Congratulations Dungeon

You have created an opening to the outside world. Remember that threats come in many forms. Protect your core and grow.

[Monster Creation] skill awarded.

[Dungeon Shop] unlocked.

+100 dungeon points.

[Animal Creation] skill is now fully functional.

The pop up clatters in my mind as my awareness returns to me, “I wonder for how long was I out this time?” Although it hasn’t been many times so far, I am getting used to the blackouts and pop-ups.

“In a way, I’m even starting to get excited about them. Like I have this urge to get more of them…”, which does make sense somehow. I have no body and none of the normal urges that come with it. So seeing the occasional pop up means that I’m actually growing and moving forward.

“The blackouts are just a plus as it means I won’t have to suffer through waiting for my mana to regenerate,” and on that note, I check my menu to see how much I regenerated this time and am pleased to see that the mana pool is full and a level up is available.

Congratulations!

You have reached level four.

Next level up at 250 mana.

+10 dungeon points

[Animal creation] skill awarded.

Notice: [Animal Creation] skill is already available.

+100 dungeon points.

Excited about the points even though I don’t yet know what they are, I order all worms to lie still for a minute to commemorate Wormy’s memory and join them in thanking him in what he gave us, “Thank you, Wormy.”

My next order of business is to check the opening of my dungeon and the new skills.

The first one disappoints me as I can’t see anything further than a few centimeters outside.

“Wait, I see through mana, right?” so I try to send more mana out but it dissipates as quickly as I can send it the moment it gets too far from the opening, “Well, this sucks…”

But does explain why I lose consciousness when exposed to large empty spaces.

“If I assume that my life force is mana, the same one that I see through and manipulate the dungeon with, then when a large open space suddenly joins my dungeon, the ambient mana flows into it. If the space is too large and my mana is spread too thin I lose consciousness until enough mana gathers.”

Which means that the more mana I have the less common the blackouts will become. A blessing and a curse as the gaps in my awareness were very useful in passing the time up to now. Although now that there’s an entrance to my dungeon, maybe losing consciousness is no longer that useful.

The new skills, however, are without a doubt, useful.

The [Dungeon Shop] proves to be a disappointment as almost all the displayed options are grayed out due to my level being to low. It seems that things start opening up at level 5 and until then I can’t buy anything but a few small animals or plants. These are probably the various things I could've gotten from the corresponding summoning skills. Checking the now unlocked [Animal Creation] skill I see that it indeed allows me to summon one of the small animals I could buy in the shop.

I decide to save my points for now as [Animal Creation] allows me to summon small mice, while the [Monster Creation] skill allows me to create a monster version of any animal I have available. Which is Dungeon Worm for the worms and Dungeon Mouse for the mice.

Both have quite the spike in mana cost attached to them. If a simple worm costs 1 mana, than the monster version of it costs 10 mana. The same with the mouse, 5 mana for the animal and 50 for the monster version. It’s too early to tell if all monsters cost ten times its animal version, I’ll need to have a larger sample size before I can conclude anything.

Ordering a few worms to increase the size of the entrance slightly, the rest continue to dig around the tree's roots looking for more empty spaces.

It seems like the bigger the size of my dungeon becomes, the faster my mana regenerates. There’s probably an upper limit to it but for now, it doesn’t seem like I’m close to hitting that cap. And if faster mana regeneration isn’t a good enough reason to expand my dungeon, being knocked unconscious for some time by an large empty space is much better than watching a bunch of worms dig for hours on end. And I hope to get the benefit of it before the entrance becomes big enough for something that can threaten me to come in through.

Unfortunately, none of the empty space my worms encounter are big enough to knock me out and I suffer through the wait. When I see that my mana hit 66, I choose one of the larger empty spaces close to the entrance of my dungeon and summon everything I can there.

A worm, a mouse, and their dungeon versions. The only visible difference I notice is the size, with the monsters being twice as big as their animal counterparts. I look again just in case I missed anything, but except for the dungeon mouth teeth looking slightly longer and sharper, there's nothing.

“Whelp… that's disappointing.”

Not having any mana left and waiting for it to regenerate I entertain myself by making the worm compete against its monster version. Who, although not looking any different, is noticeably faster than the animal version. Almost six times as fast. Not worth it too much considering I can summon ten simple worms for its cost but still interesting and I might summon a few more.

For the next test, I use the little mana I had regenerated to make a tunnel connecting the empty space where I summoned the mouse and the outside world. The tunnel is just wide enough for the small mouse to pass through, so I send it outside to explore.

The small rodent squeezes itself through the opening and I see it scurrying around the entrance.

Dead leaves and small branches are everywhere making me think that this might be a forest of some kind. Slowly, in ever growing circles it explores the vicinity. The farther it gets from the entrance the weaker my connection to it becomes, until eventually, the connection disappears completely. And the moment my connection to it is lost the mouse dissipates into nothingness, quickly crumbling to smaller and smaller pieces until it is nothing more than dust that is gone soon after.

Glad that it wasn’t the monster version that was lost, I give up on exploring for now. Instead, I summon three more simple earthworms, ordering them to join the rest in expanding my domain, and returning to the worst part of being a dungeon. The waiting.

_______________________________

The boredom is interrupted when I feel that one of my worms is in danger. Curious, I quickly focus on it through our connection, just in time to see the monster mouse tearing it to pieces with its sharp teeth and eating it. There’s nothing I can do to save the worm so I order all the others to stay away from the feeding monster.

What happened is weird, as up until now the worms did not need to eat, the mana that filled my dungeon was more than enough to sustain them. Does this one require food because it's a monster or just because it's much bigger than the earthworms?

I summon another mouse, a simple animal version for 5 mana, and put it in a small empty space. Observing it for a few minutes I get bored when all it does is run around for a while and then lie down to sleep when it sees that there's nothing for it to do and no way for it to leave that space.

I leave it there with the intention of returning to it after some time has passed to see if it is still alive even without any water and food. While this experiment is underway I order the monster mouse, “I think I’ll call you Miki from now on.” So I order Miki to stay in place and, somewhat excited at what might happen, summon another mouse into the same confined space as Miki.

Disappointingly nothing happens. The mouse just sniffs the air a few times, notices Miki and backs away from it as far as it can. When I summon an earthworm to join them the mouse doesn’t pay it much attention. Retracting my order to Miki there's nothing holding him in place and as soon as he can move freely it attacks the small mouse. A short battle between the two ensues but the small mouse has no chance against the bigger and more ferocious Miki. Once he won, Miki surprises me by ignoring his kill and attacking the earthworm as well. Only when its dead does he return to the dead mouse and starts eating it.

Somehow, Miki is able to devour both the mouse and the earthworm and once done simple sits in place, waiting. Waiting for more prey.

Not exactly sure what to gather from the experiments, I decide against summoning any more monsters for now.

I’ve noticed that while I did get mana when the animals died, it was only half of their summoning cost. And currently, any point of wasted mana means more boring waiting.

After a few boring hours of watching my creations dig I decide to do something I haven't tried yet.

Focusing my attention on Miki I order him to dig.

My largest creation yet proceeds to move towards the nearest exit and use its front paws to move earth aside as it tries to push itself into the small tunnel, barely big enough for its animal counterpart that is half its size. He isn't very efficient so I try to control him directly, thinking I can do a better job.

The result is the opposite of what I've expected. I can't do much more than fall to the side and writhe on the ground in a poor attempt to stabilize myself.

I don't know if it’s because the disorientation of needing to control four legs and a tail at the same time or because the connection wasn't made for this but even after taking some time to practice, controlling Miki’s body for more than simply standing in place is not possible.

The upside of the failure is that I’ve learned that I can see and hear through Miki’s senses. A process that is passive, allowing me to share my creations senses without interrupting his actions.

So I summon another mouse and send him outside of the dungeon. I then merge with his senses as he plays around the entrance of his home, careful not to stray too far.

“I don’t want to find out what will happen if the mouse disappears because of the lost connection, and I’m merged with its senses when that happens…”

However, a little risk is worth the scenery. The forest is a living thing, and though I have yet to see any animals, the gentle sway of the leaves in the wind is like night and day compared to the unchanging walls of my dungeon.

This proves to be a nice, though short-lived distraction from the monotony of waiting for my mana pool to fill up.