I felt bad. It was my whole existence at the moment as I laid bleeding on the floor. After the voices told me I got skills and leveled up the pain lessened and I felt… healthier? As if my injuries weren’t the end of my existence and only at the point of merely ruining my life.

I wasn’t crying, alright?

I definitely wasn’t whining in pain as I tried to stand on two messed up legs just to get the dumb cube core off its dumb pedestal so I could figure out something. I was brave and smart enough to fight off a crazy beast!

Maybe it was all the things I wasn’t doing but the first list I opened on the interface, which wasn’t refusing anymore, was the dungeon’s and my own statuses.

>12 / 12 MP

>2 Spirits

>Floor One: 1 Core Room, 1 Simple Room

>1 Creature

>Name: N/A

>Class: Dungeon Master Lv.2

>Race: Kobold

>Gender: Female

>HP: 5/29

>MP: 21/22

>STR: 5

>DEX: 4

>AGI: 4

>VIT: 8

>INT: 6

>WIS: 4

>CHA: 3

>LUK: 12

>Skills: [Dungeon Interface Lv.1], [Second Heart Lv.1], [Claw Technique Lv.1], [Tough Scales Lv.1]

>Perks: [Draconic Ancestry]

I hadn’t seen anything that used these spirit things yet but I didn’t get one for the fox. Instinct told me that it was absorbed by the dungeon and that meant something. Time must’ve passed long enough for the core to regenerate all its mana. Mine too, actually.

I wiped my eyes because it was hard to read the list and gently set the core on the floor instead of on my legs. There was a lot of mana available to use for something for my injuries. My health jumped up a lot compared to level one! Skills are definitely something to look into getting. I want all the skills.

For something to heal… ? There might be normal ways to heal but who was going to do it, me? Well, if I could somehow buy skills like that I would.

>Books

>Scrolls

>Runes

>Potions

Books and scrolls somehow seemed obvious at to what they did since the mysterious knowledge of words explained it as learning things. Potions too as magical liquids you drink. Runes were like potions but things you use once for a spell. So all spells weren’t okay for drinking?

I didn’t bother looking at books as they were going to be beyond my mana range. When I opened it wasn’t as simple as I thought. There was nothing there, not in any of the lists! Why even list them as an option?

Wait, what? Just as I was going to close the list multiple things appeared! Okay, so none of the things look like they will help me. A lot of names popped up but they all sound weak and cost everything I have right now. Who would want a for twenty-five mana?

I went back to and yes there were a lot of options now yet they were all the same weak sounding spells. Being as smart as I was it was easy to guess that it was the same in and .

Also it no longer took mana to swap between these lists anymore! When I scrolled through the long lists of useless spells under runes and potions I found two things that seemed exactly what I needed, both for twenty-five mana. Wait, wait, what’s this? When I tapped on the names it displayed something. Skill level up is the greatest! I love skills!

>Rune of Minor Heal - 25 MP

The lowest form of heal learned by any caster capable of wielding the Holy Arts.

>Potion of Minor Recovery - 25 MP

The weakest concoction of recovery developed with alchemy.

When I checked these two out in the scroll list it was available for fifty mana. Definitely weak for these prices. I couldn’t even afford the scroll so these were the best choices available. I didn’t know what the difference between heal and recovery was.

In the end I chose the rune of healing. It had heal in its name instead of something wishy-washy like recovery. This time a light didn’t form in the core and shoot out to my claw, and instead it formed directly in my claw. Hey, isn’t the difference in the [Dungeon Interface] skill too amazing?

It was bark.

A strip of dark red wood that was smooth on one side and rough-like bark on the other with a weird symbol and lines crudely carved into the smooth side. Why was everything I had made out of wood?

More importantly, how did I use this thing? Ah, I’m such a dumb kobold. Why did I go with the rune over something easy to drink like a potion. Recovery may have been weaker sounding but at least any dumb creature could use it!

Did I need to use mana to activate it? Oh, ooh! Nevermind, aren’t I brilliant?

...How do I use mana?

I stared at the rune in my claw intensely as I sat there, in my Core Room with its door unbarred, with one leg bitten to the bone and the other cut by claws, body in pain and mind frustrated at this whole thing.

Focus. That deep energy that I always felt being pulled from my stomach was probably mana. I could feel it somewhat after having it pulled out of me so often. With just that feeling I tried to do it myself, pulling it slowly up from that pit in my gut and to the rune in my claws.

It was hard. Way harder than using it with a skill but I eventually dragged a little bit of that mana to the rune. It activated with a brief flare of white light that enveloped me. The gouges in my legs knit back together to my amazement before it suddenly stopped halfway through.

The scabs that had formed disappeared during the healing so they began to bleed yet again. My blood would’ve also been healed, right? I was sure I’d be fine. Checking my status showed I healed ten points of health. That was okay for the cost, but I wanted to get my claws on the spell itself. I doubted it cost twenty-five mana to cast the actual spell.

My legs had stopped hurting a ton and was a dull ache instead even though they still bled. It wasn’t that I was resistant to pain but that the rune healed the deep wounds and now I just had shallow injuries.

I had thirteen mana left and the dungeon was dry. Now that I was capable of limping it was time to prevent this mess from happening again so easily.

>Pit Trap - 5 MP

A small pit ten feet deep.

>Spike Trap - 5 MP

A small set of sturdy wooden spikes.

>Arrow Trap - 10 MP

A small hole that will shoot a wood arrow when passed by. One arrow per delve.

>Block Trap - 10 MP

A small hole that will drop a heavy block of wood when passed by. One block per delve.

All this new information was so great. Once per delve probably meant the weird alarm feeling and what caused the core to ignore me. Why did they cost more if they were only used once? So dumb.

I made a pit trap right outside the door and filled the bottom with a spike trap. How did I do it when I couldn’t climb down to the bottom of the pit? Obviously I put the spike trap on the floor then used the pit trap after. The floor lowered a square section I had put the spikes on to create a hole that anyone could fall into.

Using all that mana had tired me out and I made sure to remember to get something to cover the hole later. Maybe something soft like a cloth or a really thin piece of wood?

Kekeke, the thought of a dumb fox falling down and skewering itself made me happy. Yet I was so tired. I opened my status to watch how fast mana recovers and struggled to stay awake until I noticed a change.

Apparently it was the same rate for both me and the core. My guess was like mana and health it somehow used all my attributes. As for me? I recovered one mana every… well I didn’t count perfectly so maybe an hour? No, it was definitely less but also more than thirty minutes. I may have drifted off somewhere while watching the interface.

Forget it. My legs hurt and the mana wasn’t coming back anytime soon. With how tired I was from suddenly fighting for my life and the awful blackout earlier I hadn’t gotten real rest. It was weird to learn that I also had to sleep and, if my stomach was any clue, eat at well.

I didn’t have mana to create anything and the dumb dungeon ate the fox before I could so I decided to sleep. Yep, sleep would make everything better. My hunger would definitely wake me up but at least I can recover enough mana to heal fully.

I hugged my tail and curled up next to the pedestal and set the dungeon core right next to my face. It was pretty in a weird way, its cube-shape and clear, see-through gemlike material it was made of making it seem fragile and also treasurable.

With the door barred again there was no daylight to sneak inside so all I had to do was close my eyes to see pure darkness. I didn’t remember drifting off to sleep but did remember that for all it was, the first day of my creation was really good.

I felt a little less weak.