t know…” To be honest, the perks that came with something like a marriage bond had never been enough to turn her head before… But this sounded like it went a fair bit further than that. Not to mention, one very lengthy conversation they would have to have on the idea she wasn’t so sure humanoids and dungeon cores were truly compatible in that way. “It’s just… It’s been a lot, you know? Nobody really understands me up there, everyone always thinks I only ever chose necromancy because it’s flashy, and I look really cute in all this, so I can see why the core would let me fall in here in the first place, but… But actually, I just like summoning things so I don’t have to be alone.” Her voice lifts like she’s trying not to cry, because she is trying not to cry. It had been a lot. And even if she didn’t like it when Branimir teased about low stamina, meaning she didn’t have the energy to hold her emotions properly, it was probably true.

“Well, isn’t that exactly what you just got offered?”

“Kind of. I don’t know.” Graverra sniffles and dabs a single tear away with the lace of her fingerless gloves. “I just want it to be for the right reasons, you know?”

“Graverra… I don’t know what to tell you. I’m just a skull. I was probably only summoned into existence moments before you fell in here. I think I might like a body though, maybe a weapon or something. I think the only way I’m gonna get either of those things is if the bossman gets more mana. I hate to tell you this, girlie, but I just don’t think this has to be that complicated.”

“Well see! That shows exactly what you know. How could you possibly understand what I want when you’re just a stupid skull!”

Unequip ’Capo (Basic Skull)’ as companion?

[Y]/N

Graverra removes Capo from the brim of her witch’s hat and holds him out in front of her. She’d really meant what she said about being lonely, but to be fair, none of the bone minions she’d summoned before could talk. This was half Capo’s fault for talking up the core so much, anyway. He’d gotten her all confused.

“What do you want, Graverra?” Capo asks. He still glimmers with the promise of XP and mana, though it still wouldn’t be enough to make a difference to her. She considers calling both their bluffs and crushing the skull right then, seeing if she could port out of there and back to her party… But they had left her. And she really feels for the skull who wanted the rest of a body… If she had summoned him she would have at least given him that much.

“I don’t know… Is being wooed first so much to ask?”

“He’s a dungeon core, girlie. I think that’s gonna have to be a yes.”

Graverra frowns again, this time in thought. That probably was a good point, but…

“Well, he’s going to have to do something. Do you hear me, dungeon core? I’m not impressed.” She crossed her arms, Capo still held in one hand, like she’s just made some kind of point.