Chapter One: Greetings from the Other Side

A pale blue light shone down from above as he awoke, mind slowly beginning to tick and turn, the cold glow shinning down from above seeming down into his... Surface.

NAME - [N/A]

AGE - [0]

RACE - [Dungeon Core Variant]

LEVEL - [0]

STRENGTH - [N/A]

AGILITY - [N/A]

ENDURANCE - [N/A]

INTELLIGENCE - [3]

CONCENTRATION - [2]

WILL - [8]

SKILLS - [N/A]

TRAITS - [Minor Insanity / Cosmic Inspiration]

In some respects not a awful lot had changed between now and his time in the infinite drifts between realities; he still had no hands, no eyes, no mouth, the diiference was now he had a body. He was trapped in some kind of crystal, or maybe a gem? A stone? A Mineral? He wasn’t really sure what the difference was. He had considered taking Geology as a subject during high school, but he’d decided agaonst it. Afterall it would be a lot more fun to point and laugh at all the weirdos spending their lessons staring at rocks - no he was much happier spending all of his lessons staring out of the window at clouds, now clouds were interesting!

He hummed lightly to himself, a shallow giggle escaping his... Mind? A gentle crackle passed through his 'skin' in response, his body scattering fragments of light in all directions. He ignored the pulsating light shinning from his surface Finally his attention turned up towards the source of the pale blue light; a glowing screen gently bobbing mere inches above his surface, shinning down on him like a spotlight.

The light felt nice, although at this point anything would have felt nice; had a body now, it wasn't human; not in the least, but it was a body none the less and for that he was grateful, the cold empty depths of dimensional space could suck it!

He continued to laugh his surface breaking out in motes of pure white light as he regarded the information on the floating blue window. He didn't really understand it, but he did recognise a couple features here and there. It looked like a character sheet you'd find in games on earth. His memories were hazy on the subject, but something about the screen just felt familiar; almost comforting... he couldn't put his finger on it.

It said he was a dungeon core; and here he was thinking he was just a rock - whether that was an improvement or a not he'd have to decide later

His name was listed as N/A. He let out a derisive snort.

He had a name, of course he did, it was... Something.

He felt like it began with an L or maybe an A, a G?

Yeah his name began with a G. Not that he could remember exactly what it was. Anyway the point was at one point in time, whenever or wherever that point was he had had a name. You’d think a magical floating screen, or whatever mystical or divine forces that controlled it, could at the very least get something as simple as a name right if it were capable quantifying things as abstract as intelligence or will. He’d try to remember his actual name later, for now he was going to need a new one. It'd have to bee a good name, a glorious one, and it would have to start with G...

G...

Gamble

Gurgle

Gimble?

Gimble!

From now on he would be called Gimble. Gimble the dungeon core. He nodded to himself, or at least he tried to before remembering that nodding required a neck a feature no longer supported by his current anatomy. A moment later the screen overhead trembled before changing to reflect his new name.

NAME - [Gimble]

NAME CHANGE - [N/A] Name change Name - [N/A] to Name - [Gimble]

Perfect!

Maybe this floating blue screen wasn't so bad after all although the rest of the window still seemed somewhat problematic. Firstly, he had been at least thirty when he died, he couldn’t remember the exact number but he was certainly old enough to drive a truck; seeing as crashing said truck into a lamppost was what wound up getting him killed. The second problem was his race, apparently he was a [Dungeon Core Variant].

Oddly enough it wasn’t the fact the had been reborn as a dungeon core that was bothering him, no – these days it seemed like everyone was being reincarnated as a dungeon cores, that or they became a skeleton, a snake or a slime; something beginning with S. He couldn’t quite remember whether that information was just something he got from reading trashy online novels or through actual experience. His memories felt... uncomfortable. In any case he was just going to assume this was a perfectly reasonable situation to be in.

He shook his head turning his focus back to his race - he'd gone off topic there. He wasn’t angry about being a dungeon core, no he was mad about the ‘variant’ tag sitting next to it. Was this screen implying that he wasn’t normal? Sure; a dungeon core with a human soul didn’t really fit in the brackets of ‘normal’ but being told that still hurt! He was an inanimate object sure but that didn't mean he didn't have feelings. He felt life he was going to cry, expect he couldn't seeing as he didn't have eyes.

Of course that was not the end to his problems, no there; crowning glory of his pile of complaints; although most were little more than petty minded gripes, were his traits.

The moment his eyes, or rather his awareness focused on the words printed on the screen two new windows opened up.

TRAIT - [Minor Insanity]

You have experienced that which would have driven others beyond the point of no return and survived, however you did not walk away unscathed. Your mind has been damaged beyond repair.

+ complete immunity to mental attacks

- Concentration based abilities suffer

TRAIT - [Cosmic Inspiration]

You have seen all there is to see, all that the vast desolate reaches of the universe has to offer; all of its' beauty all of its' depravity, all of its' fury. Having experienced the untouched corners of reality you can now bend them to your will.

+ structural limits removed

+ Logical limits removed

- Guidance System removed

Hmm...

Honestly he wasn’t sure what to think about this, firstly because he wasn't entirely sure what a 'trait' was. Quite frankly [Minor Insanity] wasn’t as bad as he’d been expecting while [Cosmic Inspiration] wasn’t nearly as positive as he’d hoped.

He supposed it made some kind of sense he did only have ‘minor’ insanity after all, and as far as the penalty to his concentration went well it didn't really bother him; his concentratiom stat was already absolute junk to begin with (not that he had any clue what it did. Going by his character sheet, window, thing the only ability he was half way proficient in was will power (although he didn't know what that did either), hell half of his statuses just had [N/A] slapped on them. Meanwhile he didn’t like the look of guidance system being removed. He had no idea where he was or what he was doing, some guidance sounded pretty good right about now. Removing limits didn’t sound very comforting either, even if it did have a little plus next to it – in his experience limits existed for a reason; usually because something bad happened if you crossed them. He was fairly sure his interdimensional flight had broken a few firmly established limits already.

Gimble frowned, or at least attempted to, before letting out a short internal sigh. How was he supposed to get rid of these windows?

As soon as the thought crossed his mind the three boxes vanished, leaving him once more alone in the dark.

It seemed like these windows responded to his thoughts or something, probably for the best seeing as he was in no state to use a touch screen. He called up the image of the original window that had contained all his information the window appearing with a pop. He let out a short biting laugh before dismissing the window with a summary thought, the screen disapearing with a poof. He then repeated that action several hindred times watching the window appear and vanish giggling to himself as he did before becoming bored with the phenomenon. Gimble sighed turning his attention away, to focus on his surroundings instead.

He was still in a alone in a cave, that hadn't changed since he had entered the strange black rock he had seen in his vision. Yup he was alone, all allone in the world, well except for the original dungeon core out of which he had grown from.

Gimble turned his ‘gaze' upwards towards the far wall where said core was currently embedded deep in the rock. He almost felt sorry for the dungeon safely ensconced in its wall not knowing the pleasures of the cold grey moss on which he was sitting and the sensation of tiny insects jabbing at its' sides with their weird antenna things. He felt so much pity it hurt!

It was at that moment one of the cricket like insectsthat had surrounded gimble and his pile of moss after his arrival in the cave hopped up landing on his surface a ripple of disgust washing through the dungeon core's new body. The other insects watched and waited for something to happen before copying the actions of thefirst and joined it in sitting on top of him.

So much pity it hurt... It hurt!

The experience of watching these 'events' take place without eyes was... disconcerting to say the least, although he was rather glad he couldn't feel the insects ontop of him.

His awareness seemed to form something like a large bubble of sight, stretching a few metres across in all directions, but with things growing ever more hazy the further it was beyond his little ring of sight. He could move this area of awareness quite a good distance from his gem, at least enough to encompass the entirety of the hundred or so square-feet of cave he currently occupied, although he could only get the faintest impressions of the far wall and the high ceiling above.

The Original dungeon; or as Gimble was going to call it Origin (a name he had plucked from his non-existent arse) continued to pulse happily above with its' warm condescending glow. Where exactly the light was coming from he couldn’t tell but he was going to assume it had something to do with the pale blue wisps of light currently being drawn into the glowing green gem.

Well, light really wasn’t the right word it was closer to smoke or mist, something intangible yet perfectly visible, seeming to glow despite the dark, but casting no light upon its' surroundings, rising slowly upwards before being drawn into Origin’s lascivious grasp. The strange mist suffused everything within the cave, from floor to roof but was most prominent in small pockets surrounding each living organism in the cave; the insects, the rats, the snakes and of course the fish. Actually if he was forced to guess he'd say those creatures were the source of the mist itself. Gimble paused regarding each abeast, then he looked up at Origin and then down at the animals, and up and down; and this went on for a while.

He wanted some of that mist too.

This desire wasn’t born out of anything quite as clear as a logical decision, or the deduction that if the other dungeon core wanted mist then he probably should as well, yet neither was it as murky as a base instinct, the intrinsic awareness that this strange resource that he could see would somehow be of value to him. No, it just peeved him that everyone else had something that he didn’t, even the horde of cricket like bugs sitting on top of him had the strange mist. It just wan't fair!

If they weren't going to share with him willingly, then he'd make them share through force!

The dungeon core let out a laugh that no one else could hear, the surface, of the strange black rock bursting with bright white light.