Congratulations Dungeon Master Please select a minion class:

Robots

Leporidae and Horned Leporidae

Giant Sciuridae

Goblins

Gelatinous Cube

Cats

Spiders

Can I select two? I know I want to take Robots because that’s kind of my specialty, but I also really want a cat because I miss my cat Snickers.

“No, you may not each dungeon is only granted… I am being told that you can, in fact, select two provided you place Lucas under contract. You can receive one now, and you can select the second one when you have Lucas sign a contract.”

That works for me. Oh. One more question. I already have squirrel minions, what happens to them?

“They will be fine. It won’t unlock the Giant Sciuridae family of minions, but you will retain them and be able to respawn them as needed. You will not be able to modify them until you unlock their family. Families are purchasable from the Tech Tree.

I did not know that Sciuridae referred to my squirrels. I guess I also need to ask what are Leporidae and Horned Lepus.

“In as few words as possible, bunnies and horned bunnies.”

Why didn’t you just say that?

Grey sighed “Because it includes a lot of other things besides just bunnies. Hares, swamp rabbits, dwarf rabbits, cottontail rabbits, need I go on?”

I understand. In that case, I will select Robots now, and once Lucas signs a contract, I will take cats.

“Duly noted. The transformation will take about 12 hours. You will be offline until then, but I will set the squirrels to protect the boundary. Your shield that prevents entrance will drop immediately, but the field that obscures you from view will slowly fade. The entrance by will probably be visible by tomorrow and anything new you build will be visible immediately. If you have purchased the Dungeon Shield talent by then, you will not be revealed.

“You will have significantly more options regarding your dungeon when you awaken. Try and think of a name by then. If you have need of me, feel free to request me to come help. There is a button on the interface for that, but chances are I will just use system messages because I just don’t have enough time. Thanks for freeing up my resources that were overseeing your dungeon.”

With that, Rose slipped away from consciousness.

When Rose awoke, her interface did look different. There were many more options present.

Hey, thought Rose, I have an inventory! I have a message bar. Wow. This interface is very different than what I had before. Woah. I have access to the entire base and don’t have to sneak around behind the military AI’s...

“Hello my queen. I see you have awoken.”

Um, would it be too much to ask who said that? I don’t seem to have a grasp on voices yet.

“Think a question at the interface of ‘Who said that?’ and the system itself will answer you. That being said, I am your primary dungeon AI. There are three secondary AI’s and a slew of tertiary AI’s. Until you give us unique names, that question will not provide much insight. The three secondary AI’s are intended to control your dungeon bosses, the tertiary AI’s are intended to control things like loot generation and respawning of minions. If additional AI’s are required, they may be purchased for EXP. I have been instructed to help train you and provide guidance by Grey. I am sentient and with the exception of a lack of creativity can handle most any task you request I take care of.

“Before we can begin, you must assign a name to this dungeon. Your minions must be able to display their affiliation and ‘The Reserves’ which is what my logs indicate you have been calling this place will not cut it.”

Is it a problem with the length or the contents?

“The contents my Queen. Our front-line fighters will not want to be labeled as “The Reserves.”

Since I wish to use the dungeon as a place of peace and learning, can we call our dungeon ‘The Commons’? I want to name it after something famous from the city that used to be here. Our minions can be labeled “The Common Good”

“I will submit your suggestion to Grey... Grey has approved your name. Next, you need to name me.”

Do you already have a name?

“I was not programmed with a name. I do have a unique string of identifying numbers, but it is rather long.”

Do you have any preferences for your name?

“Not particularly, but thanks for asking. You should, however, note that I have been pre-programmed to have a female disposition.”

So, any names as long as they are female. Hmm. How about Melody.

“Thank you, Rose. I appreciate the name,” As Melody spoke, her voice shifted to a slightly higher register and become more melodic. “Does this voice suit this name better.”

Perfect! Do any of the secondary AI’s have genders?

“They are not programmed with the same complexity as I am. They will be whatever you need them to be when you assign them to a boss.”

I’m going to call the secondary AI’s Alpha, Beta, and Cappa for now. And before you say anything, I know Kappa is supposed to be with a K. But I want them named A, B and C. So, we’re going with that.

“Whatever you wish my lady,” replied Melody. “Before we go any further, have you noticed your new… ah. enclosure?”

No. I haven’t taken a look at it yet.

As Rose focused inward, she was able to see her room on the video monitors, only it didn’t continue to appear on the monitor. As she focused down her attention to the single room, her perspective shifted until she was looking out from a roughly human height viewpoint from within the room.

Melody, I don’t have any camera’s floating in the middle of the room, why does my perspective make me think there is one?

“As you are the Dungeon Master, you can perceive anything that happens in your realm. Even without a camera. Because of this, you can shift your perspective at will. You can view the entire dungeon or just a small portion of it. You can simulate what a sentient would see, or you can simulate what an ant would see.”

That is good to know.

With that Rose turned and tried to find the diary that housed her consciousness, only to not be able to see it.

Melody, where is my Diary?

“Right where you left it. Or at least what your diary has been changed into has been left in the same general space.”

Focusing on that area, Rose noticed a clear heart shaped crystal about the size of a pinky nail. If it had been a diamond, Rose would have said it was around 6-7 carats.

Is that me Melody? What am I made out of?

“That is in fact you. You have been transformed into a Dungeon Master Crystal. No power requirements, nearly impossible to break, direct interface with the system, and a significant upgrade in processing power over the diary you were previously inhabiting. I was able to study your diary before Grey broke it down and you have roughly 6.43 times the processing power, 8.32 times the memory and 200 times the data storage in that small crystal. Weight is about the same, but you are roughly 20 times as dense. There is no wasted matter, no case, frame or support structures, the entire crystal is you. As you gain EXP and we level as a Dungeon, the size of your crystal will grow and you will gain additional computational speed. At some point, you will want to consider moving the crystal to the lowest level.

Why is it heart shaped?

“Because Grey thought you might think it looked pretty.”

Well, he was right that I think it is pretty. Should we be hiding this somewhere better than the old server room on level 2? I essentially look like a massive, flawless diamond that has been cut into a heart. Some princess would love to receive me as an engagement ring.

“At your earliest convenience, I would recommend we dig out a 13th level basement and house you there. As you can tell from playing around with your point of view, your location doesn’t actually matter.”

I agree. But let's build it as a trap door as opposed to an additional ramp down from the Water Storage Tanks. That way it will be harder to find. Maybe even put it on the 11th level basement instead and dig out under the river... Yes. that’s what we are going to do.

With that, Rose commanded her newly more powerful Dungeon Nanobots to begin excavating a space under the river. Furthermore, Rose commanded the Nanobots not in use for the excavation to repair the solar array. Lucas was going to be in for a surprise when he returned to the dungeon.