Slopes of Mount Gursway, 15th day of Sol, 1661
Monty Fortier snapped back to consciousness fully aware of his surroundings, but he didn’t know it. This was mainly because there was nothing around him. Replaying the last things he remembered, made him come to the conclusion that he was now a dungeon.
Five minutes of experimentation and he had determined that he was, in fact, in a spherical hollow, approximately half a metre in diameter, in basalt. His crystal was a strange bluey-green colour, and a moments reflection brought the term to his memory. Turquoise, his crystal’s colour was turquoise. It seemed to be about 30 millimetres tall.
He stilled his mind like he had been taught and let his senses turn inward. What was different? What was new? What was missing? What was his awareness telling him?
He had been changed. He knew he would be, but it was still a surprise to sense the differences. He finally understood what Dad had talked about, so much of his sense of self over the last couple of years had really been affected by being awash in a sea of hormones. Now that his ‘dangly bits’ were missing, he was able to see a little more clearly. He still identified with his pride in being able to sign his name in pee, especially since that skill had saved him and his sisters from a mindwipe, but he was able to see the world around him with a bit more clarity, more depth. He also recognised that Jessica had probably been beating him in a lot of things over the last few years but had been hiding it. He had apparently not wanted to see, how strange.
*Now, concentrate. Need to come up with a plan, need to identify my priorities, need to set some goals.*
Saying that out load, well, to be honest he didn’t, but specifically forming the words, did make them a little clearer in his mind.
*What needs to become my defining inspiration? My sisters need me. We are out in a very dangerous world, yes, we will have others to help, but it will be the three of us who need to stand. Love, duty and responsibility. I am choosing to be measured by these. I must be as strong as I can be in the long-term, so I will not compromise my long-term strength for a short-term gain. I must survive, I must thrive, so we can protect each other, and eventually enact our revenge.*
Once he figured out how to do it, he would carve those words into the wall of his core room, Love * Duty * Responsibility * Strive * Protect * Repay.
From what he knew, a spontaneous Dungeon would be able to use their instincts to get all of the way through to successfully running their dungeon. At some point, the spells that the Dungeon Assistants Guild ran should detect them and get them help, but that would just speed up the process. So, what did he, Monty, need to do here? Sit on his hands and wait for some assistant to turn up and hand him life on a platter, or did he have a responsibility to his sisters to get up off his backside and get this party started?
*What is the first step that my instincts are saying we need to do?* Monty realised that he had a set of instincts that must have come with the transformation into a Dungeon Core. Using these instincts, he quickly found his basic status screen, with his dungeon status screen following soon after.
Monty Fortier (Basic Status)
Dungeon Name:
(untitled)
Mana Recharge per min:
Alignment:
(unaligned)
Base/Current Recharge:
5/5
Level:
0
Recharge from rooms:
0
Used/Current DP:
0/0
Recharge from creatures:
0
DP Points Next Level:
100
Mana:
100/166
Extras from harvests:
0
Monty Fortier (Dungeon Status)
Dungeon Radius (m)
0.5
Dungeon rooms:
1
Max Radius: (m)
1
Current Delvers DP/Hour
0
Dungeon Area: (sq km)
-
DP’s per month
-
Dungeon Influence: (sq km)
-
Maximum Dungeon Level
1
Skills:
(none)
Magics:
(none)
*Here is the first step, what does this tell me*
*Hmm, this doesn’t look right. Why can’t my mana regenerating pass 100?*
Again, he allowed his instincts to guide him. His attention kept returning to the Dungeon Name being (untitled). Maybe that’s the start? It would sort of make sense. *Hmm, what do I want as a name? What do I want as a dungeon?*
Monty kept coming back to stories he’d read where there was a place of wonder. In the stories, they were usually fairy grottos. *So ‘Fairy Grotto’? No. don’t want to cause a fairy offence, maybe ‘Grotto’? Worth trying.*
The name could not be accepted, he felt that it was already in use somewhere. *What about ‘The Mountain Grotto’, then.*
Success! Monty was pleased to see his mana staring to tick upwards. *Why, though? Wait, 66 was my old mana limit, before I was changed. So, a dungeon gets a basic 100 points, plus whatever their old mana limit was, if applicable? Sounds fair, but why would it stop generating at 100? Obviously, the Dungeon Name is much more important than I think?*
Monty Fortier (Basic Status)
Dungeon Name:
The Mountain Grotto
(Mana Recharge Per Minute)
Alignment:
(unaligned)
Base/Current Recharge
5
/
5
Level:
0
Recharge from rooms:
0
Used/Current DP
0
/
0
Recharge from creatures:
0
DP Point for next level
100
Current/Max Mana
166
Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
/
166
Extras from harvests:
0
Monty Fortier (Dungeon Status)
Dungeon radius: (m)
0.5
Dungeon rooms:
1
Max Radius: (km)
3
Current Delvers DP/Hour
0
Dungeon area: (sq m)
0.25
DP's per month
0
Dungeon influence: (sq m)
0.27
*So, now I have mana, what can I do with it? Oh, yeah, what’s my instincts telling me? To expand. How do I do this? Just push? OK, that worked, wow, my mana dropped and now I can ‘see’ a metre around me. So, initial goal is just to expand my influence. Let’s get it out to a kilometre or so to start with, then we can see what else we can do.*
Monty kept playing with his instincts and started to learn how to manage his tasks. He found he could run a task on ‘automatic’ and he could set lower boundaries on his mana and the task would automatically switch on and off around limits he set. But he wasn’t happy with this, it seemed a bit ‘jarring’. Some more playing and he realised he could also adjust the rate that his mana would be used, allowing him to just run the task and it would use the mana that he regenerated to drive the task, keeping his mana pool at whatever consistent value he chose. This allowed him to ‘play’ using his active mana pool, while tasks would be completed automatically in the background.
*This makes sense, otherwise the minutia of the job would take up all of my time.*
He was nearing that kilometre radius and was pretty impressed with his new abilities. By now, the growth of his area of influence was basically automatic. He could run it as a background task while he thought through other things. Extending his ‘feelings’, he could detect a lot within the distance. There was a patch of ‘blue’, that his instincts were telling him to absorb. He did so and realised that it was an intrusion of gold into the nearby rock. That made him realise that he must be located near a current or former volcano, as the rocks he was seeing were all igneous. There was also a lot of plant and animal life on the surface, and his…
A ’pop’ sound interrupted his thoughts.
A creature appeared in the small clear sphere around his Core. By its looks, he thought it was probably a fairy.
The creature looked around with disdain and said, “HelloIamBartholomewbrightwingandIhavebeenassignedasyourdungeonassistantandyouneedtostartbygivingyourdungeonanamewhatitisdoesnotmatterthenexpandingyourinfluenceforthenextfewhoursthenyouneedtocreateabasicdungeonoffoursquareroomsinarowsowecangetyousquaredaway.”
Monty paused for a moment to parse what this creature, Batholomew if he understood him correctly, has said. He had come across a few people like this in his time in court, people who were more impressed by their own supposed importance than anyone else they met. “I suppose I have to work with him. Or do I?” he thought.
*Why?*
Bartholomew blinked a couple of times, obviously trying to work out why this Dungeon Core was questioning him. “Because I am the one here who knows what he is doing. You need to obey me, so we can quickly get you started on the path to Dungeonhood. Firstly, you need to accept this contract, so I can start getting you in order.”
Bartholomew strode across to Monty’s crystal and touched it.
Monty reacted to this unauthorised touch. There was a sense of ‘wrongness’ about someone just touching him without first getting permission.
It got worse as Monty started to examine this contract. He had read enough contracts, in fact he had been tutored in Contract Law, to know when he was being presented one that had been modified and he knew enough contract law to know that this contract was a bad one. He poked around and found he could call up not only the original contract that this bad one was based on, but also three other ‘default’ contracts. There was one that seemed to be like a maintenance agreement. The sort of thing that would be used for a tradesperson doing some important work around the castle. The second was a temporary agreement that allowed the Dungeon Assistant to work with a Dungeon until they decided if they were a good match. The third was the one that the contract had been based on and was a more permanent contract until such time as Monty reached level 15. The last one was what must be the ‘lifelong’ version of that once the courtship was done. Monty snorted in his own mind at his own sense of humour. He compared these contracts to the one that Bartholomew had somehow cobbled together. The contract was horrendous, basically making Monty the indentured slave to this Bartholomew Lightwing. At least the contract was basically illegal. Wait, it was illegal if they were located within the borders of the Kingdom of Surnae. Where are we actually?
*I don’t think so. What about if we just start with a basic contract so that we will know when one of us is lying?*
Bartholomew said, “No. You need to agree to this contract, otherwise you could be classed as a rogue dungeon.”
*Can you at least tell me where in the world we are located?*
“No, you need to sign the contract before I can help you. There will be no help coming for you until this contract is signed. You will be here, all by yourself, alone, until you agree to the contract.”
Monty thought to himself, *No way that’s going happen. I wonder if I can just ignore him?*
At that point, there was another ‘pop’ sound and another fairy appeared in the room. This was a female and darker coloured than Bartholomew. Batholomew was all light browns and golds, while this new one was black, purples and greys.
The fairy looked around and saw Bartholomew sulking in a corner and her expression changed to one of puzzlement.
“Umm, Batholomew, is it not?”
“This is my Dungeon, it is already claimed, go away.”
In an impressive example of physical control, the new fairy only raised her left eyebrow. “Right, Bartholomew it is. I am just popping in to give you and the Dungeon a couple of pieces of information you will both need.”
Turning to the crystal, Fancy said, “Hello, my name is Fancy and I am Jessica’s Dungeon Assistant. May I know the name of whom I am addressing?”
*Monty.*
Fancy was surprised at the level of hostility she was getting off the Dungeon Core.
“Jessica wanted you to know that she is located about 15 kilometres to the south-east of you, while your other sister is about the same distance to your east. May I approach your crystal and touch you? I would like to offer you a basic contract so we can help coordinate everything to start with. I will include a clause allowing you to sever the contract whenever you feel you need to.”
Bartholomew shouted, “No!”, while Monty said, “Approach.”
Fancy had a puzzled look on her face as she walked over and touched Monty’s crystal. She offered Monty a basic communications contract, with some added clauses to allow Monty to control and terminate the contract if he felt he needed to. She kept giving Bartholomew strange looks, as she felt the contract being agreed to and it gave her a ‘taste’ of Monty’s current mood. Yes, there was certainly a lot of tension between Monty and Bartholomew.
“Bartholomew, are you aware of the name of the Dungeon here?”
“No, and it does not matter.”
Hmm, looks like sulking, smells like sulking, tastes like sulking, so it must be sulking.
“Bartholomew, I would like to introduce you to Monty Fortier, eldest child to their Royal Majesties, Queen Camilla Fortier and King Duniel Fortier III.” Turning to Monty, she continued, “Right, I am off to see your other sister, then I need to get back to Jessica.”
With a pop, she disappeared.
With a snort, Monty decided that yes, he could just ignore Bartholomew. Monty had a firm design for his dungeon in mind. It would be a spiral, starting with a small, fifteen metre diameter circular room for an entrance. There would be an anti-clockwise spiral going out from there, running through a series of ever larger rooms and finishing with a sixty-five metre diameter room. Each of the rooms would have a similar sort of design, starting with a tree in the middle of each room. He would be going with an overall design theme of ‘fairy grotto’. Access to his Core Room would be via a hidden passageway on the outside of the tunnel between the last two rooms.
He now added another job to his multitasking, beginning to hollow out his Dungeon.
Every now and then, he would ask a question of Batholomew. At first he would get no answer, then over time an occasional grunt. Each answer providing a little more clarity, a little more sense to this strange world that Monty had been thrown into.
He drew comfort from the few words he got from Fancy, allowing him to know his sisters were safe and working towards their own future as well.
There was a large ‘pop’ sound in his Core Room, which he had now expanded to about 10 metres in diameter, and a creature appeared in the room. It looked sort of like a large version of Bartholomew, but with a much more angular face and body. In the back of her mind, he thought ‘sprite’.
“Bartholomew, report!”
“Master, the Dungeon has been completely uncooperative and unwilling to share even a basic contract. As much as I am pained to suggest it, I feel they need to be culled.”
“Hmm, let us see what they have to say about this.”
“No, Master, do not trust them! They have done nothing other than lie and mislead me since I arrived.”
The sprite snorted and moved over to Monty and asked, “May I touch you, young Core?”
*Certainly.*
Monty offered the supervisor a basic contract that would stop both parties from misleading the other and could be terminated by either party. Monty showed the sprite all of his interactions with Bartholomew, and the various contracts that he had offered Monty.
*Patience, little one, this will be resolved quickly.*
The sprite took out his phone and dialled a number. “Doug? Remember that conversation we had late last year, where you wanted a lead to start investigating? I think I have one. Yes, can you come now? I will send you the coordinates of the Dungeon Core concerned. Yes, see you soon.”
The sprite winked at Monty, doing so in a way that Batholomew would not notice, then turned to Batholomew and said, “I see the problems that you have had. Give me a few minutes and we will straighten all this out. You know that us supervisors can force the Assistant-Core contracts, do you not?”
Monty was shocked, but then realised that through the link with the supervisor, who’s name he now knew was ‘Brian’, he could tell that Brian was lying. Why would he lie to Bartholomew? Unless he was trying to keep him calm while…
Another ‘pop’ sounded, and another creature appeared in the core room. This one was a hobgoblin, in full armour.
Brian said, “Quick, Doug, secure the fairy and stop them from teleporting.”
Doug threw a tiny dart at Bartholomew, which hit him, burying itself into his abdomen. He obviously tried to portal away but found his magic uncooperative.
Doug strode over and put a set of restraints on the fairy, then looked at Brian.
Brian said, “Bartholomew here, tried to lock this young core into an abusive contract, similar to the ones you described. I’ve reviewed the Core’s memory, and I am convinced that this fairy has been coached by the group you suspected existed. I release Bartholomew Lightwing into your custody to allow you to investigate the incidents that have happened here in Monty Fortier’s Dungeon.”
Doug nodded, thanked Brian, and disappeared with Batholomew and a ‘pop’.
“I apologise, young core, for what has happened here. We Dungeon Assistants do pride ourselves on helping our charges, not trying to enslave them.”
He looked around the core room and asked, “Has this incident done any harm to you and your dungeon?”
*Not really. I’ve expanded myself out to the full 3-kilometre radius while Bartholomew thought I’d been sulking. I have started the hollowing out of my first level and was just starting to figure out how the monsters and traps worked.*
A grin split Brian’s face. “Oh, I am really looking forward to the impact you and your two sisters make in the Dungeon community over the next few years. Could I get a peek at what your dungeon plan will look like?”
Monty shared an image of the initial sketch of the first floor, and Brian asked a couple of questions about the design. “What will be your basic theme for this floor? Have you decided?”
Monty's Dungeon, First sketch of first level. [https://images2.imgbox.com/da/0a/Yv08KqFs_o.jpg]
*Yes, Fairy Grotto.*
The grin on Brians face got wider. “Fancy, Jessica’s Assistant, suggested an Assistant that might be a good match for you. Is it all right if I call them over and we’ll see if you find them acceptable for the initial contract. Normally, I would leave you and your new assistant alone for about 6 months to allow to work things out, but considering what has happened, I will drop back in about a month. Is this OK for a starting plan?”
*So, are you nervous because of what has been done to me, or because of who my parents are?*
Without any hesitation, Brian said, “Both.”
Monty snorted and said, *Let’s give this a try.*
Brian pulled out his phone and dialled a number. “Sharon? It is Brian here. It was actually worse than I thought, so I will need Jeremy to teleport over now so I can confirm things will be acceptable. Yes, I am sure, why are you not sure? Could you do me a favour and call up Jeremy’s school records? You were basing your reaction of his academic summary? Have a look at his actual results. Notice something? Yes, I noticed the same.”
Brian realised something, “Actually, could you call up another student, Bartholomew Lightwing and see if we have the same sort of discrepancy?”
After a moment’s pause, Brian said, “Wait, you are saying that the two summaries have been swapped?
“Interesting.
“Please contact Doug Slasher, over at Dungeon Enforcement and let him know. he is investigating some discrepancies and will probably find this piece of news very interesting. Please do not tell or share these details with anyone else until Doug has had a chance to investigate. Thank you.
“Bye.”
After a moment, Monty said, *So you expect this to be part of a wider conspiracy?*
“Expect? No. Starting to think that it is possible? Maybe.”
*Tell, me. Will I be able to mentally speak with everyone?*
“No. it is a peculiarity of the magic around Dungeons that the Core can speak with any potential Assistant in their core room. Also, certain entities, like me, are able to. Once you accept a contract for an Assistant, you will lose this ability, except with them. We postulate that it was set up this way to facilitate the Dungeon/Assistant bond.”
There was another ‘pop’ and a young sprite appeared in the room. He looked around and first bowed to Monty, then Brian, and said, “Jeremy Farsight, reporting as requested.”
“Jeremy, there has been a bit of a mix-up that we are still investigating. Basically, you should have been offered first attempt to bond with Monty here, but your academic records and those of another Assistant were mixed up and he was assigned instead. As they were really not a match for Monty, things quickly escalated in a bad way, and I ended up getting involved. There is a bit of an investigation now happening, so I would appreciate you refraining from discussing this case until we can figure out what happened. It is not super-secret, just we would prefer an unhindered playing field why we sort things. I am going to give you both an hour to chat and them I will be back to confirm everything is OK. Is this suitable for both of you?”
After getting agreement, there was a pop and Brian was gone.
“Well, this is awkward. Anyway, my name is Jeremy, and you can trust me, because I’m a Dungeon Assistant!”
Jeremy tilted his head to the side in puzzlement. While that was a fairly poor attempt at humour, the reaction he got did not seem to match.
“Have I done something wrong?”
*No, I’m just a little offput because of what happened before you arrived. So, do you usually try to ‘wing’ your jokes like that?*
“Are you saying it was a ‘fairy’ poor attempt at humour?”
*’Deep down’ it may have been funny.*
“I didn’t think the humour was that ‘buried’.”
*I can ‘dig it’.*
By the end of the exchange, Jeremy had a huge grin on his face and Monty’s attitude had lightened.
“Right, Monty, how did you want to proceed? Start with a basic contract, then, if you don’t mind, share with me your thoughts and plans and I can offer what advise I can so you can decide if we are enough of a match to go forward?”
*Sound’s fine.*
“Monty, may I touch you?”
*Best offer I’ve had all week.*
Jeremy snorted.