I love comments. And views. And support in general.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Have you ever had a great, a truly wonderful dream, and then are woken up by something akin to 10,000 Watts flowing through you? No? I see. Well, if I had to describe it, then I would say it was a rude awakening, like finding out you didn’t put a coke in the fridge when you last took one. The electricity coursing through me was incredible, and my only thought was “Huh.” See, although I could feel the sensation, and yes, it was quite uncomfortable, I was mainly confused. As confused as a homeless man under house arrest.

At first I just sat there, in so much as a perfect sphere set into a pillar could do. And then feeling confined, and a bit stiff after waking up, I stretched, expanding my conscious into the surroundings. Which was not much, because my majestic throne was the only thing within the concentric room with a single window that I could see. At the limit of my vision, through the window was something moving, and so I naturally attempted to stand up, jump down, and move closer to peer through the glass. However great my genius is though, I could not force my will upon the immobile ball I currently am. So I waited. And waited.

Soon enough something changed. As expected, because eventually something had to change, and I could wait forever. Unless this ball of mine ages, which would be pretty sick.

Only three minutes after I stopped what I was doing, which of course was nothing, the current changed. It grew thinner and weaker, flickering on and off, with other identical currents flowing into me as well. The electricity felt good, like the first piece of meat you eat after a week of only vegetables. I payed attention to the patterns that the electricity was showing, and eventually dredged up my very small amount of memories of Morse code from the depths of my brain. Or crystal ball, not sure if I have a brain anymore.

If I was correct, then something was trying to communicate with me. I might be able to understand my situation, maybe leave this room. I reached out and took control of the electric flow, and began to flicker it on and off to the tune of a popular song, Sandstorm. This continued for a while, with small miniature elves dancing in my head until the window, which was apparently not a window slid open, revealing … nothing. Seems like it was standing right outside my vision, on the border of my room.

I shot electricity towards the opening, my conscious riding on the infinitely complex waves I had emitted, flowing straight towards the creature. And then right passed it, as it quickly sidestepped and ducked the visible light stream. Which was fine by me, for I would not like a body that was only in its teens, and female at that. Based on my original situation, normally animate objects would not be my limit, no I could survive inside anything, hibernating until retreating energy.

I quickly glance around with my non-existent eyes, before my stream splashed against a magical display, sending me into a world of ones and zeros. Quickly using my very basic programming skills I cobbled together a makeshift program, and projected a hastily created ASCII face onto the monitor. I also accessed the camera, albeit with some resistance from a small wolf like territorial program which I smashed into pieces with a quickly formed hammer and scattered his pieces across the dump files.

Taking a good long look I smiled out of the screen, and said in the most cheerful voice I knew “Hello? Resident rampant intelligence here, would like to inquire about job opportunities and minimum wage. My name? Why it’s Legion of course, what else would it be?” The short, blond haired and green eyed elf standing with a gun aimed at the core that I used to be jumped, and turned to my new home.

“What are you? Why can you leave the core?” She called out.

“Hmm, well as stated before, I am Legion. And if by core you mean the shiny doodad over there, well I felt like it wasn't quite right.” I made my program shrug “what are you?”

She frowned, and stepped forward, holstering the offensive toy. As if a pistol could destroy me. It would at least take two. I think. Next step: get me some good ol defensive casing around the core, as my conscious is only projected from it.. I messed around with my program, added a body, basically a robotic humanoid. Then I added a dog, because dogs are man’s best friend. Actually on second though scrap the dog, I’ll just slap her in here. There, a perfect likeliness. I turn my avatar, a feat which required some snappy coding, and cocked my head, making her do the same, although with a slight lag time.

Unauthorized use: this story is on Amazon without permission from the author. Report any sightings.

She stared back, and then spoke “I’m Lavima, the new owner of this airship. And could you not do that, it’s slightly creepy seeing me.” Shrugging her shoulders she sighed, shooting a last remark my way as she exited through a door I literally couldn't see. As in hidden from me.

“Don’t to anything, I’ll go get someone to figure out what’s going on. Dungeon Lords shouldn't be able to leave the core.”

I promptly configured the settings of the system, and set up a constant provision of energy to the core. Unnerved by the fact something was hidden from me, I searched through the trawling massive amount of code present in the small isolated unit I controlled. And presto, spotted a severed connection. A probe or two later and I reopened the virtual path, leaping through a wall of fire to find myself face to face with a tall, emotionless woman, kneeling in a guard position, her hand holding a large sword.

Intent to travel further, and intrigued about this humanoid program. Let’s try accessing her code … hmm well I guess it’s a different language. But dang man, she must be really complex, and if I’m not mistaking that’s a self-learning program. So in greeting I recalled my comparably horribly shoddy and eye melting graphical glitch of a dog, and sicced him on her. Success, he ran forward and sprang at her growling until she touched him, at which I felt her completely rewrite his code, converting him into a fox. I see. Turning around he sprinted at me, perhaps almost 40 fps, about twice my speed. What processing power she must have to be able to just allocate that to a throw away program.

Slapping down a wall of code, I created a flashing graphic of a cat, with a small caption underneath. Armed with ad block the fox slashed through my window, only to be crushed by a small hastily sculpted square with a spike, invisible until it stopped falling due to not having an animation attached. Sprinting forward I spawned a function, which upon activation shot a small string of code into the fox, causing it to slow down and glitch as the virus ran rampant. Turning my impromptu weapon towards the armored woman, I shot multiple rapid fire, two landing, causing her to fall down as her ram was ate up. Taking my chance I created multiple chains binding her,and quarantined her, limiting her access to my core and the room containing it.

Turning to the actual airship that carried me, I learned that it was named the Andromea, and was one of the cheapest models available. However it did have a manufacturing section, which I immediately visited, with the magical intelligence following behind, a glimpse of intellect now visible in her eyes. Looking at the systems I found a automated magic circle, which I then convinced to begin creating a physical copy of my attempt at a dog, although it was more alike to a wolf.. I also reconfigured the ward into a management one, and built some slave lesser circle to take care of the actual details. After around three hours the automaton was complete, and I transferred over, removing my conscious from the ship and having a direct connection between my core and the new body.

Now in direct control over my body, I took one step forward, and then created a new dent in the floor using my head. Youch. Okay let’s attempt a second time. Ey, eye y I got this, let’s try to jump. Nope. No acrobatics for me, but let’s head to the exit, wait on whoever she brings back. Following a copied mental virtual map I made my way to the exit tunnel, redecorating and renovating the walls and floors along the way as I refined my movements. Reaching the exit, I crouched, detecting vibrations indicating speech and heavy footfalls. Flooding my motors with power, I tensed next to the door.

The next moment the portal slid open, revealing Lavima and a group of large, unruly and shabbily dressed louts with weapons drawn. Excuse me, but I doubt that these folk would be able to help with your dungeon control problem. And attempting to step into my domain dragging who knows what with them, inexcusable. Disarming them was as easy as taking candy from a diabetic man who no longer wishes to eat candy, their technique was horrible and their grips nothing compared to my massive steely jaw. Kicking them out again, and dragging the girl inside, I contacted Areanilla and had her lock up the ship, no one in or out. Standing there while Lavima watched me, I waited. And tension filled the room like a deadly fart fills a room with no windows. She finally spoke, hesitantly and quietly.

“Thank you.”