Dungeon at the End of the Universe

The plan was simple. We’d use a modified version of Faellen’s Wyld portal to teleport a few people to my Dungeon. I only partially understood how it worked, something about pulling them through the Wyld somehow, but I didn’t need to. All that mattered was that it worked.

We managed to pull three this time, but that can be improved upon later. Once they were through, I hurriedly made some destinations for them, before turning to my last remaining original quest.

Finally, I have done it.

Quest notification:
Quest complete!

Yes, my quest to figure out a way to get me some adventurers was finished.

Selecting reward.
Reward selected:
Universe affinity upgrade

Alright, that’s not great, but also not bad. Over the many many years of our preparation I did have the chance to ask the System some questions and apparently the whole Eldritch thing is not as simple as Translated or not Translated.

Even as a not Translated being, I still have some sort of inherent affinity to certain kinds of Universes. That, combined with my actual skill and active mimicry, decide how, well, eldritch I appear to natives.

But back to my future adventurers. All three of them just about reached their respective caves and are now about to touch the System orbs.

Oh, yes, I should probably mention that.

Part of my training was figuring out how to access the inner ‘essence’ in me, like I did when I infused the spears in the fight against corrupted Faellen. As a small side note, I eventually figured out that I didn’t just infused the End into those spears but the End mixed with Paradox (turns out anything infused with only End simply vanishes).

Anyway, once I learned to do this to the System essence part of my Aspects, I got much more insight into what the System Authority actually does. And also what my new System spreading quest actually wants from me.

Turns out, it’s not as easy as, for lack of a better word, infecting people with the System. Despite being a Core of the System, I still can’t house all of it. Which means I’m mostly carrying some general System rules, my own (so Dungeon Core) System rules, and that’s pretty much it. Nothing for any other beings.

What does that all mean? It means that I basically have to design how the System will work for all other beings.

Now, sure, maybe I could’ve set it up so that it is extremely bare-bones and that anyone who comes into contact with a User also gains access. It’d be the most efficient way to complete my quest. But it’d also result in a shitty System, and I don’t want to risk that after remembering what the System Core Ability description said.

Which resulted in what we’re doing right now. I took some inspiration from a few of my favourite book tropes. I’m doing a version of a System apocalypse.

But back to the three adventurer conscripts. As soon as they they the orb of my System essence, and thus become Users themselves, information about them floods the System.

Prshky, a sky scientist. I guess that’s their name for astronomers and astrophysicists. He’s a bit of a one-track mind.

Rampampadam, a constructor. Maybe their version of builders or construction workers? She seems relatively unconcerned with events that aren’t happening around them.

And Dittillapp, they’re a… what? That shouldn’t be! How come the System can’t read almost anything about them? This is unprecedented! I’ll have to watch out for that one.

For now, I don’t give them too much System access and open a path deeper into my Dungeon for all of them. I may have also closed the entrances to the caves, thus forcing them to continue. It’s fine, see: it only takes a few minutes of panicking for them to go on. Not Dittillapp though, they just continued immediately. Definitely a weird one.

Right then, what was the next step? Oh, yes, the tutorial construct.

As they walk down empty corridors into my Dungeon depths, I Create three simple stone constructs. They’re much better by now, much more human looking than before as well as more fluid in their movements.

Speaking of appearance, I’m not sure why I expected these people, the Sipalians, to be human. Like, obviously they won’t be. Then again, a six armed humanoid with legs like petrified tree trunks and a head that’s more eldritch than I am was not something anyone could’ve guessed. Even all of their hands are different! One set is normal, sure, but another one has claws and the last one a bunch of tentacles!

Ah, they’ve reached the trial chambers, good. Let’s see how good they are at combat.

The biggest shock is Rampampadam. She’s strong enough to straight up crush my poor little constructs! If every Sipalian is that strong I’ll need to seriously up my game. Dittillapp is more along the lines of what I’d expect, at least strength wise. They’re still much too skilled, something I’d expect from a martial arts master. Only Prshky performs entiely as I’d expect, if not a little worse.

But in the end, they all manage to defeat their constructs. Maybe with a little help from me in Prshky’s case, but who’s counting. It’s time for them to choose a Class.

Did I only allow the stereotypical three fro now? Sure. But this is only System version 0.1, you can’t expect much from me. And also, I know next to nothing about design. Better to see what they do with this and then adjust for the next version, instead of making an overcomplicated version 1 which introduces too many variables to track.

They choose their Classes and I unlock their full status for them. Each of them should be seeing something like this now:

Yes, it’s very simple right now, but they are only level 1. And I also wasn’t sure what more to add.

I could’ve maybe added an Aspect category, but I feel like only Dungeon Core’s get that from the start and for most other that’s a much more advanced thing.

At this point you may be wondering, didn’t Faellen say that non-Dungeons don’t have Levels? And you would be correct. Except that I don’t yet know how to design such a System. And also, they don’t have Levels, but levels. I’m sure there’s a difference there, I’m just too low level to know about it.

But enough of all this for now. They’re about to meet, and then I can have my first proper delve. Maybe I’ll even get Level-Up finally