“These.” Tibs pointed to the uneven set of tiles on the floor. “Are the ones you have to avoid between here and the intersection. Most just rearrange the layout of the halls, but a few will explode under you.”

“How about we wait until you’re done, then?” Jackal asked.

Tibs shook his head. “Stepping on any of them will change the floor, but we’ve worked out the sequence that resets it. If you accidentally—” he glared at the fighter “—step on one, I can make sure everything’s the right way for us.” He paused. “Unless you step on an exploding one. So don’t think about trying something stupid.”

“Why do you think I’d—” Jackal closed his mouth as Carina, Mez and Khumdar stared at him. “Fine.” The fighter grinned. “No thinking at all for me. Only way I can’t come up with something stupid, right?”

“If absence of thoughts leads to a better performance out of you, Jackal,” Khumdar said, “then, Carina must, once she has become an Alpha Sorceress, confine you to a university tower to be studied, for that will be an accomplishment worth replicating.”

“It can’t be stone,” Mez said. “It’ll be too easy for him to get out of that and go right back to thinking.”

“I’ll have it made of metal,” she said, “and I’ll make sure he’s restrained so he can’t punch his way out.”

“Kro is so going to be pissed,” the fighter said with a sigh.

“No, I’m pretty sure he’d like to know you won’t be able to get yourself hurt anymore.”

Jackal smirked. “He likes taking care of me too much for that.”

“Should I stop healing you then?” Tibs said, distracted by the floor.

He and the other rogues had spent so much time going over what each had learned from their runs and drawing the map of the floor with the proper sequences that Tibs was dreaming them now. The problem was that in his dreams, the sequence kept changing anytime he thought he had it memorized. That left him uncertain it wouldn’t change halfway through him setting the right triggers.

The others argued good-naturedly about Jackal’s need to be restrained and Kroseph’s willingness to help as they traversed the hall, watching where they stepped. The intersection had the same floor of broken tiles, even those that were triggers in the hall were present there, but every rogue had confirmed that they were not triggers.

Yet, Tibs reminded himself. Ganny could change that anytime she wanted between the runs.

The idea things could change always made the runners nervous. It was so easy to grow complacent, and that could be the run where things weren’t as you had grown used to. Tibs hadn’t asked Ganny about why she hadn’t done that here yet, because he hoped it was something that hadn’t occurred to her.

She tended to get lost in the setting up of the puzzle and the traps, and didn’t see the weakness until confronted with them.

“We’re all here,” Jackal called.

Tibs looked over the map for this hall Tandy had insisted he bring. She’d made sure each rogue had a copy both so they could update it as needed and so they couldn’t forget a crucial detail.

Where she got all the papers needed… Tibs had his suspicions. Mez had mentioned a few times how his girl’s household seemed to always be low on them.

He activated the triggers as he walked. Ganny had been smart enough to make the sequence use a variety of shaped tiles, but they were in a straight order. He wasn’t required to go back the way he’d come to follow it. Another weakness he hoped no one mentioned while inside the dungeon.

He really wanted to tell them to never talk about the traps while in the dungeon, but the explanation of why would be problematic.

The biggest complication Ganny had put in his path was how some tiles were clustered together so that one miscalculation or misstep would lead to the wrong one being pressed. It was also where most of the explosive triggers were.

He was halfway through the hall when he activated the trigger that opened the middle path in the first intersection. He felt that rumble in the floor, while the distant ones the other triggers activated were so faint he sometimes didn’t feel them at all even while channeling Earth.

“Is getting the whole sequence correctly supposed to make the run easier?” Carina asked. “Or harder?”

Tibs shrugged. “That’s not what we’re working on. It was easy to workout they did something, since avoiding them all only leads to the wall with the three crests and the one with the lion.”

“Which clues us in that we need to find two other doors,” she said.

“Tandy made it to the door with the dragon crest, but she hasn’t gotten it open yet. Bea’s team reached the boar crest, but she isn’t sure how they managed it. I’d like us to try to make that one so I can work on that pattern of triggers.” He looked at the shield that was now on each of the intersection’s corner, at the top of the walls. Instead of one of the design, they contained a green line going from the top to the bottom. “That’s how long we have to clear the floor. You can just make out a little red at the top. It’s going to fill more as time passes.”

“That’s when the loot chest refill, right?” Jackal asked gleefully.

“How long does that give us?” Mez asked. “And what happens to us if we’re still on the floor when it’s all red?”

“I suspect,” Khumdar said before Tibs could answer, “it will be all red near the zenith, as that is when the next team is set to enter.”

Now that enough teams were doing the third floor and had made sure the guild knew how complicated it was, the schedule had been changed. Teams who came back with loot from the third floor were put on a morning and midday schedule. That means two teams a day only, but as they were still under a dozen of them, it meant they got at least one run a week. They weren’t required to head directly to the third floor, but Tibs suspected that focusing only on it would be the only way to unlock all the rooms and go through the games in them.

The day was divided into six for the teams going no further than the second floor, and in twelve for those only on the first one.

“So that’s what, six hours?” Mez said.

“That doesn’t sound like enough for the entire floor,” Carina said.

“It’s because we’re still figuring out how to get where we need to go and how each of the puzzle rooms works,”Tibs replied. “Once we have that, the only thing that will slow us are the fights and how quickly we can go through each room. I’m hoping I can get us to the boar room. If not, we’ll be able to get there by our next run and know what’s the puzzle in it is.”

“Okay, then the plan is,” Jackal said, rubbing his hands together. “We clear the caches on the way to the Lion room, win that game, go to the dragon’s room, clearing those caches, Tibs figures out how to open it, wins the game and gets us to the boar room, we win that, then we go back to the lion room and wait for the floor to reset and—”

“No,” Carina said in exasperation.

“That’s not why we set up the timer,” Ganny stated.

Tibs smiled. “You really thought Jackal wouldn’t use it to get more loot?”

“The dungeon’s commenting on Jackal’s obsession?” Mez asked.

“Ganny.”

“How is it I’m the only one who thinks more loot is a good thing?” Jackal asked in dismay.

“We all consider it a good thing,” Khumdar said, “but we realize that taking the loot from those rooms means it will not be there for the next team. What will the runs become if each team decides to interfere with the next one, instead of helping them as they are now? You must think of the long term.”

“You mean like we get more loot in the long term if we take more in the short term?” the fighter asked, grinning.

“What do you think the guild’s going to do when they find out we’re staying past the end of our run?” Carina asked. “And before you give me snark, remember that Harry is the one making those decisions.”

Jackal grumbled unhappily.

“If it helps,” Sto said. “Tell him that if he doesn’t redo a room, it means I’m left with more essence, and that means that in the long term, I could increase the value of the reward each room gives.”

“Shouldn’t you be keeping all that extra essence for your next floor?” Tibs asked.

“We’ve come across something on that floor that… well, it’s helping a lot, in a lot of ways, too. The main thing is that it’s not going to need as much essence as Ganny had calculated to set it up, but we are going to have to rethink the whole thing around that.”

“If you don’t take from the other teams,” Tibs told Jackal, “Sto can slowly increase the value of the loot we’ll get the next times.”

“But he can keep it the same if I take the extra loot, right?”

Sto groaned.

Tibs chuckles. “What did you think he’d say?”

“His greed knows no limit, does it?”

“Probably, but I doubt you can make enough to reach it.”

“Is it offering more loot?”

“No!” Sto exclaimed. “Okay, let’s try this. Tibs repeat exactly what I say. Jackal, please do not stay past the end of your run.”

Tibs raised an eyebrow at the ceiling. When Sto didn’t explain himself, he repeated the words.

Jackal stared at him, then looked up. “Really? You think asking nicely is enough? You have met me, right?”

Sto groaned. “What about if I add a little something for Kroseph?”

“Can you do that?” Tibs asked.

Sto was slow in responding. “I’ve already made it, actually, but don’t tell him that. Now I’m worried that he’s going to keep it for himself.”

“If you agree, Sto will add something for Kroseph.”

“What is it?” Jackal demanded suspiciously.

“You’ll find out when you get your pouch,” Tibs replied before Sto could say anything.

“And I only get it if I agree to leave once the time for the run runs out?”

“Promise to leave,” Carina stated.

“Each run,” Tibs added.

“Promise to leave on each run,” Jackal corrected darkly. A second later, he brightened. “Okay, I promise to leave once the time runs out, each time we have a run.”

“That’s it?” Mez asked in surprise. “No arguing, no trying to find a way to get more than you should?”

“It’s for Kro,” Jackal replied, beaming. “I’m not going to deny him a present. He’s going to be so grateful that he’s going to do the—”

“I don’t want to hear that,” Tibs said.

“I’m kind of curious as to what Kro will do,” Sto said. “Humans have really odd rituals.”

“It’s them time,” Tibs said. “That’s none of our business.” He glared at the fighter. “No matter how willing someone is to talk about his.”

Grinning, Jackal raised his hands in defeat. “Now that’s settled, how about we get on with the reward giving?”

“After you’ve done the room you are going for,” Sto said. “I can’t wait to see how you work that one out, Tibs.”

“Are you hoping Jackal’s going to die there and you won’t have to give him his reward?”

“Hey!” Jackal protested.

“No,” Sto replied, offended. “It doesn’t change anything if I give it to him now or not. If he dies, I get the essence back.”

“Oh, it changes something,” Ganny said. “No offense, Tibs, but that guy needs to learn some patience. If the price is him getting hurt, I am all for it.”

Hurt, not dead. Tibs could deal with that.

“We’re getting the rewards as part of winning the game behind the boar crest,” Tibs said, crouching at the start of the hall they needed to take.

“Tibs, the lion room is through this hall,” Jackal said.

“I said we’re doing the boar’s room,” Tibs said.

“Yeah, but you can do that after the lion and dragon rooms.”

Tibs looked over his shoulder. “Are you willing to risk Kro’s gift on me having enough time to figure out the trigger pattern that will get us there, the lock and the puzzle that will unlock the dragon room then get us to the Boar’s crest and win that, just so you can have more loot?”

Jackal narrowed his eyes. “That’s playing nasty, Tibs.”

Tibs smiled. “There’s going to be fights and caches along the way. You’ll have plenty of loot. Now pay attention. These are the tile shapes we need to avoid on the way to the next ‘room’.”

“You’re not staying behind to unlock the hallways?” Carina asked.

“You’re waiting after the fight, right?” Mez said. “Because we can be sure that’s going to spill out of that area and into the hall.”

* * * * *

Tibs got complacent, and it almost got him killed.

He was careful with each hall, double checking the triggers against the papers, but after four battles of Gnolls dropping in on them and one with the people golem waking around a corner. Tibs thought he knew what to expect when he felt the essence shift over them.

Except, they were still in a hall, with triggers on the floor. He made the realization as Gnolls and people golems dropped from the momentary doorways. He backed away, then the trigger clicked under his foot. As he hurried to switch to fire, hoping it would offer some protection, he felt the rumble of a distant hall changing.

“Watch where you step!” he yelled

A second later, there was an explosion as a Gnoll stepped on a trigger.

Tibs dodged thrown knives, crystal this time, and grinned as another Gnoll stepped on a trigger. This one was propelled to the ceiling by the small tile and crushed there. Well, however he made them, Sto’s Gnolls weren’t as observant as the people golem, who danced around the triggers with ease.

So Tibs was going to have to deal with them himself.

The fireball that engulfed the crystal thief bathed him in comfortable heat as it exploded.