My mother used to tell me, “People are like snowflakes, every one of them is unique in their own way.” I’m sure many children have heard this line when they were young. Everyone is different, everyone is special. When you get older, however, you realize that this is a little half-truth, because at the core of their being, everybody is about the same as everybody else.

If I’m getting told this by a god, should I still believe it? After becoming the dungeon fairy, I received a new title, [A Unique Existence].

[A Unique Existence]: You are something unseen on this world as of yet. Because you are treading your own, brand new path, growth becomes slightly easier.

Gain 1% additional experience.

“Show me something amusing, little one.” – God of All, Genesis

I would rather not be watched an entertaining television show. Well he appears to be the god of everything, so there probably is not much I can do to protest. He may even get bored after he realizes that all I do is sit in trees most of the time.

I also hypothesize that this god is the voice I had heard in my evolution hibernation, based mostly on how he calls me “little one.” The voice during that time was strikingly different from the voice I hear for level up announcements, so there are probably more gods up in Heaven or Olympus or wherever.

I’m not here to be a theologist, and I have stuff to work on, so I decided to forget about the gods for now. If all Genesis is going to do is watch me, my daily life should not change all that much. He may even ensure I get a season two if things start to dip.

I pushed my newest title out of my head and headed towards the pedestal. ‘Jenna, what do we need to do to get the dungeon up and running?’

The stone seemed to shine with happiness, ‘We need to pick a starting race and dungeon traits, and then we can begin building our first floor!’

I placed my hand on the core, but I got a loud yelp in response. ‘Wh-What’s wrong?’

‘Why’d you go and suddenly touch me like that!?’

‘Eh? My title says I have to be touching the dungeon core to use the dungeon skills.’

‘R-really? O-ok…’ Jenna reluctantly gave in and allowed me to place my hand on her. Phrasing it that way, I can see why she would yelp like that. But she’s a rock. I set my hand down more gently this time, and I could see a small menu appear in front of me.

[DUNGEON SKILLS]

[Race Selection] Select a race of monsters to gain the ability to spawn in your dungeon. Variety of races depends on rank. Conditional use. [Trait Selection] Select a trait for your dungeon to hold. Variety of traits depends on rank. Conditional use. [List of Spawnable Monsters] List of monsters the dungeon can spawn. [Floor Layout] View floors of dungeon on a large map. Loot, traits, traps, and mechanisms can be placed and rearranged. Rearrangement costs additional mana. Rooms cannot be moved. [Loot Chest Maker] Create chests that hold treasure. Type of treasure and percentage of find can be manipulated. Costs substantial mana to implement. List of possible treasures included in this ability. [Boss Creation] Nominate monsters within your dungeon to become a boss. Bosses go through an immediate evolution and are respawnable with their memories intact, but with their level reset to its place when they became a boss. If the boss manages to evolve again, respawn will recreate them at their most recent evolution.

That’s… a lot of information to take in. ‘Jenna, you can see what I can, right?’

‘Yep… looks like you got your work cut out for you. Have fun with that later!’

I instinctively tapped on the screen to pull up the [Race Selection] screen. To my surprise this trick worked. I was greeted by a new menu.

[Race Selection]: Choose (1) race

[Undead] [Animal] [Goblin] [Kobold] [Plant]

How diverse. Honestly, it makes the choice a bit difficult. ‘Jenna, you said you could create monsters that have died in your territory before, correct?’

‘Yes, that is the case. I only had Pink Orchids and Grass for a while…’

‘Good, that narrows down the options on here to two.’

‘Two? Why so few?’

‘Well, we live in this large forest, right? We could probably use that space to assimilate more species of animals and plants.’

‘But there should be a lot of options under animals. Is it really okay to ignore it outright?’

Ah, that’s a good point. I’d say she has a good head, but she’s a stone. Well, I’ll keep that one on the table for now. ‘We will most likely find any necessary plants out in the forest. And we definitely have access to undead. I killed that bandit-turned-skeleton on your island after all. So, we don’t have to pick undead.’

It would be convenient to have more weapon handlers as part of the dungeon, but we could probably make do with just skeletons. I had wanted to create an environment that naturally encourages evolution with competition between races, so it may be better to have a wide variety of animals to hunt. The low-level animals would also bring in stronger fighting species.

It also didn’t seem like this was going to be the last time we got to choose a race for the dungeon. In the description for this ability, it read conditional use, not limited use. So maybe if we get stronger, we can pick another race? With the skeletons we already have, it will be like we have two races.

‘I think we should go with [Animal] in the end.’

‘Are you sure? Goblins and kobolds are stronger than regular animals usually. And you are a little bit right when you say that you could hunt animals from this forest.’

‘Yes, but I think that the variety is important. This forest is not going to have everything readily available, and I can only do so much with a knife.’

‘Okay Ozzy, I’ll trust you.’

I selected [Animal] from the starting races screen apprehensively. I still wasn’t one hundred percent sure this was going to be the best option, but it would make hunting much easier.

Congratulations on picking the first race for your dungeon! New races added to the [List of Spawnable Monsters]

I quickly looked at what we had available.

[List of Spawnable Monsters]: Skeleton, Field Mouse, Pond Bass

It wasn’t much. Jenna had noted earlier that she could spawn Pink Orchids, so I imagine those don’t fall within the purview of “monsters,” and instead was something like “items.”

I nervously rubbed the back of my head. ‘I think, uh, I think this one was a dud.’

‘Hmmm…’ It sounded like Jenna was trying to find some words to comfort me, but couldn’t find any. There is no turning back now, so I guess it is time to look at the Dungeon Traits.

[Trait Selection]: Choose (3) traits [Puzzle Floors] Create puzzle or special mechanisms that must be solved to pass the current room or floor. [Monster Loyalty] Monsters will follow the will of the dungeon unconditionally. [Natural Selection] Monsters will compete and fight with each other. Often leads to monster death, but fosters evolution. [Temperature Adjustment] Gain the ability to control the temperature in specific rooms or floors. [Large Boss Strength] Boss evolves two stages instead of just one, is significantly stronger than the rest of the dungeon monsters. [Midboss Creation] Create a creature that acts like a boss, but does not gain an evolution. Other advantages and drawbacks of the boss still apply. [Expansive Area] Capturable area cap is increased immensely. However, the amount of DP gained from area per unit is decreased substantially. [Variant Likelihood] Chance of creating or birthing a variant type monster increases. [Weather Control] Control the weather in the dungeons room or floors. [Floor Teleporters] At the end of every floor, those who have conquered that floor will get a scroll to teleport them to the beginning of the next floor.

There were a lot of potentially useful traits. I took a significant amount of time slowly reading all of them. The weather and temperature controls seemed slightly redundant, but neither one would be useful for Jenna as she is now. Those are definitely traits to get later in the dungeon’s life cycle.

Also, with few floors, the [Floor Teleporters] are something we should forego for now.

[Variant Likelihood] would probably produce much stronger starting monsters, so it would be a safe bet. [Monster Loyalty] seemed to be a need for this dungeon. It would be helpful to know that the monsters won’t go out of line or betray us. Actually, the sheer presence of such a trait suggests that possibility. I want to avoid that at all costs.

[Midboss Creation] is interesting, but we simply do not have the monster pool currently to support such a trait. [Large Boss Strength] could cover for our vulnerability, but I’d rather not encourage strong adventurers to take swings at the dungeon because our boss is strong. [Variant Likelihood] has that same drawback, though.

[Expansive Area] meant more area to get lost in, more space for monsters, and more places for traps. We may not get as much DP, whatever that is, but I think that is a loss we could manage.

For [Natural Selection], I felt as if we could artificially install something like that using the loyalty of the monsters. “Fight each other and grow stronger for the betterment of your creator!” is what I would say. So, I think that [Monster Loyalty], [Expansive Area], and [Large Boss Strength] are the best traits to go with.

I consulted with Jenna about the various traits, and she seemed mostly on board. Unfortunately, ‘What about [Puzzle Floors]? That one seems like it will be tons of fun!’

‘We should probably be focusing on what will protect us better, rather than the fun stuff.’

‘Eeeeeeeeh? But I want [Puzzle Floors]!’

‘We can get it later, I’m just sa-‘

Trait [Puzzle Floors] selected. Please select (2) more traits.

With my expressionless skull, I gave my best attempt at an angry glare towards Jenna, before putting my face in my hands. I guess this protects us all the same.

‘Uh, oops, sorry…’

‘It’s okay. I think that as long as we provide a decent training ground, they won’t outright kill us. I hope. Maybe?’

‘You don’t seem all that confident about it.’

‘I wonder why.’

I ended up deciding on my two favorites, and hoping that we would be able to choose another trait before we ran into too many humans. I selected [Monster Loyalty] and [Expansive Area].

Traits have been selected! Good luck on building your dungeon!

I had one more question left, though I had a few hypotheses on what it was. ‘What is DP exactly?’

‘DP are dungeon points! I can use it to create monsters, items, traps, and structures. It is essentially mana, but on a larger scale.’

‘How much DP does it cost to make a skeleton?’

‘About 50.’

‘How much DP do you have?’

‘Probably around 60. Because my area of influence was so small, I couldn’t stockpile all that much.’

I frowned, mentally. I had selected one that reduced the amount of DP we generated, but with the additional area it probably balances out. Please balance out.

‘Well, I get DP when invaders die in my territory, so the skeleton from a few days ago has probably pushed that amount up to around 100. Plus, as I gather more area, I process more mana, and I get more DP. DP is essentially titanic amounts of mana anyways.’

‘You can process mana?’

‘Yeah! It’s pretty much my job! It’s why dungeon cores are so valuable, as well as why we can create things at all. Creating anything from only mana takes a lot of mana to do. Creation is considered the realm of the gods, so I’m pretty much like gods child!’

It’s incredible how much information she knows while still being able to act like an impulsive child. But if Jenna was knowledgeable on mana and the world, I had something I desperately wanted to learn from her. With the traits and race selected, there was something I needed to do before I was ready to hunt again.

‘If you’re good with mana, can you teach me how to use magic?’