The alarm pulled her from sleep at 5:43 AM.
Riri's eyes opened. No grogginess, no disorientation—just immediate wakefulness. Sixty-seven Intelligence meant her brain processed the transition from sleep to consciousness in seconds.
She sat up. The Shadow-Weave gear had stayed comfortable through the night, fabric breathable enough that she hadn't overheated. Her HP and Stamina bars were full. MP at maximum.
The city outside the windows was still dark, streetlights casting orange halos through pre-dawn fog.
Seventeen minutes until Hollow Grove unlocked.
Riri stood, rolled her shoulders, tested her range of motion. The new gear moved with her perfectly—no binding, no excess fabric catching on itself. A hundred and fifteen Agility made every gesture precise, economical.
She pulled a Greater Health Potion from inventory, clipped it to her belt. Added two more for redundancy. The Hunter's Eyes ampule went into her jacket's inner pocket, easily accessible.
The Rat Fang Dagger materialized in her hand. She'd keep it until something better dropped—the Bleed effect on critical hits was still useful, even if her damage would come primarily from tamed creatures now.
System #2's interface flickered to life, particles swirling with barely contained excitement.
[Good morning! Ready to build your team?]
"Show me Hollow Grove's entry point."
[Closest entrance: Westwood Park - 1.2 miles from current location. Estimated travel time: 8 minutes at your current Agility.]
[Dungeon unlocks in: 14 minutes, 37 seconds]
[Current weather: Light fog, 52°F, visibility reduced to 100 feet]
[Recommendation: Arrive early to secure optimal entry timing. First wave of Players typically floods the entrance within 5 minutes of unlock.]
Riri pulled the hood up, checked her gear one final time. Dagger secured. Potions clipped. Hunter's Eyes accessible. Beast Tamer tome—she paused, pulling up the class interface.
The tome had vanished from her physical inventory. Instead, it existed as a mental construct now, skills accessible through thought alone.
She tested it. [Tame Beast] responded instantly, information flooding her awareness. MP cost, success rate calculations, current companion slots—all of it available without fumbling through pages.
Efficient.
Riri headed for the elevator. The penthouse door locked behind her automatically, System-controlled security she'd never questioned.
The elevator descent took less then a minute, and the lobby was empty except for a night security guard who didn't look up from his tablet as she passed.
Outside, the fog was thicker than the weather report suggested. Visibility closer to seventy feet.
Perfect for what she had planned.
She started running.
She started running.
A hundred and fifteen Agility turned the morning jog into something else entirely. Her boots barely touched pavement before launching into the next stride. The fog blurred past, streetlights smearing into orange streaks.
Westwood Park materialized through the fog after what felt like seconds but must have been longer. The entrance was marked by a rusted iron gate, half-open, creaking softly in the breeze.
And standing near the gate were five other Players.
Riri slowed to a walk as she approached. Two women, three men, all mid-twenties, all carrying gear that looked freshly purchased. One of the men had a compound bow. Another carried a two-handed sword that seemed excessive for an E-Rank dungeon.
They looked up as she emerged from the fog. The woman with the bow did a visible double-take, gaze catching on Riri's face before dropping to the dagger at her thigh.
"You running Hollow Grove solo?" The woman's tone was carefully neutral.
Riri nodded once.
"You know it's designed for parties, right? Wolf packs coordinate. Foxes mess with your head."
"I know."
The compound bow woman exchanged a glance with sword guy. He shrugged, clearly uninterested in arguing with someone who'd made up their mind.
"Your funeral," he muttered, then turned back to his group.
Riri moved past them toward the park's interior. The fog thickened between the trees, turning the world into shades of gray and black. Somewhere ahead, the dungeon entrance waited.
Her boots crunched on gravel paths turned slick with morning dew. The park was small—maybe ten acres total, most of it old-growth forest that the city had absorbed decades ago. Benches dotted the paths at irregular intervals, wood rotted and splintering.
System #2's interface pulsed softly in her peripheral vision.
[Hollow Grove entrance detected: 200 feet northwest]
[Time until unlock: 4 minutes, 12 seconds]
[Warning: 23 Players currently gathered at entrance point]
Twenty-three. More than she'd expected for an E-Rank dungeon this early.
Riri picked up her pace, weaving between trees. The fog muffled sound, making the forest feel isolated despite the nearby Players.
She spotted the entrance through the mist—a massive hollow oak, trunk split open to reveal stairs descending into darkness. Players clustered around it in small groups, checking gear, reviewing strategies.
Riri stopped at the edge of the clearing, staying in the tree line. No point pushing into the crowd yet.
A girl near the oak's base was arguing with her party member—something about trap detection and who should take point. The discussion was getting heated, voices rising.
Someone else laughed too loudly at a joke Riri couldn't hear.
A man in plate armor that had to weigh sixty pounds was doing stretches, metal creaking with every movement.
Amateur hour.
Riri leaned against a tree trunk, arms crossed, watching. The bark was rough against her shoulders, cold and damp from the fog. Her breath misted in front of her face.
System #2's countdown ticked silently in the corner of her vision. Three minutes. Two and a half.
More Players arrived—a group of four, then two solo runners who immediately got recruited into existing parties. The crowd swelled to thirty, maybe thirty-five.
The oak began to glow.
Golden light seeped from the hollow interior, spreading across the bark in branching patterns. The crowd quieted, conversations dying mid-sentence.
The glow intensified, pulsing like a heartbeat.
Then the System's voice rang out, audible to everyone simultaneously.
[Hollow Grove - Training Dungeon (Rank E) is now active]
[Entry permitted]
The crowd surged forward.
Riri stayed back, watching the mass of Players funnel into the hollow oak. They pushed and jostled, everyone trying to get in first like dungeon rewards were first-come-first-served.
They weren't. The System generated loot based on contribution and clear rank, not entry order.
But telling them that would require caring whether they wasted energy on a pointless sprint.
She waited. Let the crowd thin. Fifteen Players disappeared into the golden light. Twenty. Twenty-five.
The flow slowed. A few stragglers hurried past her position, late arrivals who'd probably overslept their alarms.
When the clearing finally emptied, Riri pushed off the tree and walked toward the entrance.
The hollow oak was massive up close—trunk wider than her penthouse's bedroom, bark scarred and twisted with age. The split gaped like a mouth, stairs carved directly into the heartwood descending into shadow.
Golden light pulsed from below, inviting and ominous in equal measure.
She stopped at the top step. Pulled the Hunter's Eyes ampule from her pocket, cracked the seal, and downed it in one swallow.
The effect was immediate. Her vision sharpened, colors intensifying, details snapping into focus. She could see individual water droplets clinging to leaves thirty feet away. The fog became translucent, barely an obstacle.
And when she looked down the stairs, she could make out the faint glow of HP bars in the darkness below—dozens of them, scattered throughout whatever waited at the bottom.
Red for hostiles. Green would be for allies.
All red so far.
[Hunter's Eyes active - Duration: 2 hours]
[Enhanced vision enabled]
[Warning: Entering dungeon. Retreat will be disabled once you descend past the threshold.]
Riri descended.
The temperature dropped with each step. The golden light faded behind her, replaced by the sickly bioluminescence of moss growing on the tunnel walls. The air smelled of earth and decay and something sharper—animal musk, recent kills.
Fifty steps down, the tunnel opened into a forest.
Not a cave. Not a subway platform.
An actual forest—trees stretching upward into a canopy lost in shadow, underbrush thick and tangled, moonlight filtering through leaves that shouldn't exist underground.
The System's notification chimed softly.
[Welcome to Hollow Grove]
[Current Objective: Defeat the Alpha Direwolf OR Clear all hostile creatures (0/94)]
[Time Limit: 8 hours]
Ninety-four hostiles.
Riri pulled the Rat Fang Dagger from its sheath. The bone handle was warm against her palm.
Somewhere in this manufactured wilderness, an Alpha Direwolf was waiting.
She stepped off the tunnel's final stair and into the trees.
The hunt was on.