16)

Back on earth. Mood. Inspired.

I’m going to make a dungeon to level up my wife’s ward to the point the girl doesn't need Alelan anymore. That’s my goal.

To do so I need to level up my core. All the while avoiding letting the locals know about me in case they panic and try to destroy my core.

Or should I let them know about me? They could organize adventures to try out my dungeon. Then threaten any of them who might try to take my core to cut up for enchanting.

But from what I’ve read in the encyclopedia, the governments around here are just as prone to incompetence, short-sightedness, and outright corruption as back home. Maybe after I get close to silver rank and can put up more of a fight it will be time to clue them into my existence.

The issue I need to deal with now is that my reach is going to grow by ten feet per level. Which means pretty soon I won't be able to move my core far enough away from Iris and Buttercup to work on the house around them. Plus the house just isn’t big enough to build a dungeon in.

From past experiences I know dungeons tend to be below ground and they can't do much of anything above ground. But there have been some that were based out of old castles and even trees which could make their structure bigger as they grow in power.

Making the house bigger would be a little tough on the neighborhood. But luckily It turns out I can go down as well as out. My reach is still limited to the edges of the house above ground, but the farther down I go the farther away from the borders of the house I can go.

I guess I can call my plans for expansion my pyramid scheme.

Once home again I check my scouts only to find Iris was gone and a strange woman in some sort of uniform was setting out multiple bowls of water and a bowl of food for the cat.

"That's it sweety. The doctor said your mommy will be home in the morning. But that is all the food I'm putting out for you. You'll just eat everything if I put out more and you're already a little chubby."

Doctor?

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I can't really ask so I can only watch as the woman leaves. I notice she locks the door with Iris's keys. I can tell since they have a little female figurine with a three-sided hat and a short curved sword attached to them.

I hope she’s okay.

As a copper-ranked dungeon, I can now pick my starting creature and element.

I look over my choices. Beasts appeal to me since I could pick out something a bit more offensive than a mouse or a raccoon.

Although opossums do have a certain appeal.

Advantage. Beasts could move around the area outside while passing for normal animals. And the locals might find them less of a threat than a dungeon full of outright monsters.

Disadvantages. Boring. Also, I can replicate any normal animal I can get a sample of. I just can't give them elemental powers.

Besides, in this world of science, I need something that can interact with technology. Maybe even integrate it into my dungeon.

Gnomes are on my list of choices. But anyone seeing a two-foot tall man with a big pointy red cap standing around outside a house will figure out something weird was going on right away.

No. My choice was going to be Kobolds. Clever with their hands, and great at traps. Plus the one I would get at the early stages of the copper ranks would only be about a foot tall. At a distance, they would just look like lizards.

As for my elements, lightning. I will wield the power of the storm and also figure out how to make the science work.

I made my choices and locked them in. For now, though. I needed to make my move down.

Death mouse led Buttercup on a merry chase to one of the upstairs bedrooms. While a dozen additional mice waiting inside pushed the door shut trapping him within.

"Guess who lacks thumbs and can't open a door? That's right, you Buttercup."

The little hellspawn managed to kill three of the mice before the others dashed away to hide within the walls. Fine, have your experience points you mangy beast. Just keep out of my way.

I left him a plate of mice meat and a bowl of water in the room. I'm not cruel.

Copper one rank comes with two abilities. Remove and compress. Remove eliminates undesignated material to allow you to tunnel out rooms and tunnels. While compress allows you to, well, compress undesignated material into a denser, harder material to hold up those rooms and tunnels. Which was handy.

I planned to keep my core lined up with the center of the house. The same spot the fridge occupies. Because it will be in the middle of the area my reach can extend to. It also just feels right to keep some sort of symbolic link to the spot I first started in. I'm not sure if that's a me thing or a core thing.

I removed the floor below the stairs to the lower level. Then compressed the stone floor and the dirt below into a set of stairs and a wall down to a landing.

The dirt around here had an orange-red color, which if redder would give the place a spooky "blood" theme. As it was it just looked like the outside of an old barn that had been painted red.

At first, I left the bottom open to the layer of clay while I shaped the fine details of the stairs. But then water started seeping in and I give myself a rule to put in a compressed wall wherever I stopped at.

Now I just need to figure out what kind of dungeon I’m going to build.

For now, I extended the stairs down another floor and fill up the floor in between with a few storage rooms, a meat locker, and some open space for later on.

I filled up the storage room with blocks of compressed undesignated material since I just can't bear to use Remove on anything. It just seemed like a waste. Maybe I can use it to make decorations later on.

Besides, two levels below the lower level of the house lets me build out by several feet. And the level directly below the house had drains in it that I didn't want to have to work around or mess up.