A great rift tore a hole in the sky above my domain. At first, I didn’t notice it, despite the grand scale of the event. It was out of my range and didn’t cause great distortions that would clue me in to its presence. There was no great light show or auditory booms to announce its presence. Even those in my domain with eyes didn’t notice it until a great change overtook the land.

The people of New Hope gave a great outcry when my domain was filled by a blue mist. It was mana, made visible and forced to rise toward the rift by an invisible force. As it rose, an invisible wind churned the motes into a slow cyclone that accelerated and turned the mana golden the closer it got to the spatial rift.

I knew what the people saw by virtue of my telescope, but after I noticed the disturbance I rushed up with my cilia and beheld the construct with far more precise senses.

It was a titanic cilia bursting through a hole in space. Clearly from a dungeon. A specific dungeon. It was nearly a meter thick, and vibrating with immense weight. It had so much power that I could feel the very space I inhabited contort around it.

Mana wasn’t the only thing that was affected. My trees creaked and every human within my domain stopped as an invisible wave washed over their souls and paralyzed their bodies. They looked up as one. Frozen in rapture to the degree I wasn’t even sure that their minds were processing anything that their eyes were showing them.

I touched upon the tendril and felt its power. This wasn’t like my interaction with Rockwood. That dungeon’s cilia had stopped me, but I could push against them. Grind them to dust with enough effort. Destroy them with enough time. Deia was different. She wasn’t merely one or two tiers higher than me. She was twice my tier and was entirely intractable.

I had grown much since my time with Rockwood and I pulled deeply on my mana reserves in response. Scintillating blue light traveled up the cyclone of slow-moving mana and slammed into the great cilia and it shuddered.

Memories crashed into my mind. Impressions. Thoughts. Images. It all mixed up in a slurry of intent I had grown accustomed to dealing with. It was a girl. A small, waifish thing. Clutching a dungeon core bound by dark chains. The core itself felt empty. Dull and dumb. Instead, it was the girl who guided the dungeon’s fibers. In the space between moments, I grew to know her. How she looked, what she liked, and what drove her. Her greed and patience. Her frustration at haven’t so little control and, above it all, her immense boredom at this pedestrian task.

Boredom?

“I’m coming to help, Mama!”

Betsy's cry shocked me from my investigation. My little one was already floating high in the sky, and so was disturbingly close to Deia’s cilia. She raced the short distance to narrow the gap and opened every one of her numerous eyes at the invading tendril.

“Staaare!”

NO!

I roared with all my might as I encapsulated the energetic little goon in a thick mesh, intending to drag her back to safety.

Quick as a whip, the titanic cilia reacted to the damage and shot out. It slammed into Betsy, latching onto her face and tearing up my thin barrier with every passing second. I shoved mana into the barrier, forcing it to stabilize as I pulled with all my might. It wasn’t enough, and in a moment of inspiration, I formed a rudimentary pulley system to multiply the force I could apply a hundredfold.

My cilia rope buzzed through the various pulleys as the mechanical advantage allowed me to slowly jerk Betsy down and away. Betsy mumbled, but couldn’t open her mouth to speak. She was trapped in a hard bubble, though thankfully not subject to the immense forces being applied through her cage.

Oh, this is new. I just must have this little monster!

I felt a thought bubble up to the surface from my connection to the strand. It was a strange thought. Rudimentary. Simple. Too simple. Almost...human in the way it lacked the deep undertones I had grown accustomed to when handling intent.

She is not yours for the taking, I sent through the connection.

Holy! You are loud! Turn it down....better.

I added another dozen pulleys to my impromptu snatch block and reinforced the cilia. Inch by inch, I dragged Betsy and her unbidden connection down toward the ground.

You really must tell me how you got so proficient at moving the Dungeon Flows! I don’t think I’ve ever seen them move so fluidly!

The words kept flowing across the connection, but I couldn’t take them seriously. They were...so mundane. Lacking any meaning. It felt like trying to communicate with a toddler. One who could only speak in clipped phrases. Despite the immense power of the cilia, the controlling intelligence behind the dungeon wasn’t strong. It was...weak. Human.

That made me mad. This was Deia? The all-powerful foe I had vowed to defeat? Yes, she was powerful, too powerful for me in my current state, but it felt insulting to have to retreat against such a foe.

Instantly, I resorted to my backup plan. It wasn’t ready but should do to even the scales. All across the land, I had conquered in my expansionist crusade, I commanded my cilia to descend downward. Deep beneath the earth, a handful of dungeons lay dormant as I expanded across the surface world. I had meant to cover more of the land before I resorted to destroying these things for the levels they could provide me, but the time for battle had come.

< You have destroyed a dungeon! [Chaos Untold] grants +4 to physical level! Physical level: 32 >

My grip on Betsy grew stronger and I yanked her farther from Deia’s covetous embrace. Good thing too, since I had already burned thousands of points of mana to regenerate the thin barrier that was the only thing that stood between Betsy and annihilation.

< You have destroyed a dungeon! [Chaos Untold] grants +4 to physical level! Physical level: 36 >

< You have destroyed a dungeon! [Chaos Untold] grants +4 to physical level! Physical level: 40 >

Now that is a neat trick! I never did like steroid ultimates but you can’t deny their usefulness.

< You have destroyed a dungeon! [Chaos Untold] grants +4 to physical level! Physical level: 44 >

What in the world was she talking about? I ignored her, forcing my cilia to dig at unprecedented rates into the dungeons of the world. Each dungeon was weak. Between tier one and four. Nothing I couldn’t handle, especially since I could easily defeat the lower-tier ones before using the strength they granted me to annihilate the defenses of the more powerful.

< You have destroyed a dungeon! [Chaos Untold] grants +4 to physical level! Physical level: 48 >

Oh wow! No, no no. Stop that! Stop that now!

A burst of incomprehensible static flowed across our connection. I froze for a second. On some level, I understood what the message was supposed to impart. Pure pain. Unfettered agony as muscle and sinew was torn apart. But...I had no flesh and blood. Technically, my physical form was a perfect crystal. Such a message washed over me, and I couldn’t help but feel it with the clinical detachment of a child studying an ant.

Pathetic.

< You have destroyed a dungeon! [Chaos Untold] grants +4 to physical level! Physical level: 52 >

Take this!

The golden cilia flexed, crushing my defenses and I was forced to dump inordinate amounts of mana into reinforcing it. At the same time, another mental buzz washed over me.

And that!

My shield cracked but I managed to yank Betsy hard enough to separate her for just a brief second—

And that!

My mana ran out.

Ooh! What is this fine specimen right here?

< Floor 1 creature count: 30/31 >

This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.

I watched in horror as my dear darling was stolen from me. Golden strands ripped apart mine despite all my efforts and took control of Betsy.

I continued battering at the golden strands with everything I had. Conical cilia drills spun at lethal speeds as I unleashed waves upon waves of projectiles that peppered the surface nonstop. Still, nothing I did worked. I was simply too low-level to fight this monster head-to-head without mana reinforcement.

A string of human mutterings flowed across the connection as I turned my attention to my telescope. None of the cilia could be seen through its lens, and all I really saw was Betsy floating in the sky.

Or what was left of her.

She twitched, her eyes open wide in horror and pain as layers of reinforced skin and muscle were peeled away to reveal her internal organs. I screamed, redoubling my blind attack and forcing the few dregs of mana that were flowing into me to restart my desperate destruction of the surrounding dungeons.

< You have destroyed a dungeon! [Chaos Untold] grants +4 to physical level! Physical level: 56 >

I had closed the gap, but not fast enough. On the small blank canvas, my telescope projected onto, I watched as Betsy was torn apart. From Deia’s muttering I concluded that she was ‘memorizing’ her so that she could recreate her later.

Ahh! What an amazing method of producing flight! I wonder if I could graft that onto myself...

Enough.

I pulled back. Racing towards my other creations. Betsy would respawn in time, and I had to figure out a way to keep her from stealing any of my other minions. At the same time, I had to eke out the last bit of mana from my domain so that I could quickly destroy a few more dungeons. Unfortunately. Most of the dungeons whose cores were close to the surface I had already destroyed, and all that remained were the high-level, or out-of-the-way ones.

I triggered my earthquake generator but I could already tell that it wasn’t as effective as normal. Deia’s presence dragged nearly 80% of the mana up to the sky. What little managed to get to me was just a drop in the bucket compared to my normal generation. Worst of all, all the incoming prayers from my town had halted as the people stood frozen in rapture. My mana generation was at an all-time low. So low, that I worried that I may lose consciousness mid-battle if I burned all that I gained.

Looks like your steroid is wearing off! Guess I can see what other fascinating creatures you’ve managed to concoct!

Above me, Deia dropped the remnants of Betsy’s corpse and raced into me. Her tendril’s ripped apart mine with frightening ease. Without mana reinforcement and because of my relatively diffuse domain, it seemed as if my cilia barely slowed the abominable creature. I stopped myself from instinctively reinforcing my cilia. I had to conserve mana though I couldn't help but kick myself for leaving my domain so diffuse.

I ignored her rambling, forcing myself to be analytical. I could command Cortana and Tank to run away, but Deia was absurdly fast for a dungeon. Tank should be able to outrun her, but Cortana was never designed to move so fast. In theory, I could just kill them both so that they could respawn later, but that thought was inherently distasteful. It probably would work, at least for a time, but if Deia decided to stick around, there was nothing to stop her from stealing those two once they respawned. Besides, I wanted to give that wretched human something to think about.

What better way to get back at her than to make it utterly impossible for her to ever get her grubby little fingers on any of my creations? The soul was a dungeon’s ultimate weakness. Even now, as empowered and knowledgeable as I was, I still couldn’t directly manipulate living things. Trying to do so would lead to a complete loss of control of my strands.

To do that though, I had to be able to give my minions souls. Something that [Soulbind Artifact] stubbornly considered a part of the creation process for an artifact. Why giving a soul to a minion counted as making an Artifact, I didn’t know, but it did. [Soulbind Artifact] needed to go. It had saved me once or twice and was kind of useful at defeating the Inquisitors but on the whole, had been a total pain to work around. Besides, there were way too few artifacts in the world for the upside of [Soulbind Artifact] to be worth it.

And so, I pulled up my interface and stared hard at the offending skill. I had no illusions that I could change the skill to some degree. Mana didn’t seem to have any limitations as far as I could tell. At least, if I had enough of it that is.

With some trepidation tempered by the rampaging tentacle encroaching upon Cortana, I covered a cilia with a thin layer of mana and stabbed my interface.

It sunk in a fraction of an inch, then...bounced. The mana coating I had constructed faded and I was forced to retract my strand. I glared at the interface as I tried to think of some method to change the interface without bucket loads of mana. Then it struck me and I almost laughed.

I gathered another tiny handful of mana and brought it to my interface. I didn't try and pierce the interface this time. Instead, I wrapped [Soulbind Artifact] with a few sparse layers of mana threads that would barely constitute a mana message. I didn't bother trying to imbue much intent into the craft, instead opting to grab a small soul of a low-tier fern and—

< You cannot craft Artifacts! >

[Soulbind Artifact] unraveled like a watch spring released from its housing. A spike of multifaceted agony raced up my core. It was both the sharp lightning of a splinter beneath a fingernail and the deep ache of a bone fracture. As the feeling propagated, hairline fractures spread across my floating gemstone, and I frantically reinforced the weakening segments with cilia. The magic of [Soulbind Artifact] was uncompromising. It targeted the components of the craft and only them, however, by tearing out such a crucial component, it inadvertently destabilized the rest. Seconds that felt like hours passed as I fought to keep myself from falling apart.

Gotcha!

Blearily, I noticed one of Cortana’s slow-moving eye-balloons get grabbed by Deia’s tentacle. Golden strands raced through my second boss’s branches to reach her core. Exhausted and in pain, I spawned a Nothic beside my largest tree, and had it stab the trunk. Dagger of Geas triggered and I gently pulled out the tree’s soul and inserted it into Cortana.

< You have crafted < Armor Artifact > >

The effect was immediate. Despite the soul only being tier 5, Deia’s tentacle unraveled at the tip.

What the? Why won’t you go? Stupid broken thing...

I sighed, as I stream of expletives rose through my connection. I was dealing with a child. I repeated the procedure with Tank and took a moment to rest.

One of these days I would wait to do untested things until after the critical battle. I ached. My crystal had numerous cracks through it, and my interface no longer opened properly, but my mana levels were rising and my children were safe. I dared not try and fix my core at the moment. Especially with so little mana that I needed to increase my level.

How’d you do that?! Tell me! Tell me! Tell me!

I couldn’t help it. I laughed. As if I would tell you! I sacrificed a few points of mana to send my laughter coupled with some pure pain across the connection since the insolent child didn’t seem to have the sensitivity to read my intent through simple touch alone. Here I was, thinking that I would finally find another intelligent dungeon. Instead, I get this...human who is drunk on power.

Ha! You can’t touch me with pain signals. If you don’t fess up, I’m going to come over there and just take your dungeon core and make you tell me!

I sighed again, trying to push away the pain in my core as her tentacle started digging again. I responded by having one of my Nothic start stabbing trees. Each one I stole the soul of, and ripped out the mana stored within. It was a terrible method of mana collection. Inefficient and wasteful. It saddened me to see my carefully cultivated forest grow dull and brown. But I needed the mana.

< You have destroyed a dungeon! [Chaos Untold] grants +4 to physical level! Physical level: 60 >

< You have destroyed a dungeon! [Chaos Untold] grants +4 to physical level! Physical level: 64 >

< You have destroyed a dungeon! [Chaos Untold] grants +4 to physical level! Physical level: 68 >

I destroyed a few more dungeons and I felt my cilia stabilize. I was still losing by a landslide, but I had slowed her advance to a crawl. Unfortunately, I was out of mana again, and the next closest dungeon was nearly a quarter mile away. I had already slain Rockwood, a fact I’m sure the Dwarves wouldn’t appreciate, and there weren't any other dungeons I could destroy. If only Deia had waited just one more day, I would have easily had access to enough dungeons to out-level her.

I didn’t regret saving up the dungeons until now. My strategy was optimal for expansion. Every additional meter I could expand was an additional meter of forest I could extract mana from to further expand. Spending significant mana and effort to go dungeon hunting would have increased my level, but it would have slowed down my expansion just that much more. No, I had done everything right. Deia was simply too strong. I probably should have stayed under the radar a little longer, but what could you do? Hindsight was twenty-twenty after all.

Deia burst into the dark tunnels of my first floor. My minions tried their best and did a surprising amount of damage, but in the end, they were swept aside. Minutes passed in painful conflict as I was slowly pushed back. Perhaps the worst aspect was the constant stream of unhinged mutterings emanating from my connection to Deia. She was angry. Not that I had used [Chaos Untold] to nearly defeat her, but because I had foiled her plans to tear apart Cortana.

Just then, a ghostly burst of wind slipped past our theater of conflict. It was the Wind Sprite. That troublesome little thing that had placed Betsy in so much danger. It flew through my tunnels and breakneck speed and eventually found itself floating before my damaged core.

Chains. Coming.

It whispered to me, caressing my cilia as it floated in arcing spirals around my core.

I know, I whispered back to it. It twirled, sending me a complicated burst of intent.

Earth sing. Wind howl. Promise?

I turned to the mischievous thing, trying to understand what it was harking on about when it touched my core and my interface pinged.

< Upgrades Pending: 1 >

Oh? Now that was interesting. I hadn’t gained a level, so clearly this sprite had somehow bypassed the system.

Gift!

I quickly snapped open the window and read through the options.

One With The Wind:

Transform your domain into wind that follows you wherever you wish to go

99 minute duration

99,999 minute cooldown

You can only gain mana from any source while the earth sings and the wind howls

One With The Air:

Transform your domain into a gaseous self-adhering conglomerate that moves as you will it

99 minute duration

99,999 minute cooldown

You can only gain mana from any source while the land rumbles and the sky shrieks

One With The Sky:

Bring all that resides within you on a journey of freedom

99 minute duration

99,999 minute cooldown

You can only gain mana from any source while the stone roars and the sky screams