"You're the gold one."
The voice came from somewhere to Orrin's left. He didn't turn. He was reading the notice board outside the Quarry entrance, which listed the dungeon's current threat level, party recommendations, and a handwritten addition at the bottom that said DO NOT FEED THE CRYSTALS in letters that suggested someone had learned this the hard way.
"From the ceremony yesterday. You're the one with the gold. Right? I saw it. Everybody saw it." The voice got closer. "I'm Fen. Gosse. Fen Gosse. I went before you. Common." A pause that lasted about half a second. "Elemental Caster. Which sounds impressive until you find out it's Common-grade and then it sounds like I'm the guy who can light a candle from across the room. Which I can. That's not nothing."
Orrin turned.
The kid was taller than him. Lanky in the way people are when their body grew faster than their coordination could keep up with. He was holding a dungeon registration chit in one hand and gesturing with the other one like his hands needed their own separate conversation.
"Are you going in?" Fen said. "Because I'm going in. They said parties of four minimum but there's only three of us signed up and the dungeon master said she'd let it slide if we had someone above Common and you're Rare or whatever that gold thing was. Which means you count. Probably. She didn't seem sure."
"The gold wasn't Rare," Orrin said.
"What was it?"
"I don't know."
"You don't know what your own class is?"
"I know the name. Sanctum Warden. I don't know what it does."
Fen stared at him. Then shrugged in a way that used his entire upper body. "Okay but... same. I know mine's called Elemental Caster and all I've managed so far is a spark about the size of my thumb. So we're both figuring it out. That's fine. We can figure it out in there."
Orrin looked at the dungeon entrance. Old mine shaft. Timbers bracing the opening, some of them cracked. The air coming out of it was cold and smelled like wet copper. Somewhere inside, water dripped onto stone in a rhythm that wasn't quite regular.
"Who's the third?" he asked.
"Dorn. He's a Swordsman. Actual Swordsman, Rare-grade. He's already inside checking the first chamber." Fen leaned closer. "Between us I think he went in early so he wouldn't have to wait around with the Common and the mystery class. But that's fine. I don't take it personally."
He clearly took it personally.
They went in.
The Quarry opened up about thirty meters past the entrance. The mine shaft widened into a cavern with walls studded with blue mana crystals that threw cold light across everything. Sapphire. The kind of blue that made your eyes ache if you looked straight at it too long. The crystals pulsed. Slow at the entrance. But deeper in, where the tunnel branched, the pulse was faster. Eager almost. If rock could be eager.
The floor was slick. Condensation or something worse. Orrin's boots slipped on the first slope and he caught himself on the wall. The stone scraped his palms through his gloves. Cold came up through the rock like it lived there and didn't appreciate visitors.
Dorn was waiting in the first chamber. Broad shoulders, sword already drawn. He looked at Orrin, looked at Fen, and his face said everything his mouth was too polite to.
"Common and unknown," Dorn said. "Great."
"I can light candles," Fen offered.
"Shut up."
Something skittered in the tunnel ahead. Claws on stone. The sound echoed wrong off the crystal surfaces, bouncing until it came from everywhere at once. A Rift Stalker. Low-level. The kind the dungeon bred in its upper chambers like mice in a barn.
Dorn raised his sword. Mana edged the blade in pale blue. Standard.
The Stalker came fast. Low to the ground, four legs, a body like a dog that had been stretched in every direction. Grey skin. No visible eyes. It moved by sound or heat or something else and it was heading for Fen because Fen was making noise.
Fen's hand came up. A spark. About the size of his thumb, just like he'd said. It hit the Stalker in the face and the creature flinched but didn't stop.
"Okay so that didn't work," Fen said, backing up.
Dorn stepped in and took the Stalker's head off with a clean stroke. Efficient. He'd done this before.
"Stay behind me," Dorn said. To both of them. Not kind about it.
They went deeper. More Stalkers. Dorn handled them. Fen threw sparks that did nothing useful but seemed to make him feel better about being there. Orrin walked behind them both and tried to figure out how to summon.
The System had given him a class. It hadn't given him instructions.
He could feel something in his chest. The same spot where the cramp had settled during the awakening. A weight. A presence. Not painful. Just there, like a door he hadn't figured out how to open.
The fifth Stalker was bigger than the others.
It came from a side tunnel Dorn hadn't checked. Fast. Too fast for this level. It hit Dorn from the side and the Swordsman went down hard, his blade skidding across wet stone. The Stalker pinned him. Claws into his shoulder guard. Dorn's mana flared but the creature was already biting at the joins in his armor.
Fen threw fire. A bigger spark this time, maybe fist-sized. It singed the Stalker's back and the creature turned its eyeless head toward him.
"That was a mistake," Fen said. "That was... okay."
The weight in Orrin's chest moved.
He didn't decide to summon. That wasn't what happened. The door opened because something on the other side pushed. Mana left his body in a rush that started in his core and pulled out through his right hand and the air in front of him turned gold.
The Sanctum Footman appeared.
Not slowly. Not in pieces. One second empty air. The next, a figure standing in the cavern that hadn't been there before. Armored. Golden plate over a form that was roughly human but not quite. Taller than Orrin. Broader. The armor caught the blue crystal light and turned it warm.
It held a sword. Not a mana edge like Dorn's. A physical blade made of the same golden material as the armor.
The Stalker let go of Dorn.
The Footman moved. One step. Two. Brought the blade across the Stalker's neck in a single motion that was too clean to be random and too smooth to be something Orrin had told it to do. He hadn't told it anything. He'd opened a door and something had walked out already knowing how to fight.
The Stalker dropped. One stroke. Done.
The cavern went quiet except for dripping water and Dorn's breathing.
Fen's mouth was open. His spark hand was still raised, the fire gone out. He hadn't noticed.
"What," Fen said. "What is that."
Orrin was looking at the Footman. At the way it stood after the kill. Weight balanced. Sword held at a specific angle, not resting, not aggressive. Ready. A stance that took soldiers years to learn. This thing had walked out of thin air with it.
The mana cost hit him late. Like a headache building at the base of his skull. Not bad. But present. He could feel the connection between himself and the construct. A thread from his chest to the Footman's center. If he pulled it the summon would disappear. If he pushed on it he didn't know what would happen.
Dorn got up. Checked his shoulder where the claws had gone in. Scratched armor, nothing worse. He looked at the Footman for a long time.
"Summoner," Dorn said.
"Yeah." Not technically a lie.
"That's not a normal summon."
"I know."
Dorn kept staring. Then picked up his sword and sheathed it. "It can take point."
They cleared the rest. Two more chambers, maybe six more Stalkers. The Footman did most of it. Same clean precision every time. One stroke per creature. No wasted movement. It fought like something that had been doing this for longer than its twenty minutes of existence should have allowed.
Orrin watched and the part of his brain that thought in schematics kept running numbers. Mana drain was steady. Slow. Manageable at one summon. Combat efficiency was better than Dorn's. Response time to new threats was faster. And the movement patterns weren't random. They were practiced. Drilled.
He hadn't drilled anything.
"Okay but seriously," Fen said, walking beside him while the Footman cleared the corridor ahead. "Your summon has better gear than the garrison. You know that, right? I've seen their equipment. It's leather and disappointment. Your guy has golden plate. Where does it come from? Do you make it? Does it just show up?"
"It just showed up."
"And the fighting. Did you teach it that?"
"No."
"So it just knows."
"Apparently."
"Okay but that's... do you hear yourself? Common summoners get things that look like a weird dog made of smoke. Rare summoners get a wolf or a bear with too many teeth. You got a knight. With a sword. And armor. That knows how to use them." Fen was talking with his hands again. "From nowhere."
"I noticed."
"Are you always this calm or is this new?"
"I'm not calm," Orrin said. "I'm just quiet about it."
Fen looked at him. The grin dimmed. Not all the way. Just enough that the person behind it was visible for a second. "Fair enough," he said.
And kept walking. And kept talking. About the crystals, about the temperature in the cave, about his mother's reaction when his notification came up White. It had been a silence that lasted eleven seconds. He'd counted.
Orrin let him talk. It was easier than thinking about what the Footman was doing in the next chamber.
They reached the end. Final chamber. Empty. The dungeon's core pulsed blue at the far wall. Steady. Done.
Dorn left first. Didn't say goodbye. Didn't say thanks. Just walked out with his scratched armor and his Rare-grade pride and went up the mine shaft.
Fen lingered.
"Same time tomorrow?" he said.
"Why?"
"Because I need a party and Dorn's not coming back and you've got a summon that can actually fight. And I can light candles." He held up his hand. A small flame on the tip of his thumb. "That has to be worth something."
"It's not."
"I know." He grinned anyway. Same grin as the ceremony. The one that came up Common and decided not to care. "Same time tomorrow?"
Orrin looked at the Footman. It was standing near the chamber entrance. Still. Waiting. Its golden armor caught the last of the crystal light.
Then it moved.
Not because Orrin told it to. Not because there was a threat. It shifted its weight and turned its head toward the tunnel behind them. Scanning. Checking. A soldier sweeping a perimeter after the fight was supposed to be over.
Orrin hadn't commanded that.
The helmet turned toward him. No face behind the visor. Just gold. It held there for a second. Then went still.
"Tomorrow," Orrin said. Still watching the Footman.
Fen said something. Probably long. Orrin didn't hear it.
Summons don't do that. Don't move on their own. Don't check perimeters. Don't look at their summoner like they're waiting for something.
His didn't know that yet.