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Chapter 249: A Dungeon Delve with Friends
🕑 Added 2025-10-17 21:28:48 +0000 UTCWe spent two hours with the jester, and learned absolutely nothing. All questions were met with some variation of trying to convince us to release it or a return to the same strange phrase of what would happen if we didn’t. It was either incapable of telling us what we wanted to know or convinced we wouldn’t do what was needed to learn it.
I wasn’t willing to address the second part, because I didn’t know how far exactly I was willing to go to learn what it knew. Killing a monster was one thing. Abject torture was a whole other line. And from what I’d read, crossing that line was very hard to come back from as the same person.
Add on the fact that the creature seemed off from when I had encountered them before, and we had a situation where I wasn’t even sure torture would be useful. There was also the possibility that just existing as it did now was some form of torture. I had, after all, never seen a jester alone before. They had already seemed to have come in pairs at least. Did these creatures even function well without other jesters?
At the moment, that was all a problem for Timon. Once he added some deep scales to his prison, things were likely to get even more interesting. But for now, we had a dungeon delve to handle. Our soul knot patients were still resting from the procedure, so it was all that I had to take my mind off the numerous problems without solutions.
“So when are we going? Is the dungeon going to be dangerous? Actually, what does a dungeon feel like?” Orglina asked all the questions rapid-fire, her mouth moving fast enough that I barely comprehended them all.
Somehow, both she and her brother had managed to form their cores. And while I was proud of them for it, my pride paled in comparison to their older brother. Glorp was absolutely beaming with the news. I still wasn’t sure it was a good idea to bring them along on this, but they had done what we asked, and done so with flying colors.
They had also proven that Empire of Dave had a mana flow potent enough to form cores. That had been something we weren’t entire sure of just yet, and no one was still sure how far the range was for being able to do it. The kids had to spend the better part of a week in a small area between Cecile’s farms and the cloudtree before they were able to form their cores.
While I was glad it was possible, the idea of having random people so close to my backyard constantly again wasn’t something I was looking forward to. The growth of the city had finally given me back more of my sense of privacy. Then again, the solitude I was feeling since my children had left hadn’t been a pleasant feeling. Bringing Orglina and Glord breakfast each morning had been a nice experience.
“We are leaving as soon as everyone is here. Yes, all dungeons are dangerous, and it’s hard to explain the feeling until you experience it. I want all of you kids to stick close to one of the adults, though. Do not risk your own lives in any way. Got it?” I asked, doing my best dad voice.
“What if something happens to you and we have to step in?” Gorpila asked.
“If we are incapacitated for any reason, I want you to get out of the dungeon and find Pryte. I’m not trying to be mean when I say this, but if anything in there is able to take me or Elody down easily, it’s far too dangerous for you to be in there,” I answered, getting worried again.
I pulled up a chat window as I finished my response. I just couldn’t let them run around without more safety rails in place, no matter how much this might be normal Spiral behavior. Mel had said it himself, far too many kids die every day in the Spiral.
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>Dave: Alright, I want the three of you watching the youngest kids. Alpha, you’re going to stay with Red and Orglina for the entire trip. Beta, you’re with Glord, and Gamma with Lorgela. I’ll have Elody stay with Gorpila.
>Alpha: Like bear, like idea.
>Beta: Will they fight for the empire?
>Dave: Yes, but right now this is very much just training and practice. If they want to be able to be as strong as possible, they have to survive through all of this.
>Beta: Yes, soldiers must be properly trained! Only a foolish leader would send them to die for no reason.
>Gamma: I will keep her safe.
>Corey: I want all of you to be careful if you encounter the core as well. Remember what we were all like before we were freed from the madness.
>Apollyon: Yes, bring another core. Let our dungeon core nation grow. Soon, we will show everyone our true power!
>Karlinovo: You know I was there when you were talking to Johan and Bert about how cute Bert’s pet rabbit was, right? It’s getting harder to sell us on your menace.
>Apollyon: Rabbits will be allowed in the nation. They are one of the few creatures of flesh worthy of such.
>Dave: Yes, regarding the core, let’s do our best to retrieve them, but ultimately, all of your and our lives are the most important part. Hopefully, some of my newer dungeon abilities will come in use, but I can’t take ownership of a dungeon on another world.
>Karlinovo: Really? Why can’t you?
>Dave: Let me rephrase. It’s a bad idea for me to take possession of a dungeon we are being paid to remove on a world that’s not our own. As it is, we only barely have the cores to keep the run running on Earth when we leave. We do not have a spare for another planet.
>Karlinovo: I suppose that’s reasonable.
>Unakite: Gnawing teeth, piercing sounds, existence.
>Beta: I am starting to like Unakite.
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I closed out the window with the thought that at least someone was starting to like them. Personally, I wasn’t big on the perpetual horror that the soul chat had become with their added presence, but I was still hopeful that it would pass as they grew.
“Everyone here?” Pryte asked as he and Grant joined us near the gate.
“Looks like it,” I answered. Elody, Glunderlin, and Glorp’s family were already all here.
It took us two jumps to get to the planet. Pryte ushered us through the gates as quickly as possible, not wanting to be spotted on the giant’s homeworld. While I had no idea if the spying network watching us was that spread out, I understood his fears. Plus I wanted to get home as quickly as I could. Considering what had happened the last time we left the planet, I wasn’t eager to repeat the experience.
Once we arrived, I was surprised to find the people who had hired us were the size and build of small field mice. Their capital city was built in a series of underground caverns that they migrated through during the year as the planet’s weather patterns shifted, and different areas were flooded. Apparently, they did this as a way to cultivate mana orbs of varying types.
This was exactly what had led to the problem they currently faced. One of the caverns had been closed off for years due to a large storm. In that time, a dungeon had been able to form and overtake vast swaths of the area. For the last couple of years, it had been progressively growing, and now it was in danger of encroaching on some of their other mana farms.
The weather change we had been waiting for was the tunnels to safely clear, so they could guide us to the main entrance. And even then, only a select few were willing to go that far, as core beasts had started to roam further from the dungeon itself. These facts together made me again question bringing the children, but as no one else seemed to be, I held my thoughts on it for now.
“Do you know how big the dungeon is?” I asked as we stopped just outside the border that enclosed it.
“No, we’ve never been able to map it. If it’s grown as big as the caverns itself, maybe twice the size of the city you saw when you arrived,” one of our guides answered.
“That could be a problem. I’m worried the dungeon has been here long enough to start propagating. If it’s reinforced itself enough, we could have a real fight on our hands,” Elody added.
“What do you suggest?” I asked.
“Nothing yet. We are going to have to start exploring to be sure,” she answered.
I released the cores from my storage as I took a step across the threshold. I instantly felt the dungeon’s presence. So it was strong enough to push back against my defenses there, at least.
“Okay, um, I don’t like this feeling at all. Maybe this is a bad idea,” Glord whispered nervously.
“Yeah, I’m not too big on this either. Is this how they all feel?” Grant asked.
“Mostly. It has to do with how strong a dungeon core is. But yes, the strength of this field means it’s just as powerful as I feared, maybe more.” An odd staticky sound accompanied Elody’s words.
I quickly turned my head to look at her, but it was already too late. She was gone. Actually, it was probably better to say I was gone. The tunnels we had taken to get here were no longer anywhere in sight.
“Uh, Dave. Where did everyone go?” Orglina asked, the terror in his question echoed in the room. She and Red were the only two left with me, not even Alpha was here.
“I want you two right here in front of me at all times now. Do not get out of my sight,” I said firmly, as I pulled up a chat window.
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>Dave: What happened? Where is everyone?
>Alpha: With Grant and Glord.
>Beta: I am alone. Somewhere underwater.
>Gamma: I am with Glunderlin. Everything seemed to go strangely fuzzy for a brief moment. I detected a surge of dungeon energy right as it happened, but I was too late to do anything about it. I believe the dungeon core has separated us all into different parts of the dungeon.
>Corey: Yes, I agree with Gamma. I felt something similar.
>Dave: Okay, I have Red and Orglina with me here. Beta, I want you to try and find the others. Be careful, do not fight if it seems dangerous. Alpha and Gamma keep your people safe. I’ll try to find my way out of here.
>Beta: For the Empire, I shall unite with our missing soldiers!
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“Dave, help!” Orglina’s sudden cry yanked my attention away from the chat window.
“Back away from us now!” Red snarled the words at a tentacled horror that had slithered up in front of them.
“You heard the bear. Take us to the core that controls this dungeon,” I said firmly, triggering my dungeon authority. I wasn’t sure if it would work or not, as the creature itself wasn’t a core beast, just some dungeon-infused monster. And it felt like the core itself was too strong for me to wrestle away ownership of the dungeon from, not that I wanted to.
One of its tentacles slapped out toward Red. I had a shield in place before it had a chance to touch her, and a second after that, two fireballs had destroyed it entirely. I’d have preferred not to subject them to an exploding tentacle monster so quickly, but the dungeon core had left me little choice.
“Okay, that was cool!” Orglina said, removing any worry I had about having killed the monster so close to her.
“Thanks, but let’s try to keep away from any more monsters. Red, how’s your sense of smell doing here?” As I asked, the bear reared up on her hind legs and took several deep sniffs, turning about the room as she did.
“Oddly, do you see that wall over there?” she pointed with one of her large, clawed paws toward a slimy rock wall behind me. “I don’t believe it is real.”
As I focused on it, I felt some of my dungeon authority flair again. The illusion that had seemed so real before started to melt away under my focus. “Okay, yeah, I can see it now, too. Both of you stay close.”
I pulled up another chat window as we walked toward the new opening.
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>Dave: Corey, can the shields block the effect that happened when we entered?
>Corey: Possibly, or at least delay it.
>Dave: Alright, keep shields around anyone you are with. Corey, do your best to block any of that from hitting again. Also, I just found a fake wall in the cave we are in. I was able to see past it using my dungeon authority, but Red could also smell that it wasn’t real. So pay attention for any illusions.
>Gamma: Yes, avoid the monsters too. Glunderlin and I just killed a mushroom thing.
>Dave: Ah, yeah, we fought a tentacled creature here as well. Stay safe, everyone.
>Corey: Understood.
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The moment I was inside the hidden passage, the oppressive dungeon feel vanished. That I hadn’t expected, and I wasn’t sure what it meant. If this wasn’t part of the dungeon, what was it? I couldn’t be sure that it wasn’t part of it, of course, but even the air in here felt different.
It was hard to describe exactly the new feeling the area seemed to produce in me. It was almost like the joy you get from a fresh rain on a spring day. There was a sense of fondness for the gentle mundane in it. I had somehow never felt anything like it before, but at the same time, it felt like an old friend.
“This room feels like fresh snow. Like those early days as I chased my sister through the cold and cuddles with our mother,” Red said behind me. So the feeling wasn’t exactly the same for everyone then.
“What’s that?” Orglina asked, pointing to a small glowing orb, sitting atop a mossy mound in the center of the new area.
It was a mana orb. One that I should have noticed before, but until she had called it out, my senses hadn’t noticed it at all. Was Orglina even being affected in the same way we were?
“That is a mana orb, and I’m not sure what kind. I haven’t seen any quite so faded before,” I said, looking at the dull blue orb in front of us.
“It’s not faded, it’s beautiful. Oh, can I have it? Please?” Orglina begged.
I didn’t really have a good reason to say no. I was pretty certain it was a mana orb, and she would need one eventually anyway. Plus, this seemed to be attracting her in a way it wasn’t Red or me. Who was I to argue with the call of a mana orb?
That all said, I wasn’t entirely stupid. I walked over to the orb and pulled it free from its bed, examining it myself before letting her risk a touch. I activated mana orb grading, and sure enough, it was just as it had seemed. Not that I had seen an anemoia mana orb before. Hell, I wasn’t even sure what the word meant.
“Well, looks like you are the proud new owner of an anemoia mana orb. We can still get you a standard set if you want to register with the Arena, but, and I’m guessing your brother would agree, I don’t want any kids doing that,” I said, handing the mana orb to her outstretched hands.
“Oh my god! A special mana orb! Yes!” she shouted through her giant smile.
“Don’t socket that until we are out of the dungeon. It’s likely a weirder one, and we will want to explore its use in a controlled environment,” I said, doing my best to ignore the complete hypocrisy of my words.
I loved to pretend I was great at thinking things through ahead of time, but the truth of it was I had just as much trouble ignoring something new and interesting as anyone. Possibly not as much as Pryte, though he hid it much better than I did. The thought of her new mana orb reminded me of my own still-empty slot. That was something I should take care of. I needed to give my mana orbs time to grow after all.
“Okay, I promise. Do you think we will find any more, though? Do you normally find them in dungeons?” she asked.
“I’m not sure. I believe this is called a natural mana orb. I thought that mana orbs like this became dungeon cores, though, so I’m actually a bit confused about it being here. Hopefully, Elody has some better answers when we find her,” I said, as we stepped back out of the chamber we had found. The oppressive dungeon sensation returned.
The problem with assumptions that mana orbs become dungeon cores is that sometimes, if you know where to look, natural mana orbs can be found deep within dungeons, flourishing. Even more interesting is how strange the orbs you find this way tend to be. It’s as though the dungeon energies have led them to grow and evolve in whole new pathways that normal mana flows wouldn’t. This has led me to question what would happen if a natural mana orb were exposed to even more energy types as it grew. Would it be possible to expose one to soul energy? What would the result be?
A Dive Into Dungeons by Jerold Helmer
Comments
viperfan7
Apollyon's been watching Monty python hasn't he. Also, sounds like the GPA is digging into the unaka mountains for some reason. And Orglina is gonna become the tentacle queen isn't she
