Chapter 1
“If you want to keep working here, you know what you need to do,” the fat farm manager said lasciviously, licking his puckered lips.
“Fuck you,” replied Kiera.
“Exactly,” he said, with a giant grin.
At this point, the fat field manager waddled towards Kiera threateningly. Kiera just heaved a sigh, stood up, and punched him quickly in the temple. Despite only standing 5' 6” and weighing 120 pounds, when Kiera punched him, the fat field manager went flying across the ramshackle room and smashed his head into the wall. He was out cold.
Kiera sighed again and spoke at his unconscious body, “You just had to go and be an asshole.”
Damn, I liked this job. What with all the refugees from back home, the managers are just getting worse and worse.
Kiera was a migrant worker in the Khal kingdom, working her way from farm to farm. The recent civil war in Ilsan had sent tens of thousands of refugees fleeing south into Khal, swamping the farms with workers. If the farm owners' managers couldn't get what they wanted out of one of the workers, they had plenty of others to pick from. It was a shitty situation all around, as Khal's entire economy existed on exporting food to Ilsan, whose soldiers and adventurers paid industriously for said food. Or at least, they did, until Ilsan's nature dungeon was destroyed, sparking the collapse and subsequent civil war. Now, there was too much food and too many refugees in Khal, and no was willing to attempt selling food in a country ripped apart by the violent war.
Kiera leaned over the manager's comatose body and searched his pockets. Nothing. Searching the room, she found his stash carved into a book he kept next to the bed.
8 silvers and 50 coppers, Kiera thought, that should get me a ways.
She left the room and hitched a ride on a cart that was traveling between farms, still trying to collect food for selling. She had no belongings that she wasn't wearing and had no friends to say goodbye to. She was alone and free, the way she liked it. The cart owner was a pragmatic man, for if he couldn't sell in Ilsan, then the cart would just head east, to Kendra. The prices for food wouldn't be as high in Kendra, but at least the risk of dying or being swept up into the war wouldn't be present. The cart ride to the east from southwestern Khal cost her all eight of her silvers. Luckily, the cart driver looked like a kind man, not the type who would expect 'favors' from her in exchange for the trip. Just all of her money. As the trip started, Kiera reflected back on all the places she had been and her recent time working at the tomato farm. It was a nice job where they were given water and not forced to work 16 hours a day. They got breaks and food at lunch time. She would miss it.
Kiera wished she had some sort of interesting story or reason for why she was a migrant worker in Khal. Something that wasn't cliché, unlike the reality of her situation. Growing up on tales of epic mages and adventurers, she wished that she herself was a traveling adventurer, springing from dungeon to dungeon. Instead, she was just running away again, something she had become increasingly proficient in as life went on, these past 26 years.
Kiera had grown up the daughter of a wealthy, middle-class family. Of course, all the money and the tailoring business went to her younger brother when their parents passed away. Despite being better at accounting and sales, no woman would inherit when a man was in the family. So much for Ilsan being an egalitarian country, where women adventurers and soldiers were aplenty. Her brother, with his massive gambling addiction, had run the family business into the ground. Then he had tried to sell her off to some noble in a bid to save the sinking business and to maintain his lifestyle. That was when she had just left, and for the first time, she was free.
Having been trained in the art of Chi, prior to the loss of her parents, she had no trouble living on the road, catching her own food. It was when she showed up at a dungeon, looking to make some coin, that she discovered how cruel life could become. Without an adventurer's guild license, it was impossible to enter the dungeon, and even if she obtained one, everything earned inside the dungeon was taxed at 50% and the price for entering was five silvers. Then, the noble who had wanted to buy her, pissed that she had run away, had placed a bounty for her at 5 gold. That was 50 silver, or 5,000 copper coins, that he was willing to pay just to regain face. Kiera had barely escaped before being captured. (1 mana crystal = 10 platinum coins; 1 platinum coin = 50 gold coins; 1 gold coin = 10 silver coins; 1 silver coin = 100 copper coins; 1 mana crystal = 500,000 copper coins).
She ran all the way to the Khal kingdom, where the only work was farming. The landowners were the nobles, the farm heads were the rich, the managers were the middle class, and the farmers were the poor. As long as the food was collected and sold in sufficient quantities, the land owners and farm heads didn't care at all what the managers did to the farmers. So for eight years, she had bounced from farm to farm, working at picking tomatoes or cotton or whatever other commodity was being grown. She hated picking cotton; it just about destroyed her back. Ever since the invention of the cotton gin, cotton had become a booming industry, and farm owners everywhere were trying to break into the textiles market. And Kiera hated it. It reminded her of her family's old tailoring business. Those thoughts inevitably led back to her brother, and the rage would start to build. If it wasn't for her brother, she would have inherited the business, and her life would be completely different. Kiera believed that she had the drive to succeed in life; it's just that her circumstances had forced her into an 8-year long rut. She kept this fantasy alive by pretending that she was about to succeed in all her dreams, that she was simply in a temporary slump. In the back of her mind, a rebellious voice muttered that maybe, she'd rather just pick apples and tomatoes all day than have to pick another cotton plant.
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The trip to eastern Khal was pleasant, surprisingly. The bandits, created by the Ilsan war, hadn't worked their way south or east yet, and the weather was always pleasant in Spring. The more moderate Khal kingdom was a relief from the heat of northernly Ilsan for Kiera, but the fact that winters existed here was miserable. Kiera hated snow, which she had never seen until she had turned 18. It was especially miserable for migrant farmers, who had to huddle together in makeshift structures with wood-burning fires for warmth.
Kiera had spent the trip meditating, finally breaking through from C1 rank to C2. Chi cultivation was widely practiced in Sorenia, at least for the wealthy. Men and women could both cultivate Chi, and this is where the egalitarian attitudes of Ilsan came from, as once women started training in Chi, their physical prowess matched up to any normal man and would even surpass them. Starting physical attributes didn't matter, only progress in Chi. Unfortunately, as a low D-rank practitioner when she was at one of the dungeons in Ilsan, Kiera was not nearly powerful enough to protect herself from bounty hunting adventurers.
Chi was an art simple in theory and difficult in practice. Mana in the air was taken in through acupoints, the name given to miniscule pores in the skin, and circulated through the series of specialized Chi veins and vessels in the body known as meridians, before collecting in the dantian, a sort of magic core located behind the navel. This Chi could then be let out of the body, through the same pathways, and turned into all the forms of magic that existed. Basic, or pure, mana manipulation could be used by everyone to create simple pushes and pulls or by S and SS-rankers to condense mana crystals. It wasn't very effective or efficient for use in fighting, however. Based on inborn affinities, most people trained in the basic elemental magics, of which there were ten: Light, Dark, Life, Death, Earth, Water, Fire, Air, Nature, and Lightning. Rare were the practitioners of the so-called higher elemental magics, like Gravity, Space, Soul, and Healing magic. It was what made healers so valuable to adventurer parties. All that was required to become a mage or fighter was the techniques that allowed one to practice Chi. The style books showed which acupoints and meridians to use in circulating to increase one's progress in Chi. The application books showed the pathways used for fighting or for magic. Of course, the greatest of these books were kept secret, owned and regulated by the rich. The styles would pass down through the ancient families, and it was how the aristocracy maintained their control over the masses.
The letters and numbers were simply designed to quantify how progress in Chi was made. There were ten levels (0-9) in each rank, because the mana in the dantian would expand nine times, to clearly delineated levels, before condensing into the next rank. At D and C ranks, the mana would be present as a gas in the dantian. At B and A ranks, the mana would condense into liquid. Finally at S rank and above, the mana was a solid, hence it was given the letter S.
Kiera, as a C2 ranked Chi practitioner, was rare amongst the poor. Her family had been wealthy enough to have a lowly C-rank style book. She didn't have any knowledge of the magics, but she was able to fight at a level that belied her small stature. With her low quality practice technique, she was bound to forever stay in the low C ranks, unless she could stumble upon a better technique. What she didn't know, however, was how high her proficiency for Chi really was. Using a C-rank style book to cultivate to C2, and in only 10 years, showed massive proficiency. Only if she had a better quality style book would she be able to flourish.
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“Emelia”
“mmm...”
“EMELIA”
“What? What's going on?”
“That's what I'm supposed to ask. What's going on? Also, how the hell am I talking?”
“Well, from what it looks like, you succeeded. Congratulations, you're a dungeon. Oh, and you're speaking telepathically.”
“So what do I do now?”
At this question, Emelia's jaw dropped. She asked, “So you mean you spent 3,000 years preparing to become a dungeon, but didn't plan anything?”
Defensively, Dorn replied, “No, I prepared. I know I want around a total of 50 floors. The first floor will be an entrance hall. The second floor will be-”
“Stop. Just stop. You don't know anything, do you?” Emelia asked.
“Well, I was going to find out from that nature dungeon in Ilsan, but I sort of killed him before he mentioned anything, except for something about Dungeon Points.”
Emelia exclaimed, “Wait, you're the one responsible for killing Tina? Thank you, thank you, thank you. I hated that elitist bitch, always bragging how she was bound to one of the only two S-ranked dungeons in this weak continent. Ha, she can go drown in the underworld.”
“Emelia, focus. I don't know how I'm supposed to start building my dungeon.”
Brought back to topic, Emelia brightly responded, “Right! That means I can still do my job. Ok, ok, I've practiced this; let's do this, Emelia,” she said to herself. Clearing her throat, she continued, “Congratulations, you are a dungeon. This means that you are one of the highest life forms on the planet. As such-.”
“Thanks, I was unaware that I was a dungeon. I thought I had spent 3,000 years trying to become a fairy,” Dorn said.
Ignoring him, Emelia continued, “As such, to aid in your growth and glorious future filling the world with mana, you have been granted access to the System by the gods.”
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“What's the System?” Dorn asked.
Emelia glared at him, saying, “If you would just shut up, I was about to explain that. The System is set up by the gods to help higher life forms quantify their growth and evolution. This takes the form of blue screens that will appear in front of you from time to time. Using these screens, you will be able to learn how much growth energy you currently have, which will take the form of Dungeon Points. Using these Dungeon Points, you will evolve as a being as well as create and populate your dungeon.”
Dorn's question finally answered, he involuntarily started talking, “So that's what Dungeon Points are. I was right, they are the energy that allows a dungeon to grow and evolve. So how do you get more Dungeon Points? And wait, if the System is just for higher life forms, does that mean that dragons really are lesser life forms compared to dungeons? Do pixies get access to the System?”
“To answer your last question first, no, pixies do not get access to the System until they bond with a higher life form. In my case, that would be with a dungeon. Speaking of, we need to create the dungeon-pixie bond,” Emelia said.
Dorn responded, “What is the dungeon-pixie bond? And more importantly, why should I? What do I get out of it? Also, you didn't answer my question about dragons.”
Giving him another glare for being difficult, she responded in kind: “Why should I answer your questions? Only if we bond will I answer your questions about the System, Dungeon Points, and the Dungeon Store, as well as show you how to grow and populate your dungeon. You will also get me to stay with you forever to help advise you on growing, maintaining, and improving your dungeon.”
“Uh huh, so what's the Dungeon Store? And what do you get out of the deal? Why do you want this bond so badly?” Dorn asked shrewdly.
Ignoring his first question for the time being, Emelia responded, “Isn't it enough that I get to fulfill my purpose in life?
“No; now, what do you get?”
Emelia, after a lengthy pause, sighed and finally responded, “I get access to all your mana.”
“WHAT?” screamed Dorn.
Emelia winced and pushed her hands out, palms first, in a placating manner. She said, “Relax; you're a dungeon now; you no longer really need mana like you did in the past, as a dragon. In fact, most dungeon cores don't even bother cultivating their core form, because a core can't move on its own, and if it leaves its dungeon space, it will permanently losing connection to everything it has built. Plus, dungeon cores can't cheat by using Dungeon Points to cultivate as a core, so they require a Chi cultivation style book and large amounts of time and enlightenment, just like every other creature.”
At this point, she directed a glare at the cheating dungeon, before saying, “Most dungeon cores don't spring into existence with a fully formed conciousness and thousands of years worth of SS-ranked cultivation. Instead, they wait until they can form a dungeon avatar before sinking all of their efforts and points into cultivating, as a form of defense for their dungeon core. Meanwhile, you can simply use the mana shoved into that rediculous diamond core of yours to blast the shit out of anyone who attempts to take or damage your core. And you STILL have 10 basic elemental shields and 1 higher elemental shield!”
Considering her own last statement, Emelia suddenly paused her rant, before asking, “Why exactly do you have 11 elemental shields surrounding your core? Are you just stupidly and obnoxiously paranoid?”
Dorn, thinking about his highly coveted revenge against the Demon and Devil Plane, responded, “They might not know it now, but I have some rather impressively strong enemies, who are going to be incredibly pissed off when they find out about this dungeon. These shields won't even slow them down if they come themselves; the shields are here to defend against any minions and agents they send, as well as any other greedy assholes who like to steal or destroy dungeons.”
At this, Emelia gave him an incredibly deadpan look. In the most sarcastic voice she could muster, she responded, “You mean assholes like you? Did you forget destroying Tina's nature dungeon?”
Ignoring this, Dorn just further justified himself: “Besides, I didn't know whether I would be able to keep my cultivation when I transferred to a core, so these shields were made as a contingency.”
Suddenly realizing something Dorn had said a little while ago, Emelia became rather panicky and asked, “Wait. What the hell kinds of enemies do you have that would not even be slowed down by eleven fucking elemental shields, including a Space magic shield built by an SS-ranked Space magic dragon?”
All Dorn would explain was, “Heh. They're pretty strong. And besides, I still have to worry about Soul mages… well… A-ranked Soul savant mages, S-ranked Soul mages with a major affinity, and SS-ranked Soul mages with a minor affinity.”
Emelia snorted, responding, “Yeah, because those are so fucking common.”
Dorn, glad that his perseveration had managed to get Emelia's mind off his future, pissed off, super-strong enemies, brought the conversation back on topic, grumbling, “I still don't see why all that means you need access to my mana.”
Emelia huffed, saying, “Consider this: right now you're a new dungeon. Most new dungeons have the intelligence of a five-year old child. Pixies need some amount of control over their dungeon charges so that they don't end up creating impossible dungeons or stupidly simple ones. Ugh, I'm thankful I won't have to explain simple concepts like what traps are and why you can't just have a straight tunnel from your entrance to your core room.”
“Stop trying to change the subject. If you get access to my mana, you'll be able to control everything I do. You'll even be able control my thoughts,” said Dorn.
“No, no, that's not the case. As a pixie, we have small souls, and as a higher life form, you have been granted a powerful soul. The bond will allow me to live, as I need mana to exist, and it will allow us to speak telepathically at any range. It will also give me natural immunity from your dungeon's monsters and traps. You also won't be able to spend any of your Dungeon Points until we bond,” said Emelia.
It was more her last point, rather than any other reason, that convinced Dorn to accept the bond. He responded, “Alright, fine, how do we do this bond thing?”
Emelia replied, “Yay! First off, open your ridiculous 11 shields.”
Dorn grumbled and opened a small foot wide hole through all 11 of his magical shields. Emelia flew in and alighted upon his body.
“I feel violated,” Dorn said.
“Oh, hush, this is supposed to be a holy moment. We will be together for the rest of eternity. This is exciting.”
“I'm not sure I'm going to last five more minutes in your company, let alone eternity.”
Congratulations! You have now initiated the dungeon-pixie bond!
Gained: Access to the Dungeon Points system
Gained: Access to the Status screen
Gained: Access to the Dungeon Store
+1 level
+500 Dungeon Points
Congratulations! You are now level 1
You may now have 1 dungeon floor!
You will now be awarded Dungeon Points based on your core identity and dungeon location
Material, analyzing...
As a gem based dungeon core, you are awarded 1000 Dungeon Points
As a perfect diamond, you are awarded 5000 Dungeon Points
Shape, analyzing...
As a regular dodecahedron, you are awarded 3000 Dungeon Points
Location, analyzing…
For starting in a dragon's lair, you are awarded 1000 Dungeon Points
You have 10,500 Dungeon Points
“Wow you gained a lot of points for being a new core,” Emelia exclaimed.
“Is 10,500 really that many?” Dorn questioned.
“Of course, that's enough to level up seven times! Of course, please don't level up seven times; that would be a complete waste of your points, and you'll need them for everything else.”
This, of course, filled Dorn with more questions: “What is leveling up? How do I do it? And why is it a waste to level up seven times?”
“Gods, you ask more questions for everything I say. We're going to be at this forever. Let me just try to answer all your questions in one go. First off, you were correct a while ago; dragons are not considered higher beings in the eyes of the gods. Only dungeons, in this plane of existence, are considered higher beings, and as such, only dungeons have access to the System. Of course, this is all relative, and the opinions of the gods are not absolute truths. Or in many cases, even regular truths.”
At this point, she trailed off and scrunched her face up in thought, before saying, “I guess they're not really gods in any religious sense at all. So why do they call themsel-”
Dorn sighed as she continued muttering to herself. Why did I have to get a hyperactive pixie with no ability to concentrate? Eventually, when she didn't stop muttering for five minutes, he yelled out: “Emelia. Focus.”
Emelia's head snapped around as she regained focus.
Wow. She actually forgot I was here, thought Dorn. I thought that only happened in badly written novels.
Clearing her throat again, Emelia continued, “Right. Now, as for Dungeon Points, they are a measure of your ability to evolve as well as grow and maintain your dungeon. You can gain Dungeon Points by breaking down matter around you as well as killing living beings within yourself. Most of your points will come from the latter, but certain pieces of matter, like rare metals and gems, will give you a somewhat significant number of points as well, but never as much as killing living beings. Also keep in mind that the Dungeon Points required for building something vastly exceeds the number of Dungeon Points you receive from absorbing it. Every living being that dies within you will give you access to its pattern, or their molecular make-up, as well as its mana distribution, and will thus allow you to populate your dungeon with copies of that once living being,” Emelia said.
Dorn just had to interrupt at this: “Oh, I think you'll enjoy what I have in my treasure horde, then.”
“Why? Do you have a lot of gold? That really won't help you too much, as gold isn't all that rare of a metal, at least speaking magically. And I just told you that absorbing things isn't really the greatest way to make DP's. What you really want to get your hands on are trace amounts of the rare, magical metals like moonstone and high steel, if not mithril and adamantium. Absorbing those will give you their pattern, allowing you to create them in the future, albeit with an enormous, disturbingly large number of DP's. But finding adamantium in the lower realms here would be ridiculous. There might be some trace amounts in the dirt somewhere, but the chance of it being here is almost zero,” Emelia replied.
“Why don't you go take a look?”
Emelia huffed out a “fine” and zoomed off to his treasure rooms. Dorn waited through half an hour of silence, almost to the point where he was getting annoyed, before a crazed-looking Emelia came soaring back into the throne room screaming, “How the hell do you have so many rare metals and gems? And all those weapons? And those herbs, animals, and monsters? This will easily make you one of the most powerful dungeons in Sorenia. It's basically cheating! You're supposed to spend centuries, centuries, slowly accumulating that amount of materials and patterns.”
“I know, isn't it great?” Dorn asked rhetorically.
“No, it's not great. It's a disaster in the making.”
Dorn was taken aback, “Why?”
“Because,” Emelia said, “there's a natural progression to how a dungeon is supposed to develop. Yes, you'll get a lot of Dungeon Points and patterns out of your treasure horde, but think about how most dungeons develop. Usually, a new dungeon is founded and the weak D-ranked adventurers come to test their mettle. Occasionally, a C-ranked adventurer will come. Instead, you have all these powerful monster patterns and treasure patterns to use, but you don't really have the capability to protect any of them.”
Dorn, not quite understanding her point, replied, “I'm not planning on awarding adamantium on the first floor to every wimpy D-ranked adventurer who makes it through, and I'm not going to be making dragon bosses for the second floor. I just wanted to have their patterns so that in the future, I won't need to go hunting them or buying them.”
“Oh, well, that's ok then. I was just panicking, looking at all the treasure you have here. If you really offered any of that, it would have caused a mad rush by every S and A-ranked adventurer in Sorenia, and you would most likely be destroyed or kidnapped to study or for power. People would wonder about the reason why you are different from every other dungeon they know. Remember, you must never allow anyone to find out you are sapient, or the A and S-ranked mages will definitely capture you and force you to make the materials they need for their magics. Towards that end, you should probably push your old, empty body outside of your former lair. That way, no one will associate you with the dungeon; they'll just think the silver dragon that lived here died. Only when you have reached the S rank will you probably be powerful enough to be safe communicating with the outside world.”
Emelia, finally calmed down, was made distraught by what Dorn said next.
“Yeah, that's not exactly how things are going to go.”