The proud natives of the northeastern side of Aveneast are known as Ursanian. Their people were once members of a proud empire that spanned from the southern tip of the Tempest Jungles all the way to the barely inhabitable lands of the second frost line. The fall of the god beasts led to the collapse of their empire, however their people held strong regardless of the trying times. They spent centuries as wandering nomadic tribes until they eventually began to settle city states along the northern reaches of the land.

For the longest of times the ten remaining clans lived in peace and prosperity, it was the advent of the Ormain that brought them to ruin. When the Ormain first appeared the Ursanian Lords were split by clan and the states of Stolm did not yet exist. It was only after the number of remaining clans had been halved that the five living clans united together to push back the Ormain, an event that luckily coincided with Wyrmrest’s first attacks against their rival empire.

* An excerpt from “The History of Aveneast” by Tallok Jones the First

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Eternal Dungeon POV

I stared down at my status screen, enjoying the sight of all those available perks. Normally I only got to select one or two per level and if I hadn’t had my particular Legendary Perk I would’ve had even less. Yet now I had seven perks available to me.

Of course four of those perks were only lesser perks, ones that I can easily just drop into leveling my already existing lesser perk. It was the two greater and one superior perk that I was excited about. These would be the last three perks given to me by my Legendary Perk, which means that from now on I’ll be getting far less perks each level.

Overall I’m happy with the early boost the perk gave me. Plus it’s not like the perk is suddenly useless, I originally picked it primarily for its ability to let me combine affinities and aspects. Now enough stalling, time to get this done before something interrupts me.

Step one I place all four of my lesser perks into upgrading Enhanced Potency all the way to level 10. As soon as I finish doing that I receive a system notice.

Notice: Lesser Perk ‘Enhanced Potency’ has reached its maximum level

Notice: You lack the following requirements to upgrade Lesser Perk 'Enhanced Potency`

Enhanced Capacity 10

Enhanced Empowerment 10

Interesting. I was aware that certain perks could be combined into higher ranked ones but I didn’t realize that this was one of them. I guess I should’ve spent more time paying attention when I was first choosing but I just remember being really excited to actually start building the dungeon.

I open up the descriptions of the two perks that are requirements to upgrade my now maxed out one.

Enhanced Capacity

Increases your dungeon creature level cap by 5%

Enhanced Empowerment

Increases the effectiveness of Empowerments used by your Dungeon Creatures by 5%

“Wyla, I need some things explained to me!” I call out to my partner.

“What is it that you need Mark?” Wyla asks as her attention focuses on me.

“A couple things. First of all, I could’ve sworn that both of these lesser perks are new. I would’ve definitely picked Enhanced Capacity if I had it at level 1. Second of all, what is an Empowerment?” I ask her.

“Enhanced Capacity only unlocks once a 5% bonus to the dungeon creature level cap would be a positive integer. In other words, it unlocks at level 2. As for empowerments, that is a rather long discussion. The short answer is that they are a tradeoff of sorts. Empowerments let an individual lower their maximum mana pool by a percentage in exchange for gaining more stat points per level.” She explains.

Huh, I guess I really should’ve checked through my perk lists more each level. I didn’t think I would unlock any new perks since the System had removed so many other restrictions on me already. I guess I’ll have to keep an eye out from now on.

As for the empowerments, well they're interesting but there isn’t much I can do with the information. I already checked with my chosen and learned that they’ve known about empowerments and have already taken some for themselves. In fact Bellator has a miniscule mana pool, choosing to instead abuse the fact that he can pull on my mana to supplement his lacking supply.

Since it seems like anything with a system already has knowledge of empowerments (excluding myself) it’s not like I’ve been missing out on a source of power. I return half my attention to contemplating my perks while using my other half to continue speaking with Wyla. Despite not really needing the information, I still want to know more about empowerments for the sake of my creatures.

I refocus on picking out my greater perks. I still have five base affinities to get before I start getting any combinations. Of course I could always skip over some of the base affinities in favor of getting a combination affinity sooner, but I’d rather not.

The five that I don’t have are Air, Fire, Dark, Light, and Scourge. I’m still not sure I really want anything to do with Scourge at the moment. I’ll get the affinity eventually, but other than undead monsters I really have no good ideas for uses. The Elemental affinities of Air and Fire are much higher on my list since I’ve already seen how they can be mixed together in interesting ways.

The way that my magic weather on the fourth floor is made is by an interaction between fire mana and the surrounding air and earth mana. I’m curious as to what the interaction would look like if there wasn’t any earth mana present.

Getting the fire affinity would also give me more control over my artificial stars. However if that’s what I care about then I would need to get Fire and Light as those are the two affinities I’m missing from having full control over the artificial stars. Weirdly enough the other two affinities present in the stars are Aether and Wyld, both of which I already have.

Dark is also a pretty good contender for a pick since I already have several creatures with the affinity naturally developed. The affinity is also one who’s uses I already have several ideas for. Blinding traps, impenetrable fog, and secret passages are all things that the affinity would help make

I ponder the choices for a while unsure of which affinities I want to grab. For a short moment I consider getting something else in the greater perk category, but immediately dismiss the thought. Even if there is something interesting it wouldn’t be worth it when taking my Legendary perk into consideration.

I eventually decide to select fire and wind as the two affinities. My reasoning is simple. Everything other than Scourge would be really good to have right now which naturally makes things a tie. My tiebreaker is the fact that I already have half of the elemental affinities and it just makes sense to get the rest of them. I finalize my choices so I can move on.

Greater Perk: Fire Affinity

Gain access to Fire Affinity Mana and Fire Magic

10% Increase in mana potency to all dungeon creatures and objects that use the Fire affinity

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15% Increase in experience gained to all creatures with a matching affinity while inside your dungeon.

Greater Perk: Air Affinity

Gain access to Air Affinity Mana and Air Magic

10% Increase in mana potency to all dungeon creatures and objects that use the Air affinity

15% Increase in experience gained to all creatures with a matching affinity while inside your dungeon.

Notice: Water, Earth, Fire, and Air Affinities have been simplified under the shared name of ‘Elemental Affinity’. Their functionality and cost are the same.

The notice surprises me for a moment, but a quick check of my status shows that everything is fine. In fact it's rather useful since the four affinities are now listed just once in my status sheet. A quick probing test with my Legendary perk shows that I can still combine different elemental affinities together if I want. A quick question to Wyla confirms that losing any of the elemental affinities would cause them to be listed separately again.

Now onto my Superior perk!

Top of my list is the Aspect of Greenskins. It includes Goblins and all the monsters that they can evolve into, which is quite a few. Despite covering such a wide range though, it still gives a 10% bonus to Aspect of All. Which means that it’s broader than a specific species but not as broad as a generalized type such as beasts.

The reasons holding me back from picking Greenskins are twofold. First, the creatures in question that I already have deployed don’t really need the potency bonus from Aspect of All. I mean it would certainly help them, but they’re doing fine so far without it. Second, there’s a more generalized perk that would apply to them still.

The perk is Aspect of Humanoids, which applies to anything that resembles a human. The term is used in the system to classify the vast majority of two legged sapients simply because of how prevalent humans are in system worlds. The main advantage to picking humanoids over greenskins would be the inclusion of my Spiritkin.

Normally the fact that it helps my Spiritkin ,who have become my favorite dungeon creatures, would be enough for me to pick the perk immediately. However I’m holding back because I could get even more power out of specifically picking Aspect of Spiritkin which counts as a species aspect which would give a whopping 20% bonus to Aspect of All.

Normally species specific bonuses are only supposed to give a 15% bonus to Aspect of all, but the fact that I’m the creator of the Spiritkin gives me an extra buff if I chose to further enhance them. In fact I noticed a lot of Spiritkin specific perks when I looked through my perk lists earlier.

I take much longer deciding on which Aspect to pick than the affinities. In the end I couldn’t overcome my love for my first truly sapient species and decided to add their aspect to the mix.

Superior Perk: Aspect of All

Aspect of All absorbs all other aspect types and brings them under its fold. Superior Perk Points may be used to either add new Aspects or to increase the base bonus of Aspect of All

Base Bonus: 20% to mana potency and experience

Aspect of Beasts: 5% Bonus to Aspect of All

Aspect of Wyrm: 10% Bonus to Aspect of All

Aspect of Spiritkin (*Special): *20% Bonus to Aspect of All

Total Bonus: 55% to mana potency and experience

With my perks selected I release the hold on my attention and spread my awareness back out to all the parts of the dungeon where I’m needed. The only piece of my attention that I maintain as it was is the one speaking with Wyla since I’m still learning more from her. I’m happy to have her as my partner, her explanations are much easier to comprehend than the download-to-brain info dumps given by the system.

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Wyla POV

Several dozen streams of thought converged to form a piece of my ego capable of processing more elaborate thoughts. The sudden increase in levels greatly surprised both myself and my bonded partner, however once determining its source my partner becomes more calm.

I can feel his attention pulled into himself, likely going over his own set of perks. A thought which is only confirmed when he asks for my help with a subject. I pull another hundred smaller streams into a single line capable of conversing with my partner and then move my attention to my own status.

I still haven’t spent any of the perks I had available to me during my conception. With the new perks I’ve gotten from four levels I now have a total of 9 lesser perks and 1 greater perk. Unlike my partner I have no special legendary perk that gives me additional perks at the lower levels.

Now that I’ve gotten to know what my partner is like I’m prepared to actually invest into my perks. I waited because I wanted to select perks that would synergize the best with my partners, or ones that at least didn’t conflict with his.

I’ve noticed my partner specializing heavily into his creatures over other things, likely because the creature bonuses are more significant than other ones. I decided to specialize in plants since my existing ability set already leans that direction.

My ability to connect with all the other plants in the dungeon and give them the benefits of my perks and abilities. Of course I don’t want to share all my abilities with the plants since if everything was benefiting from Impenetrable Bark it would be impossible to use any of the plants.

I open up the dungeon derived portion of my status and examine what perks I have available.

Lesser Perks

Fruit Recovery 3

Plant Potency 2

Spawn Treekin

Enhanced Bark

Enhanced Branches

Enhanced Leaves

Enhanced Roots

Greater Perks

Enhanced Growth 2

Summon Tree Spirit

Nourishing Gifts

Spiteful Sap

I looked through all the perks to see which ones were actually worth taking. Unlike my partner, my perk list was much smaller since I’m being restricted by the system. In addition the fact that I have abilities also alters what perks I can get, leaving me with a rather sparse listing.

As for the perks themselves. I immediately toss out any spawn or summon perks since my partner is perfectly capable of replicating their effects on his own. As for the basic enhancements. . . well they aren’t bad, but they're also not exactly super useful or unique. It’s very possible for me to replicate all of their effects with abilities eventually, I just have to focus on my personal growth more.

Now with all those out of the way let's take a closer look at what’s left. I pull up the descriptions for every perk left that isn’t an upgrade to an existing one.

Greater Perk: Nourishing Gifts

Gives you the ability to imbue different aspects of your anatomy with special beneficial properties.

Unlocks the Positive Modifier Menu

Greater Perk: Spiteful Sap

Gives you the ability to imbue different aspects of your anatomy with special harmful properties

Unlocks the Negative Modifier Menu

Well it’s a shame I can’t have both immediately, but I’ll only have to wait one more level to get whichever one I don’t pick. I’m also disappointed that none of the lesser perks were that useful. I suppose I should just upgrade my existing ones.

I upgrade both Fruit Recovery and Plant Potency to level 6 bringing their bonuses up to a much higher level. I can already feel the tingly burning sensation of my mana quality being forcefully increased.

With that done I also pick out my greater perk. It seems like a tough decision at first, however once I took my partner into account it became much easier. Mark is building a grand adventure as opposed to a massive deathtrap. My ‘role’ in his story is the goddess that has blessed the adventurers, so it only makes sense that I should be able to further bless any adventurers that stand out from the rest. I select Nourishing Gifts and with that my perks are done.

“Wyla, I could use your assistance with this upcoming conversation.” My partners’ voice echoes through our bond

“Conversation? With who?” I query as I gather together my scattering mind and refocus on the area he indicated.

“The Guildmaster of the local Adventurers Guild. I plan on having a discussion with them and I would appreciate your emotional support if nothing else” He responds

A sense of happiness fills my trunk and I assure my partner that I’ll support him. I finish refocusing my attention in time to see two powerful individuals walking into the entrance of the dungeon.