“Deek...”

“Mmm...”

“Deek!”

“Five more minutes.”

“You need to wake up now!”

“Geh!” I felt a boot kick me and I jerked up. “I’m awake! I’m awake!”

I looked up to see Ruby glowering down at me. “You fell asleep last night while still purifying people. I know you said you can’t teach others how to do what you can do, but it really would be much faster.”

I was speaking the truth though. If I could just wave my hand and cause someone else to learn Mimic, I would. Unfortunately, the way I had learned it was by getting a karmic infection and using my high resistance to miasma to overcome its control. The fact that everyone here had become controlled by the dungeon already proved that they didn’t have what it took to learn Mimic. Well, there might be other ways to gain Mimic.

Overall, it’s a job that I’ve never seen anyone else possess, and Aberis was far too unknowledgeable about the job system as a whole. I’d need to go to the Imperial Cloud Meadow if I wanted to learn more about jobs other than my research.

“I got it, I need to work on more people,” I grumbled as I sat up.

Ruby gave an awkward expression. “No... we wanted to give you some more time to sleep. It’s only been a few hours. It’s still not even completely light out. However, someone has emerged from the dungeon, so we thought it was best to get you immediately.

“Someone?” I jerked up. “Elaya?”

“We can’t tell. She’s had a hood up. She demanded that we send our master immediately, and then refused to engage with anyone else. Based on what you said before about the infection, we figured she meant you.”

“Master... huh?”nOVe.lb(In

That would probably mean Dungeon Master. I must have conquered enough of the dungeon that they were starting to notice a rival Dungeon Master down there. I hadn’t issued an official challenge, but I likely had conquered a few percent just by doing what I was doing. I had intended to smoke Elaya out rather than come in there and fetch her, so this suited my purpose just fine.

“We don’t know how long she’ll wait though...” She tried to pressure me to hurry.

“I understand.” I began to get dressed, causing Ruby to spin around. “S-sorry.”

I had grown so used to always having a woman around when I changed clothing and especially when I got up that it hadn’t occurred to me that it was a problem. Even now, Alysia was back in her blessing form on the back of my hand. She saw what I saw, which means that she saw everything. Thankfully, she didn’t talk about it with me. Actually, the next time I had sex, that might be awkward. I coughed and sped up my changing.

“We’ve managed to re-conquer half the city so far. The infected people aren’t too difficult to handle with a full team. After recovering the alchemists and a few mages, we just use spells and potions to knock them out. At the moment, we’re waiting on you. It also seems like we don’t get hungry or thirsty, so we don’t need to worry about all the food that spoiled these last two months.” Alysia spoke with her back to me.

“Makes sense.” I nodded. “The miasma provides you the energy you need. If dungeon creatures needed food, dungeons wouldn’t be able to function.”

“I-I see...” She looked back at me. “Are you ready?”

“Let’s see how she reacts to seeing me.” I agreed.