Three months was not enough time.
Early levels came fast, but the evolution to Summoner required level 25 at an absolute minimum, assuming he managed to find or create a class evolution orb in time. Otherwise, it could take up to level 40. Three months wouldn’t be enough time to reach level 30, let alone 40.
If he was going to cut off the invasions before they could grow too overwhelming, he had no time to waste.
“Where’s your dungeon?”
Skarm stood in place for a moment, looking from side to side, then the little gremlin puffed up his chest and led the way deeper into the park.
While they walked, Levi reviewed his personal stats with a frown.
Levi Morrison Unassigned Levels: 0 Primary Class: Tamer Tamer Level: 1 Subclass: None Minions: 1/1
Stat Points: 1 Strength: 0 Psyche: 0 Spirit: 0 Health
57/100 Mana
10/10 Stamina
2/50 Health Regen
1 /minute Mana Regen
1 /minute
Stamina Regen
1 /minute
One per minute regen. Ugh. It would take almost an hour for his stamina to return to full, not the two minutes he’d anticipated.
He definitely needed to get leveling ASAP. Being level 1 again would get him killed the moment anything more dangerous than a gremlin showed up.
And only ten mana? That wasn’t even enough to cast a basic cleaning spell; it would only power a sword for a few seconds.
That definitely needed to change. As tempted as he was to put his single stat point into Strength for the health regen, Levi knew how essential mana would be. Everything from his class ability to powering weapons and armor relied on mana.
100 health wasn’t much, but he should still outlast anything of Skarm’s level. Without mana, his ability to deal damage in return would be starkly decreased. Mana-formed creatures like dungeon monsters were all but immune to unpowered physical damage.
Decision made.
Psyche: 1 Mana
20/20 Mana Regen
2 /minute
“It’ll have to do. Let’s go get ourselves equipped.” Levi gestured for Skarm to continue,
The gremlin grinned and scampered ahead, then stopped beside a pair of trees grown into one another.
It took Levi a moment to make out what he was looking at.
Dungeons presented themselves in any number of ways, depending on their nature. Judging by the gremlin scout, this one would be a standard Destruction theme.
Dungeons increased in difficulty the more people used them, until they eventually became practically unassailable. But it’d been so long since he saw a level 1 anything, that if not for Skarm leading him directly to it, he could have walked past without ever noticing it.
He was used to grand towering gateways that promised danger and power in equal measure. Instead, this dungeon entrance manifested as a faintly waving patch of air that fluctuated and flickered ever so subtly. If someone wasn't looking for it, there was very little chance they'd notice the dungeon at all.
Still, with hundreds or thousands of dungeons scattered across the world over the past year, people would inevitably stumble into them. Especially with scouts like Skarm roaming outside to lure in the unsuspecting.
Levi placed a hand on the air shimmer and focused. The patch of air lit up brightly for him, and its information appeared.
Destruction Dungeon: Level 1
Dungeons didn’t physically exist in real space. How their entrance presented itself depended on various factors — once a dungeon reached level 20 or so it would make its doorway visible to all — but in their early days, dungeons tended to rely on ambush and trickery.
Levi knew exactly what to expect.
Destruction type made up over 60% of all known dungeons. Sure, there was variance between dungeons even of the same type and level, but he’d been fighting for years. He was entirely prepared.
Well. As prepared as someone could be with no weapon, no armor, no restoratives, and only a single gremlin as backup.
Dungeons weren’t recommended for a group with fewer than three people per level, though two could do it with the right preparation.
Did he need to do this? No one was forcing him to enter. There would be no immediate consequences if he simply walked away.
The thought survived for less than a moment. Every second he wasted brought the end nearer. He needed to level, and he needed to level fast. This was the only way.
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He stepped through.
The world twisted and warped around him, depositing him in some pocket space tucked into the wrinkles of reality. Even absolutely confident in his ability to survive, the twisting sensation of entry brought an instinctive jolt of visceral panic.
Though he knew a level 1 dungeon posed only a minimal threat to him, the last time he’d entered a dungeon it had ended in his death. Every time before that, he’d watched friends and allies die all around him.
Levi’s throat felt dry, and his heart raced. Old instincts rose in him — to check his equipment, hold formation, be ready to fight for his life at any moment. His eyes darted around the room, taking in everything at once.
The entry chamber was empty, a sandy cave with pocked stone walls, dimly illuminated by the omnipresent sourceless light unique to dungeons. Once the dungeon had claimed a few victims’ lives, the room would begin to fill with scattered bones and skulls, but for now it lay pristine and clean.
It unnerved him seeing it so empty, as foreign as seeing happy people and grass unspoiled by war.
Back in the original future, the few remaining dungeons had become deadly, desperate trials. They were undertaken as a training method of last resort by huge groups. Fewer than half of those who braved the dungeon’s depths would survive, but nothing else provided the requisite power to stand a chance against the invaders.
Skarm prodded Levi gently, head tilted in question.
“I’m fine. Just give me a minute.”
He had survived dozens, perhaps hundreds of dungeon runs, but not easily and not without his share of scars. He’d watched too many friends and allies die in these things. But dungeons leveled you faster than anything else. And so, they’d entered and fought desperately time and again.
No. He shook off the memories. This wasn’t a level 150 dungeon that could kill him with a single moment’s carelessness, this was a brand-new baby dungeon. Level 1. Even unarmed, Levi should be able to handle it.
He stepped forward. Sand shifted under his feet, but the layer wasn’t deep enough to provide an impediment. No two dungeons were the same — no two visits to a given dungeon were exactly the same, though they tended to remain largely recognizable — but there were general trends that Levi knew to be on the lookout for.
Skarm pointed to a small indentation by the wall, then at himself.
“Yes, I know you lived here.” Levi’s voice came out grimmer than he’d hoped. He was too tense to summon any levity. “Your job was to lure in visitors, and you did it admirably.”
Two paths led off the main entrance, a wide one straight ahead, and a narrower crack to the right. Levi knew that both led to similar traps and monsters, the “hidden” route only a different path to the same end.
Fighting in close confines would be too risky. He didn’t have a weapon yet and it would be foolish to trap himself without an easy retreat.
“We’ll go straight ahead. Walk ahead of me and let me know if you see anything.”
Skarm hopped eagerly down the main path and Levi followed.
The tunnel curved slightly, just enough to conceal the next room from view.
Before they reached the halfway point, Skarm stopped abruptly and pointed up at the inner curve of the wall.
Levi crouched to see what he was pointing at.
Another gremlin lurked in a cavity about halfway up the wall, only its spiked snout visible, easily mistaken for part of the wall.
Realizing that it had been spotted, the lurking gremlin abandoned its perch and pounced. Levi sprang forward and snatched it midair. One flailing claw scored a line across his forearm as he slammed the beast to the ground. As easily as he’d initially subdued Skarm, Levi flipped the tiny creature over and held it still.
Skarm ran forward, claws bared, head lowered, ready to finish it off.
Levi shook his head. “Wait.”
Skarm obediently came to a stop, his tail twitching eagerly.
Levi addressed the squirming gremlin on the ground. “If you don’t submit to me, I’ll kill you.”
The gremlin resisted for nearly a minute, then slumped.
Minion limit full.
Horned Gremlin cannot be tamed. Would you like to unbind a minion now?
No, he’d be keeping Skarm.
Levi had seen Tamers and Summoners with dozens of minions, so he knew 1 couldn’t be a hard limit. It took a few false tries to navigate to his Minion Registry, but he had enough experience using the system’s unintuitive layout not to be discouraged. It always felt less like navigating an interface than like traversing a mental maze, one in which the walls and ceiling swapped places and shifted about unpredictably.
Minions 1 of 1 Name Level Type Strength Psyche Spirit Health Mana Stamina Skarm 1 Horned Gremlin 0 0 1 50/50
(+1/min) 0/0
(+1/min) 60/60
(+2/min)
Skarm's name expanded when he mentally hovered on it, showing him all the details he hadn’t been able to find by examining the creature himself.
Skarm Unassigned Levels: N/A Stat Points: 0 Ability Points: 0 Primary Type: Horned Gremlin Horned Gremlin Level: 1 Subtype: None Evolution Threshold Progress: 0/3 Strength: 0 Health: 50/50 Health Regen: 1 /minute Psyche: 0 Mana: 0/0 Mana Regen: 1 /minute Spirit: 1 Stamina: 60/60 Stamina Regen: 2 /minute Abilities: None
Not much new information, at least until Skarm earned some abilities or otherwise did something to distinguish himself.
Levi focused on the minion limit, querying about increases. The system resisted, but he pushed through and found the formula.
Minion limit (base) = 1/2 Tamer level
No point keeping a hostile gremlin around if he needed two more levels before it could be tamed. Levi shifted and crushed the dungeon monster’s throat. A moment later its body dissolved into the sandy floor without leaving behind so much as a stain.
“You have permission to kill anything we meet until I say otherwise,” he instructed Skarm. “Now, let’s keep moving.”
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