The domain of darkness slowly faded as Viv’s blood dripped on the ground. He proudly stood with his head held up even as the hero’s sword was draining away his life. Unfortunately for the hero, there wasn’t even a single piece of him left.
“Such a shame, my beautiful throne room is destroyed,” he said, looking at what he had done. The soul crystal throne and the magirock furniture were cut into a million tiny pieces as a result of his domain, but that was the price of victory. The hero they sent was the strongest one yet. Kill one, and another one, much stronger, will come a year later.
“My lord, you’re injured!” six figures rushed back into the throne room. The six strongest and most loyal commanders still weren’t strong enough to join Viv in his domain, and thus they could do nothing but watch. He didn’t fault them for that, after all, they were such pitiful creatures. Even now, his heart hurt every time he thought about what they had to live through.
“Lilac, I leave you in charge of everything. I trust you.” His words echoed through the destroyed room. In the final minutes of his life, he stood tall with full conviction that today wasn’t the day of his death.
“I am the Demon Lord of Shattered Sky, Ruler of Ruined Lightning, I will not die so easily. My life string still holds strong. Even if my body were to die, I promise you, I will be back. Do not mourn me, but continue to build up our strength. One day, we will eradicate humanity.”
But alas, his body didn’t agree with his soul. His magnificent black wings retracted, and his horns stopped shining, cracked from the fight before. The cursed script on his left arm faded, and the spear of black lightning in his hands stopped crackling. His long, black hair was dishevelled, preventing him from seeing his companion’s crying faces.
Perhaps it was due to his strong conviction, or perhaps it simply was not his time to die yet, but his consciousness remained even after his soul left his body. It started whizzing around like a trapped fly before completely stopping. Then, it shot forward like an arrow, passing through buildings, trees, and people. It was too fast for Viv to enjoy the sight, and frankly, he felt sick like never before. But then again, he thought his soul was going to descend straight down to hell, so anything was better than that.
His journey came to an abrupt end when his soul arrived at a small, hidden cave. The entrance was obscured by shrubbery, a thick forest between it and any civilization. The actual cave was dark and damp, barely illuminated by fluorescent moss. There stood a raised pedestal with a perfectly round orb, inside of which were swirling milky clouds. His soul was much bigger and more powerful than this orb, but it was irresistible to his soul, he simply had to see what was inside of it.
What followed after was agonising pain as his soul folded into itself. His entire being was being squeezed to fit into the orb, but he was the Demon Lord, and he had experienced pain much worse than this. Still, it felt like he had both lost and gained something very important as his soul condensed and become a small blob.
“I’m alive! What the hell happened to me?” The journey from before felt hazy and blurry, as if in a dream. He couldn’t properly remember most of what happened, but once he woke up, he found himself in an empty, damp cave.
Initialising dungeon protocol #13.
Error.
Error.
Soul already found.
Soul found - no intelligence.
Assigning mindless fairy.
The messages that appeared in the air were strange, but what pissed off Viv was the damn thing saying that he had no intelligence. He would evaporate this damn message if he was back in his original body.
Generating Name.
Name already found.
Welcome, Viv Atelair.
“Hello, I am your helpful dungeon helper. This automated magical process is meant to help an unintelligent soul create the first floor of its dungeon. By the end of the questline, your intelligence will be fully awakened, and a more advanced dungeon fairy will be assigned.”
A small, green fairy appeared in the air following the message of his name. In Viv’s eyes, it was like an invisible hand had grabbed the air and twisted it, creating a magical construct in the process. This thing was similar to golems humans would often create, a thing with no real intelligence of its own.
“Now, let’s start. Please think about ‘Dungeon Management’ in your mind and open up the following interface.”
The fairy didn’t speak, but instead - it directly transmitted thoughts to his soul. After it finished “talking”, Viv felt something gently touch his soul, guiding him to think about “Dungeon Management”.
Of course, Viv simply brushed off the mental interference. No one would control him, he would rather explode his soul before that happened. But, seeing that absolutely nothing else happened after ten minutes of waiting, he decided to try it out.
[Expansion] [Creatures] [Spells] [Traps] [Buildings]
Mana - 0
Mana Regeneration - 1 / day
Currently, only expansion was available for him, but something more pressing drew his attention. As soon as these options appeared in front of him, he felt his soul connecting to something much greater than him. A soul so large even an ancient dragon he had seen before paled in comparison. If his soul could have cold sweat running down its back, it would. Whatever it was, it was powerful.
Title gained - [Demon Lord of Shattered Sky]
+100000% Mana Regeneration.
+1000% Demonic Creature Strength.
+1000% Demonic Spell Effectiveness.
[Create Lesser Demon] Menu can be accessed.
[Morph Greater Demon] Menu can be accessed.
Spell Access - [Doom], [Spear of Black Lightning], [Command - Death].
Innate Ability Access - [Eyes of String], [Bend String], [Snap String], [Domain - World of String]
[God S
Suddenly, the black text that had appeared shattered into a thousand pieces, golden lightning turning it to ash. Only a few pieces were left unharmed, reassembling themselves moments later.
[Shadow of Former Glory]
+100% Mana Regeneration.
+100% Demonic Creature Strength.
+100% Demonic Spell Effectiveness.
[Title Forge] Menu can be accessed.
“How dare they! Just you wait, as long as you have a soul, you can be killed. I will repay this insult a hundredfold.”
Despite Viv’s anger, he still noticed that his orb was absorbing mana twice as fast. The interface accurately represented it as him receiving two mana per day, though more experiments would have to be made to determine how big one unit of mana truly was.
“Now that you’ve learned how to access your interface, we can get started on properly managing a dungeon.”
Quest Received
The dungeon fairy started to explain how to access quests, but Viv was one step ahead of it. The interface was made for nearly mindless creatures - simply thinking about what you wanted to access would bring it up, and Viv was quite far from a mindless, newborn dungeon.
Main Quest 01
The first step to building a dungeon is making rooms. The expansion tool allows you to convert mana into space. Each unit of mana can excavate a 2x2x2 metre space.
Support the author by searching for the original publication of this novel.
Clear out a 2x2x2 metre area.
Progress - 0/2
Reward - [Creatures] Menu, Goblin (D), 5 mana.
“Huh, this is really intriguing. Who would make such a thing?” Viv wondered to himself as he thought about the expansion menu.
Instantly, he felt his mana sight sharpen. He got used to it quickly when his soul went into the orb, but now, he was reminded again that he didn’t have any eyes, but was instead perceiving everything through mana. It would’ve been disorienting for humans or other creatures, but he was used to perceiving the world in a myriad of different ways, and, after all, he was the Demon Lord.
He directed his attention to the wall, and soon after, the wall started disintegrating. “Reminds me of the disintegrate spell, but much slower and more mana effective,” he thought to himself as he continued to disintegrate the room.
“Once again, who would make such a thing? The runes on the orb that allow this to happen are advanced enough to cast a tier 9 spell, but instead, they are used for this. It feels so... wasteful.”
Now that he thought about it, he never really gave much attention to dungeons. For him, they existed to give his subordinates some training, but who created them? To what purpose were they created?”
Soon enough, another room was created. He cleared out the space in front of him that was closest to the entrance. If anything came through, they would first have to deal with the room full of monsters. Or so he hoped. His mana sight couldn’t extend outside the dungeon after all.
Main Quest 01 Complete
Reward - [Creatures] Menu, Goblin (D), 5 mana.
The quest completion was accompanied by a harmonious ding and a pleasant feeling in his core. A trick to fool other dungeons, no doubt, but Viv wasn’t going to fall for simple pleasures.
The feeling was accompanied by more and more mana gushing from the cave into his core. “If the runes can simply absorb more mana so fast, why am I limited to two mana per day? Infuriating. Just as infuriating as them doubting my intelligence and denying my rightful title.”
“Congratulations, you’re one step closer to becoming a proper dungeon! Now, we will move on to creature summoning. You’ve received your first monster - a goblin. These monsters are rightful protectors of your dungeon and will attack anyone that intrudes. Let’s try summoning a few.“
Quest Received.
Main Quest 02
Creature summoning is the most important part of any dungeon. Gaining access to various monsters is key to a strong dungeon.
Summon 5 goblins.
Progress - 0/5
Reward - [Spell] Menu, Fire Bolt(tier 1), 25 mana.
“Weak, filthy creatures. My aura alone would be enough to kill every single one of them.”
If he could sigh, he would. Alas, he had no mouth. In reality, Viv was a bit interested in the goblins. Would they be teleported over here? Or would they simply be created? With the amount of magic involved, he wouldn’t be surprised at both outcomes.
[Creatures]
Goblin (D) 5 MP
Nothing was required from him to summon the goblin, except mana. He chose the general area where to summon it - the area being the 5x5 room, and imagined summoning it. The process was unimpressive looking at it from the outside, but to Viv, it was magical.
Although he couldn’t quite see it, he was sure a goblin soul was coming out of his orb. It travelled to where he had decided to summon it. Then, mana quickly drained out of his core, powering another rune. A few seconds later, a blinding light erupted from where the soul was, and a few more seconds later, there was now a goblin.
Despite the grand magic used to create it, the goblin was uninspiring. It was around 130 cm tall and extremely scrawny, its ribs poking out from malnourishment. The most striking thing about it was its green skin and how hideous it looked. It had a malformed face, dry lips and wicked sharp teeth. Its nails were just as sharp - used for both combat and scavenging. All in all, goblins were one of the worst looking humanoid creatures, and that was a lot coming from a demon.
“Can you hear me, goblin?” Viv tried projecting his voice to the creature and was shocked when it actually responded.
“Yep,” it said in goblin tongue.
Instinctively, Viv knew almost everything about this creature. This particular goblin was a male, and, apparently, it didn’t have a name. When he started to think about it harder, an interface popped up.
Goblin (D)
Weak creature - best fights in packs. Knows how to use basic traps
Abilities - None
“Strange. Goblin, tell me your name or you shall know the flames of hell.”
“Don’t know.”
“Do you know where we are?”
“Nope.”
“Do you remember anything?”
“Nope.”
“Give me one reason I should keep you alive, you pathetic creature.”
“Don’t know. You create me.” He picked his nose with his pinky and tossed the snot on the cave floor.
If Viv could, he would make the creature suffer, but there was no option to destroy the goblin after he was summoned. Besides, he needed to summon five of them.
“Actually, that gives me a good idea. You said I created you, so that makes me your master. There’s no way a dungeon would summon insubordinate monsters. Goblin, go smash your head against the wall.”
The goblin, as unwilling as he was, followed Viv’s orders. It ran straight towards the wall and didn’t stop when it reached the wall. A loud thud resonated through the cave, the small body coming to a sudden stop and falling face up on the ground.
“Kahahahaha. I’ve missed being petty. But then again, I suppose I had my hands full with eradicating humanity. Now then goblin, I’ve got to wait for ten more days to do the quest. I’ve got just the thing planned for you.”
And then came the goblin's personal hell. Of course, Viv wouldn’t make his creatures weaker, but there were other ways of torture. Every day, the goblin would run laps in the cave until it collapsed. When it woke back up, it would have to do hundreds of squats, push-ups and sit-ups...
“Master. Evil. Cruel. Agh,” the goblin said on the second day, which promptly earned it double the number of push-ups.
After two days, the goblin thought it couldn’t possibly get worse. But it did. On the third day, from the middle of the room emerged another goblin. He was still young, he didn’t know what a cruel master they had.
“Master. Serve.” The second goblin said, more obedient than the last one.
“Listen up. From this day onwards, you will all spar after your training. Lethal injuries are not allowed. Whoever loses the spar will get intensified training the next day.”
The third day went great for the first goblin. He was more used to training compared to his younger brother. When the sparring began, he didn’t hesitate. He knew his master was serious, and whoever lost today would continue losing due to having less energy.
The first goblin punched, tackled and wrestled with all that he had. The second one only looked with betrayal in his eyes all while getting pummelled.
After that, it was on. Every night, training would become more intense as neither party wanted to lose. It was personal now, a matter of pride and dignity. Of course, the second goblin couldn’t win, it didn’t have the two days of physical training that the other one had.
Life was looking great for the first goblin. That is until day five - the day their third brother arrived. He was notably weaker than both of the other goblins, and by the time they needed to spar, he was utterly exhausted. Both of them ignored their third brother as they started sparring, and that was their first mistake.
The third brother lifted a stone above his head and swung down. The next moment, the first goblin was down on the ground, unconscious and slightly bleeding. The second brother fought back tooth and nail, but the third brother threw pebbles at his eyes. Moments later, another goblin was down on the ground. He stood victorious over his brothers, having proved himself the strongest.
The next day, he got triple the training. The next time they fought, both of them targeted him first. Still, he proved himself to be the most intelligent of the bunch, he gained Viv’s attention, even if it was brief.
The days passed by incredibly quickly for the brothers. The fourth brother was a savage who fought by ripping and shredding, using both his teeth and his claws. Despite the torture, everyone got used to physical labour and fighting, and some of them even started to enjoy this hellish training.
As for Viv, the days he spent waiting for mana were boring. It was mildly interesting to watch how the goblins fought, but there was only so much entertainment to be gotten from that. Instead, he spent most of his time thinking about his companions and the world outside. He decided on something - he had to get out of here somehow, or at least, send a message to Nex, the land of the demons.
He needed a body to travel with, but he was anchored to the dungeon. Neither his mana sight nor his goblins could leave the dungeon. Either he had to cast some magic - and it was quite unlikely that it would make it through the supposed barrier - or he had to find someone else to find a message.
“Perhaps a curse on some human, but no, he would die before he got far into Elythria. A greater demon would work, I just need to corrupt someone on the brink of death. In either case, there needs to be some activity. So far, the dungeon hasn’t been visited at all,” he mentally sighed.
So he spent his time - digging up old, weak spells he could use. The reality was that he was simply too weak, he couldn’t even cast a single spell. He had even tried a human cantrip, a weak light, but he couldn’t manage to move the mana in the air.
On the tenth day, something interesting happened. Before he summoned the fifth goblin, a small rabbit wandered into the cave. It was bleeding, most likely injured by some bigger beast. In a flash, the four goblins swarmed the rabbit, but Viv ordered them to not attack it.
“Hold your hand. Maybe I can use this rabbit to send a message.” Unfortunately for Viv, the rabbit was far too injured for the stupid goblins to save it. Teaching goblins first aid was much tougher than he imagined.
The moment it died, he got a notification.
Detected beast - Rabbit (D). Withholding summoning until the completion of the first floor.
The dungeon kept surprising Viv with its various functions. Perhaps one day he could have someone drag a dragon here and use its soul to summon one loyal to him. His imagination was once again ignited, and various methods of how to utilise this for war began to pop into his head.
“Perhaps this is a blessing rather than a curse. I once thought I was one of the strongest creatures on this planet, but perhaps I can become even stronger.”