“Is it too late to, ah, uninitiate a pact?” I ask.

[Dungeon Core abilities interfaced,] Echo says. [Pact formation complete.]

I take that as a no.

Even now, that sense of vastness I’d felt is rapidly fading. The Dungeon Core just appears to be a stone. Granted, a very excitable stone that seems eager to get to work, but certainly not some other-dimensional bottomless well of darkness. I almost believe it was just my imagination, though the strangeness of this world has shown me that anything seems possible.

I suppose it’s too late regardless.

The Dungeon Core nudges my mind, silently begging for its promised mana.

“Alright, alright,” I say. “Now, I don’t have much. And if I keep speaking with you, I’ll need to hold onto at least a little bit of it. So we need to nail down the parameters of my request now, before we lose the ability to communicate. Understand?”

The stone practically vibrates with excitement beneath my hand. Yes. It understands. It will rip this cave apart.

“No!” I object. “Uh, no, not like that. Here, let me think.”

Instead of trying to describe with words, I focus on an image of what I want: the fallen stones in the passage being pushed out of the way. Being able to walk out of the still intact cave. Minimal disruption.

The Core considers this. Yes, it supposes it could do that. Not nearly as fun, though.

I snort. “Well so long as you’re having fun, that’s all that matters, isn’t it?” I shake my head. “Alright. Now how do I give you access to my mana?”

Instead of an explanation, I feel a mental ping. A request, almost like a tug of a current, ushering me forward. Hesitantly, I allow myself to be pulled along.

[Mana transfer initiated,] Echo reports.

It takes all my willpower to not stop the transfer. I can feel the energy flowing away from me, and while I don’t notice that I’m particularly weaker or more tired as a result, the sensation is still distinctly unsettling. But if I want out of this cave, I need to follow through on our agreement.

I wait until my mana reserves dip below 10%, then I mentally pull away from the Dungeon Core.

[Mana transfer complete,] Echo says.

[Mana: 7/200]

[Psionic Touch Level up! At Level 2, Psionic Touch mana cost is reduced to 1 mana per 10 seconds. Spell evolution available! Psionic Link: form a permanent connection between two minds, allowing the individuals to communicate at will. Mana cost: 150]

That’s interesting. A one time cost to prevent future mana drain would be much more efficient. But I don’t have enough magic to use Psionic Link even if I wanted to. And frankly, I’m not sure I want to. That previous peek behind the Dungeon Core’s curtain was unsettling, and it would be rash of me to permanently fix such an unknown entity to my mind.

Of course, I’d just formed a pact with the thing, so who am I to talk?

It will take me hours to recover my mana anyway. Plenty of time to decide how I want this relationship to develop in the long term. For now, I only have another minute left to continue talking with the Dungeon Core before Psionic Touch expires. And speaking of which…

Yes! The Dungeon Core rejoices. Energy. Finally! Now it will—No, wait… Not enough! Not nearly enough. Pathetic amount of mana. So pitiful. Shameful. Well, it must work with what it has.

I breathe out a laugh. “Rude.”

The Core ignores me, too focused on what it wants to do next. First, extraction. It can’t stay here. It needs a new lair. Better lair. It needs to tap into a larger energy source. Where? Searching. Deep…. Deeper…

Every thought is accompanied with the flash of an image or abstract impression. Stones, veins in the rocks, a network of caves and passages.

The Core is disappointed. No, it can’t reach. Ah, why doesn’t it have more mana to work with? Such a sorry excuse for a pact… Okay, mobility first—

[Mana Expired,] Echo says. [Psionic Touch ended.]

And just like that, the Core’s presence vanishes from my mind. It certainly wasn’t impressed with my mana reserves, that much is clear. And what was all that about lairs and veins of energy? It’s getting off track. But without any mana to communicate, I can’t redirect it now. Hesitantly, I remove my hand from the stone. I’ll just have to hope the Core will do as I intended even without my mental direction.

The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.

A sound in the dark scratches at my ears, driving a shiver down my back. It’s coming from the ground in front of me—a shifting of pebbles and stone, I think. Very likely the Dungeon Core moving the earth around it, but being unable to witness what’s happening is more than a little unsettling. I Check my mana: still at 0/200. It should only take another 30 seconds or so to gain 1 point back, at which point I’ll be able to light a Spark. In the meantime, there’s nothing but blackness and the faint scratching of stone on stone.

While I wait, my mind wanders back to my Stats. It’s so strange to have everything about me labeled like some plane model in a textbook. A phoenix harpy? It sounds absurd. And yet, there’s something else in that stat block that catches my eye—something I hadn’t had much of a chance to process before now.

“Echo,” I say. “What does this Role stat mean?”

[Every user is assigned a Role,] Echo replies. [The user must fulfill the role requirements.]

Well that tells me very little.

“And my role is… The Dark Lord?” I ask, skeptical.

[Affirmative.]

“What are the requirements for that role?”

[The Dark Lord must defend her kingdom.]

Vague. And vaguely ominous. No one called The Dark Lord has ever ended up being one of the good guys.

“I don’t suppose there’s room to negotiate a new role?” I ask.

[Negative.]

Of course not. Yet another aspect of my predicament it seems I have no control over. Well, I’ll just have to roll with it for now. It probably doesn’t mean anything… right?

I wait a few more minutes, as long as my patience can handle in the ringing dark, then I cast Spark once more.

The earth around the Dungeon Core has come alive. What once was solid stone has now become sand and loose pebbles, all strangely cubic as if diced by a laser cutter. The ground is shifting, pushing upward, forcing the Core and all the jewel’s circuit-like tendrils from the earth. Seeing what it’s trying to do, I decide to help out. I dig my hands into the now-loose rubble and pull upwards. The bits of stone cascade away between my fingers, leaving just the Dungeon Core dangling dozens of ruby-red stone roots, like fossilized veins leading away from a heart.

I reactivate Psionic Touch, and the mental deluge of its thoughts starts once more.

From the flurry of excitement, recognition, and eagerness that floods through me, it seems happy to realize I’m back. I saved it some mana by assisting in prying it from the ground. Now it can focus on finding a suitable new lair—

“No,” I hurriedly interrupt, watching my mana start to tick back toward zero far too quickly. “The passage. Clear the passage.” My impression of the Dungeon Core is gradually shifting to something like a toddler hyped up on sugar. This is going to be like herding cats.

Disappointed, the Core relents, and I can feel its attention shift. It plunges into its own memories, and like getting caught in a pocket of differential pressure, I’m briefly dragged in with it. It’s been in this chamber a long time. Once great, its area of influence shrunk to just this cavern, then its immediate surroundings, then nothing. After its mana was depleted, cut off from its source, it became stuck. It spent decades—centuries—trying to grow, reach out, find a new vein of magical ore it could tap into for power. But it only managed these meager few inches of geological growth. Now, though. Now…

Sand hisses away from the collapsed passage. I hastily step back, fire in one hand, gem in the other. Bits and pieces of the rock slide down the face of the collapsed wall, all shaped in perfect cubes of various sizes. The rubble spills into the room around my feet and I retreat even further in alarm. How much did the Core need to clear out? What if it ends up filling the cavern with sand before I can find a way out?

My alarm seems to make it through to the Core, as it flickers with a new idea.

Don’t worry. It will make a hole! Then the room won’t fill with sand.

Its thoughts are accompanied by images of giant crevasses splitting open the floor flitting through my mind. This does little to ease my alarm.

Wait, I think. I don’t think that’s a good—

Something cracks behind me like a gunshot. My ears are suddenly muted and ringing. I’m hardly able to make out the hiss of sand still falling from the collapsed passage. But now there’s a giant crack bisecting the room, and it’s zig zagging right toward me.

The Dungeon Core sends me a mental impression of something along the line of oops.

[Mana depleted. Psionic Touch expired.]

I leap off to the side, scattering bones and flapping my wings to keep upright as the ground gives way. The sand—and skeletons—pour through the gaping hole in the floor, quickly vanishing out of sight. The crack reaches the collapsed passageway and then stops.

For a moment.

The boulders groan. A puff of dust escapes the passage as the stones shift, jolting downward. Then, all at once, they vanish through the floor in a rockslide. The chamber shakes with the waterfall of crashing boulders, first grating against each other and the floor, then more distantly shattering like bombshells somewhere far beneath us.

“Stop!” I shout over the calamity, even though I’m no longer using Psionic Touch. “That’s enough!”

But the Dungeon Core had already stopped. The distant echo of cascading stones rumbles through the cavern for another minute more, gradually growing fainter and fainter until finally all hint of the rockslide has faded away.

I wait until my pounding heart has stopped threatening to hammer out of my chest, which also gives me some time to recover a few points of mana. Once I’ve sufficiently recovered from nearly experiencing my second heart attack of the day, I reestablish a Psionic Touch.

The Core happily greets me. Sadly, it’s used up all the mana I gave it. But! Didn’t it do so well at clearing out the tunnel?

I glance toward said tunnel. A cloud of dirt obscures the entrance. The fissure that’s running through the room leads straight up toward the tunnel, so I pick myself up and carefully make my way over, gauging the slope and sturdiness of the ground with every step. I stop a few feet away.

The dust clears to reveal a dark tunnel. Sure enough, it’s empty, just as the Dungeon Core insists. But there’s also a giant shaft running through the passage floor, effectively halving the width of the tunnel and creating a cliff on one side. The remaining ledge is only a few feet wide.

“Yes,” I say with a grimace. “You did great.”