If painstakingly digging towards a giant cloud of mana, also known as the surface, sounds like fun, then you are totally right… it was a blast. I could have jumped off a bridge for all the fun I was having. Repeating the same task over and over again. My heart was ecstatic from all this laborious and boring work. And like sharks drawn to blood, Voice 1 and 2 capitalized on this time to engage in more of their authoritarian, reverent rhetoric. I had to grow that little crystal tendril haphazardly towards the surface for who knows how long.
But I am almost there. One last push of mana and the surface will become part of my domain. Okay not really, it will be just a little crystal spur just barely breaking above the soil. But it’s a start.
Voice 1: “Yes the start of damnation. Soon the world will be brought to its knees, as the unworthy beg for their lives.”
Ignoring that little imp, not much has changed while tunneling upwards. My mana reserves are almost gone but that was to be expected. My ability to collect mana has increased as I grow. Still haven’t had the time to learn mana control properly or figure out any of my capabilities. And the voices are still trying their hardest to make me go insane.
Voice 2: “You are perfection in every way, you cannot be bound by concepts of sanity or the lack of it. There is no need to worry.”
Voice 1: “All work and no play makes us a dull dungeon. We need to have fun and rip the entrails out of living prey.”
“This is what I am talking about. Has it occurred to either of you that if I go insane we might all die.”
Voice 2: “Divine will shall be enacted.”
(sigh) Anyway, the only thing that has changed outside of my expectations is my mana loss. It has actually been increasing as I expand. It’s not dramatic enough for me to be worried though. Reaching the surface will give me more than enough mana. Thankfully I chose to aim for the surface because if I had just played it safe and grew in the area around me, I would have run out of mana. There wasn’t much to see from the glimpses I saw while digging but the differences in mana concentration made for some pretty colo—
Voice 1: “Stop stalling. Go to the surface already.”
Am I nervous? Yes. Yes, I am. And there is good reason to be. Aside from the whole starving to death thing, staying underground was a least safe. However, that will change. People have a chance of discovering me once I reach the surface. Granted I don’t have any rooms but I don’t have any defenses either. If someone just dug to where my core was, killing me would be simplicity itself. Once I take this step, there is no going back from this. This is a key step in my journ—
Voice 1: “Quit stalling, we have people to disembowel.”
“Alright, alright already. Fine.”
And… here… we go. I sent the last pulse of mana. The spur grew ever so slightly and pushed the last little clump of soil aside. Like a flower sprouting from the earth, it broke the surface looking triumphant and magnificent. Of course this is just how I imagined it.
Without a constant source sense of sight, all there was to see was darkness. But I could feel the mana. Just a tiny fraction of my crystal shell had access to the surface and all the mana present there. Yet all the mana I received from the surrounding rock paled in comparison to the mana I was receiving from the surface. I was almost starting to feel full for the first time since becoming a dungeon. And as if to celebrate this occasion, a flash of light banished the darkness I saw while copious amounts of mana moved to my dungeon core. Although that light quickly vanished, changes could be felt. There was a feeling of alertness that wasn’t there before. Like waking up to a sunrise, I felt refreshed, alive, and most of all hungry.
That feeling of being full disappeared faster than chastity at a frat party. I was a starved wolf that had just been presented its first meal in months. The measly sum of mana I was gathering felt pitiful compared to this new hunger. I wanted more mana, I needed more mana to satisfy this hunger.
eat… Eat… EAT…
No need to think. Just EAT.
Devour all the mana. Take every morsel there is.
FEAST. TAKE THE MANA. EAT EVERY LITTLE SCRAP.
MORE… MORE… MORE…
And at that point I lost myself. I would have been worried if rational thought was actually possible then. It was not. Even the voices faded away to this insatiable appetite. All that remained was instinct. The drive to feed. And it acted. A whirlpool formed, as mana was actively drawn towards the core instead of the passive absorption previously.
My core greedily absorbed greater amounts of mana. If before it was a trickle of mana reaching my core, now it was a raging stream of mana flooding towards me. The crystals grew thicker and more complex as they rapidly expanded outwards. The flesh inside convulsed and twisted, growing with the crystals. Mana was practically being thrown out, given how much my mana loss had increased. It did not matter to this hungry version of me.
If I was losing more mana, than the solution was simply to take in even more mana. And so I did. I engorged myself on mana. And this desire to complete an all you can buffet didn’t seem like it would end. I don’t know how long it continued.
Finally, when I was about three times larger my previous size, that overwhelming hunger was satiated. The whirlpool of mana stopped and my mana absorption became passive again. My clarity of mind slowly returned. Naturally this clarity was complete with a headache that made a hangover caused by absinthe seem a like a comforting friend. As well as several questions including but not limited to: What the fuck just happened? I can absorb mana like that?!? Did anyone notice that I just went on a mana rampage there? I can get the voices to SHUT UP?!?!? These were all very important questions and demanded immediate answers. But it didn’t seem like I was going to get concrete answers anytime soon.
Help support creative writers by finding and reading their stories on the original site.
As far as I can tell, I just went through the equivalent of a growth spurt for a dungeon. My core is not only larger but it feels more complete now. My mind before seems fragmented and slow compared to my mind now. My thoughts are now sharp and distinct in a way I wouldn’t notice before. And my body also changed as well.
Mana is circulating around my flesh at much faster rate. My flesh isn’t just one conjoined mass of flesh, now there are little clusters of separate from the main cluster. From now on I can’t just say fleshy part as there is a need for distinction between the clusters. Since the main cluster of flesh seems the most like a heart I am just going to call it my dungeon heart now. As for the little packets of flesh, I can just call those guys dungeon… muscles.
Voice 2: “Please do not destroy our dignity by using such an awful name.”
Yes, I know it’s a bad name but I don’t know what to call those things yet. My crystals have also changed, the filaments are even more complex and mana is being absorbed slightly faster. Most notably there are actually tiny holes in the crystal shell leading straight to my dungeon heart. There aren’t many but one crack does lead straight to the surface.
So not only did I announce myself to the world by snatching as much mana as possible like a crack addict I also have a tunnel—albeit a very small one—leading straight to my core. Obviously the powers that be just want to kill me.
However as of yet, there haven’t been any intruders so I can enjoy some peace as I contemplate my inevitable demise.
Voice 1: “Only the demise of the unworthy is inevitable.”
And as if to fulfill this prophesy, I felt intruders quickly scurry across the crystal filament on the surface.
Voice 1: “Enemies to conquer! Onwards to war!”
I did not want fight a war with these creatures. The speed at which they moved was frightening. They moved faster than lightning. These things would probably kill Bruce Lee before he could even react. The instant I could feel the presence of one it had already disappeared from my senses. They were ghosts blurring in and out of my perception. By the time I noticed one of the creatures enter the tiny hole in the filament, it had already reached my dungeon heart. For a brief instant, it paused once it reached the end of the crystal tunnel.
This it. Goodbye cruel world. You never gave me a chance.
However instead of killing me though the creature simply flickered back up to the surface. After that a few other creatures flickered in and out of the tunnel. Since I wasn’t dead I naturally grew curious. As I had the mana to spare now I sent a small pulse of mana to surface to see what the creatures looked like. Mana rippled to the surface with trace amounts reflecting back to me. The creatures didn’t seem disturbed by my mana radar so that’s a plus.
Since it wasn’t a high powered pulse of mana the image my mind formed lacked details but I was able to see enough. Six legs with three body appendages and two raised, thin limbs on the front appendage. Also seems to have an exoskeleton shell. So it’s probably an insect. If it quacks like a duck and looks like a duck, then it’s a duck. Just to be sure I sent another pulse of mana and got back the same results. Yeah… that “creature” seems to be an ant. A fucking ant.
I was fearing that my end was nigh over a few ants. As a previous human that’s a low point.
But hey at least I have an answer about my size. Unless ants are much larger wherever here is, I am actually smaller than I thought. The crystal spur touching the surface is only about 4 meters in length and my dungeon core is thirty centimeters in diameter.
Of course now there is a different question. Why are the ants moving so fast? And there were only two answers: One, these ants are just really fast, this is a magical world accept it. Two, these ants aren’t actually fast, I just perceive things very slowly. Since I know more about ants then I do about dungeons and there has been no way to keep track of time, I am more inclined to believe the second answer.
So that means my perception of time is probably much slower than when I was human. I don’t know how much time has passed since I became a dungeon but it’s likely on the long side. Okay I will admit that is very worrying since my family could be getting worried sick looking for me, however now is not the time to focus on that. I need to survive and grow before I can figure what has happened to me.
And now that I am not in critical danger of starving to death, I need to understand myself and what I can do. If the recent my recent mana binge taught me anything it’s that I don’t understand myself. If someone noticed all the mana being sucked up and found me that would have been the end. I need to learn. I need to learn how to control mana, create minions, and so much more if I want to survive. And my small size coupled with my steady supply of mana, I probably won’t be in danger for a little while. So I can actually spend some time to actually learn.
----------------------------------------
Apologies for the very late chapter, my typing schedule was disrupted yet again. I hope you all enjoyed the chapter, leave comments, questions and criticisms if you so desire. Next chapter will be out tomorrow if nothing goes wrong.