The house was quiet and empty when Nate got home from school. He spent a few minutes finishing the last of the homework he hadn’t completed at school, and then pulled up the dungeon screens. There was nothing he could do at the moment but watch and learn.

The upgraded Dungeon Core was still going around, making subtle modifications everywhere it could. An effort that was continually hampered by two things. The amount of available resources, and the monsters or beasts inside the dungeon at the moment.

The Core seemed to operate under a different set of rules than Nate did when he was controlling everything. Where he could still modify things if there was something inside the dungeon, it couldn’t. On top of that, all the modifications seemed to be three to four times as expensive. At least, that’s what he judged it to be from the constant consumption.

It was nice not having to monitor anything, but it was clear there was a price to be paid. Especially in the beginning. Once all the various tweaks had been made, things would be better, until then things would be expensive.

Nate pulled out his notebook, and navigating through the menu, pulled up the possible locations for the next dungeon. He couldn’t approach the construction of the second Core quite as carefree as he had with the first one. There were a couple of different concerns that he needed to keep in mind this time around.

Now that he could create two of them, he wasn’t as worried about losing everything as he had been. However, he still needed to get the thing built and secured before that worry would fully go away. Which is what he was trying to figure out at the moment.

The goal was to find a place that had a dimensional zone of similar strength to the one he was already working with. The secondary goal was to avoid cultivators strong enough to wreck the place in its early stages.

He double-checked all the listed dimensional zones on his map, making sure to jot down his requirements in his notebook before moving over to his laptop. The internet on this Earth might not have been the best, but it would still be enough to serve his purposes in this case.

For the next several hours, he looked up the available information on each of the dimensional zones. It took a while, but he was gradually able to construct an image of what each area was like. Generally, the information on the dimensional zones was readily available. It was the might of the towns and cities around them that took longer to find.

Still, he managed to get a list of possible locations together just as his stomach began growling at him. He wouldn’t decide on a specific place until he had the actual resources to create a new Dungeon Core and Dungeon around it. That would give him a couple of days to let each location wend its way through his brain naturally.

Any negatives and positives would come to light with time that way. Or at least that was the hope. He might have just been procrastinating the decision.

Downstairs, before he could do more than pull out a frozen dinner, his parents walked in with George and a couple of hot pizza’s in their arms.

“Oh good, you haven’t eaten yet,” Nina said, flashing him a smile.

Niall wearily placed the boxes on the counter and gave his son a hug. “How was school today?”

“It was fine, nothing new or exciting there.” He didn’t feel like getting into the whole Jace mess at the moment. “George, how’s everything going?”

The older man took a moment to look him over before replying with a shake of his head. “Just cleaning house, a little bit at the moment. Everything that has happened recently has highlighted the necessity to clear out the dead and unwilling weight.”

“Are you getting rid of all those healers that refused to help Nate?” Nina asked as she grabbed a few plates for them.

“Not all of them, but the worst performing ones, yes. Unfortunately, some of them have connections or are otherwise decent enough at their job that I can’t find an easy excuse to get rid of them.”

Nate shrugged; it was all under the water for him at this point. His body had been fully healed, and he was back on the path of a cultivator once more. Sure, it would have been nice if they had done their job properly. However, if George hadn’t made an appearance in their lives, then they never would have even known they weren’t.

He wouldn’t go out of his way to enact revenge on them, but that didn’t mean he would help them if they were in trouble and in front of him either. Instead, he would treat them with the same indifference that they had for him and his life. It might be cruel, but that was the way of the world.

It was a fact that he had learned in his past life and in this one. People liked to believe that just because there were no monsters on his Old Earth, it had been more civilized in some way. That was a lie. The monsters simply wore human masks, just as they always had.

People were the worst monsters around. They were capable of the worst atrocities you could think of, and the greatest kindness at the same time.

If you spot this narrative on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

He was no different. He had a code of sorts that he operated by; everyone did. They were the limits that he planned on living his life by.

The problem lay in if people somehow ever found that he was the person behind the dungeons. He doubted they would understand that he didn’t have direct control over what it did and didn’t do. It wouldn’t matter to everyone that the cultivators were trespassing in his space, only that some had died or been injured.

He didn’t see how they would learn that, but it was affecting his ever-developing code.

“If they can do their job, then just let them be. Give them a good talking to and warning, but I don’t think it’s worth weakening your guild.” Nate grabbed a couple of slices of pizza with relish. Despite the lack of certain readily available herbs and seasonings, pizza still managed to mostly taste the same.

George grunted and filled his own plate. “I’ll think about it. People that don’t do their jobs are just dead weight, it’s not just a matter of them being scared to help you. This entire situation goes beyond that. I believe healers need to be above certain concerns and politics. The fact that they aren’t is a problem related to the guild’s authority and power.” He took an angry bite before setting down the plate and carefully removing the mushrooms from the slice of pizza.

The kitchen was silent for a minute as everyone began eating, letting the heavy topic naturally drop.

“How goes the recruiting?” Nate asked his parents as he finished off his second slice.

His dad winced. “Not great. We had a few people lined up, but they all backed out at the last minute. It seems word has gotten around that there was treasure found inside the building that surrounds the portal. Everyone, no matter their cultivation level, is currently obsessed with going out there and trying their hand at the place.”

Nate stilled. “Are they insane? Don’t they know how many of them are going to die trying to do that? Is the city really going to let everyone just go and do what they want?”

“There are a few of us who are being more cautious,” Nina began, setting her plate to the side and resting her head on her arms. “However, the rest are obsessed and are going forth in large expeditions. They want to be the ones to get the treasure before it’s gone.”

Nate screwed up his face in confusion. “What happened to everyone being scared of pissing off whoever created the place?”

“Greed happened,” His father replied simply. “The promise of money or powerful items overrides a lot of the sense those people have.”

He would have to remember that in the future and be more careful in choosing whether to include any treasure chests. It had seemed like a smart choice at the time, but looking back, he could see how monumentally stupid it had been.

The issue was, would people expect the treasure chests to appear in the next dungeon he created as well?

If he didn’t, then in time they might eventually simply move on. The problem lay in what they would do until then. Would they destroy the dungeon before it even had time to grow? Breaking down every wall and even the core in the search for the treasure that wasn’t there.

Just thinking about it was enough to give him a headache.

“Just… promise me you won’t go with them! I don’t care that a group made it through once or twice. It won’t be that easy for everyone else. For whatever reason, they got lucky and now everyone seems to think the place is easy. No one who can create a place like that would make it easy to get through.” Nate pressured his parents, knowing that the next group that entered wouldn’t have it so easy.

The Dungeon Core had only begun to change things and already he could tell everything was more deadly than before.

George chuckled and reached over to ruffle his hair. “Don’t worry, they don’t have any plans of that nature. It’s simply making it more difficult to recruit members for their fledgling company is all.”

Nina nodded. “Your father and I can go out on our own as a two-person team if it comes down to that. However, we would really rather have more people, for obvious reasons. It will mean less money initially, but there is safety in numbers and once the team gets to know each other, then we can start to make more expeditions.”

They spent the rest of dinner discussing the topic, and all things associated with it. Before he left, George examined Nate. He didn’t say anything, except raise his brow questioningly and then leave with a wink.

A little later, Nate was lying on his bed staring at the interface on his wrist computer.

Nathaniel Holmes

Age: 17 years

Realm: Unawakened Mortal (5% Awakened, Backup Core Available)

Core: Grade ??

Strength: 9

Speed: 8

Constitution: 9

Energy: 7.7

Meditative Art: ??

Energy Skills: None

Attack:

Support:

Companion Beast: None

Dungeon Creation - Current limit 2

Dungeon Interface

Dungeon - 1

Avatar

Equip

Don Avatar

Items

Storage

Most of the numbers still meant nothing to him. He had no idea how it was quantifying his strength or speed. That said, he could feel that as his energy increased, so had the other three. Even his awakening percentage had changed, though again, that was another number that he didn’t understand.

Of course, there was also the all-important item as well. The number of dungeons that he could create had increased by one, but he had already known about that change.

He spent another moment taking in the changes, before selecting ‘Don Avatar’ like usual. It was time to perform his nightly ritual and get some practice in while also hopefully getting some useful items and qi energy.

Before he started running through the dungeon, Nate spent a few minutes going through all the movements with his kukri that Anna had taught him the other day. It was a basic practice session that helped to re-familiarize him with the process while slowly instilling the instincts in him. It might not be his proper body, but it still counted and there was a certain amount of crossover between the two.

It was just a matter of drilling in everything to the point where he felt it in his bones.

If there was one thing that he was worried about, it was the matter of reach. Despite the longer than normal kukri blades, they couldn’t compare with a sword or even a spear. Which, of course, meant he would struggle against anything with a reach he couldn’t easily overcome.

People could compensate for deficiencies, but in the end that’s all they were doing, compensating. To truly overcome it, something would need to change. As a cultivator, however, the things that could change were no longer limited to just his weapon or fighting style.

Now, he could become faster, stronger, and more through cultivation.