Klaus blinked.

He stared at the massive man across the table, trying to process the shift in the air. 𝙛𝒓𝓮𝙚𝔀𝒆𝒃𝓷𝒐𝓿𝙚𝓵.𝙘𝒐𝒎

What did Kahn mean by that? What was his relationship with Astrid? The question felt like a trap which was the kind that had spikes at the bottom and no way out.

"Astrid is just my helper at the Guild." Klaus said immediately, keeping his voice as flat and professional as possible. "There’s really nothing more to it. I’m not interested in her like that."

Kahn let out a long, heavy sigh of relief.

The tension in his massive shoulders seemed to evaporate as he leaned back and the wooden chair groaned under his weight.

"Good." Kahn said, wiping a bit of foam from his beard. "I’m glad to hear it. There are a bunch of guys who try to mooch off Astrid just because she’s my sister. They think they can get close to the Phantom Crew by playing the romantic angle... I hoped you weren’t one of them, Klaus. I’d hate to have to bury a new recruit before the raid even starts."

Klaus didn’t even flinch at the threat, but he did want to set the record straight.

"Honestly, Astrid isn’t even my type." Klaus told him and the table grew silent.

It wasn’t just a quiet moment; it was a total cessation of sound; even Serra’s persistent burping stopped mid-breath and Vex froze with a cup halfway to his lips.

Garrick looked up from the corner of his eye and before Klaus could even blink, the world blurred.

THUD!

The oversized, heavy down of a war hammer slammed onto the table, centimeters from Klaus’s left ear.

The wood splintered under the impact and that table shattered... Kahn was no longer sitting; he was standing above Klaus with his shadow casting the younger man into darkness.

His expression was no longer jovial, it was threatening and his eyes narrowed into slits of cold steel.

"Repeat what you just said." Kahn said, his voice dropping a bit low. "Again... Slower this time."

Klaus felt the cold metal of the hammer pressing harder against the side of his head and he swallowed hard, trying to clarify.

"I just meant... she’s not my type." Klaus said, his mind racing to list logical reasons. "I mean, she’s very hardworking, and her efficiency at the Guild is top-notch, but our personalities just don’t—"

The hammer pressed firmer, tilting Klaus’s head slightly.

"You’re just making it worse, man." Vex laughed from across the table, leaning back with a grin. "You really should have stopped at helper."

Kahn stared at Klaus for five more seconds and those five seconds felt like an hour before he finally pulled the hammer back.

He sat back down, lodging the massive weapon into the reinforced slot on the wall where it usually rested.

"Whatever." Kahn grunted crossing his arms. "You weren’t even a match for my sister in the first place. I’ve already decided... I’ll only allow her to marry someone who is at least as strong as me. Someone who can actually protect the family name."

Klaus let out a long, shaky sigh of relief as the giant sat back down. He felt a small, firm hand hit his shoulder.

Serra gave him a sympathetic pat on the back.

"There, there." She said, her voice a bit slurred but comforting. "Don’t take it personally. To Kahn, there is no woman in this world more beautiful than his sister, He’s got a bit of a complex."

"Am I lying, though?" Kahn replied, looking around the table for backup. "Astrid is the most beautiful girl in town, she inherited all her looks from our late mother. She has that kind of face... the kind that makes people want to protect her. Anyone with eyes can see that."

Klaus rolled his eyes a bit, though he made sure to keep his face turned away from Kahn.

If it helped, he didn’t want to protect Astrid; most of the time, he wanted to punch her. She was a headache in a guild uniform and while he could admit Astrid was beautiful for a commoner, she didn’t hold a candle to women like Talia or the Raven Thief.

Those two were crazy attractive... almost ethereal though he couldn’t forget that both of them had tried to kill him at least once.

Beauty usually came with a blade in his experience.

"I’m with Boss on this one." Vex agreed, throwing a wink toward the center of the table. "Astrid really is beautiful."

Kahn placed a heavy hand on Vex’s shoulder as the grin returned to his face.

"This is why you’re my favorite person in the whole Crew, Vex." Kahn said.

Serra gawked at him, her mouth falling open in mock betrayal. She slammed her hand onto the table, making the remaining plates rattle.

"Hey! What am I, chopped liver?" She yelled toward the bar. "Bartender! Get me some booozeeeeee!"

The bartender hurried over, his feet pattering against the floorboards.

He carried a dark, thick bottle of alcohol and poured it into Serra’s copper cup.

The liquid was a deep, murky amber, and it was quite literally steaming with wisps of white vapor curled up from the rim, smelling of sulfur and fermented grain.

"That... that can’t be good for her." Klaus blurted out.

The bartender took a hasty step back, as if afraid the cup might explode but Serra didn’t care. She stuck out her tongue in Klaus’s direction.

"Don’t tell me what to do!" She snapped.

She brought the cup to her lips and downed half of it in one go.

She immediately began to gag, choking out some of the liquid onto the table as her face turned a bright, alarming shade of red.

She coughed violently, her chest heaving, before finally swallowing the rest with a loud wet gulp.

"THIS IS THE SHIT!" She roared, slamming the cup down.

Klaus looked at Kahn, his eyebrows nearly reaching his hairline. Kahn just sighed and shook his head.

"She’s a good healer, Klaus." Kahn explained with a weary voice. "At the end of the day, she can just heal her own internal organs if she destroys something. It’s a self-correcting problem."

Serra dropped her cup and let out a massive burp.

To Klaus’s horror, a small cloud of mist actually escaped her mouth with the sound. He shook his head slowly. He didn’t think that was healthy at all, regardless of whether you could magically knit your stomach lining back together or not.

Kahn suddenly shifted. He sat up properly, his expression turning serious as he cleared a space on the table.

"Since you’re a part of the team for this raid, Klaus, we need to make sure your head is in the game." Kahn said. "Are you aware of the different kinds of dungeons we’re dealing with?"

Klaus nodded, He had spent enough time playing the basics to know the layout of the world.

"I know them." Klaus pointed out, ticking them off on his fingers. "There are three main types. First, the Normal Dungeons. Those are what most adventurers raid if they aren’t in the World Dungeons... They exist in gates that appear everywhere. The Guild issues missions to eliminate them before they overflow, but you need a solid party and a certain level of strength to even get a permit."

He paused, glancing at the others.

"Then there are Resource Dungeons. In these dungeons you can find different kinds of minerals and finally, the World Dungeons. That’s literally the Galen Dungeon. They have set floors, consistent spawns, and they’re permanent fixtures of the geography. You don’t necessarily need a team for the lower floors if you’re careful, but it’s suicide to head to the higher floors alone."

Kahn clapped his hands together with the sound echoing like a gunshot.

"Knowledgeable!" He boomed. "I like that. And what about the requisites for forming a proper party?"

Klaus didn’t hesitate.

"A party is formed when there is at least one weapon user, a healer, and a scout." Klaus said. "Wizard Apprentices are optional, a party can have minimally three people to be considered balanced by Guild standards."

He didn’t say it, but he was well-versed in this because of the Artemis Online competitions.

The format was exactly the same.

In the pro-leagues, you could bring an aura user, a scout, and a healer, but bringing a Wizard wasn’t compulsory.

Players did it anyway because of the utility, but there were far more aura users than wizard apprentices in the world and just because being a wizard apprentice was rare didn’t mean a player couldn’t be absolute trash.

Kahn nodded seemingly satisfied.

"We are one of the most notorious parties in Galen and the surrounding towns." Kahn said, leaning in close. "We’ve done dozens of raids, across all types but this one... this one is going to be our big break. This is the dungeon raid that might even make us rich enough to stop raiding for a while."

Klaus raised an eyebrow.

"The only way you’d be saying that is if you found a Resource Dungeon." Klaus said. "But those are rare and expensive."

In this world, whoever found a Resource Dungeon could claim the deed. Once you had it, you could sell the rights for a fortune or raid it yourself.

The problem was the gamble. You had no idea what resource was actually inside... iron, silver, mana crystals or what the volume was until you entered and if you exited, it would vanish. Most people chose the guaranteed payday of selling the location. Plus, a group like the Phantom Crew shouldn’t have been able to afford a deed.

Seeing Klaus’s skeptical expression, Kahn chuckled.

"North Dungeon 97 is a hybrid." Kahn explained. "It’s part resource and part monster dungeon. There are a few like that scattered around. We reeled in our total savings... fifty-seven gold coins to buy the rights from the Mayor. We’re putting everything on the line to raid it now."

Klaus almost wanted to face-palm.

Fifty-seven gold? Resource dungeons were sold around that price, but it was incredibly stupid to dump your entire life savings into a dungeon where you had no clue if the ores inside were worth more than common stone but he kept his mouth shut.

As long as he got paid his fee, he didn’t care about the life choices or financial ruin of other people.

"Because it’s a hybrid, we plan to fight through the monsters and secure the ores." Kahn continued. "But in resource dungeons, finding the veins is the hard part. That’s where you come in. Astrid told me you’re a Metal Mage... You should be able to sense the minerals and tell us exactly where to mine so we don’t waste time digging through dirt."

The big man looked Klaus in the eye.

"Do you have the spells for it?"

Klaus thought for a moment.

Magnetic Field... as long as the mineral in question had some kind of metal, it was okay.

"I have a skill that lets me detect metal." Klaus nodded. "I can help you find the veins."

He didn’t tell him the name of the spell. Information was power, after all.

"Good." Kahn said, slamming his hand on the table. "You’re hired."

The man stretched out his hand toward Vex. Without a word, Vex reached into his storage ring and pulled out a leatherbound file.

He flipped it open, retrieved a crisp piece of paper, and handed it to Kahn. Kahn pushed the paper across the splintered table toward Klaus sliding a feather-pen along with it.

"This is the contract." Kahn said. "Read it before you sign... I don’t want any complaints once we’re in the dark."

Klaus pulled the paper closer and then scanned the lines carefully. It was standard business talk, full of indemnity clauses and "usual terms" but the core of it was solid.

As long as he helped them find the minerals, they would increase his flat pay to one gold coin for the mission.

On top of that, he would keep a ten percent share of the total minerals they extracted. They even promised to help him sell his portion through their contacts and most importantly they would give him two spell scrolls specifically for Metal Mages.

Klaus read it over twice and he didn’t see any loophole they could exploit. They were offering him high-tier pay, specialized magic, and professional protection.

"I accept the terms." Klaus said.

He signed the parchment with a quick, elegant flourish and except for Garrick, the entire table erupted into cheers. Kahn roared with laughter alongside Serra, and Vex reached into his ring again.

He passed Klaus two scrolls tied with silver ribbon, a silver storage ring, and a heavy black cloak identical to the ones they wore.

"These scrolls were found while we were exploring the wastes between Galen and the neighboring province." Vex explained. "The storage ring is a high-capacity model Kahn bought for everyone on this mission and the cloak... well, that makes you one of us. Put it on."

Klaus stood up.

He slid the silver ring onto his finger, feeling much more different from his usual one then, he shook out the black cloak.

It was made of a heavy, durable fabric that seemed to swallow the light. He swung it over his shoulders leaving the hem swirling around his boots as he donned it with a spin.

He looked cool, even he could admit it.

Serra clapped in her drunken stupor, nearly falling off her chair.

"Look at him!" She giggled. "A real Phantom!"

"You look the part..." Vex said, holding up the skill scrolls. "Don’t let us down."

Kahn stood up, his massive frame dominating the room once more. He looked at his crew and then at Klaus.

"Is everyone ready to get wealthy?" Kahn asked.

The roar that followed nearly took the roof off the tavern... Klaus didn’t cheer but he was ready.

It was time to make some money!