At my door stood a long line of people, from dwarfs to humans. They wore a variety of armor, from leather to chainmail, and even steel. I counted about sixty, which was wild, the guild had officially lifted the seal!

I was confused though, where was the young master? Wasn’t he and his guards talking about human politics? How did that work out, did it fail? Was that why the public now had access to me?

I mean, this was good, great even. I finally had the opportunity to see how my dungeon would perform with a large group of people within, could it even handle that much? Who knows!

The air was alive with chatter and the overall atmosphere was warm and adventurous, something far more interesting was happening at my door, though. Both Pal and Sero were there, touching and inspecting the stone basin while a mage scribbled furiously in a levitating tome.

“Have you translated it yet, lad?” Pal asked, walking over to the mage who barely glanced at him, too engrossed in his work.

“Lad?” pall asked, frowning as he realized that he was being ignored.

“Huh? Oh!” replied the mage, jerking and looking around, realization dawning on his face. “Sorry, so sorry!” He waved over Pal and Sero, pointing at his book that was more of a mess of scribbles than actual words.

“What’s this gibberish, lad?” Asked pal, frowning as he leaned in closer, hoping to see something he could understand in the mess of ink and paper.

“Oh sorry!” Shouted the mage again, adjusting his green glasses as he began explaining.

“I just expected you to automatically understand but I forgot you two aren’t mages, how careless of me! Anyway, this is old speech, a dead language that I suspect the dungeon is using.”

A frown found itself on both pal’s and Sero’s face, they were probably wondering how I was using a dead language. Ha! But seriously though, old speech? Who knew that words from my previous world were used here as well. Well, not used as it's considered a dead language now but still.

But it made me wonder about this world even more, maybe I’m not the only reincarnated person to grace this world after all?

Anyway, back to the conversation.

“But what exactly does this mean, Lad? Is that a bad thing or…” Asked Pal, lifting his head up to meet the gaze of the mage who was grinning crazily. “Oh no! Not at all!” he replied happily, fanning his hands in a dismissive manner. “It’s actually a good thing! This means that this dungeon is positively ancient! And do you know what that means, sir Pal? It means a chance to grow! A chance to experience true and real growth!”

Pal shifted his gaze elsewhere, a contemplative look replacing his confused facial expression as he considered the words of the mage.

“But it's not ancient!” Interjected Sero, drawing a confused look from the mage. “It’s barely a year old dungeon,” she continued, gesturing to the entrance door. “It might look ancient, but it's anything but! It’s an anomaly, that’s what it is, an anomalous dungeon.”

“B-B-But that simply can’t be!” Replied the mage, shifting his glass as he flipped through the pages of his tome furiously, eventually stopping on a page full of the same nonsense scribbles that he called old speech.

“I’m not saying that you’re wrong, Lady Sero, but the evidence here says otherwise.” Saying so he pointed towards the floating book and with a flick of his hand the words began to rapidly shift into something readable, something that caused Sero to pause.

I didn’t understand shit on the magical page but it made me wonder, the magical translation that automatically translated all that they said wasn’t working here, why was that? If it was something I wrote, why did it change when they rewrote it? Just what was at play here for such a thing to happen?

I didn’t know, and neither did they, which made me even more curious. Would he find out what I meant eventually? Only time will tell I guess! What surprised me the most was how quiet and peaceful everyone was. They just got comfortable, either by setting up a tent or via magical means and waited for Pal, Sero and the mage to finish their work.

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The mages got all fancy, building entire structures out of water, ice and even the wind. Some of the really fancy ones at the back sat relaxed in their steampunk-themed magical carriages while servants tended to them, typical of young masters pretending to be adventurers , that didn’t surprise me.

This was not how I was expecting a large group of typical-looking adventurers to act, I expected them to be loud and unbearable, it was a welcomed surprise. It made me question my habit of making assumptions purely on what I read prior to this life.

Honestly, I was surprised it didn’t land me in a nasty and sticky situation as yet, it was a pretty bad habit. One that I wanted to rid myself of, you’d think that would be easy now that I’m a dungeon core but that wasn’t the case.

It wasn’t something that resided in my mind, but rather my soul. And this was very confusing to me, wasn’t the mind a part of the soul? The answer was resounding probably, things got a bit fuzzy the more questions I asked and explored.

The connection between the soul and the mind was a weird one, it existed while it did not, a pretty paradoxical thing. The same thing went for anything soul related, Leburt was the only monster, well, person. Yeah, he was the only person who I knew that could interact with his soul at all, it seemed automatic for everyone else.

Anyway, I was going off topic again, another thing my mind does automatically as soon as something interesting comes up.

Shifting my attention back to the present I observed the absolutely fascinating conversation that was taking place.

“But that can’t be!” Shouted Sero, waving her hand in a circular motion which caused a strange, slightly metallic and ornate hand-held device to appear within the air, floating just a few inches above her palm.

It was truly strange, it appeared 3D at first glance but to my magical senses it appeared 2D, it was also littered in tiny runes, so tiny that they weren’t even visible to the human eye. In the real world it resembled a simple, slightly metal ball with a golden sheen and some pretty decorations but to my soul essence sight it was anything but that.

In the magical realm it looked like an eye and a nose that constantly sniffed, inhaling that strange unknown magical energy. It was bizarre, and what puzzled me even more was how the strange energy which I suspected was mana distorted and scooted around my soul essence.

How I didn’t notice this before was beyond me, it was interesting though and that made the need for such a device skyrocket.

“This is an advanced mana detector,” Said Sero, pointing towards the strange ball that wasn’t actually a ball. With a flick of her wrist the thing hummed to life and I watched in fascination as the nose got to work. It sniffed then inhaled, pulling in a mix of soul essence and mana in the process.

The ball in the physical plane began to glow a pale and weak white light briefly before going dark. Seeing this the eyes of the mage widened and a look of understanding washed over his features, followed by a concerned expression.

“I see…This is indeed troubling, indeed.” He replied eventually, adjusting his glasses before gazing off into the distance, his face rapidly shifting between concern and unhinged excitement, sometimes it was a combination of both.

Seeing his rapidly shifting face Pal broke out of his contemplation and turned to face him fully before he began speaking.

“What exactly does this mean, lad? Is this bad news or good news?” Asked the dwarf, leaning closer to study the expression of the mage as he contemplated.

Seeing this the man chuckled and adjusted his glasses, a common habit, before clearing his thoughts and voiced his thoughts.

“Both actually, it means that the dungeon is new, in the sense that it throws all uncommon notions held about dungeons out the window. Even after hearing both of your accounts I still found it hard to believe but now the truth has splashed me in the face.” He went silent for a bit, collecting his thoughts before he began speaking again.

“As a mage I take pride in my extensive knowledge of the world and its possibilities and I’m both ashamed and excited to say that this dungeon eludes me, the magic and rules it runs on eludes my sight and understanding.” He paused, looking at my door and adjusting his glasses before continuing.

“This is bad because we’ll be going in essentially blind, and that is never a good thing.” He paused, letting the information sink in. “From what I’ve gathered from you two the first floor is constantly subjected to changes, from minor to major. This wouldn’t be an issue, as dungeons do this all the time. The issue is the manner of these changes, they are calculated, almost as if the dungeon is a very intelligent being.”

Huh? This guy is a sharp one, isn’t he? I’m liking him already.

“That’s what I’ve been trying to tell everyone, lad! They think I’m crazy, even after going inside for themselves!” Pal shouted, his mouth curling up into a happy smile. “I don’t understand how they don’t see it” He continued, pointing at my door frantically.”Look at the door, the talking thing, its crazy strong and organized monsters and even its talking bosses! It’s thinking, and it's very smart too!”

He then pointed towards the writing in the book, “And now this, this dungeon is something else, maybe your advanced mana detector isn’t enough for something so old, because there was no way it did all that in just a few days. All signs point to it being old, very old and cunning.”

Both Sero and the mage went silent after that, Sero looked back at the advanced mana detector and then at my door before she shook her head and willed it away.

I felt bad, but only momentarily, it was just too amusing to see them speculate about me. Their theories were wild and interesting, Sero was the only correct one there, about my age that is. I wasn’t going to correct them though, that would be no fun, and what was life without fun?

Anyway, they eventually agreed that they were burning too much time debating and called over a second mage who specialized in word magic, a thing I didn’t know existed until now. Anyway, the word mage walked in and out of the detection range of the recorder on my door. At first I was confused as to why he was doing this, as he didn’t say anything, he just began doing it but it rapidly became clear why soon.

Using the tome he got from the initial mage, he extended tendrils of mana into it. After that, he made a sphere of mana around him that would latch on to something every time the recorder spoke.

Mana was barely visible to me, so I didn’t know what the heck was going on, nor what it was latching on to. It wasn’t my soul essence or anything detectable to me though, which made this even more alarming.

This continued for a while, the tendrils got thicker and thicker, moving with greater speed and accuracy each minute. I was only aware of this due to how mana interacted with soul essence, using this I deduced that they were searching for something, as for what? I had no clue.

Abruptly the man stopped and pulled back his mana and closed the tome. He grinned and turned to the others before he spoke.

“I’ve grasped the meaning, it’s asking for sacrifices!”