As I watch the group of guild scouts exit my dungeon, I return to the second floor to continue its steady construction. Now, where was I? Right, I had just spread a bunch of mushrooms throughout the forest. Next up—mushroom people! From what I’ve read from the system, I should be able to give quests, but I don’t really want to hand them out manually unless I feel like it.
That’s why I’ll make a bunch of mushroom people to handle that for me! Now, how do I even make mushroom people? I guess I’ll start by modifying some mushrooms and see what happens. Let’s begin with the [Lifebloom] mushroom and work from there.
Finding a cluster of [Lifebloom] mushrooms, they resemble regular fungi, except their caps look like green flower buds sprouting from the ground. I channel magic into them, envisioning little mushroom people. Slowly, they begin to transform. Over the next few minutes, I watch as they sprout small arms ending in nubs, black beady eyes form beneath their large caps, and finally, tiny legs emerge—also ending in nubs—so small it looks like they shouldn’t be able to hold their own weight.
I watch them emerge from the ground one by one, looking at themselves, each other, and the surrounding forest. Success! Now I just need to do this to the rest of the mushrooms and speed up time to complete the floor. Over the course of an entire day, I go around infusing magic into different types of mushrooms.
The next day, I observe my forest, now bustling with tiny mushroom people of all kinds, playing together in harmony. They band together, using magic to create a statue of a red orb. Is that supposed to be me? I guess, since I created them, they probably see me as some sort of god.
An hour later, they finish the statue and start dancing around it, holding hands and spinning with joy and reverence. They’re only about three feet tall, with squishy-looking mycelium bodies, and they all seem so happy and innocent.
Nice! Now, how about I speed up time and let them grow as a civilization? Stepping back, I use my magic to accelerate time by a few years and watch them grow at super speed. Their first few years are wonderful—different mushroom species come together to build a thriving village under the forest canopy. Some construct homes in the patches of sunlight filtering through, while others settle in the deep shadows of massive trees because, as I’ve learned from watching them, some of the mushrooms can’t survive direct sunlight.
More years pass, and some of the mushroom people start to die of old age, decomposing into the soil and allowing new mushroom people to sprout from the ground. This cycle continues, and the mushroom people live in peace. But the longer I watch, the more I notice something unsettling.
The mushroom people emerging from the decomposed bodies of their predecessors seem... off. They’re not as intelligent as they once were, and it seems like they share one consciousness that’s being split more and more with each new death and rebirth. The peace that once flourished among them is growing strained, and they’re becoming increasingly violent and confused. Only the [Lifebloom] mushrooms seem unaffected by this spreading madness.
Uh-oh… this isn’t good. What’s going wrong here? As I continue to watch, the situation deteriorates. The [Lifebloom] mushrooms do their best to maintain the fragile peace, but the other mushroom people, in their madness, begin to attack them, driving them away.
Okay... let’s figure out what went wrong. I open up several system windows, reading through the relevant information. After some digging, I find the problem: when I first turned the mushrooms sentient, they all gained souls. But when they die, instead of respawning or having their souls ascend or escape, their souls stay within the body, sinking into the ground, and new mushrooms sprout from the remnants. This splits the soul among the new mushrooms.
Another thing worth mentioning: apparently, sentient races created by a dungeon have a harder time respawning. This means I’ll need to limit their respawns to only a select few individuals of that specific race. Anyway...
This cycle keeps repeating, with each split making the souls more fragmented. Eventually, the fragmented souls lead to insanity, causing the mushroom people to seek out other sentient life to absorb their souls. The [Lifebloom] mushrooms, being attuned to the life attribute, are somehow able to balance and heal their torn souls over time, which explains why they’re the only ones unaffected by the madness.
Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
Closing the system windows, I stop the accelerated time and survey the changed second floor—a place once full of happiness, now twisted into a realm of madness. The [Lifebloom] mushroom people have retreated to a village built in the sunlight, far from the dark, dense canopy of the forest.
As I wander through the now-ominous woods, I witness zombified mushroom people clawing their way out of the earth, shrieking as their decaying caps hit the damp air. The animals that once lived peacefully alongside them now flee in terror, or meet a worse fate—killed and parasitized by fungi, their bodies turned into puppets to aid in the hunt for souls.
Deep in the heart of the forest, I find a mushroom person, grotesquely mutated beyond recognition. It shrieks and wails, locked in a violent struggle for control over its own rotting mycelium body.
Name: [Soulshroom Hive Mind]
Type: Undead (Fungal Entity)
Rank: Legendary
Level: 45
HP: 1000 / 1000
MP: 500 / 500
----------------------------------------
Abilities:
Soul Drain (Passive):
- The Hive Mind constantly siphons the life force of nearby creatures, draining HP from all within 10 meters. This energy is used to sustain the decaying body and fuel its abilities.
Radius: 10 meters
Effect: Drains HP, regenerates 1% of Hive Mind’s HP per creature affected.
Whispers of the Damned:
- The Hive Mind channels the tortured souls it has absorbed, unleashing a cacophony of voices that causes confusion and fear in its enemies. Those who hear the whispers may become disoriented or experience vivid hallucinations of the dead.
Range: 20 meters
Effect: Causes fear, hallucinations, and disorientation for 10 seconds.
Cooldown: 60 seconds
Zombified Decay (Passive):
- The body of the Hive Mind is in a constant state of decay, shedding spores and rotting flesh. Any creature that comes into contact with the falling spores risks becoming infected, leading to slow zombification over time unless cured.
Effect: Applies “Decay” status, reducing maximum HP over time. If left untreated for 5 minutes, the victim turns into a mindless zombie under the control of the Hive Mind.
Radius: 5 meters
Soul Rebirth:
- Once its HP drops below 30%, the Hive Mind can sacrifice a portion of the souls it holds, regenerating 50% of its total HP instantly.
Cooldown: Once per battle
Echo of the Fallen:
- The Hive Mind can momentarily resurrect one of the souls it has absorbed to fight by its side for 20 seconds. This fallen warrior fights with 50% of its original strength.
Cooldown: 60 seconds
Limit: One soul at a time
Putrid Burst:
- The Hive Mind releases a burst of decay, sending out a wave of rotting spores and necrotic energy in a 15-meter radius. Enemies hit by the burst take heavy poison damage and suffer from the "Rotting" status, which lowers their defense and HP regeneration.
Damage: 50-70 (Poison)
Cooldown: 20 seconds
----------------------------------------
Resistances:
- Poison-based Attacks (Immune)
- Psychic-based Attacks (High)
- Necrotic Attacks (Immune)
Weaknesses:
- Fire-based Attacks (High)
- Holy/Light-based Magic (Extreme)
- Physical Damage (Moderate)
----------------------------------------
Description:
The Soulshroom Hive Mind is a terrifying fungal entity born from the collective will of countless souls. Its body is in a perpetual state of zombification, a mass of decaying flesh and fungal growths. Spore clouds drift constantly from its form, and its movements are slow but relentless, driven by the minds of those it has consumed. These souls fuel its low intelligence, leaving it a sinister embodiment of insanity and madness. It haunts crypts, battlefields, and places of great death, drawn to the fading life force of those nearby, ever seeking to add to its grotesque collection.
I may have made a slight mistake.