First thing in the morning Lauri rode his bull to where the entrance to the Dungeon of Woe once stood. Getting the dungeon core out from his belt he asked it "how would I put you back?"

"Monsters have stopped spawning so it should be with trivial ease to walk over and put me back."

"But the entrance has collapsed."

"Oh no. I died?"

"If your entrance is blocked does that mean you died?"

"It means my body was eaten and now I have no hope of survival. Why couldn't you have overlooked me in that rubble, like a normal person would have?"

"Don't act like I was going to actually put you back."

"You weren't?"

"Thought I'd had a change of heart?"

"Well, yes. Because you heard about Rebecca."

"What I heard was that you were going to clear her name once enough items were given to you."

"I was going to tell the truth."

"Which I assumed would clear her name, yes?"

"The truth was Rebecca sucked as a tank and couldn't hold the line. My minotaurs walked right past her to kill her friends. It took several minutes but she did finish my minotaurs off. Then she took all the parties stuff, including their system coins."

"How'd she take their system points?"

"They'd turned most of those points into physical token that they kept in their bags, in case they weren't resurected the points wouldn't be lost that way. I suppose in that sense they probably wanted their coins taken. I don't fault her actions but I shamed her unbashful for her failures. Don't think I'm talking behind her back. I taunted her right to her face."

Lauri searched the churches inner group about resurection and found the service wasn't currently offered, with a long discussion forum on the subject. Then he got back to Woe. "So, she she didn't kill her party but she got them killed because she didn't suceed at her job?"

"Yeah and then didn't come clean to everyone that it's because she sucked."

Lauri sighed. "People would probably have treated her better if she'd admitted to inadequacy. Oh well, I try not to reveal my own flaws either. Now, about you?"

"A grave right here would be fitting. Please write 'Woe may have been a jerk but called things how they were' on my tombstone"

[Purchased 1x Amnesia Potion for 1,494SP]

Lauri looked for a mouth for a potion he'd just purchased but the dungeon core gem didn't have one. He headed to the old Survivors Guild where he found Sophie still asleep, laying under a blanked on a dining table, Lauri left her be. Trying to put the dungeon core in a couple bowls they were too small but a mixing bowl fir the gem nicely, then Lauri poured the Amnesia Potion over the gem. Woe asked "what are you trying to do?"

The liquid started to glow. "I'm seeing if resetting you will allow you to start a new dungeon."

"My dungeon was my body. If I ripped your head off, do you think an Amnesia Potion would grow back your torso?"

"Huh..." Lauri cast Regeneration on the gem.

"What did you just do? I think I'm about to take root. I'm too close to another dungeon, get me further away."

"Okay." Lauri ran back home and went to his room. "This far enough away?"

"Yeah. I think it's working. Return of Dungeon of Woe, here I come."

"You need a rename. I'm going to call you High Stakes Steaks and you can have bulls and minotaurs."

"You can't just rename me."

Lauri's wardrobe door started to shake and Lauri felt like it was a good idea to put the gem in the wardrobe, with no space he stacked it ontop his old pocket-watch and shut the doors. Light shone through every crevice of the wardrobe as it shook so violently that his mother came in. "What's going on?"

"I put a gem I got as a drop into the wardrobe."

"What's it doing?"

"If I had to guess..." Words appeared over the wardrobe, 'High Stakes Dungeon of Steaks,' and Lauri smirked at the name. "I think my wardrobe has turned into a dungeon entrance."

His mum shook her head. "What was I thinking? Barging into my sons room... when he was doing something that was shaking the whole house."

"It's nothing like that."

"I should have known that I didn't want to know. I could have left it to assumptions. But no, I ran in, without even knocking."

"It's a dungeon mum, don't make out like I was doing anything."

"Not doing anything? If only. There's a dungeon in my house now and Goddess help me its name implies food. A rare dungeon indeed... in the middle of a famine... not a lengthy journey away."

"That's a good thing, right, mum?"

"I suppose you want me to stand at the front door and collect a fee from adventurers entering you room, like I was running some sort of kitchen."

"Maybe... move it?"

"Oh. Move it? Yeah, please put it somewhere nice." His mum shut the door and walked away, knowing dungeons can't simply be moved, but then... Lauri got it here somehow so maybe they can.

Entering the wardrobe Lauri found himself in a dungeon room.

[Force dungeon to bond with you as its dungeon keeper? Warning: Doing so will reset both entities Karma to 0.]

["Yes?"]

[Gained Level 0 Enslaver Part-Timer]

"You can't just force me to let you be my keeper," Woe complained.

"Sometimes I wonder if the System is playing games with me or, at the least, teasing me."

"I only have 3 monster templates now. You've cleared my other monster templates."

"Is one a minitour?"

"Of course not. What sort of dungeon would start with such a powerful monster template?"

"Well, your name wasn't exactly as I suggested but I think the pun helped. You're called 'High Stakes Dungeon of Steaks.' So did you get a bull template instead, then?"

"No. Same three as first time."

"Which are?"

"Skeleton, Living Maze Wall and Mini-Minotaur-Taur."

"You're a maze type?"

"Yeah."

"Okay well, you can't be called Woe anymore so how about Happy?"

"Excuse me?"

"Your strategy of making people want to kill you caused someone to kill you. New life, second chances and all, you're going to pretend to be a friendly dungeon this time around."

There was silence for a while and Lauri started thinking up a better name. After a minute 'not-Happy' spoke up, "I don't think I can help but judge people."

"Then just do it as friendly advice. Tell people how they can improve, the importance of understanding themselves and say pretentious things like that admitting to having a problem is the first step to addressing it."

"That's so evil. I love it."

"It's not evil."

"You're telling me to not only insult people but how to force them to accept and internalise my insults? That's definitely evil."

"Look, if you can get people to appreciate your advice then I don't mind if you see yourself as evil or not."

"I'll accept that name, Happy, now."

"Oh, good. I was pondering Mr Smiley but do you even have a gender?"

"That is the most evil sounding of names. I love it. Okay, call me Mr Smiley."

"You're male then?"

"All dungeons are female but that doesn't mean I can't be called Mr Smiley."

"All dungeons?"

"Yeah. Like cars, boats and basically anything else humans enter inside of."

"Ah. The object 'female,' that makes sense. Mr Smiley it is then."

Lauri exited and tried to move the Wardrobe but it wouldn't budge. "Can I not move you?"

"I'm dimensionally anchored."

"Okay. I'll have to repeat what I did to get you here in the first place."

"I won't survive that. Plants anaology, remember? If you uproot me again there's no way I'm surviving."

"How do you know about that anaology?"

"I was there."

"Oh right. I forgot because you played possum so well. Pot plant, it is, then."

"What? Pot plant?"

Lauri focused like the last time he'd gained a new skill without levels or a book. He didn't have a baseline skill this time but he could feel the local magic around him and... ignored it. Reaching into his inner pools of power he tried to harness that, instead, for 'potting' the dungeon. Lauri needed to visualise but he was struggling, as he didn't know quite what he should be picturing. Then he had a thought, dimensional bags can be moved around. He got out his Bag of Many Items and touched it. Soon going beyond touch, his inner eye looked right into its fabric and then beyond even that, into the bags fabric of reality. Lauri came to understad how it worked and, as he did, the bag started to unravel and disappear as if its durability hit zero. Looking back at the wardrobe, an understanding wasn't going to be enough, what he was trying to do was on too large a scale. Maybe if the dungeon was limited to having a single floor... but that would be counter-productive.

"Oh, I've got it. I just need to fold you up and then unfold you when I need to deploy you."

"You're nonsensical words are scaring me."

"This may... ehh, you'll be fine."

"Wait, no, I don't like whatever you're thinking."

Lauri started folding the dungeon up and found it was actually quite easy since it was still only a single room. The important part was that he didn't scrunch it up or squish it in because if he did it like that then it wouldn't be as simple as unscrunching the dungeon. Seeing an opportunity, instead of folding the anchor into the wardrobe Lauri anchored it to his pocket-watch, finding its latch to be acceptable as a door now that it was made smaller.

[New skill created. Please name skill and give a general description.]

"Hey, Mr Smiley, it worked."

Unauthorized usage: this tale is on Amazon without the author's consent. Report any sightings.

"I hate you."

"You're a pocket-watch."

"I hate you."

"Oh, your name changed to Small Stakes Dungeon of Steaks."

"I cannot express enough. I... hate... you."

"I'm going to name the skill... wait, what is that?"

The back of Lauri's wardrobe was dark. Too dark. But what really alerted Lauri was the poor outline of a humanoid shape, which walked up and stood within the darkness at the back of his wardrobe. "Hello?" Lauri asked questioningly.

"Your realm seems to have a hole in it," the black silloette within the black hole calmly yet menacingly pointed out.

"That doesn't sound good."

"Who are you?"

"I'm Lauri. It's nice to meet you. Who might you be?"

"I am... no more."

"It's nice to meet you No More."

"What is heart?"

"Excuse me? A Heart?"

"I know what a heart is, it pumps blood. You don't know what Heart is then?"

"Do you mean the concept of having heart? Like, the strength of heart to go on?"

"Yes, yes, that. Tell me quickly, there is a whole world on your side. So, so, much."

"huh. Well I've started trying to figure out an answer, since you asked, but I won't have one quickly. So much what?"

"So much... chum in the waters."

"Excuse me?"

"I see your world must be healthy. Goodbye."

"I'd hope so. Um. Goodbye?"

The wood at the back of the wardrobe now showed no sign of the humanoid shape Lauri had been talking to. "Maybe I should have invited him in before the hole shut? Wait, no, that would have been an absolutely terrible idea. How would he have left after his visit?"

Lauri's mum shouted upstairs "you're not making faustian bargains with Lovecraftian horrors, are you?"

"No mum, I'm not." Lauri shook his head, his mum sometimes made silly joke remaks like that. Returning his focus, "Mr Smiley, could you spawn a few Mini-Minotaur-Taur so I can kill them and see if they drop potions for me?"

"No but I can spawn some to try and kill you with."

"Drop the act. I know you don't need to kill or even scare people for your sustenance."

"I'm pretty sure that I do."

"What makes you think that?"

"Oh, let's see, that people enter and when they get scared and die I get fed."

"So, conjectural evidence made you believe that nonsense? You're lucky you have a Dungeon Keeper now."

"I am?"

"We'll find out together."

Soon on his way back to the old guild grounds, Lauri decided to name and describe his new skill.

[Dimension Anchor Folding: Fold extra-dimensions up into a basket, shove swords through it to lock it in and if you didn't destroy the fabric of reality it'll hop back out like a party trick]

Sophie was waiting out front this time when Lauri arrived and he waved at her as he got close. A loud banging sound caused Lauri to freeze up for a moment but as he looked around he couldn't tell where it had come from. "Hello Sophie. Came out front to meet me?"

"No, there's this really scary banging sound coming out of the dungeon. It scared me."

"Well that's worrying."

"It startled me awake."

"Hold this dungeon for me please and I'll go check it out." He held it out to her.

"This pocket-watch?"

"Sure, just don't open it. Just in case."

"In case of what?"

"It's a dungeon I folded up and put in my pocket."

Will I be okay with it?"

"Um. Don't put it into dimensional storage. Don't enter another dungeon with it. Don't play with it. Don't open it while it's folded up. Should be okay then."

"What happens if I do any of those?"

"Personally I'd rather not find out. Unless it was Hero messing with it. Then I'd laugh as he floated off into the void."

Leaving Sophie even more scared than before his arrival, Lauri looked through the entrance into the Library Dungeon and noticed he could feel a draft. The ceiling and walls were more cracked than before and the worm hadn't respawned. The flying books were hiding on top of the shelves. *BANG! Crunch, crunch.* Everything shook in the library, as well as the double-doors at the entrance. Lauri checked his System and saw that each of the two dungeons he'd become Keeper of had their own screen. Checking the one for Library Dungeon he saw that its energy had gone up from 3% to 4% so his parties last adventure here had done it some good. That being the case, what was causing the current phenomenon? Was this from entire lower floors collapsing? Was the deeper toxicity from potential loot too much? *BANG! Crunch, crunch*.

Lauri entered through the threashold and immediately received a message from Library Dungeon. ["You're here? Death has come."]

["Come? As in not 'coming'? Is it too late for me to help? Should I leave before you die?"]

["Death has come. Please help."]

Catching his eye, Lauri walked over to the hole in the wall he'd once started bashing at, which lead to the restricted area with a book on a pedastal. The wall at the opposite side had crumbled apart and something pink, round and fleshy was dangling just beyond it. Lauri looked to the left and right of the 'secret room' and noticed that the walls of the outside of the dungeon itself had been hollowed out to place it here. Turning and looking back into the dungeon Lauri couldn't help but feel impressed. All the exterior walls he could see were something like 4 meters thick of dense stone. Quite the effort to keep adventurers in. "Keep... us in?" Lauri thought to himself. Turning around and looking at the pink, fleshy thing, he realised that he wasn't looking at the guts of the dungeon. "What am I looking it?" *BANG! Crunch, crunch* the pink thing dangled around and behind it Lauri glimpsed a dark tunnel. "Huh? I wonder what's down there." Lauri got out his war-hammer and tried to bash the fleshy round thing off and out of the way.

"RRROOOOAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAWWWWAAAAAA!!!"

"Oh, it's a tonsil... Oh shit, it's a tonsil." The whole mouth backed up at great speed and giant teeth slammed shut in front of him. As the creature started turning two rows of teeth flew past Lauri before all he could see were grey scales until, finally, a massive eye came to stop in front of him. "It's okay, I know of this story. I'm so small and insignificant that you can't hear me, don't see me and no matter what I do, in the end you don't even notice I exist. Right?" He said this mostly to calm himself down. The creatures massive pupil tried to focus in but Lauri was indeed so small that when the creature got further away it couldn't make him out and getting closer it's unable to focus in on something now almost touching its eye. "Phew. Well... there's no fighting you, this dungeon is doomed. Sorry Library, nothing I can do. Bye." Lauri tried to back up but his muscles didn't budge. He kept trying to calm himself as he also tried to feel his muscles out. They were extremely tense, ready lunge forward and swing with everything he's got. "Ohhhh. Agility is the ability to change directions quickly. I get it. Like, if I swing with everything I have then I have little choice but commit to the attack. If I swing with half my strength then I can pull my punches if I need to."

"ROOAAARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR!!!"

Lauri tried to move again but couldn't bring his muscles to action, so he cast Freedom of Movement, managing to take a step back. "Wait, was some other force stopping me?" He wasn't going to wait around to find out as Lauri turned and went to run away... except he wasn't moving again. "What now?" He felt a lack of normal air pressure around his waist and looked down to see some sort of nothingness 'not holding him' in place. It was almost like the opposite of holding, as if he had nothing to grip onto or push off of in order to be able to move. Trying to hit the nothingness Lauri's hand moves through it more easily than air and the thought occured to him that if he had a fan then waving it inside this thing probably wouldn't even make a gust of wind. Almost at the verge of panic Lauri remembered his Profession. "Well too bad for you, Lovecraftian monster... wait, is it a coincidence my mum mentioned them earlier?"

A reply came within Lauri's head. "WHAT IS TOO BAD?"

"Oh yeah, I got distracted. Too bad for you, I took Unrestricted and with enough levels in that not even the gods can hold me."

"LEVELS?"

"Huh, I think I need more levels. What am I going to use Drain on?" Lauri thought to himself.

"DRAIN?"

"I'm just thinking to myself. Stop... eh, whatever." Lauri attempted a Drain Level on this colossus before him but his System instead flickered and then blinked out.

"BIG THING LEFT SMALL THING. NOW I MAKE ME."

"Your thoughts aren't very clear. Anyway, big thing got away. Might as well let me go then?" Lauri became consious of the magic coursing through his muscles and it felt like the magic was leaving as it equalised with the magic within the dungeon.

"I MAKE YOU ME."

"Hang on big guy." Lauri tried to hold onto the magic in his muscles but didn't know how. He tried gathering the leaking magic and couldn't. Finally he tried absorbing some of the magic around him and this seemed to slow the leak, which was something. "Interesting."

"DONE?"

"You're very accommodating. I'll keep practicing later. So, what were you asking me to do for you?"

"NOT ASK."

"Right so what's this about you making me, me?"

"CONSUME YOUR SOUL. RARE SOUL. YOU BECOME ME."

"Now hang on, I'm not afraid of death but how am I supposed to reincarnate, or whatever, if you consume my soul?"

The thing was done talking, as a spiritual mouth poked through the hole and slammed shut around Lauri's very being. Lauri tried to hold onto his soul and found himself locked in a mental arm wrestle. "Hey, as big as you are, your mind is seems really small within here."

"SOUL BIG" The sheer weight of its spiritual pressure slammed against Lauri and he focused purely on not losing ground, as he felt like his very mind was going to be crushed and destroyed.

"Hang on, you didn't say I'd be killed. You're saying I'll become you?"

"YOU BECOME ME."

"And souls aren't rare, are they?"

"RARE SOUL, APITISER. DUNGEON, DESERT."

"So what does becoming you mean?" This question got no reply. "You know what I'm starting to think?"

"I READ THOUGHTS BUT YOU NOT THINK IT YET."

"Hah. Because I'm 'starting' to think it. That's funny."

"TINY IS TOO CALM. STRANGE."

"I'm starting to think that my mind is being crushed only because I'm fighting back against you. Like I'm in your mouth and you're going to chew me up?" There was another moment of no reply. "Yeah, that's what I thought."

"VERY OBVIOUS. BUT POOR CREATURE KNOW IT BEING EATEN. BETTER TO NOT KNOW." As the arm of the figurative arm wrestle slammed down, suddenly overpowered, Lauri's soul was devoured.