Year 52, Month 11, Day 2
I really need to stop waking up like this. My mind gets clouded and I feel so groggy for days after waking up. It’s been about a month since I started to receive consciousness again but until recently my skills were still locked. On the bright side, it seems I’m no longer in the dungeon. When I woke up, I got a notification that I received a title, “Dungeon Survivor.”
I can see a bit of my new surroundings based on my Mana Sight, there are dozens of mana sources lighting up around me. Mostly green and purple, though there is a large source of black mana blocking my vision of anything beyond it.
I'm curious what the colors indicate. I would imagine the colors would indicate a type or source of magic, but I don't have enough evidence to be sure what each means. Green seems to be necromancy or undeath magic based on the skeletons and the lich, but the lich also had the purple mana. Maybe that would be some kind of evil mana, speaking based on tropes, but I need more evidence. Yellow seemed associated with adventurers or heroes but that could indicate a lot of different things. I'll just need to observe more sources until I know enough to classify each color.
My skills are finally slowly becoming usable again but I haven't done anything till now because I wanted to be prepared for anything that might try to harm me again. It seems I was brought here by those adventurers but based on the circumstances and my absorption of the dungeon core, I would err on the side of caution. It would be natural to assume I was a threat so since I'm alive and placed in a room with other likely necromantic magic sources, my thought is I have been placed in a vault for containment or research. I haven't been disturbed yet since I woke up but I don't know what may have happened before.
My stats menu looks about the same as I remember as I saw before, other than the new skills I got from the Dungeon Core.
[Dungeon Native. Passive. While in a dungeon environment, mana capacity is increased by 20%, mana regeneration rate is increased by 10%, the effectiveness and speed of Advanced Assimilation is increased by 15%, and Death Field provides more detailed information about affected environments, including hidden threats, resources, and material information.]
[Dungeon Mastery. Active. Assimilating the core of a dungeon allows for the option of replacing the Dungeon Core, rather than gaining skills and size. While in a controlled dungeon, the Reincarnator can create and manipulate structures such as walls, barriers, and simple traps within 10 meters. The complexity, durability, and types of structures available depends on the Reincarnator’s size and available materials.]
Since I’m not seeing the Dungeon Native skill as being active, that’s another evidence of me having been removed from the dungeon. Another thing is that the Dungeon Core seemed to have leveled up all my skills by one. That was a pleasant surprise. Well, Reincarnator’s Blessing seems to not have been affected but regardless, a welcome boon.
Year 52, Month 11, Day 13
I should work on finding out more about my location. I have access to all of my skills now so I feel confident enough to begin a bit of exploratory actions. I’ve been sitting still for far too long, though I honestly don’t feel that bothered by it now. Before I couldn’t sit still for more than 10 minutes without having something to do.
Activate Death Field.
My spores start to spread out through the air and I find that I am not actually resting on the floor, rather I am being suspended in the air somehow. Luckily, my spores seem to be able to pass through whatever is holding me in place and gently rest to cover the room. It takes about an hour of regularly using Death Field to get an adequate view of my surroundings but I’ve got time galore here.
I can see ten other items that seem to be held in a similar suspension force but there are also other items on pedestals, though they don’t appear to radiate mana. I’m not getting any specific information about the items but I can see the outlined surface as well as the mana colors. Held in containment there appears to be an amulet, skull, gemstone, scepter, and chalice that radiate green or purple mana. The others are a sphere with orange mana, clear hourglass, grey gauntlet, red circlet, and a large key with black mana. The pedestals hold a pendant, a rough stone, some kind of scaled fabric or leather, and a single coin. Mounted on the wall is a sword above a chest.
Truly a vault of treasures. The question I need to know is what is the purpose of my new vault. Have I been placed in a hoard of wealth or is this like those nuclear waste deposit sites? It also could be some kind of organization that seeks to secure and contain dangerous objects, that was a trope I remember reading about on a wiki online though the name has been lost to me now.
There’s not much air circulation in here as the spores show no external forces moving them about as they fell before so this should be an artificial area. For some reason, I’m not able to make out what the walls are because the spores show a perfectly smooth surface. I can’t even find the door. Escaping will probably be difficult.
Before thinking of escape, I suppose I should focus on my containment. I’m not able to roll since I’m held suspended in the air but I can see two flat plates above and below me. They seem to be covered in runes though my spores can’t stick to them so I can only get a brief glance as the spores try to settle while being repelled away from the surface. Safe to bet that these are the main components to the suspension field. I can’t make out what material they are made of, so it may take some experimentation to find out how to shut them down.
Activate Particle Manipulation.
Pulling in all the particles within a meter, I’m able to build up a small tendril of composite materials. Luckily there seems to be some iron and rust particles that I can use to create a sharp point at the end of this tendril. Using the tendril, I slowly and cautiously move it down towards the lower plate trying to fight the repelling forces.
Year 52, Month 11, Day 16
Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
It’s tedious and harder on my mana reserves than expected but after a few days of trying, I am able to extend my tendril all the way to the plate. I can think of only a few ways to disrupt the plate but I’m not sure how many are possible. That’s assuming the plates are even what are holding me here suspended.
My first try is attempting to disfigure and destroy the surface of the plate in an attempt to cause the runes to fail. Video game tropes scream that this is dangerous and that I’m asking to get blown up but I don’t think any of my other ideas will be any less dangerous.
Year 52, Month 11, Day 22
No luck. It took almost a week for me to even be able to find a particle composition that allowed me to try damaging the plate while still being unaffected by the resistance force but I’m not able to find enough force to scratch the plate’s surface even with the iron point. I did find that I can reach outside of the suspension field with enough mana and effort so I think my next plan is trying to pry up and perhaps knock it out of alignment.
The trick will be using the right material. I think I’ll start with iron again but I might also find some success with sand or silt.
Year 52, Month 11, Day 29
I was able to get to the plate from the side within only a day or so of effort but I found there was a gap of less than 5 μm. I didn’t even realize that it was possible to have a gap that flush. I spent the past six days using all the dust I could gather trying to raise the plate but it just kept getting compressed or pushed out. Equal forces likely, it probably requires a significant force to hold my form suspended in the air and the plate is likely experiencing an equal force pushing down into the supporting pillar below.
Knocking the plates out of alignment or damaging them seems unrealistic and I honestly don’t have any other ideas. My skills aren’t suited to things like this. I’ll keep trying but I may be trapped.
Year 54, Month 1, Day 9
It’s been over a year with no changes. I kept trying everything I could think of. Echo Mimicry to create a resonance or dissonance to see how it affected the suspension field or plates with no noticeable changes. I couldn’t create a greater attractive force with Assimilation either to pull the plates or anything else towards me. Whoever designed this field seems to have done so with a good understanding of my capabilities. That would mean there was some study done on me at some point before I woke up. I wonder how the passive assimilation force was dealt with before this.
Eventually, I gave up trying to directly escape and worked on trying to gain a better understanding of my surroundings. I have covered pretty much every square centimeter of this room in millions of spores over the past year so there I have an exceptional surface vision of everything around me. I managed to gather that the plates and the walls of this vault seem to be made from the same material as well as sharing similar runic marks but nothing else major.
I … what is that? For the first time, my spores are reacting to movement along one of the walls. This was the area where I suspected a door was but never could find any physical evidence. I now understand why. Where there was once empty space is now the faint remnants of black colored mana and two human looking shoeprints in my Death Field.
Someone has used magic to enter the vault.
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Reincarnator: Ja̶ʍҽʂ Ha̶ʅvҽʀʂoɳ
Form: Stone of Adaptation LVL 8
Size: 1.8 m
Next Level: 3 m
Skills
Reincarnator's Blessing II. Passive. Increase size gain by 10%. Increase luck by 2. Improve relevance of skills upon leveling up.
Advanced Assimilation II. Passive. Upon direct contact with objects of similar or lesser size, the material or biological organism will be assimilated into the main body. Assimilating a material gains its properties or one skill for up to 45 minutes. Can store up to 3 different properties or skills at once.
Particle Manipulation II. Active. Exert a force on and control particles smaller than 2 mm to form barriers, simple constructs, or directed attacks. Damage, durability, and duration are dependent on materials used.
Regenerative Structure II. Passive. Forms a barrier around the core preventing undesired particles from being assimilated. Blocked particles will slowly regenerate 1.5% of damage every 8 minutes. Bone particles are twice as effective.
Death Field II. Active. Release a cloud of necrotic spores that can settle on surfaces within 2.5 meters and grow, creating a network of mold. The spores increase vision of physical objects, detect movement, and accelerate decay. Creatures in direct contact with these spores are slowed by 35%, natural healing is reduced by 11%, and all living creature’s stats are reduced by 1.5%.
Roll II. Active. Movement by rolling at a speed of 1/4th size per second.
Written in Stone II. Active. Store up to 20 memories in the core that are available for access by Reincarnator at any time.
Mithril Shell II. Active. Gain a hardened exterior similar to mithril, increasing physical defense by 110%, boosting physical attack power by 55%, and improving the effectiveness of mana-based abilities and spells by 6%. When stationary, stealth is increased by 55%.
Mana Sight II. Passive. Clearly see mana and mana sources within 3 meters.
Echo Mimicry II. Active. Reproduce sounds or vibrations that have been recorded within 1.5 meters of the Reincarnator. Sound reproductions are centered on the Reincarnator.
Void Storage II. Active. Store up to 1.5 cubic meters of materials or objects in a small, personal extradimensional space.
Dungeon Native. Passive. While in a dungeon environment, mana capacity is increased by 20%, mana regeneration rate is increased by 10%, the effectiveness and speed of Advanced Assimilation is increased by 15%, and Death Field provides more detailed information about affected environments, including hidden threats, resources, and material information.
Dungeon Mastery. Active. Assimilating the core of a dungeon allows for the option of replacing the Dungeon Core, rather than gaining skills and size. While in a controlled dungeon, the Reincarnator can create and manipulate structures such as walls, barriers, and simple traps within 10 meters. The complexity, durability, and types of structures available depends on the Reincarnator’s size and available materials.