DUMPLING LEARNS TO GET STRONGER

I am not sure what to do. I need to get stronger, and the John said that I need to focus on what I can already do, but I don’t really know what that means. What can I do? Nothing really, but there has to be something. But none of the things I can do are really that special. I frown. I wish I could ask Mama. Okay, so if I’m strong I should be able to beat up mean people like the necromancer lady. So, maybe being strong means you’re really good at beating up mean people? I consider that thought, it makes sense. I smile. So, I need to get better at beating up mean people. But where will I find mean people to try beating up? The John-person was nice, and I think the other people with him were also nice. How could I tell if someone was mean? I was considering this while walking around the… which floor was this? I think I lost count. I am above the floor I was on, that was now a big spikey hole. This floor is weird. It’s all bouncy. Like it looks really weird, everything is brightly colored and really smooth and square. My home with Mama is also really square, and smooth, but it isn’t bouncy. It’s actually really fun to bounce on the floor, but I need to focus; Mama needs me. I need to find bad people to beat up, and if I get good at beating them up maybe I’ll be strong enough to beat up the mean lady and save Mama.

I lightly bounce down the weird tunnel I’m in, looking for bad people to beat up. I round a corner and bounce down that hall as well. I round another and start bouncing harder, seeing how high I can go. I wonder if the ceiling as also bouncy. I keep bouncing higher and higher seeing if I can reach the ceiling. I start to giggle, as I keep bouncing. I reach my arms up trying to reach the ceiling. I’m so, so close just one or two me-heights away. I drop, landing on the bouncy ground, it warps down super far as I coil my legs, I rope stronger muscles through my thighs and calves, weaving them together to make them longer and stronger. And… I leap. The floor throws me high into the air, I reach my arms up, I thin out my arm bones, stretching their length as far as I can to reach the ceiling. My fingers just barely brush the surface. I let out a squeal of delight as I begin to fall back to the ground. I did it! I made it to the ceiling! I laugh as I reach across the network to tell Mama what I did and… oh… right. I slowly come to a stop in the hall. Right, I need to get stronger. I take a deep breath. Okay… What can I do, that is special? What am I good at? I can’t think of anything… I’ve never really done anything like beating up bad people. All I do is sleep and chase the… squeak…. I remember a conversation I had with Mama, after that time I cut my leg open to see how it worked. She said that My legs were the best legs because I could change them to fit the situation. Maybe that’s it? I can make myself all changey, and then I’ll be super strong? I sit down on the bouncy ground and look at my hands. That mean creature I fought, before I woke up in the big pit, had weird hands, they had long sharp claws on them that really hurt. Focusing, I pushed my claws to extend. They extended a little, but not nearly enough. I needed something to make them longer, I couldn’t just pull more nail out of nowhere, I needed something. I frowned. Okay, so, what if I didn’t use the nail stuff but something else? I pull a little bit of bone from my fingers and arms and make them into claws. I smile; they are far longer now, but my arms now feel flimsy. I need more bone stuff. What even are bones made of? Can I make them? Actually, no, new plan. Can I get new stuff to make stuff with? I look down at the bouncy floor, an idea forming.

The floor material tastes weird. It’s chewy and tastes nothing like food, but when I swallow it, I can move it around. I push it to my fingers and then… I get little bouncy finger pads. They’re grey like my skin. Unlike the floor, which is brown. Okay, so now I know if I eat something I can use it in myself, and I can make myself stronger by changing myself…. But now what? I guess I could try to find new things to eat. I think about the idea for a moment before deciding that there’s no reason it shouldn’t work. Smiling, I move on. I now know how to get stronger. I just need to eat everything I can find. I smiled. I have a plan; this shouldn’t be hard.

I was so bored. I thought that finding new materials would be easy, but everything around here was pretty much the same. The walls, the floor, and even the little nibble I managed to get from the ceiling were all made from the same material. I now had a lot of that bouncy stuff, but this stuff doesn’t seem all that strong. I grumbled into the room. I kinda want to leave. This place seems useless. I focus and try to remember. Immediately I got a few faint flashing images, images that pulled me in a specific direction, up another floor. The images also gave me a number. Five. Deciding that that’s probably not important, I continue onwards. Although I get a strange feeling. Aren’t there supposed to be monsters? There were monsters on all the other floors. Like… I remember a small slippery looking monster slamming into someone, sending them flailing out over…. I shake my head. NO! I need to pay attention. If there are no monsters, that’s fine, the last one I met was mean anyways. I think to myself, remembering the feeling of that thing’s claws in my stomach. Arriving at the staircase, I ascend. Although I can’t quite shake the feeling that something is wrong. There should be monsters.

The entrance of the Lomari Labyrinth is not a subtle location. In fact, it is at the center of a massive fortress, designed to be able to contain any gold rank monster that might attempt to escape. Although, it could be said that that is not, in fact, the true entrance. The creators of the fortress seemingly agree to this theory, having named the location the Lomari Fortress. The actual entrance, the point of no return as it were, the metaphorical gate at which all hope is abandoned prior to crossing the threshold, is actually a hole in the side of a mound of dirt into which a tiled road leads. Traffic bustling in and out constantly. Adventurers descend to seek fame and glory whilst evading the death that seeks them, bringing with them the occasional cart to carry out goods. Even the occasional automobile descends into the dungeon. Afterall the first three-or-so floors are relatively safe, as the floors aren’t considered truly dangerous until the eighth and onwards. The eighth given this title due to it’s reputation. All of this is to say that the Lomari Labyrinth isn’t your standard-issue horrible hole of horrors untold, no, it is a very valuable horrible hole of horrors. One that a great many people have invested large quantities of wealth towards the exploitation of. Monster parts, medicinal herbs, magical artifacts…. All, valuable resources, readily available within the caverns of the Lomari. This is to say, that this isn’t some uncared-for cesspool of death and misery, it’s a carefully monitored cesspool of death and misery, a resource if you will. Now, let’s suppose for a moment something were to inexplicably alter that resource in a very public and visible way. Those who have invested money or blood or both into such a place may be inclined to inquire as to, what the fuck just happened. There are many things that could incite such an inquiry, maybe a certain concentration of resources vanished from an area; a few adventuring teams going missing; a crop of herbs going bad inexplicably; Or, just maybe, the entirety of a floor—large enough to fit a few cities—vanishing inexplicably in exchange for a massive crater, all the surrounding land being crystallized and every single resource on the floor gone. Not to mention every single party expected to be on the floor now M.I.A. Every party on surrounding floors reporting massive tremors throughout the dungeon. Tremors, able to be detected even from the fortress above. One may be able to understand how such hypothetical events might cause a bit of a fuss.

Stolen novel; please report.

That was why a critical action had been taken, wealth from investors pooled and an invisible transfer of funds taking place. That was why there was now a figure approaching the entrance of the Lomari. The completely still entrance. As Every last person who could be contacted had been called out, leaving the Lomari Labyrinth empty for the first time in ages. Empty of humans, that is, monsters being uncaring of summons from humanity, and even if they did emerge, anything short of silver rank would be quickly reduced to their base molecules in a matter of moments. The figure walked along the tiled road, her bare feet clinking against the tile in a rhythmic fashion. Clink, clink, clink. Her perfectly white porcelain soles impacting the ground with an oddly ominous sound. She strode casually into the dungeon, as if she owned it.

I don’t like this place. The last place was all bouncy, which was fun, but this place is just full of water. I tried to swim in it, but when I did something bit me, and it’s too dark to tell what it was. How can the bitey thing even see me? I poke a toe in the water to test it. It’s cold. I tried eating the walls when I got here, but I found another problem. They are made of rocks, and when I tried to bite the rocks, my teeth broke, so I need something stronger to be able to break the rocks, but if I already have that stronger thing, I should just eat that, but I probably won’t be able to eat that without having eaten something stronger. I let out a humph, in frustration. How am I going to be able to get stronger, if I need to be stronger to get stronger? I just sat there looking out over the dark water. This floor was like a cave, but everything was super dark. I need to be able to see in the dark to keep going so that I can at least find out what the bitey thing is. I know that it’s possible to see in the dark because when I was looking through the information Mama sent me, there was information on some animals that could see in the dark, like kitty-cats. If only I’d looked into how they did it, then I could change my eyes to be like theirs. If only I still…. I slapped my cheeks. No, I need to focus. What do I know about seeing? Well… I can see in the light… but I can’t see in the dark. So, maybe instead of seeing in the dark, I just need to make it light? I consider this idea. It should work… but how? Maybe I can find something that makes light, and then make myself glow with it? The light in the staircase has to come from somewhere. I turn and walk back into the staircase behind me before looking up to see where the light is coming from. There’s nothing there but the same stone that the stairs are always made of. I whimper. Stone again? But I can’t eat stone! Why can’t it be made of something soft and squishy like a… a spongey, soft… mushroom! Yeah, why can’t it be made of mushrooms? Wait… weren’t there glowing mushrooms back on that lower floor? The one with all the mushrooms? Thinking back, I remember there being glowy mushrooms. Maybe I could go back there, eat some of the glowy mushrooms and then I’ll be able to glow. I nod my head at the idea and descend.

Returning to the bouncy floor, I began wandering my way to where I feel like there would be another staircase, when something appeared. It came bouncing around a corner, each bounce sending ripples through the bouncy floor and walls. I wabble back and forth, trying to not fall over. It’s a big orb. It looks like it’s made of… something. It’s not stone. It has swirly lines carved into it and…. It leaps at me. I squeal and jump out of the way, or at least I try to, but the floor doesn’t let me. The squishiness of it, absorbing the force I use to jump. I curl into a protective ball as the ball-thing hits me. I feel it’s hard body impact mine, I scream as my arms and ribs break under the force. I slam to the ground with the ball on top of me, the floor distending with the force before me and the monster are both sent into the air. I immediately fuse my arms back together while the ball bounces down the hall towards the far end. I hit the ground with a bounce and immediately sink my claws in and run. I can’t beat that thing, it’s four times bigger than me, and it’s hard like stone. I’m not strong enough to even scratch it… strong enough…. Maybe I don’t need to be strong enough. The floor isn’t strong, but it seems perfectly fine with the ball thing. I need more floor stuff. I drop to the ground and bite a chunk out of the floor. I turn to keep an eye on the ball thing, which seems to be trying to reverse it’s momentum to come back at me. I keep eating and rapidly replacing everything in my body with the floor stuff until I’ve replaced most of myself with the bouncy material. I smile triumphantly, just as the ball monster hits me in the face. I feel my head squish as I am slammed to the ground, I get compressed to a thin line as the thing’s weight bears down on me, before it finally springs back up. I snap back to my normal shape as the ball-thing goes bouncing down the corridor again. That… didn’t hurt at all. I let out a celebratory cheer. I’m invincible! Then I get hit in the face again.