Shrieks and cries echoed across a small clearing in the forest outside of Dylan’s dungeon entrance, chasing away all of the prey animals within a short distance. Three of Dylan’s giant centipedes were surrounding a boar, and both parties were injured. The boar was heaving, gasping for air, multiple bite wounds spurting blood while venom from the centipedes coursed through its veins. The centipedes themselves sported cracked carapaces, with green ichor dripping from their wounds.
Although the centipedes were classified as monsters, this didn’t mean that they would be able to hold their own against any other animal, as ranking was important. An F+ ranking meant that they could probably kill an untrained, unarmed human with little threat to themselves, but this did not apply to the aggressive wild boar, who was fighting for its life, and armed with its tusks and powerful legs.
The boar let out a shriek of rage which echoed throughout the clearing, before charging at the centipede group again.
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Kuraura scared…A pair of gleaming eyes watched the battle from within the underbrush. Scary. Kuraura does not like.
A small, hideous humanoid creature with dark purplish skin, scrunched up his bat-like face as he watched the fight. His four-fingered fist was clenched tightly, large ears perked, and his squinty eyes twitched as he watched the three massive centipedes, easily longer than he was tall, coiling around a boar their size. The boar was frothing at the mouth, eyes rolled back into its head, laying limply on the ground. The centipedes grabbed the boar with their mandibles and began dragging it back to the dungeon entrance from their current location, as Kuraura watched them. Quickly, he took off like an arrow let loose from a bow, retreating back to a small recon camp set up several hundred feet away. Crashing into the camp, he was greeted by the glares of several other creatures which looked just like him, with the exception of the fact that they were slightly bigger and stronger-looking, and they were also a greenish-brown color, unlike Kuraura.
“Look who’s back, hehe.” The largest of the creatures replied. He was wearing a loincloth made of the pelt of a beast, and had a sturdy tree branch in his hands. The others only wore loincloths, and none of the creatures seemed to be concerned with their lack of clothes. In fact, their ‘camp’ consisted of a small clearing they had cleared, with a pile of food near the middle, and their excrement in a corner of the clearing. “Took Kuraura the runt long enough. Now tell, why we hear such bad noise in day time.”
Kuraura shivered, then replied, “Giant centipedes, bigger than me, eating boar alive.” Although this wasn’t what quite happened, Kuraura’s adrenaline filled brain led him to exaggerate the situation.
“Oh my,” The bigger creature replied, scratching its chin in surprise, “If they kill boar, that means they is dangerous. Boar is powerful, cannot kill too easy.”
Kuraura and the other creatures nodded to this. An angered boar could easily gore one of them to death, with the exception of their current superior, so if some centipedes could devour it alive while it was still struggling, that meant that they were dangerous.
“Runt Kuraura!” The creature which appeared to be the leader of the pack bellowed, causing Kuraura to scrabble and kneel in front of him. The creature walked over and stomped on Kuraura’s head, causing his face to press flat into the ground. “Run back to chief, tell him we kill monsters.”
As the pressure lifted off of Kuraura’s head, he brought up his face to see the sneering bat-like faces of his allies, wicked sharp teeth protruding from their underbites, and eyes glinting with cruelty and bloodlust. Kuraura hastily nodded and started dashing towards the main camp. His current task was to tell the leader of their tribe what was going to happen. Glancing back, he saw the four other creatures making their way towards the small clearing he had seen the fight, led by the creature wielding a branch. He looked away then continued on his mission. He could not afford to disappoint the chief with this news.
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Dylan’s vision slowly appeared again. However, unlike his level up to level 2, he wasn’t confused. He had had a dream again, yet this was of after his death. His struggles with building the first room of his dungeon, the evolution of his bugs, the satisfaction of his populations expanding. It was finally settling into his mind that he was not a human anymore. He was a dungeon. He needed to do dungeon things. Of course, he could do things for his own satisfaction first, but he hardly doubted that F+ ranked monsters could keep him truly safe.
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[Status]
Status:
Level: 3
Name: N/A (Dylan)
Species: Dungeon
Titles: N/A
Mana: 0/75
Skills: [Dungeon Overlay] [Dungeon Edit] [Dungeon Watching] [Dungeon Order] [Absorb Essence] [Absorb Bodies] [Dungeon Summons] [Forceful Evolution] [Natural Order] [Naming] [Subordination] [Dungeon Law]
Passive Skills: [Auto-Absorb Bodies] [Siphon Mana]
Attributes: N/A
Evolution Points: 2
[Dungeon Watching](Upgraded): Allows a Dungeon to use their senses to view any of the on goings within their range of influence. The Dungeon can choose to hone their senses to view a specific area or view a wide range or even the whole dungeon with less attention to detail. The Dungeon can also see through the eyes or senses of any of its animals, monsters, or guardians, or search their memories, allowing them to send monsters out of the dungeon and view their surroundings after the creatures arrive back. If an organism that is not under the control of the dungeon enters it, the Dungeon will instinctively know where the intruder is.
Great. Now I can finally detect enemies within my dungeon. What other skills are there..?
[Dungeon Edit](Upgraded): Allows a Dungeon to focus their thoughts into the creation of new rooms, floors, and environments. By focusing, the dungeon will expend mana to tunnel into their environments and create pathways, rooms, and even floors based off of their will. Also allows a Dungeon to generate more complex things, such as water, snow, ice, fire, lava, or sand.
Finally! I can fill that ugly ditch in the center of the forest with water! Dylan cried out happily in his mind. Filing that information away for later, he reviewed the other new skills.
[Naming](New): Allows a Dungeon to use a large amount of mana to grant a specific creature with its own name. Named creatures will undergo changes depending on the will of the dungeon, the meaning of their name, and the amount of mana used up. Named creatures are bound to the dungeon, having the utmost loyalty to the dungeon, and they cannot permanently die within the Dungeon’s influence. They will respawn within a few hours of their death, and can also continuously grow stronger under the influence of the dungeon. As a consequence of being bound to the dungeon, they will not be able to leave the Dungeon’s influence. Named creatures will be listed as a Guardian, and will not receive hostility from any Dungeon-spawned monster, unless otherwise ordered to.
[Subordination](New): Allows a Dungeon to use mana to subordinate any creature who is willing to give their life to the dungeon. Grants bonuses equivalent to killing the creature, such as Skills, Magic, or Summoning capabilities. The amount of mana required to subordinate an organism depends on the organism’s strength and willingness. This is the only way a dungeon can acquire creatures with unique names without having them as guardians.
If Dylan had a head, he would have cocked it at that last sentence, as there wasn’t a true need to desire named monsters if they weren’t powerful enough to be a strong boss, at least, not to him. He decided to ignore this and move on to the next skill.
[Dungeon Law](New): Allows a Dungeon to set up laws within the Dungeon which must be followed. This allows Dungeons to reset traps automatically, respawn fallen defenders after their numbers drop considerably, or affect their terrain easily. The more complex the law, the higher the mana cost to implement the law.
This probably lets me set a spawn limit on monsters or reset traps immediately. That’s kind of neat. I won’t need to micromanage the population of creatures I have if I set some laws.
Suddenly, [Dungeon Watching] activated, and Dylan felt the presence of an intruder entering his cave. He brought his vision closer, and as he saw his centipedes dragging a limp boar into the cave, he relaxed. Dylan had been concerned for a moment, thinking that he was undergoing an enemy assault. He ordered the centipede which was closest to evolving of the 3 to kill boar, then checked his summons. Apparently, while he was unconscious, he had learned how to summon butterflies, flies, ladybugs, millipedes, and even bats. Now he had the capability to summon a boar, making him quite proud.
He recalled the centipedes deeper into the dungeon before absorbing the corpse of the boar for a whopping 23 mana. Dylan wanted to check to see how much it would cost to summon a boar, but [Dungeon Watching] activated again, startling him. Dylan brought his vision closer to the entrance, and saw some hideous humanoids with ugly bat-like faces and ears, wearing mere loincloths, entering his cave. The tallest stood at 4.5 feet high, and held a branch, while the others were visibly smaller, standing at around 4 feet, with no weapons.
Oh crap, intruders…Dylan thought nervously as he called over 10 healthy giant centipedes, 10 leaping bombardier beetles, and 100 swarm ants to gather by the entrance. It appears that they followed my centipedes, considering the timing of their entry. I don’t know what they’re here for, and they look like monsters, so maybe I should just kill them?