The main hall inside the Academy of Dark Arts is packed. The seats, rafters, balcony and floor are all full of silent listeners.

Some have been there since lunch while others arrived later as word of a sudden lecturer holding class was spread around.

Marie is set on her dream of joining the Syndicate ranks full time and is now putting in more effort than she was before to help Abi cultivate a new batch of Mages.

"Miss?" A woman near the front raises her hand.

"Please. Call me, Professor," she smiles taking full advantage of her role.

"Yes professor. I still don't understand the difference between portals and teleportation, and why is there a need for both? "

"That's a good question. Teleportation would usually be used for one or two people to fast travel anywhere they've been before. Anywhere they can remember, they can go. For a Mage on their own, that is the best way to travel. Mass teleportation can even transport armies immediately, but is not very cost effective. It takes a lot of mana to move a great amount of numbers so unless you're coordinating with other Space Mages, there's a chance you won't have enough to pull off the spell on your own.

That's where portals come in. They take longer for armies to pass through but are much cheaper than instantly moving large groups of people and exhausting the Mages. It's easy to learn from stories of the past that an exhausted Space Mage is no help when it comes to a speedy retreat. Unless they're saving their own skin," she adds, talking from experience.

The woman from the crowd who had asked the question was nodding along while scribbling down notes. Much like quite a few others, most were just entranced by the old ladies' wise words.

"I know most of you didn't see the portal the demons created in the forest, but that was different to your portals. Even I have never seen a gateway to another realm, and I have been around, let me tell you. Even when closing the breach, I couldn't decipher the spell that had been cast to open the lock. Usually that is the secret behind learning how to open portals to places you have never been. You close them while feeling for the key. The source location of the place beyond the mirror. Being able to see and then knowing where the destination is will let you open your own portal to the same location. Much easier than following a teleporter, let me tell you." Again, Marie thinks back to past events and how they helped shape her into the person she is today.

A strong woman.

A strong Mage.

A strong determination to hit level 100 and become an Assassin. Joining the Syndicate is her goal, but it's still not enough. She wants to be an Assassin living in the shadows, and if Abi knew about it, she would probably attribute the oddity of the situation to Marie's kleptomania.

The hall is even quieter than before after Marie's mention of demons. The citizens hadn't seen them, but the details weren't being hidden, and word of them had spread through Varona like the wind. Everyone now knew demons were real. That they were an actual thing, and they had even invaded them. Or at least they tried to.

The person who secretly ran the council, the woman the Priests revered as their God, the one who claimed to own the dungeon and all the monsters inside, had fought them back. Or so the stories went. There was also a lot of "I killed more than you did" in between conversations for some reason, but the girl named Abi was present in almost every story.

Even Marie had spoken about the woman with green hair and let slip that she let her stay here under strict stipulations mid-lecture before composing herself.

"Following a teleporter is like searching for invisible bread crumbs. You have to..."

Marie's lecture continued until late in the evening and her class numbers only grew larger. She was psyched, and suspected it would only take her a few days to find herself a few replacements if she kept drilling them with knowledge. Hopefully some of them would unlock the class and then she would be free.

Although, she felt like teaching was actually growing on her. Having so many people listen to her speak was a hard thing to happen, to begin with. Especially since Marie already liked to live in the shadows and had hid away from society for the last 40 years. Still, there was something about a crowd full of people hanging on your every word that was intoxicating, and she liked it.

Marie the Space Mage Professor

Dungeon Stories Volume 4

I haven't made any progress at all.

Zero.

None.

Ishda is still a far-sighted dream due to my constant spending.

Every day there's something else that I feel the need to spend points on. Whoever said having more DP would make life easier was a fool. Although, that might have been me. If anyone calls me out on it, I'll just pretend it wasn't me.

I remember the days of 20DP. Spending my points in a matter of seconds and lazing around living the life of un-luxurious bliss while waiting for them to regenerate. Ok, I know, that's not how it went down. Then again, if I swapped out 'bliss' for complaining and crying then it wouldn't be too far from the truth.

Instead of making my way towards another valuable farm of DP, I've been replenishing Assassins, upgrading features, dealing with unforeseen problems and coaching the triplets. For some reason, which they oddly attribute to me, none of the girls seem to want to use their transformation skill. I don't wanna force them, but as humans... They kinda suck. Like... really suck.

They're still level 1 for Core's sake.

Even bloody Bear is level 18!

The triplets aren't strong enough to beat a Golem in their human form yet. They just don't have the stats for it. If only they'd grab a few levels as Dragons, then they wouldn't do so bad using their human forms. At this rate though, Bear's going to end up as their protector.

I've also been spending my time sorting out other problems. The guests from Tune have been allowed to return home and we've taken in a new batch of redeemable souls that need our guidance.

Which is really scary therapy, but it works. As soon as they revert to grey, they're swapped out with another yellow or orange soul from the coastal fishing community. It's slow going, but it's better than killing everyone. I'd be a mass murderer by now if I followed Sis' instructions. Fortunately, I found my own way of correcting behaviour that doesn't involve 16 years of waiting for them to mature. Growing up in an already corrupted world is no way to start life.

No wonder the system wasn't working before. Sending souls off to the cycle of reincarnation, only for them to be born again into the same shitty world is not a problem solving idea. It's the equivalent of sweeping dust under the rug. It might be out of sight for a while, but the problem is still there. It's better to mop the floor instead. Although in this case, Tironia is the floor and it's pretty fucking big.

It's going to take a long time to clean, but it's not like I have to do it all on my own. Sacha, the Deputy Mayor of Varona, is amazing when it comes to finding the right people for the right job. Hence when she told me that Raff - one of the City Council members - would be the best person for the job, I immediately put him in charge of reformation.

Delegation at its finest.

Now my role in the matter is much more laid back. Hana and Mira still watch over yellow souls, but instead of me it's now Raff that sends them their way. Samantula and the Spiders are still on orange duty which takes much longer to cleanse.

Other variables that I hadn't considered before and another reason why I'm still nowhere near Ishda, were the present problems in the cities I already controlled. Orad wasn't actually that bad to be fair and it only took me the better part of a day to sort out.

After having a pretty awkward conversation with Mayor Baldur about me being a Dungeon Core, which he took a lot better than I thought he would, I created a few buildings to house the homeless and built livestock-producing features to ensure everyone would be fed well. I also made an orphanage and staffed it with a few Assassins to look after and teach the little delinquents. Usually it's hard to find someone to care for those who haven't been dealt the best hand in life. Since I can rely on my ever-expanding family, I don't have to worry on that front.

Mayor Baldur is roughly in his 40's. He has dark brown hair, is cleanly shaven and wears a nice tunic like you would expect your everyday city Mayor to. He came along as I constructed the buildings before his very eyes and he didn't even flinch nor say a word. He was beginning to freak me out with his casualness and I was starting to question whether he was a demon too, but when his facade finally broke I felt a little better. People should be freaked out about me being a core, right?

That happened right after we left the city walls and a small hill began to emerge from the ground. It kept rising up, growing towards the sky, then a door rose into view, embedded in the earth itself. Soil fell off the featureless frame as it and the hill continued upward until it eventually stopped. Settling on to the ground beneath it and surrounded by the grip of Tironia, Mayor Baldur screamed as the door opened, "What the fuck?"

Did he not believe me? Did he think I was just a super powerful Magus or something? I had told him what I was doing, of course, but he must not have believed me. Well... that was unlucky because it's there now and their adventurers are already levelling up on good, old-fashioned, ugly and smelly Goblins.

Dungeons that are free to enter are unheard of around here. So any treasure they find, which I did add to incentivize dungeon diving, is theirs to keep. Not to mention that they can level up quite well on Goblins. Growing stronger, the feeling of accomplishment, can become addictive and the effort they put in works two ways.

They grow and get stronger, becoming happier and higher level in the process. Improving their life and hopefully inspiring others to do the same.

I earn more points as the farm grows too, so it's a win win.

I explained to Baldur that no monsters would ever leave the dungeon and that I would always have a dozen guards on duty to deal with them if they did. Not that they would because everyone I summon is loyal to the dungeon. To me. Still, it made Baldur feel better and I created a building to house my guards next to dungeon B.

Dungeon B was only 20 floors deep and consisted solely of Goblins. A hobgoblin was the Dungeon Boss and wouldn't be too hard for a group of well levelled adventurers. Behind the boss room was more Assassins. A luxurious room where they could relax after standing on guard outside was present behind the head hob. In the room behind the Assassins, defended from dungeon destroyers, was Core B.

Nothing would happen to me if it was destroyed, it was just a Dummy Core after all, and I shaped the dungeon around it myself using my own dungeon's powers. To be honest, the Core is actually irrelevant and unneeded. Now that the land is practically mine, I can keep purchasing down and create dungeons out of nothing. Still, having a Dummy Core makes it look legit.

Also, that was the extent of Orad's problems. Not much at all and the city was run rather well too. I couldn't fault Baldur. He was a good guy with a good soul to match and I liked him.

Tune and its Mayor, on the other hand, was pretty fucked.