The First Legendary Beast Master

Chapter 2033 How To Fix It? Maybe Don't?

Karl sighed as he tried to determine what to do about a situation as odd as this one.

What could he even do?

It wasn't like he could go into the dungeon instance and get them out himself. If they died, they would come out on their own after a few minutes, and if they didn't, they would come out one day after they entered.

Like the world's most expensive hotel.

"I don't see that there is much we can do, if the other group members can't go back in to get them. Should we put the meeting on hold for now, to go speak with the others? I can finish the sale of the portal arrays any time, and we already have a plan for the schedule."

The Clan Leaders shrugged. This sounded way more fun than making real plans.

"We will go with what we've got. The payments are ready for the portal arrays, and we will come on the weeks we have things to trade, plus the solstice and equinox, a few days in advance, to set up for the tournament.

Will you start it on that day? Or end it on that day?"

"Start that day. That way there is no question about the schedule. It takes as long as it takes."

"Good, the let's go see how a team got beat up by a bunch of badgers," the Clan Leader on Karl's left agreed.

Payments were made, and portal arrays exchanged once Karl had them all linked to the proper location. The Clans would learn once they set them up that it still took a huge amount of mana to travel, but the arrays would make it much less painful, and didn't require a ritual with resources added.

The fact that it didn't need resources was the part that everyone wanted. Getting the materials to open a long-distance portal was a pain, and getting enough to do it frequently could be impossible.

So, having the array, which could do it with just mana, was the only practical way for them to travel back and forth.

They could get here in a day or two, flying from their home Clans across multiple territories. But that was risky, energy intensive, and limited the group size that they could travel with. You couldn't bring your promising disciples on a trip like that unless it was for an excellent reason.

The tournament would surely qualify to the disciples of many Clans. But not a regular dungeon run.

The dungeon team was already looking horrified by the turn of events that had led them here, and they were sitting outside the dungeon in nothing but simple Clan robes.

"Are you not going back in to see if you can rescue your team members?" Karl asked, having assumed that they would try it before he arrived.

The Cleric shook his head. "We can't equip any of our gear. The badgers cast some sort of curse on us, and we can't take anything out of our inventories. So, we can't go back in with only the clothes on our backs.

But worse, some of our gear might still be in there.

We can't tell until we can unlock our inventories and put our gear back on. Right now, we don't even know if we own anything. We can't even open our storage rings."

In the corner of the patio for the café across from the dungeon, Cara was laughing so hard that tears rolled down her face, while Button and Lotus did their best not to laugh at the pain of others.

Then Oak and her father came out with drinks, and saw the situation.

That was it for Lotus' composure, she couldn't explain it with a straight face, and Karl decided it was time to intervene, before angry Elders picked a fight they couldn't win.

"Why don't I clear that curse off you? It's not anything major, it's a suppression spell that's preventing you from accessing your mana, which apparently also keeps you from using mana activated items and System Functions."

He [Nullified] the spell on all seven of them, and the true horror began.

"We've been robbed," one of them whispered.

"I no longer own underwear," the Cleric agreed.

His group members gave him a strange look, and the man shrugged. "They're gone from my storage ring. They were in the same chest as my spare gems."

That didn't greatly comfort his team members, but it did raise questions. If you were keeping things in a storage ring anyhow, why were you hiding your valuables in your underwear drawer?

Was that a level of unhinged paranoia? Or was it something to do with his upbringing, hiding valuables before he had the ability to put them in a secure storage device?

"Now for the moment of truth. Go back in and see if you can get your team members back, or if it puts you in a new dungeon."

The seven members prepared themselves, and the tank led the way to the dungeon entrance.

For half a second he was gone, and then he came flying right back out of the dungeon portal, landing on his ass and sliding across the stone walkway.

"Time lock restricted from entering?" Karl asked.

"The boss is standing at the door, and he kicked me back out of the dungeon."

More than a few people chuckled at his complaint. That was one way to keep the team from coming for their members.

"Would you like me to put a barrier on you so that he can't knock you back out the door?" Karl asked helpfully.

"If you would, please."

Karl cast [Eternal Lightning] on the group, and then motioned for them to enter together.

This time, they didn't come back out right away, which Karl took as a good sign. However, nobody was going to leave the area until they found out the answer to whether they could rescue their team members, or if they were going to end up dead twice in one day.