“Gods alive, what was that?” Jasper swore, panting from running so hard.

“I warned you not to fuck with that cat, Jasper!” Zee shouted between his own panting breaths.

“How was I supposed to know that would happen?” Jasper shot back.

“Just be glad it just decided to chase us off and not kill us or worse, you greedy dumbass!” Zee exclaimed, “That could have been a fey or a spirit!”

“No,” Duke interrupted with an uncharacteristic seriousness, “That wasn’t a spirit or a fey. I would recognize that feeling of being watched anywhere.”

“Wait, you don’t mean…” Jasper began.

“Yes, that was most certainly a dungeon,” Duke said.

***

>Name Scions:

“Ugh I was always the worst at this,” I groaned as I stared at the popup.

Tom had been a spur of the moment name and I had kind of named him without really thinking.

“I trust you’ll come up with something fitting for us,” said my white cat.

“I have my doubts,” said my black cat.

“Appreciate the confidence,” I mumbled and got back to thinking.

“Hmm well the white cat handled herself well, like a lady,” I mused, “How about Lady? No doesn’t feel quite right.”

She handled herself well during the game of dice, so maybe a femme fatale name, but not too femme fatale. She was still just a cat after all.

“I got it, your name is Carmen!” I exclaimed.

The text box changed above Carmen to reflect the name change.

“I like it,” Carmen cooed.

“Well that’s one good name,” the black cat quipped.

“Someone got up on the wrong side of the spawner last night,” I thought to myself, “hang on, maybe something like Night, Smoke, Cloud, (No, definitely not that one. Focus on night again) Nighttime, Midnight-”

“Your name is Midnight,” I said focusing on the black cat.

“Hmm I don’t hate it,” Midnight said with a hint of a grin.

“Whew, at least we got that out of the way,” I thought before turning my attention back to the menu.

! EXP threshold reached !

>Upgrades available

! Mana threshold reached !

>Expand: (Up/Out/Down)

“Ugh what now,” I moaned at the new notifications.

“Well everything costs mana, but not everything costs EXP so, fuck it, ‘out’ I guess- WOAH!”

It felt like someone had grabbed both sides of my head and stretched my mind out over a larger area.

It took me a moment for my head to stop swimming, but I quickly discovered that expansion pretty much did what it said on the tin and my awareness was now bigger than it was a moment ago.

Turns out the warehouse was bigger than I realized. There was a loft area that had a few offices including a main office complete with an old wrap around desk and a ripped overstuffed chair.

“I guess bosses have overinflated egos no matter what universe you’re in,” I mused.

“Well no sense in letting a good office go to waste,” I thought.

“Hey can one of you guys pick me up and move me?" I asked my newly named scions.

“Where to?” asked Carmen.

“There's an office in the loft,” I said, “it's got to be more safe than being out in the open like this.”

“Let me just pick you up then,” Carmen said as my core was enveloped in a telekinetic glow.

“Aaaaaahhhh! stopstopstopstop!” I exclaimed.

Carmen quickly dismissed the spell.

“What's wrong?” Midnight asked standing up.

“No clue,” I groaned, “felt like how a microphone sounds when you hold it up to another microphone.”

“What’s a microphone?” Carmen asked.

“Never mind, just don't try to use telekinesis on my core again,” I said as the feeling passed.

“So how are we going to move you?” Midnight asked.

At that moment, Tom came around the corner and gave my scions a smug look before opening his mouth and barely scooping me up.

“Way to go Tom,” I said, trying not to cringe from being in a cat’s mouth, “now let's go to the office."

With care and haste, Tom strutted up the stairs into the biggest office before he spit me out onto the ‘L’ shaped desk.

“Good job Tom,” I thought as a trickle of cat drool rolled off my core’s surface.

“Let me get that for you,” Carmen said as she cleaned off my core with a piece of parchment.

“Thanks,” I said as I settled into my new digs before Tom curled around my core once again.

It wasn’t perfect, but at least there won’t be a situation where I’m out in the open for the next person who wanders in.

! EXP threshold reached !

>Upgrades available

“Man, I hate how that keeps popping up,” I thought as I opened the notification. There was only one option available.

! Unlock Craft/Build menu !

>Y/N?

“Oh I’m spoiled for choice, how ever will I decide?” I thought in my most sarcastic tone before selecting ‘yes”.

The ‘Inventory’ tab glowed white for a moment before being replaced with the ‘Craft/Build’ tab.

“Wait, so was there a way to get things into the inventory before this? Ah, whatever; let's mess with this a little before I get another popup,” I thought before selecting my new option.

A grid overlay expanded on top of my awareness of the dungeon.

"Well there’s not really a tutorial, so let's just start pressing buttons," I said as I began to focus on a ruined crate.

[Medium wooden storage crate, broken, rotten]

>Repair?*

>Move?

>Break down?

>Upgrade?*

-*Not enough materials for the following actions

"Ah I guess everything isn't just mana then," I thought as I selected the 'Break down' option.

The crate disintegrated quickly into a black dust before disappearing.

! Medium wooden storage crate blueprint unlocked !

! Wood unlocked as a crafting component !

! Iron unlocked as a crafting component !

"Hooray," I thought dryly and noticed that the wood had gone up by a few units and I had one unit of metal; probably from the nails.

The crafting menu now showed the transparent outline of a crate.

“Let’s see if this works,” I thought as I added the unit of metal to the crate blueprint.

! Medium metal storage crate unlocked !

The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement.

! Not enough materials to build !

“Figures,” I sighed.

I had a world of possibilities open to me. All sorts of things to build and all sorts of things to make them out of. Hell if my cats were any indication, I could probably get into making or doing some cool magic.

But I was getting ahead of myself. All of the cool magic wouldn’t stop people from seeing me as a dungeon. If I didn’t come up with something soon, someone would stumble upon my core or I would be getting human entrails as a crafting component before long.

My awareness wandered over the new section that I had just unlocked before stumbling across something interesting.

“Oh sweet there’s a safe in here!” I exclaimed.

“You really need to stop going quiet for long periods of time and then shouting,” Midnight said, his hackles returning to a more normal state.

“Ah, sorry,” I replied.

“Just try not to make a habit out of it. What did you find?” he asked.

“There’s a safe under the floor here, let’s see if I can open the safe,” I said.

I selected the safe in the ‘Build’ menu and expanded the ‘Break Down’ option.

[Small iron lockbox]

>receive the following materials:

-Iron

-parchment

-gold

“Ah beans, looks like I can’t just break down the safe,” I said.

“If only you had someone to help you open it,” Midnight said with a deadpan tone.

“Right, I forgot that you guys can do that,” I said.

“Has the novelty of talking cats worn off so soon?” Carmen joked.

“Yeah, sorry,” I said, “just got a lot on my mind right now."

“Do you want to give him a hand?” Carmen asked.

“I suppose,” Midnight replied as he stood up.

“It’s over here in the corner. All you need to do is pull on this board and the whole thing slides open,” I said.

After some prodding, midnight found the board that I was talking about and revealed the lockbox.

“So what now, House?” Midnight asked.

“Did you just call me House?” I asked.

“That’s how you referred to yourself. ‘Don’t you know, House always wins’,” He quoted.

“Yeah, but my name is-” I started before I froze.

I didn’t remember my old name.

My parent’s names, the street I grew up on, my first pet’s name, all of my other memories seemed to be in tact.

“House?” Midnight asked.

“Sorry,” I apologized, “just go ahead and call me House, I guess.”

“Right…” began Midnight, “so how do you want to get this open?”

“Hang on, let me try something,” I said.

I took a look at the ‘Craft' side of the ‘Build/Craft’ menu to see if there wasn’t something I could do.

The only iron blueprints I had available to me were for nails and some fittings that were used to reinforce some of the shelves.

“Too bad I can’t combine these into a crowbar,” I thought.

Suddenly both of the blueprints highlighted and a new notification popped up.

! Pry bar unlocked !

“Oh sweet, just what I needed,” I thought as I hit the ‘craft’ option in the menu.

The pry bar was added to an inventory space with the option to deploy it in the executive office next to Midnight.

The pry bar coalesced from the same black dust that had disappeared when I had broken down the crate.

“Try to wedge the lock between the notch on that end and press down on the other end,” I instructed.

Midnight picked up the pry bar with his telekinesis and did as I told him. The pry bar jerked against the lock a few times without much yield.

My scion stood up and took a wide stance as a look of concentration came over him.

The pry bar slammed down once more as Midnight grit his teeth in concentration.

The metal groaned in resistance before yielding with a mighty pop.

Midnight slumped over in exertion as he took a moment to catch his breath.

“Way to go!” I exclaimed as midnight regained his composure.

“Naturally,” Midnight said, licking his paw as if he wasn’t straining just a second ago.

“Well what are we waiting for, let’s open it,” Carmen said as she strut past her brother and opened the safe.

Inside were several sheets of bound parchment as well as some neat stacks of gold coins.

“Ooh shiny!” Carmen exclaimed as she floated the coins out of the safe.

“Well it’s not like I can go down to the market, so there’s no harm in letting her have them,” I thought as I turned my attention to the parchment.

The writing was in a language I didn’t recognize, but as my eyes moved across the page, I began to understand what the words ment.

“Master inventory and price sheet…” I began.

“This is all just prices for construction materials and contracts with the suppliers,” I sighed.

“Thinking again, Mr. House?” Carmen asked.

“Yeah, you remember when you gambled with Duke and Jasper?” I asked.

“Of course,” She beamed, “that was so much fun!”

“I think I might be on to something, but I’m going to need yours and Midnight’s help,” I said.

“As long as it’s not boring, I’ll do whatever you want, Mr. House,” Carmen said with a gleam in her eye.

“Not like you could survive without us,” Midnight quipped.

“Perfect,” I said, “let’s get started.”

The next several hours were spent figuring the ends and outs of the Building/Crafting menu.

Breaking things down did a good job of cleaning up the place and moving things around only cost a little bit of mana.

Unsurprisingly, repairing an object cost a lot less than making a new one.

In total, I now had more scrap iron and much more wood, but not nearly enough of anything to make or upgrade anything worthwhile.

The warehouse and the offices were now much cleaner than they had been before and I was now left with a bunch of blueprints for storage equipment and medieval office supplies like quills and inkwells. Of the blueprints I had, one of them was the iron padlock that came off of the lockbox.

"Maybe I should try to make my core more secure," I thought as I tried to figure out how to combine a door with a padlock.

It turned out that the game was willing to work with me and seamlessly integrated the lock into the door. It also gave me the option to craft a key or to control the door with mana. I couldn't think of a good reason to make a key especially if someone could walk out of here with it, so I opted for a keyless door.

! Locked door blueprint unlocked !

I chuckled a bit at that one before taking a closer look.

"Hmm let's try something," I mused before crafting a crate and attaching a lock to it.

The results were a bit more dramatic than I had anticipated. The crate changed shape to something that anyone who was even a little familiar with fantasy would recognize.

! Treasure chest unlocked !

>Unique interaction with [Fortune Magnet]

“That’s interesting,” I said as I crafted and deployed the treasure chest.

“What’s interesting?” asked Carmen.

“The treasure chest interacts with one of your abilities. Do you feel anything when you’re around this?” I asked.

“Not sure, let me see,” she said as she hopped up on the box to examine it.

Clink

I took a look inside the chest and to my surprise, a silver coin had appeared.

“That wasn’t there before,” I said.

“I heard something come from the box. What happened,” Carmen asked.

Clink

“Coins are appearing in the chest from where you’re standing,” I replied.

“Really?” Carmen said in a sing-song voice.

“Well this is going to make my idea a bit easier,” I thought as I took a look at the coins.

Part of me wondered where the coins were coming from. Most of them had scratches and tarnish, so I probably wasn't making counterfeit currency.

Probably…

***

"Are you sure about this, Duke?" asked Zee as he checked the binding on his broken wand.

"We have to do something," replied Duke solemnly as he ran a whetstone down the length of his short sword.

“Can’t we go to the city watch or the adventurer’s guild?” asked Zee, “surely someone can handle this better than the three of us.”

“Nobody would believe three bums claiming to have found a dungeon in the middle of the city,” Jasper said as he strapped a knife to his waist..

“Ugh, I hate that you’re right,” Zee groaned.

“Don’t worry Zee,” Duke said, “nobody is getting hurt.”

“Easy for you to say, Duke,” sighed Jasper, “you’re the only one of us who’s actually been in a dungeon before.”

“We’re all going to be fine Jasper, it was a weak dungeon that only had two small scions. I wouldn’t be surprised if the core wasn’t that far from the entrance,” Duke explained.

“Fine, let’s get this over with,” Jasper sighed and slung his pack over his shoulder.

***

“If you build it, they will come,” I thought, “I think Julius Caesar said that.”

Well I had built it now I just needed to wait for someone to show up.

“Maybe I should try to advertise,” I thought before feeling a set of familiar people approaching my door.

! Warning: invaders approaching !

“Huh, well that was quick.”

***

“All right Jasper, you’re up.” Duke whispered.

“Just to let you know, a house and a dungeon are two completely different things,” Jasper hissed, “houses don’t have traps unless a madman is living in it.”

“I’m well aware Jasper,” Duke whispered back.

Grumbling quietly to himself, Jasper began to slowly make his way to the door, checking the flagstones as he went.

“Do you really think that the street is going to be trapped?” Zee whispered to Duke as he watched Jasper poke the road with a stick.

“Where a dungeon is concerned, you can never be too careful,” Duke replied with a hard glint in his eyes.

Zee just nodded silently.

***

“What the hell are they doing,” I moaned as I watched the scene unfold.

“Maybe I can speed this up a bit,” I thought before selecting the door.

All but the move option had been grayed out.

“Well here goes nothing.” I thought.

***

Jasper had reached the door and had managed to slip a shard of a mirror under the gap when suddenly the door opened. Jasper almost fell on his face while Zee flinched in surprise.

“Looks like we got invited in,” Zee said after a moment.

“Well let’s not keep it waiting,” Duke said with a sharp edge as he drew his short sword.

Jasper picked himself up and stared into the warehouse, “Guys you won’t believe this,”

“What’s wrong?” Duke called back as he approached the entrance.

“Nothing,” Jasper replied, “just weird.”

Duke and Zee caught up to Jasper and stared in shock at the dungeon.