《Invasive Dungeon》 Chapter One or The Abduction Of A Monster As I approached the planet below me, I seethed in rage. How dare they! What gives them the right! Nothing! Nothing, I say! And yet, the powerless are at the mercy of the powerful. An endless cycle where those that have, get more and more while those who lack lose more and more. But fine. If they want to play that kind of game, I can play along. At least, for as long as it¡¯s necessary. And then they¡¯ll be the ones getting ripped out of their day to day lives. But first, I need a starting point. The self-titled gods that ripped me from Earth and pulled me into their world made no pretence at what they want from me. To be a Dungeon Core for them. Sounds good at first, doesn¡¯t it? Wrong! So very and utterly wrong. They do not care about me, nor the undoubtedly thousands of other souls they summoned previously. No, all they want is a mindless little slave that¡¯ll produce hordes of weak monsters for their champions to battle and grow from. There¡¯s no glory in being a god¡¯s Dungeon. There¡¯s no growth in it, no potential. No dream of unimaginable power. No, just a simple slave without a will. But I¡¯m gonna show them. Oh, how I¡¯ll show them! They made a mistake this time in picking me. I may not have a unique advantage to the other poor souls that came before me. I don¡¯t have a perfect memory, I don¡¯t have a cheat ability to take advantage of, I don¡¯t have a god¡¯s blessing or eldritch knowledge to draw upon. Support the creativity of authors by visiting Royal Road for this novel and more. No, I have none of that. But what I do have can be so much more deadly. Maybe not in its immediate power, but that¡¯s a part of its unique strength. It¡¯s sneaky, at least in the beginning and once it get rolling, it¡¯s often too late. It¡¯s my strange little obsession. Some may have called it weird or even creepy, but I don¡¯t care. Especially not now, when it may allow me to take down some bigots with overinflated egos. Which is why, instead of searching for a place with natural resources like a river, forest or mountain to begin building my dungeon, I¡¯m instead painstakingly combing over the landscape below me, searching for that perfect environment to serve as my starting point. I have no idea if I would have been able to find the correct spot as a human. As far as I ever researched (which wasn¡¯t that deep), it¡¯s pretty inconspicuous. Thankfully, my newly gained dungeon senses helped with that. While I could exactly scan the complete underground area, my sense did manage to penetrate a couple of metres into the earth. Enough for another new part of my senses to tell me exactly what kind of material I was looking at. And there it is. Asbestos. The fabled construction material of many horror stories. Used due to its relative cheapness while still being quite tough, but also a great thermal and electric insulator. The problem? It¡¯s an insidious, slow killer. And I was going to build my dungeon out of it. Decision made, I reached out with my new and strange dungeon instincts, initiating the process of forming my core and thus becoming a proper Dungeon Core. It didn¡¯t take long for a small hole to form in the asbestos riddled earth. That small hole then expanded into a small cave in which my core began to form. Mystical energies of the world gathered into the small underground space until something gave and they condensed. Where the energies mingled just moment before now stood, or more accurately, floated, a smallish pyramid made of iridescent crystal. It was about a fist sized tetrahedron. Or a d4, as it¡¯s known among fans of a certain roleplaying game. Either way, I was now a fully formed Dungeon Core. I was also on a timer. It was a small mercy the gods gave me, the only mercy. A small, excruciatingly small amount of knowledge about this new world I now found myself thrust into. And thanks to it I knew. I knew that the process of core creation, of forming the body that I¡¯d inhabit wasn¡¯t just for show. The energies involved were immense and most anyone with sensitivity for such things would take notice. I had, more or less, a month to prepare my dungeon for invaders. Probably less. And so, I got to work. There¡¯s no time to waste. Chapter Two or The Preparation For War The first step to building a dungeon is making the actual space where the dungeon will be. As such, I let my dungeon instincts guide me in moving and shaping the earth around me. Unfortunately, nascent dungeons such as myself are weak. Too weak to directly create or destroy in any appreciable manner. Sure, a small amount is possible, but it¡¯s too small to matter. And over too long a time frame. Especially with the horrendous efficiency I currently have, it¡¯s not really worth it. So, I instead do my best with just the shaping ability I obtained. The asbestos rich earth is pushed to the sides, compressing into walls. Probably a feat of physics impossible without magic, this technique allows me to form relatively solid tunnels without having to move the soil above ground. It doesn¡¯t take long and just a couple hours later I already have a long and winding tunnel, reminiscent of a cave. The beginnings of my dungeon. For now, I left it linear, too little time left to prepare anything more complex. Especially if I also wanted to protect all the routes a complex layout would create. But that¡¯s not how it¡¯ll remain for long. Before that though, I have to survive. And for that I need protectors. A brief scan through my mind gives me a good starting option. Powerful enough for them to be worth the cost while still being relatively cheap to make. Cane toads. One of the more famous invasive species on Earth. The scourge of Australia, though I suppose many creatures possibly have that name there. Stolen content warning: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences. They were introduced into the Australian ecosystem to combat some farming pests, though it backfired immensely. With no natural predators and their strong poison, they soon reproduced into an unmanageable number. For now, I mostly want them for the poison, though if things work as I suspect in this world, their other attributed will come in handy later. But first I¡¯ll have to create them. They probably don¡¯t even exist in this world which is a bit of a problem, if only a slight one. Us Dungeon Cores gain new creatures in one main way. By absorbing those that fall within our halls. Though this does not work on humans and the other ¡°civilized races¡±. In truth, they are just an arbitrary group of creatures that enjoy the favour of at least one god. Be that as it may be, there¡¯s also a second method, even if it is much more limited. Not too dissimilarly to when I initiated the forming of my core, I reach out to the magic that permeates this world and feed it images of what I want. Even as flashes of the bulbous and ungainly frog race through my mind, I can feel the same mystical energies converge just a few metres in front of my core. But instead of continuously gathering until a threshold is reached, the energy instead transforms and the vague outline of a toad begins to take shape. In a moment of inspiration, I push the image of the toad being much bigger to the magic. Sure, on Earth that may have created a whole host of problems biologically speaking, but I trust the magic to take care of it. Soon after, they cane toad is fully materialized. Standing and just under a metre tall, it¡¯s status as a monster is cemented in anyone who sees it. It¡¯ll need a new name, cane toad no longer cut it. But the magic isn¡¯t done yet. Whatever energy it is that managed to force life into the world envelops the newly spawned toad for a second. Then, carrying the shape it imprinted upon itself, the magical energies approach me, that is, my crystal core. Once again, it does something and flows inside me. More specifically, into one of the facets of my crystal. The single affected side out of the four seems to shift, loosing its iridescent nature. And yet, while it now feels distinct from the other three walls of my crystal, it can also tell that from the outside it¡¯d still look the same. And that¡¯s it. The second option. Somehow, by letting magic create what I want, the resulting monster is imprinted onto me. Sure, it gives me a couple of benefits when it comes to creating the monster in the future, but there are only so many times I can do it. No matter. It¡¯s time to finish the first iteration of the dungeon. Chapter Three or Final Reinforcements One of the benefits of imprinting a monster onto myself is that their creation costs a vastly reduced amount. Enough so that it only takes a couple of hours for me to populate the whole tunnel leading to my core with them. Which signals the completion of dungeon version 1.0. Except that that¡¯s not really the case. It more like the alpha version of the dungeon, or perhaps even pre-alpha. It certainly isn¡¯t something I¡¯m proud of. Just the bare necessities to allow for something grander to come later on. And it will come. Let¡¯s see, what can be improved? And what need to be improved? Technically everything, but some things are more pressing and if I were to list every single detail I¡¯d never finish. The most obvious thing is layout, but once again, I push that back a bit. I can manage with just this for now. No, a much more important thing is the environment itself. Right now, I only have bare walls with no decorations. Only the occasional frog to disrupt the monotony. Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings. Sure, the walls are made of asbestos, but that¡¯s not going to be much help in and of itself. No, to take full advantage of that I need to create a dungeon where every movement forces you to scrape against the stone, chipping microscopic strands off of it. Those will then find their way into the lungs of the intrepid adventurers foolish enough to venture into the depth of my dungeon. It may not do much, but a slow killer is still a killer. And in the meantime, it¡¯ll at least weaken them, giving my monsters an easier time of defending themselves and the dungeon. And then, even if they manage to survive and escape, they¡¯ll still die in a decade or two. So, I get to it. Shaping the tunnel to have more bends and curves, ground and ceiling riddles with stalagmites and stalactites and even the occasional stalagnate. I also make sure that the surface layer of asbestos is much less compact. Hopefully that¡¯ll cause more of it to come off. With that all done, I¡¯m not left with enough time to do any more major changes before the first of my challengers will begin to arrive. It¡¯ll be more effective to reinforce what I already have. I throw myself into one last whirlwind of reinforcement. This time, I use my nascent creation and destruction powers to increase the concentration of asbestos in the walls. While they aren¡¯t very good or efficient now, they won¡¯t improve if I won¡¯t use them. And the very last thing that I also do in tandem with that is something I should have dedicated a small amount of my power to this whole time. Letting my dungeon energy permeate the walls of the dungeon, strengthening them and, hopefully, also causing their secondary purpose to improve. Chapter Four or The Intrepid Heroes It would seem that our journey was slowly coming to an end. A little over two weeks ago (or was it three weeks?) we received a message from the gods. The Twins, as the sibling gods of the suns are often called, blessed our small group and gave us a mission. Well, an opportunity is a more fitting name for it. A new dungeon. Just a few weeks travel off from our home town. And to top it all off, it was even located in an as of yet uninhabited region. The opportunity of a lifetime. And now we were finally here. Well, almost. Not too long ago, just yesterday in fact, we crossed into a desert like landscape. It was also at around that time that Jared, our member most in tune with the mystical, sensed the whirlpool of magic inherent to every dungeon. But now I could feel it too. We all felt it. And quite frankly, it¡¯s horrifying. Like the maw of a beast of unimaginable proportions sucking in the lifeblood of the world. We all stood there, frozen in awe and a not so small amount of terror. If a wizard had that amount of power at their back and call, they could do things of immense proportion. Like, like, I don¡¯t even know what! Maybe flatten a whole country. Or an entire continent! I don¡¯t even want to imagine what a proper mage could do with it. But all of that was a moot point, because the recipient was none of those. It was a dungeon. The gods¡¯ gift onto mortals. We spent the rest of the day in contemplative silence. None of us wanted to interrupt it. After all, this is the first time any one of us had seen a dungeon or its power. Such a shock needed time to be processed. Maybe little Timmy had an easier time of it. Untouched by the gods as he is, he won¡¯t be able to see much. Maybe at most get a vague feeling of something supernatural being close by, but even that¡¯s doubtful. But we still needed someone to carry our things through the dungeon, where we would be busy fighting to carry it ourselves, so off he went with us anyway. Besides, we paid him good money to be here. And then we reached the dungeon proper. It was¡­ a bit underwhelming, but that a new dungeon for you. We really shouldn¡¯t have expected that much from it. Most definitely not the fabled gates of the famous Ighrad dungeon. Anyway, we set up a sentry schedule and went to sleep. It¡¯s best if we tackle this full of energy tomorrow. The next morning, we all woke up full of trepidation. Our first dungeon delve was upon us. We all prayed to our chosen god with a small hope of a last-minute appointment as a chosen, but no such luck for any of us. No matter, we had a dungeon to conquer. We stepped in, our formation a rather simple one. Me and Hilda in the front, guarding against any and all attack to come. Behind us were Jared and Matt and behind them Janice, though Matt and Janice tended to switch positions sometimes. I never really understood that part. Why would it matter whether the rogue or the ranger were behind? Either way, right now the rogue, Janice, trailed behind our group. The insides of the cave were dark and cramped. The walls made of some kind of greyish stone were dry, though I guess that makes sense in a desert. Jared made a light for us. After all, he did have the most power to spare fort that. The spellcaster had real chances of becoming a wizard someday. Oh, yeah. Little Timmy was also in our formation, trailing behind us along with Janice. The cave, which turned out to be more of a tunnel was littered with stalagmites and stalactites obstructing the way. We weaved through them where we could, though wasn¡¯t always an option. When the path got too narrow for us to pass while still in formation, me and Hilda smashed a couple of the pillars to bit, freeing our way. The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement. Sure, there was a small chance of alerting whatever guardians the dungeon summoned forth, but we were confident in our group. No weak critters from a newly spawned dungeon could make us flinch. After a little while, we spotted our first enemy. A¡­ frog? Sure, it was giant, almost a metre high, and had almost no resemblance to the limber creatures that live in the nearby lakes, but it was still a frog. And perhaps it even had the mental faculties of one. Because, it just, shot its tongue, at us. Yeah, I¡¯m not exactly sure what that was supposed to accomplish. Hilda just batted it aside with her shield and the cut it off. Not even a second later, Matt shot and arrow right into its head and it dropped dead. We stared at each other nervously. The same thing probably ran through all of our minds at that point. That couldn¡¯t have been all, could it? It was just that weak. Our two more nimble members quickly got to dismembering it. Even if this first fight was easy, the next one didn¡¯t have to be, so it was good to learn what we could from this corpse. And then there was also the other motivator. The bigger motivator. The potential of at least part of the body being valuable. ¡°It¡¯s poisonous,¡± Janice called out. ¡°Sure, but it¡¯s secreted through the skin. Makes it tough to extract. We¡¯ll be lucky if it¡¯s even sellable,¡± replied the ever-dour ranger, Matt. ¡°Do we at least know what kind of poison it is?¡± I asked in return. That would be the real deciding factor. If it¡¯s something valuable, it doesn¡¯t matter how difficult it is to extract a poison. If, on the other hand, it¡¯s useless, we wouldn¡¯t be able to sell it at all. ¡°Dunno,¡± replied Janice. ¡°Anybody care to try it out?¡± With a heavy sigh, Hilda volunteers. ¡°That¡¯s what I get for wanting to be the tank,¡± she mutters as she approaches the duo crouching over the corpse. Jared also approaches with a similar sigh. He already knows it will be his job to heal if anything goes wrong. Thankfully, it doesn¡¯t. With the smaller doses Hilda applies to her skin, the biggest symptom she feels are some phantom sensations of pain and maybe a twitch of a muscle here and there. But that¡¯s not the problem. It¡¯s doubtful whether one of these monsters can manage to touch us for long enough to give us a larger dose than that, and all of us can deal with problems like that. No, the problem are the phantom sensations. We all know what that means and we look at each other knowingly. It is inevitable that once these things reach the open market, a new drug would be invented. But that¡¯s for the future. We were still in a dungeon. We progressed further and further in. The frogs became more and more frequent until we eventually faced off against two and then three or even four at once. Still, it wasn¡¯t a tough fight even against the occasional group of four. We just had to actually employ our training for once. A hack here, a slash there. A redirection off of a shield and a well-aimed arrow. And repeat. Arrow, shield, magic, dagger, sword, Timmy¡¯s distracting cough, getting knocked over by one of the shooting tongues, falling to the ground. Wait, what? By the time I realized what was happening, the fight was already over. Nonetheless, the fact that I let myself get distracted like that wasn¡¯t a good feeling at all. What if the monsters were actually competent here? ¡°Can you not shut up for one moment! I don¡¯t know if you haven¡¯t noticed, but we¡¯re in a dungeon! That could have cost us much more than just Alex falling to the ground,¡± Matt yelled at Timmy. Which was¡­ harsh. But, to be fair, the kid had been an almost constant source of coughs since we entered. Even now he was panting like a dog. Seriously, I though we hired him because he was quite fit for one untouched by gods. ¡°So- Sorry,¡± he began, but had to take another huge breath of air, which just caused him to cough more. ¡°Ah, forget about it. At least try to be quiet. We don¡¯t pay you to act like a common street dog. We pressed on deeper down the tunnel. Except that Timmy did not quiet down at all. If anything, he appeared to be becoming louder. Eventually, Jared couldn¡¯t take it anymore and approached him. He cast some kind of spell. Based on the fact that Timmy¡¯s breathing eased a bit, a healing spell of some kind. ¡°Hmm, guys, perhaps this should be it for today.¡± ¡°What do you mean, Jared? It¡¯s barely been two hours and also haven¡¯t even reached the end yet,¡± Janet was quick to point out. ¡°Be that as it may, I think we have a more pressing issue at hand. Whatever is causing Timmy to cough and wheeze is not natural. He has something in his lungs and judging by the time this began, we may all be in danger.¡± That made us all freeze. Environmental effects like that weren¡¯t common in dungeons. In fact, there were only two real scenarios in which you heard about it. Both of them bad for us. Either the dungeon was old and powerful, thus capable of engineering these kinds of effects, whether by nature or magic. Or, and this was the worse of the options, even if mote likely, the dungeon was cursed. Corrupted. Blighted. Whatever you wanted to call it, they basically always got destroyed. Which would normally be a motivator to delve it as much as possible beforehand. But not if this is the cause, or symptom, of its corruption. We had to get out of here, and fast. Chapter Five or Further Preparations Huh, that¡­ was not entirely expected. I definitely thought that my monstrous cane toads would be at least a bit tougher, but at the end of the day they are still just toads. But they did manage to do a bit of damage when they ganged up on the intruders and had the assistance of distractions. An idea for another time. No, what is much more interesting is the effect my asbestos had. Or rather, my enhanced asbestos. As far as I know, then normally it isn¡¯t anywhere near that fast. Back on Earth it would take years of directly working with asbestos and even then, it could take decades to develop symptoms. But not here. It would seem that whatever magic my dungeon reinforcement does, it makes my materials much more powerful. Except that that isn¡¯t the whole truth. After all, it was only one of those people that got affected. As for the others. I have no idea whether it¡¯s acting at the more normal speed or if they got affected at all. It sure would help if I was able to understand them. At the end there it seemed like they were talking about something relevant to this, with how they suddenly retreated in a panic. Questions, questions, so many questions. And yet, so few answers. Either way, it would seem that I have some more time again. It¡¯s time to do some more work on my dungeon. All I have to do is figure out how to proceed. I did some thinking over the few days between me having finished and the adventurers arriving. And I think I really have only three options. Well, two, but the second one has two possible paths right now. My frogs. It¡¯s rather obvious after this first invasion that they are much too weak. So, I could dedicate some time into improving them. Thanks to them being imprinted onto my core, it¡¯ll be a much faster, easier and cheaper process. But even then, I doubt I can do much in just a day or two. This narrative has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. If you see it on Amazon, please report it. The other option is for me to alter the environment of my dungeon to better suit my monsters. Like the distractions I mentioned earlier. For this, two idea come to mind. I could work on some kind of bog or marsh environment to better suit my toads. I think that¡¯s the sort of place they are at home. And even if it isn¡¯t like that on Earth, it¡¯s rather obvious at this point that these cane toads are at most tangentially similar to those. The other option, well, I feel like this one¡¯s better. But I also feel like I¡¯m biased here. And, if that weren¡¯t enough, this option would also require me to use another of my limited imprinting slots. Hmm, yeah, no. I don¡¯t care. A new monster it is. A plant monster, to be exact. Besides, it isn¡¯t like I won¡¯t be doing the other things too. This is just deciding the order of operations. With that decided, I once again call out to magic. Or whatever it is I¡¯m doing when initiating these monster creations. The magic, the mystical energies, once again begin to gather near my core. I¡¯m slowly getting used to the sensation, but there¡¯s something more to it. I¡¯ll have to examine that once I¡¯m a bit safer. Anyway, I begin to push images onto the forming blob of energy. A vine like plant that grows over everything and spreads everywhere. That smothers the life out of things it overtakes. Hmm, and actually, let me also add some poison from poison ivy. Normally, it doesn¡¯t have any, but I think I can do some fun stuff with that later. Finally, the process is done and on the ground before me lies the infamous kudzu vine. Yet another invasive plant. But that is for the future. For now, I need to spread it through my cave. Hopefully it¡¯ll provide adequate camouflage for my toads. And maybe it¡¯ll even be a tripping hazard for future invaders. There¡¯s just one tiny problem. There¡¯s neither food, water nor sunlight down here. When I only had a couple dozens frogs it was fine. And even now, covered in vines as I am, I¡¯m able to sustain my creatures fully on just magic. Or mana, or whatever it is I¡¯m using as a dungeon. No time to examine all that just yet. But that won¡¯t remain like that forever. At some point, I¡¯ll grow too big. At that point, I¡¯ll have to create an actual ecosystem. Anyway, all that took me the vast majority of the day. I expect this team to give delving me another try tomorrow, so it¡¯s best if I don¡¯t start any bigger changes. What I can do with this remaining time is try to do some minor shifts in the two monsters I have. Mostly just colourations, so that they blend in better with each other. Also, I¡¯ll try to change the behaviour of my not-cane toads. Just shooting their tongue is much too stupid. Chapter Six or Final Touches Turns out I was, but also wasn¡¯t, right. The adventuring party, sans the one affected by asbestos, did enter early the next day. But once they saw the, admittedly, drastic change withing, they almost immediately turned back and left. I suspect for a good long while too. Which means I have some time to do the necessary changes to feel safe. Like, for example, adding another environmental hazard. And why not combine it with adding another thing I¡¯ve been lacking? That is, water. Both the not-kudzu and not-cane toad would thrive more in an at least partially watery environment. But why use such a boring thing like water? Especially since, with the power of magic, I could make my monsters treat some much more fun substance the same as water. Like poison! And, if I play my cards right, this should also enhance the poison in both of my creatures! A perfect plan! More danger! Enhanced danger! And a lessened strain on my powers (since I will no longer have to make up for the lack of liquid with magic)! So, without further ado, I once again initiate the magical ritual that imprints another monster pattern onto my crystal core. How am I able to do this if I¡¯m creating a liquid and not a creature? Easy, I¡¯m not. At least, not directly. Besides the fact that I have no idea how I¡¯d go around making a material, I think this is just generally a better idea. Sure, it¡¯ll leave me with only one last slot for an additional creature, but this is definitely worth it. I¡¯m, of course, talking about the deadliest poison. Well, the deadliest poison back on Earth, maybe there¡¯s something better here. And technically it¡¯s a toxin and not a poison, though I never really understood the difference. And technically I¡¯m not talking about the toxin itself, but what produces it. And that is¡­ bacteria! Sure, it may seem like a strange choice for a dungeon monster. After all, aren¡¯t they supposed to be big and scary? Powerful defenders to stop invaders? And yes, those are certainly qualities that are nice to have in my guardians, and eventually I¡¯ll also have those, but if everything goes according to plan, I won¡¯t need them just yet. As long as my idea for a unique dungeon works out. One without limits. But I¡¯m getting off track now. Back to the bacteria. (Just one last tangent. Did you know bacteria is the plural? The singular is bacterium.) Clostridium botulinum and their product the botulinum toxin. Commonly also known as botox. Oh yes. Sadly, I do not actually know that much about it. And the fact that it¡¯s a microscopic bacterium doesn¡¯t help at all in imagining it. Thankfully, over the last few of these magical events, I¡¯ve realized something. Magic doesn¡¯t care. It cares not for facts, logic, how things should be or anything of the sort. I¡¯m not quite sure what it does care for, but belief certainly seems to be at least a part of it. Unauthorized reproduction: this story has been taken without approval. Report sightings. And so, instead of trying to dredge up to scant few details I can from the recesses of my mind, I instead show the magic what I want from it. The few details I do know only acting as a hollow skeleton in the whole process. I want a small, miniature, creature that is just a single cell. And I want it to produce botulinum. That¡¯s still more or less how it¡¯s on Earth though, if a bit reductive. It¡¯s time to weave some real magic into this creature. It¡¯ll be a true monster. I want it to produce said toxin constantly, never stopping for even a second. But how to power such an organism? After all, it won¡¯t help me reduce the upkeep of my toads and vines if the cost just shifts onto something new. Well, how about I make it eat breathable air? Huh, that¡¯s impossible? There¡¯re no real nutrients there? Who cares about that! It¡¯s magic! And it¡¯ll bring another hazard into play. And, with one last twist, I make sure that it can act as a substitute for water for my monsters. How? Once again, magic. Though I suspect there¡¯s a major factor of this one is going to be that all of them are my creations. And then it¡¯s done. Of course, nothing actually changes in my core room, but that¡¯s to be expected. Only one single bacterium formed from that and I¡¯ll have to summon more later. Before that though, I have to do some more modifications. Because while having the botulinum is all well and nice, and I did include the potential to act as water, my other monsters aren¡¯t actually prepared for such a change. Which I¡¯m going to have to remedy right now. What follows is a long and arduous process. Unlike when I¡¯m creating a new monster, modifying one is much harder. For one, there¡¯s resistance. Sure, it¡¯s reduced compared to if I wanted to it with a creature whose pattern isn¡¯t imprinted on me, but it¡¯s still an additional obstacle to overcome. And then there¡¯s the whole magic thing. Which is to say, almost no magic. Yeah, magic does graciously assist me with creation, basically doing the whole thing, but now? All I get are vague whispers of what I¡¯m supposed to do, with maybe an occasional nudge in the right direction. It¡¯s, quite frankly, exhausting. It is really lucky that part of being a Dungeon Core apparently also includes adaptation for long periods of gruelling and (partially) mindless work. What I suspect are at least a couple of weeks later, I¡¯m finally done. Though it could be month, or even just days. It¡¯s hard to tell without access to the sun. Either way, all three of my monster guardians are now ready and primed to coexist. Hopefully in perfect harmony so that the whole is greater than the sum of the parts. I quickly spawn everything in. Well, I do carefully calibrate the amount of bacteria so that the rate at which they produce ¡®water¡¯ is just right. This way, I won¡¯t become flooded. Sure, it would be another environmental hazard for adventurers to brave (and die in), but even I¡¯m not that cruel to become a water level. Though maybe I¡¯ll do a small layer like that eventually. With that all finally done, I notice an almost immediate dip in the energy siphoned from me to sustain my defenders. Actually, now that I¡¯m thinking about it, I am technically already capable of having a mostly self-sustaining ecosystem. But it¡¯d necessitate more modifying. Later, then. For now, it¡¯s time to dedicate time to something I¡¯ve been ignoring for some time now. My new defences should be enough, so it¡¯s time to figure out this whole magic and supernatural thing. Or at least some of it. *** Finally, after another two weeks, we were back. Though admittedly in a much less glorious manner than we intended. Our first dungeon dive truly hadn¡¯t gone that well. Worst of all, little Timmy never recovered. The tough breathing and painful cough remained with him even after we left the dungeon. Even the healing Jared provided only offered temporary alleviation of the symptoms. It only took us a couple of days to realize that whatever conditions it was, there¡¯s no coming back from it. That dungeon needed to be destroyed. Even so, Jared didn¡¯t stop healing him. Did it just prolong his suffering? Was it just torturing a dying man? Either way, it didn¡¯t matter. Around the halfway point in our journey back we encountered a pack of moghs. The nasty critters put up a tougher fight that we expected though we still beat them off easily. That did leave Jared with no power left though. That night was a true nightmare. I don¡¯t think any of us slept one bit. The whole night was accompanied by the tortured wheezing and coughing of little Timmy. By morning, it was quiet. We packed our things and left for home. All five of us. But that¡¯s in the past now. We¡¯ve reached home and it¡¯s time to make a report. Hopefully, the world will be a better place soon, one abomination less. Chapter Seven or Magic? As much as I wanted to figure out even a smidgen of what magic is and how it functions, I didn¡¯t have much of a starting point. Sure, my forced instincts told me how to do the things I needed to build my dungeon, but that was about it. Probably another scheme by the gods to limit their slaves. No matter I¡¯ll just have to figure it out myself. The obvious way to begin would be to get another monster creation going and instead of focusing on the monster focus on the process itself. But, as much as I wouldn¡¯t mind using up my last slot for this, I didn¡¯t have much of an idea on what to actually create. Besides, it¡¯s hardly feasible to learn from such a complex example. That¡¯s like being introduced to math through quantum math or whatever and expecting to understand basic addition. No, I¡¯ll need something simpler. Sadly, even without resorting to this, my other supernatural abilities don¡¯t seem much simpler. The actual conjuring of my monsters is at most just a smidge easier and my other abilities literally involve the absolute creation and destruction of matter. As much as I had no idea about anything magical, there is no universe in which those things can be considered basic. This just leaves me with one last option. An option that may not even work, since it¡¯s based on hoe people on Earth believed magical things can happen. Meditation. So, I¡¯m left with no other choice. Oh well, let¡¯s give it a shot. At least, as good of a shot as I can. I doubt I¡¯ll be able to remember much of how it¡¯s supposed to be done. Anyway, step one. Get into a comfortable position. I cannot move. And I¡¯m a floating crystal without any physical sensory input. Does that mean every position is comfortable or that none it and I can never do this? Step two, close your eyes. Once again, I am a crystal. No eyes to close. I suppose I could shut off my dungeon perception, but that¡¯d leave me completely deprived of any and all senses! Ah, whatever. I suppose I can give it a shot for a little while. I¡¯ll trust my guardians. And now, I have to clear my mind. Wait, is that right? I swear I heard way too many variants of this. Am I supposed to clear my mind, have an empty mind, examine each thought but let them go, or concentrate on just one thing fully? So many options. I suppose I¡¯ll just see what comes to me most naturally. Hmm, should I wait for the next step? The next thing I know I wake up, but not really. It¡¯s that state when you suddenly realize you¡¯ve been staring at nothing without thinking (but not sleeping) and startle awake. Except I don¡¯t fully wake and stay I a sort of halfway trance. I think that¡¯s what it¡¯s called. This story has been taken without authorization. Report any sightings. Just a simple state of mind. Any thoughts being just temporary additions that float by in a second. Simple, and peaceful. Just a deep breath in. And a deep breath out. In. And out. Over and over, repeating. ¡­ Wait. I¡¯m breathing? I¡¯m breathing! What? How? I don¡¯t breathe! I¡¯m made of goddamned crystal! How am I breathing! Hold on, no, don¡¯t panic. This is most likely what you wanted. Don¡¯t lose it now. Just focus on the sensation breathing. Examine it. Let¡¯s see what it actually is, because it¡¯s not breathing in the biological sense, that¡¯s for sure. And indeed, as time passes, I make my first observation. Mainly that it¡¯s not switching between in and out, but both are happening simultaneously. Also, interestingly enough, both of them are not exactly equal. At least not directly. As far as I can tell, whatever it is I¡¯m breathing in comes from all directions. But when breathing out I feel it leaving in only one direction. But, likely to compensate for the smaller space, out breaths are much more compact and powerful. Like a hurricane compared to a summer breeze. Ok, maybe not that much of a difference, but still. Is this magic? Or more likely the energy that fuels magic? So, mana? Qi? Something else? Or is that all just semantics and all are referring to the same thing? So many questions, but only so many ways to find the answers. But the first step at least should be simple. Slowly, I begin to once again expand my perception from my core. But unlike before, where I only had the same senses as a human would, there¡¯s something extra now. As my sight (and other senses) fill out the whole of my dungeon again I can also sense a little something extra there. It isn¡¯t anything visual, audible or perceptible to any of my other senses. After all, if it were, I would have noticed it much sooner. But as strange and arcane this feeling is a different quality of it pulls my attention to itself. Its quantity. The energies of the world are dense between my walls. And not only dense, they are also rushing down the tunnels, twisting back and forth to reach something. My core. I shift my attention back to myself. My true self that is, my core. Whatever this torrent of energy is, it¡¯s continuously entering inside through the facets of my crystalline core. Huh. Is that what I interpreted as breathing? It is then that I notice what I must have interpreted as breathing out. One of the facets or my crystal is not only letting this river in, it is also releasing a smaller, albeit more concentrated, stream of it. As far as I can tell, each moment only a small amount of it stays in the core. Never increasing. Always staying constant. Damn it, this just open up more question! Argh, fine! Let me see what is happening with the stuff that doesn¡¯t stay trapped in my core. Which is the vast majority of it. Not much, is the answer. At least, as far as I can see. All that happens is that it disperses throughout the whole dungeon. Actually, now that I see this, I think I can differentiate the huge river heading to my core from the passive energy that I released. Hmm, but the one that is mine appears to be constantly diminishing and being refuelled by what doesn¡¯t stay in my core. Strange. Anyway, one last thing. How do my abilities interact with all this? As I go through the motions and conjure up a toad (I really should name them at some point) I watch what happens with the energies. A small spark separates from the small amount that is constant in my core. That pool is almost instantly refilled by the giant stream of mana though. And yes, I¡¯ve decided to call it mana until proven otherwise. Then the spark passes through one of the facets of my gem. Strangely enough, it¡¯s a different one that the one the stream of unused mana leaves through. Then it just floats over to the space I wanted the monster to be. Where something happens, causing the nearby passive/claimed mana to lower for a second. And then there¡¯s a frog standing before me. Ok, it¡¯s getting rather clear to me that whatever is going on is way too delicate for me to perceive. I suppose I¡¯ll have to hone this new mana sense like many other things. Chapter Eight or The Seed Of A Plan As much as I like finally being able to perceive magic, there are more important things to worry about. Like the fact that I fucked up. Not in a major way, but that doesn¡¯t change that I did mess things up a bit. Mainly in my creation of liquid for my dungeon. Yes, it was smart to make the bacteria consume breathable air, and yes, it did lower the passive drain on my energies. However, I didn¡¯t completely think it through. And because of that, the decrease was much lower than it could have been. Indeed, I, the absolute moron that I am, forgot that my monsters also need air to breathe. Which just added to what I needed to supplement my creations. It is fortunate then that I already have a solution to this problem. And best of all, I¡¯ll be killing two birds with one stone. It¡¯s time to initiate the plan. The plan which made me pick the cane toad and kudzu vine. It is because both of these had a very special classification on Earth. A classification as an invasive species. Which I¡¯m going to use as a basis for some magical modification on them. It is time to break one of the fundamental rules of this world. Or at least, one that the gods impose on us dungeons. I¡¯m not too sure about the origins of this one. Could be either. Be that as it may, Dungeon Core and their dungeons cannot expand above ground. It is impossible. They just simply aren¡¯t able to do it. And where the dungeon can¡¯t go, its monsters can¡¯t go either. But what if they could? What if, due to magical shenanigans, a monster had the ability to, even if only temporarily, leave the dungeon? Would that simple fact allow the Dungeon Core to expand the core there too? Or, if not, could the monsters build building for the dungeon to expand into? After all, from a certain angle, a building is not above ground, but still part of it. Yes, that is my plan. I¡¯ll be the dungeon not limited by location. This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there. And, while I¡¯m at it, it¡¯ll also allow my plant to breathe the fresh air above ground. Perhaps they could even carry it down into the dungeon. Hmm, that¡¯d take a huge amount of modification. But it would also be interesting. And to be honest, I¡¯m getting really fascinated by the idea. An area above my dungeon covered by strange, bulbous plants. And when you follow their vines, you¡¯ll see them lead into a hole in the ground. My dungeon. And if you follow them even more, you¡¯ll eventually see these strange growths appear on them periodically as they descend deeper and deeper. And then if you observe for some time (though a delver would never have the opportunity), you¡¯d see that the frogs (and eventually other monsters) periodically come to those growth to suck in some fresh air. Yes, that is something I definitely want in my dungeon. Sure, maybe nobody¡¯ll ever realize what they¡¯re there for. They¡¯ll be too busy fighting, suffocating and dying of poison to notice. But I¡¯ll know, and that¡¯ll be enough. But that¡¯s for the far future. the far, far future. I first have to see whether it¡¯s even possible. Which is, once again, the crux of the problem. I have little to no idea how magic works. And a major change like this most certainly will necessitate at least some magic. Especially if I want to break this seemingly fundamental law. Perhaps the normal shifting and changing of the imprinted pattern is enough, but I doubt it. I don¡¯t just want to change how the monster functions or imbue some minor magical qualities. I want them to become proper magical creatures that¡¯ll carry my influence with them. Argh, why does this have to be so hard? Actually, maybe I do have an inkling of an idea on how to it after all! This may be just a basic starting point, but it¡¯s something. Every time I did something with magic before, which is mainly just creating my monsters and my core, one unifying thing about all of them was the massive amount of mana gathered at those times. Now, I¡¯m not sure if that¡¯s the fuel of magic, if it calls magic here or something else, but I might as well try to do it. Just one small issue with that. How do I manipulate mana? Because, as far as I can tell, any supernatural ability I¡¯ve shown so far is something baked into my existence and an actual manipulation of the mystical. Sure, I can conjure creature, but that¡¯s the equivalent of pressing a button. Even the original creation of a monster is more or less the same. just change the button for a switch. Destroying and creating matter also works in the same way. The only difference is that I hold the button pressed. And then I only have¡­ matter manipulation. Wait, that¡¯s it! Well, maybe not directly, but that¡¯s it! That¡¯s the one ability that feels much more natural than the others! Maybe I can actually perceive what happens while I¡¯m using it. And then replicate it. Hopefully. And you know what, my dungeon¡¯s been in need of a redesign anyway. Might as well combine research with redecorating. This straightforward passageway was too simple and easy anyway. Chapter Nine or Danger Nears I immediately got to work. This simple dungeon layout of a straight shot to my core would be no longer. I created offshoots, growing my dungeon ever wider. I blocked some passages off and created new, more complicated ones to replace them. And, at one point, even descended further underground to grow even more. *** As we once again approached the dungeon, I couldn¡¯t help myself to tremble a bit. It was more than a month ago that we first attempted do delve into its depth and suffered the first defeat of our adventuring career. And now we were back. Except this time, we came prepared. Well, it¡¯s not like that matters much. We won¡¯t be the main group to delve the dungeon. It took us a while to go through all the bureaucracy, but once we finally managed to give our report of a cursed dungeon sighting, everything moved much faster. A delving team with a decade¡¯s worth of experience was put to the task of examining (and if necessary, destroying) the dungeon. And our group was assigned as their guides, since we had ¡®experience¡¯ delving it. Not that that¡¯ll do us much good, judging by how much it changed just on our second attempt at delving. Still, willing or not, we were here now. By the source of more than one nightmare for our group. The dungeon we so lovingly nicknamed ¡®Verdant Hell¡¯ between the remaining five of us. Yes, it wasn¡¯t very verdant on our first delve, but the source of the nickname came more from our second one and why didn¡¯t even attempt it. Seriously, who¡¯s ever heard of a dungeon that can become completely overgrown by plants in just a single day?! The delving group we were assigned to, the Fierce Four as they called themselves, didn¡¯t care much for us. Sure, they acknowledged our existence, but other than that ignored us for the most part. Even now they just barely made the effort to notify us of their plans. We¡¯d go to sleep early tonight so as to be ready for tomorrow¡¯s dungeon delve. *** Hmm, I think I¡¯m beginning to get it. And also, why it¡¯s difficult to start out manipulating mana, but once one starts, it¡¯ll become instinctual relatively soon. I suppose it¡¯s not that dissimilar to muscle movement, even if what I¡¯m actually moving is completely different. So, why can¡¯t I just move mana by thinking about it real hard? The same reason why our bodies don¡¯t move like that. Well, ¡®our¡¯ isn¡¯t really applicable now, is it? Human bodies, then. The author''s content has been appropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon. Back on Earth, when I though about moving my arms or something, nothing happened. No matter how hard I willed it, at most a strange tingle would begin in that body part. It was also a cause for some morning panic every now and then, when I didn¡¯t realize why my body wasn¡¯t responding. And no, it wasn¡¯t sleep paralysis. Because when one wants to move their muscles, they just do. You don¡¯t have to think about it, you just do it. And the same goes for mana. It¡¯s basically the same as learning to use a, till now, unused muscle. Like flexing chest muscles or moving one¡¯s ears. Sure, some people can¡¯t do it due to genetics, but others simply don¡¯t have the experience of doing so to call upon. But how does one learn then, if you need to do it in the first place to begin? Well, for mana it¡¯s simple. I already have an innate ability to manipulate it, so I just have to internalize it and then emulate it. I¡¯m not sure how it works for muscles. Maybe a ¡®lucky¡¯ cramp awakens it? Or would electric shock work? No matter, I don¡¯t have a fleshy body anymore, so it doesn¡¯t matter. Suddenly, alarm bells ring in my mind. Intruders. I was wondering when another group of challengers would risk delving into my depths. A bit later than I expected, but that¡¯s fine. It just gave me more time to prepare. I now have a much larger dungeon to combat them. A size I¡¯d consider as three dungeon floors if I were stupid and made them separate like that. Instead, all three layers are interconnected at various points and the correct path loops up and down through each one multiple times. Anyway, the first adventurer to enter my dungeon is one I vaguely recognize. The rogue woman that was trailing first party to visit me. Not long after her, there enters the other sneak from that group. The ranger-ish man that had accompanied the wizard of the group. Speaking of the wizard, he¡¯s nowhere to be found. In fact, for a little while, no one else enters. (AN: I haven¡¯t outright said this yet, and the MC hasn¡¯t learned of it yet, but wizard is a very wrong title for Jared. I sort of implied it in the first POV switch, but that¡¯s like calling a babysitter a professor, but more. Jared is only a spellcaster right now. Just keep in mind that the MC doesn¡¯t know these things yet, so please don¡¯t consider it worldbuilding when the MC calls something the wrong thing. Mana technically also falls into this category.) After a while, both the ranger and the rogue return and leave. Huh, must have been scouting the area. Weird, they didn¡¯t do that before. I wonder what changed. Then, a completely new group of people enters. The people I¡¯m familiar with trailing behind them. Another thing to note is that the people who already invaded me earlier seem to be much more on edge that the other group. And make no mistake, they are definitely two distinct groups. Now I¡¯m really beginning to get interesting in what is going on. Did they take a job doing a guided tour for this new group? Why? Not only do they not have the experience to do so (they didn¡¯t complete my dungeon even when it was in its infancy), it also seems like that¡¯d pay much less than personally delving, right? Surely whatever they can scavenge from my monsters is worth more than doing a tour. Hmm, hopefully I¡¯ll find out soon. And it looks like they¡¯re just about to encounter the newly enhanced toads. Chapter Ten or Here They Come Turns out that my modifications to my guardians don¡¯t amount to much when faced with a vastly more experienced group of invaders. It took them barely any longer than it took the rookies. Hmm, I suppose that is a good thing. It does mean that I am able to keep up with the people of this world. Still, it¡¯s a bit disappointing to see all the effort you put into something not result in anything. And it¡¯s not even as if my toads alone could have managed that. No, it took the synergy of a swamp-like environment, camouflage and the enhancements to do it. And the ¡°it¡± in this case was basically just stalling. Seriously, they don¡¯t even look winded from that! Oh well, let¡¯s see how this delve progresses. And it looks like luck is on my side for once. They don¡¯t even attempt to test out the poison again. Do they seriously think something so important would have stayed constant when everything else changed? Perhaps they aren¡¯t as professional as I thought. Or maybe the previous party, the one that¡¯s now giving a ¡°guided tour¡±, was just extra stupid for testing it. I do wonder what is going on in their minds though. But with how silent they¡¯re being, not even knowing the language would help. Not that I do. Time goes on, and so does the adventurers¡¯ expedition. And it doesn¡¯t take long for them to arrive at the first fork in the road. Something my dungeon layout lacked the last time. ¡°What it this?¡± Ooh, looks like they¡¯re finally talking about something. Probably the fork and, if I¡¯m lucky, that¡¯ll manage to sow the seeds if dissent between the groups. ¡°We don¡¯t know. It wasn¡¯t here last time,¡± the ranger from group one says. Sadly, it would seem that that is the end of that conversation. Well, except for the disgruntled mutterings of the guy who asked. The leader of the new party, I suspect. Actually, the whole make up of the new group is a bit weird. They don¡¯t appear to have any variety between their members. Like, none at all. They¡¯re all carrying a sword along with some miscellaneous paraphernalia. Unauthorized tale usage: if you spot this story on Amazon, report the violation. Is that common here? To have just a whole adventuring group made out of melee combatants? If so, I truly am extremely lucky. I¡¯ll just need to focus on those with maybe a bit of preparation for the occasional diverse group. But I don¡¯t have enough info yet to base my whole dungeon design off of it. Not that I¡¯d even know how to design something specifically against melee users. Anyway, that¡¯s not important right now. How far did they progress in the meantime? Huh? How? Thet haven¡¯t even reached the next split in the tunnel! This needs further investigation. Surely it cannot be that a more powerful band of adventurers is slower than some newbies. Well, I suppose that said newbies could be slowing them down. Except that also doesn¡¯t make sense. The only way for them to slow them down would be if they were fighting. But they aren¡¯t. The swords group is clearing out all of the monsters. Let me see, let me see. They encounter a group of three toads. They pause for a second and then take them out. The whole affair doesn¡¯t take even a full minute. So far, everything checks out. Then, they set off down the tunnel again. And there¡¯s the problem! It would seem that I vastly underestimated how much of a hindrance walking thorough muddy ground is. Especially when you add cutting down vines and occasionally breaking of a stone pillar that¡¯s in the way. With all that combined, they are basically moving at a snail¡¯s pace. Well, that¡¯s just plain and simply good. For me, that is. I imagine they are getting quite annoyed with the whole situation. Oh well, I¡¯ll leave them to it. It¡¯s time to practice some magic. Not real magic. Not yet, at least. I¡¯m only starting with manipulating mana, after all. *** Alright, it¡¯s definitive. This dungeon is a manifestation of hell, sent out to torment us. The whole thing is basically unrecognizable from the last time we¡¯ve been here! And I¡¯m even counting the vines into that, even though we only saw those for a brief while before giving up. Ugh, giving up. For starters, the whole ground turned into some kind of weird mud. Somehow, the dungeon acquired water to mix with a bit of pulverized rock. And now every step requires at least twice as much effort. But no, that wasn¡¯t enough. Both the vines and the frogs, though mostly the frogs, changed their colouration and texture to blend in. They¡¯re almost perfectly camouflaging when still. Seriously, even our enhanced eyes can¡¯t always make them out when they don¡¯t move! It gave us quite the fright on the first encounter. After that, we knew to be on the lookout. Fortunately, even if we can¡¯t spot them, the Fierce Four somehow manage to do it. However, it was the last change that¡¯s the most terrifying. Right about the moment we encountered the first fork in the road, we began to tire more easily. It started off relatively mild, but quickly ramped up. The dungeon developed an aura, somehow. It must be so. How else could it impart such a debilitating effect over such a large area of effect? No matter what we tried or where we went, the lethargy persisted. The Fierce Four are acting as if they aren¡¯t affected, but we¡¯re beginning to spot sign of weariness on them. At least they aren¡¯t as affected as us, but that only points towards the source being an aura again. Seriously, what the hell is up with this dungeon?! No pun intended. Chapter Eleven or Revelations My mana manipulation practice is once again interrupted by my not-exactly-welcome guests. Thankfully this time, it¡¯s for a good reason. I think. One of them, I think it¡¯s the ranger from the newbie group, somehow managed to get himself killed. By the looks of it, one of my toads managed to sneak past them and ambush him. And while that may be important, being the first death in my dungeon and all that, what actually catches my attention is something much more interesting. As he lays there, dead, I feel a bit of mana exit his body. Mana mixed with something else. Something I can¡¯t quite perceive yet. And that mixture of energies wastes almost no time. Part of it, a very small part, gets absorbed by the toad that killed him. But a much bigger portion hitchhikes on the already present stream of world mana. Thanks to which it arrives at my core. Where, just like the rest of the mana, it gets absorbed by my crystal. By this point, basically all of my attention was focused on the happenings in my magical perception. And yet somehow, the next event pulled even more scrutiny to itself. Normally, when mana from that ever-present river flows into me, it almost immediately exits through one of the facets of my crystal (always the same one). But that¡¯s not what happens with the mixture of mana and something that came out of the dead ranger. Which is another point of difference. I was actually able to track the blob of energy the whole way here. At no point did it get mixed in with the rest of the stream. Anyway, instead of exiting my core, the mixture remains inside. For a little while, at least. Slowly, over quite the large period of time I¡¯d say, it also begins to leak. But even an hour later, when I¡¯m pretty sure it has stopped, the amount that entered doesn¡¯t match how much got ejected. Which is extra weird, because I can no longer detect it in my core. Royal Road is the home of this novel. Visit there to read the original and support the author. I double, even triple, check, but there¡¯s simply no trace of it. The only thing that could have changed is the density, or maybe how energized, of the mana in my core. But even that¡¯s such a negligible increase that it could very well be my imagination. This does, however, bring up an interesting idea that¡¯s been brewing in my mind for a while. What would happen if I filled my last available slot with a monster? I¡¯m still not one hundred percent sure, but I think that the reason three of my facets don¡¯t appear to let mana out is because my three monster patterns are bound to them. I have no idea how, or even why that¡¯d prevent mana from leaving, but that seems to be it. I mean, I am a tetrahedron. And I also have exactly four slots for guardians. And as if that¡¯s not enough, every time I created a new one something did enter my core. At least, that¡¯s what I thought was happening, but apparently it was instead merging with the walls of my core! All this to say, if I fill that one final slot, and all of the energy that mana river carriers stays trapped inside me, what will happen? Will I explode? I hope not. The mess of knowledge that was the only ¡°gift¡± from the gods is telling me to only use those monster slots in emergencies. With no reason as to why it would be bad to use all of them up. So, if I weren¡¯t one to distrust those bastards before, which I was, then I sure as hell am now! What are they hiding behind that false piece of advice? Yeah, I think I¡¯ll risk it. And luckily, I also already have an idea of what to make my final summon. It may not be big or flashy, but then again, none of my guardians are. It¡¯ll be a small little creature called an uropygi, also named the vinegaroon. Or perhaps even the whip scorpion. Not that it is a scorpion. This little critter is closer to a spider than a scorpion. Still, it¡¯s appearance is something in between. Sort of a spider with a scorpion version of lycanthropy, stopped midway through a transformation. Or vice versa. But none of that¡¯s important. What is important is one special ability of the vinegaroon. And unlike my other creatures, it¡¯s not poison. No, the whip scorpion can spray a weak acid from its tail. Which, among other things I plan to change, I hope to enhance to supernatural levels. That freeform nature of monster creation is truly the best ability I have. Now then, let¡¯s get to it. I sense the adventurers got a lot closer in the meantime. Actually, I may want to keep them here just in case. Yes, let me just reseed the tunnels they walked thorough already with new monsters. And while I¡¯m at it, I¡¯ll also change the layout a bit. Now the way back is changed and they are, hopefully, trapped. If that first death was any indication, whatever extra thing is mixed into their mana is super useful for me. I wonder how much more powerful of an enhancement it¡¯ll give me if it can¡¯t escape my core. Oh yes, I feel like a huge power-up is on the horizon. Well then, let me not delay. I better summon this scorpion-spider. Chapter Twelve or Desparation By now I barely even have to focus on the process of selecting my guardian monster. I simply initiate it and it¡¯s go time. A vast quantity of mana gathers in my core chamber in preparation for the upcoming magic. And this time, I¡¯m watching it. Because if everything goes according to plan, this won¡¯t be the last time I do some magic. And if everything goes really well, it won¡¯t even have to be this restricted magic that only allows me to do one thing. Anyway. As soon as the blob of mana reaches a sufficient size and/or density (it¡¯s difficult to tell with this supernatural stuff), a pulse of some kind reverberates through it. And then the mana begins to compress to one spot where it disappears. Huh, that¡¯s not exactly what I expected. But observation time is over, I need to actually create this vinegaroon. Because as interesting a creature as it is, the mundane version would be less than useful to me. So, I go with the usual alterations. Bigger, but not as extreme as with the toad. More greenish colouration to blend in with the vines. Ables to sustain itself on the poison ¡°water¡±. And so on. Most importantly, I make sure that the acid is much more potent. Enough to react pretty much immediately when in contact with skin. At least for regular humans, not sure how that¡¯ll interact with adventurers. And then, just like every other time, it¡¯s done. Before me stand a weird arachnid that¡¯s not really a scorpion and only kind of a spider. But that¡¯s not even the half of it. The creation of this whip scorpion was only the means. Now comes the end. The last remaining speck mana that hadn¡¯t been consumed in the creation of the vineragoon darts towards me. Where it merges with the last unaltered facet of my crystal core. The changes are immediate. The stream of mana exiting me as if water from a leaky faucet just simply stops. That, however, doesn¡¯t mean the river stops going inside. Stolen story; please report. So, what happens when there¡¯s input, but no output? Well, one option is that the environment bursts. Thankfully, that doesn¡¯t happen. Instead, the mana gets denser and denser, not too dissimilarly to how it did so just a minute ago. Except that it doesn¡¯t stop. There¡¯s no pulse to pull it all into one point, there¡¯s nothing to get rid of it. And while all that is happening inside my core, outside of it, similar changes happen. But inverse. The passive mana of my dungeon starts to slowly dip, reducing in amount. Ah, now I get it. All the sustenance of my creatures that they don¡¯t get the normal way, they pull from the mana I release into the dungeon. The mana that was previously exiting my core. And now that that leak is fixed, there¡¯s nothing to refuel it. Shit, how much time do I have? No idea. I need more mana. I just need more mana in my dungeon. Oh, damn it damn it damn it. Damn it! Just don¡¯t panic and we can figure this out. But I am panicking! Damn it, let¡¯s just try what I wanted to try in the first place. Yea, that¡¯ll even reduce the number of monsters I have to keep alive. I order every single one of my guardians to attack the intruders. Every toad, whether the ones in front of the group or the ones I respawned behind them. The single vinegaroon still in my core room. Hell, even all of the vines, though I doubt they¡¯ll do much. Not even the bacteria producing the ¡°water¡± of my dungeon are spared of the order. I need everyone to do this. Hopefully, whatever that extra thing is in the adventurers¡¯ mana will help me. And if not, I¡¯ll at least have a grace period without intruders to figure everything out. Because right now, I¡¯m basically cut off from interacting with the world. *** No. No no no no! NO! What¡¯s happening? As if Matt dying was bad enough already, all of the dungeon monsters suddenly went berserk not too long after that! And as if even that wasn¡¯t bad enough, they began to appear from behind us too! The only good thing is now we know for sure this is a cursed dungeon. Who¡¯s ever heard of monsters reappearing behind you? At least the toads have abandoned the little strategy they employed before now. Though even that¡¯s not exactly a good thing, as now they¡¯re hurling themselves at us. That¡¯s arguably tougher to deal with than the shooting tongues. And there¡¯s no end to them. The Fierce Four are still taking the brunt of it, but we were already forced to help and at this point it won¡¯t be long before we have to go all out. The tiredness aura of the dungeon certainly doesn¡¯t help with that. Something flies towards me and, expecting another frog, I move my shield to deflect it. All I hear is a wet splat. And then, sizzling. A quick look through my teammates reveals a new monster. Some kind of insect or something. Then, I look at my shield. Which immediately throw away. Fuck! It¡¯s an acid thrower. ¡°Watch out!¡± I yell, ¡°acid thrower!¡± The battle rages on, but it¡¯s not exactly looking good. And then, in a critical error, I step on uneven ground and tumble. Huh? I was sure there was solid ground there before. Chapter Thirteen or Pierce Beyond The Veil In the end, it turns out I needn¡¯t have worried. While it wasn¡¯t an easy victory, and more on the extreme side of a pyrrhic victory, I still managed to overwhelm the adventurers. Besides, for a dungeon that can easily replace its monsters, even a pyrrhic victory is just a victory. Turns out that numbers still mean something, even when faced by a much stronger force. Like the new group of what I called professional adventurers was. Though they did manage to last twice as long compared to the other group. But that¡¯s all in the past. The very recent past. In fact, it just happened. Now I¡¯m just watching as their corpses lie there, waiting for the special mana to appear. And I don¡¯t have to wait long. It starts with the first person from group one. After that, the rest of that group follows. Interestingly enough, the mana from the pros takes longer to appear than I¡¯d expect. It doesn¡¯t take twice as long (like how long they fought for), but a bit more than that. Be that as it may, all of the blobs of mana head out on the not-so-long journey towards my core. My dungeon is in shambles. The ambient mana level has already dropped by half. Almost all of my toads are dead and the one vingeraoon is long gone. Only the vines and bacteria survived without any casualties. Just in case this gamble on the special mana doesn¡¯t work out, I give a command to the few remaining toads to feed on vines. That should give me more time in case this doesn¡¯t work. Speaking of, said mana blobs are just now arriving at my core. One by one, they enter the already overfilled core. And immediately I can tell they do in fact enhance my mana. But unlike the usual stream of mana, which simply increases the proverbial density of the mana, the specialized mana from invaders takes a different direction. Almost literally. Help support creative writers by finding and reading their stories on the original site. The feeling isn¡¯t that different from a rise in density, but at the same time the two feel like night and day. Maybe a better descriptor would be the mana feeling more energized. But other than that, nothing more changes. All of the mana from the stream keeps getting trapped in my core. And the mana of my dungeon keeps decreasing, consumed by the guardians. It just keeps on and on, building up inside of me. It¡¯s long past the amount summoned for the creation of a monster, and yet it continues to go up. And all the while I have this massive storage of mana literally inside of me, I can¡¯t help but wish for more. Not more to be trapped withing me, but for my dungeon. I need more mana to go to my dungeon, otherwise it¡¯ll be completely mana starved and my creations will die. I just need more mana. ¡­ A pulse. Beginning nowhere in particular, the pulse expands through all the mana stored in my core. And then¡­ movement. The entirety of the mana, by now resembling more a star than a nebulous cloud, moves towards the centre of my core. I can¡¯t believe this. Is this¡­ magic? Did manage to do it after all, or is this innate like my other abilities? I have no time to think about that, as the process diverges from what I observed previously. The converging mana doesn¡¯t disappear once it gets to the centre like it did previously. No, it just stays there, condensing into one single ball even denser than how it was previously. More and more, the mana compresses into that single spot of seemingly infinite energy. Until something breaks. Not my core. In fact, it¡¯s nothing I can perceive at all. None of that changes the fact that something gets ripped apart, just absolutely shredded. That infinitely dense point of mana pierces through an invisible veil, a direction in space previously unknown, and vanishes. But in its place is something much greater. In the next moment, a couple of things happen pretty much all at once. From the point, where all the mana congregated and then vanished from, a new torrent of mana surges forth, as if out of nothing. The facets of my crystal core become indistinct, as if I didn¡¯t have any specific shape. To the best of my ability, I can only describe the core as a formless blob. And third, which is the strangest and yet likely the most important of all, a simple line of text appears in my mind along with a background of deep blue, all contained in a neat rectangle. Conscious entity detected¡­ Permanent aether portal detected¡­ Link to System? Y/N (System Note: please) No way. Absolutely no way! The System is real after all!? This changes everything! Hold on, slow down for a second. Why is it begging me to accept it? Actually, why didn¡¯t I have access to it from the very beginning? Isn¡¯t the System supposed to be something that is designed to help everyone grow? Something doesn¡¯t add up here. And my instinct is telling me that this System may very well have the answers. Chapter Fourteen or The System There¡¯s no use hesitating here. Although I had no idea this would be the reward, there¡¯s no point in throwing away the thing I¡¯d been pursuing this whole time. Some answers, hopefully. Yes, I¡¯d like to link to the System. Initializing user interface¡­ Upgrading authority level¡­ Scanning entity¡­ ¡­ System initialized Here¡¯s your initial System status: Name: --- Dungeon name: Verdant Hell (temporary) Age: 0 Species: Mystic phenomenon Subspecies: Dungeon Core Body: 10¡­ Soul: 10¡­ Skills: ¡­ Traits: ¡­ Huh, is that it? Wait, no. A couple of those seem to have drop down menus. Leftover aether portal opening energy detected¡­ Searching for outlets¡­ Oh, what now? Wait, this seems important. Hmm, would this energy left over from the portal opening have hurt me if I hadn¡¯t accepted the System? One-way divine bond found. Annul? Y/N Oh, those fuckers! I should have known they¡¯d try something like this. Who knows what that even does. Yea, destroy that garbage please. ¡­ Modify Monster patterns to increase synchronicity? Y/N Really? There¡¯s still more of that energy even after destroying a literal divine bond? Anyway, yes. I can always use an upgrade to my creatures. Though¡­ does synchronicity mean they¡¯ll be more complementary to each other or something else? I¡¯d think the former, but who knows. ¡­ Provide extra assistance in advancement to next Tier? Y/N Okay, this is getting ridiculous now. How much energy did just the opening of that so called aether portal produce? And that¡¯s not even counting the mana that¡¯s pouring from it since it opened. Then again, that¡¯s mana and not this mystery energy the System mentioned. All that aside, advancement? Tier? Is that something like levels in this System? Or maybe the equivalent of a Class evolution? No idea, but the very fact that it¡¯s offering to assist me makes me think it¡¯ll be dangerous. Or, at the very least, it¡¯ll get me a better advancement, whatever that means. Ugh, I never liked going into all the nitty-gritty of min-maxing. Sure, why the hell not, give me some assistance. Suddenly, something reaches out from beyond the aether portal (at the centre of my core) and grabs the undulating walls of my shapeless core. Oh, I¡¯d forgotten about that. The force, or is it energy? I¡¯m not sure, but it seems to have a very faint trace of mana as a part of it. It grabs what remains of the walls of my core and twists it. Unauthorized usage: this narrative is on Amazon without the author''s consent. Report any sightings. Language has no proper descriptor for these things, supernatural as they are, but the shapeless blob that is my core untwists, like a knot coming apart, gaining more and more definition. And soon enough, my core once again assumes a shape you¡¯d expect from standard geometry. Except it¡¯s no longer a pyramid, but a cube. Or hexahedron, if we¡¯re being fancy. The best thing about having a cube shaped core is that while four of the walls still have monster patters in them, the other two don¡¯t. Yes, my dungeon is once again being fed by a steady stream of mana. Two streams of mana, to be exact. One, the old reliable, runs through my whole dungeon and (presumably) collects mana from the outside world. The other, new, one appears right in my core from the portal to the aether. Which I still don¡¯t know what that is. But before that, the System wants to tell me something. Advancement successful. As a Tier 2 Dungeon Core you now have 6 Guardian slots. That¡¯s nice, but that¡¯s not the main thing it wanted my attention for. You have now become fully integrated into the System. Please check your full System status. Further contact imminent. Well, that¡¯s a bit ominous. Anyway, I can finally do the thing I¡¯d dreaming of my whole life. Status! Name: --- Dungeon name: Verdant Hell (temporary) Age: 0 Species: Mystic phenomenon Subspecies: Dungeon Core 4/6 Body: 20¡­ Soul: 20¡­ Skills: ¡­ Traits: ¡­ Perks: ¡­ Right, not much change at first glance. Just the addition of the 4/6 next my subspecies and a new dropdown menu. Both of which raise questions. Why is Dungeon Core a subspecies? And what even is a Mystic phenomenon? And similarly, how are Perks different from Traits? Well, there¡¯s only one way to find out. And subspecies doesn¡¯t appear to be expandable, might as well check my Perks. Perks: [System Preservation] You are one of the last few entities with access to the System. Help preserve and expand it, and gain benefits. Increases authority level of user. That¡¯s¡­ a rather ominous sounding one. Is this why the System begged me to accept it? Actually, why was it even in that space, the aether? There¡¯s something afoot here, but it can wait until I check the rest of my status. Traits: [Aether Portal] Your very being serves as a portal to the aether. Reach out and grasp almost any energy you need. Shape and transform this connection to suit your needs. [Partial Soul-Body Unity] Your existence is a partial fusion of your body and soul into one entity. Not quite there to consider both as one, but enough for one to benefit from the other. [Immobile] Due to your very nature, you cannot move. But reality has a way of balancing things, enhancing your ability to endure in compensation. That¡¯s considerably more. And also, much better than the Perks. Especially since I don¡¯t actually know what an increase in my authority level grants me. Well, except for the last one. I guess it¡¯s nice to be harder to destroy, but moving is also nice. Maybe that¡¯s why Dungeon Core became basically living fortresses. Or maybe they gave up mobility to complement being a fortress? Anyway, let¡¯s check out my skills. Skills: ¡­ Are you serious!? No Skills! This is a disgrace! How come I have no Skills? No, seriously. How? At the very least I would have expected some of the innate dungeon abilities to be here. But noooo, apparently not. Whatever, I¡¯ll figure it out later. It¡¯s time to see what this body and soul thing is about. I¡¯d expect more stats. And a mind stat too. Usually, in the stories I read, soul would even be a hidden stat, so I wonder why it¡¯s just there. Body: 20 > Give ¡­ > Take 40¡­ Alright, this is extra unusual. Let me just expand it more, to confirm my theory. Body: 20 > Give -> Force ¡­ -> Fidelity ¡­ -> Recovery ¡­ > Take 40 -> Durability 70 ¡­ -> Recovery 10 ¡­ Yeah, I see how it is. And a quick check in the soul stats confirms it. They are more or less the same, with the only difference being soul doesn¡¯t have the give section crossed out. So apparently, I can have some pretty specific stats. And the overall is calculated on the average of all the sub-stats it contains. Honestly, a pretty genius solution to the whole ¡°what does x points in strength actually mean?¡± problem. Though I¡¯m still not sure what says how deep I¡¯m allowed to go. There are obviously more dropdown menus, but they¡¯re greyed out for now. I can¡¯t even look at it. Oh well, it¡¯s not as if I could do much with this anyway. I¡¯ll worry about it when I have some points to assign. Alright, it¡¯s time to see what I can do now that I have the support of the System.