~~Magenta~~

When Cyan and I finally finish our preliminary construction phase of shaping the first two of what would eventually be eight challenge rooms, I slump to the ground, drained of my energy. I have a little Mana left, but that doesn’t change the fact that building two rooms and the several corridors that link them isn’t an easy task. It is taxing.

I sense the arrival of Kassimir, but I don’t feel up to greeting him. Regardless, Cyan is already taking care of it. I feel another presence nearby, that of Six Whiskers as she sits as close to me as she can get without our bodies overlapping due to my lack of corporeality. Something was found in the body, Capo. The centipede was eaten by your domain, but this was left behind. She holds in her paws a small orb. I instinctively reach out to take it, and the moment I touch it, the orb becomes as non-corporeal as I am, Six’s paws passing through it.

The orb radiates power. An unfamiliar and yet simultaneously familiar power. I get a rush of Mana energy as the dungeon absorbs whatever Kassimir has dropped off, and I know what the orb is. “I need to tell Cyan about this. It… I don’t yet know the implications of this.”

I quickly make my way towards Cyan, reaching him as he’s examining the Compendium. I mention what I discovered earlier about getting a little more detail from the tables, but before he can get too deep into thinking about that, I present the mystery orb. I wait for him to look at it for a few moments before I speak.

“The centipede had a core.”

Cyan blinks, clearly processing. He’s an odd duck, that one. Some things he understands within a moment, other things take a while, and there doesn’t seem to be a pattern. This one takes a couple of moments before he comes back to himself and reaches out to touch the Orb. And then the rambles begin.

“The centipede has a core. That… that can’t be real? The guide said that only sentient creatures have Manacores. Or was it sapient? Whatever it is, ol’ green boxes said that if a thing has a Manacore, it’s either a Sapient creature, or it belongs to a Dungeon. No offense to our dead friend,” he taps on the orb, “but there’s no way a centipede is advanced enough in its awareness of itself to have a Manacore on its own. Which means, ergo, therefore… therefore… it’s a monster.” He spins to point at Six Whiskers, who has slowly followed me to the entrance. “A Monster, like our dear Six here, has a Manacore despite her species not naturally being capable of having one.”

“Exactly what I feared,” I speak softly, kneeling down and leaning up against the stone arch of the doorway, looking out into the meadow. It seems this is our favourite place. We should install a bench. “It means there’s a risk of a much more powerful Dungeon discovering us.”

That same sense of dread fills me, but we are interrupted by the Guide.

It’s not as bad as you think.

“Not as bad? If a strong Dungeon knows we’re here and crushes us before we’ve got our feet under us… so much for that second chance at life,” I scold, poking the screen.

Really! No Dungeon, no matter how primal or stupid, would take out another Dungeon that’s barely cracked into its first floor. What would be the point? Get an extra fraction of Mana? No.

Unless your neighbour is completely mad, they’re going to let you grow in power for a while. There’s a few categories of dungeons, based on their hostility towards other dungeons. Actively hostile neighbours, friendly neighbours, and mind-your-own business neighbours.

My database lists six specific varieties. Kill Squads, Harvesters, Bullies, Cheaters, Isolationists, and Friendlies.

The only one you’d have to worry about at this point is the Kill Squad, but since those spill out and destroy everything, not simply targeting other dungeons, well… Sapients would take care of that for us and send an Adventuring Party in to clear the dungeon and break the Core.

A Harvester will feed you Mana and let you grow until you start attracting a bunch of Adventurers. Then it’ll Harvest. Bullies are self explanatory. They will attack if you’re a threat to them. Cheaters mostly just send scouts to copy your puzzle and trap designs. Isolationists stick to themselves. Friendlies are rare, but they’re willing to trade in resources and information, even make alliances.

I read the information slowly, absorbing it as it sits in front of me.

“Adventurers. They are people who come in here and face our challenges, and in return we get more Mana?” The small box bounced up and down, almost nodding. “So, they are essentially the entire reason we have to design challenges, instead of just hiding our core in a hole and filling it in, and blocking the door so no-one can hurt us?”

If you just hid your core and blocked off the entrance, you’d starve to death. You slowly consume Mana just by existing. You want adventurers. You need puzzles and challenges for them to face. The other option is to make a kill box that just murders people to get their Mana, but I’ve gathered you’re not that sort of Dungeon Core.

“So… which neighbour do you think is the most likely?” Cyan changes the subject.

Harvesters, Cheaters, Bullies, or Isolationists. Best one for you is one of the first three. Harvesters can be dangerous, but I think you have it in you to push back any invasion attempts once they think you’re strong enough to harvest. Cheaters are annoying, since they don’t send in enough to really help you grow, but still attack occasionally. Bullies can be dangerous, since when they do attack in force, it’s a desperate move born from fear of your power, instead of the calculated assaults of the Harvesters, which makes them less predictable and therefore harder to counter.

It still sounds frightening, but I’m comforted by having at least some information. Another question comes to mind, and I lift up the tiny Manacore. “What are we meant to do with this?”

Well, the most common thing to use Manacores for is Research. It allows you to discover new Magic types. That’s likely what you may want to do with this. Another option is to shape the Core into equipment for your Monsters to allow them to perform feats of magic.

“We could fill out the elemental map?” Cyan asks, excitedly shoving my shoulder. I give him a glare, and he calms down. “We only have two elements unlocked. Mana and Light. There are thirteen more, but the Guide wouldn’t tell me how to learn the other ones. Guess this is how.”

“So… we… invest the Manacores that we harvest from enemies in order to discover more varieties of magic?”

If you discover this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the violation.

“Yeah, seems like it. Right?”

That is correct! It’ll take quite a few Manacores of this size to unlock full use of an unknown Element though, so don’t get your hopes up for quick and easy progression.

Also… you haven’t unlocked Research yet.

“In other words, we’re best to store this away until such a time as it is actually useful to us.”

The Guide’s textbox bobbed up and down again.

“Well, that’s annoying.”

Cyan turns away from the conversation, then freezes and stares, eyes wide, at the horizon. “Wow.”

I follow his gaze and immediately understand his reaction. It’s the sunrise. We seem to have survived to see our first dawn.

The meadow lights up with a different ambiance now that the sun is rising. Where before there was soft cricket chirping and warm night sounds, now it becomes a tapestry of light and colour. Butterflies flit around blooming flowers and the buzz of bees fills my ears. The sun, at least, seems similar to that of Earth. It's a bright orange on the horizon but I expect it will develop to a yellow by the time it rises to the apex of its skyward travels.

"I doubt I've seen such a beautiful sight before…"

Cyan doesn't speak, but he nods, eyes wide as he shares my sense of wonder. It's beautiful.

We enjoy the sight for a few moments, basking in the warmth. When I eventually turn to step back into the Dungeon, I notice that we don't have shadows, another reminder of our strange existence. I don’t like it.

The addition of new resources (and the mana they provided upon absorption) helps in pushing me to get working again. We first awoke during the night, and now it is dawn. Not knowing the day-night cycle makes it difficult to know how much time has passed, but I am quite certain it was early night when we first saw the night sky. There are a few things to consider in calculating how long the night might last. What time of year is it? Does this place experience seasons the same way Earth does? Where on the planet are we and how does that affect the relationship between night and day? All told, it could have been three hours or it could have been twelve, although my internal sense of the passage of time tells me it’s closer to six or seven.

Regardless of the passage of time, I have some work to do. No, we have work to do. “Now that we have a little Mana to work with, I suggest we make those challenge rooms functional.”

“Yeah. Looking at the insects and other creepy crawlies we have acces to, I think our best options are ants for an Anthill room, and spiders for a Spiderweb room. You on ants, me on spiders? Or the other way round?” Cyan begins back into the darkness along with me.

It seems darker within the tunnels now that the sun is up and I have seen what an illuminated meadow looks like with my new eyes. I had suspected our vision was altered by our death and rebirth, and this confirms it. We can see clearly in the darkness of night even without the assistance of light sources. Now that the sun is rising, everything around me seems more vibrant and colourful. It is something to consider for later.

“Those options seem reasonable. I can design the anthill room,” I reply with a slight shrug. We walk along the passage until we reach the split in the path.

“Left or right?”

“I’ll take the left passage. After the environmental challenges, we planned for there to be challenges for the body, correct?”

“Yeah. Ants or spiders, then climbing or tightrope, then puzzles. Then the… something or other challenge, then the boss battle. And maybe some mini-fights in-between if Sting and Bruce don’t mind being like… wandering bosses. I think that might be cool. I think whoever we’re putting in the Boss Arena is going to have to be stronger than a mouse. No offense to the mice, but a human could pretty easily defeat them, especially one with a sword. Not the strongest Boss encounter, unless we can super duper beef them up.”

I agree with his sentiment, but I don’t have much in the way of ideas for a solution to the Boss fight issue, so we split up and I travel down to what will be the Anthill. I push the walls out to make the room a little more circular, then begin to play. I think the Compendium senses that I plan to make these ants into critters, because it provides some useful information

Ants

Busy, busy little creatures. Ants have tough exoskeletons and sharp pincers. Most ant species will eat just about anything, but they all need protein and sugar.

Options:

Red Fire - small ants with a stinging bite

Leaf-cutter - fungus-cultivators, they love to garden

Carpenter - these ants nest in wooden structures

Black - large ants that are aphid ranchers

Seeing my options, I believe there really is only one real option in this case. While black ants and leaf-cutter ants could be useful in other situations, and carpenter ants sound fun, the feeling I get from this challenge is a carpet of ants with small areas of safety upon which to walk. The ant that fits that is the red fire ant.

I start with the food. I try to start with the ants, but the interface doesn’t allow me to do so until the environment is at an appropriate level of sustainability for the ants I choose. That means food, so I make them some food.

I dig small holes in the ground where fly nodes will produce a steady source of food for the ants. The compendium doesn’t bother giving me an information page to read about the flies, but I can feel that I can make them sluggish and easy for the ants to catch. I do so, and send Cyan a message suggesting he can do the same for the spider food. They also need a source of sugar. After a little struggle with the interface, I manage to create a little pile of self-replicating sunflour seeds. I’m not sure if it’s enough, but the little ‘ding’ I get from the interface must mean it is sufficient. I check and confirm, finding I am allowed to make the critter spawner now.

That task complete, I add in the spawners for the ants. These take the form of anthills peppering the floor, and a few ants immediately emerge and mill around, heading for the food sources in the room. The ants are a little bigger than I expected, and as I watch over the next few minutes, they cover the floor quite well. Once again, I notice how dark it is in the room. Absolute darkness, although for some reason I can still see my surroundings with detail.

My mind casts back to something Cyan said. Or was it the guide? Regardless. We have magic. We have Light. I cross the room to the exit and concentrate just above the opening that leads further into the tunnels. “Let there be light?”

With a glimmer, Mana concentrates in a small sphere above the door, glowing in a faint, yellowy-orange hue. With a little thought, I make the light flicker. Cyan’s games with roots earlier gets me thinking, and I begin to form a solid door frame out of roots, shaping it to support its own weight. It’s not as good as a proper wooden door, but it is certainly better than a hole in a dirt wall. I’m still confused by how all this dirt is keeping up under its own weight, but chock it up to magic being magic.

I return to the front entrance of the room and do the same, then turn to survey my work. The ants are carpeting the floor, milling about and being nice ambiance, but I can feel that if a centipede like the earlier invader ever made its way in here, it would be devoured quite efficiently. Now, it is time to set the challenge. I’m not sure how I know how to do this, but just like my terror of invaders and my ability to shape the environment around me, I feel this must be something inherent to being a Dungeon Core.

I reach out, and the ants part in front of me, revealing a small patch of the floor just large enough for me to step on. I then outline to the Mana that infuses the critters exactly how this challenge will function.

I step into the patch of clear floor and another is revealed. I follow the path as it is given, eventually reaching the end. This is what all adventurers must do. I turn to walk back to the front, and the ants part to create a full pathway. Perfect. Our visitors must be granted leave to exit. I return to the entrance and mime stepping off the path. The ants aren’t crushed under my intangible foot, but they do freeze and waggle their pincers at me for a moment. I have an idea, and make it come true. The light on the other end of the room brightens into a vibrant green, and I begin to make a mess of the ants, jumping all over the room. They take the test in stride, pretending to die, and the more of them are ‘crushed’, the more the light goes from green to yellow, then to orange, then finally to a deep red. When it is red, the ants begin to gather, following the idea I had laid out for them. Like jungle ants that form rafts to survive floods, they form into a swarm that then lifts itself off the ground on six spindly legs. Mana links them all together into a hive mind, and they are held aloft by its power in the shape of an ant made of smaller ants. The big ant is about the size of a large dog. Not as intimidating as I expected, but it’ll do.

My task complete, I seek out Cyan and the Spiderweb room, curious to see what he has made with his time and Mana.