"How many more are there?" Carl asked, throwing the core that had claimed it would become the pirate king into his inventory.

"You could undertake a course of action which—"

"Yeah, yeah," Carl said, giving the axe a tired glare to cut it off before it could again try to get him to do some quest. This guy is so freaking annoying. I just wanna relax a bit and not do anything stressful. "Look, if Ir'alith wants to go do some elf rescue quest and asks me, I'll go since we're friends, but you and me aren't friends, okay? Now let me do my thing."

The axe remained silent, finally giving Carl some peace and quiet.

Quiet, of course, until he pulled out the next core.

"After reviewing your story, I've found you to be in violation of our mature content policy," came the voice of an old lady. "I'm going to have to ban—"

"Wait, what?" Carl asked, feeling even more exhausted at the mere mention of a ban after already putting so much effort into his current idea.

"I'm a moderator, and I'm banning you," the voice said, speaking to him as though he was a small child.

"Is this a joke?" Carl asked.

"No," said the core, "I'm a moderator. I don't make jokes."

Carl rubbed his face with his free hand. "Alright, just for the sake of argument, what part of your policy did I violate?"

"Sexual content cannot be a central component of your work."

Carl frowned. "Huh?"

"Must I repeat myself?"

Is this some kinda verification check for the sex expansion or something? "I think you've got me mixed up with someone else," Carl said, feeling like he needed to defend himself since his friend's father was glaring at him. "I didn't do anything back then, and I didn't even wanna go there. It was—"

"But there was sex happening everywhere around you, wasn't there?" the voice broke in. "And it was central to the events that occurred?"

Carl was deep in thought as he scratched his beard. "No, not really?" he said after some consideration. "I mean, there were a bunch of people being really blatant with their lifestyles, but I pretty much ignored it."

"That's not what I was told," the voice snapped.

"Hold on," Carl said, now growing annoyed. "You were told? So you didn't even see any of this or check for yourself?"

"Well, no," the voice huffed, "of course not. I don't have the time to keep track of everything, and I would never personally look at something so…so filthy!"

"What kind of a mod are you?" Carl asked incredulously. "You don't even do stuff yourself? You just listen to what you hear and then cite some flimsy as heck content policy?"

"It's a comprehensive policy," the core protested.

"Uh-huh," Carl said. "Then why don't you explain the comprehensive way in which I violated it?"

"I don't have to explain myself!" the core shouted. "You are hereby banned!"

Carl considered squeezing the annoying dungeon core and trying to crush it just out of principle, but some instinct deep inside told him that it would be a bad idea to provoke a so-called moderator.

No, he suddenly thought of a much better idea.

"When you say banned," Carl said, feeling the idea begin to coagulate into a plan, "you mean like, moving me somewhere?"

"Of course! I'll—"

"So you're good at, for example, transporting things to places they'll never be seen again?"

"Well, I suppose that's one way of describing—"

"Alright, Seth'tith, I found my core," Carl said as he put the lid on the half-full box before tossing it into his inventory and quietly dismissing the related window.

"WHAAAT?!" the core shrieked.

"Wow, that's pretty loud," Carl said, wincing. He held the core out in front of himself at maximum distance in case it tried to deafen him. "How the heck do I turn this thing on?"

"What?!" the core shrieked at a slightly lower volume. "How crude!"

Carl grimaced. "I meant how do I use you—"

"I am not some thing to be used!" the core screeched.

I thought this would be funny, but I'm starting to worry that it'll get old too fast. "Hey, uh, Seth'tith," he called, "how do I activate a dungeon core?"

"Now you would speak with me?" Seth'tith asked in an icy tone.

Ir'alith, I'm really starting to wish you hadn't left. Everything else in this freaking game is so annoying! "Yeah, Ir'alith said you'd guide me, didn't she?"

The axe sighed deeply, which was a sound Carl hadn't been expecting at this moment. "If I do, will you promise to not set me upside down?" it asked.

"Sure," Carl said, wanting to get a move on this whole dungeoneering thing.

"From what I have been told," Seth'tith said, "you—"

"Banned! Banned! Banned!" the core shouted.

Carl reopened his inventory and threw the core in for a moment. "Sorry, you were saying?"

"By infusing it with any amount of magical energy, the core will become active," Seth'tith said. "But—"

Carl pulled the core back out of his inventory and did his fire magic thing, accidentally focusing too hard and creating a giant pillar of flame that melted a hole pretty far into the ceiling. "Whoops."

Melted rock dripped down, thankfully landing next to his chair and not on it.

"Put me down," the core commanded.

Carl frowned, feeling especially disinclined to do anything the core asked. "Why?"

"A dungeon core must be directly touching the ground for the dungeon to be considered valid," the core said with the feel of a person reciting something from a rulebook.

"What is a dungeon core exactly?" Carl asked, finally posing the question that he'd been wondering since the term had been mentioned. It's gotta be more than just a thing that grows a dungeon, right? Why can it talk?

"A dungeon core is a powerful construct of magic which allows its partner to create a series of rooms or floors with the intent to prevent access to the core itself, which is customarily located at the heart of the dungeon," the core said in a condescending manner. "Everyone knows about dungeon cores," it added.

"What happens if someone reaches the core?" Carl asked.

"If the core is destroyed, then the dungeon and its contents will be sucked into the void soon after," the core said. "Didn't you read the documentation?"

Documentation? What the heck, first we've got backstory and lore and now we're back to needing instruction manuals to play games? What freaking year is it? "What documentation?" he asked, starting to feel tired again.

"I'd tell you, but you're banned," the core said with considerable snark.

"What is this banned?" Seth'tith asked.

"Just ignore that," Carl said, waving his hand. "This thing thinks it's got some kind of special power it can wave around, but it's delusional."

"How troubling," Seth'tith said, sounding pensive.

"I AM NOT DELUSIONAL!" the core shrieked, causing Carl to wince again. "My ability to ban is very real!"

"Why would you choose a core so damaged as this one?" Seth'tith asked.

"I AM NOT DAMAGED!" the core screamed.

"Hold on, let me…" Carl focused really hard on making a ball of water to hold the core in, and a large globe of water appeared in his core-holding hand.

There was a very soft sound, like someone trying to shout through a lot of water, and both Carl and Seth'tith sighed in simultaneous satisfaction.

"Mostly I wanted to annoy it," Carl admitted after a moment, "but also it's good at space magic, which means I can probably do something I've always wanted to try out."

"What is that?" Seth'tith asked.

"Portal puzzles!" Carl said with some amount of excitement, thinking back to a game he'd played years earlier. If this works out, it's gonna be so freaking cool. I'll have to figure out some way to get Bobby over here to play with it when I finish. "Might bring my daughter to try it out if it isn't too bad."

This novel's true home is a different platform. Support the author by finding it there.

"Intriguing," Seth'tith said. "Your daughter would enjoy such things?"

"For sure," Carl said, nodding. I wonder… "Does Ir'alith like puzzles?" Maybe she'd enjoy it too.

The axe was silent for a moment. "No," it said, sounding a little uncomfortable, "she prefers more aggressive means of spending her time, such as sparring or practicing her battle magics. She follows after me in this regard."

Carl was starting to get the picture. So she's kind of a shut-in who just plays games all day, and her dad is too. Yup, I can see why she'd want some time off. Seems like something they should probably talk out at some point. Gah, now it's a little awkward, isn't it. Better… He considered it, then tried to hurl the big ball of water at the wall off the left side of his chair.

The water splashed down next to the chair, soaking the side of it.

"Ah, shoot," Carl said, standing up quickly. "Deposit," he murmured, stowing the chair back into his inventory with the hope that he could find somewhere to dry it off later. A good chair like this probably has to get dried out properly or else it'll get damaged. It's got so much padding in it, and the game's annoyingly realistic about this kinda stuff.

Gotta save these chairs. Too comfortable to waste.

"Don't do that again. Or else," the core threatened.

"I won't do it again if you don't scream anymore," Carl said. "Deal?"

"Don't peddle your smut anywhere near me either," the core said disdainfully.

"C'mon, we've already been over that," Carl said. "Besides, I think I have something you want."

"What could I possibly want from you?"

"People to ban?" Carl said in a teasing tone.

"There's nobody else here," the core said.

Carl decided at that moment to employ a low-level skill from home that he'd retired several years ago once it had become ineffective: Dad's An Accomplice used to have a fifty percent chance of tricking the girls into thinking that doing what he wanted would somehow be a form of parent-sanctioned mischief, but then Annie had revealed that she did not, in fact, hate broccoli and wish they would stop eating it in front of her, and his cover had been blown, rendering the technique useless no matter how flawlessly he executed it.

"But there will be at some point once I start making a dungeon with you," Carl said, "isn't that right, partner?"

The small, black core was silent for a time. "There's really going to be people I can ban?" it asked.

"I promise," Carl said, his tone the same as it had been when he assured a twelve year-old Sammy that Santa was most certainly real despite what her friends were telling her.

"Fine, I'll accept this partnership for now," the core said reluctantly. "But if I catch even a whiff of any sexual content I'm—"

"Whoa, that's not what dungeon creation is about, is it?" Carl said in an incredulous voice. "Seth'tith, have you ever heard of such a thing?" he asked, turning his head away from the core to wink at the axe.

"No," Seth'tith said before going silent once more.

"Alright, but I'm going to be paying very close attention from here on out," the core said, sounding somewhat mollified.

Social engineering really is a skillset that provides a key to any lock. Carl let out a satisfied sigh. "Great! Let's get started then!"

"Put me down first," the core said, sounding slightly less demanding than the last time it had made the request.

"Well," Carl said, drawing out the word. "I would, but then wouldn't you be at the start of the dungeon?"

"No, this would become the heart of the dungeon, and the rest would spread from here," the core said in a Why Don't You Know This Already voice.

The core's insistence at being placed on the ground bugged him. If someone breaks the core, then the dungeon gets destroyed and all my hard work's ruined. And if I put the core down, it's a lot easier to find and break, and even if this is some high level thing, I know there's high-level players since Ir'alith's pretty strong, which means someone might come in and try to grief me by blowing up my dungeon before I can show it to Bobby… He watched the core for a moment. But I know if I ask it for details then it'll probably demand to be put down before it tells me, so… "If the heart of the dungeon starts here," Carl began, "then that would mean I'd be walking around making the dungeon as I go?"

"No," the core said, sounding appalled at the idea, "you'd stay here, and you'd dictate how you want the dungeon to be created, and I'd make the dungeon according to your specif—"

"But then how do I know it's a good dungeon if I'm just standing around telling you where to put stuff?" Carl interrupted.

"By not making a poorly-constructed dungeon?" the core said, again sounding snarky.

"Look, I'm gonna level with you here, I've never made a dungeon before," Carl said. "There's a pretty good chance I'll end up making a bad dungeon, and then it'll be really easy for someone to walk right in and…"

The core was silent, and he let the silence hang in the air for a short while.

"So," Carl continued, "I was thinking maybe I could make a few rooms first and sort of get the hang of it, and then I would absolutely put you down since I wouldn't ever want to do anything that would break the rules and make our dungeon invalid, right?"

The core remained silent for another moment. "Your proposal makes some sense," it said slowly, as though puzzling over his words. "But how do I know you'll put me down like you say? I will not be a party to any rule-breaking."

Carl scratched his beard, "If I don't, then the dungeon is invalid," he reasoned, "which means I can't get any of the benefits of having a dungeon…"

"This is true," the core agreed, "you wouldn't obtain any of the spoils of those who were slain, nor would you retain any fragments of their souls, nor—"

"Yeah, see?" Carl said, not caring about any of whatever that was about. "I want all those things, so I have to put you down soon."

"I suppose," the core said in its skeptical-sounding old lady voice. "But if I feel we've gone too far, then I'll refuse to do anything more until you put me down."

"That seems fair," Carl lied, having clearly seen that this core was easy to manipulate. "How do we get started?"

"First, I must open a path to the surface so that the dungeon can be entered," the core said.

"Hold on," Carl said, staring at the core in disbelief. "You're gonna just open a path right to you immediately?"

"A dungeon core must always be accessible from outside the dungeon once it has formed a partnership," the core recited.

These are the dumbest rules I've ever heard. "How about you let me do a couple rooms first?" Carl tried.

"No, that would be against the rules," the core said with finality.

"But I'm really worried someone might just walk in and smash you with, say, a giant axe," Carl said, coincidentally turning to put the core between him and the axe that Ir'alith's dad was playing as. "We're partners now, right? I can't let you put yourself in danger like that!"

Carl felt like he was really getting into character now, and he was having fun doing it. It was the same as when he'd personally called Paul Harding, the CTO of Fire Entertainment, the previous month using a voice modulator and attempted to acquire the man's mother's maiden name, his father's middle name, the street he'd grown up on, the brand of his first car, the elementary school he'd attended, and then the hospital he'd been born in, rounding out his checklist of personal information. Thankfully, Paul had hung up after only two questions on that occasion, unlike…

Carl focused once more, continuing to not want to think about how annoying his commute home was going to be, or how much this stupid performance analysis project he had agreed to complete was going to be, or…

Carl really focused this time, and he wasn't going to be distracted by anything.

"You… You're really concerned about me?" the core asked.

"You bet I am, partner," Carl said.

"Nobody's ever cared about me," the core moped. "Everyone always just gets mad and upset and sends me hurtful messages, and I'm just trying to follow the rules, and…"

"It's not easy following the rules," Carl said, starting to feel some tiny amount of kinship with the core he'd chosen mostly in order to annoy it, even though he again remembered that this was just an NPC and not a real person, which meant he was only really annoying himself…

Carl frowned.

"It's not!" the core said in vehement agreement. "You really sound like you understand that, too!"

"Yeah, I definitely do," Carl said, feeling like he needed to speed things along before he or his silent, curmudgeonly audience grew tired of it. "What do you think about giving me five—no, three rooms before you open up that hole to the surface, partner?"

"I… I suppose that would be alright," the core said in a cautious voice. "It's not a valid dungeon anyway, so it's not technically breaking the rules."

"I'd never ask you to break the rules, partner," Carl said, laying it on thick. "My name's Carl, by the way."

"I really feel like you wouldn't, Carl," the gullible core said, having been masterfully deceived by Carl's strategy to have a low-key dungeoneering experience without needing to worry about anyone barging in and wrecking the whole thing.

Yeah, this is gonna be pretty cool. Now that I think about it, an actual dungeon probably would've been too much for today. I really just wanna chill out. A puzzle game is always good for that.

"Let's begin," the core said. "I'm currently only able to perform basic restructuring and—"

"And portals?" Carl asked excitedly.

"I can create limited rifts in space which can be connected to other locations within the dungeon, but my current range is limited to perhaps fifteen or twenty of your paces," the core confirmed.

This is gonna be so freaking awesome.

"To begin, we should decide on a horizontal or a vertical layout," the core said. "I prefer horizontal, but—"

"Horizontal is definitely the best," Carl agreed, nodding vigorously.

The core paused for a moment, perhaps in surprise. "Then we will create a dungeon which extends horizontally. The next question we'll need to consider is the design of the rooms."

"I think we're gonna want square, dark gray, stone tiles on the floor and ceiling," Carl said, recalling from memory the environment he wanted to create, "and then we're gonna want some tall, rectangular, off white, stone tiles for the walls."

"This…fits my preferences as well," the core said.

"What of creatures to inhabit the dungeon," Seth'tith asked abruptly. "Such things are necessary for dungeons."

"It's against the rules to have any sentry creatures in a dungeon which isn't considered valid," the core said disapprovingly. "I won't—"

"No, it's okay," Carl said, "he was just asking. We don't need anything else for now."

"Good, because I would not be a party to any rule-breaking," the annoying core said yet again.

"I apologize," Seth'tith said, sounding contrite. "I have no desire to violate your customs."

"That's Seth'tith," Carl said. "He's an axe."

"I can see that," the core said. "You're a very big axe, Seth'tith."

"I forged this axe myself," Seth'tith said with substantial pride in his voice. "It required two decades of painstaking work."

We all know how long those character creators take. Really does feel like decades.

"Do all axes have eyes?" the core asked.

"No, Seth'tith is a special axe," Carl said. "But how about we get back to the dungeon-making. I was thinking we'd start out with a plain room that has no traps or anything."

"No traps?!" Seth'tith exclaimed.

"I don't know, Carl," the core said. "That sounds like you're trying to let everyone complete the dungeon, which is against—"

"Nah, I've got a plan," Carl said, now grinning. "I've got a couple more questions about your portals, but I think what we're gonna do is…"