Dungeon at the End of the Universe

Turns out I forgot about one major weakness of my newest monster. Their mana consumption is truly ginormous.

Even just a couple of them in the same room can drain the nearby mana in minutes.

Which then causes all of them to go into hibernation until it replenishes. So no the best combat monster ever, but perhaps I gave a use for it. Instead of them being the main obstacle of a floor, they could be the ambushes.

If I made a forest themed level, it’d be child’s play for these fake Treants to hide there (at least in their inactive modes). And when an unsuspecting adventurer wanders nearby… BOOM! They start moving and attacking. Or maybe a more literal boom and they self-destruct.

I quickly tell Faellen of the possibility, to which it agrees, before focusing on other stuff. Like little intruder in my mini-Dungeon.

It’s some kind of rodent. That’s as much as I can say. It somewhat reminds me of a mix between a rat and a squirrel. Alien planets are weird.

The… squirat, is scurrying across the floor, cautiously exploring my new Dungeon.

Aww, how cute. Too bad, I think as I drop a stalactite on it.

A quick application of Destroy later, I finally have my first monster for this Dungeon. A quick test does reveal that the ‘can’t use patterns from one Dungeon in the other’ thing works both ways, so I’ll have to acquire my own squirat later.

But back to Dungeon design.

The squirat is still just a normal animals. Which isn’t too much of a problem just yet while everything on Lapis is unmutated by mana. But eventually I’ll need some proper defenders.

Likewise, this is an excellent opportunity to experience another aspect of normal Dungeon life, as well as to figure out how to mutate normal animals into monsters. I doubt most Dungeons have the luck to have an injured real monster wander inside them that they can take advantage of. Which means there has to be a way to customize them more, one that doesn’t involve my giant quantities of mana.

Not to mention that I didn’t exactly have the most normal monsters to experiment on, so who knows if the usual methods for Dungeons would even work on things like Wyld-trees.

Ahh, hello and welcome back.

I’m sure you’re curious what was happening to our intrepid adventurers all this while. Well, not to worry, I have an update here for you.

Let’s see, which one to pick. Oh, doesn’t truly matter, Ram will do.

As you can see, the three of the didn’t have too many opportunities to level after fighting that Boss. Old Faellen’s training regiment may have been harsh and efficient, but it provided little combat.

That’s the issue with these strict level-based combat-progressed Systems. They only ever really measure one aspect of the person while almost completely ignoring everything else. But I digress.

Ram here had gotten her first active ability, some sort of mix between a taunt and a temporary defensive boost. The same happened to Ditty, only Prshky had the reverse happen since he’d had an active one from the start.

Oh, what they were doing now? Great question!.

Faellen was teaching them how to escape if an enemy captured and or bound them. Now, don’t ever tell Faellen this, but I’m somewhat doubtful this’ll be useful for the vast majority of adventurers. I have my own theories on why it’s doing this, but let’s leave this at that.

What’s much more interesting is what’s happening down bellow. Deep, deep down, on the surface of Lapis.

You see, while the fairy and its Dungeon Core may have forgotten about it that did not mean it stopped having an effect. I’m of course talking about the End Aspect. Yes, it was muted by the combined might of Paradox, System, and Eldritch. But it dragged them forward regardless.

Maybe a few days at most had passed within the Dungeon moon, sure. But on the planet below them? Well, time sure does fly, wouldn’t you say?

The panic from the pillars of light and the subsequent mysterious disappearances had somewhat quelled in the weeks following it. And while the professionals in P.I.S.S. were still studying the Light more, and talks about sending someone up there were progressing, even they had lost much of their urgency.

Until another unexpected phenomenon happened. And its source was once more the Light.

A small meteor that hadn’t been in the sky moments before, one that none of their devices had picked up, hurtled through the atmosphere. Naturally, this sparked another panic. But an investigation revealed that for one, no one had mysteriously disappeared* like before, and for two, the landing site wasn’t anywhere populated.

(*if there was one plus to all this, it was that there was much more focus on disappearances in general, as well as more resources dedicated to them)

If anything, it seemed to land as far away from civilization as it could’ve. A sort of point Nemo, except that this point of Lapis just happened to coincide with an island so technically it wasn’t a point Nemo at all.

Now, dear reader, I’ll have you know one thing. If it’s the only thing you remember about featherless bipeds, so be it, but you need to know this: They can’t hold a secret. Especially a large organisation like the P.I.S.S.

What did that mean then? It meant that soon after, many people that shouldn’t’ve found out about it found out about it. And that then sparked a race.

A race to see who could reach the ‘point Nemo’ first and uncover the mysteries of the Light.

There was only one slight issue. While the Dungeon Seed on the point Nemo island had not been releasing mana for long enough to mutate the wildlife, it was certainly enough for the most clever animals to make use of it and enhance themselves.

Which meant that for anyone approaching the island, a nasty surprise was in store. Mainly in the form of ocean-life that was much stronger than it should’ve been, but a few critters on the island also had welcoming gifts prepared.