《Heart of the Dungeon》 Chapter 1 - The Goat And The Imp. Darkness. Darkness all around me¡­ Floating around in the darkness¡­ How much time has passed? What is time? So tired¡­ Don¡¯t disturb me¡­ ¡­¡­¡­. ¡°Preparing the sacrifice¡­¡± A voice said. It was a fairly high-pitched voice, probably from a small being. *Meh-eh-eh! Meh-eh-eh! Aaa, that feels... good? Or is it unpleasant? Can¡¯t tell the difference. ¡°It¡¯s working. It¡¯s starting to glow. Keep up the blood flow. Gotta make sure everything gets covered.¡± *Thump! A small, flickering light broke through the darkness. What is happening? Light? I felt oddly drawn towards the light, like it was sucking me in. I didn¡¯t resist, but simply followed with the flow. *Thump! My mind and vision swirled constantly, until I could finally see an image. A small dimly lit room, illuminated by a light source I could not see. A small hairless two-legged and two-armed creature, with two big dark eyes, watched something, staring at it intently. The creature used its hand to smear some kind of liquid on whatever it watched. *Thump! ¡°Need to bring the other one and keep it up.¡± It mumbled to itself. *Meh-eh-eh! Meh-eh-eh! *Thump! The world slowly changed in color, no longer in grainy black and white. The animal, the liquid comes from it. It''s red... blood? The strange creature is using the blood on something. It seems to be close to me. No, not just close to me¡­ Ah, I see. It¡¯s me. *Thump, thump, thump! The beating got faster and faster, until it reached a stable rhythm. The light source in the room grew brighter and brighter, until all the darkness in the room got expelled. The creature stopped, throwing the, now dead, animal to the side. ¡°Oh, great Heart, hear me! I have come to serve you!¡± The creature bowed and stood still in that position, waiting for an answer. ¡°...Heart, you hear me?¡± After two minutes of waiting, the creature got impatient. It moved closer to the glowing and pulsing crystal. The beating slowed down to a more stable ''once every thirty second'' tempo. The creature reached out with its hand and gently tapped the crystal. ¡°Hello? I know you are awake, it¡¯s not like you can pretend to be sleeping anymore.¡± ¡°...Who are you and why do you disturb me?¡± I replied, in a soundless voice, but it seems the creature heard it, because it startled in shock and quickly moved back. The creature returned to its former position with a bow, and said: ¡°Greetings, Heart, I¡¯m your Prime, and have arrived to serve you. I¡¯m sorry for the delay.¡± ¡°Prime? Serve me?¡± Once again I spoke with no sound. Have a feeling since I don¡¯t have a mouth, I instead use a mental connection to this creature to communicate. Well, no matter, since it works, let¡¯s just go with it. ¡°Yes!¡± The creature said with a wide smile, while nodding vigorously. ¡°Now, let¡¯s get to work. You first need to learn how to operate the dungeon, and for that you need to learn how to control yourself!¡± ¡°Control?¡± What is this thing talking about? ¡°Yes, focus on your mind. Don¡¯t try to move your body. Hearts got a special view that they can use inside their dungeons. Try to float up, into the ceiling.¡± What is going on? Eh, no point in trying to understand it. Let¡¯s just do as he says¡­ ... ¡°I have no idea what I¡¯m doing. Some help?¡± This is ridiculous. ¡°Uh, well, I don¡¯t know the details, I¡¯m not a Heart, as you can see. Back in school they taught us some of the basics, so we could know how the Heart saw the world. They said to focus on moving your mind, or something. I couldn¡¯t understand it, so I kinda forgot about it.¡± The creature shrugged with its thin arms. ¡°Helpful, but I will try.¡± I closed my eyes, or at least I tried, but nothing happened. The odd creature still took up most of my view. Hmm, seems like it works differently than what one would assume. It feels like I¡¯m locked in a box, can¡¯t even turn my head or change my current vision. My mind, huh. Am I only a mind? In a focused but relaxed manner, I emptied my mind and tried to feel like I was floating. Like I was weightless, and nothing could hold me down. With an unsteady pace, I finally managed to move up into the ceiling. ¡°Hey, it worked, I can see everything from above now.¡± I could even adjust it slightly and rotate. Huh, is that me? A white, glowing crystal, with a red pulsating heart, made out of actual flesh, inside it. Creepy. The light from the crystal dimmed significantly each time the heart beat, only to return to its former strength immediately afterwards. ¡°I have many more things to teach you. Learnt it from school, in case you are wondering.¡± ¡°School? What?¡± ¡°Yes, let me tell you my story¡­¡± The creature began to talk and talk. About his struggles in school. How the winged imps bullied him. How he had to repeat school for ten thousand years. But finally one day, the day of the compatible test he took every decade, he passed the test. A dungeon Heart accepted him. The supervising teacher spurted out his coffee on him in surprise, but he didn¡¯t even notice the burning hot liquid. I sensed the end of the story approaching, so I began to pay attention again. ¡°I was so happy! Finally, finally I had a Heart that wanted me!¡± The creature beamed with happiness. ¡°Uh huh. And who was that?¡± ¡°You! You, of course! Haha, you joker.¡± The creature pointed its thin finger at me, while laughing. Not sure if it actually thought it was funny, or if it really hoped it was just a joke. ¡°Oh, oh right, of course, that is why you are here. But I can¡¯t remember anything about accepting you?¡± ¡°Eh, what do you mean?¡± The creature looked puzzled. ¡°You were sent a request for accepting me as your Prime. All unattended Hearts were, but you, only you, said yes.¡± Hmm, what is it talking about? Let me think¡­ Oh. As I thought back to a certain event, I finally realized my mistake¡­ ¡°Do you accept imp xxx as your Prime imp?¡± ¡°Do you accept imp xxx as your Prime imp?¡± ¡°Do you accept imp xxx as your Prime imp?¡± ¡°Request to see his grades if needed.¡± This thing, no, voice, kept bothering me, so in my anger, I accepted it without thinking. ¡°Yes, yes, shut up! You woke me up!¡± ¡°Request accepted, will arrive within the month.¡± ¡°Fine, go away!¡± I went back to sleep immediately after. Returning to the present¡­ ¡°Right, I remember now. So, what do you do?¡± Though, that voice seemed to lack a fairly important detail. Or maybe he doesn¡¯t have a name? ¡°Eh, you a new Heart? Well, you look a bit smaller than the ones back in school, so probably. It doesn¡¯t matter, I never served a Heart before either. We can both explore how it works together!¡± It said, still having a big grin in its face. Unauthorized content usage: if you discover this narrative on Amazon, report the violation. Well, if you just taught me how to control myself, that should be a clue. Ah, but maybe there is more to it than that. Maybe other Hearts lose their memories, maybe I have lost mine? It hardly matters now. ¡°Uh, sure¡­¡± It is way to excited, better do as it says for now. Maybe it will calm down. ¡°Let¡¯s work hard!¡± With shaking arms, the creature clenched its small fists. ¡°So, what¡¯s with the goat blood, not to mention, you brought the entire goat here?¡± Seriously. In fact, it brought two. ¡°Eh, I thought you Hearts loved those things?¡± Tilting its head, the creature looked at me questionably. ¡°Well, I don¡¯t know, didn¡¯t find it particularly pleasant.¡± Honestly, I didn¡¯t feel much at all. Maybe it¡¯s more the principle of not wanting to have blood smeared all over my body, or in this case, my crystal. ¡°Ah, but it woke you up, didn¡¯t it?¡± The creature grinned. Probably thinking: ¡®Haha, gotcha!¡¯ ¡°That¡¯s true, I guess.¡± Maybe a bucket of water could have produced the same results, but now we will never know. This is how all those odd traditions start out, isn''t it? It worked once, better keep doing it, just to be safe. ¡°¡­¡± ¡°...¡± A silent moment for a change. Already much better. But this imp, or whatever it is, seems like it decided to wait for me to say something. ¡°So, uh, tell me about yourself. You never answered it before.¡± ¡°Hm? It was all in my grades. Didn¡¯t you check them before?¡± ¡°Maybe¡­? But, tell me anyway. I want to hear it from you.¡± ¡°Oh, a Heart that wants to talk with his minions! How lucky I am. I just love talking. Guess that is why you accepted me. Heh, I remember back in school, how the teachers hated me for always talking during the classes.¡± The imp snickered to himself, before continuing with his story. ¡°They always threw me out! But you are different! You love to listen to me! Anyways, where was I?¡± The imp spoke while gesturing wildly and changed from one emotion to the next in an instant. Oh, finally back on topic? This guy, I think he is a guy at least, really likes to talk about irrelevant things. ¡°As I was saying, the teachers always threw me out, but I didn¡¯t mind. The classes were so boring anyway. I went to the plaza and talked with the other students. It was always packed when I got there. Of course, everyone was busy so they couldn¡¯t stay for long. They had to go somewhere else when I arrived and started talking to them. When the plaza emptied, I went to the library or cafeteria... and there I¡­ after that I¡­¡± ¡­ *tick tick ¡°Hey, you listening?¡± The imp stood right next to me, my crystal, pressing his face hard against it, slobbering his drool all over the place. He tapped the crystal, with his claw like fingernails, to get my attention. ¡°Ouch!¡± That hurt, surprisingly enough. Guess, I¡¯m actually really sensitive. Makes me wonder, what happens if a piece of dirt or stone falls down from the ceiling, and lands on me? I won''t shatter, will I? ¡°Hey, you fell asleep?¡± The imp backed up again, no longer invading my personal space. His saliva still stuck on my crystal, though. Hey, aren¡¯t you going to wipe that off? ¡°Uh, sorry, tired, I guess. So, you were saying?¡± ¡°Ah, what was the last thing you heard?¡± ¡°Oh, something about getting thrown out of the class and going to an empty plaza?¡± I wasn¡¯t really listening. ¡°Hm, so at the start then.¡± The imp stroked his chin while seemingly staring up into nothingness. The imp thought for a bit, calculating things in his small mind. ¡°You missed about¡­ three hours?¡± ¡°Three hours?! Three hours? You talked for three hours?¡± Imp-impossible... ¡°Ah, don¡¯t worry, I can repeat it all again.¡± The imp reassured me. Somehow, he made it sound like he was actually worried for me. That I would be upset if I missed out on this story. ¡°So, back at school, the teachers disliked me for always talking during class and always threw me out but I-¡± Oh no! ¡°Hold it! Let¡¯s leave that story for another time. For now, tell me about your skills and actual job here in this place.¡± ¡°Aw, but the other story is much funnier.¡± The imp said with a sad tone and lowered head. He fidgeted with his fingers. Seems really he wanted to tell his story again. ¡°I don¡¯t care. That is for later. Also, tell me my purpose. What am I and what do I do?¡± The most important question. It has been on my mind for quite some time, by that I mean a few minutes. But considering how old I am; a few minutes is a large part of my entire life. ...What is the meaning of my life? I shook my vision, since I got no head. Feels like I got sidetracked there for a moment. ¡°Uh, fine, here are my grades.¡± The imp flicked with his wrist. A large box popped up in front of my vision. For now, let''s put it aside. ¡°And, your job is to maintain and control this dungeon and try to take over this land. Or something like that.¡± The imp shrugged. ¡°Take over?¡± His explanation covered the bare essentials, but I would prefer some details too. ¡°Yes, but first try to survive. The heroes, forces of good, as they call themselves, will try to stop and destroy you.¡± The imp¡¯s formerly playful expression, turned into a serious one. He spat on the ground. ¡°They are the bad guys, coming into our homes and killing us. Calling us monsters. Well, we called ourselves monsters before that, but it used to be a good thing, instead of the insult they turned it into.¡± The imp¡¯s formerly serious expression, turned into an angry one. He spat on the ground again, but this time, he also stomped on the spit with his foot. Pretending it was a hero perhaps? Anyway, that doesn¡¯t seem like an acceptable behaviour from a Prime. ¡°How do I stop them from stopping me?¡± ¡°With your army, of course. Expand this place and attract others to fight for you. Me and my underlings will help you with digging, mining, cleaning, construction, transporting, and so on. Everything except fighting and traps. We can set up the traps though, just not make them.¡± ¡°Everything?¡± Don¡¯t really wanna trust this guy with the entire work list in the dungeon. ¡°Well, at first. Later, when you get actual experts at different jobs, you should probably let them do their jobs. However, for mining and digging and cleaning, we are the best! No dungeon can survive without an imp group working in the background, trust me on that.¡± The imp puffed his chest. Seems he was proud of something, just not sure what. I took this chance to look over the grades¡­ If I could, I would be covered in sweat. Especially those last lines... Chapter 2 - The Grades.
Mining: Average speed. Could not mine higher than one block and could not mine proper ceilings. Final Grade: F. Digging: Fast digger through soil and quite good through other materials too. However, could not come up again, which made him useless for solo deep digging. A critical flaw, since he needed to have a helper with him which doubles the cost. Final Grade: F. Cleaning: Great floor cleaner, however could not clean the walls higher than one block and could not clean the ceilings. Final Grade: E. Cooking: Quite good when making small meals. But had problems moving around when cooking for many in large kitchens. Final Grade: D. Washing: Very good. Put in extra amount of effort compared to everyone else. Some problems with large objects but used special techniques and more effort to overcome it. Final Grade: A. Sewing: Very good. Slight problem with gigantic fabrics but for regular clothing he was one of the best in class. If not ''the'' best. Final Grade: A. Decorating: Made nice and comfy floor areas. Could not decorate the higher walls and ceilings though, which made his rooms dull. Final Grade: E. Wall fortification: The lower part of the wall was well made. The upper? Not so much. Final Grade: F. Mage assistant: Could not reach the upper shelves in the library, when tasked with gathering books and then returning them. Which was the main job for him. Otherwise worked hard after I cast a mute spell on him. Final Grade: E. Blacksmith assistant: Could not do the above fanning at all. His side fanning was better, but above fanning is much more comfortable and cooling. Pumping air into the fire with the pump was not done properly. Had to ask a mage for a mute spell. Final Grade: E. Torture assistant: Wiped off blood and other things from the floor with great skill. Could not clean the higher walls and ceilings from splatter though. Cleaned weapon and tools nicely. Had to gag him after the victims complained he was worse than the actual torture. Maybe a future career? Final Grade: B, thanks to his great potential. Portal greeter: The strongest mouth flapping skill I have ever seen, but it¡¯s not the quantity that matters. It''s the quality. What good is a thousand words, if someone else can convince the same monster with ten words? Final Grade: D. Livestock feeder: Took good care of them. Had some trouble getting a wild chicken down from a pillar, but solved it by throwing another chicken at it. Almost got stampeded by the larger livestock when feeding them, since he walked around on the ground, instead of feeding them from the air, like normal. Final Grade: C. Carrier: As long as the object''s destination was the ground, there were no problems. However, he could not cross lava rivers, water lakes, great chasms or anything higher up. That is a very big weakness, and severely reduces his value when needing a carrier. If you stumble upon this tale on Amazon, it''s taken without the author''s consent. Report it.Final Grade: E. Trap layer: Things like tripwire, spikes and rolling boulders on the ground went fine. Anything that came from above was literally impossible for him to set up. He almost got crushed himself instead. Final Grade: E. Room constructor: Ground based rooms were decent. Had problems with lamps, torches, pillars or anything that reached up high. Cannot recommend him for this job. Final Grade: F. Small nest constructor: Very good. As long as it was for a tiny creature, there were no problems. Final Grade: B. Large nest constructor: No, just no. Too slow and shoddy quality. This is where the main non-sentient fighting force lives. Only the highest quality is acceptable! His roofs were atrocious, filled with holes. The upper walls missing paint and most of the planks were only leaning against each other. Final Grade: F. Runner: Best in class! Thanks to no wings, he weighed less than the others. It also helped reduce the drag. Final Grade: A. Flying: No wings. Disgusting and a disgrace. Should be expelled. Final Grade: F-. Climber: No wings, so weighted less. Falling meant death since he could not stop a fall. Not very good overall. Small arms and feet. Pot belly and clumsy. Final Grade: C. Fighter: As long as flying was forbidden, he did decent. However, the free form and air combat was a complete disaster. After all, he could not fly. Final Grade: E. Trader: Thought about what he needed and tried his best to get it. However, after being tricked several times, he lost everything. Naive and gullible but with a good heart. A good heart is unacceptable when trading. Only profit matters. Final Grade: E. Theoretic knowledge: He spent ten thousand years taking this course. It would be an unprecedented disgrace if he did not somewhat learn it. Final Grade: A. Total: A: 4.B: 2.C: 2.D: 2. E: 8. F: 6. Low class servant: Very fitting. Recommended direction. Middle class servant: Not recommended, but possible with the right jobs and orders. High class servant: No. Never. Prime Imp: Serve the Heart personally? Absolutely impossible. Do not accept him not matter how desperate you are. Which would be odd since we always have thousands high class servants waiting for a chance to become a Prime. Courses: 24/10 courses needed for graduation. Final result: Graduated as a Prime!
Incase you are wondering why this chapter was so short(I prefer to read shorter chapters, which is why I post shorter chapters myself, but this is unusually short), it¡¯s because I decided to separate the grades from the rest so I can easily edit them if I come up with something new. Chapter 3 - Bug Dungeon? ¡°That¡¯s quite some grades you got. Though, seems most of it was because you simply lack wings.¡± ¡°Yes! Some teachers are so unfair! My parents are low-class and have small wings, but at least they can fly for a short while. But, I got no wings at all! Yet, they think I must become a low-class too. Never! I will show them that even a wingless imp can become someone! And I did! I became your Prime imp! Oh, my parents and other relatives, were so proud of me, when I told them.¡± The imp actually wiped a tear from his eye. Your parents were low-class, but had wings, you got no wings, but thinks you deserve to become a higher class? I''m sensing some faulty logic here. The imp continued his rant. ¡°My gang; Ah, I was, well actually, still is, the leader of a small ten-man wingless imp gang. We hang out together and talk shit about the winged ones. Well, not only that, but you get the idea.¡± ¡°Oh, I see¡­¡± Is this his back story? ¡°I wasn¡¯t done. The gang was also super happy for me, but they quickly got sad again. With me gone, you see, their life would suck again and they would be forced to join the low-class. So, I invited them all as my personal underlings! Great, huh? No need for snobby winged imps when you got my gang.¡± The imp folded his arms and nodded to himself. ¡°That sounds great and all¡­ But who is going to clean the ceilings and such things? Seems most of your tasks are pretty much based around the fact you can fly.¡± I have a feeling there is a reason why the wingless are generally considered, how should I put this... worthless. ¡°Eh, don¡¯t worry. If we all help each other out, maybe we can reach the top walls. By climbing on top of each other and leaning on the walls, I mean.¡± The imp stacked his hands up high, to explain to me more clearly. Not that I needed it; understood what he meant from the start. Can already see them falling down in a pile of bodies and limbs. ¡°What about the ceiling? With no wall to support yourself on, how will you clean it or even expand it?¡± Not to mention, the ones in the bottom of the imp tower, would get crushed. ¡°Fear not, Heart. I have already thought about such things.¡± The imp waved with his index finger. Wait, he does not have five fingers, he only got four. Is it still the index finger? You know what, don''t think I really care either. ¡°Oh, tell me.¡± He got a plan? He is better than I thought. ¡°You.¡± The imp stated bluntly. ¡°Wha?¡± ¡°You will do it.¡± The imp said in a serious tone. ¡°I¡¯m sorry? What did you just say? Me, the immobile non-living Heart should clean his own ceilings and do the imp''s job?¡± Sigh, seems he is serious. Well, maybe he got an actual plan. ¡°OK, how exactly?¡± ¡°A Dungeon Lord, your own body, an avatar.¡± The imp said smugly. ¡°I can create my own body? How?¡± Now we are talking. ¡°Simple¡­ You need access to a portal, at least two floors, lots of mana and gold, something to design it after, the ritual room and the ritualist working there.¡± The imp counted with his fingers, as he listed the things needed. ¡°The portal, floors and something to design it after, will be easy. Mana and gold will just take some period of being frugal, until we have gathered the required amount. A stronger body is more expensive. The ritualist, that one will be hard. The room too, I have no idea how to build it.¡± ¡°So, not simple at all¡­¡± Too good to be true, it seems. ¡°I, I guess so.¡± The imp laughed awkwardly. ¡°What now? I know about your skills, and that I am creating a dungeon, or something. How do I actually do that?¡± I want to start doing something. Anything. This guy''s voice is starting to get on my nerves. ¡°Well, first¡­¡± The imp took out a hollow tube, made of some kind of wood, from the bag on his back. He pressed one end of the tube a few centimeters into the ground. He put his mouth on the other end, and made a sucking sound, like drinking the last few drops with a straw. The imp opened his mouth and spat out a small bug! Disgusting? ¡°Look! A wild beetle bug.¡± The imp held the bug in his palm. The beetle bug, laying on its back, twitched with its tiny legs. Making the gross bug even more gross was the fact that the imp''s saliva covered its entire body, from the hell like experience it just lived through. Poor thing. Hm, guess I can''t really feel any sympathy for it. Oh well, I tried. ¡°Uh, great trick, but don¡¯t see how that will help.¡± ¡°Foolish, look again.¡± He ate the bug, it crunched loudly as he bit into the hard shell, and then the imp repeated the process. ¡°Okay, two bugs. Didn¡¯t know there were so many here, but whatever. Get to the point.¡± Starting to lose my patience with his bugs. ¡°Exactly! This is a bug sucker! The bug sucker can draw bugs towards it, from upwards to fifty meters! First, you input your own mana. The mana undergoes some kind of change as it passes through the tube, and somehow, when it comes out, it¡¯s able to locate bugs, as it spreads through the ground. The mana grabs the bugs, and then you must suck up the mana with your own lung capacity, which brings the bug with it. Stronger lungs, means longer range. Since you recycle almost all the mana you used in the first place, this thing allows you to find bugs with almost no cost.¡± He grinned while holding out the hollow tube in his palms, like it was some kind of treasure. ¡°Oh, that sounds¡­ useful, I guess. You don¡¯t want bugs in your home.¡± Though, the fact you have to remove them with your mouth lowers the usefulness of it, drastically. The imp tilted its head in confusion. ¡°I don¡¯t know what you are talking about, but I will collect some bugs for you. You will take control over them, and finally, we will start breeding them.¡± The imp put the second bug in his mouth, and chewed it quickly. Guess those two didn¡¯t count. ¡°Breed bugs? What kind of dungeon am I?¡± Did my imagination delude me? I thought I was something amazing. But a bug dungeon? Oh, how the mighty have fallen. Well, not sure if I ever was mighty in the first place. The imp lightly facepalmed. ¡°It¡¯s only the first step. What eat bugs?¡± ¡°You?¡± ¡°Well, yes. But also slightly larger creatures!¡± The imp measured with his hands, about ten centimeters apart. ¡°Go on¡­¡± He seems to be on to something great, but I can¡¯t figure it out, just yet. ¡°And, what eats these slightly larger creatures?¡± Slowly, the imp increased the distance between his hands. Twenty, thirty, forty... Until he could no longer spread his arms apart any further. ¡°Even larger creatures! Haha, you are quite smart.¡± Indeed. I thought about it all wrong. You must start small, if you want to become big. The imp laughed and rubbed his nose and straightened his back. ¡°Well, I didn¡¯t take ¡®Theoretical Knowledge¡¯ for ten thousand years for nothing.¡± ¡°Ten thousand years. Is that normal?¡± Is it just me, or does that seem like a very high number? ¡°Eh, no, you only need to do ten courses to become low-class. Even if you fail them all, you can still graduate as low-class. I tried to become mid or high so I kept trying to improve my grades.¡± At least he was trying. ¡°This might sound weird, but how long does you imps live? As in age.¡± ¡°Forever. Until we run out of mana or have some external force end our life.¡± The imp did a throat slitting motion. ¡°You live from mana?¡± But, he just ate a bug? ¡°Yep, most do. You too. So don¡¯t reach zero mana or we will all be in trouble¡­¡± Wait, what will happen? How can I see how much mana I got left? Maybe he doesn¡¯t know either? Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on the original website. ¡°Where does mana come from?¡± I have not felt any hunger or anything like that. Do I even need to eat? Can I eat? How do I consume this mana? ¡°Everywhere, I guess. But only some places have enough mana for many people. Like my school, it provides free mana for the students, though, they normally only stay for ten or hundred years or so. I was the oldest student by over eight thousand years.¡± The imp laughed to himself. ¡°I¡¯m quite proud of my record. Won¡¯t be beaten for a long, long time.¡± He smiled, probably thinking about the legacy he created. ¡°Anyway, other places is dungeons, like this one. You feed us all by releasing it into the air and ground. That is why beetles gather. Other bugs will arrive soon, maybe bigger things too. So, we must hurry. After a Heart awakes, there is only a day or so before it¡¯s discovered by larger beings that wants to eat you. Swallowing a Heart is a surefire way to success in life.¡± The imp nodded to himself again. He didn¡¯t seem to notice he said something terrible. ¡°Hmm, I see. So, I¡¯m in actual danger here and you have talked for what? Four hours now?¡± The imp scratched the back of his head while laughing awkwardly. ¡°Maybe we should have talked about old memories after you set up the basic ecosystem.¡± ¡°Yeah, maybe¡­ You start gather bugs while I control them.¡± This guy¡­ Will he be the death of me? The imp immediately got to work and in only ten seconds, he had a new bug. He put it down on the ground, gently pressing the bug down into the dirt, to keep it from moving too much. Five minutes later¡­ How do I control them?! ¡°Hey, imp-¡± ¡°Ah, call me Prime.¡± The imp interrupted me, as he removed another bug from his mouth. He had created a small pile of bugs on the ground. ¡°Prime, how do I control them?¡± ¡°Eh? Simply overwhelm their minds. Or something like that. Can¡¯t remember all the details.¡± The imp shrugged, like it was not his problem, which it technically, was not. ¡°Can¡¯t rem-! You took it for ten thousand years!¡± Maybe if he learnt it ten thousand years ago, I could forgive him. However, he took that course every time. ¡°Yeah, but it had something like ten pages. That¡¯s too much for anyone to memorize!¡± This guy is useless! No, must calm down. I need to focus. It should be like the other controls. Feel the bug, feel the bug¡­ I closed my ¡®eyes¡¯, turning the world into darkness. At first, I could only see the Heart glowing in white, surrounded by total darkness, like a star in the night sky. After a while, I managed to see a faint blue light, it was only a single light, but it was all I needed to practice on. Ah! There it is! Attack! I focused all my mind power on the small blue light I could see. ¡°AAAAHH! Stop! You are! Attacking!! MEEEEE!!!¡± The imp shouted in pain, as he rolled around in the dirt, while clutching his head with his hands. Huh? Oh, oops. Best to change back to normal vision for now. The imp was down on all four, panting heavily. ¡°Sorry, I saw a blue light, some kind of cloud of particles, thought it was a beetle.¡± I kinda feel bad for him. Eh, maybe not. He laughed weakly. ¡°I forgot to tell you. Blue color equals an ally. For now, that¡¯s just me. Green color equals a neutral lifeform. Any wild animals, like the bugs, or simply beings that have no strong feelings about you. Red color equals an enemy. These you want to kill. As creatures move from the different states, their colors will mix up, so be careful if you detect someone with small amounts of red. That one might rebel soon.¡± The imp got up from the ground, and brushed himself off. Some blood dripped out from his nose, probably caused by the mental damage. He simply wiped it off, not bothered much by the injuries. Either these imps are tougher than they look, or he is unusually unconcerned by the state of his body. The imp continued: ¡°Find the small green ones. The ¡®cloud¡¯ is related to the amount of mana they have, usually simply body size, so just keep trying. They are much, much smaller than mine.¡± Should have told me that earlier. That was your own fault. I restarted the process. They should become easier to detect, thanks to the pile of beetles on the ground. Ah! Is that them? So small. Like grains of sand compared to the mountain sized imp. Attack! ¡­ Not sure what that did. They look like they simply froze. Stopped moving their legs and all. Stunned from the attack? ¡°Now what? They just stopped moving?¡± I tried asking the imp again. ¡°Hmm, keep trying? Don¡¯t know how all that mind thing works.¡± The imp shrugged. Ah, helpful as always. I tried to move closer for a better look, however, I was still stuck at the ceiling. Ooh! Suddenly, it felt like I was falling. No, wait, I zoomed in. Oh, now they are easier to see. Submit yourself to me! No? Kneel before Zod! Wait, what¡¯s a Zod? I meant: Your Heart! I command you! Surrender your will! Okaaay, I think they can¡¯t hear me, probably would not understand me either, even if they could hear me. Let¡¯s think. They feed on my mana that I¡¯m releasing. So, should I send mana into their minds? How do I do that? After ten minutes of testing, I finally managed to control the mana I constantly release. I willed some of the mana to surround them and started probing their body. Apparently, mana ignores the physical form and simply goes through anything. I focused the mana on their small minds and it worked. The green colored cloud slowly changed over to blue, as I used mana to convert the small particles the cloud consisted of. It worked, but, I¡¯m not so sure about the details of what just happened, but who cares. Now, little minions. Walk in a circle on the ground. The ten beetles I converted to my cause, immediately jumped into action. They lined up and started to walk in a circle, each bug following the one in front. They showed no sign of stopping, even after ten minutes passed, so I told them to stop. The bugs were all dizzy, and their formation immediately broke as they, unsteadily, walked in different directions, trying to find a place to sit, and calm their minds. This seems like a direct result of ordering mindless creatures. They can¡¯t resist at all, and their lack of common sense prevents them from figuring out when to stop, when the order could be considered completed. These bugs would have walked in that circle until they died. Must remember to not do it too much in the future. Or be extra specific when doing it. I decided to test it one more time. Walk two laps in a circle, and then do whatever you want. The bugs got up again, not a shred of hesitation, and did as told. They fell down again, the moment their two laps finished. Once they recovered a bit, they scuttled off, wanting to get away from the strange area, where something made them walk in circles. That went better. This will be useful for fighting. Fearless minions is the best. The imp saw the strange event, and figured out I had succeeded in my task. ¡°Hurray! You did it. Now we can finally begin! Well actually, you should repeat it until we got a few dozens at least. You can hunt them on your own, right? Should be plenty of them crawling around. Maybe other kinds too. Take over everything you see.¡± Chapter 4 - Mushroom Farm. ¡°They are in the walls? Let me see¡­ Yep, I can see plenty of them.¡± Who knew there were so many bugs in the ground. Maybe because of my mana, there is a larger than normal amount of them? ¡°While you do that, you should also construct their nest, or at least design it, and find them a source of food other than your mana.¡± The imp said. ¡°Hm? Like what?¡± Don¡¯t see anything to eat around here, unless he means them eating each other? ¡°Ah, I brought some other things for you.¡± He pulled out a small drawstring leather pouch, from his bag. ¡°These are mushroom seeds. I got it as a gift from school. I also got the bug sucker and my pickaxe from them. The goats were from my parents. They thought it would be an appropriate gift for a new Heart.¡± He wore a proud expression on his face when he talked about his family and school. ¡°Oh, your parents? They ever met a Heart before?¡± For some reason, I doubt it. ¡°No, but they heard stories from when they were young, about how goat blood was every Heart¡¯s favorite, or something.¡± So he said. Seems like I was correct. You shouldn¡¯t trust everything you hear, you know. ¡°Right, so, what now?¡± He talked a lot, but never showed me how to do any of these things. ¡°Okay, the mushroom seeds. They grow underground, in the dark. Don¡¯t need any sunlight. The most basic plant, but also one of the most important ones in a dungeon.¡± I hope their helmets are plump. Get it? Plump helmets? Eh, forget it. ¡°Oh, we can plant them here?¡± ¡°No, not right here." He shook his head. "This is, literally, the heart of the dungeon and the last room they, the enemy, should reach. We will fill it with decorations and traps and make it out of stone. Not some mushroom farm.¡± I agree. I want white marble pillars, four of them, surrounding my crystal. The finest floor tiles, decorated with the faces of our enemies. A mural on the walls showing the progress, our history, of the dungeon. The ceiling painted with the faces of our heroes. Hm? What? We only got dirt? Oh, nevermind then. ¡°You are right. Don¡¯t want a bug eating farm next to me. So how do I build a new room?¡± Really don''t wanna have any bugs crawling all over me, so they have to go to another room. ¡°You should have a view from above, right?¡± The imp looked up in the ceiling. He normally acted like I was in the crystal. Or crystal heart, not sure what to call it. Guess I can use both terms. Anyway, technically, that¡¯s where I am. ¡°Yep, can zoom and move the camera around.¡± I did so, to demonstrate, but, naturally, he could not see me doing it. Which made it pointless. ¡°Camera?¡± The imp looked confused. ¡°...Nevermind. Not sure what that is either. I meant my¡­ vision.¡± Huh, how odd. ¡°Okay, Heart¡­ Anyway, you should be able to select a block on the wall. It¡¯s one cubic meter in size. I heard that Hearts have some kind of ability to help with the targeting, some kind of marker. Like an arrow, a hand, a cross, a sword or something like that? You create it with your mind, so the shape is up to you. I would recommend the hand, since it lets you pick up things. The price goes up the more advanced it is, but it¡¯s worth it. Trust me. Our teacher repeated it many times.¡± Oh, your teacher told you? So, you actually have no idea? Huh, like a cursor¡­ What''s a cursor? Nevermind. Something to help me with targeting? Hmm, a hand does sounds useful. Interesting. Picking up things, means I can interact with the dungeon, even though I have no body to speak of. Yes, a hand¡­ Slowly, a green, thin hand with long black claws, grew out from seemingly nothing. It hovered in the air, and after a few seconds, I managed to twitch slightly with a finger. Yes, this will work. Soon enough, I could start moving the hand around, and gained full control over the fingers. ¡°I did it! Haha, look at it. Hm? You see it, right?¡± I waved my new green hand in front of his face, but he had no reaction. ¡°No, only the Heart can see from that view, and therefore only you can see the hand. Maybe later you can figure out how to make it visible, but I don¡¯t know how.¡± ¡°Ah, of course. But, can you feel THIS!¡± I slapped the imp as hard as I could with my hand. *Slap! A loud sound echoed inside the room. ¡°Urgh!¡± From the impact, the imp flew two meters into the air. He smashed into the dirt wall and even sunk a few centimeters into the wall. The dirt slowly crumbled under his weight, and he fell out onto the ground again. ¡°Why, why did you do that?¡± He said with tears in his eyes. Some black blood dripped from his mouth. ¡°Uwah! I¡¯m sorry! I didn¡¯t think it would work!¡± Oh shit! ¡°Of course it works, you are the Heart and can punish your minions when you want. The hand is the best tool for that.¡± He slowly got up and rubbed his sore body. He spat out a mouthful of blood, but seemed fine otherwise. No visible injuries, at least. If you can¡¯t see it, it doesn¡¯t exist right? Right? ¡°But, but, you said it was only in my mind?¡± He did right? I¡¯m not the one in the wrong here, am I? ¡°No, I said only you could see it. The hand is very real and can even be used to move around your minions and transport other things when things needs to get done quickly. I was going to tell you about that part later, didn¡¯t expect you to hit me ten seconds after you created it¡­¡± He looked a little bit angry. Oh well, call it revenge for wasting my time earlier. ¡°Eh, I said I was sorry. Now, continue with the story. How do I create a new room?¡± Hehe, it was quite funny. Maybe poking him and knocking things down on him will be just as funny? It will create a legend about ¡®The Haunted Dungeon¡¯, where items falls down randomly and moves around with no one near them, and when you sleep, if feels like something is touching you. Or maybe not. ¡°Right. Simply mark the blocks you want removed and I will do it for you.¡± He spoke in a monotonous tone. I may have injured his teaching enthusiasm. ¡°Can¡¯t I just simply tell you to do it?¡± Seems like a needless step to take. ¡°You can, but since I can¡¯t see from your view, the result might differ from your expectations. Besides, don¡¯t wanna listen to ¡®little bit to the right, no, more to the left, just a little higher.¡¯ when I¡¯m working.¡± Huh, makes sense, I guess. Need to learn this anyway. Might be fine when I only got one minion, but when I need to order a hundred? ¡°If you want to try, we can do it the ''easy'' way. First, let¡¯s start with something simple. Order me to dig out that part of the wall.¡± He said and pointed behind him with the thumb over the shoulder. ¡°...What are you talking about?¡± Seeing the smiling and patient look on the odd creature I sighed inwardly and said: ¡°Go and dig that wall.¡± Unauthorized content usage: if you discover this narrative on Amazon, report the violation. Shaking the head while laughing, the imp said: ¡°What wall? There are many walls.¡± ¡°The one you were talking about? You were the one that brought it up!¡± I slashed the wall with my hand, making a large cut in it, causing the dirt to fly all over the small room. ¡°That one!¡± The imp nodded and took out his pick from the bag and dug out the wall. He created a small cubic meter sized hole. ¡°Now what?¡± He said with a smiling face. Hmm, I see. I would need to order him at every step. Guess I need to learn it. *Tap tap I poked and touched the wall. Leaving my imprints on it, but nothing else seemed to have happened. Ah, right, the mana. Need to infuse the mana like always. ¡°Okay, done. Get to work!¡± I did it. The wall parts were glowing in a faint yellow color, indicating that I had succeeded in trying to order the walls to get dug out. ¡°Eh, but you didn¡¯t send me the blueprint or layout yet.¡± He said, while doing an exaggerated shrug. ¡°Dammit, you always leave things out.¡± ¡°Hey, I¡¯m just teaching you in steps. Don¡¯t blame me.¡± The imp said with a lofty smile. He seemed to enjoy watching my struggles. Well, soon I will be fully learned, and he won¡¯t have any more opportunities to teach me the things he spent ten thousand years to learn. Guess I can tolerate his ¡®games¡¯. For now. ¡°Hm, I¡¯m guessing to send a stream of mana into your mind while thinking about the new base layout?¡± I did so and he flinched and nodded. ¡°Got it. Good job.¡± His pick sliced through the soft dirt walls and formed a hallway, just like my design. It was one meter wide and two meter high and twenty meter long. However, I soon discovered a problem. The upper dirt block was still there! ¡°Oi, you missed a spot¡­¡± ¡°Eh? Oh, well, can¡¯t reach that high.¡± He laughed. ¡°You know how it is.¡± The imp was half a meter tall and didn¡¯t have any wings to fly any higher. Therefore, he couldn¡¯t reach it. Great, I''m starting to understand why his school stressed the importance of being able to fly. ¡°Sigh, leave it for now. We will deal with that later.¡± Nothing I could do about it anyway. I started to design the new room. I made it quite small, only three by four meters. Can always make it larger later or make another farm somewhere else. The imp got to work and quickly finished it. It had a low ceiling like everything else, but perhaps the mushrooms won¡¯t mind? I hope they are not giant mushrooms. The only room with high a ceiling is my own chamber, where it¡¯s five meters high. Perhaps that is the standard height for a dungeon? Flying or gigantic creatures would not like my current dungeon. ¡°Okay, done.¡± The imp put back his pick into the bag and took out the small seed bag again. The bag seemed to work with magic. He simply reached back with his hand, and the item would come out from the back on its own. Same thing when putting the pick back. He merely pushed the pick against the bag opening and the bag would take over from there. ¡°Now, I simply plant the seeds, like this.¡± He put a seed every ten centimeters, the rows thirty centimeters apart. ¡°Now, add mana to grow them faster. Tell the bugs you captured to stay in this room. They can eat the mushrooms instead of your mana.¡± The imp brushed off the dirt from his hands. ¡°Why does it matter? If I feed the mushrooms my mana and the bugs then eat them? Is it not the same thing?¡± If I give the bugs, say, a hundred mana or if I give the mushrooms a hundred mana. I still lose a hundred mana. Actually, because I still pay the bugs, since they don¡¯t have any mushrooms to eat yet, I¡¯m losing twice as much. ¡°You won¡¯t be feeding the mushrooms forever. You might not notice it yet, but as we, the dungeon, grow, you will feel the mana drain a lot more and it will limit you.¡± The imp no longer stood in front of my crystal heart, so he had nothing to look at as he spoke. Therefore, he simply acted like I was inside his head and didn¡¯t look at anything particular when we spoke. My voice is inside his head, so it was quite fitting, I guess. ¡°Limit me? How?¡± I can guess more mana = more options, but I still want to hear the details. ¡°Well, in the book they used this example: ¡®Imagine feeding five minions. Now it¡¯s not so bad, but add another five and you will feel it. Imagine at fifty! You will have a hard time to focus on anything, like mind powers. But if you have some proper food for them, they can eat that instead of your mana, and you can have hundreds of minions instead.¡¯¡± He talked like he was reading it straight from the book. ¡°Oh, you know your stuff.¡± I¡¯m impressed. He laughed and rubbed his nose. Seems he does that whenever I praise him. ¡°It was the thing I focused the most on. After all, it would affect me if I don¡¯t have any mana to feed on, right?¡± ¡°...R-right.¡± He only thought about himself! ¡°So, will you eat the bugs now?¡± Might save me a lot of mana. Now that he has taught me the benefits of being frugal, I¡¯m going to take every chance I can get. Well, not like there were ever any doubt about the benefits of not wasting your resources. ¡°Hah! No, I¡¯m your Prime imp. I won¡¯t live on bugs. Only the finest, straight from the source, mana for me.¡± And that was that. ¡°Uh huh, I see. Now what? We got some mushrooms sprouting up soon and the bugs are on their way.¡± I really have no idea on how to progress from here on. ¡°I, I was thinking about taking a nap by your crystal. You can continue with the bug domination. Just keep doing it until you can¡¯t find anymore.¡± He yawned and stretched his arms up. ¡°... A nap? I thought we were running low on time?¡± What is he talking about now? ¡°Yeah, but I¡¯m still tired. I normally nap at this point in the day.¡± He smacked with his lips and blinked several times. Seems he is not joking around, he actually looks tired. ¡°So, what should I do? Hunting bugs feels like second nature for me now. We already got plenty too.¡± ¡°Hmm, well, try to search the nearby area for anything bigger. Don¡¯t know, tired now.¡± He laid down on the stone stairs leading up to my crystal heart. Right, my crystal heart was two meter up, thanks to the large platform it sat on and had stairs to get up there. ¡°Hey, wait!¡± I shouted at him. ¡°...What? I just dug out a massive amount of dirt. I¡¯m tired. Talk later¡­¡± He mumbled. *Zzz... Zzzz... He, he actually fell asleep? On the stairs up to my heart too. Tsk, should I smack him? Snoring sounds so quickly? Seems a little fishy, but I don¡¯t know enough about the imp race to know how quickly they fall asleep. I guess he can sleep, sigh. Better try to search the nearby areas, like he said. Maybe there is something besides bugs hidden in the dirt. Chapter 5 - A Snake Has Arrived. If zooming in is possible, then zooming out should prove little difficulty for someone as smart and creative as me. I forced my ¡®presence¡¯ upwards and lo and behold, it worked. I could see the entire dungeon area. It was still small, of course, but much better than the old ''one room'' view. I could see three blocks away from my edge, but everything else was black, total darkness. Hmm¡­ I sent out my ¡®presence¡¯ out into the outer walls, and used my ¡®soul view¡¯, as I have come to call it. Many tiny green dots. Bugs. Oh, what is this? A larger one. Long, but thin? A snake? Hnnnnrgh! That was the sound of me focusing hard, trying to capture it. Got him! It was harder than the bugs, by quite a lot. Well, come in, little one, so I can see you. The snake slithered through the dirt, seemingly unhindered by the mass of dirt in his way. Oh! The snake suddenly burst through the wall and fell down to the ground. With a ten centimeters long, three centimeters wide body, covered in brown scales, it looked... small. Its tongue flickered wildly, trying to sense its new location. The snake noticed the wild bug right next to it, and snapped the jaws around the bug, swallowing it whole. Excellent! I need more of your kind, so we can breed you. For now, crawl around and eat some wild bugs, until you feel full. Then do whatever you feel like. It hissed in response and slithered off. After I had dismissed the snake, I returned to the soul view and searched for more. It took around one second to take over a bug. Smaller than one centimeter bugs were almost instant, but the one to three centimeters ones took around one second. Bigger than that, I only found one of; a five centimeter long earthworm. They can expand and stretch out in size, so I measure them at their smallest. I decided to take over all the bugs I could see in the surroundings, to clean my walls up. I would no longer allow these freeloaders to feed on my mana without submitting their minds to my will. Two hours passed, and I started to feel the drain on my mana. My current force consisted of over a thousand bugs, from dozens of types, and ten snakes. I had cleaned up my surroundings, or so I thought, but the area I started at showed signs of green again. Well, it¡¯s better to have more than less. Don¡¯t wanna run out of bugs, which I think is impossible, but you never know. Thanks to the unlimited appetite of the bugs, the mushrooms were hard pressed to survive, so I had to order the bugs to stay away from half of them. This was so they could grow up, and start releasing their spores, automating the mushroom production. This was also a large part of the mana drain. To super accelerate their growth speed, I invested massive amounts of mana into each mushroom. But the bugs swarmed and could chew the mushrooms down faster than they could grow. Wonder how I can increase my mana regeneration? Hm, time to wake up the lazy one. *Smack smack! ¡°Ah! I¡¯m up! I¡¯m up, mom!¡± He shouted and waved his hands around in front of him. ¡°I¡¯ll go to school!¡± He awoke with a start. "Ah, where am I?" He rubbed his eyes. ¡°Uh, hello?¡± I don¡¯t even know what to say. ¡°Ah, you? It wasn¡¯t a dream?!¡± He laughed loudly. ¡°I¡¯m so happy!¡± He quickly got up and faced my crystal. ¡°So, mom, huh? She normally wakes you up?¡± A mom? Imps are born? I always imagined them to simply... pop into existence or something. Though, kinda odd to think that, when I have only met a single one. ¡°Uh, yeah. When I get thrown out of the noon class, I usually go home and take a nap.¡± ¡°Sounds like you made it into a routine.¡± How often can it happen for him to react like this? ¡°Yeah.¡± He said in a sad voice as he looked down at the ground. ¡°It was flight training class¡­¡± Ouch! ¡°Anyways¡­ I need more mana. How do I get it?¡± Let¡¯s just change the subject. ¡°Hm? Why? You should have plenty to spare with just a hundred bugs or so, and me here?¡± He looked around, but couldn¡¯t see anything different. ¡°Oh, but while you were sleeping, I worked hard. I got over a thousand bugs and ten snakes.¡± The imps eyes bulged out as he heard me. ¡°W-what? So many, huh. I understand. I guess the mushrooms aren¡¯t feeling so good either?¡± He nodded in approval of my hard work. ¡°Nope, but I spared half of them, so they can grow up.¡± ¡°Well, the fastest way is to simply reabsorb some of the mana you release. But that is a very short-term solution.¡± ¡°How do I do that?¡± Might be good to know anyway. ¡°You know how you continuously release mana into the air and ground? Well, there is a limit on the mana density in the world, the amount of mana you can squeeze into a meter sized cube. So after some time, you naturally stop doing it, however, you will stop quite a bit earlier than the actual limit. It gets harder and harder to contain the mana as you approach the limit and it makes the air and ground poisonous, even for us begins that lives on mana. Don''t worry, you need to force the mana inside a small area to even get close to such dangerous levels." "Good to know." Let''s just say I was not very worried about such a thing as accidentally poisoning the air he breathed. "Just like there is a limit on how much you can compress the mana, there is also a limit on how much you can stretch it out, how thin the density in the air and ground can get. By absorbing the mana back into your mana reserves, you make it thinner in your surroundings and starve the creatures that lives in that area. Perhaps more importantly, it also causes your domain to weaken, shrink and finally disappear. By that I mean, your vision and control in the areas where your mana is gone. You can get blocked off from parts of your own dungeon if you are not careful. Another way to gain mana is to simply kill off some creatures and absorb it from their bodies.¡± ¡°Well, I worked hard to get all my creatures, so I don¡¯t want to kill them yet.¡± No, really. It was hard work. ¡°Correct, that is a bad idea. Now is the time to build a proper nest area for them and collect rent from them.¡± Rent? Rent from the bugs? He is joking right? ¡°Rent?¡± Might as well ask him. ¡°Yes, in mana. They will give you a small and harmless portion of their mana that they gather during the day. May not sound like such a good idea right now, when you are the one feeding them with mana, but consider this; you give them zero mana and receive four in return.¡± He held up a closed fist, next to an open fist with all four fingers raised. I think he might be underestimating my math knowledge. Or maybe he is just proud that he could figure it out himself. You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story. ¡°Oh! Passive income!¡± This is genius. ¡°Indeed.¡± He nodded. ¡°Payment for sheltering them. Such weak creatures like this have no mind to resist your demands, but when smarter ones move in, they don¡¯t like to see you extort others. So, might aswell do it properly from the start.¡± I could only agree. Don¡¯t like those that preys on the weak. Well, sometimes I might do it, but I can assure you that it¡¯s for the greater good. ¡°However!¡± The imp suddenly exclaimed. Huh, what now? ¡°When strong fighters arrive, whose job it is to defend us, they will demand a payment. Gold or mana, or even both.¡± Ah, of course, everyone wants a piece of my mana. ¡°Gold? Where can I find that?¡± Do I just dig it out? ¡°In the walls, of course! Dig out metals and such things. There are more things than dirt walls. More on that later.¡± He waved that topic away. ¡°Okay, but how will anyone come down here? It¡¯s walls everywhere?¡± I doubt everyone would enjoy digging through the dirt to arrive here. ¡°A portal. I got the ritual and magic circle to make one. It will connect us to the monster world!¡± ¡°Monster world?¡± There is more to life than my, dozens of meters sized, dungeon? The imp grinned, apparently enjoying my ignorance. Any chance to teach is a chance for him to show off. ¡°Indeed. Did you think there were only weak imps and bugs in this world? Hah! It¡¯s a gigantic world and there are countless dungeons, like yourself.¡± "More like me?" Well, now that I think about it, seems obvious since he went to a school to train himself to serve a dungeon Heart. The imp turned serious and said: ¡°And countless heroes waiting to destroy you, and the others.¡± Oh, I forgot about them. ¡°After we set up the portal, we will get traders and even tourists and people looking for a safe place to live or work. Of course, letting the heroes invade us deep enough for them to kill all the non-combatants is a bad thing. We won¡¯t get many visitors if that happens.¡± The imp shrugged, seemingly more concerned about the loss of profits than the loss of life. I approve of that attitude. ¡°Yeah, I can imagine that.¡± If there is anything left of us to visit in the first place. I can''t imagine the heroes leaving empty-handed if they killed our military forces. The imp moved towards the mushroom farm as we spoke. The imp stopped in the doorway in shock. Even though I say doorway, we didn''t have doors yet, but I''m sure you understand what I mean. After a few seconds, he finally recollected himself enough to speak. ¡°Okay, we got a massive overcrowding problem.¡± What he saw were layers upon layers of wriggling bugs, crawling on top of each other, trying to reach the mushrooms. In the other side of the room, however, there were a bunch of mushrooms that looked just fine, and the bugs avoided them like the plague. The imp entered the room and began to inspect it more carefully. ¡°Let¡¯s extend this area by double and put a few nests in here.¡± The imp could barely walk around, afraid of crushing the bugs underfoot. As he walked in further, that ''fear'' seemed to lessen. Some casualties were unavoidable, and they made crunching and squishing sounds as he stepped on them. However, some casualties were definitely avoidable, yet the imp seemed to go out of his way to step on large piles of bugs from time to time. Think I even spotted a hint of a smile on his face. Either he got some sadistic personality, or the bugs were just funny to squish. Looking at him, I believe the second option is more likely, mainly because he only targeted the juicy bugs, that exploded from one end when he applied pressure to them. ¡°Let me design it first¡­ There, done.¡± With my command sent to him, he got to work. He quickly dug out the new area and the bugs flowed naturally to the new empty space. Now they didn¡¯t have to crawl upon each other all the time. I could even sense they were happier. Somehow. ¡°Now, let¡¯s put a bug nest in each corner and a snake nest by the entrance.¡± The imp pointed at each location as he spoke. ¡°What are you using to make the nests?¡± Don¡¯t see any building materials around. Actually, what kind of nests does a bug need? ¡°We can upgrade them later, but for now, I thought about simple dirt nests. If you use mana to harden the nest, it will be just fine.¡± ¡°Hmm, stupid question maybe, but where will you get the dirt from? Seems like it disappears when you dig it out.¡± It vanishes like... magic? ¡°Oh, yes, that is thanks to a special racial spell we imps have. You see, since we are practically born to dig out the dungeons, we developed a special spell that allows us to store the dirt and rocks we dig out, and only leave the useful parts, like ores, behind. It was later found so useful, that the Clan head, from a long time ago, spent large amount of resources to figure out how to brand the spell into our very being. It took many volunteers and lots of experiments, using hired mages and other experts, to succeed, but they did it. All imps are now born with the knowledge to use this spell.¡± Wow, who knew. ¡°I was wondering what was going on. That is very useful, otherwise it would be hard to expand. We would merely shuffle the dirt around.¡± ¡°Yep, the early dungeons had it hard. They had to send their dirt and rocks out through the portal, by special traders that specialized in ''wall waste'' removal, as they called it. Well, the discovery of this spell destroyed that thriving industry. Later, people found or invented ways to turn the wall waste into pure mana. Not much, but you got rid of it and got a small thing in return.¡± Ouch, poor traders. I imagine some never recovered from the unfortunate destruction of their once thriving industry, that they had spent their lives to become experts in. Instead, they jumped from part-time jobs, doing jobs that were unworthy of their education and spending the rest of their days complaining about how the good old days were better. ¡°I can store quite a lot, thanks to magical compression, but we have to do something with it soon. We can dig out a few other rooms for sure. Another nifty thing about this spell, is that I can shape the dirt the way I want and then simply let it out in that shape.¡± Into anything? That seems overpowered? But then again, if it''s just dirt, perhaps not. Probably comes with a mana cost anyway, to balance it out. Chapter 6 - Constructing The Nests. ¡°So that¡¯s how you are gonna build the nests, huh.¡± Seems like a cheat, but since I''m the one benefitting, I''m not gonna complain. ¡°Yep, let¡¯s start. When it comes out, immediately pour mana into my dirt creation.¡± With a wave of his hand, the dirt nest suddenly materialized on the ground. ¡°Now!¡± The imp shouted out so suddenly, that I almost forgot what he asked me to do. I poured my mana into the nest like crazy. ¡°Phew, did it work?¡± *Tap tap The imp tested the hardness, and found it acceptable. ¡°Yep, it¡¯s hard. Hm, let¡¯s put three in each corner. We probably need them.¡± ¡°Sure. More rent for me, right?¡± I see no problems with this. We quickly did two more nests. They all had different designs. The first was a large pile of dirt, filled with chambers and tunnels. Made for ants and similar bugs. Hive bugs that have a queen and eggs, that they need to protect. The second was a square box, with holes in it. Long straight tunnels, with many small rooms attached to them, where the bugs could sleep. This was the nest with the most living space, designed for everything that could fit inside. For independent bugs that roamed around alone in their hunt for food. The third model was a pile of dirt, with tunnels leading to larger rooms filled with soft dirt. This version forced them to design their own homes in the soft dirt, something they gladly did. It allowed them to experience the joy of free digging, something the other nests could not give them. The feeling of rolling around in soft dirt was vastly superior to the hardened dirt that would not budge no matter how much they tried. Designed for worms and other things that only lived under the ground. Something important to note; these nests weren¡¯t for wild bugs, but the mind controlled ones. This meant they could live in environments they normally wouldn¡¯t. ¡°Will this work?¡± The nests weren¡¯t exactly of the highest quality, but maybe I¡¯m overthinking things. They are only bugs, after all. ¡°Yeah, just tell them they may live in these nests and they will move in with time. C¡¯mon, let¡¯s set up the others while we wait.¡± The imp moved on to the next corner, ''accidentally'' stepping on a few juicy bugs on the way. We began to work on creating more nests. We made slight variations of each. The soft soil inside the nests created a massive pileup of bugs, all wanting to get in at the same time. The bugs really enjoyed digging apparently. But if everyone lives in luxury, no one does. So, sadly, some of them must live in the ''ghetto'' style nests. We also made a fourth type. A hardened surface, with three soft dirt patches to dig into, and a heavenly paradise of only soft dirt inside. It looked just like the basic ¡®pile of dirt¡¯ on the outside. Inside, however, it was all up to the bugs themselves to build their homes. There were no limits on the home sizes, so this also doubled as a small experiment. How well will the bugs go together if they can dig into each other''s homes? Will they start a fight? Perhaps they think I can''t see them from inside their nests, so they will act more freely? Or are they just brainless bugs? A very intriguing experiment, indeed. ¡°Very good. They are moving in to rest now. When they sleep, you will receive a small portion of their gathered mana.¡± The imp looked proudly upon his work, as the bugs streamed into the new nests. Sadly, not everyone got a home. In time we would expand to make room for everyone, but for now, please endure, my little bug minions. ¡°How much?¡± This feels important to know. ¡°You can actually set the fee yourself, but I would suggest one to five percent? Anymore than that, they will just get tired and it will start impacting their daily lives. Being too greedy never pays off.¡± ¡°... Don¡¯t they just crawl around and eat a lot?¡± I mean, they are just bugs, right? ¡°Well, maybe. But they are your minions and you shouldn¡¯t mistreat them! There will be strikes and boycotts! The union is strong! The union is strong!¡± The imp marched back and forth while chanting. ¡°You got a minion union?¡± Somehow, I doubt it¡¯s very strong at all. ¡°¡­¡± ¡°...¡± ¡°Anyway¡­¡± The imp broke the silence. Seems we will just forget about this union, for now. ¡°Let¡¯s build the snake nest. Maybe make it larger than one block. How about two openings next to the entrance and then an underground network connecting them?¡± The imp pointed and motioned with his hands. ¡°Sure, if you think it will be good.¡± I have no idea what these snakes might enjoy. Dirt? But without a proper nest, we apparently can¡¯t collect the rent. The imp dug out three blocks, and then filled them up again. He created a tunnel and two entrances/exits by using his special spell. He placed a larger chamber in the middle where the snakes could coil up together. To, uh, do stuff. ¡°Phew, that nest took a lot of mana to build.¡± While my mana storage is enough to build plenty more, it was still an unexpected expense. ¡°Yeah, but it¡¯s just a one time cost, and they will pay for themselves in a few days.¡± The imp reassured me. It better... ¡°Now what? Oh, yeah. The fee? What are the pros and cons, not counting any moral or union issues.¡± I want some more detailed information about this. ¡°The more mana they have, the longer and stronger they live. They breed faster and grow faster. If you want bigger bugs, I suggest keeping it at the level I spoke of before.¡± ¡°Oh, they can grow?¡± Makes sense, if you think about it? Support the creativity of authors by visiting Royal Road for this novel and more. ¡°Yeah, the various insect clans are extremely large, with countless members. They came from small bugs, like the ones we got, that stumbled upon a great mana source. Like the beetle, spider, fly and worm clans. As time passed the next generation surpassed the old one. The strength of the parent is very important too. Having powerful parents, means you will be born stronger, can live longer and absorb more mana. Finally, you will give birth to new generations, which will also be stronger than the average. It¡¯s an up going spiral that is almost impossible to stop, except by force.¡± The imp pointed towards the ceiling and moved his hand in an upward spiral motion. The imp took in a huge breath of air. Preparing to speak a lot? ¡°That is, if they have enough mana. Their homes can only provide so much, so the weaker ones have to find other mana sources, like from dungeons. Either pay a bit of mana to live in peace, or help defend the dungeon from invaders and troublemakers and get paid, but have a higher chance to die. Unless you come from a richer family, most pick the second option. If they are lucky, they won¡¯t see any action, but they will get paid regardless. Then there are those that loves to fight, and to kill the forces of good, as they decided to call themselves. They only think about their next fight, not how much they get paid. While normal people would be upset if you stop paying them, these guys will be upset if there is nothing to fight and might resort to create a fight themselves. They might riot and end up being a bigger threat than the heroes. Finally, there are the normal workers, like me, that won¡¯t fight for you, but get paid for other jobs. However, unlike the ¡®Great Imp Clan¡¯, yes, that is the official name, most can¡¯t afford to educate their people, so they can only fight for their paychecks.¡± The imp sucked in new fresh air after talking so much without stopping. ...Is he done? Phew, he went on another rant. ¡°So, who would come here and pay rent? Also, if a big monster comes, wouldn¡¯t I be losing mana to him?¡± ¡°Hm, guess I can explain it some more. Not all will pay us with mana, some might pay with gold or items. It¡¯s up to you if you want to accept an item as payment, though. Maybe he considers it a priceless treasure, passed down for generations in his family, but it¡¯s only a common item to you.¡± ¡°That solves some issues I had.¡± Imagine someone offering me his ''priceless'' bug sucker. Well, to me, that is worthless. ¡°Also, the main part of your rent will come from the mindless creatures you dominate or the captured livestock you drain mana from. If some big monster comes and sucks up a large portion of the mana, then he is usually worth it. If need be, you can always grab him and drop him into the portal to get rid of him." The imp grabbed the air, or rather the imagined monster, with his hand, like a crane, and moved his hand to drop the monster into his made up portal. "Just a word of warning though, it''s not recommend to do that, since he might get angry and come back for revenge later. Easier to just tell him you don''t need his services anymore. Most people respects the Heart''s wishes.¡± ¡°Livestock? Tell me more about those.¡± Sounds like an endless stream of mana to me. ¡°Some beings generate mana simply by existing and, of course, eating and drinking. Like the bugs. They eat our mushrooms, which grows by feeding on the natural mana that exist everywhere. Right now, we are feeding the mushrooms but in the future, we won¡¯t. So, we capture something, feed it food to generate mana and drain it to keep it weak.¡± ¡°That sounds like a great idea, but what¡¯s the catch?¡± There is always a catch. ¡°Well, there is none. Except getting it here and have something to feed it with. All dungeons have large amounts of these livestock. Both big and small types. But the best is... Humans. Especially their mages. They generate mana really quickly for some reason. They wander into our dungeons willingly, so they are often captured. Larger dungeons, that are tempting targets for the humans, often sell their overwhelming amount of prisoners to less fortunate dungeons. Maybe we can get one later, to help with our development." "How much would that cost?" Can¡¯t wait for some flesh bags of mana to start wander into our dungeon. Mmm...free mana... "No idea, sorry. Depends greatly on the quality, I guess. Anyways, humans doesn''t have the highest mana regeneration, but they are numerous, easy to take care of, and most importantly, wanders into the dungeon willingly. Therefore, they got first place in the ''best livestock competition'', hosted by the number one magazine in the monster world; the Dungeon Home Journal! Everyone that subscribed to the magazine got to create their own top ten list, and then they added up the votes.¡± Who? Never heard of them. ¡°Huh, that seems good and all, but it¡¯s far into the future, right?¡± Don¡¯t really see us capturing any humans in the near future, even the weakest peasant group could kill us. Maybe we could drown them in bugs. Actually... that might be quite terrifying for the humans. Dump a ton of starved bugs on them, and their armors will no longer be on their side! Haha! You better start running while you can, knights in plate armor, because my bugs are coming for you! ¡°Yep, very.¡± Knew it. ¡°Then, why go into such details at this stage?¡± I have a feeling I know the answer. ¡°Well, you asked and I like talking...¡± The imp looked down at his feet while scratching his head. Knew it. Chapter 7 - A Mole Has Arrived. ¡°You know, I have been thinking. What are we gonna do with those dead goats?¡± They are going to stink up my chamber soon. Not that I have a sense of smell, or do I? Something to think about for later. ¡°That was my gift to you, but...¡± The imp glanced at the two goat corpses lying in the corner. ¡°Yeah, not sure what I can do with that, so I was thinking to simply throw them to the bugs. They are currently set as ¡®Do not touch¡¯, but I can change that after you drag them to the farm area. The bugs would probably be happy.¡± I know I will be happy to see them gone. ¡°Good idea! They should love these goats. Even though many of them only eat plants, some might want meat too. Otherwise, they would have to feed on your mana to sustain themselves.¡± Bugs that only eat meat? I should look into that, and tell them it¡¯s fine to hunt the common bug types and eat the dead. Maybe even do a group hunt for a snake? The imp quickly dragged the bodies, one at the time, to the mushroom farm. Even though I say quickly, since the goat was larger than him, it still took him a while. As soon as I allowed it, hundreds of bugs threw themselves at the corpses. Even the snakes stopped eating the bugs and joined the new feast. The snakes, lacking cutting teeth, had great trouble removing the flesh from the bodies, but by stealing from the bugs, they managed to get something to eat as well. Some snakes even swallowed the meat carrying bugs whole. The corpses shrunk rapidly, getting consumed at an alarming pace. Soon the bugs would be out of food again, forced to return to their mushroom diet. ¡°Now what?¡± And I¡¯m out of ideas. ¡°Before we get a portal, there isn¡¯t that much we can do. So, let¡¯s just keep doing what we have done all along. Dig out some more space and see if something else is hiding there.¡± The imp licked the blood from his fingers. Apparently, he dragged the goats by the spot where he slit their throats, instead of say, the legs. We dug out four straight lines from my chamber, in each direction. Each going about a hundred meters. We found more bugs and snakes. But also something new. ¡°Hey, got something new here. A larger green cloud, about your size. Perhaps a little bit smaller.¡± What can it be? ¡°Be careful. Don¡¯t make it angry, we can''t defeat it yet. Probably.¡± The imp tightened his grip on the pickaxe. He swallowed nervously. Clearly not much of a fighter. ¡°Eh, it will be fine. Watch, I learned a lot about the mind control when you were sleeping.¡± Preparing myself to attack I shouted out: ¡°Surrender your mind!¡± ¡°Oh, scary.¡± The imp didn¡¯t seem very impressed. ¡°Did it actually help?¡± ¡°Makes it more fun, at least.¡± Though, his lack of reaction made me feel kinda silly doing it. ¡°Got it.¡± The imp nodded. He probably thinks I¡¯m being weird. ¡°He, yes, I checked, can¡¯t compete with me. I control over a thousand beings!¡± ¡°Is that relevant?¡± The imp scratched his head, starting to look a bit bored. Damn, when I¡¯m showing off something new, he doesn¡¯t care. When he blabbers on, I must listen. Well, the incident at the start doesn¡¯t count. ¡°Yep, found a way to channel their powers to help me. Like some kind of Hivemind or something similar. Can only do it with dominated creatures though.¡± However, a thousand bugs, is still just a thousand bugs. Not that helpful. If the bugs pooled their mental powers together, they could probably not even defeat the imp. Also, not sure how this would scale up. Only time will tell. ¡°Oh, didn¡¯t think you could do that. Impressive. Now, bring this creature out, I want to see it.¡± He folded his arms to his chest and tapped with his feet. Guess I should tell it to hurry up. ¡°It¡¯s on the way, should arrive about... now!¡± The earth burst out from the wall and a black blurry shadow jumped out from the hole. The creature landed on the ground and started sniffing. It moved over to the imp and sniffed his legs, making an odd facial expression, that I can only assume was a frown. It kept sniffing as it moved around. It made its way to my stairs and kept climbing them until it bumped into my crystal with its head. It stopped, reaching out with its little arms, hugging the crystal, and licked it with its little tongue. ¡°Err, what is it doing?¡± I¡¯m in shock from its behaviour. Though, can¡¯t say I dislike it. ¡°I think it¡¯s blind. Must be using other senses to see.¡± The imp said, moving closer to get a better look at our newest member of the dungeon. A blind minion. Sounds useful. ¡°What is it? Some kind of mole?¡± Black, grey fur and about twenty centimeters in size. Something special about it was the hands, or in this case, the forepaws. They were in the shape of some kind of five-clawed spade. Clearly an expert in digging. The question is however, what else can it do? We already got a digger. ¡°Yep, looks like a normal mole that lives underground. There are many types of them, some even have odd-looking star-shaped noses. It must have sensed the mana and dug down here.¡± The imp poked the mole a few times, causing it to run to the other side of the crystal, trying to hide from the strange creature that attacked it. Another minion that is worthless in a fight, it seems. Hm, wait? Dug down? ¡°Do you know how deep down we are? Most big animals lives above ground, and if we could capture those, we would have quite the army.¡± I can see it. My animal army flooding the plains, killing everything in their way. ¡°I would not recommend searching for the surface before we got the portal and some proper monsters. The heroes would sense the breach and attack us. We can surface when we got the basics up. Don¡¯t worry, you won¡¯t be bored for long.¡± Aww, my animal army dream. Crushed. Oh well, they would probably be hard to control. My vision of ultimate victory slowly changed into something else... I see... heroes... wielding torches? Oh, no! All my animals are running from the fire! They trample each other to death! Damn, let''s scrap the mindless animal army plan for now. As time passed, we expanded the dungeon some more. We dug out another farm area and an empty room. Not sure what to use the empty for at the moment, but hey, more space can''t hurt. We planted some of the mushroom seeds on the new farm and built a few more nests. The new farm had the same design as the old one, including the nest placements. If it ain''t broke, don''t fix it. Every time we dug out a wall, the creatures inside also fell out and entered my dungeon''s domain. Instead of searching for them, we could simply mine out the wall they lived in. This made taking over them quite simple. The bugs and other neutral creatures normally kept away from the block that directly touched my domain. Mainly to avoid accidentally digging into my dungeon, because they did not actually want me to dominate their little minds. They only wanted some of the mana that I released out into my surroundings. Sadly for them, it did not matter much, since I could see them three blocks away. However, a small problem arose. After some observing we discovered the mole liked to eat snakes and worms, which was fine, since we need to cull their numbers anyway. The problem was that the mole had nowhere to live. Since the mole was blind, it felt wrong to place it amongst the extremely numerous bugs, that would constantly crawl upon it and confuse it with countless scents and sounds. Also, the mole might damage the mushrooms when chasing the snakes. We needed a new room. But how does a mole live? Underground in tunnels and with total darkness? So, the entire room became a nest. We first dug it out completely, thereby expanding our borders. Then the imp did his magic and filled it up again. We used some mana to keep the dirt from escaping the room. A dominated creature won¡¯t leave the dungeon area unless told, so the mole could not dig into the border walls. We made no nest design of any kind, we just told the mole that it could live inside this room. I say we, but the imp did all the work, though, I feel like I should deserve a large part of the credit. After all, I was the one that told him to dig. Teamwork. The mole happily dug in when told it could live inside that room. When hungry, it would go to one of the farms, and grab a snake that lived by the entrance. This meant it would not be confused by the mass of bugs or risk hurting any mushrooms. At the same time, the snakes kept the bugs from leaving the farm area. We found two more moles skulking around the borders and brought them in. They quickly started breeding. By supplying them with mana, a dominated creature could be ordered to breed rapidly. This meant we could maintain the numbers of all animals even if someone preyed on them. Within some limits, of course. It''s not some kind of magical miracle thing, but rather a way to boost their bodies natural abilities to the absolute maximum of what the body could handle. So far, most, if not all, our creatures have been found and dominated by me, and things will continue like that for quite some time. ¡°Phew, finally done with that. I¡¯m almost out of mana! Isn¡¯t there any way to regain some? Well, not counting the fact that I could cut supply or something like that.¡± I want to expand. Even with mana boost, it still takes some time to create a new animal the natural way. That¡¯s why I don¡¯t really want to consume my minions. Yet. Reading on Amazon or a pirate site? This novel is from Royal Road. Support the author by reading it there. ¡°Well, we got all this dirt lying around. We could convert it to mana.¡± The imp spawned in a fist full of dirt from his storage into his hand. He closed his fist, letting the dirt slowly trickle down to the ground. He kept it up for over a minute, making me wonder just how much dirt he had in his hand. Then I remembered he could spawn in more dirt at will. I decided to ignore his tricks. ¡°Oh, right. How does that work?¡± The imp looked up into the ceiling with a disappointed face. He must have hoped I would ask him how he did the ''endless dirt from a closed fist'' magic trick. He brushed off the dirt from his hand and began to explain. ¡°There are a few ways.¡± The imp raised a finger. ¡°First: Using a ritual and magic circle to offer the dirt to the gods. Not very good for the long-term, since such offerings would upset the gods. But they will still pay a small amount of mana for it, since it¡¯s an offering, after all." The imp raised a second finger. "Second: Similar, but in a proper temple, with a godly water mirror that you can dump it in. The gods will pay you more when using a temple, but they still won¡¯t like it." He raised a third finger. "Third: A portal. You simply dump it in. Some mana might be released from the portal, but it will be neutral mana and will slowly spread throughout the dungeon, but you can¡¯t use it. Other beings can though. For them, it¡¯s all the same. And then you can take it from them, which makes it yours." He raised his fourth and last finger. "Forth: Sell it for around one gold per ton. Some traders still trade like this, but they used to get a lot more. Usually beginners or people who emptied their stocks and would simply return with an empty wagon anyway. Even with our racial skill, it''s still kinda bothersome to transport the dirt to the wagons, not to mention finding a trader that wants to trade in this primitive way." He raised his fifth finger... eh wait, he closed all his four fingers, making a hand blade. I guess that counts as a fifth finger... "Fifth: Matter converter. This costs mana, but can be worth it if you are desperate for something specific. Turn the dirt into something else. The rarer the item you turn it into, the more expensive it will be. Like, iron ore is not that expensive, but going straight to steel would be.¡± He looked at his hand and shrugged. He stopped talking. What does that mean? Did he finish or did he simply run out of fingers and other combinations? Sigh. ¡°Hm, it¡¯s all impossible or a bad idea. Can¡¯t I just absorb it myself? If my theory is correct, then the dirt is mainly mana? If I suck up all the mana from the dirt, shouldn¡¯t it disappear? A mana drain?¡± This way I can simply convert it to mana directly. Genius. ¡°Maybe? We didn''t learn advanced spells and such things in school. Only the common and free spells and techniques. Imagine buying the licenses for all the students. Too expensive, even for the Great Imp Clan. The strongest spells are too expensive to learn, so you have to discover them on your own. The strong won¡¯t give up their advantages for free, or at all. Maybe we can buy some of the cheaper ones, when we get a trader. The best would be if you could figure it out on your own though. Try it out. I don¡¯t know how you see the world, but nothing is impossible for a powerful Heart.¡± He stopped talking for a moment and looked like he was thinking. The imp began to tell me a story. ¡°I heard a story about a hero, powerful and mighty, that slaughtered his way into a dungeon with his party.¡± The imp waved his ¡®bug sucker¡¯ around, like a sword, pretending he was the hero. ¡°The dungeon gathered all its fighters together for a large battle. Just as the lines were about to crash into each other, the Heart transformed the hero into a chicken! Then the Heart summoned a lightning bolt to strike their healers.¡± The imp added plenty of hand motions to his storytelling. His fingers smashed into each other, just like the battle lines. The finger lightning rained down upon the dirt figure healers. He even walked around like a chicken. ¡°That caused their party to fall into chaos and they easily got wiped out. The hero got captured, and lived out the rest of his days in torture and constant mana drain. He finally died of natural causes at the age of three hundred twenty!¡± The imp looked like he had great respect for that Heart. His eyes sparkled and he clenched both his fists as he spoke about the fate of the hero. ¡°Three hundred and twenty? Wait, how long does a human live?¡± That doesn¡¯t seem right. That abnormal number made me forget his, let''s be honest, quite impressive and immersive storytelling. ¡°Normally about hundred years. They really are short-lived, you know. He was so powerful that he lived much longer. If he had not spent around two hundred fifty years as a prisoner, being starved, tortured and mana drained almost daily, he might had lived double that.¡± The imp stopped again, immersed in his imagination; how wonderful it must have been to live in that dungeon. He shook his head as he returned from the dreamland, coming back to my barren and tiny dungeon. ¡°That dungeon got so famous, that its tourism industry exploded in popularity. They even held public torture sessions of the famous hero. Thousands had died by his hands, so many were rightfully enraged and gladly paid the expensive ticket price to watch him suffer.¡± ¡°What happened next?¡± Now I¡¯m curious. Public torture sessions? That¡¯s genius. I need to study what other dungeons have done to become truly successful. No need to reinvent the wheel when I can just... take someone else''s wheel. Yeah, that old saying. The imp shrugged and said: ¡°Well, the heroes got scared and stopped attacking that dungeon and once the hero died, their popularity dropped, and they had to sell their knowledge about the ''transform'' and ''lightning'' spell. With the mana and gold they got from the spell sales, they invested into broader fields of income. They had invested so much into that, and only that, hero tourism that it took a long time for them to stabilize again. Being too broad and generic, makes you not stand out amongst the rest of the dungeons, but focusing too much on a single thing, to stand out, can sink you, if it fails.¡± Good point. However, I don¡¯t think having bugs and mushrooms is worth much anyway. ¡°Anyway, my point is that, they had a unique spell that they researched on their own. I don¡¯t know if your mana drain idea is unique, but I highly doubt it. It¡¯s probably a rare spell and would be expensive if we wanted to buy the knowledge.¡± He smiled and said: ¡°Why don¡¯t you research that while I go to sleep again?¡± ¡°Uh, sure. Just give me a bunch of dirt before you go.¡± While he is a lazy bastard, I don¡¯t need him right now. I still don¡¯t know if he actually needs to sleep or not, but for now, I should probably let him do as he wants. ¡°Here!¡± The imp waved with his hand and my entire chamber filled up with dirt. The dirt covered my crystal, killing the only light source, and plunged the entire dungeon into darkness. ¡°Thanks, I guess...¡± Hm, now, how do I do this? We also need some other light sources, it seems. Torches? Fire seems like a bad idea in this closed space. Maybe we can buy some glowing crystals later. Also, good thing the ceiling is so high here, otherwise the dirt would have burst into the hallways. Well, I actually used some mana to keep the dirt inside my chamber, don''t want dirt all over the hallways. Wait, speaking of mana. What is this feeling? "Hold it!" I shouted to the imp. "Uh? What?" The imp stopped in the middle of his digging. "Something happened. My mana regeneration just jumped up." ¡°Hm? Oh, I dumped off some dirt, so it no longer takes as much mana to store it.¡± ¡°Wait, what do you mean?¡± ¡°Errr, you see. As your Prime, I have some liberties, some decisions I can take without asking you. So, I decided to not bother you with this silly question, and simply made it so all my mana usage uses up your mana, instead of mine. I also made it so the same rule applies to all the imps.¡± The imp said, rubbing his hands together. Seemingly, a little bit nervous. Why would he be that? ¡°Not sure what that all means, but okay. How much mana do you use?¡± ¡°Oh, not so much. Hey, look, I finished doing my task here, so I¡¯m gonna go and do something else now. Ah, I just remembered I must go and check on the mushrooms! Bye! Work hard on that dirt now!¡± The imp frantically dug through the dirt and left my chamber, walking away unusually quickly. He filled up the hole he created with dirt again, sealing me in. Not that some dirt can seal me in, but whatever. What a good and hard-working imp. Now, let¡¯s get to this dirt, I really need more mana. Chapter 8 - Mana Drain Research. I began to cycle through my vision modes. Normal: The normal view. Nothing special and is the same as everyone else have. Except my point of view is from the ceiling. Heat: Discovered this one while trying to figure out ways to change my vision. Shows every heat signature in the dungeon. Allows me to see how hot the rooms are and if we are digging into lava. Can be useful, I guess? Mana signatures: Formerly known as ''soul view'', but I don¡¯t actually see their souls, only the mana inside their bodies. Instead of a ¡®cloud¡¯, like I said at first, it¡¯s now more like the mana moving throughout their body, traveling inside the veins and organs and so on. However, for unknown beings, it still shows up mainly as a cloud. It¡¯s only possible to figure out how their bodies handle the mana when I got one of that kind under my control. Zoom: In and out. As my dungeon expands, my zoom out does as well. While it gets less detailed, but as time moves on, and my workers takes over the vast majority of the small tasks, there should be little need for me to get involved in the small details. The main benefit of the zoom out, is that my movement speed increases drastically, and I get a good overview of my dungeon. Rotate: Not really a view, but might as well list it here. Allows me to see everything from whatever direction I want. None of these worked. I must find a way to detect the natural mana. The dirt in front of me, was the only thing that filled up my vision. No sign of anything special. Time passed and my experiments continued. Haha, think I got it now. I combined two different vision modes, zoom and mana signatures. This should make it possible to zoom in really close and observe the mana. Hmm, no, not what I wanted. It only allowed me to zoom in really close on the mana of living creatures. No sign of mana inside the dirt, even after extreme zoom. This is slightly different from the old method of zooming in separately, and then turn on the mana signature vision mode. Now I can do both at the same time, allowing a constant view, instead of zapping between them. Helpful, but not what I need. Back to the mental drawing board. Ah, maybe like this? I combined the heat with mana signatures, allowing me to do an extremely wide search that looked for even the smallest amount of mana, instead of only looking for living signatures. It worked! Everything got a faint glow. Similar to the heat vision. Stronger mana sources are a mix of shades of red, while weaker mana sources have a blue tint. Natural mana is more like heat, than a lifeform. Hm, maybe you can control and regulate heat with mana? Who knows how much this ¡®mana¡¯ really affects the world. Now for the hard part. How does one absorb it? Grab the dirt with my hand? No, that only moved the dirt around. But the dirt seems to disappear from the world when I grab it. Hm, maybe I should try with something bigger first. Don''t need two male moles, so come here. Where are you? The male mole sat outside farm one and munched on a big bug, a juicy earthworm. Next to the mole laid a half eaten beetle bug. Apparently, they eat the other bugs too. Good, I guess, since I got endless of them. I grabbed the mole after he finished eating the earthworm. A last meal. He struggled inside my hand. The fur and claws tickled me as he moved around. He even bit my thumb, however, it seems I can only feel small things, not actual pain. Or more accurately, my senses in the hand are severely dulled, in a good way. Any strong feelings, like spikes of pain, gets removed. If someone slashed my hand with a sword, it would not affect me much. How they managed to slash my hand with a sword, in the first place, is an entirely different matter. The mole was still completely fine, even inside my weird hand dimension. Good, this makes moving creatures around easier. Another idea that popped up in my mind was: Is it possible to make my hand visible, and if so, how? Perhaps that¡¯s for another time. Though, it would be good to maintain order with my floating hand, always flying above their heads, ready to slap at a moment''s notice. Maybe if I... Hmm... No, focus, I was doing something else. Okay, little mole, time to give me your mana. Mana drain! ... Nothing. Except the mole looked scared; it rolled up in a ball and trembled in fear. Huh, can it understand me now? Doesn¡¯t matter, he can¡¯t talk back anyway. Not that I care much for what he would say. I turned on mana signature vision, allowing me to see the mana moving inside his body. It was much more detailed now, when I held him in my hand, compared to when I watched them from the ceiling. Should I stick a finger into his body? To drain the mana directly from his insides? My clawed fingers would easily penetrate his skin, but it would most likely just kill him. Maybe modify my hand? Hm, a suction hole in the middle of my palm perhaps? Yeah, sounds good. I remember something like that working quite well to suck out someone¡¯s life force, in this case mana. Not sure from where, though. The hand changed as I thought about it, and about a minute later, I understood how the new addition to my hand worked. Well, good luck, Mr Mole. The mole was given a name, to celebrate his sacrifice. The first, but not the last, minion that would die by my hand. ¡°Squeee!¡± Mr Mole squealed in pain. The suction force pulled him towards the hole, making him unable to move. The skin on his back got stuck in the small hole, stretching the skin to the extreme. His four limbs squirmed around in the air, trying to get a grip on anything to help pull him out of there. Unfortunately for him, no one can hear you scream inside my hand dimension. All sounds got muted, both ways. I¡¯m obviously not affected, only the thing in my hand. Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on the original website. The mole slowly turned wrinkly, and even started to shrink a little. Luckily for Mr Mole, death was quick, but there still remained some more mana to absorb. Huh, quite good, but the corpse remains intact. There are still some mana left that binds together the body. They are too small for me to remove, but this is a good start. Now for the snakes. With a flick of my hand, I threw the used up body of Mr Mole, to the side, and picked up a snake. This one was smaller, but it should still work. The results were the same after I sucked the mana out. No problems with that size, since the body was still bigger than the hole. What about a bug? I threw the snake to the side as well and picked up a big bug. It was four centimeters in size. Hm, getting close, but still big enough. The bug died quickly, the whole ordeal only lasted a few seconds. The body didn¡¯t change as much as the others, since it got a hard exoskeleton and shell covering it. Got barely anything from this one. I allowed the bug to join the mole and the snake in their pile. Now for the smallest bug. It was half a centimeter in size but the hole was one and a half centimeter. Yep, couldn''t get a lock on it. It was just too small, and therefore the dirt will be too. I flicked the bug away with my finger, like a booger, and it splattered into a wall. Smaller holes, I need smaller holes. The hand surface, the skin, changed into something that looked like an old pincushion; one used for way too long. Countless tiny holes, smaller than one millimeter, spread out inside the palm and even covered the fingers. Hooh, this thing should work quite well. A new tiny bug volunteered, and this time it worked fine. It crawled around in my hand as I slowly drained it wherever it went. No escape! The new version was slower and not as forceful as the old version. The bug received a reward for his bravery; a swift death, crushed between my fingers. The tiny corpse got wiped off my hand, when I dug down to grab a handful of dirt. Holding the dirt in my hand, I slowly drained the miniscule amount of natural mana inside each grain. Hey, it worked. Worth the same as half a bug, the smallest kind. I have near infinite amount of this dirt. However, it still left behind a small dust pile, about one tenth of the original size. Making even smaller holes are not worth it, because modifying the hand has a large cost as well. I should drain these dirt piles when I got a spare moment. Looking at my current workload, that is almost all the time. How much time has passed? The imp said he would work on the mushrooms, but must have just taken a small break, because he is now sleeping. Maybe two or three hours? Let¡¯s take a quick look at the dungeon. Farm One has finished the part of the mushrooms I spared from the bugs, the other part is pretty much eaten down to the roots. Thankfully, these are some tough plants. They can regenerate as long as there is at least one centimeter of the root left. I forbade them from eating the root systems, just to make sure they are safe. Soon, the mushrooms will mature and release a cloud of spores, that will cause them to grow everywhere, even the walls and ceilings. This can cause them to spread to unwanted areas, but I¡¯m sure the bugs can clean it up for me if asked. The bug nests are full, but there are plenty of homeless bugs crawling around. The snakes coil up together when they sleep, to keep warm and for protection. The dungeon is getting warmer and warmer. It started at a few degrees celsius, don¡¯t know the exact details, since I only recently learned how to measure the temperature. It¡¯s now around ten degrees in my chamber and fifteen degrees in the farms. Closed space together with thousands of creatures body heat, is a recipe for global warming, except, it¡¯s not really global. I did a quick count of my creatures and there are about three thousand of them now, of course, ninety-nine percent of that is bugs. Farm Two is the same as Farm One, but younger, and will take some time for the mushrooms to grow. The two moles are cuddling inside their small nest. They could dig out more, but they apparently likes it small and cramped. Natural instinct perhaps? Normally, expanding needlessly in the wild, is just asking for trouble. I also got an idea for a new combined farm and nest design. Something like this: Shaped like a large square, with three layers. By building over the old layers, it¡¯s possible to expand any layer as needed. First layer: A big mushroom farm on this outer layer. Bug nests on all the corners, even the inner corners, and a snake nest in each of the four directions. Second layer: A mole nest on this middle layer. They can dig it out and design it themselves. More bug nests on the corners, but not the inner corners this time. Third layer: Another mushroom farm in this inner layer. Bug nests on the corners and a single snake nest in the middle of the farm. The moles can hunt in both directions, maybe even build underground tunnels, for hidden movement, to the other sides of their layer. The snakes have easy access to bugs and plenty of space to live in. The bugs have more than enough mushrooms to eat, and if they feel brave, they can try their luck with a snake. The mushrooms have plenty of space to grow in, and the bugs will keep their numbers in check. Life in perfect harmony. With killing and slaughtering going on non-stop. Other than that, we got nothing special going on. Sometimes new bugs and snakes crawl into my range and I take them over. Chapter 9 - Mushroom Spore Disaster. Since we need to dig, might as well start doing it now. Now, where is he hiding? *Slap!* A loud slapping sound echoed throughout the dungeon. ¡°Uwah!¡± The imp rolled around in the dirt. He stopped and slowly raised his head from the ground, trying to spot what awoke him. Fool, you will never discover the secret behind this haunted dungeon. ¡°Uh, my cheek feels odd.¡± The imp rubbed his left cheek. ¡°You mean where I slapped you?¡± Did it hurt? Held back a lot this time. A lot. ¡°Yeah, but it¡¯s not pain. Something else...¡± He poked his cheek several times, testing his senses. ¡°It¡¯s completely numb! Can¡¯t feel my finger at all.¡± He formed a fist and punched himself on the right cheek. ¡°Ow! That hurt! Wrong side.¡± He spit out some black blood and repeated the process, this time on the correct side, the numb left side. ¡°Hehe, look!¡± He repeatedly banged his fist into the left side of his face, each punch containing more power than the last. The force from the punches twisted his head. With a wide smile, the imp said with a laugh: ¡°It doesn¡¯t hurt at all!¡± Blood dripped out from his mouth and down his throat. This caused the imp to suddenly cough, and blood spurted out, just like when squeezing a slightly empty ketchup bottle. Ketchup? The imp looked confused, wondering where all the blood came from. Uh oh, did I rattle his brain too much? He lost all feelings on his left side? Oh, it could be that... ¡°Just because you don¡¯t feel it, doesn¡¯t mean you won¡¯t get hurt. Anyway, I learned how to mana drain, guess it¡¯s always on? That¡¯s not good.¡± A bug sacrificed itself to test my theory, and it died a few seconds later. The imp stopped playing around. He got up with some effort, his legs unsteady and leaning heavily against the wall. He wiped the blood from his mouth. ¡°Yeah, please find a way to turn it off. My tiny nap did not cure my tiredness at all, in fact, I feel worse now, than before. I even feel somewhat dizzy.¡± The imp stretched his arms up high, towards the ceiling, and yawned. The yawn lasted for several seconds and he ended with smacking his lips and blinking. The reason you are so dizzy, might be related to your previous action, but hey, what do I know? ¡°I drained your mana, huh. Hm, you have quite a lot. In that brief moment of contact, I got more than ten moles.¡± Is this guy loaded? Literally, loaded with mana. ¡°Hah, don¡¯t compare me, a magical being, to some mindless animal. Don¡¯t forget that I¡¯m over ten thousand years old. I have stored mana all this time and I¡¯m quite strong compared to other imps." The imp said proudly with his chin raised up high. Then he seemed to remember something and lowered his head, a hint of worship appearing in his eyes. His voice turned a little meek as he said: "Well, not counting those that have served in the ancient dungeons for half of eternity.¡± Half of eternity? What kind of scale is that? ¡°So, you are not completely useless. You are an emergency mana bank.¡± And I won¡¯t hesitate to make a withdrawal if needed. ¡°Uh, please don¡¯t joke around like that. Remember, I¡¯m your prime.¡± The imp looked up at me, in this case the ceiling, with some kind of eye technique. His eyes turned larger and moist. His lips quivered. His head tilted to the side. His hand were held together, close to his chest. I will name this technique: ''Imp eyes''. Damn, can¡¯t resist those imp eyes, you are safe for now. ¡°Yeah, yeah, we got work to do. Here, take a look.¡± I sent the new design for a combined farm and living area directly to his mind. The area scheduled for digging was already marked, and sent to him together with the design. He nodded and praised me. ¡°You have been busy. This looks quite good. I will get right to it.¡± ¡°While you dig, I will work on this dirt pile and tame any new things we find. Dump your dirt here when you are full.¡± A small mountain of dirt already waited for me, practically begging for a mana drain. ¡°Kay~!¡± The imp brandished his pickaxe and swung into the wall with full force, using his entire body. He jumped up slightly as the pick struck the dirt wall, gouging out a large portion of the dirt block. He smiled with satisfaction. This was what he loved the most. Dirt was easy to dig through. Even easier when it was ¡®wild¡¯ dirt. If a dungeon lived next to a normal dirt wall, they would automatically reinforce it with their mana. Wild dirt are the blocks beyond the dungeon''s domain, the ones in the black unknown. We, or rather I, do the same thing of course, but it will take some more time for any real hardening to occur. When we reach actual rock, or stone, we can improve the walls even more. If there is a wall one does not want to dig out, perhaps a huge amount of water behind it, the imps can use some kind of ancient spell to make the wall very hard to break though. A normal pick would not cut it. Pun intended. How do I know all this? Well, the imp talks, or rather, mumbles in his sleep. I hear everything in the dungeon, whether I like it or not. Besides, he is the only one that can form a voice, not just buzz around with their wings and the other noise the bugs make, so he stands out. Either way, I have sensed small amounts of mana getting sucked up by the walls, so I figured something like that was happening. The details on that ancient spell are still unknown. His grades mentioned another kind of wall fortification, something that his lack of reach greatly affected. Negatively, of course. Have to ask him later what the difference is, but I''m guessing it''s made by hand instead of using magic. ¡°Okay, all done! Should we let the moles design their own homes again?¡± The imp asked, just finished his digging. Just making sure, I guess. Better safe than sorry, I like that attitude. There are no stupid questions. ¡°Yeah, that is fine. Start making bug nests and place them according to the design. The actual nest designs is up to you. Mix it up.¡± I stopped a moment to think. ¡°Should we plant new mushrooms?¡± ¡°We are running low on seeds. Only got two left.¡± The imp emptied the bag into his hand, and after the two seeds fell out, he held the bag upside down and shook it even more. Nothing else came out. ¡°No point then. Just grab one that''s almost mature from Farm One. We can pump it full of mana, now that I have this mana drain.¡± How I ever survived without my mana drain before, is beyond me. The imp ran over to Farm One, and in his haste, he stomped over dozens of bugs and even a small mushroom; one that only just managed to breach the surface. The mushroom splattered into pieces. Half sticking to the imp''s foot, while the other half flying all over the farm area, causing the bugs to swarm on the small pieces. ¡°Ugh, be careful, or I¡¯m making you pay for them...¡± With my recent discovery, I have new ways to threaten him. ¡°Eh, sorry, didn¡¯t notice them, hehe.¡± The imp laughed a bit, as he stealthily dragged his foot in the dirt, scraping off the mushroom and bug bits, removing all the damning evidence of his murder. Too late for that. His gaze swept the farm area, looking for the biggest mushroom. He found one and carefully tipped over to the chosen one on his toes, avoiding any needless deaths. He brushed off the surface dirt around the mushroom. He then inserted both of his hands deep into the dirt, all the way down to the roots of the mushroom, taking the entire root system with him, or as much as possible at least. ¡°Got it! Let¡¯s go." The imp quickly ran back to the new area with the mushroom in his hands. The roots seemed to move towards him, but it could just be my imagination. "Plant it in the center of the inner farm.¡± I told him, making sure he knew where to go. The imp made a small hole in the dirt by doing a heel kick several times on the same spot, to soften and crack the hard dirt open, and then some more accurate digging with his toes. All while holding the mushroom above his head. Support creative writers by reading their stories on Royal Road, not stolen versions. The mushroom roots twitched and slithered, like they were alive, and slowly reached for the imp¡¯s neck. Just as the roots were about to circle the imp¡¯s neck, he deemed the shallow dent in the ground adequate for his purpose, and stuffed the mushroom inside the hole. He then quickly covered over the roots and the mushroom''s base with some dirt. Maybe we should have prepared the hole first? Also, did my imagination run wild again? No, it must have. ¡°What now?¡± The imp asked. He scratched his neck, for some reason. ¡°You go and collect bugs from Farm One, while I put all my mana regeneration into this mushroom. Mana boosting it.¡± Maybe not all, but ninety percent, at least. The imp did as told and ran back and forth between the different farms, taking as many of the roaming bugs he could carry. Many fell off during the trip, so it was quite inefficient. ¡°Why can¡¯t I hold all these bugs?¡± He complained while holding them with crossed arms towards his body, while they crawled around or simply fell through the openings. Honestly, he carried more on his body, than in his arms. A very large hercules beetle bug sat on the imp''s bald head, pretending to be in command of this gigantic creature that moved them around. No, as I, somehow, sensed its thoughts, I could feel it did not pretend. I had declared that spot as his own territory. I sensed it was the Beetle King in Farm One. Looking at its size, the title was well deserved. It was the largest beetle we had, by at least two centimeters. Once the imp arrived at the new farm, he shook his entire body, scraping off all the bugs. This agitated the Beetle King, and it bit and pinched the skin on top of the imp''s head. The imp slammed his palm against his head in reflex, ending the reign of terror of King Hercules, first of his name. As the bug''s life ended, I felt a small telepathic voice shout out, directly into my mind: "The Swarm will rise again!" Since I had no idea what just happened, I decided to ignore it. The mushroom needed my full attention anyway. We finished the bug transport and built all the nests needed. As we had expanded our dungeon area, new creatures fell inside. Amongst them was another female mole, but the male refused to touch her. He was very faithful to his own mate. Or perhaps the new female was just very ugly. Too bad I killed the other male, oh well. The time for my reward, for all my hard work, had finally arrived. It was time for the mushroom to release its spores. Ah, there it goes! A cloud of tiny, tiny white spores flew up and I grabbed several pinches of them with my hand, and sprinkled them over the rest of the farm. The imp on the other hand... He laid on his stomach, right next to the mushroom, and rested his head on his hands, watching the mushroom slowly grow. He finished his work long before me, so he had nothing to do. Honestly, unless I tell him to dig, he genuinely got nothing to do. When the spore release finally happened, he got so surprised, he took a deep breath, sucking up ten percent of the total amount of spores. In his panic, he ran through the cloud, flailing his arms around, not to mention, stomping on the mushroom, crushing it to pieces. He tried to scream, but couldn''t let any sound out. He grabbed his throat, and violently pointed towards his wide open mouth. His clothes will turn into a mushroom land, but I¡¯m quite curious if the things that entered his nose and mouth will grow. After coughing and sneezing for a while, the imp finally seemed to calm down and stopped to rest. ¡°Ugh, don¡¯t feel so good...¡± He swayed with his upper body, before finally falling to the ground. Arms and legs spread out, even his tongue rolled out. He passed out. Uh-oh. This might be serious. I switched to my new ''mana vision'' mode. I managed to combine the recently discovered vision mode, that I used to see the mana inside the dirt, named ''natural mana'', with mana signatures. Natural mana now have a faint yellow glow instead, with higher density having a richer color. It has the same color as the areas designated for digging, but since I can¡¯t have both turned on at once, it¡¯s not a problem. The natural mana¡¯s yellow glow goes away if any life forms draws near, to make it more clear. Living beings mana are glowing stronger, but with same three color as always. Hmm, there are green spores moving around inside his body. Seems they are looking for a place to latch on to. The spores planted themselves on the imp¡¯s organs and veins and slowly sucked his mana. The horror! I wanted to do that. Leave my, I mean, his mana alone! Can¡¯t I dominate the plants? Never tried. Let¡¯s try on a grown mushroom first. I targeted one of the mushrooms from Farm One and it was a piece of cake. It barely resisted, and quickly got converted from a green, to a blue mana cloud. Now for the spores. I have to target them from inside the imp. Ah, got one. They offer no resistance, but they might be mindless and won¡¯t listen to my commands. Stop! Release! Leave his body! Nope, no use. Brain-dead. Is my only choice to drain them to death? It will affect the imp too, but I have no choice. Mmm, juicy mana... Haha, soon I will have more mana than what I started with! The problem is, I¡¯m draining the mana from all over his body, instead of focusing on where the spores are. Or rather, the mana flows from all over his body to fill the large void I create as I drain him. It will turn into a war of attrition with the spores, and that is something the imp won¡¯t survive. I grabbed the imp and zoomed in on the mana veins. His body contained countless of them, and they sprawled the entire body, like tree branches. The spores followed these to find a strong mana source in the body. If I do this... One of my fingernails changed into a thin syringe needle. I injected the needle into one of the more harmless looking mana veins, and managed to suck it dry. Success! The spores connect and feeds directly from these veins. This meant my mana drain could now reach the spores directly. By injecting the needle closely to where the spores resided, the negative effects of the mana drain were greatly reduced. I worked quickly, and soon, there was only one left. The last spore sat on the top of the head, just below the skin. Since it took me a while to clean the spores up, it had managed to take root, spreading its thin roots out over the skull bone. Hehe, if this thing sprouts through the skin, it will be too funny for me to remove. If it decides to squeeze the skull to the reach the brain... Well, some risks are worth taking. Hmm, the imp looks like he lost a lot of mana. The imp was deathly pale, his breathing shallow and entire body drenched in sweat. The seemingly random seizures scared me every time they happened. While he came out of the blue, claiming he was my Prime, I can''t say I dislike him, nor do I want him to die. I have a feeling I would be screwed without him. After all, he does all the work and have all the knowledge about the world. I gently placed him down next to my crystal heart, to maximize the amount of mana the imp could absorb. It looked like ninety-five percent of his mana got drained, if comparing the amount of glowing he had before. Oh well, my mana storage is overflowing at least, but I still don¡¯t feel anywhere near full, assuming there even is a limit. Unfortunately, the garbage tier creatures I got right now are the only things I can spend my mana on. Which is something I don¡¯t want to do. Maybe I can return it to the imp? Should be possible. He is my minion. Ah, but I have an even better idea, hehehe.... Chapter 10 - The Rise Of The Mushroom Head. Sometime later.... ¡°Imp, imp, wake up!¡± I gently shook him. Or rather, I poked him in the chest with my fingers. No response. ¡°Prime!¡± ¡°You called?¡± The imp immediately sat up straight. ¡°Urgh, mana, I need mana...¡± He instantly started to complain, putting his hand to his forehead. Seems the natural instinct to respond my call only goes so far. ¡°Get up, you didn¡¯t need all that mana in the first place.¡± I did him a favor, yes, that¡¯s what I did. ¡°My mana... uh, my head feels heavy too. Don¡¯t have any energy to talk...¡± The imp raised his hand a bit, before dropping it to the ground. Too exhausted to hold it up. See? Clearly an addiction problem. ¡°Lack of mana means you talk less? That is good to know, but for once I want you to talk, because I got some questions.¡± ¡°S-speak. This one shall try to answer your questions before death comes to claim its prize.... Ah, my mana...¡± He kept complaining and mumbling about his mana. Mana this and mana that. It¡¯s gone now, deal with it. Sure, you gathered it for ten thousand years and all, and I removed it in a few hours... If you put it like that, I¡¯m the bad guy, aren¡¯t I? ¡°While you rested, the dungeon has grown and we reached five thousand creatures! We also got three more moles. So, how are we doing? Are we going to the surface now?¡± I can¡¯t wait. I wonder what the sun feels like. Is it like my own glow? The imp gave me a blank stare. ¡°...Are you crazy? You are still the weakest dungeon I have ever heard of! Aaah, my head!!¡± He massaged his temples. His shout apparently caused great headaches. ¡°Don¡¯t get me so agitated, please.¡± No sun for me. Maybe it would burn me anyway. Maybe there is a reason I¡¯m hiding underground, besides heroes wanting to kill me. Though, now that I think about it, that is a pretty good reason on its own. Actually, why do they want to kill me? Are they simply discriminating against all Hearts? One Heart did something stupid once, and now all must die? Or maybe the vast majority of Hearts are bad and I¡¯m the exception? ¡°Sheesh, relax. So, what now? Are we just going to dig and rest and dig some more? There must be more to a dungeon than this? I know the passing of time does not affect us, but I still feel like doing something besides waiting.¡± Even immortal beings gets bored. And when they have endless time, they start to focus on odd stuff that no normal person would consider important. Of course, this is all assuming I don¡¯t age. Would honestly be very surprised if I did. ¡°Of course! At this stage, however, you could be defeated by myself!¡± He puffed up his chest, pointing towards himself with his thumb. ¡°Well, maybe not now, after I lost all my mana.¡± He deflated once again, returning to his previous ¡®bag of potatoes¡¯ posture and ¡®almost dead¡¯ state. ¡°Can you return it, by the way? Because I lack so much mana, it feels like something crawled out from my head.¡± He wants it back? Well... ¡°Uh, I kinda spent it all...¡± It was worth it, I promise you. ¡°What? What could you possible spend-.¡± He briefly stopped and pointed towards himself, almost grunting out the next word. ¡°My!¡± He stopped once again, returning to a more calmer tone. ¡°Ten thousand years of mana gathering on?¡± The imp shook his head, his face wore an expression of disbelief, more accurately an ¡®I can¡¯t believe this shit¡¯ expression. Many things, if you have some imagination. As I recently realized, you can never have too much mana. ¡°Well, I helped out in the farms and getting the moles to breed. Then, I made a new item. A mirror.¡± The imp opened his eyes wide, simply staring at my crystal in shock. It lasted for a whole ten seconds. ¡°WHY WOULD YOU MAKE A MIRROR!!!¡± The imp shouted at the top of his lungs. No, really, it was the loudest thing I have ever heard. His voice even turned almost squeaky. Squeakier than normal that is. ¡°Aaah! My head!¡± He quickly massaged his temples. ¡°Please, please, please, tell me you are joking? There are only two sentient beings in this place, and one of them doesn¡¯t even have a body! Don¡¯t tell me you wanted to see if you had a reflection... Ah, what kind of foolish Heart am I serving?¡± The imp covered his face with his hands. ¡°No, no, that¡¯s not why. Though, I did check after I finished the mirror. In case you are wondering, I got no reflection.¡± It was weird to look into a mirror and not see yourself. ¡°Hmph, that was obvious.¡± He crossed his arms and looked away from my crystal. ¡°I made it for you!¡± His expression, his breathing, his entire body froze. Then the imp turned towards my crystal with slow and jagged movements. His expression was still frozen stiff, but it slowly melted and the corner of his mouth pulled back into a grin. He blinked a few times, before fully melting the sudden ice that froze him. ¡°Wha-? For me?¡± His mouth twitched, trying hard to suppress the smile. ¡°You made me a gift? Hehe, I don¡¯t know what to say?¡± The smile finally won, and his face almost split in two by the wide grin. If he could, he would have blushed too, but unfortunately, or perhaps fortunately, imps can¡¯t. But suddenly, the smile disappeared and his hairless eyebrows scrunched together, his lips tightly pressed. A hint of craziness appeared in his eyes. ¡°You made me a mirror?! Why the flaming ancestral dungeon Heart would I want a mirror instead of my mana?!" The imp fiercely roared out, and raised both arms up in the air, before smashing with his fists down upon my crystal heart. That huuuurts!! If mana signature vision had been active at this point, one would have seen the fluctuations in his cloud color, from peaceful blue, to fierce red, back to peaceful blue. ¡°Um, ouch. Please refrain from hitting me.¡± I tried hard to suppress the pain and the instinct to scream. ¡°You deserve more than that, you know.¡± The imp rubbed his hands nervously, probably just realizing what he did. ¡°Okay, before you get too angry, let¡¯s go.¡± I picked up the grumpy imp with my hand. He grunted and squealed some in protest, but he most likely enjoyed the feeling of leaving the ground. I placed him in front of a wall. On the wall, was a red silk sheet, covering a mirror. The back of the mirror was slightly pressed into the dirt wall, but it also rested on a small stand out of dirt, one that I dug out with my own hand. Digging out the small stand took a long time, and cost mana every second. The hand is not recommended for digging purposes. ¡°What is that? Is this s-silk? Damn, that is extra expensive to produce from mana, you fool!¡± The imp pointed towards the silk sheet. Luckily, he could restrain himself from attacking it. Enjoying the story? Show your support by reading it on the official site. ¡°Oh, it is? That explains the troubles I had creating it.¡± Maybe I should have noticed something was wrong, but it was only the second item I ever made, and the mirror was just as bothersome. ¡°Anyway, now I¡¯m going to remove the silk sheet, you just stand right there.¡± With a quick and smooth motion, I uncovered the mirror and put the silk in my hand for safekeeping. ¡°Tada!!¡± ¡°...!! What the...¡± The imp slowly raised his hand towards the top of his head, to touch the thing there. ¡°You, you!¡± His first reaction was anger. But, just as he was about to smash the mirror with his fist, he stopped. He shook his head slowly, probably thinking: ¡®That¡¯s where my mana went, can¡¯t destroy it!¡¯. Or the instinct of not destroying my property kicked in. The imp leaned forward, closer to the mirror. He poked the mushroom, and shivered as he did. With eyes wide open, he did it several times more. The imp turned and twisted his body, trying to see how it looked from other angles. On his head, grew one of the light blue mushrooms we used in our farms. The stem was slightly thicker than normal, probably to counter the sudden movements of the imp. The cap had the normal convex shape, but was also slightly larger. On the cap were, unless you knew about them, invisible flaps that the spores shot out from. The darker, blue colored gills, ran down the stem for a few centimeters. The root system was visible under his skin, like veins. They spread out over the head, down to the start of his forehead and ears and all the way down to his neck. This mushroom also glowed slightly in the dark, unlike the other of its kind. Possibly something to do with the large amount of mana it got access to. Its size and glow gave it a majestic look, making it appear like it was the King of its kind. The imp stroked his now bumpy skin, tracing the roots to their ends, with his fingers. He can feel with it? Well, it¡¯s part of his body now. His mana flows through both the mushroom and him. ¡°You know, at first I hated this thing, but now, I quite like it.¡± The imp smiled once again. ¡°Eh, really?¡± I blurted out the first thing on my mind. ¡°Not worth ten thousand years of mana.¡± His reflection in the mirror gave me an angry stare. ¡°But, since I have it, might aswell keep it. It¡¯s like I have hair now.¡± He laughed to himself. It was more of the disturbing kind of laughs. ¡°All imps are bald, but now, I got something on my head that''s just as good as hair or horns. Maybe even better.¡± Well, I¡¯m speechless. ¡°Oh, so you like it? You are welcome, I guess.¡± I¡¯m a benevolent Heart, after all. I take good care of my minions. ¡°Yes, I quite like it. But you know, did you really have to waste all my mana on a mirror and that stupid silk sheet? I¡¯m more upset about that, than the fact you grew a mushroom on my head.¡± ¡°Didn¡¯t want to half ass it, you know. Besides, I had a lot of mana, and nothing to spend it on. What was I supposed to do? Just let it sit? Unused mana is wasted mana, as I always say.¡± Don¡¯t think I have ever said that, but he probably won¡¯t notice. ¡°You have never said that.¡± He rolled his eyes. Hard to see, since they are completely black, but by observing them closely, it¡¯s possible to see the eyes move. ¡°Also, if there is one true thing in this world, it¡¯s that one can¡¯t have too much mana. Do you know what it costs to create a portal?¡± He noticed it. He is getting smarter? Or am I turning dumber? Hm... Who is infecting who? ¡°Nope, tell me.¡± I have no idea. The only frame of reference I have is the silk and the mirror. ¡°About the amount an imp can gather in ten thousand years by natural absorption...¡± The imp held up all eight fingers, then lowered all but two. Then he repeated that several times. Yeah, think I got it the first time, you can stop now... Anyway, such an exact number, and I just spent that exact amount. What a coincidence. ¡°Ouch, that¡¯s a lot.¡± ¡°Plus, everyday it¡¯s around one thousand years of mana to maintain it.¡± The imp held up a single finger. What? Is he serious? ¡°How are we gonna afford that?¡± How many bugs worth of rent would that take? ¡°One way is to have a large stockpile of mana to burn, while you work on getting residents and livestock from the portal to increase the amount of income.¡± The imp channeled his inner teacher, like he always did when he felt I needed to know things, and prepared himself for a long session of ¡®Questions and Answers¡¯. ¡°Still, that is way too much. Who can afford that?¡± I don¡¯t believe it. Are we really ¡®the bottom of the barrel¡¯ material? ¡°Every other clan and dungeon?¡± The imp said bluntly. ¡°Most even have multiple.¡± ¡°What are we going to do?¡± I can only trust in the imp now. ¡°Well, we can sit on our hands and wait, and slowly expand to gain mana.¡± Pass. ¡°How big is the average dungeon?¡± We have a few rooms... we are in the top, right? ¡°I don¡¯t know about the ¡®average¡¯, but the great dungeons have millions of minions and the ancient ones have literally countless. Smaller dungeons, probably around hundred thousand?¡± The imp looked a little unsure when he spoke. "Never been in any dungeon but this one, so only got some references from books." How can it be literally countless? Either their maths skills are about the same level as the imp, or it changes to quickly for them to count accurately. But still, they could just round it up to the nearest billion, or trillion or whatever they got. ¡°What are we ranked as?¡± Some kind of small dungeon perhaps? Maybe they have some kind of alphabetical ranking system? ¡°Unranked. By the way, they don¡¯t normally count beings smaller than an imp. Which is all you got.¡± Okay, then. We are nothing, it seems. A bug in a world of giants. However, being a bug has its advantages. You won¡¯t attract attention and can sneak around the giants and crawl inside their ears and lay eggs. What a terrifying thought. Must find some bugs that can do that for defense purposes. Also, the imps are a race that seems to almost worship the Hearts, so it¡¯s possible they are exaggerating in their teachings. Come to think of it, I got no real proof that any of what this guy says is true. Maybe he got sent to hinder my development? Maybe I¡¯m just being paranoid... ¡°Let¡¯s follow your suggestion then...¡± Not like I have any other choice. Chapter 11 - A Badger Has Arrived. Seven days later... Great news! We reached fifty thousand creatures! However, that¡¯s not the best part, we also found a new creature. A badger! ¡°Hey, is that the dangerous being you talked about before?¡± It¡¯s big enough to kill and eat me. The imp looked at the new creature that just dug out from the wall. ¡°No, that¡¯s just a badger.¡± Yes, I can see that. ¡°But you said before, that we only had twenty-four hours until a monster would arrive and eat us all.¡± I clearly remember it. I have racked my brain for a solution all this time for nothing, it seems. Not that I have a brain, but you know what I mean. ¡°I said ''maybe''.¡± The imp shrugged. ¡°We are lucky, stop complaining about the fact you aren¡¯t dead yet. Maybe there is no one around. Maybe it¡¯s drawn towards something else?¡± ¡°Like what?¡± Maybe the monster that preyed on new Hearts got scared off by an even larger monster. Now, the big monster simply waits for us to grow up a bit before swallowing us? ...I need to stop scaring myself like this. ¡°Another... Dungeoooon.¡± The imp waved his hands in front of him, like a wave, while moving his fingers separately. Is he trying to be spooky? Well, stop it, it¡¯s working. ¡°Is that such a bad thing?¡± Maybe they are friendly. Would I be friendly if I ran into a weaker dungeon? Uh, of course, I would. I would not exploit the weak! Unless it¡¯s for the greater good, of course. I only want to liberate the monsters inside from their terrible Heart dictator. It has nothing to do with me wanting their oil, I mean, their... not sure what I would want. Mana maybe? Creatures? Buildings? Ah screw it, I will just take all of it. ¡°Depends on if we expand in the same direction. If not, we might never run into them, even if we only live a hundred meters apart. Unless we strengthen our walls, they could break in and attack, but as the defender you can use your spells in your own territory. But if they send in their imps, they can quickly capture territory from you and expand their own domain.¡± The imp smiled to himself, probably feeling smug about the usefulness of the imps. He continued: ¡°They can also send in their mana to do the same, but that will be expensive and take longer since they literally needs to grind down our mana, which we can reinforce. However, that can be useful if you fight an enemy that have strong and terrifying spells. We grind down each other¡¯s mana reserves, and when he can no longer afford his dangerous spells, you attack with your minions.¡± ¡°Spells? Imps?¡± I don¡¯t have any spells? And only got one imp! ¡°Eh, don¡¯t worry about it. You only got me, and I¡¯m your Prime. I won¡¯t enter enemy territory, I would stay by your side, in here, at the deepest and safest part of the dungeon. Also, you have no spells, except maybe mana drain and some vision modes, which are not really spells, since they are part of your ¡®body¡¯. Besides, you are screwed, no matter what we do, if the enemy is more advanced than us. Don¡¯t think too much on it. For now, let¡¯s study our new badger.¡± Not sure if I¡¯m happy he would stay by my side til the end, or angry he is hiding in the safest place with me, instead of fighting. ¡°Yeah, seems it eats everything we have, but mainly snakes.¡± The badger in question had two snakes hanging from the mouth, taking them to a more quiet place to eat. It was grumpy over the fact it did not have a nest yet. It ate in a random corner my chamber, glaring at my crystal. Even though its mind was fully dominated, it still had some free will. Looks like it gets harder to maintain the creatures under my control as they grow in intelligence. The badger was just over one and a half meter long, weighing about thirty-five kilograms. Its shoulder height was around thirty-five centimeters. The small head was black with white stripes, the underside black and the back grey, the whole body covered in fur. The four legs were short and stocky, with bigger claws on the front paws. Overall, it was a sturdy creature that would not tolerate being pushed around. It was currently, by far, the most powerful being in the dungeon, and did as it wanted with the other creatures. I even had to step in when it chased the imp around. Well, that incident was more the imp''s fault. The imp pulled the badger''s tail when the badger slept peacefully. From that point on, the badger would growl at the imp whenever they saw each other. Considering the size of our dungeon, that was very often. ¡°How are we going to design its home?¡± The imp asked. I had already prepared myself for this, so I quickly answered. ¡°Like this: A square, with three layers. First layer: The outer layer, and where the badgers live. They can design their own nest. Bug nests on the four corners. Second layer: The middle layer, and where the snakes live. Snake nests on the four directions and bug nests on the inner corners. Third layer: The inner layer, and we will plant a mushroom farm here. Bug nests on the corners. This way, we can prevent it from eating the more valuable moles. The badger can build its own home, it should be smart enough to do that. I''m guessing a hole and maybe some tunnel system.¡± ¡°Genius idea, as always.¡± The imp said. I detected a slight hint of sarcasm in his voice. He returned to his normal voice. ¡°I will get right on it!¡± The imp quickly dug out the design and started to transfer over the resources needed. By now, we had plenty of mature mushrooms and the bug flooded the dungeon. The farms could not longer contain the bugs, so they crawled around in all the hallways, even my own chamber had ''moving walls''. Luckily, they had enough respect for me to not climb on my crystal. The mushrooms used to attack the imp when he transported them, but they became peaceful after I dominated every single mushroom in the dungeon. Their spores were just as harmless now, as my will got passed down to the next generation of mushrooms. The imp could breathe them in all day, they did not drain his mana. Instead they moved towards his nose, coming out with the snot. I must personally take control over all the things in the dungeon, even seemingly mindless plants, otherwise they will start doing odd stuff. It turned out I was not imagining things earlier. Those mushroom tried to strangle the imp, as well as trying to insert their roots into all his orifices, entering his body to drain him faster. Horrifying plants. Maybe I should plant them on the roof to greet visitors? By digging out such a large area, many new lifeforms fell into the dungeon and got dominated by me, most even before they hit the ground. Sadly, still only got one badger. ¡°Hmph, we got so many homeless bugs. Let¡¯s make another farm area with only mushrooms and bugs. With over a hundred nests!¡± Should be noted we didn¡¯t even have a hundred nests in total, so far. ¡°Eh, wait a minute now¡­ I¡¯m still working on this one. You are overworking me here. I have my rights too.¡± The imp complained, as he carried dozens of bugs in his arms to the new badger area. Bugs crawled all over him, even nibbling his mushroom. Remember, just like his regular body, he got one hundred percent pain sensitivity on it. Hm, there must be a better way to transport the bugs. If only I had some kind of cloth or large sheet he could wrap them in. Oh, right, my silk sheet. However, I¡¯m not letting him fill it with bugs, no way. Could make him something else, buuuut, this is quite funny. Ah, he fell down, and now the bugs swarm his mushroom. Yeah, no way I¡¯m letting this view go. The imp screamed in pain, being eaten alive and all. He had to resort to violence to save his mushroom, crushing the bugs into the ground or against his body with slaps. ¡°Damn, couldn¡¯t you have helped me out there?¡± The imp brushed off the dirt from his body and peeled off the smashed bugs that stuck to his body. Most bugs swarmed his head, so he had lots of them to remove. Their sticky entrails left disgusting marks on his face. Since we had no water, he could only scrub his face with some dirt. If he got cleaner or not after washing is up for debate. He surveyed the damage done by the bugs with his hands. About one-third of the mushroom got eaten, and its formerly majestic look got replaced by a gloomy mushroom that looked like it had given up on life. The cap was pretty badly damaged, but the most important piece was the stem. If it broke, everything above the breaking point would be lost. This specific breed of mushrooms had strong vitality, hard to kill and fast to heal, but this one healed extra quickly. Mainly because of the higher than normal amount of mana it got from the imp, and it would soon be restored to its former glory. If you spot this tale on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation. I waited in silence for him finish with his work. The fun factor died down by a lot, because he was more careful now, taking less bugs in each trip. ¡°Phew, finally done. Ah, so tired, going to bed¡­¡± The imp wiped his brow and was about to head to my crystal to take a nap. ¡°Not so fast, dig out this first.¡± I sent him the design for the new mushroom farm. It was nothing special. Similar to the old version but much bigger and no snakes. ¡°Uh, no, no way. I just finished my shift. I¡¯m going to bed.¡± He shook his head waved off my order. ¡°Do it!¡± I roared out in his mind. We only have one shift, and it never ends! ¡°Y-yes!¡± The imp flinched in fear and ran over to the new area. He took out his pick and quickly mined several blocks, in a new record setting pace, before slowing down, to a pace that was slower than normal. He panted heavily, and wiped his brow several times. ¡°What¡¯s wrong? You are actually tired? Hmph, you just need some proper training. No sleep until you have mined out a hundred square kilometers area!¡± The imp dropped his pick and stared at the ceiling with a gaping mouth. ¡°Too much? Oh well, make it a hundred meters then.¡± ¡°Such a difference!¡± The imp said in shock. However, he picked up his pick again and continued with the mining. *Ding! A loud metallic sound came from the mining tunnel. What did he do now? ¡°Ah, Master! Boss! Err... Heart! I found something! Ore! Iron ore!¡± He held up a fist sized piece of iron ore and raised it up towards the ceiling, giving me a better view of it. I have a zoom function, so, not that helpful, but I appreciate the gesture. I can also rotate and move to any block I want, however, for the imp, that might be difficult to understand. Easier to pretend I live in the ceiling. To be fair, I spend ninety-nine percent of my time in the ceiling. ¡°Oh, our first ore! Any more?¡± Finally something besides dirt. Kinda odd it showed up in the dirt, but not going to complain. ¡°Yeah, it¡¯s a whole vein. A few hundred kilo, I¡¯m guessing.¡± The imp smiled widely, as he held up the piece of ore close to his eye, to take every last detail in. His former tiredness, completely forgotten. Correct me if I''m wrong, but that is a pretty small vein, right? Like, very small. Actually, if it weren''t iron ore, but say gold, or some gems, a few hundred kilograms would be pretty nice. Then again, I don''t know much about geology. Not even sure why I know that word, but I digress. How can he tell how large the vein is? Oh, the mysteries of the imp race are too profound. ¡°What are we going to do with that?¡± Sounded great at first, but when you think about it, the ore is pretty useless. ¡°Well, we got no blacksmith or smithy, so we can¡¯t use it. Keep for trade or you can absorb it? The ore should have a lot of mana inside.¡± The imp looked a bit sad as he said that. He just found something exciting, and now I''m going to turn it into mana. Kinda a waste of good material, but oh well. ¡°Can we afford the portal if I absorb all of it?¡± ¡°If not, we can at least summon another imp. Getting tired of doing all the work around here, you know. I¡¯m the Prime, not some low-class imp. Ah, I¡¯m supposed to sip on the finest drinks while having my feet massaged. Servants coming over with the juiciest bugs on a golden plate. My own personal fanning imp, a flying imp that uses a large leaf to cool me. Not just any leaf, but one from the rare ¡®Palmus Manais¡¯ tree, whose leaves have the special effect of releasing the mana it stored inside to deal with draughts, when you wave it around. All while seated on my throne, made of rare bones, and holding my scepter, with a head sized mana crystal on it. My crown would be the legendary self-adjusted kind, and it would be covered in smaller mana crystals. As they run dry from my absorption they would instantly be replaced.¡± The imp stared into nothingness, facing the wall, daydreaming about his future. ¡°How does that work?¡± More imps? What can go wrong? Yeah, I ignored his ramblings. The imp woke up from his dreams and returned to reality. ¡°Don¡¯t worry, that is my job as the Prime. I already got contracts with ten imps. My friends from school.¡± Just his friends? No one that got hired for their actual skills? ¡°Are they any good? I mean, honestly?¡± ¡°Yeah, they work hard.¡± The imp averted his eyes. Kinda less effective, since I¡¯m everywhere and nowhere at the same time. ¡°Now, start absorbing the ore! We have no time to waste!¡± He changed the subject! I have a bad feeling about this. I did as told, but the mana inside a kilogram sized piece of ore was less than I thought. However, the sheer amount more than made up for it. About five hundred kilograms of iron ore. It was not in a straight line, so the imp had to dig, both up and down to get it all. Afterwards, to keep our dungeon even and smooth, he filled up all the holes again with dirt. While I was busy with absorbing the ore, the imp prepared the new farm. We had an excessive amount of mushrooms compared to our current population, but the imp assured me there were many uses for it, besides feeding the bugs. ¡°Hey, why do we actually need all the mushrooms? We are not using them, and the bugs can no longer keep up.¡± It was no longer just the actual farm ground that had filled up with mushrooms, no, no. Now, both the walls and ceilings in Farm One and Farm Two were completely covered with mushrooms. In short, it was a mess. ¡°Yeah, but don¡¯t worry, there are plenty of uses for them. Like in the future, we can brew them into drinks. Or cook with them. Or maybe sell them. But that is for when we got more sentient beings and a proper kitchen area. Unlike normal mushrooms, these also help with purifying the air, which is why they got chosen for the starter pack sent with the first imp, in this case, me. While you may not notice it, since you don¡¯t breathe, I definitely do. The air here was pretty bad at the start, but it recently got better. While the mana you release prevents us from being sick from the bad air, it¡¯s still hard to breathe it, and perhaps more importantly, this way you use less mana to clean the air.¡± The imp sat on the ground, resting from exhaustion. However, he always had energy to talk. I never considered the air quality. I thought about fire and smoke, but not, uh, the thing he talked about. Not sure how the mushrooms improved the air, but then again, I don¡¯t breathe, so it¡¯s probably for the best to trust the one that does. ¡°All done, should we get you an underling, my Prime?¡± ¡°Yes!¡± The imp raised his arms up in celebration. ¡°Now, don¡¯t resist, because this will use your mana.¡± The imp pulled out a piece of paper from his bag on the back. On the paper was the design for the magic circle, and he carefully copied it over directly into the dirt with his finger. He double, no, triple checked at every step. The design was¡­ a shitty drawing of an imp? A round figure with two thin legs and large feet, wielding a pickaxe in his hands, a bag on his back, large eyes and pointy ears. Around it was a single thin line, a circle. Surprisingly crude. There must be more than meets the eye, yes, that''s it. I am merely so ignorant about imp magic that I cannot recognize the magnificent work of art in front of me. The imp got down on his knees, placing his hands on the thin line. Suddenly, an enormous suction force drained my mana reserves. The imp¡¯s own mana reserve remained untouched. The imp lowered his head towards the ground, his arms extended forward, before he raised his torso and arms up, and then lowered it once again. In short, a kneeling bow. He repeated this for a total of ten times. All while chanting something to himself. I surprisingly could not understand the words. The lines in the dirt started to slowly glow. The glow increased in intensity, until even I, a being with no eyes, could not withstand the bright light. The magic circle turned into a beam of light, and the light spread out, covering the entire dungeon with its shine. Even places that should logically be dark, thanks to the walls blocking the light, lit up for some reason. Every shadow disappeared for just an instant. Finally, the light beam faded and I returned my view to the magic circle... Edited Chapters. Ch.1 and 3. 07/08/15 Don¡¯t read this unless you are at the latest chapter. There might be some spoilers further down. Dates are in DD/MM/YY. Sometimes, when I don¡¯t feel like writing anything new, I might go back to an older chapter and change some of the things that have been bothering me. Quality of life improvements, you know. It probably won¡¯t be big enough to make it a ¡®must read¡¯, so if you don¡¯t feel like re-reading an old chapter, you don¡¯t need to. However, the chapters are quite short, specifically, to make them easier to read. I will list the major changes here. I may feel like returning to a chapter more than once. The title will have the latest changed chapter, if I work on a chapter twice in a row, it will be marked with a ¡®part 2¡¯, ¡®updated¡¯, the date or something like that. Chapter 1: Spoiler : 07/08/15: About 300 words longer, and a few smaller changes all over the chapter. 30/10/15: About 200 words longer, I think. Just more minor changes, implementing a few things I have learnt since I did the last edit. Chapter 2: Spoiler : 30/10/15: Just a few minor changes and grammar corrections. Nothing big. All grades and so on are the same. Chapter 3: Spoiler : 07/08/15: About 500 words longer. Expanded bug sucker part and bug controlling part and some other small things. 30/10/15: Another 200 words added. Just minor stuff. Chapter 4: Spoiler : 30/10/15: About 100 more words. Nothing big, mainly rewording things. Chapter 5: Spoiler : The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.31/10/15: About 600 more words. Mainly rewording things and small additions. Chapter 6: Spoiler : 31/10/15: About 300 more words. Mainly rewording things and small additions. Chapter 7: Spoiler : 01/11/15: About 800 more words. Mainly rewording things and small additions. Added the concept of the imp using the Heart''s mana for his spell. Chapter 8: Spoiler : 01/11/15: About 200 more words. Mainly rewording things and small additions. Chapter 9: Spoiler : 02/11/15: About 700 more words. Mainly rewording things and small additions. Added a cameo from The Swarm. Chapter 10: Spoiler : 02/11/15: About 100 more words. Mainly rewording things and small additions. Chapter 11: Spoiler : 02/11/15: About 600 more words. Mainly rewording things and small additions. Chapter 12 - Where am I? Who am I? What am I? Where am I? Who am I? What am I? Oh that¡¯s right, I¡¯m a Dungeon Heart! Hm, this feeling... feels like time has passed without me noticing. About...eight-nine months? How can this be? What was I doing¡­ Oh! That bright light! Wait, what is this? An imp? No, two imps! Hurray! It worked! If time passed without my knowledge, then...they must have been worried sick! ¡°Haha, welcome new friend! Welcome to my Dungeon! It is I, the greatest Dungeon Heart the world has ever seen!¡± ¡°And then he stumbled on the carpet, threw the plate with food up in the air, and fell right on his nose!¡± ¡°Hahaha! So that¡¯s why it¡¯s so crooked!¡± ¡°Exactly!!¡± The two imps rolled on the floor with laughter. Between them, they had dug a small hole, and filled it with squirming bugs. In the corner of the room, a pile of dead bugs had somehow formed. Pretty sure those weren¡¯t there before. Looking closer, those bugs looks dried out, but also somewhat squashed. Seeing this...I¡¯m not even sure what to think. After the imps recovered, they each grabbed a fistful of bugs, shoving it into their mouths. The imp, ah wait. Got two of them now. Let¡¯s call the original Prime from now on. Anyway, Prime chewed his bugs fully and swallowed them afterwards, but the new imp only lightly bit on them, releasing the juice. Having sucked them dry, he spat the hard shells out and threw them into the pile behind him. Okay...so they haven¡¯t exactly been worried sick about my sudden absence. Hm, the growth of the Dungeon have been surprisingly low. No new expansions have been dug out either. Would have thought more imps meant more work, but apparently not¡­ ¡°Oi! You two! Prime! I¡¯m back!!¡± ¡°Wah!¡± Prime threw his bugs up in the air and fell backwards. ¡°You¡¯re back! What took you so long?¡± The second imp continued to slowly eat bugs, one by one, completely unaffected by my arrival. ¡°Not sure. That light came out, and then...nothing happened. Have a faint memory of lots and lots of text, but also that the text was unrelated to me¡­ It¡¯s very odd. Let¡¯s drop that subject for now. I¡¯m back, and what do I see? Nothing has been dug out?¡± ¡°Um,¡± Prime scratched his head, ¡°this is the new imp! I was just entertaining him until you came back. Who could have guessed you would be gone for months?¡± ¡°So, you did nothing except talking for month after month?¡± ¡°Hey, we had a lot of things to talk about! We also slept and ate, ate and slept¡­ Well, guess we didn¡¯t do much. Anyways, he¡¯s my old buddy from school. You know that gang I talked about? He¡¯s one of the members!¡± ¡°Right. So, new guy, introduce yourself.¡± ¡°You are supposed to name him, actually.¡± ¡°Oh. Imp Two for now, then.¡± ¡°Hmph, what¡¯s so great about this Heart? He¡¯s just like everyone else, giving us a number and only shouting about work,¡± the new imp said. ¡°Wasn¡¯t finished... As I was just about to say before you so rudely interrupted me: or simply ¡®new guy¡¯, ¡®newcomer¡¯, ¡®you there¡¯...¡± ¡°Yeah, much better¡­¡± the new imp rolled with his eyes. Prime frowned towards the ceiling. ¡°Fine, I¡¯ll think of something else. So, he got any skills? What about his grades?¡± ¡°Eh, about the same as mine,¡± Prime looked away and spoke in a lower voice, ¡°except a bit worse.¡± ¡°Oh?¡± Have a bad feeling about this¡­ ¡°Wanna see them?¡± ¡°No. Please spare me from the despair¡­¡± Let me keep some hope intact about our future! ¡°Fine. You can watch them later if you wish. So, now that you¡¯re back, got any orders for us? We are both very eager to work!¡± ¡°Pssh.¡± The new guy, or whatever, blew out some air in response. Not sure how to take that, but I¡¯ll let it slide for now. ¡°Hm. Not sure. Hoping you could say. Anyways, what¡¯s up with his clothes? Why is he wearing so much fur clothing?¡± ¡°Oh, that? Haha, you noticed¡­¡± Prime looked over at the new guy, forming a ¡®hand shield¡¯ at the side of the mouth, and spoke in a whisper: ¡°Told you he would notice!¡± ¡°What¡¯s he gonna do?¡± Imp Two said with a shrug and threw a big beetle into the mouth. ¡°We are his only workers. He gotta treat us right, or we just strike.¡± Prime laughed a bit awkwardly. ¡°Well,¡± Prime pondered for a moment about what to say, ¡°he felt a bit cold in here, so he kinda killed a few of the animals by dropping rocks on them in their sleep. Afterwards, he skinned them with his teeth and nails. He¡¯s actually quite good at making clothes!¡± ¡°How, how unexpected.¡± I¡¯m speechless. ¡°Wait, he killed my precious animals? That¡¯s why they are so few?¡± Damn. ¡°Well, you know how it is. When the Heart is out, the imps do whatever they feel like.¡± ¡°Pretty sure I never heard of that before. And that is also the last I will ever hear of it, got it?¡± A moment of silence. My words kinda ended that conversation, so guess I should restart it. ¡°So, what did you to talk about? Anything important I should know? As in, related to the Dungeon?¡± ¡°Oh? You want us to repeat it all?¡± Prime asked, his whole face beaming with joy. ¡°Been a few months since I heard your voice, so yeah, sure. Spill it.¡± ¡°Okay! First, we talked about our old school days and such¡­ Haha, like the time when we were both kicked out from flying class and went to the library to scribble bad words in the magical spell books!¡± ¡°We also drew funny faces on the portraits there!¡± Imp Two chimed in. ¡°Had to scrub it off afterwards though¡­¡± ¡°So you read the spell books? Excellent! You know any good spells?¡± ¡°Nah. We just wrote the words to mess with the other students that did. Didn¡¯t pay much attention to the actual text¡­ Still, we got the basic stuff! Don¡¯t worry!¡± Better than nothing...and have this feeling I could really end up with an imp having literally nothing to offer one day¡­ ¡°Go on.¡± Prime began to speak in more detail. Imp Two ¨C that name kinda got stuck, but I will probably change it later if he turns out to be useful ¨C occasionally added some extra details or comments. Four hours passed like this. I had hoped they would simply give me a quick run down of the topics, but...nope. Word by word, like they had rehearsed this a thousand times already. Worst thing is, they probably only spoke casually the whole time. Funny how Prime¡¯s memory only works when it¡¯s useless. ¡°Okay, stop! Let¡¯s skip all the school stuff and just give me some basic topics. What else did you two talk about? How did he react when he saw your, you know, your thing?¡± ¡°What do you mean? What thing?¡± Imp Two asked. ¡°The, the giant mushroom on his head?¡± ¡°Oh, that. Yeah, it¡¯s alright, I guess.¡± That¡¯s it? That¡¯s the reaction? What the? Imp Two! What¡¯s wrong with you! ¡°Fine, forget the mushroom. What else?¡± ¡°The weather?¡± Prime said. ¡°Amazing sunrises we have seen, or even the sunsets. We even had a competition to describe the most different kinds of snowflakes we have seen. I won, by the way. Terrible raining days that forced us to stay inside, or storms that almost picked us up from the ground. You¡¯d be surprised by just how much one can talk about the weather.¡± I don¡¯t know any of these words. Well, kinda recognize them, but can¡¯t place them in my memory. ¡°What¡¯s a sunrise? And all those other things?¡± ¡°Wat,¡± Imp Two said, stunned, staring right up at the ceiling. ¡°Is this Heart...retarded?¡± Excuse me? What did you just say about me, you little shrimp? I¡¯ll have you know I graduated top of my class in the Navy Seals¡­ Wait, what am I thinking? What¡¯s a Navy Seal? ¡°No, no. He¡¯s just new to this whole ¡®existing¡¯ thing. He will learn in time. Hey, that¡¯s why I¡¯m here!¡± Maybe you should get started with that then¡­ ¡°School, which I don¡¯t care about. Weather, which you never did explain to me. What else?¡± ¡°Favorite foods, favorite bugs, favorite pickaxe, favorite dirt to dig through, favorite stone, favorite metal, favorite¡­¡± Prime rambled on and on. I cut off my audio at this point, accepting that I would not gain any useful knowledge from them, and moved my vision to the rest of the Dungeon. While the two imps had feasted without restraint, the bug population still exploded and reached up to the ceilings ¨C in all the rooms! Well, except this one. Prime had filled the tunnel with dirt to block out the bug swarm. The snakes and moles ate until their stomachs almost burst, but that barely caused a dent in the bug population. The badgers showed signs of extreme stress, having lost hair and acted with a twitchy behavior. No one wants to live with bugs crawling all over them, not even the brave badgers. No new special interest species had arrived, only a couple different bugs. Speaking of the bugs, is it just me, or is it quite odd how these non-digger bugs can dig down to the Dungeon? Like take this grasshopper ¨C how the hell did he get here?! Forget it, who knows how it all works. Support the creativity of authors by visiting Royal Road for this novel and more. The mana reserves had filled up nicely. Can maybe make something nice again. The other imp guy ¨C not even sure if it¡¯s a guy or not, but don¡¯t think he cares what I call him, I sure don¡¯t care whether he cares or not ¨C seemed to have some skill in making clothes. He did, after all, skin a badger with his teeth. Gotta admit, I¡¯m impressed. I may not have any teeth, but for some reason, I¡¯m still impressed. ¡°Hey, Imp Two, new guy, yes you. Wanna try creating some beetle necklaces or other clothing?¡± ¡°Heart, you must first bind him to your Dungeon Heart, otherwise he won¡¯t get access to all the special things in the Dungeon. For example, a tourist imp can¡¯t just go around and dig walls as he likes, or he will be marked as an enemy. While we don¡¯t have any active defenses right now, it¡¯s a good habit to have. It¡¯s a way to swear allegiance to you, and prevents...most disloyal acts.¡± ¡°You never did that, did you?¡± ¡°I¡¯m different; I¡¯m your Prime! You accepted me a long time ago, remember? Anyway, we tried to do that before, but while you were...unavailable, nothing worked. So, let¡¯s all go there now.¡± ¡°I don¡¯t know...this Heart feels a bit lame. Maybe I can get another offer somewhere else? A better offer...¡± Prime stopped, glaring at Imp Two. ¡°We both know...this is your only chance.¡± Imp Two widened his eyes, but said nothing, only following quietly behind. Yeah, think you got it all backwards. I¡¯m the one being kind accepting you! As they slowly walked, wading through the squirming bugs, each step making a squishing and cracking sound, I began to ponder. ¡°Hey, if it¡¯s been like eight months, how come nothing happened? Remember when you said we were in a hurry and all that? I feel like we just lost all urgency.¡± ¡°Nah, we could have been wiped out by now. We¡¯re just lucky. You really need to stop pushing fate,¡± Prime said with a casual handwave. ¡°Hey, wait! Is this Dungeon in a dangerous area? I, I don¡¯t want to...die. Not in a Dungeon like this! No offense, oh great Dungeon Heart,¡± Imp Two said. Yeah, I¡¯m sure you meant nothing with those words. Actually, is my Dungeon really so lame? Look at all this life! Sure, we don¡¯t have a single proper tool, no portal, no furniture ¨C ah, we got a mirror ¨C only two non-mindless, okay, I get it, it kinda sucks. ¡°We don¡¯t have any way to scout our surroundings yet, so we don¡¯t know. Judging by the amount of bugs, we must be fairly close to the surface,¡± Prime said, with one of his rare moments of not being so stupid. The two finally reached the room with my physical Heart. ¡°Now what? Must I do something?¡± ¡°Not really. Just accept him when he touches your Heart.¡± Imp Two walked forward, placing his hand on my Heart. Ah, this feeling! I can feel his entire being. What¡¯s this flickering light inside his body? What happens if I blow it out? No, bad, bad idea! That might be his spark of life. Phew, almost killed him there. So, to join me, the vic-sacri-subject, yeah, subject sounds good, must surrender his whole being? ¡°Sure, I accept your request of becoming my eternal slave.¡± A white glow radiated from the Heart, engulfing Imp Two. After it receded, a strange feeling appeared in my mind, like a second, no, now that I¡¯m here, I can sense a third consciousness. So, they have a small connection to me? Or rather, I have a connection to them? ¡°What? What did he say there at the end? Slave? He said slave, didn¡¯t he?¡± Imp Two looked back and forth between Prime and the Heart. ¡°Argh! You, you tricked me!¡± He punched out towards the Heart. Ah, stop! Holy shit! Two centimeters from the Heart, his tiny fist stopped, twitching in the air. ¡°Argh! Let me go! Release me!¡± ¡°Okay...what¡¯s his problem? What kind of imp did you bring me?¡± Jesus Christ ¨C I have no idea who that is ¨C this new imp makes Prime look like an angel sent from Heaven. Heaven? What¡¯s that? Prime scratched his head, something of a tick of his whenever he got nervous. ¡°Gotta blame you on this one. You turned him into a slave, instead of worker.¡± ¡°There¡¯s a difference? You aren¡¯t my slave?¡± ¡°No, I can resign. He can¡¯t. Also, he can¡¯t join the Union.¡± Wait, is that Union thing real or not? Seriously, I can¡¯t tell. ¡°Who cares about those! I¡¯m not getting paid now! How can I support my family as a slave!¡± ¡°Ah, but I¡¯m sure, since it was Prime¡¯s lack of education skill that caused this whole mess, that he will share his wage with you. Aren¡¯t I right, Prime?¡± A wage? What¡¯s this? First I¡¯m hearing about it. Thought it was just food and lodging for work. ¡°You, you¡­¡± Prime stared wide-eyed at the ceiling. Hearing a cough, he turned to face Imp Two, who glared at him this time. ¡°Hehe, of course I will share my meager pay with you. It was, after all, my own fault that I didn¡¯t spend more time trying to hammer in this basic knowledge into the Heart¡¯s tiny mind. Who could have guessed the Heart would require such special teachings to learn. I admit, my teachings have been lacking. I simply assumed the Heart¡¯s intelligence was on a level similar to my own ¨C don¡¯t say anything ¨C but clearly, I must lower my expectations and try to simplify the material so even the Heart can understand it.¡± Phew. That¡¯s the best you got, huh? What do you mean, don¡¯t say anything? Clearly our levels of intelligence is widely different. I¡¯m a ¡®thing¡¯ with no restricting body! How can his flesh compare to my...existence? Oh well, I got a free slave worker out of this mess, so I can¡¯t complain. ¡°Excellent! With that sorted out, let¡¯s get to work! You, Imp Two! Start digging until I order you to stop! While you two were talking earlier, I surveyed the Dungeon and created a few more blueprints for you to follow. I¡¯m sending them now. Prime, for now, you can also join him. Once a room is done, start planting mushrooms and transporting bugs if needed. After that, you can create nests. Everything understood?¡± ¡°Yes, Heart!¡± Prime and Imp Two said at the same time. Imp Two brandished his pickaxe and got to work. After cutting his way in, Prime joined in and dug to the side to speed up the square room digging process. Excellent, excellent! I placed my floating hand in a steeple position, but soon realized I only had one hand, so that didn¡¯t work out. Not sure why I felt the need to do that in the first place, but I digress. The imps have worked hard. After all, they were well rested ¨C very well rested. They dug out several new rooms, and the badgers finally got some breathing space as the bug swarm relocated to the new farms. Time to create that thing for the new imp: needle and thread! The gathered mana rent was sufficient to create two needles. A small for fine stitching, and a larger one to puncture through hard hides. I could afford enough thread to last him a while too. ¡°Imp Two! Enough digging! You may rest for five minutes! Prime, you keep doing what you do.¡± Imp Two immediately fell to the ground. His slave instinct forced him to push through his body¡¯s limits and focus only on my orders. Better be careful with that. This reminds me of that experiment with the bugs when I first started to learn how to find their souls. Guess this slave thing is similar to complete soul domination, but less work for me since he offered himself. Feeling generous, I sent a stream of mana to Imp Two, curing his fatigue. ¡°Better? Or what? Want a snickers? Well, you¡¯re not getting any! Now, for your first proper task: create bug necklaces, preferably using beetles, since I have a faint memory of something about ¡®the beetles¡¯ being popular. Build up a storage of them. Use that pile you created during my absence. Two hundred necklaces should do it, for now. Use your artistic sense to determine what kind of bugs and the amount on each string. What are you still lying on the ground for?! GET UP AND GET TO WORK!!¡± Startled, Imp Two flew up on his feet and rushed down the tunnels. I followed with my hand. ¡°Here, Imp Two. Take this gift. A set of needle and thread you can use to craft with.¡± Imp Two accepted the gift, but stood there frozen on the spot for several seconds, simply staring at the items in his hands. A smile slowly formed on his face. ¡°Oh, thank you, Heart! What a nice quality needle¡­¡± Imp Two said, holding the slightly bent and somewhat rusty needle over his face to see it better. Hey, I had to cut some costs! If it weren¡¯t for the fact he was now my slave, I would have suspected that was sarcasm. Though, the needles were, in my opinion, high quality, made of metal and everything! Hey, could have been bone! Now, with two working imps, things started to flow on quite nicely. Prime busied himself with setting up the much-needed farms. Imp Two worked hard on the necklaces, occasionally trying them on ¨C not sure if I like that, but I''ll ignore it for now. What a wonderful life being a Heart is!