When we woke up again it was dark, very dark. Somehow, Jake could feel Baxter and he could sense that Baxter was worried.

“It’s Ok boy, don’t worry about it, we’ll figure this out.”

“Ok” Baxter answered. “When?”

Jake was kind of stunned by two facts: the first, that the dog could talk now and the second, that he was so literal. “Give me a second, Baxter. Let’s try to figure this out together, ok?”

“Ok,” Baxter answered. “How?”

Jake figured out that he needed to quit asking open-ended questions. So he said, “Can you move?” He felt and heard the sound of a body moving. However, it was weird, he didn’t hear it through his ears, as a matter of fact, he didn’t really hear sounds the way that he used to at all. It was more the presence of a vibration that his brain interpreted as sound. It was quantified too, like soft noise, coming from this direction, at this angle, sounds of a furry body moving, clicking noise, medium loud, sounds of toenails on stone, below and approximately two meters away, in other words, it was the information content of a sound without the actual physical sensation of hearing. It was like someone or something was describing the sound and its characteristics to him. But at the same time, it wasn’t a description as in a voice or words on a page, it was just knowledge that he suddenly had. More knowledge than he used to receive from his senses. And feeling was the same way, he felt and interpreted the movement similar to the way that he would have felt something on his skin, except rather than a physical sensation, it was a quantified description and he felt the dog walking on his skin and knew much more about it - direction, weight, rate of speed, how hard the dog’s paws were pressing down, how far away it was all of these things were just part of his new sensorium. However, there existed a zero point to all of these sensations, sounds, from which the sounds were measured. Like a body, but without the actual presence of a body. Like on a cartesian graph, the point where the x,y, and z axises all met. It was very odd, but somehow, familiar. It felt natural.

“Woh!” Jake exclaimed.

“What?” Baxter asked.

“I can feel you moving, I can hear you moving,” said Jake.

“Touch you?” asked Baxter.

“I guess so,” said Jake. “But I don’t feel my body. I just feel around me.”

“Inside you?” asked Baxter. “Where I? What dungeon? Asleep?”

** 11/5

Jake figured that even though Baxter had been somehow ‘upgraded’ and could talk now, he still was a dog. Even though he may have gotten a brain overhaul, he still had to grow into the space. It wasn’t enough to just give him intelligence, he had to learn how to use it too.

“It’s Ok boy!” he said. “We’ll figure this out. Let’s see what we can puzzle out. To answer your questions, I think I’m a dungeon now and you are a dog monster. And we’ve been asleep or something like it for probably many days.”

“Monster?” asked Baxter.

“Well, not a monster, maybe a fairy or a boss helper? I don’t know what to call you.”

“Where?” asked Baxter.

“I don’t know,” said Jake. “I think you are inside me, whatever that means?”

“Eat? In belly?” asked Baxter his voice rising into a whine.

“No, no,” said Jake. “You’re not being eaten, you’re just inside what I think I’ve become. Let me try something.”

“Huh?” asked Baxter, clearly not understanding.

“You’re not being eaten,” Jake said, simplifying it for the dog.

“Ok,” said Baxter.

Jake tried to see. Of course not having eyes, he didn’t. He tried to move and once again discovered that he had no body with which to move. He started to panic, not in the way that he would have before when he had a body, but a new way. A kind of “Does not compute” way but then he remembered feeling Baxter and hearing his voice. “Baxter,” he said. “Can you move around a little bit? And keep talking and describing what you’re seeing.”

Jake felt and heard Baxter moving and at the same time, Baxter said, “Ok. Black. Smell rock. Smell me. Only me. And pee. I peed. Sorry. Oww! Wall.” Then a pause, and then “Oww! Another wall.” Then a pause and then “Oww! Wall. Floor bump. Oww! Wall, Want light. Want see!” and Baxter began to whine.

As Baxter moved around Jake could feel the area that was defined within his senses growing. It looked as if he and Baxter were in a small stone room, about 3 meters by 3 meters. It could have been a bit larger. Actually it was a bit larger. It was exactly 3.25 meters by 3.25 meters. He just knew that piece of information suddenly. It was odd like suddenly discovering the inside dimensions of his stomach. It was also odd that he was suddenly using the metric system. I guess Bob converted me and the rest of the world while he was at it.

“It’s Ok buddy! Relax! You’re a good boy. Who’s a good boy? You’re a good boy!” Jake said, doing his best puppy talk.

“Baxter good?” said Baxter.

“You’re a very good boy! Yes you are,” said Jake. Baxter calmed down and Jake could feel him pause. So Jake said, “Lie down boy. Let me think a minute.”

“Ok,” said Baxter. “Small space. Wanna run!”

Jake thought back to their conversation with Bob. Bob had said that he would be a quote web novel type unquote dungeon and that was basically all of the information that he’d given Jake. Jake would have felt rage, or helplessness or something about now if he was the same as before, but he didn’t. Thinking about it, he realized that he didn’t have a limbic system, no glands. As a matter of fact, he hadn’t felt much of anything. No fear of waking up in what he now knew was a 3.25 meter by 3.25-meter cell, no real longing for light, just a relative calm acceptance of what is. The only real emotions that he felt were attachment to Baxter. When Baxter got upset, he wanted to make the ‘upset’ go away. Other than that, his interest in the world was, well, intellectual, rather than emotional. He remembered emotions, he just wasn’t sure he felt them anymore. Other than for Baxter, maybe that’s what Bob had meant when he said that the two of them were karmically bound.

Anyway, he pulled his mind back to the puzzle of his existence, ‘What am I?’ was a very real question. ‘A dungeon?’ He thought about that for a second. ‘What does that even mean? Am I suddenly going to turn into a murder hobo and start racking up levels? Killing people? Where am I? Besides being in a stone cell. Am I still a human? Can I be human if I don’t have a body? Shit! Shit! Shit! Shit!,’ he thought, but once again without the visceral thrill of his body amping the emotions. It was like he remembered emotions and felt like he should have them but didn’t.

‘I’m a dungeon!’ he thought. ‘Let’s start with that. That means that I’m probably a gem if the stories hold true and that this is my first room. Again, based on the stories. And, if the stories are right, then let’s try the magic word, “Status!”

Welcome to the Apocalypse!

You go boy! Only 10 minutes in and you’re already starting to figure this out. Well done!

Name

??

Level

0

Race

Dungeon (Human Variant)

Experience

0

Mana

310

Age

0 years.

Titles

None

Dungeon Points

10

Intelligence

15

Wisdom

16

Luck

17

“Yes,” Jake exclaimed, happy that something was going according to, well, plan except he didn’t have one yet.

“Huh?” said Baxter.

“I figured out that I’ve got a status menu,” Jake answered.

“I do?” asked Baxter.

“I don’t know. Say ‘Status’,” said Jake.

“Status,” Baxter said and then was Jake made deaf by a loud, painful noise as Baxter began howling his head off.

“Stop, stop” screamed Jake. “What’s wrong?”

“Pictures. In head,” he said. “Don’t like. Don’t want.”

“Shh boy. Hold on, let me try something,” Jake said. Then he followed up with an internal “Close Status,” which caused the menu to disappear.”

“Ok,” Jake said. “Say ‘Close Status’.”

Baxter did and the menu must have disappeared because he said, “thank you.”

Jake wondered if Baxter’s Status Menu looked the same as his, but he wasn’t that concerned with the dog’s menus right then. He said “Status” again and the menu reappeared.

“Ok boy,” he said. “Let me try to figure out something.”

Looking at the menu he thought again about what it all meant. He noticed that he didn’t have a name first off. He guessed that his name he didn’t translate. He thought about renaming himself Jake Silvestre but figured that his former human name wouldn’t match his new dungeon existence. It seemed odd to be a dungeon named Jake. Like the sentence ‘I’m going diving inside of Jake’ didn’t seem appropriate somehow. Although the idea that the adventurers might say Jake has many levels made him happy. ‘Take that ex-girlfriends who thought I was a shallow nerd. I have levels.’ Although thinking about it, did he? All he had so far was a room.

He decided to table thinking about the name for now and come back to it later. He wasn’t sure about the level either. Level 0 seemed a little harsh, but appropriate, after all, he was a room. Again he decided to table it. The race was interesting. Dungeon, Human Variant. He guessed that there were dungeons made out of animals, even monsters. In most of the dungeon stories, dungeons formed where things died where the mana was particularly dense. Sometimes it involved a crystal or gem called a core. He wondered if he was a core. Somehow he didn’t think so from the way Bob had described him. What does the phrase “a semi-autonomous, quasi-divine helper that’s recruited to manage a transition problem” mean anyway? He wondered if he was an attempt to prevent this random spawning or a whim of a god named Bob or even something else. Then he wondered about both terms in the description: semi-autonomous and quasi-divine. Could he move up to fully-autonomous and divine?

Experience? Again, didn’t know anything about it, but he assumed that it would grow and cause his levels to grow. The Mana points seemed at a guess tied to his wisdom and intelligence statistic. He had no idea how they regenerated, but he assumed that they did - somehow. He wasn’t sure about the intelligence or wisdom statistics either. High or Low? On a scale of 1-20 they were pretty good, 1-100, well, he could feed himself.

Finally, he tried “Help” after which he got another menu.

Good try! You’re doing fine! Unfortunately, the help file writes itself with knowledge gained or already possessed by the owner. Since you just started, … not much here. But keep the faith! Keep trying!

He tried “Inventory” which didn’t result in anything.

Skills brought up another menu, blank except for the title and some random chatter.

Doin’ good. Again, nothing here. You gotta have some skillz before you can show ‘em.

Skills:

“Spells” brought up another blank menu which he thought was interesting in what it implied. He might be able to do magic.

Look at you go! Nothing yet.

Spells:

At that point, Baxter spoke up and said, “Hungry. Want light.”

He wasn’t sure that Baxter needed to eat or if it was a leftover reflex of his earlier life, but he was pretty sure that some light would be helpful. He just had no idea how to generate it.

“Ok boy. I’m working on it. Give me some time, Ok?”

“Ok,” said Baxter and then a moment later, “How long?”

It was probably a good thing that Jake didn’t have a limbic system since he was pretty sure that he’d be a little frustrated with Baxter about now. “I don’t know boy. I’m going to be working on it though so hopefully soon, Ok?”

“Ok,” said Baxter.

Once again Jake felt the connection to the dog. He wanted to help him but really had no idea how just yet. ‘Let’s go with the old standby,’ he thought. “Let there be light,” he said.

He felt Baxter raise his head from his paws and heard the sounds of his head moving and the hair on his body brushing against the ground.

“No light,” said Baxter.

“I know Baxter,” said Jake. “I’m going to be talking to myself a lot, so just ignore it if you would, Ok?”

“Ok,” said Baxter. And then, from the sounds Jake heard, he lay his head back down on the stone floor of the room and soon was fast asleep. ‘This is hardcore,’ Jake thought. ‘No help, no tutorial, a dog for a dungeon fairy, I mean what the hell, Bob. Are you wanting me to fail?’