When we reached the dungeon maple lane had gotten busier, but the dungeon traffic was virtually nonexistent. Me, Jake, and Wiggles stepper toward the foggy white doorway together. As we reached the doorway I got my first look into the dungeon, and the white made more sense. The dungeon entrance led out on the trunk of another giant maple, and a massive root formed a gentle slope down. The dungeon maple was nearly identical to the one outside but with one key difference, its roots stretched above ground thousands of feet. The roots only stopped when they reached the foggy white expanse that surrounded trees somewhere around a mile out. The dungeon had looked white because all I had seen was the fog wall. The sheer size of the place left me reeling, and this was only the first of three layers. Jake nudged me and I stepped into the dungeon, and as If I had passed an invisible wall the sounds outside faded away and the sound of quiet skittering filled the air, punctuated by the occasional sound of a person fighting a monster. I could see some people walking around, but I didn’t see any of the beetles I heard.
“Where are the beetles, I can hear them, but I can’t see any?”
“Yeah, they’re everywhere, they just blend in. Look over there.” Jake pointed at a person a hundred or so feet away, swinging a sword at… a brown lump. Jake handed me a pair of binoculars from his backpack, and I looked to see the lump was a backpack sized beetle, its exoskeleton mottles to blend in with the bark. Looking around again I noticed more lumps slowly crawling along the ground, many of them in loose groups, once I knew what to look for I realized they were all over the place. I handed back the binoculars.
“Oh, thats a lot of beetles”
“Yeah, fortunately their camouflage works best at a distance and from above, when you’re on the roots it’ll be much easier to spot them.”
The three of us stepped away from the entrance, and I continued to take in the dungeon. The canopy was just as impressive as the one outside, and I could make samaras and people harvesting them. I saw a shape dart and my eyes moved to track it. It was black and yellow, and I realized that it could only be a giant wasp (or bee I suppose). Maybe I’ll avoid the canopy for now. Wiggles looked around at the dungeon excitedly, and Jake had to grab her so she didn’t bolt off.
“Not yet Wiggles, can’t have you running around without me, you’ll scare the newbies.” Wiggles gave the puppy dog eyes but Jake held firm.
Looking back down from the canopy something out of place caught my eye. Wrapped entirely in massive roots only the front of the gazebo sized (and shaped) building was visible. It was made of smooth white stone, and only three sides of it were visible. The side facing me had a smooth black door, to the right of the door was a red stained glass window, and on the other side a purple one. Jake noticed my gaze.
“That’s the Primordial shrine, where you make your avatar. Do you want to go there now or fight some monsters first?” I wanted to say go to the shrine, but I had only sparred against air and a dummy so far. Maybe it was better to get to know what actually fighting a beetle was like?
“Uh, maybe fight a beetle? They're pretty small so they should be pretty easy to take care of, right?” I asked uncertainty.
“Yeah, These guys are pretty weak, they’re called root beetles. There are other kinds of beetles that are stronger pound for pound, but they don’t appear until the second layer. Don’t let your guard down though, they can still hurt you pretty bad if you let them.” With that we started walking down a root. I was a bit reassured, but the last thing Jake said lingered a bit in my headI paused as I had a thought, did I ask, or just stay quiet? At that moment I heard Tom’s voice in my head: Rule 24 if you don’t know, don’t hesitate to ask.
“Where do the beetles come from anyways? Is there like, a broodmother, or…” That got a chuckle out of Jake
“Oh, no, monsters periodically crawl out of small white tears scattered around the dungeon in monster dens.”
“Alright, I was worried for a moment.” the root we were on forked, with the end we followed growing into the ground leaving me and Jake on the dirt floor with the massive roots on either side. Jake grabbed my attention.
“We're in luck, look over there.” He pointed out a lone beetle skittering along the ground, its carapace failing to disguise it from here. The beetle was moving our way, but it would be a while before it reached us, so Jake started talking.
This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.
“Beetles always spawn in groups of ten, but usually the ones by the tree get picked off by wasps, leaving behind smaller groups that are much easier for a beginner to face. This one looks like it lost its entire group.” After asking the first question the next one was much easier to ask.
“Monsters eat each other?”
“Yeah, they generally don’t touch their own kind, but different monsters hunt each other. They grow if they kill enough monsters, but if they grow enough smaller prey loses its allure and they have to go to a deeper layer. It's why monsters don’t leave the dungeon.”
'Monsters can leave the dungeon?”
“Yeah, but they never do it on purpose, I think they can’t sense outside of the door, kinda like how it blocks out sound.” That was really interesting, but before I could ask a follow up question I noticed the beetle was almost here, time to get ready. I pulled my warhammer out of the little belt it came with, and with some effort got my shield off my back and strapped to my arm. I expected the beetle to look scary or disgusting up close but honestly it was neither, it was almost cute. Its body was made of two bulky sections, and it was covered in a thin layer of fuzz. As the front it had beady eyes and short mandibles. Did I really want to kill it?
While I was debating if I should really attack it reached me and tried to bite my ankle. I yelped, stumbling back, and I swung my warhammer into its carapace on reflex. The strike was a bit off center but the vibrations weren't too bad, and it was still effective. My strike drove the beetle into the ground with a large crack in its carapace but it was still alive. Another swing made it stop moving. Its shell had a gaping hole full of a greenish ooze. I felt a bit sick at the sight. After a moment of silence Jake spoke up
“We really are lucky today, the beetle didn’t vanish, that means it has a shard. Put your hand against the shell to get the shard.” I placed my hand on a patch of unbroken carapace, and to my surprise my hand sank in slightly and I felt something thin and glassy. I pulled a glowing silvery gray shard out of the beetle, and after a moment the beetle began to slowly evaporate into a lifeless gray smoke. In just a moment there was nothing left of the beetle but the shard in my hand. It was the first one I had seen up close. It was shaped roughly like a pyramid, on one side it was perfectly smooth and slightly curved, its other three sides straight and slightly jagged. The shard seemed like it should be more special, but if it weren't for the glow I could mistake it for a chunk of glass. The shard couldn’t distract me from how I felt for long however.
“That was horrible, how do you do this” I asked Jake, and he nodded.
“Yeah. for me it helps to keep it in perspective, humans kill animals all the time, and this is no different, we're just doing it for a different product than meat or skin.” Jake’s voice was a bit more somber than usual. I nodded but my heart wasn’t in it, and Jake looked like he knew I wasn’t convinced.
“If it helps monsters don’t know much but violence. It didn’t hesitate to attack you, and other monsters wouldn’t hesitate to kill it.” That point hit a bit deeper, but I still felt a bit crappy, why did it have to be cute?
“You know you don’t have to fight monsters to level your avatar. You could just buy shards, and gaining sync doesn’t need combat.”
“Can I get to the second layer without fighting?”
“Uhh, not really, but I have a few days off every week. If you give it a few months I’ll probably get more time off, we'll still have plenty of time to hang out.” He made a good point, and I considered it for a moment, but no, I didn’t want to be alone, and Jake was all I had. I felt my resolve strengthen, and my negative feelings were buried for now. Now that I wasn’t distracted I noticed my pants leg had a cut in it where the beetle had nearly took a bite out of my leg
“wow, I barely avoided that didn't I”
“Sorry, I didn't expect you to just stand there, that's on me. On the bright side you have good instincts, if you hadn't avoided that it would have hurt quite a bit, even a tier one root beetle can get an inch or more in with a bite." I started to feel a bit overwhelmed, this was the smallest weakest thing here, and it had still nearly got me, could I really do this. You aren't going to be this week next time, I reassured myself, next time you'll have an avatar. Speaking of.
“So what type of shard is this?”
“You recovered fast, it looks like it's a… armor aspect.” Jake said, and I realized I had no idea how origin shards worked.
“So it can make armor?”
“Yeah, pretty much.”
“Alright, and how did you know the aspect? Was it the color or something else?”
“Well for me it was just experience, but you can feel the attunement if you concentrate on the shard.” That was very vague, I tried to concentrate and to my surprise I felt it. The shard felt solid and unbreakable, and I saw a vision in my mind. A car sized beetle facing a knight in a field. I watched as the knight's sword crashed into the beetle, but when he raised it there wasn’t even a scratch. The beetle lunged at the knight with a devastating crunch, but its mandibles were caught in place by the knights own armor, like a metal carapace. I came back to reality a moment later, but it had felt longer than that.
“Woah.” I said quietly and Jake smiled.
“Yeah, it's pretty trippy. You make your avatar out of that, you can see why it's hard to explain.” I nodded, yeah, that did sound hard to explain, I had trouble wrapping my head around the idea of it.
“So, are you ready to start your avatar?” Jake asked, and I nodded.
“Yeah, that sounds good.”