As the core had expanded its territory and perception, it had occasionally found regions with dense affinitied mana, similar to the forest where it had started off.

Most of the time, the pockets of specific affinities had warranted nothing more than the core’s brief notice, but after spreading past the mountain range, the core had indeed found more human settlements, much like the ones that the core was already accustomed to.

As the core’s perception had crept across the kingdom of Tamar, it had found something unique at one of the villages. While the town itself had been unexceptional, butting up next to it was a pocket of the oddest affinity the core had ever sensed.

This tainted mana somehow felt repulsive to the core, yet not entirely.

As it spent some time checking the mana and the odd sensation, the core realized that what was actually triggering the sense of repulsion was the concept of life that it had touched upon. Somehow, this particular affinity felt antithetical to life itself.

As the core examined the physical location, it had found that the ground was full of corpses, mostly human, and by checking the soil, it understood that this particular place had been receiving the dead for a very, very long time. The process had repeated so many times for so many years that the earth had started to remember death itself.

After all, that was what the core had discovered for the first time, death-affinitied mana.

As always, the core was both curious about what it had found, and intrigued by how it could be used. The core may have absorbed fragments of memories from many humans who had died in its first dungeon, but the core had remained rather untouched by those memories on a base level. Its values and morals remained those of the dragon it had birthed from. Logic and greed dictated the core’s actions, rather than any sort of emotions or morals.

Naturally, with a new affinity to experiment with, the core tried to see how it could improve its creatures and what sort of new possibilities had opened up to it.

Unfortunately, the antithetical feeling that the core had sensed proved to be true, as the slightest touch of death mana would kill whatever creature the core tried to introduce to it. Some died immediately, and some slowly, but every last one of them died.

Was this a useless affinity?

The core did not want to accept that, as waste was infuriating, and it had already acquired quite a bit of this death affinity into itself. What could be done?

One day, after its latest experiment had died from being touched by the death mana, the core toyed with the mana, manipulating it along the patterns of spells that it had learned from the concept of life. It was nothing more than an idle thought of what might happen when the two opposing forces were brought together.

Shockingly, the mana had practically leaped into the fresh corpse of the creature the core had just been playing with, and the corpse twitched.

Intrigued, the core watched intently, trying to understand what was happening. The corpse was clearly still dead, yet the death mana was following the same pattern that had existed in the creature while it had been alive.

Then, the corpse stood up and started to move around.

The core’s mana perception could see that each movement was slightly draining the mana that was animating the corpse, and while there was no brain activity, there did seem to be some sort of raw instinct.

Curious, the core allowed the corpse to do as it wished, and watched as it moved straight over to the bird that was waiting to be the core’s next experiment. The dead fox bit the bird, killing it instantly. However, what was more interesting to see was that the fox corpse managed to extract a tiny, tiny bit of death-affinitied mana from the bird as it perished, and that mana was added to the corpse’s own reserves, allowing it to exist for a few more minutes.

This opened a brand new path for the core. It had always hated to see bodies go to waste, which was why it recycled the mana of its own creations. Unfortunately, it was impossible to do anything at all with the bodies of the dungeon invaders, which was a terrible loss to the core’s thinking.

This death mana opened a new opportunity to the core, where it would be able to use even the dead bodies of its “harvests.”

The core had quickly started constructing a new dungeon beneath the pocket of death-affinitied mana, and claimed the oldest bodies buried in the ground as its own. With the slightest touch of death affinity, the core’s mana was able to animate the corpses, even if they were nothing but dry bones.

Also, the core found that so long as there was ambient death mana nearby, the corpses would remain animated indefinitely, which was wildly efficient and wonderful to see.

It did not take long to create a basic dungeon of just a few levels, and after just a few weeks, the core was ready to open its new “farm.”

Things had progressed much more quickly than normal, as there was no need to raise creatures to maturity or develop their abilities. All the core needed to do was animate the dead bodies that were already available, and adjust how much mana they were given in order to adjust their strength. It seemed as though this method perfectly suited the core and the creation of dungeons.

When the core felt the new dungeon was ready to open, it prepared the entrance. The core had learned of gods and kings from Avery’s memories, and since such beings required grand entrances for their own structures, the core had decided it needed the same. Its first dungeon had formed a simple cave in the forest near a village, while its second had only been an annex to a subterranean sewer. Neither had an impressive entrance by any measure, but the core wanted more for its dungeons.

For that reason, the core reworked stone to create a small building in the middle of the pocket of death mana. It had been observing the human coming and burying more bodies each day, and as the core appreciated the offerings, it had decided to offer the man the first chance to enter the dungeon.

Knowing that it would need to somehow entice the man into entering, the core reshaped the stone as the man walked around the building, and had only opened the concealed entrance after he had proven to be sufficiently intrigued.

The core had absorbed enough human memories to understand the need for a bit of flair and drama now and then.

After the man had entered and started fighting the skeletons, the core had noticed the small, immature human enter the graveyard. Such immature humans were not worth harvesting, as it wasted their potential. The core fully intended to extract everything it could from the humans, which was why it was strengthening and reinforcing them.

The small human was easy enough to keep out until the core’s first guest in its newest dungeon returned to the surface.

The man had… not done well.

Sure, he had been determined enough, but the man had just been so clumsy! Things had been so bad that the core had needed to directly interfere on several occasions to prevent the man from dying to the fragile skeletons that he had been facing.

Once, the core had even just made a skeleton freeze in place, because the stupid man had not even noticed that an enemy had been standing less than a pace behind him.

Naturally, the core had “rewarded” the man with some boosts that would hopefully improve the man’s coordination, balance, and senses, but the core could not be entirely certain how the improvements to the man’s senses and reaction speed would affect him.

It had also been clear that the man would not stop until he was dead or finished, so the core had quietly closed off the entrance to the second section of the dungeon. There would be no harvests at all if the man failed to return and share what he had found.

After clearing the first room of the skeletons and finding only a single exit to the large chamber, the man had finally turned his weary body to returning to the surface.

Even if the core had not given the simple skeletons any weapons, they had still managed to bruise the man multiple times, though most of his injuries had come from him throwing himself around on the floor and into the stone pillars of the chamber while trying to dodge the skeletons’ weak attacks.

It was truly pathetic that the man had suffered more from self-inflicted injuries than anything the core had allowed to happen to the man.

At one point, the core had even been ready to grant the man a bit of healing from its life concept so that he would survive, but at that moment, he had finally revealed a slight improvement when faced with his own impending mortality, and he had succeeded in taking down the last two skeletons.

After the man returned to the surface and met with the small, immature human, the core pieced its skeletons back together, reopened the passage to the second section of the death-themed dungeon, and made sure that everything was ready for the next guests.

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Hopefully, this man would not be as selfish as the humans who were still secretly accessing and using the sewer dungeon the core had created. The core needed more people to visit its newer dungeons.

The core was actually rather surprised by the man’s actions after leaving the dungeon. He had gone to the small human and grabbed her. They had then both proceeded to cry for some time while holding each other.

After that, the man had picked up the small human and carried her away. They had first visited the nearby shrine, and after the man had spent quite some time bowing and speaking to his god, had grabbed the small human again, and had gone to find the people in the village who the core understood to be those with more influence and importance.

From there, the core had lost most interest, as its first visitor to the new dungeon had excitedly started talking to other people, who had initially seemed hesitant, but had quickly started to grow excited as well.

The humans continued to talk for a long time, and quickly lit fires as darkness fell. While the core could not make things out visually with its mana perception, it was able to pick up on clues from observing things, and had long since understood that humans could not see in the dark, and thus lit torches or fires at night in order to see what they were doing or their companions.

When the next day finally dawned, the core was excited to see a rather large group of men and women march towards its new dungeon and descend the stairs to challenge the skeletons.

Bones were easy to put back together, and there was ample death-affinitied mana for the core to work with, so the skeletons had been repaired and moving about again before the dungeon’s first guest had even made it to the top of the stairs.

Also, the core had re-opened the connection to the second chamber of the dungeon, as it believed that a larger group of humans would be able to clear at least the first section.

However, shortly after the humans had entered the first chamber, the core noticed a rather large group of people arrive in the village. Such activities rarely attracted the core’s notice, but many of these humans possessed magic, and they were accompanied by many soldiers as well.

These humans had made their way into the village, and while a few had walked to the center of the town and started shouting at all of the quickly gathering locals, all of the rest had made their way straight to the core’s newest dungeon.

There had been no hesitation or guessing, as the humans had made their way straight for the dungeon, and immediately entered and descended the stairs.

While the core was happy to see so many guests, it felt rather confused as to how these humans had known exactly where to go. They had clearly not received any information from the locals, and yet seemed fully prepared to challenge the dungeon.

The mana users and soldiers flooded into the first chamber of the dungeon, and quickly overtook the gathering of locals which had been methodically and awkwardly shattering the roaming skeletons.

There was a brief confrontation, during which the core noticed its first guest was pushed forward by the locals, and then seemed to be both reprimanded and acknowledged by the newcomers in a very confusing manner.

After that, the newcomers took the lead. They methodically destroyed every single skeleton, and even made sure to destroy the remains as completely as possible. After that, they had performed some strange ritual to cleanse the remaining debris of all death-affinitied mana in some strange fashion that completely baffled the core.

The skeletons were unable to harm any of the humans, and the first chamber was quickly cleared.

When the humans made their way to the next chamber, the core was ready to see how they fared against the armed and slightly armored skeletons, as well as the corpses it had animated that still possessed various amounts of flesh.

Oddly, the humans seemed enraged at the sight of the core’s newest creations, and they were all destroyed in the same manner as the first chamber.

While the humans tried to avoid the various rewards the core left behind, the core would never allow that, and the rewards that improved various aspects of the humans would shoot towards the nearest humans.

After the first time that happened, the person had frozen in place, and the mana users had stepped forward and performed various spells on the person before moving them to the rear of the group. That soldier gave up all of his weapons, and willingly accepted having two other soldiers stand guard over him.

This continued, and each person who received one of the dungeon’s rewards was similarly isolated and disarmed.

The humans were not slowed in the least by the fact that they were losing a number of their combatants, and as time passed, the mana users started becoming increasingly active.

The small army pushed further and further into the dungeon, and quickly arrived in the lowest reaches of the dungeon. In that place, the core had left its subsidiary core for the small dungeon. As this was not the core itself, but rather just a weak extension of its will and power, the core had not bothered trying to do much to protect or hide the secondary core. It was instead curious to see what the humans would do.

It watched as one of the mana users stepped forward, stretched out a hand, and-

Pain.

Tearing.

Absence.

Nothing!

The core could not process or understand what had just happened, and in its other two dungeons, the creatures went berserk.

Rats and slimes surged out of the dungeon and started attacking any humans they found in any part of Guilone’s sewers.

In every single section of the core’s first dungeon, the human teams were swarmed by every last one of the creatures that belonged to the core. The teams in the deeper reaches were quickly wiped out entirely, and only the teams in the swamp and the forest sections were able to fight their way out, due entirely to the veteran soldiers who had been in the process of being escorted by the rookie teams to the lower sections.

The frenzy lasted for half a day before the core was able to regain control of itself. Once it did, it found that its perception no longer extended beyond the mountain range. Its third dungeon was simply gone, as well as all of its territory, creatures, and mana.

It had been robbed!

The humans had stolen from it!

The core quickly calmed its creatures, though the damage had already been done, and the humans were on high alert.

No creatures had escaped from the primary dungeon, but several aquarii and civilians had been attacked in Guilone before the core’s creatures had been put down.

The core tried to understand what had happened, but nothing made any sense. How had the humans stolen the core’s territory? How had it been made less?

For the first time, the core was learning just what happened when a subsidiary core was destroyed. In much the same way that a living creature would suffer and weaken after losing a body part, the core had been handicapped and crippled. While it was possible to recover and heal, the core had been badly wounded, and it needed to recover.

Days and weeks passed, during which the core tried to repair the damage that had been done to it, as well as the damage it had done to itself during its throes of agony.

The humans at the first dungeon remained wary and hesitant to return to the dungeon after losing dozens of their own to a strange event that none of them could understand how it had been triggered. Without knowing how they had set off the defense mechanisms of the dungeon, the humans were scared to enter.

In Guilone, soldiers started visiting the dungeon, and guards were placed at the entrance that they had found. The poor who had found the dungeon and had been making use of it were stopped from returning, and once it was learned that some people had been aware of the dungeon and been making use of it in secret, an investigation was conducted, and all who were found guilty were imprisoned, executed, or forced to join the army.

As for how events were playing out in Tamar, the core knew nothing. When it had tried to re-extend its perception past the mountains, it had found that pushing forward received greater resistance than before. It was easier by far to press outwards in other directions. Where the core had been wounded, it proved difficult to recover what had once been.

Frustrated by its setback, the core had no choice but to grow in other directions.

However, what had it done to receive such a strong reaction from its third dungeon?

***

In Triple Falls, Allan had barely left Ixel’s shrine for weeks. The only times he left was to care for Hera, and then he would return to the shrine immediately afterwards.

Everywhere he went, he was overseen by a priest of Ixel, and other priests and temple workers had taken over the village’s graveyard.

Allan was cared for by the priests, yet they were also aloof and wary of him.

Allan had misinterpreted his god’s will and actions, which had angered Ixel, but had also reported the greatest blasphemy to ever walk the earth, which had pleased Ixel. Thus, Allan had been both praised and scolded by his god, who had spoken to Allan directly through a high priest.

Allan had felt both mortified and honored to receive such attention from his god, but he had not once stopped condemning himself for misreading blasphemy as a miracle of Ixel.

The priests appeared to be similarly torn over how they felt they should treat Allan, as even Ixel himself had both praised and disciplined Allan.

He had been banned from ever stepping foot in any of Ixel’s temples or working for any of the temples or shrines, yet Ixel had also declared that his people would see that Allan and his daughter would be cared for, which was seen to by the priests themselves.

Allan had seen the wrath of his god at discovering that the rest of the dead had been desecrated. The priests and few temple guards had destroyed the abomination, and everything that had been in it.

Those who had been tainted by the power of the place had been taken to the nearest temple where they could be cleansed by Ixel himself, aside from Allan.

Allan had been checked by a high priest, who had also performed a purification ritual, but even though the high priest had declared Allan to be clean, he could still feel the taint in his body. He had become stronger and faster from the curse he had received, and the price he was forced to pay was being ostracized by his own god.

Allan felt shattered by his own failings, and the only light in the dark place he was in was his daughter. Only she still showed him any affection, as even the villagers had essentially ex-communicated Allan.

Ixel’s clergy were seeing that Hera and Allan received food, but Allan was wasting away as time passed. All food tasted like ash in his mouth, and he was only ever able to choke anything down for the sake of Hera, as he could see her concern for him.

A month after Allan had lost almost everything, he finally came to a decision.

He spoke to the high priest of Ixel who had been left in Triple Falls to ensure that the abominations did not reappear, and the man seemed relieved to learn of Allan’s decision.

Hera would be cared for by the temples of Ixel. As for Allan himself, only by performing the final service to the god of death would he be able to redeem himself.

He would finally be clean.