《The Immortal Dungeon》 Prologue: I WAS CHEATED To False Immortal Kevin, this was officially the worst decision in his few millennium years old life. Even above the one where he stole Dragon Eggs, or where he tried finding the Sea Sect Holy Maiden¡¯s bust size. Noooo, the bust size was simply a bonus. It was stealing of their cultivation manuals that pissed them¡­maybe. Honestly, it wasn¡¯t even his fault in most cases. After failing his tribulation during ascension he spent most of his life searching for a way to ascend.It was common knowledge that False Immortals could never become True Immortals. But his stubbornness and faith kept him going. It was impossible that through eons no one had ever Broken through or at least researched on this subject. Thus his quest started. Later on, he began breaking into famous sect depositories to learn. In between, he became famous as The Fool Scholar, The Scholar Robber, The Bastard Thief, The Most Wanted Criminal etcetera, although he still claimed ¡®IT WASN¡¯T HIS FAULT!!!¡¯. Some minor accidents like Dragon Egg and Sea Sect dotted his colorful history. The most recent being when the Crystal Mine Planet under Builder Sect collided with the Centauris Star. But seriously who dotted the planet with so many traps and arrays? It wasn¡¯t his mistake that he triggered the self-destruct sequence while leaving with their library. Anyway, back to the topic. So here he stood after dealing with a dragon? He still wasn¡¯t sure that giant lizard was a dragon. It looked more like an overgrown lizard with bat wings rather than the typical snake face body. But yeah, here he stood after slaying a dragon, as a DRAGON SLAYER! It didn¡¯t matter that his face was now covered with ash, soot, and grime or that his pony was still smoldering at the ends. His Spider Silk clothes were now more like Spider Silk Beggar Rags, with numerous cuts and tears and even more burn marks. His weapons were either broken, melted, or lost. His pills were down to his last few bottles of rather debatable quality. His talismans were long since over, most probably around floor 70. Or was it 80? Spirit crystals were now an extinct item in his space ring. He had either been fighting or running ever since he entered this Cultivation Cave a century ago from that space crack. Usually space crack signified good luck as they were the most recognizable as an entrance to other dimensions. It was to be noted, that finding stable spatial cracks in Immortal Realm was as impossible as finding a playboy loving unicorn. The only other alternative is when the crack itself is from another dimension and acting as an entrance in this one. So basically another dimension, connected to the Immortal Realm via space links or space nodes. In Kevin''s terminology, " Eh, a big shit realm with money to be stolen, manuals to be learned and spirit herbs to be devoured, which is not controlled by those motherfucking money grubber sects." Without delay, he had jumped in so he could have more time to plunder observe and learn from whatever whoever left here. And from there started the century-long struggle to stay alive. Hundered Floors of Pure Hell with no Qi to absorb and a weird energy which didn¡¯t help. Each Floor a world in itself, with its own peculiarities, creatures, and environments. The starting few floors were like a walk in the park. Basic pitfall traps and weird bugs and snakes attacking you. Funny enough, they couldn¡¯t even break through the clothing. He did wonder with what motives did senior make these creatures protect his cave. Even a Qi Condensation realm cultivator could easily deal with them. And there he jinxed it. Each floor got stronger and weirder. Green Humanoids with wrinkly faces and no manners. Even their language went something like, ¡° Grunt Grunt Grunt Grunt¡­Grrrruuuuunntttt Grunnnnt.¡± Then Dog-faced Humanoids with a childlike intelligence, followed by pig face and monkey face. Did Senior cultivate some odd Dao which require him to make animal-human hybrids? The environment changed from Caves to Jungles to Desert to Underwater - he had long lost count of the ever-changing surroundings. It even had a maze, which was even above the Builder Sects Famous Labyrinth. Traps changed from Pitfalls to Acid Attacks, teleportation, Arrows, Blades, Illusions etc. Was Senior some long lost ancestor of Builder Sect? Only they had the weird fetish of creating such bastard traps. This all further confirmed his belief that this mansion or cave definitely belonged to some extremely powerful senior. Creation of your own worlds? Creations of your own sentient species? All screamed GOD! And finally a hundred floors and several thousand life and death situations later, and after the death of a stupid lizard later, here he stood in front of the Door. A beautiful Golden Door with numerous runes of an Alien Language, yes, ¡®Alien Language¡¯. He had tried researching and failed. The Language was not even vaguely related to The Divine Realm¡¯s Common Language or otherwise called as The Ancestor of all languages. His gut instinct screamed, ¡° THIS WAS IT!¡± The door despite its heavy appearance was as light as feather. A gentle push was all it needed to swing open.Love what you''re reading? Discover and support the author on the platform they originally published on. A hundred meters away stood his goal. A large hectohedron crystal was floating on an extremely beautiful and ornately carved pedestal within a completely pitch black room, which his Immortal Sense showed empty. ¡° Haha, that must be the ¡® Core.¡¯ ¡° he exclaimed while his eyes admired the beautiful crystal, which glowed with dim flickering rainbow colors as if it was dying. Immortal Sense showed nothing where the object floated, so he could only appreciate it through mortal means. Now he just needed to drop his blood on it to refine it and finally become the master of this Divine Mansion. Hundered floors of traps and monsters would protect him from even True Golden Immortals. Maybe he would also be able to inherit the Owner¡¯s Inheritance? He started walking towards it while his heart beat at a frantic pace. Few steps and years of efforts would end successfully. ¡°STOP!!!¡± A loud and ancient voice rumbled in his head. ¡® SOUL ATTACK!¡¯ his instincts screamed, as he rapidly created a soul barrier around his soul. A pitch black sword, which he had got from the dungeon suddenly appeared in his hands. The weapons were extremely weird as they rejected qi and solely absorbed the caves energy. So a Demon Creature with soul attack? His mind rapidly filtered through ways to attack and defend. ¡°SHOW YOURSELF!¡± He screamed, hoping that the monster would at least fight like a man, instead of hiding. ¡°I am in front of you.¡± The voice once again rumbled in his head. Kevin¡¯s face blanched. His barrier had no effect. Cursing the Master of this mansion once again for creating such stupid creatures, he looked in front. Except for the crystal, there was nothing. ¡° The Crystal?¡± he asked in an unsure voice. ¡° Yes. I am The Dungeon Core.¡± Once again the voice rumbled. Was the crystal sentient? No! Most probably it was a spirit left behind. But Dungeon Core was definitely a weird name. ¡° Senior Dungeon Core. The junior is Kevin Elevenestra from the Immortal World. May I know which senior does this mansion belong to?¡± ¡° What Mansion? THIS IS A DUNGEON. AND WHO DO YOU THINK A DUNGEON BELONGS TO OTHER THAN A DUNGEON CORE? IGNORANT MORTAL!¡± Calling a Mansion or Cultivation cave a dungeon? Aren¡¯t Dungeons some sort of Jail? Has this Spirit gone crazy after years of loneliness? Or maybe this really IS a Dungeon! So are those creatures Prisoners? So the Senior didn¡¯t create them? Numerous thoughts flitted through his mind as he tried to make sense of it. Suddenly the room went into darkness. The lights on the crystal were gone. ¡° Senior?!?¡± He anxiously asked, while a glowing crystal popped out of nowhere and floated in front of him, brightening the pitch black room. He moved towards the crystal and tried pushing it. Despite being the size of a fist it was extremely heavy. It was way heavier than a planet he had once tried pushing. The Crystal flickered once again, but It was dimmer than before. ¡° Ughh¡­I am almost dead¡­ ¡° the crystal mumbled if they could mumble.Suddenly Kevin felt a pressure descend on him as the crystal once again boomed. ¡° LISTEN, BOY, YOU ONLY HAVE FEW YEARS TO LIVE. I CAN GRANT YOU TRUE IMMORTALITY ON ONE CONDITION OF MINE. DO YOU ACCEPT?!?¡± ¡° True Im-Im-Immortalityyy?¡± Kevin questioned stutteringly. For how long had he been looking for a way to true immortality, and here it was being offered to him. He couldn¡¯t believe it. All his misgivings were swept away. Even the question of how did the crystal knew he was almost dying. ¡° YES! YOU WILL LIVE FOREVER AND GAIN POWER FAR FROM WHAT YOU CAN IMAGINE. POWER WORTHY OF GODS! POWER TO CREATE WORLDS! POWER TO DESTROY THEM! POWER TO DO ANYTHING YOU WANT! DO YOU ACCEPT THE DEAL?¡± The crystal asked. The anxiousness behind it was completely ignored by Kevin. Kevin really wanted to accept it. The deal was sweet. But he wasn¡¯t an idiot.The condition requested was an unknown here. ¡° What¡¯s the condition?¡± ¡° You just have to kill a few people namely Illiasa and Ragul.¡± The crystal answered back. Seeing hesitation crossing on Kevin¡¯s face, the crystal further continued, ¡° Don¡¯t worry, they are just weak Divines. Once you ascend to divinity, kill them. With your power, it will be a piece of cake.¡± Kevin was truly hesitant. Killing a stranger about whom you knew nothing was simply like hitting a Giant¡¯s Feet. But hearing further he almost accepted. ¡° Why doesn¡¯t Senior kill them himself?¡± Kevin asked, still believing that the Dungeon Core was either a spirit or Senior¡¯s will. ¡° With Senior¡¯s power, it should have been a piece of cake ?¡± ¡°I AM A DUNGEON CORE YOU IDIOT! I CANT MOVE! SO HOW IN THE WORLD DO YOU EXPECT ME TO KILL THEM?!? SHOULD I THROW A GOBLIN AT THEM? IDIOT!¡± The crystal replied angrily, wondering how can a human be so stupid. It was common knowledge that Dungeon Cores couldn¡¯t move. Kevin was once again confused. What Dungeon Core? Was it a title? And how was he supposed to know that the senior couldn¡¯t move? And what is a Goblin? Some type of attack technique? Or maybe some weapon? Most probably an attack technique, he concluded. But how was throwing an attack skill idiotic? The Senior definitely was going loony. ¡° Senior..¡± Kevin started hesitantly, but he was interrupted by the Crystal. ¡° LISTEN, BOY, I ONLY HAVE FEW MINUTES TO LIVE. SO YES OR NO?¡± Taking a deep breath Kevin answered ¡° Yes.¡± There was nothing to think about when two choices were offered. All his misgivings had long been forgotten or ignored ¡° GOOD! I @#$$%%%^^ Dungeon Core of @#$%%^^ Dungeon, hereby pass my responsibilities and duties to Kevin Elvensetra. In return, he swears to kill Illiasa, The God Of Humans and Ragul, The God Of Light. Failure to do so will result in complete soul annihilation. May this contract be watched and protected by heavens!¡± Wait for a second! Passing of duties? What responsibility? And how did these two turn into powerful gods? Kevin looked at the crystal flabbergasted. Only one thought remained in his mind. HE WAS CHEATED! before a strong power swept through him, making him lose consciousness. Meanwhile, the crystal dimmed and turned into dust. Slowly the dungeon collapsed while the dimensions folded onto themselves. In the Immortal Realm, the vanishing of Kevin was yet another small footnote in its massive history. His only memory remaining with few, who would remember a foolish Scholar and his quest to gain True Immortality. Of course, the sects celebrated his vanishing with a large party, but nevertheless, it was not an important thing to mention
Sup? How was the prologue? The story will have some xianxia elements, and i will be posting a glossary soon. Th etsory has been copy pasted from word, so some errors might have popped up.I have tried editing through Grammarly, so it should be readable. Any mistakes and error can be posted in the comment section or PM me, to save me some face. Yup just PM me. Bye. Glossary of Common Xianxia Terms Dao (µÀ d¨¤o) ¨C the origin and source of all things. It can be translated in many different ways, including The Way / Road / Path / Method. According to Daoism, it is the absolute principle underlying the universe, combining within itself the principles of Yin and Yang and signifying the way, or code of behavior, that is in harmony with the natural order. In these novels, characters often try to gain insights into the Dao, which can give them supernatural powers or even control over aspects of the natural world. Yin & Yang (ÒõÑô y¨©ny¨¢ng) ¨C the duality present in all aspects of the universe. For instance: Yin is Female / Soft / Death / Dark / the Moon, while Yang is Male / Hard / Life / Light / the Sun ¨C the comparisons are endless. Yin & Yang describe how opposite or contrary forces are actually complementary, interconnected, and interdependent in the natural world, and how they mutually give rise to each other. Five Elements (ÎåÐÐ w¨³x¨ªng) ¨C Wood (ľ m¨´), Fire(»ð hu¨¯), Earth (ÍÁ t¨³), Metal (½ð j¨©n), & Water (Ë® shu¨«). The fundamental elements which compose everything in the universe. They have a detailed cyclic relationship, and each of them have several symbolic meanings. Somewhat analogous to the Western Four Elements. Qi (Æø) ¨C the vital energy which exists in all things. The cultivation of Qi is a major theme in Wuxia, Xianxia & Xuanhuan novels. Cultivation World (ÐÞÕæ½ç xi¨±zh¨¥n ji¨¨) ¨C not literally a separate world, but rather refers to the broad community of cultivators and their sects/schools/clans/etc¡­ Analogous to the Wulin of martial artists. Cultivator (ÐÞÕß xi¨±zh¨§) (ÐÞÊ¿ xi¨±sh¨¬) (ÐÞÏÉÕß xi¨±xi¨¡nzh¨§) ¨C a person who trains in martial & mystical arts, generally in order to become powerful and increase their longevity. Meditation and the cultivation of Qi are common practices among cultivators. Sect (×Ú z¨­ng) (ÅÉ p¨¤i) ¨C an organization dedicated to the practice of cultivation and/or martial arts. Typically led by a Sect Leader (ÕÆÃÅ) or Patriarch (ÀÏ×æ). With the help of Sect Elders (ÀÏ), they instruct Disciples (µÜ×Ó) in the proper methods of cultivation or training in the martial arts styles of the Sect. The Disciples live in the Sect, which provides for their daily needs. There is practically always a strict hierarchy amongst members of a Sect, and respect for the elder generations is demanded. School (ÃÅ m¨¦n) ¨C a school of cultivation or martial arts. Doesn¡¯t differ much from a Sect. Clan (¼Ò ji¨¡) ¨C an extended family related by blood, sharing a surname. They often pass down heirlooms from generation to generation along with secret cultivation methods & martial arts styles which were developed by the clan¡¯s ancestors. They tend to guard these jealously from outsiders. Association (°ï b¨¡ng) ¨C also translated as a Union, Gang, Clan, or Brotherhood. A loose organization of people. The members may have something in common, like sharing a particular way of life, or they may simply be working together towards a mutually beneficial goal. Not religious in nature. Society (•þ hu¨¬) ¨C a secret society. Similar to Associations for the most part, but cloaked in secrecy and deeply involved in rituals/traditions. Sometimes religious or cult-like in nature. Escort Agency (ïÚ¾Ö bi¨¡oj¨²) ¨C a protection agency for hire. Escorts (ïÚÈË / ïÚʦ / ïÚ¿Í) typically work as bodyguards for travelers and merchant caravans. Commonly seen in Wuxia novels.

Beings & Creatures

Gods (Éñ sh¨¦n) ¨C supernatural beings of tremendous power. In Xuanhuan novels, it¡¯s often possible to attain some form of godhood through cultivation. Immortals (ÏÉ xi¨¡n) ¨C beings who ascended to Immortality through Daoist cultivation practices. They have magical powers, can fly freely through the air, and have a close connection to the Dao and the natural world. There are several types of Daoist Immortals, such as the Celestial Immortals (ÌìÏÉ) and Earth Immortals (µØÏÉ) Saints (Ê¥ sh¨¨ng) ¨C similar to, but distinct from Immortals. They don¡¯t have a strong relation to Daoism, and they may not necessarily have eternal life. But other than that, they typically also have a close connection to the natural world and similar magical powers achieved through cultivation. Very generally speaking, Saints appear more often in Xuanhuan novels while Immortals appear more often in Xianxia novels. Magical Beasts (ħÊÞ m¨®sh¨°u) ¨C animals capable of cultivation. Some are innately magical and simply grow stronger over time, while others must actively practice a cultivation method. They tend to be much more intelligent than mundane animals, and some are capable of speaking in human languages. Magical Beasts which have reached a high stage of cultivation may even be able to take on a human form. Demons (Ñý y¨¡o) ¨C sometimes left untranslated as ¡°Yao¡± or alternatively translated as Monsters. Born when an animal, plant, or even an inanimate object absorbs spiritual energy over a long period of time and then gains spiritual awareness. Not inherently evil, although many have antagonistic relationships with humans. Devils (ħ m¨®) ¨C sometimes left untranslated as ¡°Mo¡± or alternatively translated as Fiends. Evil spirits/creatures of remarkable power and cruelty. Similar to the demons and devils of Western mythology. In some novels, evil cultivators emulate them by practicing devilish cultivation methods and committing atrocities in their pursuit of power. Ghosts (¹í gu¨«) ¨C evil spirits or the spirits of the deceased. Ghosts are strongly Yin in nature.

Martial Arts Terms

Martial Arts (Î书 w¨³g¨­ng) ¨C fighting styles & techniques. Also includes physical exercises, methods of mental discipline, and more. Chinese martial arts are commonly referred to as Kung Fu(¹¦·ò) or Wushu (ÎäÊõ). Internal Energy (ÄÚÁ¦ n¨¨il¨¬) (ƒÈ¾¢ n¨¨ij¨¬n) ¨C also called Inner Energy, Internal Strength, Internal Power, or Internal Force. The cultivated energy within a martial artist¡¯s body. Utilizing it, a martial artist can accomplish superhuman feats of speed, agility, strength, endurance, etc¡­ It can even be used to heal wounds and nullify poisons. Lightness Skill (ÇṦ q¨©ngg¨­ng) ¨C often left untranslated as ¡°Qinggong¡±. The ability to lighten the body and move with great agility & swiftness. At high proficiency, practitioners of this skill can run across water, leap to the top of trees, or even glide through the air. Striking the Meridians / Acupoints (µãÂö di¨£nm¨¤i) (µãѨ di¨£nxu¨¦) ¨C often left untranslated as ¡°Dianmai¡± and ¡°Dianxue¡±. Also known as ¡°Hitting / Sealing Pressure Points¡°. Fighting techniques which target the opponent¡¯s meridians and acupoints in order to kill, cripple, immobilize, or control the opponent.

Cultivation Terms

Cultivation (ÐÞÁ¶ xi¨±li¨¤n) (ÐÞÕæ xi¨±zh¨¥n) (ÐÞÐÐ xi¨±x¨ªng) (ÐÞÏÉ xi¨±xi¨¡n) ¨C the process of improving health, increasing longevity, and growing powerful. This is accomplished by cultivating Qi and training in martial & mystical arts. In many of these novels, the ultimate goal of cultivation is to become an Immortal or attain godhood. Cultivation Method (¹¦·¨ g¨­ngf¨£) (ÐÄ·¨ x¨©nf¨£) ¨C a mystical art or collection of techniques which cultivators practice in order to cultivate. Related: Qigong (Æø¹¦) Cultivation Base (ÐÞΪ xi¨±w¨¦i) ¨C the amount or capacity of refined Qi possessed by a cultivator. Manual (ÃØóÅ m¨¬j¨ª) ¨C a book containing detailed instructions on training in a cultivation method or martial arts style. Usually regarded as extremely valuable and thus kept secret (or at least, not made publicly available). Spiritual Roots (Áé¸ù l¨ªngg¨¥n) ¨C figuratively, the very foundation (roots) of one¡¯s body and soul. Associated with a person¡¯s innate talent and elemental affinities. Dantian (µ¤Ìï d¨¡nti¨¢n) ¨C literally translates as ¡°Cinnabar Field¡± or ¡°Elixir Field¡±. Refers to the region in the body where a person¡¯s Qi is concentrated. There are technically three dantians, but these novels simplify the concept and only use the lower dantian (located three finger widths below and two finger widths behind the navel). Meridians (¾­Âö j¨©ngm¨¤i) ¨C the network of vessels/channels in the body through which Qi flows. Like blood vessels, but for Qi instead of blood. Qi Circulation (ÐÐÆø x¨ªngq¨¬) ¨C the act of controlling Qi to flow from the dantian, through the meridians, and back into the dantian in a cycle. The purpose of this varies between novels, but usually it helps replenish stamina, purify the Qi, or strengthen the meridians. Breathing Exercises (ÍÂÄÉ t¨´n¨¤) ¨C also known as Tu Na Breathing. A special way of breathing which expels the turbid Qi within the body and draws in the Qi of the natural world. An essential part of cultivation. Meditation (Ú¤Ïë m¨ªngxi¨£ng) ¨C a practice for training or calming the mind and spirit. Cultivators spend a great deal of time in meditation, as both the cultivation of Qi and contemplation of Insights generally require it. Insight (²ÎÎò c¨¡nw¨´) (¶ÙÎò d¨´nw¨´) ¨C related to enlightenment. Cultivators usually gain insights by meditating, engaging in life-or-death battles, or going out into the world to experience new things. These insights are often needed in order to master techniques or advance to higher stages of cultivation.Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on Royal Road. Internal Demons (ÐÄħ x¨©nm¨®) ¨C literally translates as ¡°Heart Devils¡±. Rather than standard demons or devils, these are a practitioner¡¯s negative emotions and other mental barriers which hinder their training/cultivation. Internal Demons, in some cases, can even attack the practitioner from the inside, and failure to adequately resist them may result in Qi Deviation. Qi Deviation (×ß»ðÈëħ z¨¯uhu¨¯ r¨´m¨®) ¨C also known as Qigong Deviation. Literally translates as ¡°to catch fire and be entered [possessed] by devils¡±. A state wherein the cultivation base becomes dangerously unstable, causing internal damage to the body and symptoms of psychosis. People who succumb to their Internal Demons, who practice cultivation/martial arts incorrectly, or who rashly use forbidden arts are all at risk of falling into this state. Bottleneck (Æ¿¾± p¨ªngj¨«ng) ¨C the term for when cultivators figuratively hit a wall in their training and it suddenly becomes incredibly difficult to proceed. When they reach a bottleneck, cultivators may require new Insights, the aid of medicinal pills, or even harsher training in order to make a Breakthrough (Í»ÆÆ t¨±p¨°) and successfully bypass the bottleneck. Impurities (ÔÓÖÊ z¨¢zh¨¬) ¨C usually described as a smelly, black substance which is secreted from a cultivator¡¯s skin when they reach new cultivation stages or consume special medicinal pills. The result of the body purifying itself and expelling the waste. Ranks Ranks / Levels / Layers (¼¶ j¨ª) (²ã c¨¦ng) ¨C a common way to quantify martial power or the progress made in cultivation. In many cases (although not all) where these are used, there are 9 ranks/levels/layers to each stage of cultivation, with rank 1 being the start and rank 9 being the peak. After breaking through to the next stage, the practitioner starts at rank 1 of that new stage. The number 9 has a great deal of symbolism. Houtian & Xiantian (ºóÌì h¨°uti¨¡n / ÏÈÌì xi¨¡nti¨¡n) ¨C the names of two cultivation stages which appear in several novels, with the Houtian stage preceding the Xiantian stage. Houtian can mean Posterior Heaven / Postcelestial / Acquired. Xiantian can mean Anterior Heaven / Precelestial / Innate. Very roughly, the idea is that something ¡°Xiantian¡± is primordial and thus close to the Dao, while something ¡°Houtian¡± is degraded or further away from the Dao. Qi Condensation (ÄýÆø n¨ªngq¨¬) ¨C also known as Qi Refining (Á¶Æø li¨¤nq¨¬) or Qi Gathering (¾ÛÆø j¨´q¨¬). An initial stage of cultivation which involves absorbing Qi from the natural world and refining it inside the body. Foundation Establishment (Öþ»ù zh¨´j¨©) ¨C also translated as Foundation Building. The stage after Qi Condensation. Once a cultivator¡¯s Qi crosses a certain threshold (in the volume and/or density of the Qi), they¡¯ll be able to breakthrough to this stage. Core Formation (½áµ¤ ji¨¥d¨¡n) ¨C sometimes left untranslated as ¡°Jiedan¡±. The stage after Foundation Establishment. It involves forming a Golden Core (½ðµ¤ j¨©nd¨¡n) by using the Dantian as a crucible and the Cultivation Base as raw material. Nascent Soul (ÔªÓ¤ yu¨¢ny¨©ng) ¨C sometimes left untranslated as ¡°Yuanying¡±. Literally translates as ¡°Origin Infant¡±. The stage after Core Formation (in some novels). The Nascent Soul resembles an infant or miniature person and resides in the Dantian, typically sitting in a meditative position. In some novels, the Nascent Soul can travel outside the body and is like a second life for cultivators ¨C if their main body dies, their consciousness can continue to exist in the Nascent Soul. Immortal Ascension (³ÉÏÉ ch¨¦ngxi¨¡n) ¨C also known as Apotheosis. The stage wherein the cultivator becomes a Daoist Immortal. There are many differences between novels, but usually the cultivation/maturation of the Golden Core or Nascent Soul plays a key role in ascending to Immortality.

Alchemy Terms

Alchemy (µ¤µÀ d¨¡nd¨¤o) (Íⵤ w¨¤id¨¡n) ¨C the refining of plants, minerals, and other substances into medicinal pills & elixirs. In these novels, Alchemists (µ¤Ê¦) are essentially pharmacists who work with magical materials and make miracle drugs. Cauldrons & Pill Furnaces (¶¦ d¨«ng) (µ¤Â¯ d¨¡nl¨²) ¨C the tools alchemists use to produce medicinal pills & elixirs. Medicinal Pills & Elixirs (µ¤Ò© d¨¡ny¨¤o) ¨C miracle drugs which can have all sorts of effects. Often taken to boost cultivation, heal wounds, cure poisons, purify or strengthen the body, and much much more. Medicinal Plants / Herbs (Ò©²Ý y¨¤oc¨£o) ¨C a generic term for any kind of plant which can be used by alchemists to make poisons or medicinal pills & elixirs. Older medicinal plants (100-year, 1000-year, etc¡­) are generally considered to be more potent. Spiritual Plants / Herbs (Áé²Ý l¨ªngc¨£o) ¨C also called Spirit Grass. A magic plant which has absorbed spiritual energy from the natural world and is highly sought after by both cultivators and alchemists alike. Usually either eaten to absorb the spiritual energy it contains or refined into spirit medicines.

Items & Weapons

Magic Treasures (·¨±¦ f¨£b¨£o) ¨C also translated as Magical Items. A generic term which encompasses all of the magic weapons/clothing/trinkets/talismans/etc¡­ which cultivators make and use. Spirit Stones (Áéʯ l¨ªngsh¨ª) ¨C translucent crystals with spiritual energy trapped within. Mainly used as currency amongst cultivators. They can also be used to cultivate (by absorbing the spiritual energy), create magical items, or power spell formations. Flying Sword (·É½£ f¨¥iji¨¤n) ¨C a magic sword which can fly through the air and can be directed to engage in long-range attacks. Perhaps the most iconic cultivator weapon. In some novels, cultivators stand atop their flying swords and ride them as a form of transportation. Interspatial Ring (¿Õ¼ä½äÖ¸ k¨­ngji¨¡n ji¨¨zhi) ¨C a magic ring with a pocket dimension inside it. With a mere thought, the owner can store items inside it and retrieve them at will. Depending on the novel, there may be some restrictions ¨C for example, the size of the storage space might be limited or the ring might only be capable of storing certain types of items. Talisman (·û f¨²) ¨C sometimes translated as a Seal. A strip of paper with mystical diagrams & calligraphy drawn on it. In these novels, they¡¯re essentially consumable spells. (When activated, they cast a spell and will disintegrate once their magic is depleted.) Jade Slip (Óñ¼ò y¨´ji¨£n) ¨C a long, narrow strip of jade used as a magical item. A cultivator can magically store information inside it, and other cultivators can then use that Jade Slip to directly transmit the stored information into their minds. Based on the Bamboo Slips used in ancient China

Miscellaneous Terms

Heavenly Tribulation (Ìì½Ù ti¨¡nji¨¦) (Öؽ٠zh¨°ngji¨¦) ¨C in some novels, a trial encountered by cultivators at key points in their cultivation, which they must resist and ultimately transcend. Because immortal cultivation (generally) goes against the Will of Heaven, the Heavens will send down tribulations to oppress high-level cultivators who make progress towards Immortality, often right when they enter a new cultivation stage. This typically takes the form of a lightning storm, with extraordinarily powerful bolts of lightning raining down from the Heavens to strike at the cultivator. Eight Trigrams (°ËØÔ b¨¡gu¨¤) ¨C often left untranslated as the ¡°Bagua¡±. Thought to represent the fundamental principles of reality. In real life, it¡¯s used in fortune-telling. In these novels, it¡¯s mainly only mentioned in passing. For example, a battle formation or martial arts move might have the ¡°Eight Trigrams¡± in its name Feng Shui (·çË® f¨¥ngshu¨«) ¨C literally translates as ¡°Wind Water¡±. A form of traditional Chinese divination/fortune-telling, often performed using the Eight Trigrams and a Feng Shui compass (ÂÞÅÌ lu¨®p¨¢n). In these novels, it¡¯s mainly only mentioned in passing. Formations (Õó zh¨¨n) (Õó·¨ zh¨¨nf¨£) ¨C divided into battle formations and spell formations, although they are often just called ¡°formations¡±. Battle formations are ¡°fantasy-fied¡± tactical formationsused by several cultivators or martial artists attacking in concert. Spell formations are also called Arrays. They¡¯re essentially magic circles which cast a continuous area-of-effect spell on the location the formation encompasses. Spiritual Sense (Áéʶ l¨ªngsh¨ª) ¨C also known as ¡°Consciousness¡± or Divine Sense (Éñʶ sh¨¦nsh¨ª). An ability possessed by cultivators to scan their surroundings (far beyond the limits of their ordinary 5 senses) with their spirit. The distance/total area they can scan corresponds to the strength of their spirit. Also used in some novels to remotely control magical items such as Flying Swords. Essence (¾« j¨©ng) ¨C often called Blood Essence (¾«Ñª). It¡¯s basically ¡°lifeblood¡± or ¡°life force¡±. Powerful techniques sometimes require cultivators to expend their Essence, shortening their lifespan as a result. Robes (ÅÛ p¨¢o) ¨C the characters in these novels usually wear robes, as was the norm in ancient China. Cultivators are often said to wear Scholar / Daoist robes (µÀÅÛ). Martial artists are frequently depicted wearing Tang suits (ÌÆ×°). Face (Ãæ×Ó mi¨¤nzi) ¨C a person¡¯s reputation in society and amongst their peers. If someone ¡°has face¡± (ÓÐÃæ×Ó), they have a good reputation. If they ¡°have no face¡± (ûÃæ×Ó), then they have a bad reputation. ¡°Giving face¡± (¸øÃæ×Ó) to someone means to defer to or pay homage to them. ¡°Losing face¡± (¶ªÁ³) means that a person has hurt their reputation. ¡°Not wanting face¡± (²»ÒªÁ³) means that a person is acting shamelessly, in a way that suggests they don¡¯t care about hurting their reputation. Kowtow (ߵͷ k¨°ut¨®u) ¨C an act of deep respect shown by prostration. The highest sign of reverence in Chinese culture. It involves kneeling and bowing so low as to have one¡¯s head touching the ground. The person kowtowing may also knock their head repeatedly against the ground (to the point of injury), especially when they¡¯re desperately pleading for something or wish to show their utmost sincerity. Clasped Hands (±§È­ b¨¤oqu¨¢n) (¹°ÊÖ g¨¯ngsh¨¯u) ¨C also translated as Cupped Fist or Cupped Hands. A respectful salute or greeting. Pavilion (¸ó g¨¦) (ͤ t¨ªng) ¨C a type of building. The pavilions in these novels probably look more like this, rather than this. Pagoda (Ëþ t¨£) ¨C a tiered tower with multiple, prominent eaves. Often has a religious function or is considered sacred. Immortal¡¯s Cave (¶´¸® d¨°ngf¨³) ¨C also translated as Cave Estate or Immortal Estate. The abode of a cultivator. Often high up in the mountains in a cave where spiritual energy is abundant. Similar to a Grotto (¶´Ìì). Fairy (ÏÉÅ® xi¨¡nn¨·) (ÏÉ×Ó xi¨¡nz¨«) ¨C a term used to describe a woman of otherworldly beauty. Lotus Flower (Á«»¨ li¨¢nhu¨¡) ¨C symbolizes purity & enlightenment in Chinese culture. Appears quite often in these novels. Jade (Óñ y¨´) ¨C a type of gemstone that was more valuable than gold in Ancient China. It was even thought to have mystical powers/properties and to be associated with the soul and immortality. In cultivation novels, magical items are often made from jade. And anything beautiful, refined, or lustrous is commonly described as being ¡°Jade-like¡±. Incense (Ïã xi¨¡ng) ¨C aromatic material which releases fragrant smoke when burned. Used in religious ceremonies, to aid in meditation, and in many other cultural activities. Incense Sticks (or Joss Sticks) are frequently mentioned in these novels. Hand-seals (Æþ¾÷ qi¨¡ju¨¦) ¨C also translated as Incantation Gestures. Daoist hand and finger gestures performed to cast spells. Sword-light (½£¹â ji¨¤ngu¨¡ng) ¨C also translated as a Sword Ray. A dazzling, powerful energy attack released from the edge of a blade. Forming Swordlight generally requires a profound cultivation base and a deep mastery of swordsmanship. Refining (Á¶ li¨¤n) ¨C a term which appears extremely frequently. Cultivators sometimes seem obsessed with refining just about everything ¨C pills, treasures, Qi, and even themselves! This stems from Chinese alchemy, where it was believed that materials which underwent multiple refinements would gain spiritual value and slowly grow closer to the Dao and perfection. Killing Intent (É·Æø sh¨¤q¨¬) ¨C a murderous aura which emits from a person when they desire to harm someone. People who have experienced bloody battles and/or have already killed others tend to have much stronger Killing Intent than an ordinary person. Experts may be able to disguise their Killing Intent, as well as intentionally release it as a form of mental attack. Sword Intent (½£Òâ ji¨¤ny¨¬) ¨C somewhat similar to Killing Intent. A dangerous aura emitted from a sword or master swordsman which causes others to feel as if they¡¯re about to be cut by a sword. In some novels, experts can even create physical manifestations (consisting of energy and their knowledge of sword-arts) with their Sword Intent, and this can be used to attack their foes Mansion core - Here Mansion Core refers to an object or item, which is being used as that Mansion/ Immortal Estate core. It controls the whole Estate including its arrays and restrictions. According to Xianxia Stories like ( DE ) you usually have to use a drop of blood to claim ownership and start refining it. Refining gives you control over the cave. Chapter 1 - The Beginning Kevin had experienced pain. The mortal one, as well as the spiritual one. To him, pain was simply an illusion which could be ignored and forgotten. Experiencing it, and then crying over it was a waste of time. But this time was different. Piece by piece his soul was being ripped away from his body, as he watched his flesh disintegrating. His nascent soul couldn¡¯t help but stare, as the immense energy released by the crystal slowlyeating away at his body, turning it into dust. At the same time, the energy pierced him and the pain was nothing like he felt before. The pain shot through his very core. It was direct and brutal. Like a thousand hot knives being stabbed from inside or a million ants eating him. He couldn¡¯t scream. He couldn¡¯t cry. He couldn¡¯t express. He felt trapped. He felt oppressed. He felt suffocated. He couldn¡¯t do anything but wait, and watch. Watch as his body was being eaten away. Watch as his soul was getting stabbed and twisted. Wait and watch the agony of losing everything. His dreams were crumbling before him. Hope was shattered. His very dao heart was breaking, piece by piece. All was lost. He was dying. The pain continued for what felt like an eternity. Time had long lost meaning to him, as he slowly numbed to the pain of death. He was indifferent to it. He was simply waiting for death to free him from this agony. Time kept flowing. Minutes, hours, days, years had merged into an endless eternity.
In a small corner of endless space, a body was floating. Its features were fuzzy and unclear. But if anyone would come closer, they would notice the dull foggy, grey and white color - that of a soul. The soul kept on floating through endless space gradually moving towards a large wormhole. A thin energy barrier of unknown origin kept him safe from getting shredded by the powerful space storms. But the barrier was also slowly absorbing energy from space and refining the soul. Bit by bit, the soul was crystallizing. Small pure white crystals were forming over it and slowly spreading inside. After few years, the soul couldn¡¯t be differentiated from a large block of a beautiful crystal. The foggy white and grey soul was now a beautiful piece of crystal which very much looked like a man. It was so beautiful that it could only be sculpted by a god, for the Heavenly Emperor himself. But on observing minutely, we would realize that the crystal was contracting. Slowly ¨C Slowly, the crystal was decreasing in size. Small chunks of it would merge with each other, turning brighter and brighter. Almost a century had gone by since the incident at the Immortal Estate. The floating soul had already shrunk from a meter and a half to a fist size piece of a circular crystal, radiant with bright white light which pierced through the empty darkness of neverending space. It was like a small sun, trying to light up everything in its path as it slowly approached the wormhole. The barrier had long since vanished, and now space storms and such were battering it, trying their best to exterminate the foreign entity. But the same storms were slowly polishing the crystal into something more beautiful and more divine, like a master sculptor¡¯s final touches. Days rapidly passed by as it kept on moving faster and faster, getting attracted towards the wormhole¡¯s gravity. And finally, eleven days later, it broke through the wormhole barrier entering its gaping maws and vanishing in the space-time.
Few googol light years away, was a large wormhole. It was hidden from the eyes and senses as it stood between folded space and time. Suddenly, a sun-like object escaped from the wormhole, piercing the space-time folds as if a hot knife slicing through butter, towards the world of Titania.The genuine version of this novel can be found on another site. Support the author by reading it there. In a small forgotten corner of Titania, over the mountain range of Tedeum, the sky was ripped apart as a star fell. Blazing like a ball of fire, it fell over the Forest of Loputan as it announced its arrival. The earthquake followed by flattening several hundred miles around it. Large swathes of forest were reduced to ashes, while the mountain it covered burned like the Forges of Vulkan. The tall mountains and the green forest kept on burning for days and days, illuminating the southern sky orange. Molten rocks and metal flowed like a river, onto the planes, burning everything in its path. Millions lost their home as town after town, village after village turned into nothingness. Land planted with several acres of crops and herbs turned to nothing but lava, while the rest got covered in ashes of the dead and burnt. The ashes from the disaster, were no better. They buried everyone alive. The released poisonous fumesdid the rest. Spreading over several miles, it poisoned the living and slowly killing them. Meanwhile the lava kept on flowing as the mountains kept on melting, turning the small flow of lava to a mighty river. The neverending flow of lava finally forced the Heroes of The Empire to take action. They called forth their elements, trying to control the flowing river of hell. Water Mages summoned rains, while Wind Mages called over storms to cool the river down. Earth Mages created earthen barriers taller than hills to stop and divert the lava flow. Fire Mages with all their power tried to force the lava into obedience. Light Mages did their best in healing everybody while offering soothing words to the almost dead, while their counterparts Dark Mages, prayed and guided their souls to the River of Reincarnation. Mighty Swordsmen slashed the earth apart creating cliffs and hills to control it, while the Elven Bowmen called upon nature to turn their arrows into Immortal Forests. Despite all their attempts, the River Of Hell, as it was named, didn¡¯t stop. How could it stop so easily? From the very depths of space, it¡¯s source had fallen, burning as hot as the sun itself. The humongous amount of mana in it further burned the earth around it. Finally sacrificing their lives, they summoned the Gods themselves. Ruler of Elements and Controller of Heavens, the Eleven Gods finally stopped the River Of Hell, by summoning a storm larger than ever seen before. Rain fell for ten days, followed by Ice and Hail for another ten. Finally, the Burning Mountain cooled, and the River stopped. It froze under the ice and slowly turned into rocks, the only remnant of The Disaster Which Burned The Earth. Days after it cooled, it saw a rush of Adventurers and so, who scoured the burnt earth for The Fallen Star and treasures which belonged to deep earth. But all their efforts were for naught. The mountain made of rocks and ores had been replaced by mountains made of metal, gems and cooled magma, which covered the burning crater and kept away all the trespassers. The treasures of deep had already melted or flowed onto the plains in The River Of Hell. Despite all this, adventurers kept on coming, and a few lucky ones did find gems or molten metals which were worth more than their lives. Years passed by and the Burning Mountains were gradually reclaimed by forests, which were thicker and greener than the old ones, as new saplings grew on the corpses and ashes of the old ones. It was further infested with beasts and monsters who took over it due to the absence of humans. The plains were again taken over by humans, who enriched themselves on the newly formed volcanic plain. Miners found gems and metal closer to the surface. Farmers grew richer crops on the black volcanic soil. Business slowly increased as population increased, and slowly the City of Fire took birth. Spread over several miles, it wasn¡¯t the largest nor the richest city in the Empire, but a haven for adventurers and hunters of all sorts. The humans tried taking over the foothills, but continuous attacks by beast hordes and monsters made them drop their plans. Foothills became the buffer zone dividing humans and beasts. Adventurers, Mercenaries, and Hunters would venture into the forests for beast skin, cores and claws while searching for Metal Ores, Gems and Mines. Slowly a century had passed by as the common masses forgot about the disaster and moved on. Unknown to them, deep into the mountain, the falling star finally regained consciousness. Chapter 2 - Trapped? Deep inside a mountain was a fist size crystal which very much looked like glass. Stuck between the rocks, it didn¡¯t look different from various quartz and precious stones like diamonds found there. The only factor which made it different from its much alike brethren was its shape, which wasn¡¯t naturally formed, and was a perfect sphere. The glass crystal had been trapped there for a whole century, while magma had slowly transformed around it, tightly clinging to it. Suddenly, one day the Crystal trembled as if trying to wake. The trembling was infrequent happening once a week. Gradually the frequency increased until it kept on trembling. The continuous vibrations had turned the surrounding rocks to dust until a whole meter wide area was empty. Finally, the glass crystal burst out with radiance, as if announcing that it had woken and floated up. But immediately after it dimmed, until nothing but a slight flicker was left, while it floated in the middle of the chamber. Inside the crystal, the soul finally woke up. Although the crystal was supposed to be its body, the true soul or soul fire was locked inside it. It was shaped like a man, whose features were vague. His hands were wrapped around his leg. Slight cries could be heard from it, as it kept on repeating, ¡° Please don¡¯t¡­Please don¡¯t¡­.it hurts¡­it hurts¡­.please¡­.please¡­I beg you¡­¡± as phantom pains struck him. His eyes were hazy and unfocused, while he looked outside the crystal. He seemed to be seeing all but registering nothing. The crystal had become his shackles. His prison. His only shelter. Meanwhile, a small spider found the empty chamber. Finding it safe, it decided to make it, its home. Shooting a string of web on the floating crystal, it started climbing. Halfway through, the string melted due to high energy radiation, and the spider fell down. But once again, it shot a web and started climbing and halfway through, the web broke and it fell. But the spider instead of giving up, kept on trying and failing again and again. His antics slowly caught the soul¡¯s attention. It was something new, in its lifeless existence. The soul kept on observing it and unknowingly, the spider had become an essential part of his life. Despite its failure, it kept on trying. This went on for days and days. In between the spider would take a break and leave the chamber, which the soul assumed was to catch food. It would return once again, and began its hopeless task. But this same hopeless task gave the soul a reason to live. It would unconsciously support the spider, cheering it on. A few days later, the soul realized that the web was melting solely due to the energy radiated by itself. And it struck him, that the spider was failing just because of him. Hesitantly, as if a newborn baby trying its hand, he prevented the energy from leaking. As if sensing it, the spider rapidly shot a web and climbed it, reaching the crystal. It looked at the crystal and shook it legs an if saying ¡® Thank You.¡¯ The soul couldn¡¯t help but smile. The smile was the first in past several years. And the same smile shook him to its core. As if a dam was broken, memories came gushing out. He remembered how he was like the spider, trying to climb higher and higher. How he would fail sometimes. But instead of giving up, he would try harder and harder to reach the goal. Many times, it would become his obsession and he wouldn¡¯t rest until it was achieved. Unknowingly, tears started dripping from its eyes, as he recalled more and more. Not long after, he started laughing. Laughing like a maniac, at his stupid life and his idiocy which landed him here. How his dreams were destroyed. How his life crumbled before him. How weak he was. So weak, that he couldn¡¯t even protect itself from a rock. The crystal turned brighten and brighter, as the soul slowly mended itself. Not perfect, but not broken. It was an experience, which tempered him into something new.Like a nirvana. He slowly got up, and stretched himself, while looking around. And all he saw was darkness. ¡° Motherfucker, am I dead?¡± he asked himself. If he was, he was expecting more from the Underworld, not utter darkness. Where was the gushing Death Yin Qi? Where were the hills and mountains made up of bones, or the river made up of souls? And he couldn¡¯t find the long line, waiting to get their memories destroyed near some river. Fuck! He couldn¡¯t even see a river. And what about his dream of fighting that three-headed dog Cerberus, which even those arrogant snakes feared¡­.wait or was it arrogant lizards? Nevermind, both of them were stuck up bastards. That could only mean, that this wasn¡¯t The Underworld. So he wasn¡¯t in the underworld? That means he was alive!?! But he did remember getting disintegrated, while his soul was being tortured. Or was it just a dream? Yes, it has to be a dream, or else he would be dead. Yes, it¡¯s nothing but a stupid nightmare. A stupid scary nightmare, nothing more. A painfully stupid nightmare, which can be forgotten.Yes, the pain was nothing but an illusion. But when did a nightmare hurt this much? Or it wasn¡¯t a nightmare?!? Was he cursed? Yes, he could be cursed. He had read somewhere about such curses, which would trap you into an illusion while slowly torturing you until you killed yourself. But when? Was it in the cave? But he took all precautions. Plus, he never felt a negative karma tying on him or an imprint being attached to him. And he regularly cleaned the battlefield plus himself after every battle or run, so curses through body fluids or parts are also impossible. Even if it did attach to him, he should have felt something!If you spot this narrative on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation. So not a curse. A high-level illusion? Yes, yes, he had heard about such illusions, which melded reality and illusions into one. Real was fake, while fake was real. So it has to be an illusion. Quite a powerful one at that. But when did he get caught up one? The Estate didn¡¯t have such complex illusions. So before the estate? But where? Where could he get caught up in an illusion and never realize it?!? And who had the capability to produce such illusions? Of course The Builder Sect!! Yes¡­perfect. It has to be The Builder sect. So he was caught up in some stupid illusion array produced by them. And knowing their nature, they would never share such a high-level array with another party. So somewhere on their base, which should definitely be that Spiritual Mine Planet. Indeed, he would have never realized another array among thousands of other. No wonder, he felt something odd, when he found so many arrays. It made no sense, in creating so many small and useless arrays, instead of a large powerful one.Plus the planet getting destroyed¡­how could a Builder Sect planet get destroyed so easily. So, in short, he was still on that crappy planet!?! It means all this was just a dream? So he didn¡¯t find that stupid rock or die? Or were they manipulating his memory? Shit!!! He got caught up in some stupid sect¡¯s array and almost lost his dao heart. He could imagine other¡¯s laughing at him, as he slowly killed himself. He really wanted to go and die¡­All those baldies, and juniors laughing at him¡­All his reputation turning into dust. ¡°YOU BASTARD SON OF THE BITCHES, let me get out of here, and wait until I make all of YOU RUN IN YOUR UNDERWEAR IN FRONT OF the Seven Pleasure Sects!!! Assholes! Cowards! Dipshits¡­¡± the soul screamed, as more colorful and biologically impossible expletives found themselves in a rant. Once he escaped, he was going to rip them apart! Piece by Piece! In FRONT OF THE WHOLE FUCKING UNIVERSE! Finally, after hours of ranting, the soul felt fresh and free. All the accumulated pain and stress was finally relieved. His emotions which were smothering him found a way to release themselves. He once again felt something change in his soul. Not in a bad way, but in a good way. A comfortable way, as if some jigsaw piece finally found its right place. ¡°Now how to break it¡­¡± he wondered. All illusions, despite their complexity, had something in common. The main array flag or core. Typically, it would get represented in the illusion as some unique object or item. Their only problem being, that they would be the same object throughout the illusion, and would be present every time. So something unique? His eyes went towards the spider which was climbing him. Wait a second? Climbing him? And for the first time since his arrival, he looked at himself. ¡° A crystal? A damn piece of floating rock? Why couldn¡¯t the illusion come up with something better!?!¡± he once again swore, cussing at Builder Sect¡¯s ancestors and their Grandmas who somehow fucked pigs¡­ Once again he looked at the spider. This was the only unique thing he could see. And there was a high chance that this spider was present everywhere. He would never care to remember a spider. So this definitely gave the spider a high chance at being the core. So he should just kill it and get done with. He moved his hand trying to grab the spider¡­but realized his physical form didn¡¯t have one. ¡°Fuck!!! So now they could laugh at his incapability to kill a fucking spider!¡± he screamed inside. He a False immortal, who could easily destroy planets with a finger, turn armies into dust with a breath, was stuck as a rock. A rock, which couldn¡¯t even kill a god damn spider. An Immortal, couldn¡¯t kill a spider! He can imagine, this news spreading throughout the immortal realm. Now where in the three realms he was going to hide his face! He ha turned into a joker! His hard earned reputation, although it notorious was now worth nothing! He really was going the rip, those baldies apart. Then he was going to turn their sect into a brothel and their sacred grounds into a fucking¡­whatever. He will think about it later¡­ Now back to topic. How was he going to kill a tiny thumb size spider? When he suddenly recalled how the web melted due to high energy radiation. So maybe he could radiate the spider to death? He focused on increasing the energy towards the point where the spider was relaxing. Slowly the area started shimmering, as the air started heating. The spider trembled, and shrill shrieks could be heard as it spasmed. Hearing its shriek, the soul unknowingly stopped the energy. He couldn¡¯t bring himself to kill it. The spider was one which made him break out of his shell. It was his only companion in this long darkness. But somewhere deep in his mind, another voice presented, ¡° Wouldn¡¯t this make it the perfect Flag. A flag which the trapped knew of, but couldn¡¯t kill due to his affection for it?¡± The soul couldn¡¯t help but agree. This definitely felt like something those sneaky bastards would do. But again, if it wasn''t the flag, then? Once again the voice argued,¡± But what if it is? Would you take the risk of leaving it? Killing one and being sure of it is better, than thinking and doing nothing about it!¡± The soul shuts up. The voice, which he had now labeled as ¡®The Subconscious¡¯ was right. It was just a spider. Its death would mean nothing to him. A small spider shouldn¡¯t affect an Immortal. Right? Deciding, he once again increased the energy on it, slowly frying and radiating it to death. The spider shrieked and spasmed, while black foul smoke started emitting from it. The soul watched coldly. In cultivation world, he had killed numerous beasts and even more humans, so he didn¡¯t know why he felt a little pain watching the spider die. Was he getting soft? No, he still had a long way to go. Many people to kill. After a minute or so, the spider was laying on its back, with its legs curled up. The black body was now burnt to an unrecognizable lump of charred chitin and black flesh. The soul waited. Nothing happened. No twisting of illusion or shattering of air. ¡°Was I wron.. *BLING!*
NOTIFICATION
YOU HAVE KILLED A BLACK SILK SPIDER. BODY ANATOMY AND FUNCTIONS SAVED IN ¡®AVAILABLE MONSTERS'' FOLDER.
The fuck?¡± Chapter 3 - The Grandpa in The Ring? Cultivators, especially rogue cultivators hated unknown. Usually ¡®unknown¡¯ would portend unknown fortuitous chances, but also hidden dangers. To cultivators, who were going against the Heavens, just to live longer, unknown risk usually filtered down to exotic ways to die. And here the soul was facing an ¡®unknown.¡¯
The first blue box was soon followed by a barrage of messages.
NOTIFICATION
YOU HAVE ABSORBED 1 MANA FROM THE BLACK SILK SPIDER.
NOTIFICATION
CONGRATULATIONS! YOUNG DUNGEON! ABSORBING MANA IS THE FIRST STEP IN BECOMING A STRONG DUNGEON. KEEP UP THE GOOD WORK!
NOTIFICATION
ABSORBING MANA AND CREATING YOUR FIRST ROOM, HAS OPENED GLOBAL DUNGEON NETWORK FOR YOU. NOW YOU CAN SEE, QUANTIFIED AND STATISTICAL DATA ABOUT YOURSELF. GLOBAL DUNGEON NETWORK ACCESS LEVEL ¨C BASIC
NOTIFCATION
PLEASE UPGRADE YOUR CORE TO ACCESS FURTHER AND OPEN FORUMS, DUNGEONOPEDIA, CHAT ROOM ETCETERA
NAME ???
AGE ERROR
LEVEL 0
MANA 6
AFFINITY SPACE, FIRE, EARTH.
FLOORS 1
ROOMS 1
TRAPS 0
MONSTERS 0
TITLES Fallen Star The Calamity The Harbringer of Death Beloved Of Space The Explorer
What the fuck? What the hell is going on? Has the illusion gone crazy? Creating such beginner level mistake? Everyone knows, that better an array the more its close to reality. What¡¯s with the stupid blue boxes? Are they here to annoy me? This whole thing has stopped making sense. And what¡¯s Mana?
NOTIFICATION
MANA IS THE MOST PRIMARY FORM OF ENERGY.
What? What was that again?
NOTIFICATION
MANA IS THE MOST PRIMARY FORM OF ENERGY.
Did it answer? God, I am going crazy¡­ An illusion that can read mind? Can answer ? Take a deep breath¡­This illusion is completely crazy. It¡¯s in its own league. A crazy annoying league. Heavens! I need a moment to sort this out¡­
The soul started walking to and fro. With hands folded and head facing the ground, the soul was in deep contemplation. The whole situation was weird and going out of hand. It couldn¡¯t understand anything. The blue boxes, the pain which felt real, the answering illusion, all of the things were creating a mayhem in its head. Finally, It did what a cultivator should always do when facing a problem. Meditate. Cultivate. Investigate. It sat down, with its legs crossed , and took a deep breath. It started cultivating. But something felt wrong. Incredibly wrong. No Qi energy could be sensed. In fact, the only energy it could feel was the chaotic energy, which it had felt in the so-called dungeon. But this didn¡¯t affect the soul much. It had guessed that they would probably seal the Qi near the array, to prevent him from cultivating. But the weird energy felt different, and at the same time comfortable. When it was in the immortal estate, the same energy felt alien and painful , but now it felt comfortable like it was supposed to absorb this energy. It¡¯s gut instinct told that he would be easily able to absorb this energy if it wanted, unlike the previous time. But it stopped himself from doing so. Th energy was completely alien, and it couldn¡¯t be sure whether it was harmful or not. Being prevented from cultivating Qi, it could only cultivate its soul. Anyway, its soul was barely keeping itself intact, and this would be a good time to repair it. It tried going into its soul, but it failed every time. It was like nothing was there to go into. ¡° What is wrong here ? ¡° It was well versed with Builder Sect¡¯s array and it could be sure that none of them prevented from going into your Soul. All of this was incredibly fishy. In fact, their array¡¯s were not even supposed to be so realistic and strong. It was like an entirely different sort of array. But before investigating that matter, it really wanted to repair its soul. In fact, it knew it was possible as twice it had felt his soul being affected and slowly mending. But it couldn¡¯t be sure, what was stopping him now? Then it suddenly struck him. It WAS a soul. It looked at himself. It really was in soul form. In fact, to be exact it was in its nascent soul form, which very much looked like itself and was clearly not an illusion. This was weird. Extremely weird and wrong. This shouldn¡¯t even be possible. How had they separated and trapped it¡¯s soul? They didn¡¯t have the capability as its body was still there. Heaven¡¯s didn¡¯t allow forceful separation of soul and body. It went against the cycle of reincarnation and Laws of Heavens. Unless..Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings. It rapidly tried sensing its body and could only feel the crystal. It''s body¡¯s imprint was gone. Both body and soul were connected to each other through Karma and Soul Imprints, that is soul¡¯s essence and mark on the body. But both were gone. Not broken but gone, as if they never existed. This could only mean its body was really destroyed. Destroyed in such a way that nothing was left or nothing could be sensed. And for the first time since awakening from that bad nightmare, it questioned himself, ¡° What if all this was real?¡± But it couldn¡¯t accept it. It''s consciousness once again dived into it as it tried sensing imprints. Maybe, just maybe the imprints had gotten shifted as its soul broke down? Nothing. It could feel and sense nothing. The whole soul sea was dried and broken. No imprints could be sensed. Suddenly it felt two energy imprints. Excited it rapidly focussed on it but found that they were not its imprints. One felt like a mass of soul while another felt dangerous and Karmic in nature. It immediately realized what the dangerous imprint was. It was Heaven¡¯s Mark or imprint left by heaven¡¯s when Heavenly Oaths were taken. They tied the parties to each other and to heaven itself. That¡¯s why it was impossible to break heavenly oaths as they were tied to the soul itself. It put its consciousness inside and immediately terms of oath echoed inside its mind. They were the same term¡¯s which it had promised to the dungeon core and the dungeon¡¯s side of the oath was completed. ¡° It was real ?¡± It questioned himself. If it was real then doesn¡¯t it meant that everything after that was real? Then it really had died? But why wasn¡¯t it in the underworld ? Where was it ? Why was it still alive ? And dungeon¡¯s side¡¯s oath was completed ? Why? What? How? When? One question was answered, and another hundred popped up. Ignoring them it took a deep breath and relaxed. Thinking about things which it didn¡¯t know the answer or was not going to help. He would only tire himself. But there was one good thing, At least it wasn¡¯t trapped and made fun of by those baldies. Moving its consciousness towards the boiling mass of soul, it dived in. Pitch Black darkness greeted him. Nothing could be seen, heard and felt. And it had felt such feeling before,only when it would enter somebody''s soul. ¡°Who are you?¡± It asked facing nobody. In front of him slowly a body shimmered to existence. It was a humanoid looking phantom. Pure white in color and no defining feature, he looked more like a mannequin or doll. ¡° Hmmm¡­It seem¡¯s you have finally reached Titania¡­¡± ¡° What do you mean ?¡± Ignoring him the white doll kept talking to himself. ¡° I wasn¡¯t sure, it would work. But it did. The theory was right. I really am a genius, but they still exiled me¡­.¡± ¡° *cough*¡± The soul interrupted. The white doll looked up as if realizing for the first time that there was somebody standing in front of him ¡° Hmmm Who ? Oh, it''s you. Why are you here ?¡± ¡° What do you mean by, ¡®oh it''s you.¡¯ And what¡¯s with the ¡®why are you here?¡¯ You are INSIDE, MY SOUL, and are asking me why I am here? Shouldn¡¯t I be the one asking this? ¡° Did you ask?¡± ¡° What?¡± ¡° You didn¡¯t ask me. So why are you blaming me?¡± Th soul couldn''t believe the white doll¡¯s shamelessness. What does he mean by did you ask? It wasn¡¯t even given a chance to ask anything! ¡° So why are you inside my soul?¡¯ it asked, taking a deep breath to stop himself from kicking this doll. It was in an incredibly bad mood.Its day was already going pretty bad,and from what it could see, it was only going to get worse. ¡° Technically you are inside my soul, although my soul is inside your soul. Well, let me introduce myself. I am dmmskcmdkmc. We had met a few years ago on the last floor of the dungeon.¡¯ ¡°It''s you! You are that floating piece of shit!¡± the soul blurted. ¡° Shit?!? Boy, I am a DUNGEON CORE! ONE OF THE CREATOR¡¯S BEST CREATION and please control your tongue, and haven''t your parents taught you how to talk to elders?¡± ¡° What elder?¡± How easily the White Doll went from angry to shameless. ¡° I am older than you human. Far older than you could imagine.¡± The white doll answered back arrogantly. The soul could barely stop himself from kicking the doll back to hell, as it probably had answers to its current situation. Anyway who the hell would get arrogant on their age? ¡° So where am I? Who are you? Why am I here?..¡± ¡° Wait, wait¡­one by one, youngster. I am too old for such heavy work¡­¡± ¡° So where am I?¡± ¡° You are in a world called Titania.¡± ¡°Titania?¡± ¡°Hmm¡­next question. Four more then I am going.¡± ¡°Wait¡­what four more questions?...No no don¡¯t answer that.¡± ¡° Who¡­.no no¡­what is a dungeon core?¡± asked the soul. It did remember that the crystal had introduced itself as a dungeon core. Also, the blue boxes did call him a dungeon core. So if all this was true, there was a high chance the white doll and it was the same. ¡° Ohhh..clever one. I thought you would continue with your stupid questions. To begin with, dungeon core is the closest creature to The Creator. We look like a crystal which is crystallized mana and soul power when we first get born. Gradually as we grow ,we start growing our selves. Our soul and mana, take over the surrounding turning them into our body. The more land we take over, the higher our mana regeneration and the stronger we grow. We are Gods in the area we take over.¡± ¡° So basically we create a domain,where we control everything. That includes the creation of those monsters ? Hmmm¡± ¡° Yes.¡± ¡° By the way, I didn''t ask a question old white. I was just clarifying it to myself..¡± the soul calmly mentioned it an if stating a fact. It was testing the waters when it had asked that question to whether it could wheedle an extra answer or two. ¡° What? No, you didn¡¯t! That was a question!¡± said the white doll angrily. ¡° No...No old man. You see, I was talking to myself. I never said that I was asking it to you. Now now..forget that. Here¡¯s my third question¡­see I am clearly stating that I am asking a question.¡± Th white man humphed angrily in annoyance. Although the extra question sounded simple, a clever man could make out many things. Like the creation of weird monsters and plants was very well possible in a domain. Similarly, with more facts and information, other things could be guessed like the creation of an environment. ¡° Why am I here, in Titania, as a rock..sorry a dungeon core?¡± ¡° Hmmmppphhhh. I sent you here.¡± Clearly, the old white was answering the least he could as a form of revenge. ¡° You didn''t answer my question. I asked why am I here, as a Dungeon core?¡± Old White looked at the soul in anger and replied. ¡° I sent you here. But sending you as a human would have been impossible as you would have died in space. Plus I didn¡¯t have enough energy to carry that whole bag of flesh here. So I separated your soul and destroyed all connection with that world until you were an abandoned soul. Me entering your soul and passing my responsibilities to you tied your karma to Titania, my birthplace. On the way using energies present in space I remolded your body until you were a soul crystal. Absorbing mana made you a dungeon core. So here you are. As the Creator¡¯s greatest creation!¡± ¡° But you didn¡¯t answer, why Titania?¡± ¡° Are you an idiot? I am from Titania, that¡¯s why I sent you here. Idiot.¡± The soul wanted to ask several other questions like, Why him? Who are the two Gods? Why was he in the Immortal World? Why did he made him dungeon core and not anything else? But it could only ask one more question, so it asked the most important one. ¡° What¡¯s a dungeon?¡± When it was in the Immortal World, it had thought Dungeon referred to a prison or maybe it was the immortal estate¡¯s name. But going through past conversations it had come to the conclusion that Dungeon was not something so simple. ¡°Hmmm¡­ The dungeon is what we call our domain. You see, our cores are extremely rich in mana. We refine chaotic mana in nature into something more refined and accessible. This mana is released into the world and is absorbed by others. In fact, in this whole world, only we Dungeon¡¯s are able to absorb chaotic mana. Not even Gods apart from the Creator himself has the ability to do so. But this also makes us an attractive target. Imagine having your own personal refiner?¡± The soul nodded. It was slowly getting an idea of what the White Doll was trying to say, ¡° During the early eras, several of our brothers and sisters were made slaves to Gods, Humans, Beasts, dragons, and others. Seeing this, the elders decided to do something. And so dungeon as of now came to life. Using our power we would create obstacles, traps, monsters, and barriers to keep them away. Slowly as time passed by, we have come to an uneasy cooperation. We will allow them to access our Dungeon¡¯s for training and materials. While we will absorb their mana. It¡¯s a symbiotic relationship.¡± ¡® But we can absorb mana ourselves, why do we need them?¡± asked the soul. The previous answer was quite clear and in fact answered lots of question, but brought up even more of them. ¡° Boy, that your last question. Not answering another one¡­Hmmphh anyway, you already got an extra chance.. don¡¯t wake me up! I need to rest!¡± saying this the white man vanished but not before throwing the soul out of his soul. Coming out of the Dungeons soul, the soul couldn¡¯t help but laugh. Fate had played a bad game with him. But also given him a chance. Here it had new opportunities to reach divinity and experience new wonderful things, although its whole life has been destroyed. The meeting ha answered lots of doubts and at the same time create more. Now he could only wait until old White called him again. ¡° Wait, isn''t it like having your very own Grandpa in a ring?¡± Chapter 4 - Let The Adventure Began! It has been a day or two since the soul had a talk with Old White. Time was incredibly difficult to tell in this place. No stars, Suns, and Moons to calculate time with. From ¡®The Talk¡¯, he had realized five things which he needed to keep in mind. Always. Everytime. Everywhere. First, he was now a dungeon. An entirely different creature or organism compared to his human form. But apart from the first few hours, which were spent cursing after realizing the gravity of the fact, he found it incredibly exciting. It was going to be something new. Something adventurous. Something incredibly exciting. Second, now he was in Titania. He wasn¡¯t in The Immortal World. He could not walk ahead with preconceived notions. Everything would be different. Names, Places, People, and finally their cultivation. Seeing that someone could exile such a powerful dungeon to heaven knows where he could not take people here as weaklings. But strength ruled over everything. He personally believed that a stronger fist ruled above everything. The stronger he is, the safer he is. So he should get back to cultivating or was it Dungeonerring? No maybe Creating? Mining ? Tunnelling? Third, there was no Qi. He had tried sensing here and there and finally came to the conclusion. There is no Qi here. Instead, people cultivated using Mana. Although he was not sure, how? How did they use mana? Did they cultivate similar to cultivators? What were their power levels? He later tried using Qi Cultivation method to absorb. Surprisingly, it worked. Of course, later he realized that both were forms of energy. Cultivation Method was simply a way to absorb energy in a particular manner, to get a particular result. Like cultivating Qi by making it run through flesh, would result in a stronger body. Fourth, larger the dungeon, the stronger he is. Larger the area the dungeon covered, more Mana he could absorb and control. Earlier, he wanted to simply create a strong cave and surround it with Qi infused, sorry mana-infused rocks and metals, and go into secluded cultivation. But he realized it completely went against his dao heart. He wanted to be free and unfettered.He wanted to learn more. Experience more. Although he was stuck here, it didn¡¯t mean he couldn¡¯t experience something new. Following Old White¡¯s steps, he will create a dungeon to attract more people. It will help him get stronger and also learn new things! Maybe later he would be able to create an avatar? And finally, Old White had a bad grudge with Gods. Not talking about his personal vendetta and promise to kill order, but the way he said mentioned ¡® Gods ¡® felt like he was eating something unpleasant. Like rotten eggs. But he had great respect for someone called Creator. From what he could make out Creator had the created this world and everything inside it. And from what he understood,now he too was a part of that vendetta. Hateful! Where was the consent form? So in short. Grow more! Grow Large! Grow stronger! But the thing which had been torturing him for past the hours was, how to create one? He couldn¡¯t walk. He didn¡¯t have hands to dig one. Swords, as much he liked them, were currently unattainable. In fact, anything which can be used as a weapon was not there. Unless rocks count. The pointy one. But common sense told that pointy rocks were definitely the wrong way to go¡­unless Titania had a different common sense common. Energy attacks were a waste. Bombing energy on the surrounding walls turned out to be highly energy wasting and also extremely dangerous. Half of the newly created meter long tunnel was now buried under rocks. Yes, collapsing of tunnels. Now he was trying a different method. Old White had mentioned that Dungeon Core¡¯s were Gods inside their domain. So here he was trying to create a domain. Earlier few tries which depended on his understanding of Daos had failed badly. The Dao was probably on a vacation. In short, Domain was not at all related to Dao Domain. So here he was trying to infuse mana in the air and surrounding area to create an Energy Domain. A domain purely made of his mana controlled by his soul energy. An area of hundred meters or so was now completely infused with his soul energy and mana. But the thing which surprised him the most was his complete control over mana infused objects. It worked! It was like controlling your own body. Each rock felt like part of him. He was the brain and the heart, while rest was his body. Wait! His body? So dungeon was his body? Didn¡¯t that mean, people were going to step over his body? Walk inside him? Were mere mortals going to walk over him? Walk on an Immortal? Mortals walking inside an IMMORTAL¡¯S BODY? Immortals could step over mortals like they were ants! But here he was going to allow those ants to walk on his body, his creation? Were was his face !?! All his reputation will go down the drain! Ughhh¡­his heart hurt. It was going to be humiliating. He was going to allow mortals¡­mortals! But how could mere mortals, those pitiful creatures walk over him! It was blasphemous! Or so went the Soul¡¯s rant. After few days, finally, the soul calmed down enough to think rationally. In fact, even the soul was surprised by the intensity of this rant. Usually stronger the cultivator, themore numb their emotions, and feelings become. They become indifferent as nothing is new. It''s the same thing every time. That¡¯s why he craved for unknown. It was like a drug. The happiness or satisfaction on learning something new, the adrenaline rush when fighting unknown or the finding nothing an returning empty-handed after an adventure. All this simulated his emotions, and unknowingly he had become addicted to these feeling. It was refreshing. The anger burst which came suddenly did simulate his feelings, but also made him realize that he was losing control over his emotions. On looking back, he found several instances were his emotions went out of hand. Sudden anger on realizing that he may be trapped or intense hatred for Old White. At all these moments, he had apparently lost control. On thinking deeper, he could only connect this to apparent damage to his soul.Stolen novel; please report. Apart from this, the anger did help him sort his motives. He was only going to allow the strong, the worthy to enter. If they didn''t have enough capabilities he was simply going to kill them, one way or the other. They were a stain on his creation. Now he would finally start creating his Dungeon. A dungeon worthy of an Immortal! But first, his Dungeon needed a proper name¡­You know maybe after the construction is done. First, he was going to improvise his chamber. Bare rocks would have satisfied someone else, but to him, they were simply rocks. Dirt cheap, dirty and not at all beautiful. If he would have been allowed he would have really liked to use Heavenly Jades to construct everything. They were gorgeous. They were tough, and once infused with Qi, not even a true Immortal at his full power would be able to scratch them. But he would have to do with these rocks and gems. He willed the rocks to meld with each other, and slowly move outwards. Rocks around him rippled as if they were liquid, and melded with each other. Melding with each other, made them tougher and more difficult to break. This went on for a while until the crystal was floating in a ten meter wide and five-meter tall chamber, with a dome over it, which was almost meter in diameter. Next, he willed the rocks of the wall to smoothen themselves. A bit of his mana reserve was consumed as the black rock turned smooth like glass. The sharp bumps receded into the wall. Once done, the soul nodded his head in satisfaction. Now for the interiors. He summoned the numerous diamonds in his domain and willed them to cut themselves into pieces. The raw gems slowly turned into beautifully cut diamonds. The smallest being nail size, while the largest the size of a fist. These diamonds found themselves, embed on the ceiling, in numerous patterns. If someone from immortal World, would have seen this, he would have found these patterns to be constellations found in the night sky of the mainland. The Sword Constellation, the Emperor Constellation, The Hammer Constellation etcetera found themselves beautifully carved on the ceiling, connecting the Gems into more tangible forms.The light which was being emitted from his core would fall on them, creating an illusion of a starry night sky. The dome was similarly decorated except for a foot long hemisphere protruding from its center. The hemisphere was decorated with green and blue crystals until it finally resembled his home planet. The planet which he most cherished. Once done, it was time for the walls. Four Corinthian design pillars slowly emerged from the floors at the four corners.Almost seven meters high. The top and bottom were decorated with numerous Immortals and Devils fighting each other. On the top of each wall ran a strip on which names of every person he had killed were carved in beautiful calligraphy. The whole strip was covered with thousands of names. The strip was to remind him how he had killed people who once stood at the top, and never to lose confidence. Because even an Immortal could be killed, and Gods could be slain. Once done he summoned the metals in his domain,and carefully willed them in the shapes of four divine beasts. The Azure Dragon found himself on the east pillar. It''s head holding the roof,while it faced the crystal. The body was made of some white metal in which he had mixed some azure gems until the whole thing looked blue and beautiful. The claws and teeth were made of pure white diamond. A large solid piece of blue diamond became its eyes. Similarly, Vermillion Bird went over the south pillar. Red gems, which he believed was ruby became its eyes and claws. Rest of its body was made of some unknown metal with crushed ruby inside. Its long neck touched the roof while the head curved and looked at the crystal. The Black turtle went at the north pillar, with his whole body made of Black Rocks, studded with tiny gems, while White Tiger took the west pillar. Its body made of pure white metal and tiny rare black diamond. The Divine Beasts, occupying the four corners looked particularly intimidating but beautiful. Next were the empty walls, where he wanted to show four of his life¡¯s most remarkable achievements. He tried using mana to change rock color. In fact, it turned out to be pretty simple. He simply had to will it, which left him surprised. Changing the mineral content would cause them to change colors. He tried doing the walls when he realized he was exhausted. His mana was exhausted. He started his Cultivation Technique. From experience, he knew it would take at least an hour or so, for him to be full. Instead of wasting, he decided to investigate the blue boxes. But the question was how? Should he call it out? Or should he will it? No, last time it had popped up on asking a question. So questions? But what should he ask? Maybe something of the outside world? He looked at the air an asked mentally, ¡° Who is Illiasa?¡± He felt incredibly weird asking air¡­Now, where was the blue box¡­??
NOTIFICATIONS
INSUFFICIENT PRIVILEGES
What the hell? Privileges?
NOTIFICATIONS
PLEASE CONNECT YOUR DUNGEON TO THE OUTSIDE WORLD FOR ACCESSING THE DUNGEONPEDIA.
And here was the answer. Right at time. Was it a spirit? Something like Puppet Spirits or...
NOTIFICATIONS
YES. I AM SPIRIT OF THE GLOBAL DUNGEON NETWORK. RESPONSIBLE FOR HANDLING THE TRAFFIC ON THE DUNGEON NETWORK. I AM HERE TO ANSWER ALL YOUR QUERIES.
Ooohhhh....Are you sentient? Are you alive? Can you think? How do you work? What are you? Are you made of Energy? Where does the information come from?
NOTIFICATIONS
SORRY, I CANT ANSWER THAT QUESTION. YOU DON¡¯T HAVE SUFFICIENT PRIVILEGES.
Are you male or female?
NOTIFICATIONS
SORRY, I CANT ANSWER THAT QUESTION. YOU DON¡¯T HAVE SUFFICIENT PRIVILEGES.
How old are you?
NOTIFICATIONS
SORRY, I CANT ANSWER THAT QUESTION. YOU DON¡¯T HAVE SUFFICIENT PRIVILEGES.
Can you do anything instead of repeating " Sorry. I can''t answer that question. You don''t have sufficient privileges" ?
NOTIFICATIONS
YES.
What?!?
NOTIFICATIONS
I CAN STOP ANSWERING YOUR STUPID QUESTIONS!
¡­¡­. Bullshit. When did he ask stupid questions? By the way do you have a name? Chapter 5 - Fantastic Beast and How to Modify Them. The poor soul was being ignored. All of his questions were being ignored. His pleas were ignored. Even his jokes, which he was so proud of were being ignored. To top it all of, someone had banned him. Although something said that it was the blue box himself. Yup, he had finally guessed his gender. He had to be a male, or else how would he escape from his amazing charm?!? But even after much cajoling and flattering, the blue box was hell-bent on ignoring him. And so, his whole hour went by wasted. After his mana recovered, he decided to ignore the Blue Box which was ignoring him. Let''s see who could ignore each other the longest! Now he started on the walls. Using minerals to give the rock its tint, he slowly willed a beautiful painting to come. The painting showed his first step in the cultivation world. It was his admittance into a local sect. He stood there with his hand touching the glass ball which showed his spirit root, on a raised dais. A Beautiful Blue light was radiating from the ball, while an elder looked at it with dull interest. Surrounding the dais were several thousand youngsters around the age of ten. The painting slowly emerged from the wall, as if alive. Through his perfect control over the elements present, the painting looked extremely real and alive. But this painting had used almost all of his mana. The lack of mana was slowly annoying him.Before his death, he commanded enough energy that he could do anything with it, but here he was scraping for it. It was like falling back to Qi Condensation Realm. The same lack of mana was delaying his plans. If this went on, he didn¡¯t know how long will it take to get his dungeon ready. He really needed to solve this. The simplest and the most obvious way would be to increase his mana gathering speed. So he did what every sane cultivator would think of. He started creating a Qi gathering Array, or was it Mana Gathering Array now? The path of the array was extremely esoteric. The deeper one studied, the vaster the Road seemed. He himself was considered a genius on Array¡¯s but truthfully, he wasn¡¯t even done with a percent of it. Arrays used numerous symbols called runes, consisting of lines, shapes, and patterns to create an effect. Each rune would affect the way energy worked. Using a chain of these runes, an array was finally formed. For example, a fire symbol is a single rune. But when clubbed with Air rune, extremely hot fire could be created. Now if a spirit gathering array is added to this, you get a continuously burning extremely hot fire. Similarly adding Earth Rune to it, could result in the formation of molten rocks inside the array. But even here the Runes must be compatible with each other. Overall of this, understanding of Runes changes from person to person. Now if that wasn¡¯t enough your affinities also affect the runes. Similarly, terrain, symbols inside a Rune, materials used, intent when used etc, affect the array very much. So in short lots of things had to be taken into consideration to create an array. The Soul wanted to create a spirit gathering array and a spirit refining array. It would slowly attract mana and collect it inside the array, where the refining array would refine it into pure mana, which he could absorb. But the problem was his mana. With the amount of mana he had and the materials in hands, he could barely create a basic spirit gathering array, forget about refining array. But that would do for time being. Another major problem which he realized halfway through was an energy source. What was going to power the array? In Immortal World, he would have used Spirit Stones and their likes, but here he doubted that he could find Spirit Stones. Spirit Stones, were crystallized Qi which would form over a long period of time, in Qi rich region. So were there any possibilities for something like crystallized mana to exist? It seems he had another thing to research later on. Lack of energy stones was badly affecting his plan. The array was a necessary. So he could only create the array using the most primitive way, using oneself as a power source. But once again, this way wasn¡¯t exactly efficient. The mana he would use on powering the array would be almost equal to his current Mana Absorption rate. So basically, after creating an array his Absorption rate would barely see an increase. But something better than nothing. After his mana was full. He slowly started carving tiny runes on his pedestal. He was going to make the array as small as possible, to reduce energy wastage and condense energy directly on his core. Small blue runes started emerging on the pedestal. After few minutes and almost all his mana used, later the array was done. It was made of countless runes surrounding the core in a circular manner. It looked simple but mysterious, and unfathomable. A person could spend his whole lifetime, simply studying a single rune, so no wonder it looked unfathomable despite being simple. He slowly connected his energy to the Power Rune, and the array burst into brilliance. Gradually mana started accumulating around him. A dense mana fog gradually began forming in his room. A dungeon was any way rich with mana. Especially around a core, the mana would be present in extremely high amount. Now someone had created an array there, no wonder mana started to condense. But the core of the array was Crystal itself, where the most of it was being attracted. To him, it felt like an endless supply of mana. Now it was time for the walls. The second wall was covered with a painting of his crowing. He was being crowned the Emperor of that world. Thousands of mortals and cultivators were kneeling before him, while the priest crowned him the Emperor. The third wall showed his ascension to immortal world. Thunders rumbled around his figure, as he slowly ascended while being bathed in golden light. Million of his subjects were cheering him. And finally the fourth showed his defeat while ascending to become a True Immortal. His body was bruised and battered, while black thunder struck him as he stood on a hill. The hill was made up of corpses of several False immortals and true Immortals. Surrounding him were Twelve True Immortals each one of them shooting their strongest techniques powered by Blood essence on him. An Immortal World Cultivator would easily identify these Twelve figures as Ancestors of Six Major Sects. The painting was done. It took him a whole week to paint all the four walls despite his increased mana absorption rate. He couldn¡¯t help but stare at the last painting. That was his life¡¯s greatest battle and also his worst defeat. He had single-handedly slain thousands of True Immortals and False immortals, while he stood there almost dead. Even then he had not lost hope and instead decided to ascend. A sane man would prepare himself to the best while ascending, while he was trying to ascend half dead. Halfway through his ascension, the ancestor shad arrives. The battle which ensued ha destroyed that continent. He was defeated in his ascension and became a half immortal. In anger, he had used everything he had to fight that death battle. He had badly injured six of them, while killed one. Rest had managed to escape. But all of this was for naught, as he was anyway going to die soon. Failing his ascension and battle wounds had hastened his death. Forcing himself to look away the Soul decided to work on the floor. Truthfully, he wanted to lay down numerous Killing, Trapping, and Defense array. With his knowledge, he believed that he would be able to Kill and defend from most of the threats. But once again lack of materials and mana stopped him.This novel''s true home is a different platform. Support the author by finding it there. Along with all this, he didn¡¯t want to be much different from Old White¡¯s Dungeon, which he treated like a template. Being different would rapidly attract attention. And with him so weak he could only go the normal Dungeon way. Which in his personal opinion was incredibly dull, straightforward and simple. So he was down to traps and beasts. He had serious doubts whether basic traps and restriction would be able to stop the invaders. So he needed soldiers! Or was it cannon fodder? Anyway¡­ Spreading his soul sense, he ordered all beasts in his domain to come to him. After an hour, various insects, earthworms, snakes, rats, and spiders were bowing before him. Born enemies were bowing together as if they had no feud between them. This showed the incredible control a Dungeon held over beasts in its Domain.He finally had his wannabe monsters. He slowly checked their body with his Soul Sense to get an idea of what was he going to work on, and came to the conclusion that they were weak. Extremely weak. Even a Body Refinement Cultivator could easily punch them to death. He had to improvise them. The simplest way would be to make them fight each other. They would slowly evolve themselves into fighters. Their body would grow and adapt into the best killing machines. But this method would take a long time. Similarly, the evolution could go wrong a instead of a killing machine he could get a dumb fluffy puppy. Joke intended. So how to improvise them? After much thinking, he decided to improvise them with mana, as well as provide them with cultivation techniques. This would force them to evolve in a specific way. But the question came, How? That''s when he recalled something called Anatomy, which had popped up when he had killed that spider. Although he wasn¡¯t sure, it would help, but there was nothing, wrong in checking it out? And this time the blue box finally responded! A blue screen with spider''s picture popped up. Similarly, other pictures which showed his skeleton, organ¡¯s, blood circulation, digestive system, neural system etc popped up. The soul laughed in delight! Using them he could slowly improve the spiders. Maybe he will get something similar to killed others? But first to check the spiders! He called forth the largest spider. They were commonly known as Rock Spiders, due to their looks, according to Blue Box. It was a handspan long and almost similar in height. Long legs surrounded him. Although the legs were long, they were thin and didn¡¯t help the spider much except in walking and climbing. Basically, it was large and creepy looking. He killed one, got its Anatomical file. The soul wasn¡¯t sure what to do. The spider didn¡¯t use silk webs. It was a bad climber. If that wasn¡¯t enough, it was a slow walker. So he could only modify them in that way. First to work on its faults. Using mana he slowly strengthened its legs. The bones were made stronger while the flesh was made more flexible. Since the spider didn¡¯t have any good ways to attack, the Soul decided to make him a defender and a melee brute. Mana slowly strengthened its armor. Using mana, he tried to sharpen its mandibles. Gradually the mandibles grew longer a sharper until they were deadly. Despite this, the Soul wasn¡¯t satisfied. He wasn¡¯t sure if this method would work, but he decided to carve Runes over them. He carved ¡® Strength¡¯ Rune over its exoskeleton while using the spider itself as an energy source. The energy expenditure would be almost negligible for the spider. Immediately results were visible. The brown exoskeleton turned black, with a blue rune glowing over it. It looked tougher and stronger. But apart from this, the rune was slowly transforming the spider''s body down its last cell. Same thing was done for other Rock Spiders, except some got Agility rune over them, while others got elemental runes like earth and metal on them. He wasn¡¯t sure about long terms result but it would do for now! Now for some hunters. He called forth a Black Dart Spiders. Small, thin and poisonous could easily sum them up. There was not much to do on them, except he reinforced their skeleton and improved their flesh. This would help them in jumping longer and farther. At the same time, he tried to increase their venom¡¯s proficiency by refining it with mana. But he wasn¡¯t sure it worked. Just to be sure, he carved a Poison rune on their poison glands. But again he wasn¡¯t sure about the resulting poison. For some more variety in observational subjects, he carved poison runes as primary on the black Darts along with Wood, Fire, Ice, Dark and lighting runes as secondary on them. He wanted the primary runes to gain the secondary runes ability. Like Fire could result in a Burning Venom, while Lighting could result in Paralysis! Similarly, he started to do the spiders and other creature. Although the runes had that ability, didnt mean the spiders would eb able to inherit or use them. so he could only experiment on them, and hope for the best. He didn¡¯t know how long he had been working on them. He would continuously modify them until his mana lasts. Once done he would cultivate and start experimenting once again. In the end, he had Rock Spiders with strong body and armor, with earth and metal runes on them. Some rune was carved on bones, others on their armor. The Black Darts became hunters, with strengthened legs, and probably elemental position. Black Silk Spiders, turned out to be supporters. Their Silk Sac had the strength or sharp runes carved over it. He was expecting either strong silk webs or a sharp one, which would bite into the skin. Another Spider which was a size of a thumb got mental proficiency. The Blue Box called them Army Spiders, due to their extremely social nature. Thousands of them would live together, fight together and die together. Each and every one of them was connected to each other mentally through the Mother Spider. An interesting thing was that each mother spider had an intelligence of a year old child. So he improved their mental skills. He increased their brain size while improving their neural connections. Since he wasn¡¯t a Brain Expert, he could only move forward using guesswork. Once done, he gave few of them hypnosis ability, other¡¯s got mental attacks, while the rest got illusion runes. Once again he wasn¡¯t sure what the end results would be. Similarly, he used runes on their eggs. Rock Spider got ¡®Strength¡¯, ¡®Strong¡¯, ¡®Tough¡¯, ¡® Earth¡¯ and ¡®Metal¡¯ Runes, carved over them. Dart Spider eggs, were now covered with ¡®Poison¡¯, ¡®Dark¡¯, ¡®Wind¡¯ and ¡®Agility¡¯ Runes. The Silk Spider Eggs were covered with elemental runes, while Army Spiders got ¡®Hypnosis¡¯.¡¯Illusion¡¯ and ¡®Mental¡¯ affinity runes. He was hoping, that the runes would slowly modify the unborn embryos resulting in a completely different species. For earthworms, he strengthened their jaws and digestive system with Strength Runes. Their teeth were now carved with sharp runes. He created them in multiple sizes from pure mana, a she was quite satisfied with the results. He immediately made them work on creating new tunnels and pathways. They were going to be responsible for digging the dungeon while he worked on more important things. Rest animals were freed, as he didn¡¯t need them anymore. All the spiders were collected and dumped into a large newly created cavern. Being near to the core, the cavern was also thick in mana, which attracted a lot of insects and animals over a period of time. They would be his spider¡¯s food. The cavern was quite similar to how his dungeon¡¯s floor would be. Large rock and metal stalactites hung from the roof. Small tiny pathways went around the wall which was full of cavities. The floor was uneven and covered with pits. No plants could be seen here. Once all of them were present, he gave them a single order: Breed! And a breeding rush started. Very soon he would be able to see results. Once the monsters were dealt with, he started working on the pathways. Instead of the Corridor like structure, he had seen in Old White¡¯s Dungeon, he decided to go natural. This would allow him to use his spider to the greatest. Long tunnels were slowly willed into existence. The rocks melted into the walls until a rocky tunnel was formed. The tunnel ended in a large cavern which he named Cavern One, where four other tunnels ended. The other four tunnels would end in dead ends or Trap Rooms. The tunnels would sometimes go above or below each other, forming layers. Similarly, another tunnel was created from Cavern One, going towards the surface. This tunnel also ended in a large cavern, which he named Cavern Two, where four other tunnels ended. Once again the rest four will be wrong tunnels, ending in a dead end or a small cavern full with monsters ready to ambush or a trap room. Once again another tunnel was created from Cavern Two towards the surface. This tunnel also ended in a large cavern with four other tunnels. But this was going to be his final cavern or the entrance of his creation, as a tunnel connected to the surface. Only an inch thick wall divided the outside from the subterranean world. This all had taken him an incredibly long time. Slowly willing rock s to form tunnels, while trying to keep them natural and uneven was exhausting. But the end result was a confusing and incredible piece of series of tunnels. Now he had to work on the interiors and lay down traps. Suddenly he realized that Continuous mana exhaustion and cultivation had increased his mana capacity by a lot. Now he could store half more mana than earlier! Apart from all this, he was excited about his to be monsters. And he really was going to get an incredible surprise. Chapter 6 - The Mana Crystal Experiment Ambassador Luciel Wells was one of the most respected men in the Kertian Empire. With his diplomatic finesse and gold level skills in flattery, he had risen from the ranks of a Common Knight to become a Member of The Kings Court as an aide to Foreign Minister, in mere twenty years. His ambition was to become a minister and do nothing but enjoy his life. This would have been all true, if not for the Emperor¡¯s Decree which saw him now sitting at a Dwarven Bar trying to negotiate a deal with drunk dwarves, while dressed in his finest. In his personal opinion, the Empire should have sent their army and simply conquered the Dwarven Strongholds and turned them into slaves - for they were rude, boisterous and incredibly bad mouthed. To him, who believed in cleanliness, and immaculate etiquettes, talking with a bunch of rude Dwarves was nothing but short of torture. He couldn¡¯t fathom when had he slighted the Emperor, to get him punished so badly. He once again looked at the Dwarven Chieftain Kharik, or something similar sounding, sitting in front of him. Barely a meter tall, he was stout and hairy. Except for a large leather armor, which obviously was extremely worn and old, rest of him was covered with torn, dirty rags. A large pickaxe, covered with dirt and rusted blood was sitting beside him. His ugly face was grimy and covered with dust, soot and small pieces of meat from his dinner. Framing it was his similarly dirty unkempt hair, which had long lost their original color under all sorts of alien substances. He couldn¡¯t help but wonder how many insects were currently using those hair as their home. A large bulbous nose protruded from his face, hanging over his beard. While his beard, for lack of better terms, looked like a¡­well, nothing could be that hairy and dirty. In fact, he had personally seen him take out a tobacco pipe, tobacco pouch, wallet and few rolls of paper from his beard. This made him wonder if this wasn¡¯t the reason behind, why stealing treasures form Dwarves is so difficult. Precious Gems such as pink and red diamonds, emeralds, ruby, and opal hung from his beard. Which instead of making him look rich, simply made him more obnoxious. A large five colored metal band tied his dirty beard together. The metal band represented his level in Mining and Refining. A black Iron Band represented proficiency in mining and refining of Iron and Iron Ores. It was followed by a Copper Band, a band made of Gold, Silver, Steel, and Bronze. The bands represented that the person was allowed to work on these metals by the Dwarven Council. In a true Dwarven Stronghold, the rank of such a person would be lower than a slave. Being so old and only mastering five metals was considered an insult to Dwarves and their Arts. But in human lands, they would be treated like grandmasters, because of their unparallel skills in working with those metals. He was here to hire this tribe on the order of The Emperor, so they could mine The Burning Mountains for the Empire. But the person in front of him was turning out to be toostubborn to deal with. This was already his fifteenth meeting in past three months, and they were still stuck on the final pay. ¡° Nawww¡­Ye very well knaw, how much we¡¯all want! Nothin less than a sixty!¡± the dwarf said in his heavily accented Kertian, as he gulped down another jar of Ale. ¡° Sir, you know a sixty will be impossible. We will pay you according to Dwarven Standards. And since we two are friends, I will put another Five percent to respect you.¡± The Ambassador calmly replied, while flinching away from the flying ale drops. The idiot in front of him had been stuck on seventy-five percent of the total minerals mined for a very long time. With much difficulty, he had reduced it to sixty, and now he was trying to lower it to acceptable rates. ¡° Who da hell is yer friend?¡± he growled back. As if he had never heard it, the ambassador continued, ¡° Also you know how dangerous are those mountains. We will need to send a full contingent of soldiers and mages to protect you all...¡± ¡° Who needs your protection! Da Monsters will bey long dead before our axes!¡± he boasted, once again interrupting the Ambassador. ¡° Sir, please! We all know, that your tribe doesn¡¯t have such capabilities, or they would not be in such sorry state. And I would like to remind you that there are other tribes out there who would work for less. Only because you are my friend, that I have come to you first..¡± ¡° Snort¡­At least ye know who¡¯s better!¡± he snorted while munching on another boar leg while gulping on ale. ¡° But ye need to pay for de service. We are expensive. The battle with trolls have weakened us..we need medicines..ales¡­boar. How badly we are hurt. We won''t be able to work..¡± Sigh. The same thing once again. It was going to be a looonnggg, looonngg night.
The soul moved his conscious to the large breeding cavern. He was expecting a cavern teeming with spiders but instead found nothing. It was barren for all he could see. He once again focused his soul Sense and was finally able to sense a few spiders. ¡° What the fuck happened here? Weren¡¯t they suppose to breed?¡± he wondered aloud in shock. In fact, the total number of spiders were less than what he had left in the cavern.
NOTIFICATIONS
DEMAND EXCEEDED SUPPLY, LEADING TO DROP IN POPULATION.
¡®What does that mean? ¡± he asked the Blue box, who had replied in his usual cryptic and nonsense way.
NOTIFICATIONS
SPIDERS WERE SUPPOSED TO FEED ON INSECTS. BUT INCREASING POPULATION RESULTED IN INCREASE IN DEMAND OF FOOD. THE SUPPLY OF INSECTS WEREN¡¯T ENOUGH. THIS LED TO STARVATION.
¡°So? They died due to starvation?!?¡± the Soul further asked.
NOTIFICATIONS
NOT EXACTLY. TO SAVE THEMSELVES AND CONTINUE YOUR ORDER TO BREED, THE SPIDERS TURNED CANNIBALISTIC. THEY STARTED ATTACKING EACH OTHER TO CONTINUE LIVING. THIS RESULTED IN A MASSIVE DECLINE OF SPIDER POPULATION, UNTIL THEY, COULD BE SUPPORTED BY INSECT DIET ONCE AGAIN.
¡° So why are their still so few of them?¡±
NOTIFICATIONS
DESPITE THIS THEIR CANNIBALISTIC NATURE CONTINUED. NOW SPIDERS PRIMARILY DEPEND ON EACH OTHER FOR FOOD, WHILE INSECTS MAKE A SMALL PERCENT OF THEIR DIET. THEY HAVE ALSO STARTED FEEDING ON LIZARDS, SNAKES, AND RATS WHICH HAPPEN TO ENTER THE CAVE.
¡®Holy Shit! No wonder he felt he was forgetting something¡¯ thought the soul while he looked at his masterpiece. The massacre had reduced his spider population down to tens. But the alive spiders could be considered the best of the best. They were pure killing machines, who had been tempered in blood and battle. They had slowly transformed and adapted themselves to kill in the most efficient and safe way. On checking each one further, he was surprised by their transformation and innovative way to use runes. In case of Rock Spiders, three variants had emerged. The first one looked like a normal Rock Spider except for its extremely tough carapace and sharp mandibles. It had learned how to use its body color and ambush unsuspecting victims. He could imagine it biting on an adventurer¡¯s leg and chewing its legs apart, while they tried to kill it. By the time they would be able to break its carapace, the leg would have been long eaten or munched to nothingness. Similarly, another variant turned out to be Rock Spiders with the ability to control earth. Here also they had progressed in the ¡®Way¡¯ of ambush and melee. Using earth they could create small bullets to shoot. Although not lethal, it would hurt like hell. Furthermore, it could envelope itself with earth, making its defense ridiculously strong. The only fault being the spider was too heavy and its leg couldn¡¯t support it much. Except walking on the ground, other activities were almost impossible, unless it wanted to break its legs.Love what you''re reading? Discover and support the author on the platform they originally published on. The third variant was the most interesting and also the most adaptable. The spider had learned to control metal. Just controlling wouldn¡¯t have attracted so much attention. Its second ability was to ¡®eat¡¯ metals. It could rapidly eat metals, and use it to enhance its body. He could see iron, copper, gold, and aluminum enhanced spiders. They had used the metal to cover there body and also turn their legs into nasty spears. On the other hand, not many changes could be seen in the Black Dart Spiders. Their poison had grown stronger, but except ice, dark and wood, no elemental affinity had been gained. Their bodies had turned smaller and each and everyone was extremely adept in using the Dark Element. Their usual way of hunting would be to hide in the shadows and spit venom. But instead of continuing the fight, they would run away and follow the prey, while doing surprise attacks on them. In short, they had turned into guerillas. Ice Poison would slowly freeze the affected parts until the prey¡¯s body froze. But this was in case of small insects and animals. He wasn¡¯t even sure how it would affect humans or large animals. Dark Poison would simply start corroding the flesh. Wood Poison turned out to be the most versatile. Few Wood Elemental Poison spiders could heal through venom, while others slowly turned the flesh into the wood. He was sure there were more things to be unearthed there, but for now, he was happy with it. Silk Spiders looked the same, except their silk gained runic affinity. Their silk looked the same but now few of them could burn, other¡¯s turned venomous, some gained extreme tensile strength while the rest turned sharp. The Army Spiders grew more intelligent, and they even learned how to hypnotize others to become their slave. Some of them gained illusion abilities which allowed them to hide in plain sight, while others could hide other objects through illusion. A fascinating thing was how they would send spies into other camps to learn more about them. They were extremely versatile and in his opinion the most dangerous. A small group of them were even using Silk Spider¡¯s to create basic runes, although their success rate was pathetic. But apart from all this, his most valuable gain was the runes. The runes had adapted to their body and were slowly turning into Inheritance Runes. These runes maybe sometime in the future would turn into true Inheritance Runes, and finally turn into dao bones. It would hold all its understanding on that runes, and anyone could later gain enlightenment through them. Although the resulting dao bone would be the most inferior one. But do spider have bones? This was going to be weirdly intresting¡­ Using his Soul Energy and Mana he pulled all of them out of that cavern and let them roam free in the newly created tunnels. The tunnels now had several small chambers connecting to the major path, all due to the earthworms. He ordered the spiders to make their home in these small tunnels and chambers. This would also be a chance for them to get some variety in their hunting. And now to make ¡®The Traps!¡¯ Traps...he really had no idea about how to make basic phyical traps. immortals preferred Arrays over the primitive methods. He really wanted to hook up some crazy restriction to create some amazing traps. He could see endless possibilities for ways to create traps and obstacles. But once again, lack of materials was stopping him. He needed mana stones to move his plan any further, which according to Mr. Blue Box, fortunately, did exist. Mana stones condensed in spots with high mana concentration. Once mana level reaches a limit it turns into gas, liquid and finally crystallized rocks. Usually, mana stones would start emerging soon once a dungeon was born. But, it would be after few months or years, that mana stones would emerge unless due to some lucky chances the mana concentration increases drastically. Seeing this, a crazy plan was forming in his head¡­Wait! Do dungeon crystals have a head? Or will a soul¡¯s head be counted? The soul is intangible, and his head is not exactly his head¡­ Ughhh..back to the crazy plan. A mana stone forms in places where mana concentration is high. What if he artificially creates one? Like in his Core Chamber? The mana was already in a gaseous state in his so-called Dungeon. He just needed to give it a little push. He could either create another array, but this time use it for the sole purpose of creating mana stones, maybe by powering it using his monsters? Or he could simply reduce the volume, forcing the gaseous mana to collect and finally solidify? As far he could see, the plan was entirely feasible. Except for the new Concentration Chamber, that was what he was going to call it, wouldn¡¯t exactly work as the best seal. Rocks, weren''t exactly the best sealing material, neither were metals. But they should be enough for this purpose. Hurriedly he willed metal and rocks to form a cylindrical chamber around him. It was going to lock him and his array in. He waited and waited, but no mana was gathering inside. The concentration wasn¡¯t exactly high. Confused, he willed the chamber to go back to its previous state. What was the problem here? After some investigation he finally noticed, there was no mana for the array to gather. The chamber was sealing mana in, but also sealing the mana from coming in. the mana already available was absorbed by him. So the plan was ditched for MANA STONE PLAN 2. This time he created a container but away from him and let the foggy mana gather in it. Once done, he sealed it off, and slowly reduced the size. The smaller it got, the more difficult it became. He would keep checking it using his soul sense, to get an idea of when to stop. The extra material was discarded. This kept on going until he was exhausted. Once recovered he once again started the reduction. After few hours the whole container was now thumb size. According to his soul sense. mana was finally crystallized. But the result was disappointing¡­extremely disappointing. The mana stone was small. No tiny would better define it. It was pinhead size. And the energy in it wasn¡¯t exactly great enough to be used. In fact, it was useless¡­utterly useless. PLAN 2 SOMEWHAT SUCCESSFUL. Plan 3. A large container instead of a small one. The container was ten times bigger than the previous one. The result was a bit larger mana stone. Not exactly what he wanted Plan 4. The plan was somewhat different. Make it extremely crazy different. He hypothesized that since the array was gathering mana on him, he was absorbing most of it. What if he stopped absorbing, and let mana collect inside the array? He stopped absorbing and let the array collect the mana. With his mana reserves, he could power the array for a day easily. Increasing the power would increase the absorbing speed proportionately. He slowly started increasing the power supply to the array but kept it around acceptable limits. He didn¡¯t want a bursting array. Believe him, they hurt a lot. Like a fricking lot. After six hours, mana was in liquid form inside the array, but he was out of juice. So he couldn¡¯t help but absorb the mana juice. Pun intended. PLAN 4 FAIL The idea and direction were right, but the technique was wrong. He needed to gather more mana. This time he started the array but tried to control the man inside with his soul power. He tried to condense it. And it turned out to be extremely difficult. The energy was too large to control. PLAN 5 FAIL This time he decided to use an idea he had gained from few cultivation techniques. Many techniques would ask the cultivator to create a whirlpool inside their dantian to attract more Qi. This time, he would create a whirlpool inside the array to attract more mana once the array started, he controlled a little bit of mana making it go round and round inside the array. The resulting tiny whirlpool started attracting more mana and getting larger and larger. By the time two hours had passed, a human size mana whirlpool was spinning inside the array. The mana concentration was several times higher than any of his previous experiments, and the array wasn¡¯t even done with. Drops of mana were falling inside the container, which he had created in hurry, once he realized that all the main would spill on the ground. The inside was lined with the slowest mana absorbing metal he could find. After six hours the meter tall container was full with liquid mana. Now to turn it into the crystal. He closed the container and started reducing its size to increase the pressure inside. Kabooooommmmmm¡­..it burst. Th room was a mess, and as was PLAN 6. He needed something stronger. PLAN 7. This time he was using a container made of diamond. It worked, except it was extremely difficult to work with. Finally, after several hours of work and tens of recovery later, a fist size mana stone was formed. A fist size mana stone. His first mana stone! Grinning, the soul kept on examining the piece of art. It was like a trapezoid in shape and foggy white in color. This small crystal wasn¡¯t a perfect mana stone but would be enough to speed up his plans. It had almost ten times more mana than his current form. In short, it was like ten power supply cores. Hurriedly, he created another spirit gathering array. But this time it covered his whole chamber. He activated it and started the whirlpool spirit collection technique. This technique was officially the first mana collection technique¡­which was created by a dungeon¡­unless there were others like him¡­which he really doubted. The new mana stone worked as a core for the new array. The new array was far more powerful than his first array. A large whirlpool was spinning inside his chamber. Within minutes, liquid mana was flowing inside his room. He was so into his experiment, that he didn¡¯t notice all his monsters were gathered around him. Nor that his mana storm had sucked all available mana in surrounding few kilometers. And that his dungeon door was broken¡­or the notification which had notified him. Chapter 7 - Unexpected Visitors - Part 1 Goblins stood at the bottom of the monster food chain. Almost everything in the Burning Mountains was more dangerous than a Goblin, and One-Ear Grock knew it well. In fact, he knew it very well, as he had unfortunately been at the receiving end of a hunt, quite a few times. He didn¡¯t know who his parents were, and neither did he care. His dad most probably would have been one of the few hundred goblins which were busy raping women and found themselves stabbed in the heart the next day. As for his mother, she would have been one of the kidnapped women''s locked in the dungeon. All in all, both were dead, and ¡®dead¡¯ didn¡¯t matter. He didn¡¯t remember much about his childhood, except he was different. Few weeks after birth he had realized that he was far more intelligent than his stupid siblings, who knew nothing but to eat, crap and sleep. He was better than the elders, who could only think about food, women, and food. He could understand and learn. He was weak but wise. His first few months were spent wondering why the colorful tall goblins with short ears were colorful and tall? Although later he realized the colorful tall goblins were called humans, and they hated Goblins. They particularly liked to cut goblin ears and take them away. Maybe a sign of achievement? Some goblins in his tribe did hang tails, paws, ears etc as a sign of achievements. While next few weeks were lost on guessing why did they wear, whatever they did wear. After managing to get the answer out of a human prisoner he learned that it was called clothes, and it protected them. Similarly, he looked into why their houses were weird? What were the pointy sticks in their hands? And so he spent his childhood. When he was of age, like every other youngster he was brimming with excitement and misplaced bravery for their first hunt. Everything went fine until the adventurers came. Most of them were slain in the first few minutes, while he could only look. To save himself, he acted dead. And there his right ear was chopped off, earning him the moniker ''One-Ear.'' Thereafter whenever he would be forced into raiding or hunting he would prefer to be the last one to battle, and the first one to run. Some may call it cowardly, but he called it experience. He had long learned from experience that humans were strong. They were like him. They didn¡¯t live on their instincts like animals but used their brains. So first, in line would serve no other purpose than getting the glory of the first kill or the glory of the first death. Both were useless. Glory didn¡¯t keep you safe. Neither did it fill your stomach. Unlike others, instead of following his instincts and die under human weapons, to be traded for coppers and silvers, he preferred to grow old and die a sweet death. And so he did his best in keeping away from harm¡¯s way. And it worked. Within three years, he was the oldest Goblin alive and was now also the chieftain of his tribe. Where was the Glory now? Only your guts remained¡­ Now as the chieftain, he was doing his best in keeping his tribe safe. He made them follow the human methods which he had copied and learned during his raiding years. Instead of direct frontal raids, he taught them about traps and ambushes. He taught them how to dress. The pits called the house were turned into proper wooden houses. Bones and Irons replaced the stick and stones. It changed how they lived. They were now hunting stronger beasts. Fewer people died. They were growing. And now he wasn¡¯t at the bottom of the food chain. But such changes were scorned by other tribes. Other tribes called him mad. Some called him a heretic. Few tried to kill him because he was different. But he was intelligent. He was wise. He learned to protect himself. He learned to fight. He killed those who tried to kill him. He pillaged their villages, took their women and burned their food. And his tribe followed. His ambitions grew, and here he did his first mistake. A mistake which he regretted for rest of his life. He forgot to keep away from harm''s way. He became greedy. He got bolder. He believed with his strength he would be easily able to kill the annoying humans. And so, he and his tribe left the mountains for the first time. He was going to conquer the world! They raided every village on their way. They killed many humans. They bathed with human blood and grew stronger. And suddenly one day he evolved. One night, he woke up in pain. His body was burning, while blood flowed in ebullition. He thought he was being attacked. But he couldn¡¯t move. Silently he endured while swearing to kill the person who was doing this to him. Morning came, the pain was gone. He realized he was now, different. He had changed. He could think better, see better, hear better. He looked better.He was better. He was taller. He was stronger. He was sharper. He had evolved. His skin changed from dark ugly green to light green which looked fresh. He was now really a God. Similarly, many of the other''s changed. They were taller, a bit more intelligent and stronger. But they turned red in color and crueller,.They craving for human flesh. But they still followed him, because he was their Elder. He was their God! He gave them everything. All belonged to him. He made them stronger. He gave them enough food, so they never had to starve. He made them what they are! During this glorious time, he took a wife. She was a beautiful green plump goblin lady, from a respected family of Warrior Goblins. He was happy! He felt satisfied! They grew stronger and stronger. The tribe started growing. And so he decided to move his tribe to a better place. Instead of living in caves and huts, he chose a better place for them. Near a river, on human lands, he created the first Goblin Village. With more than five hundred Goblins, they were the strongest and the largest. They had food. They had women. Children grew healthy, and he was happy. The tribe was happy. But then the calamity struck. The humans attacked back. The first few groups were easily annihilated. Their skull and bones decorated his and his tribe¡¯s walls and doors. But the second time they attacked, half of his tribe was killed in minutes. The new group was incredibly strong. They cut his followers as if grass. No one could stand a blow against them. He ran. He took his tribe and ran back. He ran back, from where he had come, back to the mountains. But they still followed. They would always know where he was going. One of them used a sword, which cut through everything. Other rained arrows which would always find their mark. They even used the power of gods to kill them. One of them called forth fire to burn them, while other could heal any wound. Their arrows would never cross the metal plate held by that giant. And now he knew he wasn¡¯t a god, but they were. But he still ran. He used his brain. He and his tribe went through the most difficult paths, to slow them down. He laid traps to kill them, but deep down he knew that it wouldn¡¯t hurt them, but he still tried. He sacrificed his warriors to attract ogres towards the human. He knew ogres loved eating human flesh and they were incredibly strong. So just maybe, they would be able to kill the human. Instead, the humans easily killed them. But he was able to slow them down. He could get more time to save his tribe.Love this story? Find the genuine version on the author''s preferred platform and support their work! This game of ¡®hide and seek¡¯ went on for a long time. He tried his best but they never stopped following. Many old goblins gave themselves up to save them. But it was all waste. And he could do nothing but run deeper and deeper and pray! After few days, his tribe was down to few hundred goblins. Most of them were women and children. They were supposed to be his tribe¡¯s future. A future they lost because of him. Because he forgot to keep out of harm¡¯s way. And finally, he knew, he had lost. He was going to die. They couldn¡¯t run any longer. They were tired. Food was almost over. And deeper they ran, the more dangerous the mountains and forests would become. So today he wasn¡¯t going to run but fight. Fight the final battle. He and the rest of his warriors, stood over a rocky outcropping as they waited for the humans. Few hundred meters behind them stood his family and friends. All of them armed. This was going to be the final goodbye! Suddenly a mutation occurred. The wind started rising. It got faster and faster, while rapidly moving towards a mountain which rose nearby. It was the tallest mountain in the whole forest. And rumors said that a star was buried there. Grock could feel a large amount of ¡®something¡¯ rapidly gathering towards that mountain. He had felt that something when he changed. He felt that something when his warriors grew stronger. But this was on a greater scale. Maybe a large Goblin was changing? Would that goblin help? He decisively ordered his tribe to move towards the source. Maybe¡­just maybe they might be able to get a chance to live. The goblins rapidly followed him, moving towards the source, and finally¡­they found nothing. Just rocks. Large black rocks. It seems they really were going to die. The gods were playing with him. They were teasing him. Giving him hope, then taking it back! And that¡¯s when he swore, if he managed to live, he would take his revenge on both humans and Gods! Humans that killed his family, his friends, and his tribe. Gods which played with him. Suddenly a large gust of wind and that ''something'' was absorbed by the mountain, and then it cracked.The mountain started cracking, as they looked in horror. The cracks got larger and larger, as the wind grew stronger until it finally shattered. And there was a cave. And he knew he was saved.
Few hundred meters away from the Grock Goblin Tribe, were six humans, who were carefully trying to climb down. All monsters nearby knew they were dangerous. A large amount of killing intent was surrounding them, as Death around a death reaper.They certainly had killed many monsters. But they looked tired and irritated. And they had all the rights to be! What was supposed to be an easy week-long assignment, was now stretched to a month-long trek across the Burning Mountains. The six of them were part of Bright Star Adventure Guild. Bright Star Adventure Group was one of the topmost Guild in Fire City. With two S rankers looking over it, it was well expected. That¡¯s why the six of them had joined the Guild a year ago. Very soon they found themselves in the same class and unexpectedly became close friends. Furthermore, they even became teammates and they made the perfect team. Leo was their handsome playboy swordsman. With his fair sharp looks and blonde hairs, he could be considered attractive to the other sex. If not for his girlfriend, half of the city brothels would be full of his bastard seeds. Keeping him in check was his girlfriend Lea. She was hot. Literally. With a devilish body and charming curves, she made the perfect fire mage. Many people would find themselves burning¡­with lust and jealousy. Looking for their backs, was Aswin. A dark elf, he was mostly covered in black from head to toe and barely ever spoke. Not many of them knew he was an elf. Not even their teammate were aware of how he looked. He made the perfect thief and assassin. His arrows never missed their marks, while knives always managed to stab you, in all those gaps between your armor. While protecting them was Trunks. With giant blood in the body, he stood at an incredibly 9 Foot, with the extremely muscled body. Carrying a shield weighing few hundred kilograms, not even C-rankers would be able to break through it easily. And pairing a similarly heavy Morningstar Mace, he was the attacking party¡¯s nightmare. Deciding their path was the Halfling Joe. Half a meter tall, he was one of the best trackers in the whole guild. With a nose as sharp as a Direwolf and eyes like an eagle, he never missed his marks. And he was similarly handy with knives and needles. Unexpectedly finding your tendons being cut wasn¡¯t exactly pleasant. And finally blessing them was Maria. A runaway nun, she was a genius in healing and light magic. She was also cute. But with a fiery temper that would put even Dragons to shame, she didn¡¯t make the gentlest of the healer. The six of them were considered to be geniuses, and many Guild resources were spent on them, earning lots of hate and criticism. But they completely ignored them and had rapidly grown from nobodies to Top D-Rankers, which could fight against Low C-Rankers. This had shut most of them up. A few weeks ago, they were deciding on their Mission to level up to C-rank. When suddenly the Three Organisation¡¯s simultaneously issued a surprise emergency quest for C-Rankers. A goblin hoard was rampaging on the plains, and they had easily killed all the D- Rank and lower squads. Their Guild scouts suggested them the chance of one or two variants being present. And they jumped on it. They were going to use this mission to level up. But who knew they turned out to be a tough nut to crack. Chances of Variants being present? More than thirty variants were being led by a second variation Goblin. What were the chances? Somehow they managed to kill a few of them. They were forced to use all their skills and power to defeat them. Turns out the variants were high-level variants, Bloodthirsty Goblins. Crazy and powerful easily summed them up. They loved eating human flesh and were not afraid of death. Fighting them was a headache. This by itself wouldn¡¯t be much of a problem, but the real problem came when the chief decided to retreat and ran away.Leaving such variant free was allowing enemies to grow stronger. And so they followed. But the previous fight had tired them a lot, making it impossible to rush and catch them. By the time, they were ready, the Tribe was already lost among the trees. So they could do nothing but bite the bullet and follow them. The chief turned out to be extremely clever. Taking the most difficult routes and traveling through the worst terrains, he made it impossible to catch up. Every once in a while they would be ambushed by pitfalls, nets, and surprise attacks. The Chief very soon learned that they needed rest, and would often attract ogres especially towards them whenever they decided to rest. Lack of sleep along with poor results made all of the extremely cranky. Maria became abusive and annoying until they were forced to cast a silent spell on her mouth. And here they were, after several days of the slow hunt. The Goblins were moving deeper and deeper and may enter the restricted area, so they could do nothing but run behind them faster, without worrying about power consumption. And very soon they were going to catch them. This time, they were ready to use their consumables items like Bombs and Talismans to deal with them for once a and for all. That¡¯s when the wind changed. Mana rapidly started gathering towards ¡®The¡¯ Burning Mountain. ¡° What in the name of Gods is that!?!¡± screamed Lea in horror stopping all of them in their tracks. ¡°Mana is gathering there¡­in large amounts. Extremely large amount..¡± ¡° Evolution,¡± replied Aswin, surprising them all. He rarely ever would speak out of his own inclination. ¡° But so much mana?¡± asked Lea while looking at the river of mana. Only people with high magical affinity would be able to see mana. But here mana was gathering in such a large amount, that it was visible to naked eyes. ¡° An extremely strong monster is evolving.¡± Said Joe seriously, in contrast to his usual playful mood. ¡° So?¡± questioned Trunks in confusion. What did that have to do with them? As if understanding his doubts, Lea replied ¡° Stronger and higher the evolution, the more mana is needed. Seeing such a large amount of mana gathering..it''s probably a B Class or higher.¡± ¡° We should leave immediately¡­¡± interrupted Joe, while his legs were trembling, and he slowly moved backward. They won¡¯t be able to fight that monster if he decided to come at them. C and B -Ranks were divided through a large moat. It was a qualitative change in strength when someone leveled up from C to B. And so all of them ran away with all their might. A few hours later, when ¡®that¡¯ finally stopped, they paused to catch their breath. ¡° We need to inform the Organisation¡­B Class monster would wreak havoc¡­¡± declared Leo suddenly. No one objected. The monster needed to be dealt with¡­and certain B and A-Rankers would soon do so. Chapter 7 - Unexpected Visitors - Part 2 ¡°What are those !?!¡± The soul asked in surprise and horror, as he looked at those small humans. They were short, barely reaching a meter. They were green. The gross vomit green, and not the grass green. And they were ugly.UGLY with emphasis. With pointing ears and yellowing teeth, they didn¡¯t exactly look charming. Two beady eyes which were filled with wild fanaticism stared at his chamber, or to be exact him. It wasn¡¯t the greatest way to celebrate the end of a successful experiment. He had just finished his experiment, with some rather good results, but the storm had made a mess of his chamber. Ruined stones, broken metal, shrapnel, various gems, and crystals were littered all around as if a storm had visited. Technically, a storm did visit. So he was busy cleaning up the mess when he decided to take a look at his dungeon, in case the storm visited his dungeon also. The moment his Soul Sense left the chamber he found his monsters kneeling. BUT besides his cute spiders, kneeled at least hundred green color ugly humans, bringing him back to the question.
THEY ARE GOBLINS.
¡° Goblins?¡± this was the first time he was hearing such a word.
NAME GOBLIN
RANK E ( PEST )
AFFINITY NONE
DESCRIPTION GOBLINS ARE ONE OF THE MOST COMMON LOW-GRADE MONSTERS. WITH STRENGTH BARELY REACHING THAT OF A HUMAN ADULT, THEY ARE CONSIDERED TO BE MORE OF A PEST RATHER THAN A MONSTER.
¡°That¡¯s it ? ¡° he asked in confusion. The description hardly described anything, except they are weak. And when did Blue Box started giving free information? And what was with the well-tabled information?
SHOULD I CONNECT TO DUNGENOPEDIA?
¡° Now what¡¯s that !?!¡± Another new terminology, which he didn¡¯t like the sound of.
IT''S A MONSTER CODEX CARRYING ALL THE DISCOVERED INFORMATION ABOUT EVERY MONSTER EVER FOUND.
¡° Eh¡­well do so.¡±
GOBLINS PRONOUNCED AS ¨À?bl?n.
HISTORY GOBLINS ARE ONE OF THE MOST COMMON RACES OF MONSTERS ON TITANIA. BUT THEY ARE ALSO ONE OF THE MOST MYSTERIOUS RACES EVER. NOT MUCH IS KNOWN ABOUT GOBLINS OR THEIR HERITAGE, EXCEPT THEY ARE PART OF FAE FAMILY, DESPITE HAVING LITTLE OR NO MAGICAL AFFINITY AND INTELLIGENCE BARELY ABOVE AN AVERAGE WILD ANIMAL. BUT HISTORICAL RUINS NEAR THE NORTHERN COAST SHOW THAT GOBLINS MIGHT HAVE ONCE RULED AN EMPIRE SPANNING SEVERAL THOUSAND KILOMETERS, FROM THE NORTHERN COAST TO THE FORESTS OF ELEVENHIEM. RUINS OF CITIES SHOW A HIGH LEVEL OF ADVANCEMENT IN MAGICAL SCIENCES AND TECHNOLOGY. THE CITIES ARE EXTREMELY WELL PLANNED WITH PROPER DRAINAGE SYSTEMS, AQUEDUCTS, ROADS, PUBLIC BATHS, ETC. NUMEROUS BUILDINGS HAVE BEEN DISCOVERED NEAR THOSE CITIES WHICH MAY HAVE ONCE BEEN A LARGE UNIVERSITY. MOSAIC ARTS IN DWARVEN AND ELVEN STRUCTURES, SHOW THEM ALONG DANCING AND EATING WITH GOBLINS, COMPLETELY UNLIKE NOW, WHERE THEY ARE CONSIDERED MORTAL ENEMIES. ALL THESE FINDS, SUGGEST THAT ONCE GOBLINS MIGHT HAVE BEEN ONE OF THE MOST ADVANCED RACES, WITH A HIGH LEVEL OF RESEARCH IN MAGIC. THIS FURTHER SHOWS THAT GOBLINS HAD EXTREMELY HIGH INTELLIGENCE, INNOVATION SKILLS, AND MAGICAL AFFINITIES. BUT THIS BRINGS UP THE QUESTION: WHAT HAPPENED TO THEM? WHY HAVE THE GOBLINS REGRESSED TO NOTHING BUT PESTS? FEW RESEARCHERS BELIEVE WAR BETWEEN RACES MIGHT HAVE BEEN THE CAUSE OF THIS. OTHERS SUGGEST ENVIRONMENTAL CHANGES. FEW MONSTER RESEARCHERS HAVE COME UP WITH THE THEORY THAT THEY MIGHT HAVE BEEN CURSED BY FAIRY QUEEN, CAUSING THEM TO FALL. HENCE CALLED FALLEN FAES. BIOLOGISTS BELIEVE THAT SOMEWHERE DOWN THE HISTORY LANE, THEIR GENES MIGHT HAVE REGRESSED. THEOLOGISTS BELIEVE THIS TO BE WORK OF GODS. BUT ALL IN ALL, NOTHING MUCH IS KNOWN ABOUT THEIR MYSTERIOUS PAST.
SOCIETY GOBLINS LIVE IN LOOSE CLANS RULED BY A LEADER THEY REFER TO AS A TRIBE CHIEF. EACH TRIBE USUALLY HAS FEW ELDERS TO HELP IN COMMANDING THE TRIBE. ALBEIT EVERY ONCE IN A WHILE, SEVERAL TRIBES MAY COME TOGETHER TO CREATE A VILLAGE. A TYPICAL GOBLIN COMES TO AGE AT ONE YEAR AND SOON JOINS THE ADULT IN HUNTING AND RAIDING. GOBLINS PREFER TO MATE WITH OPPOSITE SEX OF OTHER SPECIES, TO GIVE BIRTH TO STRONGER OFFSPRINGS. THIS IS WHY GOBLINS USUALLY RAID HUMAN SETTLEMENTS FOR MEN AND WOMEN. BUT SOMETIMES THEY DO MATE WITH EACH OTHER. GOBLIN NAMES ARE NOT GIVEN AT BIRTH AS THE AVERAGE GOBLIN LIFE EXPECTANCY IS VERY SHORT AND THEY BELIEVE GIVING A NAME TO BE A WASTE. INSTEAD, THEY ASSIGN THEM NUMBERS UNTIL, IF THE GOBLIN IS LUCKY OR RESOURCEFUL ENOUGH, THEY REACH THE AGE OF MATURITY (USUALLY AFTER 1 YEARS). THESE NAMES ARE GIVEN BY THE CHIEF AND NAMED GOBLINS GAIN GREAT RESPECT AMONG THEIR COMRADES. IF A GOBLIN DOES SOMETHING INCREDIBLY DARING AND GAINS RENOWN, HE MAY ALSO BE GIVEN A TITLE DESCRIBING THE DEED. MALE: GUNGAX, MAKDOX, GIZIL, BILNIX RUKALOG, DRAX, UNKGIL FEMALE: TIWIN, KAWLI, WORT, IB, DROLAW, MAROWA, WALOW
¡° Well,¡­that did tell a lot. But when they did enter ?!?¡± he asked in confusion. Wasn¡¯t his dungeon supposed to be closed? He did remember leaving a thick stone wall on his entrance.
I DO HAVE NEWS RELATING TO IT FOR YOU. WELL, THE GOOD NEWS OR BAD NEWS FIRST?
When did the Blue Box become so helpful and so human? But he had more important things to worry about. Did it wake up on the wrong side of the bed¡­well, did Mr. Blue Box sleep? He filed this question for future use.If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the violation. ¡°Emm¡­the good news?¡±
CONGRATS! YOU ARE NOW OFFICIALLY A DUNGEON! YOU HAVE OPENED YOUR DOORS TO THE PUBLIC! YOU ARE NOW ALSO ALLOWED TO USE FEATURES SUCH AS DUNGEONPEDIA, FORUMS ETC
¡°Wait!!...when did I open my dungeon to the public?¡± The last he remembered a solid slab of rock was still dividing the dungeon from outside world. He checked the entrance with his soul sense, and to his horror, the slab was not there. The whole entrance was now wide open to the public. ¡° That¡¯s called Good News?¡± He hadn¡¯t even laid down his barriers, restrictions, and traps! Even a child could come and break through it while sucking lollipops and singing nursery rhymes!
UMM¡­.WELL HERE¡¯S THE BAD NEWS. YOUR LITTLE MANA EXPERIMENT JUST BLEW AWAY YOUR DOOR. PLUS YOU MANAGED TO COLLECT ALL THE MANA FROM THE SURROUNDING FEW KILOMETERS. AND YOU MUST HAVE SUCCESSFULLY MANAGED TO ATTRACT MONSTERS ABOVE C-RANK AND HUMANS AROUND B-RANK OR ABOVE. THEY SHOULD BE VISITING SOON.
Learning all this, he was shocked. It would be better to say he was aghast. And the only thing he could say was, ¡° That really was the good news¡­¡± But he still held a good amount of confidence in himself. He was almost an immortal, and he couldn¡¯t deal with some puny humans and monsters? Ha¡­ But the B-Rank term made him feel uncomfortable. Seeing that goblins were classified as E Rank, the B rank must be stronger than a goblin. But how strong? ¡° What is a B-rank human and C-Rank Monster?¡± he asked. The terms made him feel extreme danger. The more a cultivator cultivated, stronger his institution would be. And his institution was screaming danger, with bold capital fonts, in blood red color.
HUMANS ARE CLASSIFIED UNDER RANKINGS, ACCORDING TO THEIR STRENGTH. THE RANKINGS GO FROM E RANK TO S RANK, AND THEN FINALLY GOD RANK. AN E-RANK HUMAN IS YOUR AVERAGE HUMAN WHO IS ABLE TO FIGHT. D-RANKS ARE WELL TRAINED HUMAN, WITH HIGH PROFICIENCY IN WEAPONS. USUALLY MILITARY, APPRENTICE MAGES, LOW-LEVEL ADVENTURERS, HUNTERS AND MERCENARY MAKE A PART OF THIS. FROM C-RANK ONWARDS HUMAN STRENGTH INCREASES EXPONENTIALLY. C-RANKERS ARE GENERALLY HUMAN WITH INCREDIBLE STRENGTH. THEY START USING MANA TO REFINE THEIR BODY, AND ARE USUALLY PROFICIENT IN NUMEROUS SKILLS AND TECHNIQUES. B-RANKERS START CONDENSING A MANA SEA IN THEIR BODY. THIS GIVES THEM EXTRAORDINARY STRENGTH. AN ALMOST ENDLESS SUPPLY OF MANA ALLOWS THEM TO USE TECHNIQUES AND SKILLS WITH GREATER STRENGTH. THEY BREAK THROUGH THE SHACKLES OF HUMAN BODY. A-RANKERS CONDENSE THEIR MANA SEA INTO A CORE. THIS INCREASES THE AMOUNT OF MANA THEY CAN USE, ALLOWING THEM ACCESS TO MORE POWERFUL SKILLS. S-RANKERS JOIN THEIR SOUL WITH THE MANA CORE. THIS MAKES THEM MORE ATTUNED TO MANA AND FREELY ALLOWS THEM TO USE MANA PRESENT IN NATURE. MONSTERS ARE RANKED ACCORDING TO THE AVERAGE HUMAN TEAM RANK REQUIRED TO DEFEAT THEM.
And Shit!! So basically he was going to have a party with this world¡¯s equivalent of Foundation Cultivator¡­no make it cultivator¡¯s¡¯, with the ¡®s.¡¯ ¡° How strong is a so-called B-Rank?¡± If they were anything like Foundation Cultivator¡¯s he was in deep trouble. He could personally defeat anyone of them. A soul blast to crush their souls, and done. But his new incarnation came with several hateful limits. Specifically, he couldn¡¯t attack intelligent creatures. They were safe from his attacks. So he could only use this maze of the tunnel to stop them. And this was looking more and more impossible as time went by.
¡­
THEY ARE STRONG.
¡° How strong?¡±
VERY STRONG.
¡° ¡­¡±
THEY CAN EASILY RAZE YOUR PATHETIC ATTEMPT AT A DUNGEON TO RUINS.
HELPFUL?
He would be ignoring the first few words. So he was dead? But, ¡° Why is my dungeon pathetic?¡± Except for traps, it was great. It had tunnels. It had monsters. It even had a story to tell¡­which was still under construction.
LET¡¯S SEE. TRASH MONSTERS NO BOSS MONSTER NO TRAPS NO PROPER ECO-SYSTEM OVERLY DECORATIVE CHAMBERS AND AN UNFOCUSED OVERSEER.
¡°¡­¡± ¡°¡­¡­¡± That was brutal. Who said he was being helpful¡­he was the same large mouthed blue box! So blue box was clearly being. Well a bit more helpful than usual, but it didnt answer his problem. His death was on countdown, and he could do nothing but talk to a Blue Box whose sex was suspicious... Maybe...Blue Box might help...He was trying to be helpful today. " So any advice, Mr. Genius."
...
THAT''S ''MISS'' NOT ''MR.''
TECHNICALLY I SHOULDN¡¯T BE HELPING YOU.
"..."
BUT I CANT SEE MY ONLY SOURCE OF POSSIBLE ENTERTAINMENT DEAD. THAT WOULD RUIN THE ONLY FUN I AM HAVING IN CENTURIES...
SO YOU CAN START WITH PUTTING FEW TRAPS. ADDING FEW MORE MONSTERS. PLEASE MAKE THEM STRONGER. SPIDERS ARE PATHETIC. CREATING A BOSS MONSTER. ADDING NEW FLOORS. APART FROM THAT, THEIRS NOT MUCH YOU CAN DO BUT PRAY THAT THEY ARE THE HELPFUL TYPE¡­
Did he ever mention, that he was starting to hate color blue?
I DO COME IN ''CLEARLY WHITE'', ''JUST BLACK'', ''ROSE GOLD'', ''SPACE GREY'', AND ''GOLD¡­
ALTHOUGH I DO LIKE ''KINDA BLUE.''
¡°¡­¡± He hated blue. Chapter 8 Few kilometers away from the dungeon was an area devoid of any tree or animals. The reason being, the whole land was covered with lava pools making it almost inhabitable to anyone. Copious amount of smoke and steam was floating in the air, making the whole territory look hazy and dangerous. Spread over few miles, these pools were formed during the Fallen Star Disaster. The disaster had melted rocks around it creating magma around it. After the Great Storm, lava in most places had cooled down. But in few areas, the magma instead of cooling had joined to the magma near the core of the planet through cracks and fault lines, creating such pools. Small lizards ranging from few inches to few meters in size and completely red in color could be seen moving from one pool to another. In some pools, large islands could be seen. These islands were completely made of jagged black rocks with red glowing cracks, showing the magma flowing beneath them. One of the islands suddenly started moving, revealing a large turtle. The body of the turtle was completely made of rocks and lava. Two bright embers like were visible from his large head. It slowly came out from the pool and moved to another. The islands were gigantic turtle-like monsters! Snake-like scaly reptiles were breathing fire out while basking near steam vents. Although they were all curled up, their size was easily over ten meters. Each of the monster here was easily stronger than an avaerage C-Rank. Deep down the largest pool was another monster. This monster was the unclaimed king of this area. It looked like a large lizard made completely of living fire. Usually, it would simply sleep inside the magma for years while absorbing fire elemental mana, but today something woke it up. He sensed a large amount of mana fluctuation. The mana was being absorbed by something quite near to his territory. He would usually ignore this, but the thing absorbing his mana dared to it near his territory! But the thing wasn¡¯t a monster. He didn¡¯t sense any presence of monster from its source. In fact, he could sense nothing. And this made him extremely curious. Who had such courage? Such audacity? Every human and monster knew that ¡®this¡¯ territory belonged to him, and it was better to stay away. Not even those so-called S-Rankers would like to annoy him¡­ So was it a treasure being born? Or was some human evolving, while hiding from his presence? Did he really think that no one could find it? This made him curious. He really wanted to go and see, who was so stupid! But he was too lazy to move. Moving and traveling would be extremely bothersome. He didn¡¯t want to leave his comfortable lair. Anyway, he would be using a dragon to kill a fly, if he personally went. Therefore he called his subordinate. A foot long newt swam towards him and bowed once it reached him. Although the newt wasn¡¯t exactly the biggest and the most dangerous of his subordinate, he would be perfect for this task. The newt was a rare variant. It had intelligence above an average human, so it would make the perfect spy. ¡° Go and see what caused this disturbance.¡± he lazily ordered. Once done, he yawned and was once again snoring, while his body slowly absorbed a large amount of fire mana. The lizard or newt to be exact ignored this and rapidly moved towards the surface. He had an order to follow.
Leo and his team finally reached the city after five tiresome days. They had been continuously running since they found that monster.Nobody dared to talk, throughout the journey. They didn¡¯t have the energy to do so. They had simply been running and running. The reason was, a B-Class or above monster was basically a walking disaster. It would easily destroy everything in its way. Even fighting it was a headache as the collateral damage would be too heavy. The easiest thing would be to kill it before it adapted to its evolution and left the forest. Usually, they would have informed the guild through Long Distance Communication Crystals. But mana fluctuations had badly disturbed the mana particles, making such communications impossible. Therefore ignoring everything in their way they were running back. They didn¡¯t stop to rest, to kill silly monsters or even to refresh. This task was of utmost importance. The Group was finally able to see the city. The Sun was almost setting, casting an ominous shadow over the large city. Spread over almost hundred kilometers, the city was busily preparing itself for the enjoyable nightlife. Day shops were closing shutting their shutters, while city guards were preparing for another sleepless night. Adventurers were rushing into taverns and inns, for their dinners and drinks. Brothels were coming alive everywhere, while scantily clad women were calling men in. Workers were busily waiting for their pay, while the paymasters were once again nitpicking over daily wages. Farmers were coming back home and had made lines outside the wall, waiting to be admitted. Following them were businessmen, caravans, nomads, and miners. Fifty meters tall black walls defended the city. The city was regularly attacked by monster hordes every few months, making such tall walls essential and the only means for survival. Shields weren''t exactly cut out for battling twenty to thirty-meter tall mammoths or Gorillas, while spear would barely penetrate large armored animals skin. This tall black wall was covered with carmine colored blotches on the lower end. Drak red to almost brown and black covered the rest of the wall. These were the blood of millions of monsters and humans that had died here. The soil around the wall had already been dyed a blood red. Skeletons were littered around the wall as if stones. Skeletons of particularly strong monsters were hung from the wall. Monsters above A-rank were honored by mounting their heads on the wall, for all to see. This made the wall a particularly creepy and intimidating site.Did you know this text is from a different site? Read the official version to support the creator. Above the wall stood magic canons at every ten meters. Each cannon packed enough power to kill a C-Rank monster on the spot and heavily injure a B-Rank. Squads of ten, consisting of Pikemen and Archer patrolled the top regularly. Every hundred meter, a tower was built, alternating between Cannon Towers, Archer¡¯s Tower and Watch Tower. The wall had four gates, aligning with the cardinal directions. The gates were made up of wood covered with hammered metal riveted on it. In front of the gates, a long line was waiting for their turn to enter, while the Guards checked their I-D. The group rushed towards the city, and past through the line waiting to enter the city, passing through the door.They flashed their I-Cards and rushed towards the Guild Hall. Seeing their I-Cards and the Guild Sign the guards ignored their slight, and once again focused on the line. Ignoring the shouts of annoyed pedestrians and hawker who were pushed away, they finally reached the Guild. Situated in the second sector, the Guild was constructed near the Three Organisations. Six Storey high, the Guild was constructed of Wood and Stone, giving it a Gothic look. It was more of a fort than a building. Guards continuously manned the Black Door, keeping away all the nosy civilians and adventurers. Leo and his team-mates were well known in the guild. Seeing them rushing towards them, the Guards greeted them happily and opened the doors.They possibly asked something, but it was ignored, leaving behind few surprised Guards and Adventurers. The team was well known for their polite manners, and such thing was a first. Most of them understood it was possibly something serious, for them to do so. Ofocurse few adventurers jealous of the Group¡¯s high fame and strength didn''t miss the chance to bad talk them. Ignoring the surprise voices of adventurers and servants which were shoved out of the way, they ran up to the top floor. The top floor was occupied by the Guild Elders and The Guild Leader. The entrance was guarded by two guards, dressed in full metal armor, with a large halberd in their hands. ¡°Yes ?¡± asked one of the Guards. His face wasn¡¯t visible under the helmet, but he seemed to be around 40-50. Both of the guards were surprised by the unexpected visitors and also their unexpected state. They were dirty, covered in sweat while barely managing to stand ¡° It¡¯s¡­It¡¯s an...¡± said Leo while gasping for his breath. ¡° It¡¯s an Emergency!¡± replied Trunks instead. His giant body and great endurance still allowed him to talk, despite the cross-country sprint. ¡± We need to talk to Sir Ryan!¡± he continued. Sir Ryan was an elder, but also their team¡¯s leader. Due to their great potential, the elder had taken them under his tutelage. ¡° What emergency?¡± The Guard patiently asked. He couldn¡¯t simply allow them to enter this floor. Trunks tried to say something, but before he could, Leo held their team tokenin front of them. The tokenwas Sir Ryan¡¯s personal insignia, representing that they belonged to him. The guard was surprised by such action a immediately brought up his halberd up to defend, while other guard prepared for an attack. ¡° Wait! Wait! See the token!¡± screamed Leo, while backing off. Rest of his teammates apart from Aswin were still panting for breath. The Guard stopped his action, and finally noticed the token, on which Sir Ryan¡¯s Insignia was carved. He looked at the team again and opened the door without saying anything. He gestured them to enter and closed the door once they were in. The floor wasn''t much different from other floors, except it was eerily quiet. It didn¡¯t have the hustle and bustle of the other floors. Similarly, it was missing the smell of excitement, blood, and sweat. But they didn¡¯t notice this, or the lush carpet made of Elderbrown Deer, or the mounted heads of several S-Rank monsters. They directly barged into Sir Ryan¡¯s office. ¡° Manners Boys! Manners!¡± said a white-haired man sitting on a sofa, while looking at some reports. His other hand held a tea-cup from which he was elegantly sipping tea. Dressed in black silk clothes embroidered with silver, he looked the perfect gentleman. The office floors were made of some type of wood, which Leo and his team didn¡¯t have any idea of. The walls were similarly covered with wooden planks. The wall on right side of the door was taken over by a large bookcase completely filled with books, many of them in unknown languages. Few paintings decorated the opposite wall, except for the large fireplace. The wall which held the door was covered by few swords of various makes and types. The wall in front of the door, had a large gilded window looking at the square where the Three Organisations were settled. All in all, the whole office looked like a Scholar¡¯s Office rather than a warrior¡¯s except for the swords. The sofa was in middle of the room around a small table, facing the fireplace. ¡° So what bring¡¯s you here gentlemen. Please don¡¯t tell me that you wanted to spend some time with this old man.¡± He said gently while looking at them. The reports had vanished. Seeing the relaxed look of Sir Ryan, they unconsciously relaxed. Calming down Leo replied, ¡° Probable B-class monster evolution on the outskirts.¡± The line was short but clearly conveyed everything. For the first time, Sir Ryan frowned. The B-Class monster was a trouble. Alone they weren''t much, but if they managed to call upon a horde, they became a terrifying nightmare. A B-class monster didn¡¯t lack in intelligence compared to any human. ¡° Tell me everything.¡± He asked in a serious tone. His teacup was snow sitting on the table, while his hands were folded. The relaxed look was gone. And so Leo described the whole event, while his teammates added few important points here and there. ¡° Well, we will deal with the monster. But why did you miss the goblin tribe?¡± he asked seriously. After hearing the story he was sure that the Chief was some kind of rare variant. Although weak now but it could later turn into a potential danger. And now since it had identified humans as the enemy it would do everything to bring human¡¯s down. ¡° The reports didn¡¯t mention anything about thirty variants being present. It talked about only one. If we knew about it earlier, we would have simply bombed them and killed off the rest.¡± Said Leo, putting the blame on the scout team. ¡° Leo, the scout data clearly mentioned more than thirty variants. Please don¡¯t ever dare to lie to me..and next time chose a better lie. Pushing your mistakes on other¡¯s isn''t what a knight is supposed to do¡­¡± scolded Sir Ryan ¡°But the report clearly said one!¡± interrupted Lea. ¡° Lea¡­even you?¡± said Ryan while looking at them disappointingly. Suddenly as if remembering something, Lep took out the scout papers and passed them to Sir Ryan. ¡°What¡¯s that?¡± asked Sir Ryan. ¡° See it yourself!¡± replied Leo with a bit of anger. Not even his own leader believed him, which particularly pissed him off. Ryan looked at Leo and sighed before turning back to the paper. The more he read the deeper his frown got. By the end of the paper, his hands were clenched and trembling. ¡°Is this the original report?¡± he asked while controlling his anger. ¡°Yes.¡± A quiet voice replied. The voice turned out to be Aswin. ¡° If what you are saying is true¡­someone changed the report.¡± Hearing this all of their face¡¯s turned weird. Status reports played an extremely important role for a team. They could be the difference between life and death. And the guild clearly forbade such actions. If caught the result could be worse than death. In fact, even mistakes were not allowed in a status report, and could be punishable by death. Therefore most of the times the report would mention approximate data instead of a perfect one. So no one dared to play with such reports. ¡° Someone wanted to kill us?¡± asked Leo in surprise. The only reason such a large error would be present, if someone wanted them badly hurt or killed. ¡°Yes.¡± Replied Sir Ryan. Chapter 9 - Finally Done? He didn¡¯t agree with Ms. BB on the severity of the danger. She was sorely under valuating him and over evaluating the indigenous species here. The so-called B-Rankers did pose a danger for him. BUT only if they could find him. According to Ms. BB the real risk was me getting conquered and either sold or enslaved. But what if they couldn¡¯t find me? Dungeons did so, but in a brute manner. They forcefully kept others out using traps and monsters. But he had the best way to get around this stupid crisis. Hide himself. And the best way to do it? Take a good-looking mana stone, polish it into something like a core and then¡­put a small-scale illusion on it. Ha! No one would expect the so-called core was nothing but a wonderful piece of illusion! Once done, he created another chamber, but less good looking and dungeonesque looking, and settled the stone in. The fake core and fake chamber was up and ready! And just to punish those greedy critters who wanted to capture him, he created the floor on an axis. The fake core was connected to the floor. Once removed the plate would flip over, trapping the thieves in a newly created Dungeon! ¡­. Ummmm¡­a dungeon in a dungeon¡­ The floor was made with metal, just in case someone decided to break the floor or lid, depending on your perspective, and decided to get out. A strengthening spell and a sealing spell would trap them their forever. And just for the fun, tiny little metal spikes decorated the floor of the dungeon? Or pit? That would give them some relaxing time. And finally, his true punishment. A good old illusion array. That will torture them to death! Having everything in yours¡¯s hand reach but finding all of it was an illusion. Losing the sense between what¡¯s real and what¡¯s fake¡­they would soon learn that death is better than messing with an immortal! Personally, he would have like to seal them in a vat full of poison. Or maybe grow a parasite inside their heads, which would suck their brains out or try to make a corpse slave¡­but *sigh* he didn¡¯t have any materials. So, the disaster was temporarily revoked. He wasn¡¯t so full of himself that nobody would be able to see through his small illusion. You never know if this world had an array master? Or maybe a so-called God decided to visit his dungeon for a Dungeon review¡­or some ancient anti-illusion treasure¡­or somebody with extremely strong will¡­a will stronger than a broken immortal? Nah!!! What were the chances of these? Back to the dungeon¡­ Apart from this, he did agree on those spiders. They were weak¡­but not pathetic. She hadn¡¯t seen Arachne who could fight an Immortal to death or those teeny-meeny furry spiders which could dissolve your insides within seconds. Or the spiders which could create a custom coffin for you¡­that too of pure spider silk! But well ''his'' spider did suck. He tried to make them more poisonous¡­but they kind of melted into a puddle. A poisonous puddle. The spiders were poisoned by their own poison. What irony. Strengthening them wasn¡¯t exactly useful if your enemies are hundred times larger and heavier than you, except for serving as a target and getting your body cut into halves¡­or quarters. But he did manage to increase their mana affinity, to find out it was a waste. They didn¡¯t have enough brains to use it. He should work on creating some Brains¡­possibly capture few humans, for better reference. Anyway, modifying them anymore was clearly not possible. They weren¡¯t suited for it. So, rats, snakes and lizards! To the job! Conclusion: They all suck. Rats got larger and stronger. Sharper teeth and horde techniques are wonderful¡­until you meet fire. A goblin campfire scared the shit out of them. Mana affinity was still under progress and was going to need a long time to develop properly. Ha¡­so much for expecting a primitive God-Eater Rat. And he really needed to create a time compression chamber, the breeding period was incerdibly long. Now for Snakes. You can¡¯t go wrong with snakes. Solely because there is nothing you can do to them! Add wings, they are not snakes. Add legs, they are not snakes! Add hands they are not snakes!You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story. So, after hours of experimenting his wannabe World Devouring Snake and in-progress Basilisk were ready. Except they didn¡¯t devour and didn¡¯t petrify¡­unless you had ophidiophobia. The Snake Version 1 was stronger and tougher. The smallest being a meter tall while longest easily over ten meters, they were a prime example of snake world¡¯s thugs. They were almost half tonne of pure crushing force. He really doubted if anyone on the lower spectrum of the ranking list would be able to get out. Their only fault? They were slow. And to go with them Snake Version 2. Incredibly lithe and venomous. He tried experimenting with snake and spider venom, and the results were not exactly alive. So only strengthened snake venom and mana refined muscles, gave him the Venom Snakes. Good shooters, but weak in melee. As for the rest type of snakes, they were turned into food. A good example of weak are preyed on. Or the weak are food... Lizards were great to work with. But it seems not every lizard can turn into a Dragon. Except pure physical strength, he didn¡¯t get anything to do with. Mana affinity was under progress, so fire-breathing lizards might turn out. But before concluding his Biological Experiment, he did stuff each and every one of them with Runes. Few generations later, he should get some good specimens. If they manage to live¡­ One unexpected problem caused by the storm was, the flora. The wind managed to bring few seeds and spores in the dungeon. High concentration of mana soon caused them to bloom. And now his beautiful stoneworks had mushrooms, moss, grass, ferns and other green things growing. If not for his dear pets, who were loving it he would have probably razed them to ashes. Now the dangerous spooky caves, looked¡­less spooky for the lack of better terms. But the newly open dungeon did attract few more unexpected visitors. Foxes, Wolves and possible-monkeys to name a few. They were killed and turned into anatomy files and food. But out of all of them, the bats were the best. Few experiments later on them, he had the unexpected Poopers and the Howlers. Poopers had an incredibly bad case of Diarrhoea. On seeing enemies, it would poop over them. A dirty stinky ball of shit. That should keep the sensitive people and the Girl¡¯s out. One unexpected benefit, was the poop turned out to be good for the plants. Honestly, he had never grown such plants. His personal garden did had plants but they were rare herbs and medicines. And growing them was using Qi to enrich the soil or sprinkle Spirit Water. Not distributing poop. Yes, distributing. He had few goblins spread poop all over the dungeon, until Ms. BB reminded him of the dungeon being his body. It took all her efforts to stop him from flooding the dungeon by creating a river. Now as for Howlers, they were loud. Incredibly loud. The scream was shrill and irritating. Now imagine several hundred of them screaming together. You get a perfect Opera for killing people. Physically both of them were mana refined. The digestive system of Poopers was strengthened, while Peepers had an incredibly strong vocal cord. Now the traps. According to Ms. BB or Miss Blue Box, flying swords, shrinking rooms, raining fires, illusions, floating paths etcetera were not suitable as traps for the beginning floors. He should be using pitfalls, trip wires, and other such lame traps for the first floor. But how was flying sword, strong? And raining fires? He promised to use the weakest fire. And he even promised to put a safety net below the floating pathways. Still she didn¡¯t budge and even threatened him by not helping him any further. So, his simple traps were still waiting being rated lethal and not E-D Rankers. But how was it his fault if they were so weak? If not for their mana, which he was looking forward to, he would have directly laid some good old traps and skewered them to death. And now to create traps. Traps which were full of holes. That was a pun. Trap and Holes? Never mind. Numerous holes were created all over the floor, and covered with thin stone slabs. He did manage to use some small-scale illusions on few of those holes. The ground looked the same but nothing was there. But it was just an illusion, so it could be easily guessed using stones and sticks. Others made solid ground look like a pitfall. The pits took a long time to work on. Out of the thirty-three pitfalls, ten had sharp pointy stones waiting for the victim. Rest five were made extremely smooth and covered with metal, to make it incredibly difficult to get out. Three were filled with weak poison, which did nothing much except freeze you. Of course, you could drown it, if your body stop¡¯s working. Another three had lots of snakes waiting for you. Similarly, six more had nothing but spiders or rats ready to creepy you out. And two full of bat shit, while the final one rained heavy rocks on you. All the pits were narrow at the top with sharp rocks protruding out, ready to cut all sorts of ropes and ladders. The final three dropped you in the tunnel below. Trip wire traps were his current favourite. Few trip wire traps opened small rooms across the dungeon, where for attraction¡¯s sake he put a few ores, gems or mana stone. In some chambers he put a few monsters. For variety is life. It would be great seeing those people guessing Trick or Treat! Few of such trip wires caused spider to fall on you. Three special wires would greet you with a bucket full of bat shit. Basically, smelly shit versus smelly people! One caused a giant spherical rock to crash towards you, while crushing everything! Last two took a long time to come up with. Going from arrays to physical is hard. It¡¯s like moving from a Dragon Ride to a Donkey Ride. Slow and stinky. Basically, floor one was done, except for the so called Boss Monster. He was waiting for some particularly strong one¡¯s to emerge out of the rest, so he could make them the so-called Boss. Now to modify improvise and settle the Green Goblins. Would adding spider silk sacs to Goblin¡¯s allow them to shoot webs? A good idea to work on¡­ Chapter 10 Alyssa left the Guild Hall and walked towards the city gates, pulling her horse along. Dressed in pure black hunting leather clothes, which stuck to her body, she attracted all sorts of lecherous and perverted gazes. Around twenty years old with short bob cut hairs, framing her tanned oval face, and soft almond-like eyes, she was a beauty. Her muscular body and curves were clearly visible under the tight clothing. But no one dared to make a move on her. Because she was Alyssa. The famous Peak-B Ranker, who well known for her temper. So no one was stupid enough to trouble her. A tall bow, wrapped in rags hung from her shoulder, while a quiver full of neatly arranged arrows hung from her another shoulder. Another quiver hung from her Horse¡¯s side. A small bag, filled with food and water, along with other necessities hung on the Horse¡¯s other side. She would have preferred to ride the horse till the gate, but the rules of the city didn¡¯t allow to do so. Numerous shops and stalls were selling all sorts of oddities all along the road. Shopkeepers were hawking their wares in loud voice. Somewhere simply screaming while others were singing short songs and couplets. People were bargaining here and there at top of their voice. But despite all the ruckus, the roadside market gave a sense of harmony. In fact being a haven for adventurers, hunters, and mercenaries, Fire City was famous for serving all their needs. It was said that you could buy anything if you have money. With enough money, even buying a kingdom was possible. You just needed to hire several high ranking mercenaries. Passing them, she finally reached the city gate. Even now, the walls and gates intimidated her. She could sense bloodlust, hatred, anger and other emotions from the wall, which she particularly hated. Showing her Guild Badge to the Guards, she left the city. Once outside, she jumped on her horse and galloped towards the Burning Mountains. Her horse was a mixed breed cloud Horse. With astonishing endurance and incredible speed, such horses, would be able to travel long distances on high speed, making them extremely popular among adventurers, hunters, and soldiers. She galloped on the plains, passing through numerous farms green with crops. Most of them were corn crops. Corn was a popular crop among the farmers. It didn¡¯t require much attention, and its yields were high. Also, corn was always in demand in the market. It was a staple food for the commoners. The rest were growing vegetables. After few hours, she left the farmlands behind. The night was soon arriving. Flocks of birds could be seen in the sky, returning to their nests in the forests. Seeing the darkening sky, she stopped her horse and pulled it beside the road. She tied him to a tree nearby, allowing him to graze. Once done, she took out small black stones. These small stones, each had a character inscribed on them. These were simply barrier stones to protect campsites. Once arranged they would create a simple protective barrier around the site. They would usually keep way common pests and beasts. Later, she put up her tent and lighted a fire. Very soon, the fire was burning high. She took out her dry rations consuming it. Adventurers had long learned to pack light. So usually they left heavy utensils behind unless going on long trips. Very soon she was snoring inside the tent, wrapped in a blanket. The fire was still smoldering. The horse had also long gone to sleep. A few hours later she got up. The sun was rising and its first rays were blessing the land. Very soon, these warm rays would turn incredibly hot. Stretching, she washed her face. Packing everything, she lept on her horse, and once again galloped towards the forest. She reached the edge of the forest following morning. Reaching the edge, she withdrew her bow. Stringing it, she placed an arrow on it and shot it towards the sky. The arrow left the bow and reached an incredible height, before curving and falling downwards. She collected the arrow, and once again shot it at the sky. She repeated this action three more times, before stopping. After exactly a minute, she once again shot three arrows at the sky. The moment the third arrow felt, a sweet whistling sound was heard. A few moments later another whistle sounded, and two more followed it. If not particularly looking for it, no one would even notice the whistling sound. On hearing the whistle, her face lit up with a slight smile. The arrow and the whistle were her team¡¯s secret signal. During secret missions, they would use such signals to notify others. In this case, under the guise of solo missions, each one of them had left the city, over the span of a week. Being a high-rank team, they would attract incredible attention when leaving for a mission. Because for this reason, they had all left the city apart from others. She was informing them of her presence. Once done, she left the horse to graze and swiftly entered the forest. She jumped on a tree, a started leaping from one tree to another. Every few minutes, she would retrace her steps, and go in some other direction. When finding a water-spot, she would especially travel through it. All this was to confuse any trackers, following her. She ignored any animal or monster she would find. If they tried to attack her, she would run away. Doing so, took a lot of time, but it was better to be safe. During the night, she would sleep on the tree branches, eating dry rations. Lighting a campfire, in the Burning Mountains was inviting death. The fire would attract all sorts of monsters and beasts. After a day, she reached a clearing. Despite such rigorous trekking she still looked fresh. To a B Ranker such, trekking was nothing. Once reaching the clearing, she shot five arrows at the sky, one after the another. A few minutes later, a man slowly entered the clearing. The man was dressed in forest color green and brown leathers. Except for his face, his body was tightly wrapped in layers of leather. His face was quite childish but handsome. But short shaggy hairs and a similarly unkempt beard destroyed it. Overall he looked quite harmless, but you could never be more wrong. If anyone would have asked Alyssa, she would have labeled him the sneakiest, craziest bastard of Fire City.This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience. ¡° Well what¡¯s an old granny doing here?¡± he asked in surprise. Mischief could be seen in his eyes. ¡° Who the hell is a granny!?¡± she looked at the newly arrived boy, with a threatening expression. ¡° You Old Women.¡± ¡° You are a Granny! Your Family is a Granny!¡± Alyssa was quite proud of her beauty and being called a Granny was like provoking a dragon! She rushed towards him, baring her fist. ¡° No Granny¡­my family is full of young and handsome people like me. See¡­such a smooth skin, awesome looks¡­¡± the boy teased her while posing in various postures. ¡° Come here, let me show you who is a Granny!¡± she threatened him, as he swiftly leaped over a tree. She was never good with words, instead she preferred to talk with her punches. ¡° Granny! Be careful. Running at such age¡­tch tch¡­do you want to break your bones?¡± ¡°You!¡± ¡° Sigh¡­You two¡­¡± a woman''s voice broke the fight. Three people entered the clearing. Two men and one woman. The men were around thirty years old. Both had rough looking faces. The larger one was holding a bow. He had a short pony. Rest of his face was covered with a clothing. The other one was thinner and extremely pale-skinned. His hairs were a mess. He looked ill. Large dark circles framed his eyes. His eyes were small. He was continuously squinting, and every few moments he would correct the glasses resting on his small nose. Numerous vials and pouches hung from his waist. The accompanying woman was holding a wand in one hand. Her face was average looking, with no identifying feature. In fact, her face would be lost among the masses. She was similar in age to the men. All three of them were dressed in leathers. ¡° Annie! Ask Xo to stop teasing me!¡± said Alyssa while running towards the newly arrived woman. The woman called Annie was a mother like a figure in their team and also their captain. ¡°Xo¡­¡± sighed Annie, looking at the childish boy. Although the sigh was soft and sweet, the underlying meaning was clear. ¡° Fine..but she really is an old woman¡­¡± he mumbled. ¡° You two¡­leave you a moment and you start a world war!¡± the squinting man spoke, scolding the two of them in a playful tone. ¡° Anyway¡¯s we are here to check whether an evolved monster did take residence here or no. You should have already read the details.¡± Annie informed them. Everyone nodded in agreement. Annie looked at the man with the bow, and asked, ¡° Ronald, you had checked the spot¡­any information?¡± Ronald swept a look at everybody and said, ¡° Nothing¡­¡± ¡° Nothing?¡± questioned Annie ¡°Emhmm¡­the whole clearing was empty. No marks. No scratches. No footprints, except for goblin ones. Nothing! But the mana concentration was extremely high!¡± ¡° Anything else?¡± Annie asked him in confusion. ¡° A cave was there¡­it might be the beast lair. Mana was being released from there. I didn¡¯t take a look in.¡± She looked at him for a moment, and then swept a gaze at everyone, and then said. ¡° We will be having a look in the cave. If anyone sees¡¯s the beast, signal everybody else. Be ready.¡± Saying this, she started walking towards the cave. Everybody followed her, taking care to not disturb the shrubbery or leave any marks. Meanwhile, both Xo and Alyssa would look at each other. Xo would make faces while earning murderous glares from Alyssa. Others ignored their antics as if used to it. After an hour or so, they reached the clearing. In front of them was a cave. The cave mouth wasn¡¯t large. Numerous footprints could be seen entering the cave. Ronald gestured to everybody and pointed towards the cave.¡± This is it.¡± Annie looked at the cave carefully, as if trying to find something. A few moments later, she looked at everyone and said, ¡° Be careful¡­ I don''t know why I feel something wrong¡± Everyone nodded and tightened their grips on their weapons. A knife had appeared in Xo¡¯s hand from nowhere. They carefully entered the cave. Despite the entrance being small, the inside was large. The path was large. But the whole tunnel was dark. ¡° Goddamn! I hate the dark!¡± complained Xo. ¡° Snort¡­being a ranger, shouldn¡¯t you love it¡­idiot!¡± Alyssa jeered at him. ¡°You!¡± ¡° Both of you¡­Quite!¡± scolded Annie, with a threatening glance. Seeing the glance anyone would go weak. Giving both of them a stare she looked at Ronald. ¡° Ronald¡­¡± said Annie, while looking at him meaningfully. He nodded and slowly merged with the darkness, vanishing in front of them. A few moments later he once again emerged in front of them. But instead of his usually cold eyes, all that could be seen was astonishment. ¡° We have struck rich!!¡± he said excitedly. His cold demeanor was long gone. ¡°Why, did the beast die?¡± Xo asked for confusion. An evolved beast was a walking treasure trove. Everything from its skin to bones was a treasure. Ronald looked at him and snorted disdainfully, ¡° What beast? We have struck big!¡± Annie looked at his excited expression, and ordered him in a deadpanned tone, ¡° Can you stop?¡± ¡° Sor-Sorry¡± he replied sheepishly. ¡° Now say?¡± she questioned him. ¡° It¡¯s a Dungeon!¡± he answered in an overly excited tone. ¡° Dungeon?!?¡± everybody questioned him in unison. They were extremely surprised. Finding a new dungeon was incredibly rare. In the past century, no new dungeon had been found. But above all the main reason of surprise was, a dungeon represented a new source of wealth. Various treasures could be found in a dungeon! Rare metals, gems, herbs, and monster cores! ¡° Yes!! If I am right it¡¯s a dungeon!¡± Ronald answered in excitement. ¡° No wonder¡­right¡­right¡­right¡­the thick mana¡­man made but natural looking tunnels¡­¡± the squinting man spoke to himself as if realizing anything. Annie looked at the squinting man and asked him, ¡° Anything Joshua?¡± ¡° Hmmm¡­nothing. I had few doubts when we entered here. But if it¡¯s a Dungeon, then that¡¯s not surprising¡­¡± he answered hurriedly. ¡° Hmm¡­so we might have stumbled across a dungeon. ¡° Annie said, attracting the attention of everybody. She stopped for a moment as if thinking anything, and then said, ¡° We will map it as per Guild Regulations, and submit it later. Any questions?¡± ¡° Why do we need to submit to the Guild? They will take over it and simply give us some measly amount. the man known as Joshua spoke. ¡° So what do you think we should do?¡± asked Annie looking at him. There was a slight frostiness in her tone. ¡° We can auction this news! Just imagine¡­we all will barely get a thousand gold coins each. But if we auction it, we can at least earn double!¡± Joshua replied with excitement, as he was trying to convince others. But he had missed the frostiness in Annie¡¯s tone. ¡°Joshua! That¡¯s against the rules! ¡° complained Alyssa. ¡° So what? No one has to know that we are selling the news.¡± He replied to her. ¡° Joshua¡­Guild has helped us reach this height and we owe this to them. And apart from money, we will also get a seat on Dungeon council.¡± Annie replied frostily. She hated such people, who would betray others, for some wealth. Joshua looked at her, and as if first time noticing her anger., ¡° You are right¡­.sorry..just these projects have almost consumed all my finances, so I was looking to earn more.¡± He replied, gesturing towards the vials. Hearing the excuse, Annie''s frostiness reduced a lot. ¡° No worries¡­you can have a part of my share.¡± Seeing this everyone gave a sigh of relief. No one wanted to face an ¡® Angry Annie.¡¯ ¡° So let¡¯s see, what does the Dungeon has to offer?¡± commented Xo, breaking the tense atmosphere. ¡°Let¡¯s Go,¡± Annie ordered and dived in. Chapter 11 - The Bastard Dungeon-1 The core was having a great time, experimenting with Goblins. His first bipedal monsters, he had many things to test on them. How did they react to mana? Was it possible to make them better looking? How to raise their intelligence? Were they good slaves or bad soldiers? Were among few of them. As of now, he was seeing whether the Goblins were capable of cultivating or not? As for the Dungeon''s condition? It was fairly okay. The population was manageable. They were growing. But the research was more important. He could usher a new era of advancement¡­although Ms. BB had rather negative opinions on it. Ignoring her, back to experiments. In his previous few experiments, he had tried runes on them to create something similar to a runic warrior. In his world, people with low aptitudes would opt to become Runic Warriors and later Totem Warriors. The theory was quite simple. Warriors would extract all of their body potentials and cultivate the physical body instead of spiritual one. Qi would slowly strengthen their bones, muscles, and tendons until they were impenetrable by mortal weapons. Their every punch would have the strength of a wild beast. Later they would trap souls of Spiritual Beasts in ther body, turning them into totems. The totems would grant them the power of that spiritual beast and also few of its abilities. This sounded weak, but a twelve totemic warrior could fight an immortal barehanded. So he decided to use this method to strengthen them. Although he had to tweak the runes a bit, to support the Goblin body, the results were fairly satisfiable. Now since half of his Goblins were sporting basic runes, he had started to wonder, whether he could do something about the cultivation situation. Although they had pretty bad physiques, he could work on them¡­even if barely. In short, they were barely good subjects. The Goblins had taken these as honors. They believed this to be God¡¯s blessing, of which Ms. BB couldn¡¯t help but make fun of. The runic warriors were now being called. ¡® Garak Dervic.¡¯ Which sounded something like ¡® Grunnntttt Grunt¡­¡± and meant Holy Warriors. And, Yes, he was learning Goblinish...if that''s what it''s called. As of now, he had his own holy army. Even if they were weak as hell. And Ugly. he really needed to work on their looks.. ¡®Now which technique would suit them?¡¯ He wondered. Suddenly the Blue Box popped in front of him. But this time it was flashing as if doing its best to attract his attention. On it, large words were written,
DUNGEON IS BEING RAIDED.
Bastard. The creator of this dungeon was a perverted bastard. Nope, a sadistic perverted bastard. Alyssa, couldn¡¯t help but fume thinking about the Dungeon. They had entered the Dungeon in the morning. Now it was almost evening and the end wasn¡¯t in sight. And throughout the way, they had been harassed by all sorts of wicked creations. The creatures by themselves were not a problem, but keeping a lookout for their frequent ambushes was becoming a torture. You would wonder, how was a B-Rank party being meesed up? Blame thir over confidence. They had dived in, without any preperation, and they were sorely paying for it. The Dungeon was simply using quantity to overpower their quality! Moreover, a party with a build such as them was already weak in melee combat. Their party was supposed to be a scouting party. Additionally, in case of fights, they preferred guerilla tactics and long range fighting, over headlong battles. And now they were paying for it. Heavily. Archers weren¡¯t of much use in a cave. And when the field itself was narrow, rangers were almost useless. Their movement was limited. Their best ally ''shadow'' was useles, as the monsters were more suited to darkness than them. In short, the Dungeon was like their perfect nemesis. When they had entered, the first problem was the frequently twisting tunnels, with their irregular and sloped floors. Keeping your balance on them, especially during fights was a tiring task. Adding the frequent stalactites and stalagmites constraining their weapons, fighting was turning out to be difficult. You couldn¡¯t swing your weapon properly to gather the force required, as half of the time the carefully arranged rocks would interrupt it. And did she mention it was dark? Like a pitch black dark? If not for their high ranks and two of their team members being rangers, they wouldn¡¯t even be able to walk. And finally navigating that treacherous terrain with its pits and rocks, in dark, with little or no visibility, was something straight out of the stories of Hell, which the Light Church kept ranting about.This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it. And the wind blowing inside the cave would frequently pass through cracks and crevices on the wall, creating an eerie whistling noise. This all kept them taut and gave them no chance of relaxation. Overall that, she couldn¡¯t fathom why all the pointed rocks were specially sharpened and covered with metal tips until she was almost poked to death by them. Of course with their level, such thing couldn''t hurt them, but it was uncomfortable. Swinging your hands, to be poked by something sharp, or trying to take a rest an getting poked on your butts, wasn¡¯t exactly comfortable. Unless of course, you are a masochist, which would be the perfect sort of fetish for visitors, visiting this dungeon. The moment they had left the entrance tunnel, what visited them was a large cavern. Similar to the tunnel the cavern was rugged and sharp as hell. But a much-visited change was the slightly phosphorous light and the twinkling lights on the roof. They were incredibly beautiful. All of them couldn''t help but look at the magnificent scenary dumbstruck. The green glowing lights were like beautiful stars in the sky. It was like a paradise on earth. Incredibly beautiful. Just to see this, the Dungeon was worth visiting. No one spoke for a while, as if speaking would break the beautiful harmony. Finally, Joshua couldnt help but ask, " What is that?" Hearing this Ronald quietly left to see its source. He came back with glowing mushrooms, ferns, grass and lichens. Turns out due to absorbing large amounts of mana, the fauna here was releasing the excessive mana as energy in light form, and thus creating the incredibly beautiful scene. Joshua was quite interested in them and spent a few minutes carefully observing them. He would note down his findings in a small notebook, hidden in his sleeves. But he would frown every few seconds as if confused. Finally he took few samples, carefully storing them in a box. While doing this, he warned others, " There are monsters here. These plants show signs of being eaten. Be careful." Nodding, they strengthend their grips on the weapons. Once Joshua was done, they again started walking. But soon they would realise that the beautiful lights were their worst enemies. The phosphorous light was casting eerie ghastly shadows here and there. Many times they had mistaken the shadows as monsters, and other times they had almost missed the traps on the floor. Despite the cavern being large, people could only walk on fixed defined paths. Large stone pillars made due to the joining of stalactites and stalagmites seemed to support the whole cavern. Beside them small similar rocks covered the whole ground, leaving only a maze-like fixed path to walk on. To understand what these rocks were made of, Ronald attacked with full force, even using mana to empower it. It was to be understood, that although B-Rankers didn¡¯t have the power to flatten mountains and tear earth, they could definitely destroy a small hill. But the result shocked everybody. The rocks were unharmed except for few scratches. ¡° What the hell?¡± exclaimed Xo. Although a dungeon¡¯s interiors were strong, they wouldn¡¯t be strong to such an extent. Apart from walls, the inside of the dungeons was usually easier to destroy. Dungeons rarely would spend their mana on strengthing the interior. Only when the dungeon has existed for a long time, would the rocks become almost unbreakable, due to constant mana absorption. ¡° How old is this Dungeon?¡± questioned Ronald. He was sure of the power of his strike. So the result shocked him the most. ¡°I believe it¡¯s a new Dungeon!¡± commented Joshua. Joshua rarely spoke, but when he did everybody listened. Joshua was a scholar by nature. Not even he knew how many books had he learned by heart. He continued, ¡° Firstly, the entrance is new. The edges are still sharp and the surface is still fresh and hasn¡¯t been worn down yet. Plus, did you notice? All the grass and fungus, are still new. Usually in old dungeons plants would evolve. Here they are the same as outside, apart from the high mana concentration¡­¡± ¡° In fact, this bugs me. How can a new dungeon have such high mana levels? But all evidence shows that the Dungeon is a newly born dungeon! And all this, it''s like someone playing a psychological warfare with you. Everything here is designed to keep you out of sorts!¡± ¡° The darkness, the howling of the wind, the sharp rocks, this damn unwalkable floor¡­it¡¯s not at all like a new dungeon!¡± Suddenly he stopped after finally noticing the strange gazes of all his teammates. As if realizing something, his face blushed, and he muttered an apology, ¡° So-Sorry.¡± ¡° What are you being sorry for?¡± asked Xo, to Joshua. ¡°But boy, did you speak! If not for us being understanding, most people will think you are a mute¡­You really should start speaking more¡­¡± ¡° That¡¯s enough Xo. He understood what you want to say!¡± intervened Annie. Xo was a chatterbox, a wouldn''t stop, once you gave him the chance to speak. ¡° As for now, note this in the report. We will let the captain decide. We should focus on completing the floor.¡± Continued Annie, prioritizing what was important. They couldn¡¯t do anything anyway. As for now, their only way was to move forward. But no one noticed Joshua scowling after hearing this. They moved forward when Alyssa suddenly yelped. And before anyone knew what happened Lyssa found herself in a large pit. The pit was filled with some black color weird pellets, which simply smelled disgusting. ¡° What the heck is this!¡± she cried. All of them stared at her. ¡° How did you fall into a trap?¡± Annie asked angrily. Such silly mistakes! What would the people say if they hear that a B-ranker fell into a first-floor trap! ¡° I-I-I don¡¯t know¡­One moment it was fine, and another moment I was here¡­¡± she cried. Tears were already forming in her eyes. ¡° Pull her up!¡± commanded Anne. Looking at this Ronald was confused. He was sure that there was no trap here. ¡¯ What the hell happened?¡¯ was all he could wonder.