Guild office, four months after Yorick began building his dungeon, 673 A.H.P.(After human pacification)

The woman leading the guild was a large, powerful cyclopes, and her green eye was red around the edges, with the skin under it deeply dark from late nights. Ever since that team of adventurers had come in and explained that new dungeon to her, she'd been... stressed was a mild way to put it.

The appearance of a celestial claiming to be a forgotten goddess, with power that seemed to back up the claim, and a seemingly friendly dungeon core that had been claimed by an adventurer... Her day had been immediately in the dumps. She'd spent the rest of the week refusing all requests to go to the dungeon. Now, though, paperwork was building up, and people were finally beginning to take regular jobs again. Now that that was true, she began looking over the few teams she felt actually had a chance if they went.

Thankfully, each one had a priest or cleric on their team. The three were ridiculously different other than the, though, and each one was foolish enough yet experienced enough that they might be able to make it.

Team one had three rogues and a cleric of Cuth'Duna, which consisted of two Elves, a Halfling, and Beastkin. The second group contain a paladin Centaur, a berserker-warrior Kobold, a Tibbit cleric of Ashera, and a Minotaur priest of Duur'Gareth. The third group consisted of a Kobold assassin, a Kitsune cleric of Nigen'Sei, an Elvish druid, and a Beastkin bard.

All three were considered silver moon adventurers. That was another headache to keep track of- how many missions a person went on, and how difficult they were added to an 'experience' counter in the guild. The more experienced they were, the higher their celestial rating was- earth, then stars, then moon, then sun. Solar adventurers were extremely rare, though. The other measure was the metal types- starting with stone, then copper, then brass, then iron, bronze, steel, fools gold, quicksilver, silver, gold, true silver, dragon's gold, Adamantium, Titanium, and Orichalcum. Each one told of a team or individual's ability, and the team's rating was an average of its members ratings.

Of course, as a matter of fact, only humans had ever reached anything higher than true silver, and Orichalcum had only been held once. That man was long dead, and left her to deal with the issue of people trying to steal his plate. The gods created the plates in order to give adventurers a sign to be identified with. Of course, as things went, the more expensive the plate, the more magic was held within. The plates stored their owners essence and- as legend went- the Orichalcum plate could restore it's owner to life if broken.

Of course, people who didn't understand how the plates worked- which meant almost everyone in the world who wasn't part of adventuring management- wanted the chance at being resurrected and wanted to steal it to obtain that chance. The amount of gold that the guild made that went onto paying for the things security was obscene...

Honestly, she was hoping that this 'Fae wild' place that Valentine had mentioned was real so she could break the plate and tell him the most dangerous and exciting adventure he'd ever face was in the Fae-wilds, and then they'd be rid of his plate for good. It'd free up so many funds that they'd be able to handle most of the guilds finances with room to spare. The number of healing temples they could set up in a year alone...

Still, she had more pressing matters to attend too. Mainly who the next group of adventurers she sent would be. Val's group had each reached fools-gold star rank. An awkward rank, but not the worst. With time for the dungeon to reform, she'd figured that this mission would be a subjugation mission meant to kill off the monsters, so she needed the best fighters she could manage. The most likely to be successful.

It had been days and she was desperate for sleep, so she wrote out a quest for them- whichever group could complete one dungeon from each member's homeland first would win the right to go- four dungeons for each team. She went downstairs and posted the challenge on the board, with each team named, and then got the largest mug of Dwarfish ale she could before chugging it and going upstairs to pass out in her office for the first hopefully decent rest she'd had in a week.

***

Ashera, goddess of the Elves

Ashera threw open the door to the meeting room that the gods had made- a truly neutral ground where no divine power could be consciously used. They could not attack each other here- not that any of them wanted too, but it was a safety feature to protect against the gods of other realms.

What she found was as she'd expected. Every god was assembled, and each one looked uneasy about what was about to happen. Except the Human god. He was simply waiting for her to speak, unconcerned with the other gods' concerns. Of course, given his situation, that was understandable. Humans really had suffered an unfortunate, if necessary, loss.

She sighed, stepping up to her place and looking around at the others, grimacing. "I come bearing poor tidings. I know that among you, only Epithemeus listens to his people as closely as I do, and two of his people were on the mission that I am about to tell you of. You see... a Fae core has been found, one with Celestials in it. Not just one kind either- Celestials of both the light, and the dark inhabited this core's dungeon."

The gods all focused on her in unison, only Epithemeus not fully understanding why this was important. Granted, that made sense- he was by far the youngest of the gods. She nodded at their apprehensive looks, and then shook her head in frustration. "It gets worse." She took a breath.

"My child described their adventure in detail, and... fears she may have helped awaken an 'Old One'." Epithemeus straightened, eyes sharpening as the others tensed. Every single one of them had been around the last time an 'Old One' was awakened. They were the gods that had ruled this world when she herself had first arrived. She was the oldest god in this group, and had been fighting a losing battle against the 'Old Ones' until the Kitsune arrived.

That still was a horrible memory, and they had been put to sleep themselves for a few centuries before waking up. To put every 'Old One' to sleep, they'd killed every member of their respective races and then enchanted each of them. It had been hard... but this world was theirs now, and if an 'Old One' were to wake, their peoples would be in for the fight of their lives... again...

Shortly after humans had come, they managed to wake an Old One on accident, and the killing of it had taken every god's help. They still were recovering from the fight, and it had barely woken up when the fight started. If an 'Old One' was already awake and gathering power...

"I doubt it is an 'Old One'. After all, our people supposedly met it and returned to tell the tale, didn't they?" Cuth'Duna said, making everyone pause. That... was a good point. How could a mortal survive an encounter with an 'Old One' when the gods themselves couldn't do so? It made no sense...

"But if it wasn't an 'Old One', what did they find in that place? How did a temple we filled in centuries ago reappear as if we'd never touched it? Only a few minor things were different about that place. Unless you're suggesting that some random dungeon core somehow appeared there and ate the inside stone in only the places filled in by us, do explain how they managed it. Because that is a terrifying bit of luck. Unless they had something guiding them, and the ability to eat things outside of their territory, they couldn't have managed it so fast on their own..."

The silence after Nigen'Sei spoke was telling, as no one here had an answer. Given that the god of truth never did things half-heartedly, and never asked questions he knew the answer too... Everyone looked around, very tense.

"Well... if that's all, I'm going to go and see this place for myself. You all know my avatar, you all know how good I am at avoiding notice when I want, so I'm proud to say I might be able to get however deep this dungeon is fairly easily. If it cannot 'eat' things anymore, it probably has at least twenty floors. That's usually when dungeons hit level five, after all, right?" Tulrae looked around, then smiled.

He, as always, was only dressed in the absolute bare minimum we required him to have on around us. The god of trickery and nakedness, quite a frustrating man. Still... none of the elves in the room were nearly as good at sneaking around or seducing others as he was. looking around, there were only two gods that had not once been elves. That being Epithemeus, and Nigen'Sei. The rest of us were or had been Elves, and... that was to be expected.

"Yes... that isn't a bad idea, actually... why don't we invest ourselves into an adventuring party? If three or four of us send champions to hunt this dungeon, maybe we can find out what actually is there... if it is an 'Old One', we cannot afford to continue letting it grow. There aren't enough living things on this plane to kill to cast that spell again, even if we wanted to, so if this 'Old One' is awake, we'll have to kill it. There aren't many other options..."

They all nodded in response to her, and began setting up plans on who to send. They could choose new ones, and they would, but for this... they needed to find the most experienced group of adventurers they could, and send them- adventurers that had once managed to earn the direct respect of the gods. They cast their votes on each member, and soon set up the party.

An Orcish Shaman and healer, a woman so powerful she'd managed to multiclass and gain an elfin immortality. A Kitsune bard with an extremely strong passion for styling hair. A Halfling Barbarian who was close to multiclassing into rogue from the sheer number of skills and attributes he had that fit the class- if he got anymore, he'd break the system and automatically reach the level of rogue that matched his Barbarian class, which would be a revolutionary discovery for everyone in all the kingdoms.

Finally, a human Archmage- the last one in existence. He was more than seven hundred years old now, and had managed to continue increasing his power. He wasn't able to access the system, and had none of the perks or streamlined ease that came from the system's exact numbers and titles, but with the level of practice and effort he'd put into the process, he'd earned the unofficial title of Archmage.

That decision was rough, and not many gods liked it, but... Epithemeus wanted to let his humans prove themselves, and thank this remnant of a bygone era for his service. Human's were odd creatures- the more magic they had, the longer they lived. This human archmage was the only creature on the planet other than the gods with an Intelligence score that, if measured by the system, would be higher than 10,000. He had functional immortality. He was still aging, though, and seven hundred years had not been kind to the mortal body that was barely clinging to life.

But the vote was cast and the decision made. So those four would be their party, and they'd all pray that somehow, these four would be enough to manage.

***

Gavan Fallwick, Archmage Eternal

Gavan sat at a table, his mind whirling through calculations and down paths so often and thoroughly tread that he couldn't help but reuse them. Every detail was cared for, every plan laid, every trick used to its fullest.

He'd spent the past four hundred years politically maneuvering humanity back into a sustainable position as a national power, primarily through magical and technical research. It had become so hard, and he could barely speak. He couldn't grow hair anymore, so he was left looking like a seemingly emaciated, wrinkly old man that was so old his skin was gray. His bones were weak as well, and he couldn't even stand without help anymore.

He paused to indulge himself in remembering what his glory-days had been like, what his past was to him. Days and years spent on the battlefield, wielding sword and staff as he slew countless men and women of every race and stopped stars falling from the heavens above from harming his armies.

Battles with both sides summoning demons and angels to fight by their sides, countless fallen and dead by his hand- entire islands worth of land destroyed by his uttered words. He could still cast spells, but each casting aged him further, and weakened his already fragile body- He barely ate these days, he relied solely on his mana to preserve himself. His people saw him as a god-like figure, revering him as the pinnacle of humanity... really, he'd simply been lucky.

Thanks to a single talisman of an old god, one from before the current god's reign, he'd received intelligence equal to the level of every person or monster he killed. Every battle had strengthened him and given him greater and greater reserves to draw upon. Had he been able to fight for another month, he might've had the power to stand against the very gods themselves... he was still only a level 24 man, despite his high intelligence.

He only remembered that because of his intelligence. He'd never been able to see his status screen again, but he remembered it vividly thanks to a gift not even the gods could deny- a gift of divine memory even the system hadn't been willing to impart. His intelligence was beyond what mortals were meant to have, even if it was still his. He continued to gain intelligence every year as well. Another boon of that same talisman.

Still... he wished he could reclaim that past... it was glorious in its time. He sighed, the first noise he'd made in days, and paused as magic he could barely sense worked in the air. By pure godly force of will, he watched a letter drift down in front of him, his almost blind eyes struggling to pick out what it said. He managed, though... and then dropped the letter.

He just might get his chance, to reclaim the lost youth that had once filled him. The vigor and vitality he missed, that had slowly drained out of him... He struggled, trying to stand as his limbs shook, a guard looking in and calling for help as he tried to unlock the door. But he was too late. Gavan smiled for the first time in almost four hundred years, and shouted, a spell augmenting his voice to the point that even the gods could hear him.

"You wicked and cruel tempters! I accept your wondrous invitation!" He stood on his own as he spoke- a single glorious instant of physical success before his legs and knees broke under him and he collapsed to the ground, coughing up blood from his now rapidly decaying lungs. He started laughing, cackling and waiting for either death or a promised blessing from his god.

Death did not come.

In a few short moments, he sucked in a ragged breath as light flooded the room and his skin fell off, his entire body deconstructing and then reconstructing itself around his brain as youth and life flooded the organ. Soon, he stood up again, looking at himself and grinning in victorious pleasure.

Where once a decaying shadow of a man had fallen, now a naked, powerful, handsome young man with blood-red hair and sun-kissed skin stood, muscular and tall, his skin glowing faintly from the sheer immensity of the mana filling him. He turned to his guards as they entered the room, green eyes ablaze with inner light and life, placed his hands on his hips, and grinned as they gaped. He was proud of his youth for more masculine reasons than just his ability to stand, after all...

"Bring me my armor- the black and green robes with the bloodstains. They should be in the front hall of the castle. And fetch me my wife." He smiled, and a man finally looked up at his face, blushing and blinking in confusion.

"G-Gavan... Master Fallwick? But... magic... but you didn't have a wife. You were a virgin." Gavan dropped his hands to a resting pose and felt less pride in his other assets than he had before. Really, that was a point of vague disappointment in his youth. He'd been so attractive and intelligent... and he'd only ever managed to have one child, and only ever with a woman he'd paid.

"My staff and book, then. In case you forgot I am married to war and magic, and I'm going to go kill a god more ancient than our maker within the next few weeks. So get me some clothes and my weapons. I want to use this body to the fullest while it lasts." He had a month with his body as young as it was now- possibly longer if a dryad kissed him- but he didn't plan to just use it to adventure. He had a city to fix and spells to practice before he could go on that little errand. And he was eager to do so.