As soon as the feeling of the dungeon's presence faded, one of the high elven priests of Marlon whispered, "By Marlon, I pray for answers!"
The door marked Temple opens, and a seven foot tall statue of Marlon stepped out, a cold beer in his hand. "Oh, hey, Jarlin! Welcome back!" Marlon looks around and does a head count. Let's all go over to the Tavern section, as you're probably all wondering about how you are all back, seeing as you all died in various ways. Someone write on the 'Dear Reginald' board that we need ten kegs of high quality Daedril Ale, a case of Superna Fire Whiskey, and a case of Elverbright White, as a request from Marlon for the Tavern."
As they enter the tavern, the floor space, number of tables, chairs, and boothes expand as more of them enter until it can hold everyone without any issue, the requested alcohol appearing on the bar counter. "Everyone, take a seat," Marlon stated as he leaned against the counter, waiting for everyone to be seated and quiet. "So, Jarlin, my high priest requested answers. Just so you know, every deity is on very good terms with this 'Dungeon', Reginald Montgomery."
"My God, please, I remember dying and being sent to your afterlife. How did I end up coming back?" Jarlin requested.
"Well, most of you died in service to either your god or craft, or for some reason, when asked if you would be willing to reincarnate you marked yes on the paperwork. Today's date is 10.25.189,839,975. Many of you have been dead for centuries, if not millenia. We've finally returned to Origin, which is currently known as Earth. Two thousand some odd years ago, that bastard Lich destroyed this world's Twin Trees, World and Mana. That separated this world from the pantheon running it and launched them back in time to other worlds almost two hundred million years ago," Marlon started with.
"Many of those ancient deities have gone into seclusion and are not currently part of the modern divine pantheon as they just want to sleep and be forgotten. There are currently at least two different areas on this world that are trying to pull all of the mana in and nullify our ability to influence this world. As for how you are all back, in your physical primes," Marlon chuckled as he looked at the glowering Arch Lich of Alberos, "we gave this sapient dungeon the ability to spawn bodies for you from Mana. Alberos, don't glower at me, you know you were never physically stronger than when you were a Lich."
"Excuse me, Lord Marlon, but why did he choose us, and why do some people have two cards instead of one?" a bubbly tabby catgirl receptionist inquired while glowering at a smirking Wolfkin BeastLord.
"Ah, you must mean the Instance cards... Yes, that is something we shall discuss..." Marlon smiled as he produced two of his own, one marked Personal Shrine, the other Grand Temple.
"Wait, did you say Instance, as in a dungeon's private dimension?" one of the archmages asked before scurrying out into the main sector and snagging the three 'Library' cards and returning.
Marlon laughed loudly. "Yes, this world has gotten interesting, and we haven't even been here half a year. Mana levels are still below average for the next three months so that people can come and do some immediate training inside Reginald's 'Tutorial'..." Marlon cut off as he couldn't help but laugh at the idea of the Tutorials. Marlon waved his hand and everyone received an notification of the Level Sync dungeons that Reginald is making.
The Dwarven Shieldwall trainer spits up a mouthful of his ale. "Ye cannae be serious, Lord Marlon! Even ye would not risk people's lives pointlessly like this in a quest for power!"
"Oh, I'm perfectly serious. You see, one of the boons Regi has earned is free resurrections of all who challenge his dungeons."
"Back to the subject of Instances, Lord Marlon?" one of the Archmages inquired.
"Oh, yes, you see, for the longest time, no dungeon has gone above the third tier in the Instance perk, since that was all they needed to fulfill their minimal roles as training grounds," Marlon stated. "Well, Regi received five free Perk points off the bat from Borick because of the fact that his physical body was killed when the Construction Core released a huge burst of concentrated mana, the Core Gem absorbing his mind, and I offered him the Perk Divinity option. Some of you are familiar with this Perk. For those of you who aren't, Perk Divinity grants a single Perk point per level per tier of the Perk, and can only be purchased at Level 1."
"How many Ranks did he purchase?" one of the Paladins asked.
"All five," Marlon grinned. "I think he said that while there were so many pretty options available, he will be able to get them all if he maximized Perk Divinity. The fifth rank, doubled the amount of Perks he got per level to ten, and he has only leveled with maximum overlevel, granting him a total of 11 perks per level. Anyways, he made a Grand Temple of the Pantheon, which you should all totally check out, along with individual private shrines for each deity... He also created a new category of boss, called an Overboss, where everything the Boss is in charge of leveled via maximum overlevel, including the boss. Likely, that list of Instances will have some additions, regarding Overbosses."
"Lord Marlon, do you know what Library perks he has purchased?" the Archmage with the Library cards asked.
"He has purchased the complete System Library, Lore Library, and Spell Library. Ah, I see you have his Library instance keys. Yes, let's get back to the Instances. He has an unlimited number of instances that he can create or edit, and he found a way to tie the entrance and exit to a reader system with your cards granting each of you a private instance for your off time, and a training or crafting instance each fully stocked at the moment."
The ForgeLord raised his hand, "Yer Lordship, what do you mean by 'Fully stocked'?"
"Each Crafting Instance includes tools of Grandmaster Level quality, with resources that would make many of the gods weep at the audacity of you mortals having access to the materials. He can replenish your resources with Mana, but he has also made it so you can pump your own mana into a creation circle and thus raise your own mana levels. I would recommend checking out the Instance 'Lilian's Garden' to see what this dungeon is truly capable, with only a few handful of levels. It will be a godsend for you alchemists.
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"Also, he has done something none of the older dungeons ever considered, placing an instance inside another instance. Really, the God of Space and Time was flummixed by that revelation. We all knew that they don't spontaneously collapse if you carried a bag of holding into an instance, but nobody ever thought of placing an instance in another instance, let alone a bag of holding inside another bag of holding."
The Hero of Birule stood up. "What do you mean placing a bag of holding inside another? How would that work?"
Marlon grinned viciously. "Why, Tronjo, Hero of Birule, it is a wonder you were resurrected. I know you have that Spacial Ring that you keep all your tools and equipment in, and it negates all their weight. Well, Bags of Holding have always been limited to a 90% weight reduction. Now, take that one bag of holding, and place it in another bag with the same properties. The new Bag will have the old bag in a single slot of its inventoy, and the weight of that bag will again be reduced by 90%, making it only 1% of the original weight. Now you could put that bag in another bag if it was still too heavy, if you had another."
Many of the wizards sighed and shook their heads, remembering how often they had had to leave loot behind because they had too low of a strength score, and the answer was something so simple as placing one bag inside another. "Well, that's what we deserve for thinking most of the secrets of the universe had been discovered..." one of them stated.
"Don't worry, he also improved the Quiver of Holding, making a Creation Quiver that can create different arrows for mana..." Marlon tossed one of the bracer-mounted quivers to an expert sniper.
"Any type of arrow can be created, you just need to select it's properties and it gives you a mana cost... What is a 'Macro', and why are there ten different slots for it?" the wood elf sniper asked.
"A Macro is what the humans who live on this world call a programmed set. The fact that it can hold ten macros means you can program it for ten different types of arrows to 'quickly' create without having to mess with the arrow editor," Marlon answered, getting a nod from the sniper who then tried to return the quiver.
The drow butler stood and bowed. "Lord Marlon, what do you know about this Guild, the Eternal Gamers?"
"I don't know much, other than the fact that Reginald was one of them before he had his incident, and that they were some of the best among those who played fictional versions of limited simulations of an adventurer's life, called Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Games, or MMORPGs. Apparently, they tend to be antisocial outside their own bunch, and most were working the system of the two week trial for bonuses. Many ended up cashing in those bonuses to have an advanced level one. The Leader of the Eternal Gamers went by the handle of 'Eternal Darkness' or just 'Dark' or 'Darkness' amongst the guild. Reginald was and is known as 'Hidden Leecher' or as they all called him, 'Leech'.
"The Guild consisted of thirty primary members, and maybe twenty more secondary. All of them will be here in a week and a half, when Eternal Darkness emerges from helping her grandmother through an Assisted Tutorial, since the deity who generated her race and character change didn't take her advanced age of mid eighties into account when assigning her the Feline-kin race without applying an age reset or granting her immortal youth via the loli status."
"So, we will have a minimum of fifty guests to look after?"
"On the contrary, all of them will be issued Private Instance cards like you have for their personal rooms and needs. You will only have to help arrange the care of this Guild Building, making sure that everything is stocked properly in the Tavern and shop sections, and prepare some 'training' quests for them to take off the Request Board. Right now, everyone on this planet is level one other than all of you. This entire Guild has caught my eye, and as such, I shall be issuing specific quests. Know that most of these people won't hit above Level five in the next three months, not because of the fact that they will be making no effort, but because of the fact that they will be grinding their base stats and only leveling with maximum overlevel. Eternal Gamers will likely become our very first OverGuild."
"Why is there such a variety in trainers?" the wolfkin BeastLord asked. "Surely he doesn't expect us to try to train outside our Class roles!"
"Of course he does, Fenron," Marlon chuckled. "You can expect them to try to get you to teach everyone but the Necromancers, as living beasts and monsters don't tend to work well with undead under the same controller. You'll see people mixing Demonic or Angelic summoning with Beast Taming from the Gamers. You see, thanks to the vast openess of the System, they can crosstrain to make some impressive combinations. What would you think about an Archfiend wearing a Bone Juggernaut as armor? Or an Archangel sending a blast of Light magic through a Glass Elemental designed to Focus the beam? Those are just two ideas that he has mentioned to his Guild."
The summoners, necromancers, and elementalists eyes went wide at the two ideas.
"Reginald Montgomery has already broken so many things that I had to convince the rest of the pantheon to drop the price of a resurrection token to a standard ten gold, and they agreed due to the fact that he gifted each of us new instance shrines as well as the Grand Temple for all of us. And now, I've overstayed my time here and the mana in this statue needs to be recharged. I'll be off."
Chatter broke out amongst the various crews when Marlon left, exiting through the door marked 'Pantheon's Temple'. "Will this Guild accept us as more than Trainers and Craftsman?" a large bear-kin asked.
"Why would they?" one of the gnome accountants muttered. "We're just hirelings, after all... They'll probably treat us like garbage and expect us to lick their boots."
Jarlin, High Priest of Marlon, stood and tapped his staff on the ground, silencing everyone. "We have heard many answers from Marlon, the God of Overpower. All of them will have been true to the best of his knowledge and ability to speak. I would suggest that we try to make ourselves useful to this Guild and see how the treat us before worrying and coming to a predetermined negative end. Now, since the God was kind enough to have us get plenty of alcohol, let us celebrate our rebirths!"