“Ras! What themes do we have with Diner at the End of Reality rooms?” Red asked with a smile as he felt that it was time to start work on the rooms. He was rather confident that the overall feel of the floor was going to be achieved rather easily. He just hoped that his contractor had given him the recipe for success.

Diner at the End of Reality Rooms

Line Kitchen

Eating Area

Storage Room

Freezer Room

Bathroom

Manager’s Office (Boss Room)

“Wait… there’s no parking lot? There is no place for people to have fistfights or park their cars?” Red asked with a frown as he thought about it, forgetting that there weren’t exactly motor vehicles in this world. At the very least there was no sign of any sophisticated technology involving complex machinery or gears. He could change that if he knew how the majority of motors or other machines might work.

[Parking lot? I have no information on what a Parking Lot could be. You will have to create a special room if that is a room you wish to create something like that.]

“Dammit. Alright, I suppose nothing comes easy.” Red sighed as he looked around for a long moment, considering what he needed to do to make the parking lot for the diner. “Alright, not too rough. Just one step at a time and we will see about making a special room, sound good?” He asked the box floating next to him before it gave a positive chime to show its approval.

[Indeed. I believe you should be able to do so without much effort.]

“Not the enthusiasm I wanted, but it is at least something,” Red said before he began to open his menus and began to look through what he wanted. The first thing that he addressed was the room menu, opening it up to see what he could find on his upgrades. He frowned however as he noticed that the menu was severely limited in what it was telling him. He would have preferred that it be far more descriptive.

Room Menu

Theme: Swamp House

Size: 5 x 5 Squares

Room Type: Entrance (No Theme)

He raised his finger tapped on the ‘Size’ bar and sighed in relief when a pop-up appeared telling him exactly what he was looking for. “Thank goodness, though… how big is a square?” He asked as he looked over at Ras’ menu to see what the appropriate measurement was.

[A square in your common measurements is that of three feet by three feet. The room is approximately twenty-five squares.]

Size: 5 x 5 ↓

Reduce

Expand ↓

Expansion - 5 mana per square

Bulk Expansion Long - 2.5 mana per square

Bulk Expansion Wide - 2.5 mana per square

Bulk Expansion Even - 3 mana per square

Red looked at the dimensions and frowned as he realized why he hadn’t been able to make the {Special} Garden because it was far too big. He would need to spend over four thousand mana for the size of the room that he was trying to get right away. So he would just have to trick the system into giving him what he wanted without spending so much to make a massive room.

He opened up his materials menu, making sure that he wasn’t about to let things like physics or realistic settings get in the way. Scanning through it all, he managed to find a stone that would be perfect for a parking lot, especially considering that there wouldn’t be any actual cars parked in the area. He selected lava rock for the floor, the wood shifting into stone in odd ways as the gaps filled with more material. The edges of the walls shifted upwards to make it seem like that was an intentional design for the floor to be a solid sheet of gritty black stone.

“Ras, set the theme to outside if you would please,” Red said with a smile as he selected the build menu and opened up the color section, beginning to use his ability to change the color of matter within his dungeon as he pleased. With the expanded menu open he paid for there to be enough room for four parking spaces, which he quickly outlined with paint. While he was focusing on that, the ceiling of the room dissolved to reveal the sky outside, the fog and slight visual obstruction making it to where the sun was just vaguely able to be seen. Red noted the fact that this view showed how different his first floor truly was. It was absolutely like walking into a whole different world from the swamps.

The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.

Red waved his hand through his menus when he was done painting, rather glad that he was able to have Ras do some of the simple tasks that didn’t require such finesse. The border around the room was not hedged like in the garden, but rather wooden fences that remained unpainted. It was certainly different, especially with the doors being wooden archways that led outside or deeper into the dungeon.

“Anything?” Red asked as he looked over at the menu assistant, hoping that there was something about a special room that had appeared.

[Nothing. Unfortunately. My Apologies, Red. It seems that we have not met any special requirements.]

“Damn it. I was hoping that would work.” Red frowned as he paced around the parking lot, wondering what he could add to it. He knew that there were things that he could add randomly if he wanted the real diner parking lot experience. He could crush up some brown glass to give the impression of broken bottles, or maybe some crushed-up aluminum cans but those wouldn’t make much sense in this world. Finally, his eyes went wide as he realized exactly what he needed to put in to make it a true parking lot.

“Wait… wait I have it! A parking lot isn’t a parking lot if it doesn’t have anything parked in it.” Red said with a grin as he opened his items menu and scrolled through everything before he finally came across a carriage. He adjusted it to be painted white with clear spots where the wood had rotted and the wheels were loose. It was surprising to find that complex items had sliders for age and durability.

The carriage appeared in the leftmost parking space, the best that Red could do to make it seem like a two-decade-old Honda Accord that some wage slave line cook would put to work in every day. It was a piece of junk and Red would feel bad if it wasn’t meant to be just a decorative item that sat in the parking lot. He waited for a second, and then another before another window suddenly popped up for him to observe.

Special Room Unlocked!

Parking Lot at the End of Reality

Requirements: Diner at the End of Reality Contract, occupied parking space, exterior style room.

Activate?

Yes No

“Yes! We did it Ras! Great job!” Red cheered with a grin as he threw his hands up in the air, showing his excitement for how he had managed to trick the system. He slammed his finger against the ‘Yes’ button and watched as the parking lot changed. The wooden fences disappeared as the blacktop expanded outwards around him, making it to where there were five spaces on either side of the building and fifteen in front and behind it. The parking lot wrapped around the stairwell that led to the next floor, changing its shape into a non-descript diner with tinted glass and a glass double door that Red could see the stairway behind it.

He turned as the edges of the parking lot stopped growing, a jagged semi-circle around the structure that seemed to fade off into inky blackness. He approached the edge, looking off into the void and seeing nothing until pinpricks of stars began to form in the distance. Looking up, he watched as the somewhat sunny sky was suddenly enveloped by an all-encompassing night. It was not the same star-filled sky that the garden showed off at night, but rather a lonely darkness. Stars were like islands, glittering points in the darkness that offered some show of reality still being there. A bit of cold went down his back, feeling like there was more in the darkness, things that he couldn’t see.

Special Monster Unlocked

Void Beast

In the Inky Blackness beyond reality, just a step too far beyond the bounds of existence there lies predators in wait. Unfathomable things that cannot be seen or heard until you are in their domain, and by that point, it is already too late. Watch for the shifting stars, lest you miss their gaze as well.

[It seems that with the creation of the room, some monsters were automatically spawned. Would you like to put them in storage or remove them?] Ras asked as Red looked around, taking a moment before he could see shifting outlines of indescribable monsters floating in the black.

“U-uh. No. No don’t do that. The last thing we need is to upset them for any reason. Let’s focus back on the restaurant, alright?” Red asked as he quickly turned around to look at the non-descript diner, trying to think about what else he could use. That was when he noticed a pole on the sidewalk around the shop. It had to be a twenty-foot pole, clearly meant for a sign although there was no actual image at the top of the pole.

“This place needs a name!” Red said with a smile as he knew any good roadside diner needed to have a name that was lit up in lights so that everyone could see. He supposed that this was going to be the entrance floor of his dungeon for a while. It also mattered that he was planning on keeping it here unless he found something better to be the entrance.

[A name seems fitting, especially since you wish to be welcoming from what I have gathered.]

“Well, there is a man who was always ridiculous in my old life that I secretly wanted to visit my shop. So I think an homage to him would be appropriate.” Red said with a smile before he pointed at the signpost and waited before a menu popped up. It was a simple one, just simply a keyboard and a fill-in window. He brought his hands to the keyboard and typed out a simple name.

‘Delicious Dungeon Diner’ appeared in bold blue letters on a circular sign in the style of fifties highway rest stops.

“Alright, and now for the interior! We have rooms to build!” Red said with a smile as he went into the stairwell room that would eventually be at the very end of his entrance floor. He smiled as he opened the purchase menu and clicked on the option to create another room. That was what he was hoping would happen before the button gave a negative noise.

[Messaging Architect Ivy, a member of the build team must come if you are going to be creating any new rooms.] Ras stated as Red slumped his shoulders some, rather frustrated that his flow was being disrupted by the lack of immediate action.

“Well, hopefully, Ivy doesn’t need all of them for building outside. I don’t want to be waiting forever.” Red sighed as he tapped his foot, checking the timer on Ka’ron and finding there were still a good number of hours left before she spawned.