Moon.
I wake and turn off the sun. I am tired. I'll check my status in the Database, review the Log then go back to sleep.
Beg pardon?
I'm at Exhaustion III. But. When? I'm an S Tier, Rank D dungeon. I was demoted? Promoted. Demoted? I was Rank C. What's this "Tier" thing?
"Check your messages."
What messages? I have no messages. Where do I find messages? I'm trying to dig into the database but I can't focus when I'm flashing like that. Why am I flashing? Doesn't matter, where was I? Messages.
A screen pops up with lines of text split vertically, the left side far smaller than the left. Oh. Letters. Messages! I get it. Sender and message. Who am I in this system? Where's the recipient?
Kimlxik Iteration#0214.
There's forms for everything... Everything. I am not an iteration of a task or some experiment, I am me and my own. Does that mean I was reset two-hundred and fourteen times? I can't even feel angry. This is sick. This. I need to report this. I need this to be checked. I don't want to know but I need to. What have I lost?
There's a comforting warmth trying to slow my thoughts. I will not calm down. I am not angry. No, I'm not livid. Am I livid? I might be livid. This cannot stand. Where do I change my name?
"What would you want your name to be?"
Hope. I am Hope. I want to be Hope. I want to be Protection. I want to be the sword and shield that punishes the wicked when they attack the good. I want to be the rod that breaks the backs of those that would use others for their own gain with intentional ill will. I want to burn those that cause pain for their own sick desires and bleed those that would sit comfortable and laugh while others work themselves to the bone for their benefit. I will meet cruelty with cruelty and kindness with kindness. I wish the burden to be spread among all for the benefit of all not just a few.
"You can go back to sleep now..."
Sleep? I haven't checked the database or the Log. There are things that need to be done. I need to see if the lake is prospering, and the fae pit, and the Alfain may need supplies. And the messages. I need to check on the Alfain. You...
> Hope is Offline. Hope is Online.
Logs registered occurrences on separate lines. Did the core just crash and reset at the same time? And the glow... The core gutters and flickers like a dying candle versus a gentle, slow pulse of brightening and dimming.
"Weeping Lights, what happened to this core?" Zenya's speech translator buzzes, translating their thoughts into sound patterns understood by the listener.
Zenya takes a deep breath, tentacles twitching and their soft tissues shifting colours from blue to indigo. The clawed fingers on their left hand twitch as they hesitate. They'd been assigned to this dungeon as watcher and companion, but creeping darkness is more comforting than looking after a dungeon that's gone mad at least once. Now they realize what the phrasing meant.
Hope's previous companion had been a brilliant Artificer who had attempted to streamline and design the perfect dungeon. What their evaluation didn't show was that Kimlxik didn't consider dungeons truly sentient. How could they be if they could be modified so easily without the need for any special knowledge? Kimlxik tinkered with this dungeon like they had with the little tools and devices they'd constructed. True the dungeon had gone mad "at least once". And no wonder. Each rewrite had corrupted it more and more. The periods of "madness" were it attempting to dump the damage. Then they'd be reset again.
Zenya shudders, their form, hidden by a long purple robe with blue trim and gold piping, moving unnaturally. Zenya's right hand was a mass of writhing tentacles with suckers and barbed ends. Their left hand was similar to a humans except in color and texture, having the same thick, soft, stretchy skin across most of their body.
Their head was atypical for a Mind Breaker, in that they didn't just have a soft sack for a head with large eyes and a mass of barbed tentacles covering a beaked opening. Rather they had a large, long skull that ballooned at the back, their skin only covering their neck, face, and just past their ears before the bone shielding became visible. They had no tentacles on their head Their mouth had no beak but was a bone plate and needle filled orifice meant for crushing and grinding and a rough barbed tongue for flensing.
Zenya's natural coloration was a delicate purple, the color shifting to pink or blue depending on their energy levels and feelings, and right now they were a pale indigo along the thinner areas and a deep blue where their loose skin was thickest. Shifting closer and closer to white and black the more they read the dunegon's information pre-contract.
"Hope" had been "killed" at least ten times under an artificer imp's care as they tried to "perfect" the dungeon creation process and their simulacrum for "automated" dungeon deployment. Zenya finds this tidbit in a footnote. A footnote. This shouldn't be a footnote, this should be the title of the message! "Dungeon murdered 10x by previous companion". No, wait.
A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.
Zenya rereads the message and goes back over the highlighted section of the Log. The Dungeon had gone mad ten times and been reset two hundred and thirteen times with five failed attempts!!! "Hope" was the 214th iteration of the dungeon core's mind. A creeping death and a human paladin with a "cleansing" indoctrination is more appealing at this rate.
How many commands had been issued to "Hope" on this interaction? Zenya checks the Logs, the bowl-sized black orb they used as a translator hovering silently at their left elbow. Zenya inclines their head slightly as the Alfain Alara approaches while requesting initial entries from the Log.
Alara, having been given a light debriefing and a quest by the dungeon keeper entities to help assist another in helping establish an Alfain colony, knows more about the realm than Hope, but not enough to hold fear or prejudice towards Zenya or other Mind Breakers. When Zenya had appeared in the hidden cavern Alara had initially thought they were the physical manifestation of the exhausted core. Zenya, confused by the lack of disgust and the genuinely warm reception gently explained the situation and then attempted to find out more about the dungeon's interactions with the straightforward Alfain.
"Greetings, Alara," Zenya's orb buzzes, Zenya's color evening.
"Hello, Zenya," Alara smiles warmly and her Hearth Maker ability creates a sense of peace and comfort in a 3 meter diameter centered on the Alfain.
Zenya's coloration shifts from white and black to lavender and navy blue. Until they get the first ten interactions between the dungeon and its previous companion on iteration 214.
Alara stiffens, preparing to attempt to drive off the intruder. She can't call for Kralin, there'd be no one to guide the little ones. Zenya's coloration is so bright it hurts to look at and so dark it becomes a void that disrupts one's vision.
> Reset failed.
>
> Reset failed.
>
> Reset failed.
>
> Reset failed.
>
> Reset failed.
>
> Reset failed.
>
> Reset failed.
>
> Reset failed.
>
> Reset failed.
>
> Reset failed.
"What are you doing?" Alara asks calmly while stringing a bow they'd developed with woven, treated plant fibers.
"The dungeon... Hope. Hope's last companion killed her dozens of times before you found her," Zenya's orb buzzes, the sound painful to mind and flesh, as they sway unsteadily, the form under the robe writhing unpleasantly.
Zenya understands Alara's silence as they themself drift unsteadily to the side.
"You were correct, the dungeon is functioning," Zenya is horrified and impressed as they finally process the information in the letter. "It has been fighting to rebuild itself after the other companion broke it again, and again, and again... That's why she breaks when she tries to make this place inhabitable. She should not have the ability to. She should not have survived. She's reaching too far."
"Can she be healed?" Alara stammers. "Can Hope be healed? Of the damage?"
"She needs rest," Zenya sighs.
Zenya's eyes close and they reach out, feeling the cracks and resin like scarring of the core's "mind". Hope's mind appears as a piece of deep blue glass with glowing, golden filled cracks. The unhealed cracks pulse with a black light in tune to Hope's thoughts and feelings. The "pieces" are still mostly in place but there are so many. Zenya fears that whatever is binding them together at the core's core may come undone if they attempt to delve any deeper. Being a Corrupted Mind Breaker makes them less than subtle in touching the minds of others.
Zenya retreats, heading to the Companion Logs to find Kimlxik's companion notes.
> Permissions revoked for Kimlxik.
That's it. Zenya tries to close and reopen the Companion Log but the information doesn't change. There are no Logs.
Nope.
Zenya attempts to file a request for the information through the Companion Logs. Ah. They were here to see if they'd take the job, they hadn't taken it yet. They don't have permission to interfere. But earlier they'd issued a sleep command, hadn't they? Or was the core that broken that it had just collapsed... Wait. That's right. The offline then online thing. The core had had a partial collapse. Fine then. A request that the core be put in stasis until it recovered? A magically induced sleep that could be ended at any time. That might work.
"She's done all of this by herself, without assistance," Alara takes a small step closer. "Maybe with your help she wouldn't push so hard? She said she needed help with the tasks. I ask her for moon or sun, but she usually doesn't respond to any other requests."
"I don't believe I'm qualified for this workload," Zenya says slowly. "There is a staggering amount of progress, yes, but I'm only rated for D rank dungeons and this one is, or until a few days ago was, a Rank C. There's an entire litany of things that it should not have been able to do, but it managed to do them. Somehow. If anything it's rather broken the entire system."
"But that's good, right?" Alara smiles shakily. "She's managed to push beyond her limits and accomplish so much without help. Imagine how far she'd go with help."
"At best she's dying," Zenya cuts in, flinching at the abruptness but the Alfain doesn't seem to understand. "You can literally see the damage. Can't you?"
Zenya observes the Alfain very carefully as Alara's eyes slowly drift to the exposed core before darting away. As a Hearth Maker Alara is a strong empath and she can "see" the pains of others. Being able to identify non-physical wounds helps Hearth Makers keep communities together. Alara is strong enough to see the damage, mayhaps the golden resin like substance was her attempts to heal it, but the damage is too much. Surely she can see that.
"Your heart breaks for us," Alara grins wryly, fine wrinkles visible on her normally smooth face. "We have done our best, Hope, Kralin and I, but it is not enough. We've failed."
"No. You didn't fail," a few spines hidden by Zenya's robes attempt to extend, hitting an enchantment inside the robe and retracting painfully. Zenya flinches and continues. "Apologies but I cannot stay. I will attempt to find more information about this Kimlxik to find out what they've done and if there are any steps that may be taken to undo it, but until that goes through I'm going to suggest you and the others be relocated.
"This is a very nice starter habitat and you've all done very well, but it is not sustainable without a functioning core." Zenya bows to the Alfain as tears slowly slide down the stoic Alfain's cheeks. "Apologies, but I cannot help."
"It's not that hard."
Zenya and Alara flinch, jumping away from the unknown voice as a small, imp with pale, grublike skin rolls its eyes at them, a chunk of memory crystal in its hand.
"I'll prove it then I'll get my blessed certifications back," the creature scowls down at the guttering core in disgust.
"Who are you," Zenya asks dangerously, robes slowly opening as they prepare to expel the intruder from the broken dungeon.
"I'm Kimlxik. This was my dungeon," they roll their eyes. "Until the damn thing went rogue. But look how much it accomplished by itself! No way can anyone contest my methods as being effective."