“Does that mean you will tell me what happened to her?” I asked.

When you entered a dungeon, you were usually offered two choices. You could complete the lore by destroying it. Completing the lore turned it into a blessing which you could then absorb. Essentially, the power of the dungeon was turned into a blessing which then became an extension of your soul, like adding a peripheral to a computer. At least, that’s the best I was able to explain it.

Destroying the lore was the same as eliminating the source of power. The dungeon would no longer be able to turn mana into miasma and the miasma would be released from the dungeon and freely disperse. Cut off from miasma, the dungeon would whither up and collapse and the monsters would die out, although it was possible that some survived and became surface-level monsters.

However, there was a third option that didn’t seem to be mentioned, and that was conquering a dungeon. Technically, it didn’t resolve the cursed lore, but it just passed it into a new party. They became the new dungeon master and were capable of manipulating the lore to their will. Dungeon masters and their dungeons had a strange relationship.

Despite often being closely linked, they weren’t the same. A dungeon was a bit like an animal. While it had will, it could be guided, influenced, or manipulated depending on who was in charge. Meanwhile, a dungeon master was tasked with repairing the dungeon but didn’t necessarily have complete control of the dungeon.

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How my dungeon differed in the past was that I was the builder, while I assigned others as the master. The dungeons I created were linked to my soul. Thus, I was my own dungeon, and thus could control it or allow it to be controlled. That was no longer the case. My dungeon was no longer bound to me. Instead, I was the dungeon’s master. The dungeon contained a lot of lore, but nothing that was inherently cursed or unfulfilled. Until it finished evolving, I didn’t know what that would mean for the future of my dungeon.

In the meantime, however, I seemed to have inherited another dungeon, and after taming the dungeon master, I indirectly had control of this dungeon. Yet, I didn’t even understand it. I had indeed threatened this kid with the thought of destroying the core, but he seemed to give up rather quickly. Was he that terrified of the lore being destroyed? Most dungeon masters wouldn’t be dungeon masters if they didn’t inherently want to protect their dungeons, but it wasn’t so clean-cut as their lives being tied to the dungeon. I’ve personally managed to cut the lives of various people from their dungeons, and with Alysia, it’d probably be pretty easy to do on someone willing.

“I will never do what you tell me!” The kid responded defiantly with tears in his eyes.

“Won’t you though?”

The woman in the witch outfit sighed. “It seems like Master has recognized you as his big brother.”

“N-Not true!” The boy cried.

“I don’t care,” I responded, feeling slightly irritated. “Can someone just tell me where my woman is?”

“Fine! I’ll show you, but I’ll never see you as my big brother!”

I didn’t want him to though.