The mechanical- and biological beings sized eachother up, one standing in between a core of energy and its single, raged protector.

As the man-sized centipede raised its head, both in confusion and to try and scare off the new opponent, would the now equally-large Neith rear up onto her 4 hind legs, the hydraulics shifting without a single creak as the spiders blood-fuel would coarse through them.

Within seconds would the 2 beings crash into eachother, carapace crashing against steel as both tried sinking their fangs into the other. Although the centipede managed to be the first to allign them, would the creature soon find its sharpened weapons unable to create a wound, leaving a dent in the Spiders shining armor.

The 2 would untangle themselves, having switched positions as 2 small protrusion on Neith’s abdomen started producing a clear, wire like substance. In the dark, mana-filled room, alight only by the soft glow of the dungeoncore would said wire look like a blue-silver silk, being carried underneath the mech by one of its legs towards the 2 pincer-like mandibles, being formed into a small ball.

The arthropleura would begin circling around the spider, once more trying to reach for the core.

Allen could do little but stare, trying to capture the feeling he had achieved what seemed like moment sago to give his single creation another powerboost.

Neith would toss out the small ball, unfurling itself in mid air to reveal a large net, which would warp itself around the segmented body of the centipede.

Though the creature was strong, evident by the wires quickly becoming taut, there was one issue.

One was biological, the other was metal. There’s only one of the 2 that can grow ‘tired’.

Though it could be said Metal can grow ‘tired’ as well… These are not the same meaning.

Try as the Centipede might, its fangs were unsuited for breaking through the mesh-like net. Even so, the materials are as, if not stronger then Neith’s own body.

Allen himself would have counted the time it took for the monster to stop moving, but he had been too busy with trying to figure out how exactly he used, well, ‘magic’.

As one of the 2 monsters stuck in the deathbattle stopped moving, would the other calmly reel in the prey larger then itself, a soft whirring noise filling the room as a small engine-like apparatus inside Neith’s jaws would drag the centipede towards the spider. For the first time in this fight would Neith finally have the chance to sink her own fangs into the blasted creature, and she did so with a almost human-like expression of glee. Though in the case of her, considering she was a mechanical spider, it was more of a tilt backwards and a dialation of her lenses.

Her venom had been replaced by some form of highly-corrosive acid, a sickly green liquid melting through the hard carapace, turning it into mush. From her estophagus, would several tiny arm-like appendages appear, folding outwards from the walls to scoop and tear into the centipedes soft flesh.

The resident dungeoncore merely stared in odd facination at his creation. The small mana-soaked spider which he had expected not much off besides a companion, and perhaps amusement, had now turned into what could only be described as a proper bossmonster.

And he didnt even have a single floor yet.

Allen sighed at the stupidity of this weird series of events.

A single, square room at the end of a hallway with a large, glowing gem (himself) and a angry mechspider.

An… Intresting start for a Dungeon, he thought.

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And so, the next day passed, Neith had finished up the centipede corpse. Unlike normal spiders, would the mechanical being leave not a drop to waste. Whatever it did with all of the biomass, nobody knew. Allen guessed it was as a source of fuel, though going by the dim blue lines showing inbetween its metallic plating, its source of energy would most-likely be mana-based instead.

Allen halted.

Blue lines?

In his hurry to beat the centipede, besides throwing ideas and concepts at the evolving creature, had Allen not taken the time to truely Look at his new creature.

Shifting his gaze over from within the core, would he narrow his non-existend eyes. While it seemed his sight had definitely improved, even noticing the specks of dust on the walls, it was still uncomfortable to observe from such a distance.

‘’Perhaps I just need more time to adapt…’’ He thought to himself, wishing silently he could have gotten a bloody tutorial on how to observe his creatures, or entire dungeon from a point away of his core for that matter.

Lo and behold, Neith suddenly perked up from its seemingly hybernating state, the previously dim lines coming alive to produce a glinstering blue lighting effect. Said spider would calmly move its way over to his core, staring up at it while tilting its entire body as if asking a question, much like a tiny jumpingspider.

The dungeoncore would ‘stare’ back, both remaining silent.

Did spiders even make noises? Though Neith did have her metallic parts which would now produce a steady, soft hum.

Losing track of his original discovery, would Allen smack his metaphorical cheeks.

‘’C’mon, focus, Neith literally just reacted to… what was it, a question? Command?’’

The fledgeling sentient core would calm down as a slightly more intense light would be produced from its crystal.

Allen ‘told’ the spider to turn around.

Neith turned around.

A command for climbing up the wall

Neith climbed the wall.

A command for… making a small, round tunnel in the wall.

Nothing happened.

Allen paused…

‘Okay… that… didnt work. Maybe I need to think of it as some sort of 3D drawing program? Neith herself has a own conciousness, though I don’t know how smart she is, or how she understands me in the first place. I do remember some studies saying Jumpingspiders were quite smart for their size… So if I need vague commands for creatures, I need detailed explanations and thoughts for editing the terrain?’

The dungeoncore tried again, its surface becoming alight as the mana in the area would begin to weave, forming a tralucent round shape on the wall. The bottom of the tunnel would be in touch with the floor, diameter would span a single meter across, enough for Neith to fold herself up in.

The position of the tunnel itself would be calculated by measuring both the distance to the top of the wall, placing it exactly in the middle horisontal wise.

Glancing over at the spider, would Allen push the mana inside, the sound of rock being grinded into nothing briefly echoing through the room. As per his specifications, would his now perfectly round tunnel be 2 meters deep.

‘’Neat. Okay, now to get the Spider to actually move in…’’

Said… Spider… would have already found itself inside, Neith’s lenses and blue tatoo’s dimming once more.

‘’And… I forgot to take a look at her… bugger…’’ Allen sighed softly, deciding to let his champion have her rest. In the meantime, he could start messing around with the designing of his little room, trying different options to see if he couldn’t get more… creative instead of only using certain highly-specified yet simple shapes.

Several days had passed.

Neith had appeared from, and went back to her tunnel multiple times, wrapping it in her steel mesh-like webbing, as well as making a flat disk for a door. After a long period of studying, would Allen have figured out quite a bit over the designing of his room. Everytime he made a edit, some of the blue aura, Mana, would be whisked away from the rest. Then again, he only found this out a few hours ago after noticing the surrounding area had lowered in quantity. Lowered might have been a harsh word, as it was more of taking a drop out of a industrial storagetank.

While he didn’t figure out on how to completely remove the specifications when carving out something, he did manage to ease the process quite a bit, now needing to only sketch a idea out into his mind for the mana to follow and replicate.

The cave had been transformed into a neat, square room… the only parts not being in the same dimension being the altar on which his core rested, having now been turned into a scaled down Aztec-like pyramid.

‘’Maybe I should have tried making some pillars…’’ Allen would stare at the blank, perfectly flat wall..

Before he could continue sighing about his lost chance of detailing the room and perhaps try figuring out how to create matter instead of making it vanish, (which he pretty sure added more mana, lessening the cost), a sound would capture his attention. Unlike the wriggling hissing sounds of the centipede, would this sound alot more intelligent, albeit he had no idea on what it actually was.

In all honesty, it sounded, descripted with the best of his ability, ‘Fantasy-like’.

A creature appeared at the end of his tunnel leading outside, followed by multiple others, all dressed in simple barbarian-like clothing and using a rusty old tools as weapons. At first, Allen thought it to be a banditgroup of some kind, untill he noticed its small stature… and… green skin.

What he didn’t know, was that this was just the start to a series of events which would lead to his mastery of magic and language. Neither did he know that the little spider had actually been a Mana-spider, a creature with great adaptation of both its own terrain, and lingering magical energies and boy, was there alot of lingering mana here, blessed with a form of strange, yet somewhat familiar energy.