“We all have an edge. We all are floating our psyche on top with a great ocean underneath.” ― Brad Dourif
Once I had recovered my composure and my energy levels, I started to take steps to avoid further embarrassing episodes like that one. There may have been no witnesses, but I can only imagine whatever deity had sent me here was shaking their head in bemused disappointment.
Deciding that some form of mobile defender was a real priority, I began by spawning a granite badger to guard my core. Creating the animal was an interesting experience and not as mad science-y as I thought it might be. I turned my attention to the blueprint I’d been awarded, focusing on my Create Life skill and was able to determine a few things. Firstly, that creating the badger was going to take most of my current mana and energy, though I could reduce the energy cost by using matter conversion to convert soil and air, rather than generating it directly from stored energy.
The actual process of creation took both absolute focus and almost no time at all – the blueprint took over my conscious thought and filled me with the knowledge of an adult badger’s composition from a genetic and cellular level, up through its musculo-skeletal system, metabolic processes, and ending with its nervous system and brain. I couldn’t hold that image, but for an instant, I understood everything about the creature, and then it took shape. I could feel that I would eventually be able to make changes to that pattern, but that any messing with it came with potentially horrible consequences for the animal at this point. It came into existence abruptly, leaving a larger hole in the wall off to the side of the main entrance tunnel, where I intended to place the first of my branching rooms. I could also feel my dungeon instincts coming into play, automatically overwriting its base instincts to make defending the core its primary focus and enabling me to issue it basic commands to direct its movements and actions. It wasn’t a puppet, by any means, but obedience to these directives rewarded it with a rush of endorphins and any resistance could be punished with pain signals or even death, at my discretion. I *shuddered* internally at that realization and determined to avoid that sort of manipulation as much as I could.
With some significant effort, I could even see through its eyes and take advantage of its other senses, though only as a passenger. The mana cost for that was high, though, and I could do it for only 20 seconds or so before needing to rest.
I used that ability to get my first real look at the surface surrounding my dungeon. The entrance to the dungeon seemed to be in a narrow, open grassland with rocky crags (fortuitously including one directly south of my entrance and above my core), pocked with scrubby oak trees, that became bigger and denser in the distance to the east. A mid-sized stream or small river flowed by to the North, running largely from east to west. Lines of sight were generally obstructed by scattered trees and shrubs in all directions, but the dominating central feature was a mountain rising above the trees to the east. It wasn’t massive, but looked quite rugged, rising several thousand meters above the flatter area I was in.
That said, the badger was an animal and not a sapient being, and my directions were largely limited to having it take up a position near the entrance to the dungeon and let me know when anything larger than basic prey came near. Knowing that it would need to feed itself, omnivore that it is, I gave it permission to seek out food in the surrounding area, some hours later, once I had a second one available to exchange watches with it. I did direct it to bring back any food items it encountered to allow me to assimilate them. I could always generate food for the animal myself, and I suspected that I could energize my creations directly at the cost of my mana and energy stores but preferred to let them feed themselves as much as possible. Eventually, I’d want an entire cete of badgers, but for the moment, I limited myself to a pair. The second badger took up residence in my core room, and the two would spell each other periodically. As a note, the badgers were fully functional beasts and able to reproduce themselves naturally, though that would obviously be much slower. More to the point, I wasn’t sure if I could link to their offspring in the same way. A worry for another day, I suppose.
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[Quest Complete: Create a Dungeon Creature]; Reward: Choose one of the following: Jewel Viper, Cloud Wildcat, or Grass Slime
[New Quest: Create three different Dungeon Creatures]; Reward: Tier 2 Dungeon Creature
Wondering what made a creature “Tier 2”, I decided I’d opt for the slime, figuring I probably couldn’t go wrong with a dungeon classic like that.
[Blueprint Awarded: Grass Slime]
Figuring my best move was to work on the actual dungeon part of things for the time being, I continued to expand my territory in a more or less circular pattern focusing on a 5 m deep band centered on my core and running about a meter below the surface (which seemed mostly fairly level in this region) I started by working for a 25 meter radius, figuring I could then push upward to the surface.
Without a deadline hanging over my head, I took a more relaxed approach, avoiding the anxiety inducing mental mathematics. As my mana and energy refilled, I used that to excavate new rooms at roughly the same depth as my original core room but branching off from the entrance tunnel, two rooms spreading to the west and a third off to the east. I also reshaped the entry tunnel a bit, adding a bend shortly after the entrance to limit the light, widening the main entry to the point where the three new rooms extended off and adding a sharp bend in front of my core room and blocking the view of the entrance with a large stone to give the impression of a dead end to any who didn’t look closely.
It was only going to fool the most gullible of sorts, but it might help keep out some wandering strays.
The rooms themselves were quite boring for the moment, bare rock cubes fitting the minimal requirements; I tried to give them a more natural look, with organic curves and a scattering of large and small rocks, but it was a cursory effort for the time being.
More notably, with each spatial expansion, my mana and energy levels grew, albeit incrementally. I could already see that expanding my territory and navigable space was going to be a primary driver of my progress.
Quest Complete: Create Additional Rooms Lv. 1; Reward: Choose one of the following: Hematite, Asbestos, Corundum
I pondered that briefly, but decided that corundum would be a good choice, potentially offering gems like ruby and sapphire (though maybe those were separate things for the system?) and at least a harder stone for special purposes.
Blueprint Acquired: Corundum
New Quest: Create 5 additional rooms in Lv. 1; Reward: 1 Material Blueprint and 1 Loot Blueprint
*Hmm, maybe the loot blueprint would be one of the derivative gems? A question for another day, though. If that’s the case, then I’d probably want to find some volcanic rocks to get some metals and other gems*
The interesting part was that my westmost room ran into an open space. Pushing my territorial claim into the void bought me nothing but air abutting a rock face. Sending the currently resident badger to take a quick peek, I was able to verify that either we were, in fact, on a sky island, or else we were located on an overhang of an exceedingly high cliff. Forcing the badger to peek its head out the hole in the wall, I could see ocean well below us (or a truly massive lake), with the cliff wall curving away in the distance both on the left and right.
I took a few moments to admire the view whenever I could – the blue sky spreading out before me, occasional clouds drifting by both above and below my vantage point, until the sun began dipping lower towards the curve of the horizon, sparking colors in the sky I associated with tropical latitudes.
