I pumped my fist over and over.
Yes! Yes-yes-yes, that was SO much fun! Actual adventures! Magic! A proper dungeon fight! So much fun!
It would have been a shame to lose my minions, but thankfully the only casualty was the one crawler guppy that Owyn smacked. Those guys were still little after all. Just Owyn's little smack was enough to break the poor thing's spine. It was still technically alive, but I didn’t want to let it suffer. I let Mimi eat it.
The dungeon delve was a huge success too! I gained so much mana from it, not to mention the magic core fragments and some very vital information!
The little amount of dungeon core dust that Faux cast into the pond caused some very interesting mutations in some lucky guppies. Not many of them, only about two dozen or so, but still! Their front fins had turned into something like arms! And they could kind of breathe air a little! Not for very long, experiments suggested they could only last about five minutes out of the water before collapsing from exhaustion, but that was still more than nothing!
Mimi and Rab though, they had big chunks of dungeon core! And it showed! Rab was a warrior now, with a shield claw and a lance claw! And his big, meaty shield claw wasn’t just for defense either, I watched once as he crushed a rock with the big claw!
Mimi was a little bit of an oddity, I couldn’t see where her evolution was leading. All that happened to her was her claws gained an extra digit. It came in useful during the fight though, because she was able to grab my core much easier with that third digit. After passing it to a crawler guppy, our teamwork made short work of my blunder.
All I wanted to do was distract the little magician girl! With the confidence the humans had when touching my core, I’d inferred that having humans touch other cores wasn’t that big of a deal! And yet, the mother, Baroness Bellamy, got enthralled by that dinky little core!
She blamed the fact that she was distracted enough to not bring up her defenses, and honestly, I believed her. Especially since she said that after coming into contact with my core. Turns out, dungeons can steal each other's minions! All it costs was a bit of mana and a little bit of mental bullying of the weak! That's right, I now had a living, breathing human minion!
I didn’t want to tear her away from her family or duties however, I wasn’t a monster. Currently, her commands were to ‘Act as if you are not enthralled. Bring no suspicion that you are under my control. Return to your normal life, and wait for my call.’.
Effectively, I now had a sleeper agent in the human world! Well, assuming nobody noticed. I didn’t know how humans could tell if their own were enthralled or not, or even if they could. I would have to ask Faux about that later.
For now though, I think it’s about time I had some real fun! Playing with the humans was fun and all, but I was used to my dreams. Single player. God of my own world. Since I can’t sleep as a dungeon, I was beginning to miss the feeling. But now I had rules! Now I knew what I was doing!
And I had all the fragments of the magic cores that broke off when the Baroness punched Ryker’s shield!
Shame I never caught the other guys name, but oh well. Who cares! I ordered Faux to collect the core fragments that he could. The little dusty bits I left on the ground, but ordered my crawling guppies to go and lick it up. Wouldn’t want to waste after all!
Ok, so! The rules of this world would seem to be as follows.
One, magic worked through mana and will. Was intent the same thing as will? Or were there semantics there that I didn’t know about. I didn’t know, and I don’t think the semantics made a difference to me. Hadn't stopped me yet.
Two, I could direct the evolution of my creatures if I wanted to. Since I didn’t insert my will into the previous evolution, maybe they evolved randomly? That would explain the difference between Mimi and Rab, but not the conformity of the crawling guppies. I’d have to experiment there.
Three, magic cores and dungeon cores functioned identically for my purposes of evolving my creatures. Dead cores did not.
Three and a half, I suppose, I could use either mana or dungeon cores to evolve my creatures. I didn't have a lot of mana, and dungeon cores weren't that hard for me to gather. So for the foreseeable future, I'd just use other dungeon cores.
With all that in mind, I eyed the dozens of fragmented bits of cores in Faux’s hand. Most of the fragments were a dull black. Not the same inky void of the other fragments. Those must be dead cores. The inky fragments, hidden behind that very distinct veil, must still be viable sources of cores. There were more inky fragments than would make up the dungeon core, so broken magic cores must shatter into part functional cores, and part dead cores. I could experiment if I ever found magic cores of my own, but why would I? Magic cores would always be more valuable than dead ones.
Just in case though, I fed all the dead cores to one of my trout. to the other trout, I fed a magic core fragment. It was a shame I didn’t have a third, to use as control. No, I killed the third when I was young and didn't know how to control my strength.
I gave that fish a middle finger, although now it was just a skeleton resting at the bottom of the pond. My guppies had picked it clean, as well as the barracuda. I could waste mana and convert them to undead, but now that I knew I had better uses of my mana, I didn’t want to do that.
Rab, could you dispose of the skeletons please?
My large mimic crab obeyed happily. It opened its now giant hatch and tossed both fishy skeletons in. It also went to the last remaining thausen corpse, tucked away in a corner. Mimi joined him, and together they picked at the flesh, throwing the large chunks into the pond for the fish to pick off. They would share the bones once they picked it clean enough.
Food was slowly becoming an evident problem. My crawler guppies didn’t eat for the longest while at first, but eventually they did begin to hunt down the guppies that remained free of my control. My guess was that when they ate the dungeon core, whatever mana it supplied them with kept them satiated for a while. Since I couldn’t sustainably feed all my minions cores whenever they got hungry, I would need to find a new source of food soon.
The waterfall that occasionally spat down a guppy was slowing down, and the guppies that did fall in were getting bigger. My guess was that wherever the guppies were coming from, they were growing up. Getting strong enough to escape the pull of the waterfall, or even just too fat to fit down the hole. Who knew.
I told Faux to keep the smaller chunks of dungeon core next to me on my pedestal. All the other bits of magic core and dungeon cores would go to Mimi and Rab. I really wanted to see their next evolutions!
As for my crawler guppies, I had a plan for them. As Owyn so kindly explained to the little Bellamy, Isabelle, my influence over my minions evolution was tied directly to my will. The mana could be substituted for cores, meaning theoretically, all I had to do was focus my intent on where I wanted the fish to end up.
Dragon. I want dragons! Y'all got scales right? It’s not that big of a stretch. Just grow some legs, lengthen your necks and tails, and turn your fins into wings! Even if we don’t get there in one big leap, let’s take some steps. Legs first. Or wings first. Or even the neck and tail, who knows! Maybe I’ll end up with my very own, mini loch ness monster!
I kept my mind on dragons, focusing my will on the crawler guppies. In the meantime, I wanted to use my mana elsewhere. Namely, expanding my territory! I had a whole bunch of mana now, and I really hated being confined.
I felt it as my dungeon expanded. Deeper and deeper into the cave system, still leaving my core room exposed to the human side. Luckily, the path down never encountered any doorways leading back to the surface, meaning my core room became essentially a choke point! The humans could have everything up above, but down below was mine! I had a few words to give that one rude dungeon that chased me out from below there.
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My last order of business I gave to Faux. Although food was becoming an issue, it wasn’t a problem yet. If I really had to, I could ask him to collect rats and mice and throw them into the pond. No, he had a job that only he, with his opposable thumbs, could do! Write in the book!
Faux seemed very pleased to be the one with an exclusive job.
First, I would write a ‘letter’ to the Baroness. Even though I could theoretically communicate with her through my connection to her, I wanted to give her a valid excuse to leave me alone, or at least open a dialogue with me. She was supposed to be acting like a normal human after all! And that involved attending to her duties as a Baroness. Whatever that involved.
The second thing Faux would write would be an introduction to me as a dungeon. Nothing complex, just something like ‘Hello, my name is Lucid! I’m a friendly dungeon!’ or something like that. I would have instructions about how to interact with the denizens of my dungeon, and a warning that no quarter would be given to those that seek to harm me or mine. I also wouldn’t mind if people just left me to my own devices! I would never actively seek to harm anyone anyways.
Besides all that, Faux would probably just go exploring. I wanted more dungeon cores, and the only way to get them was to conquer them!
While he did that, I imagined what my life was going to be like with hundreds of dragons at my command.
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A dungeon brushed up against my territory. Faux was nowhere close to me at this point in time, he was deep in the caves below, fighting a dungeon of his own. No, this dungeon came to me.
Mine! Go away! My territory! It shouted at me.
It came from a wall of all things. My avatar teleported to the room it was trying to enter. I noticed a black void, slowly growing out from a crack in the wall. I also heard the angry chittering of a mouse with something clenched in its teeth.
I relented some of my territory to the invading core, passively taking in the mana it offered me in exchange. Once it grew to a certain amount, it stopped. The black void fell out of the crack, in the shape of a hexagonal cylinder on its side. The void scampered along the wall, eventually reaching a corner. The void jostled a bit, and I heard the quiet sound of glass touch rock. Then, a mouse darted out of the void, sniffing around my territory.
Ha! Scared! Weak! My territory! Kill!
I watched with passive fascination as the mouse darted towards the nearest creature. A centipede. It bit the creature, killing it instantly. The mouse then shoved the bug into its mouth before scampering after its next victim.
I received a bit of mana from the kill. Although it’s been a while since I actively killed insects of my own accord, I still remembered about how much mana I should get from the kill. These kills only gave me about a tenth of what they should have, but still, mana was mana.
Hey cool! Auto farming!
My avatar laid down on thin air, smiling as it watched the little mouse scamper about, killing everything it could. It was so cute! The dungeon, that was, not the mouse. I could care less for the rodent. But look at the baby dungeon! It thinks it’s so strong, taking territory that I willingly gave it! How cute!
Back! The dungeon core said. The mouse ran back to the dungeon's territory.
It sent it back out after a second. Kill!
Faux finished up with his core down below. I felt it when he grabbed onto the core with a closed fist. He held it in a fist in order to protect it from other creatures that might want to steal it from me. I protected Faux in turn, from being taken by the other dungeon. Not that it took much effort. Granted, the distance away from my own core made it slightly more difficult to hold off the other core’s will, but I managed.
As Faux made his way back, he suddenly stopped. At this distance, I couldn’t feel much from him, so I could only guess as to what he was doing. He wandered off path, making a detour somewhere. When he reached his destination, I knew why. He found a second core!
Good boy! I praised. Bring them both home!
Faux radiated at the praise. Even with our weak connection, I could feel it from here!
The Baroness’s connection was so weak I would almost count it as non-existent. If she were to even brush up against a weak core at this distance, I wasn’t sure I’d be able to keep my control over her. Hopefully she never touched a stray dungeon core while out there.
During the time it took Faux to make his way back to my territory, I noticed something strange about my pet dungeon. Well, actually with the mouse it controlled. Every once in a while, after it collected enough mana, it would bring the mouse back to its territory. I didn’t notice anything strange at first, but now that enough time had passed, I could visibly see a difference in the size of the mouse.
Its fur was sharper, and more clumped together. Compared to the other wild mice in my territory, it was also a little bigger. Its teeth in particular were visibly larger than other mice. It was practically a rat at this point!
Faux wandered into the room with the wild dungeon.
Leave it alone. I told him. It’s doing something to the mouse. I think it’s feeding it the mana it's gaining and evolving it? Maybe. That’s my guess anyways.
Faux had no qualms about it. Not that he would, with his cultish personality.
I observed the little core for a while longer before returning to my core room. Faux waded through the water and up the stairs to my freshly repaired cage. Mimi and Rab watched him from beside the stairs. Both of them had grown taller than the water was deep at this point, Rab more so than Mimi. Mimi gained a fourth digit on her claws, which have shifted to better resemble hands at this point.
I recalled a time when those claws held me above a giant, fleshy maw, full of tentacles and teeth. She’d tried to swallow me whole.
Unbroken.
That led me down a spiraling train of thought. Faux? Give one core to Mimi, and the other one to Rab. Don’t damage them.
Faux obliged. Mimi accepted her core graciously. Rab was a little clumsy with his. His shield claw was too bulky to hold the core, and his lance claw wasn’t built for precision work. Mimi ended up helping him in the end, dropping the core into his open hatch mouth.
Both crabs raised their crowns.
According to what I’d experienced so far, it would take a little over three hours before their mutations began actually manifesting. This time seemed to be an exception. I heard their shells begin creaking and cracking under the stress as they underwent drastic changes.
Rab visually grew in size. His rear most legs shifted slightly, moving even further back. His chest swelled without elongating, creating more muscle to better support his growing, giant claw. His lance lost its second digit entirely, transforming into a true lance that extended in both directions. His crab mouth parts fused with his frontal shell, almost looking like abs. As he finished his growth, his abs opened in six different parts, revealing dozens of sharp tentacles with tooth blades on the ends. He screeched in pleasure, excited about his growth.
Mimi did not grow much. Her body rounded off, becoming almost circular. Her eyes emerged further out of her shell, pulling a pale form with it. A humanoid body emerged from her hatch mouth, complete with human hands. Her eyes remained as stalks, poking up from where the eyes would be on a human. The human portion of her body looked rather plain, with no details where I would have liked them to matter. She didn’t even have a mouth or nose, just a rise or indentation of flesh that almost looked like a mask. Even her hair just looked like matted tufts instead of what it should have looked like.
Maybe I would have to influence that in her next evolution. Next time, I would for sure give them full cores! Unbroken cores were so much more powerful than the fragments!
Rab reached up for my cage. With hardly any effort whatsoever, his giant claw tore down the stone bars. Satisfied, he shoved his way between Faux and my core, settling his giant body down on the stairs between me and everything else.
Protect. He grumbled.
I heard him even without physical contact. I heard him! Rab! I cried, overjoyed!
Mimi’s human half rose, the hatch of her shell opening in a screech.
And Mimi! She screeched.
You guys! I could tear up. This was wonderful! I could hear my minions!
Help! Mimi shouted enthusiastically. Hands! Help! Write! Explore!
You have hands! I agreed, my avatar jumped in front of her grotesque form, pretending to hold her human hands. Would you like to help Faux explore?
Help! Mimi agreed. Her mimic mouth shut with a clunk. Grow dungeon!
Thanks guys! My wild grin faltered a little bit. But… I don’t want to take away your free will. I still want you guys to do what you want to do, you know? I don’t want to overwrite your personalities, so if you ever want anything, you just let me know, ok?
Rab grumbled. Dungeon help us. We mimics. We belong dungeon. Help dungeon.
I wiped away an invisible tear, genuinely touched. You guys are awesome.
I spun in place, planting my hands on my waist. Right! Let’s turn this place into an actual base of operations! Mimi! I think we need some plants growing in here! Hopefully we can harvest them for food later! Faux! I think it’s time we ask the outside world for help! You still got that letter for the Baroness? I think we might need to add a few lines to it!