Novels2Search

A short interlude story.

A certain unfortunate dungeon core's POV:

Though I didn't comprehend the meaning of the term "luck" I understood the rarity of the occurence in which I'd rapidly gained my heightened self awareness as well as the spike in difficulty my dungeon had. While developing my ninth floor, I'd coincidentally dug my way directly into one of the local ley lines that surrounded myself. The ley line greatly boosted my available mana, as well as my burgeoning sense of self. I'd rejoiced at the oppurtunities which had been suddenly made available to me, working in a frenzy to further populate my previous floors as well as finish the layout of my ninth. The flood of mana allowed me to create many more monsters and traps, as well as more dangerous ones that I hadn't been able to afford before.

For a while, everything went well. Adventurer's which previously could've delved into my depths and made off with my loot where now consistently being killed and devoured inside of my walls.

But then...

They came.

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Aliana's POV:

As Rone and I sat to one side of the 6th floor's boss room, taking a break for lunch and giving Rone time to update his maps. I pet the head of the giant wolf who served as this floors boss, ignoring it's frustrated whimpering, "Oh hush now, we've only been here two weeks. Don't worry, soon enough you and all your dungeon buddies will be able to go back to devouring adventurer's and whatever else it is that you do."

Obiously the wolf had tried to attack us as well as all the previous bosses and monsters, as was their job to guarding the way through the dungeon and to it's core, but after several repeated uses of my [Paralyze] spell each time they'd do so, eventually they all gave up. So here I sat, taking advantage of the situation to pet the giant creature. "Still, though most of the monsters so far would match other dungeons of similar ages. The fact that they're not entirely mindless and can think to some degree makes this dungeon stand apart for it only supposedly having 8 floors," I was happy to figure this out because it meant we didn't need to kill everything in the dungeon as we explored it to determine what made it different than it had been before, "You can't assert any sort of dominance with regular mindless dungeon spawned creatures, but once the dungeon starts to think for itself it's spawns inherit a degree of this. In our situation it simplifies things considerably, but for most, the added cunning to the creatures can come as a deadly surprise."

"I don't think the dungeon will let you keep him Ali... and please don't tell me you've already named him, this dungeon has already proven itself dangerous enough to new adventurer's without having a named boss showing up on the 6th floor," Rone looks up at me from where he'd been comparing the map he was drawing with the ones that had been made before the dungeon had it's spike in difficulty.

"I know I can't keep him, even if the dungeon would allow it. Dungeon's usually need at least 20 floors before they can give pets or mounts as loot... Are you sure I can't give him a name though? I promise I'll come up with something cute!" I playfully reply back to my husband, laughing as I see him freeze up for a moment, no doubt having flashbacks to the last time I'd named a dungeon boss.

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

There'd been a rather pretty Arachne boss on the 45th floor of the Realgar dungeon who I'd named "The Luculent Red Widow of Agony" or just "Lucie" for short. The name was apparently considered so fitting by the system that the boss had unlocked a special evolvution on the spot, causing it to nearly double in size and growing two large scorpion tails tipped with stingers which dripped with incredibly potent venom. I'd also been granted the rare skill of [Naming] though I'd rarely used it since. Apparently a few years later, the core ended up feeling so bad about the incredible spike in difficulty that the boss provided that it relocated Lucie to the 75th floor instead.

"No no, you named our daughter something we thought sounded cute and look how she turned out." Rone and I both laughed at this for a moment before he shivered, "Nor do I think the world needs another 'Lucie' either so let's just leave the poor thing as it is for now."

"If I recall, at the time you seemed rather mesmerized as a certain Arachne's rather ample bosom increased in size right in front of your face. Or did you think I hadn't noticed how you could hardly take your eyes off her chest?" I look over at him again, remembering the event as his face begins to flush at my accusation.

"It's not my fault you decided to name her right as I'd been planning to attack, and I was just looking for a weak spot." he tries to defend himself, his face beginning to blush gives himself away though.

"Attack?! You practically ran face first to bury yourself in her cleavage. Even poor Lucie herself was embarassed by your 'attempt to find her weak spot' at the time!" I glared at him as I recalled the events from back then, we hadn't even technically been dating yet so I couldn't be too upset, but he'd still been constantly going out of his way to display his affection for me in an attempt to woo me at the time.

"Your poor 'Lucie' went on to wipe dozens of parties in the following years before the core itself had to move her farther down out of pity. *Ahem* Anyways, let's continue on to the 7th floor, shall we? I'm done with the maps up to this point, I've marked down all the new traps and monsters." Rone gets up to make his way to the stairwell down to the next floor, clearly knowing he wasn't going to win that argument against me.

"Alright, since we didn't find anything that really stands out yet I'm betting it dug into a ley line while developing it's 9th floor or something. Would be quite the lucky dungeon if so." I give my giant wolf, who would've easily doubled my height had he been standing, one last pat on it's head, before making my way to the stairwell alongside my husband.

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A certain unfortunate dungeon core's POV:

The Adventurer couple finally quit treating my giant deadly alpha wolf like some sort of common house pet and made their way down to the 7th floor. At this point, thanks to the couple who were making a mockery of all my monsters, I was beginning to get worried that the system would name me the "Petting Zoo" dungeon or something equally cruel and demeaning. This couple treated me like I was some sort of vacation spot for tourists, and not at all like the intricate cave designed to systematically push all who entered to their utmost limits until they eventually succumbed to their deaths that I was. I knew now that they were searching me floor by floor for whatever had lead to my increase in power, unfortunately this meant they weren't going to stop until they found the ley line on my 9th floor. I decided to instruct my very deadly and dangerous monsters to just leave the couple be until they left, in order to prevent any more damage to my poor creature's egos.

I took some small solace in the fact that at least my infantilization was occurring at the hands of two clearly seasoned adventurer's and not some child...