A Bar a Vampire and the Apocalypse

Standing at the base of the giant Chinese elm that was the dungeon, holding a notepad in my hands with the questions we had come up with and a pen to take notes. I prepared myself to summon the dungeon master. Truth be told I did not need the notepad, but I feel it will be a good idea.

Taking a deep breath I activated Call of the Dungeon Master. After using the skill nothing happened for a second, then I felt a click and just like the last time a swirl of power gathered in front of me swirling with green and blue. Forming into the feminine form of Gareena in all her glory. Thankfully this time she did not exude her pressure on me.

“Oh so you have survived the week. I expected nothing less hehe.” the other worldly being said.

“I would hope I could survive a week. That would be pretty sad to survive over 2000 years only to die after one week of changes.” I said while shrugging

“Now down to business. Before you bombard me with questions I would like to explain the rules of my dungeon.” Gareena said. Seeing me nod, she continued.

“First and foremost no intentional destruction of the dungeon that is not purely for available resources. No burning down forests on purpose or the collapsing of caves and tunnels. Next there will be off limits areas that will be designated by magical means. Should people go in there all available monsters on the floor will rush them and if that fails monsters from lower floors will go after them. The last major rule outside of not trying to kill me or destroy the dungeon core is don't mess with the entrance of the dungeon or try to make an alternate entrance to the dungeon.” Gareena finished listing off her rules and to be honest it was less than I thought. Don’t destroy things in the dungeon without reason. Don't go in off limit areas and don't try to cheat the dungeon by making new entrances. Seems more than fair to me.

“Is that all? I was expecting more.”

“No, that is it. There really are no other things I as a dungeon master need to worry about. For the most part things are self-sufficient as long as there is no mass destruction. Though new rules will be made if needed so please don't make me need more.

“Okay thank you, I will try to make sure everyone that enters is respectful so you don't need more rules. Now do you mind answering some of my questions about your dungeon and the system itself.” I asked Gareena, rubbed her chin and spoke.

“Hmm I will answer basic questions of the dungeon but nothing too specific. That would take some of the challenge and mystery out of it and where would I be then. As for the system I am limited on what I can share. The system has a temporary built in block that will stop me and others like me from sharing information that it does not believe should be known yet. For example, I can not tell you when or how to unlock the other classes.”

Well that was a bummer. I guess we will have to experiment and wait and see. Still anything would help. Crossing the question off my list I said.

“So be it. The system can’t let it be too easy for us I guess.”

“That it can't,” Gareena chuckled a bit at me. What a glorious sound her laugh is.

“Ok then first off what is the general theme of the dungeon and how does it work. Such as is it all forest. Is it a couple of giant floors or is there many smaller floors.”

“Hmm for theme it will mostly be forest and mountain based creatures with greater creatures, spirits and elementals mixed in. But that will not always be the case. As for the floors they are fairly big and there is much to explore on each floor. Some floors are a lot different than others, some being arguably not on theme but there are not as many of those. There are also a lot of floors. I know you can feel the general size of the dungeon due to your connection.”

I did not know what to expect but the information will be useful. I'm sure one of the others will have a better idea of what could come up this. Though I did my fair share of research into different fantasy worlds to get an idea of what to expect. But with how many different takes there were on all of the creatures, I really don't know what I should take as the best examples.

Moving down the list of questions I continued.

“Are there bosses? Such as keepers of the floors and the like?” Gareena stared at me for a moment and cocked her head before speaking.

“Why do you ask? Bosses that is an…” she paused for a second then continued. “Oh you mean floor guardians and apex predators. I see that your world has come of with digital games that use dungeons. Interesting, what you call bosses I call floor guardians and apex predators. So yes there are. I will not tell you how strong they are or anything other than that they exist.”

Well that was weird. Did she just get told… oh whatever it does not matter. But it is nice to know.

“Next, are there safe areas in the dungeon where beast and monsters do not roam?”

“Yes they will be magically marked but you will have to find them.” nodding I moved on

“Are there any kind of special events that happen such as a puzzle trap or some kind of wave of monsters that will attack us or try to flood out of the dungeon?”

“There are some puzzles and traps. What they look like, how they interact or what they hide I will not answer. The only thing that I will say is that they do reset after a time. How long I will not say. As for events there are a couple events that I will need to inform you about and the rest I will let you and those you let into my dungeon discover.

The first and most important one is once every 2 to 5 months depending on a variety of factors there will be a system forced dungeon break. This will consist of 10% of all floors inhabited coming out of the dungeon, but it is only that bad 10 years after full system integration. For the first one it will only be the first floor and one new floor will be added after every break. Until either the number of floors has been maxed out or the 10 year grace period is over.”

I paled hearing this which was quite impressive seeing I was not the most tan person alive being a vampire and all. Knowing how big the dungeon is, the number of monsters that would come from the first floor alone is rather terrifying. Depending on the strength of the monsters on the first floor I might be able to hold it back myself but it would be a challenge to do so. I stood there and contemplated the logistics of it and the consequences of such a thing happening. Gathering my thoughts I started asking questions.

“Will you be able to warn me ahead of time?”

“Don't worry about that because I will not find out any sooner than you. Yes there are a couple signs that can imply one may be coming but nothing concrete. But one week before the event will happen a system notification will go out to all those in the affected area. You will also gain a temporary still called appointment. Which will give out special titles. The titles you give out will give different temporary skill depending on the title. There is a limit of the number of titles you can hand out. You get more the stronger the wave is and the stronger the dungeon is. For a dungeon break all those who help and the system decides what is help or not, will share experience depending on their contribution to defeating the waves.”

That is nice we get a week to prepare but even then we can also have things already in place to help with the fight. It's nice that it sounds like people who do not fight can still help. At least that's how it sounds.

“I can imagine that all your creatures will be able to fit through your entrance over there” gesturing to the entrance.

“The entrance will grow inside to be able to let out the largest monster that will be coming out of the dungeon which is rather large how large, well you will eventually find out.”

“Wait won't that take out my building next to us?!?!?” Gareena looked over the still intact building that was both my current home and bar. Then looked over to the buildings her dungeon took out in its sprouting. Then turned to me and spoke.

“Well, looks like I did some damage when I came here. I did not notice that last time I was out. I don't get the best view of the surface while I'm in my core room. Part of the reason i need a handler to inform me of what happens around my dungeon. But do not fret Viviana your building will be fine why I am barred from explaining.”

Well that is both a relief and gives a better reason as to why handlers are needed. They are required by the system because the system made dungeon breaks. I also would not doubt that the system made it so dungeon masters could not communicate with the surface to further make them necessary,

“Last one for this event, knowing how large your dungeon is, I can imagine you have some monster near the bottom that would make the strongest of our world look like ants. Do we have a chance to defend ourselves in 10 years?”

Gareena did not say anything for a moment. Looking off into the cloudless sky of the new world she calls home.

“Based on you and the classes you are bound to get. No, not even close, but I am most likely one if not the strongest of dungeon masters that decided to come to this new world. So this is unlikely to be a problem in other dungeons.”

This is a major problem and the way she is talking I will not have any immunity being the dungeon handler. I wonder how she came to her answer? Was it just based on me and the average human or a group or people at my strength?

“Is that based on me being the strongest person with the average human as the rest or is that me being the average?”

“The former, dungeon masters are able to see the average level of those that are in our influence. And as of right now even with you and the system being here a week the average level is only 12 and 10 years even with the dungeon and your help will not be enough to fight it off. The area will be overrun with monsters from my dungeon until people can clear them all out to finish the dungeon break.”

I may need to pack up and leave after all. But there is a chance. I did not spend 2000 years doing nothing. I have friends and a couple good kids.

“What about if there were 2 more people not as strong as me but at least 4 times the level of any human here as well?”

“Better but still not a chance.” She said

Well shit maybe…

“What about an elder dragon?”

Gareena did what I thought of as the equivalent of a blink and then got a thoughtful look on her face. Or what I thought was one, her features were both lacking and hard to read.

“Maybe. The dragons of your world are rather mighty and though I was only given limited information about them I believe there is a better than zero chance the with you and the 2 others along with an elder dragon you could fight off a full dungeon break from my dungeon in 10 years assuming you also got a bit lucky with what of the 10% comes up.”

Well there is a chance if the worst comes to worst I'm sure we can pack up and leave if we don't feel we can do it. But that is for later.

“Is there any other major events I need to know about?”

“There is one more major event that is not unique to my dungeon but not all dungeons have it. The other events are nothing that requires explanations and are better discovered.

The last major event is once every 1-4 months but never within a month of a dungeon break a unique monster in the dungeon will either be born or spawned on a random floor. Though the same rules as the dungeon breaks apply with what floor it is able to spawn on.

There is also a rule that the highest floor it can spawn on is the one above the floor with the same average level as the top 0.01% of the highest level people in the affected area.

This monster is what you would call a raid boss. And has a very similar effect as the dungeon break but worse. Instead of 10% of the floors inhabitants coming out 20% will and each floor guardian that is on a higher floor will both have a guaranteed chance to join unlike a dungeon break and they will be powered up by the raid boss. What the power up is depends on the raid boss.

Like a dungeon break you will a one week notice and unlike a dungeon break all people in the dungeon will be teleported to the start of the first floor when the one week notice is given out. You will be given the skill again and all those the system deemed participants with get experience shared.

Also unlike a dungeon break all fallen floor guardians will revive and will take 95% less damage also being immune to most defense penetration skills. The raid boss will slowly make his way up the floors. All the upper floors will already have monsters working their way up the floors but the floor guardians will not move until the raid boss reaches them at which time they will lose their defense buff in exchange for the raid boss buff.

The longest it will take for a raid boss to reach the first floor is one month even on the lowest floor the same goes for the dungeon break. Once the raid boss reaches the first floor you have one week to defeat it and all the floor guardians before monsters start to respond and all the new spawns from the floors the raid boss passed through will race up to help the guardians and the boss.”

I am beginning to think I have made a grave mistake of being the dungeon handler of this dungeon. But what she said brought up some more questions about dungeon breaks.

“You said everyone will be teleported to the first floor for a dungeon raid. What about dungeon breaks?”

“No, all dungeon functions will stay the same for the week leading up until the break. This is a system enforced event so there is little I can do as the dungeon master to affect it. Unlike a raid, which is created to be a challenge from the dungeon with benefits for both me the master of the dungeon and those around my dungeon, a dungeon break is meant to be a hazard to life created by the system. If there is one thing to know about your new world it is this. The system has little care for life and death. Though it does not wish to wipe out life it also does not care how many die so long as there is still life in the end. But when a dungeon break is announced I will make all beings within my dungeon neutral for the week leading up to the break. But only for those who are not making progress in the dungeon. Also if people begin to attack those in my dungeon they will lose the protection if it happens too much I will no longer do it all together so keep those people in line.”

Its a lot to take in, the scale of what is to come is rather horrifying. If the power of an elder dragon with 10 years of system power only gives us a chance to survive, I fear what is to come. Then there is what Gareena said about the system. I guess in a way it gives us power but not to really make us stronger but so we can face great challenges. At least the raids sound to be manageable. We are going to have to prepare for both the break and the raid. We might need to level the whole area around the dungeon to create a defendable perimeter. Unless we are able to defend on the first floor of the dungeon. That is an idea.

“For the raid boss and the dungeon breaks along with just in general can we set up on the first floor to defend or must we defend outside of the dungeon? For example, can we make a town on, say, the first floor around the entrance of the dungeon?”

“Short answer yes, long answer no.”

“Explain?”

“You can build within the dungeon but only if the dungeon master lets you. For the week before both a raid and break happen I will allow fortifications to be built on the first floor no more than one quarter of a mile from the entrance. After the raid or break is completed you will be given a week to retrieve any and all items you brought into the dungeon to create your fortifications after that they will rapidly decay and be gone within a week. There may be exceptions on later floors but I am still in debate whether or not I want to do that. No I will not explain my reasoning for this, yes some other dungeon masters would let you do such a thing.”

Well that is both nice and a little disappointing. But when an uber powerful otherworldly being decides something no need to question it.

“Last question on the raids and breaks for now I'm sure there will be more next time. Should we expect a raid and break within the next 3 to 6 months?”

“No, you will have more time. The timers for both of those will not start until the second to later phase of the system integration.”

That was an interesting bit of information. So it sounds like there are a number of phases left and they will take some time before they are all done. Good to know. I wrote this tide bit down in particular. It is more immediately useful to us then the raids and breaks. After I finished writing down my notes and moved on with the questioning. I spent much more time on this part than planned.

“One last question about the dungeon. Should we go down in floors, do we have to back track or is there a way to get back faster.”

“There is no fast way out of the dungeon. No shortcuts to or from different floors. Short of the event of a raid boss.”

I nodded. That was the last of the questions I had about the dungeon. The rest we came up with I have a strong feeling she will not answer.

“Now I don't know if you can answer this but are there any other nearby dungeons?”

Gareena gave a laugh that sounded like how silk felt. After she finished her laughter she spoke.

“Already trying to get more dungeons under your control Viviana. Well to answer your question I have no idea. I was not given any option in where I was located. To be honest I don't know where I am on your planet. I have an idea but I do not KNOW where I am. Let alone others like me.”

“That's a little disappointing, but expected. In that case do you know if there will be any more large-scale changes to the planet? I would rather not be caught off guard.”

“Sorry I am not allowed to talk about any changes to the planet.”

“Drats.” Well I guess we will have to see what comes next then.

“In that case can you tell me about what each of the stats specifically do. Knowing that would be invaluable.”

Smiling Gareena said, “Now that is something I can help you with. Of the 7 stats 6 of them can be affected by the system. Wisdom being the only one that is not modified by the system. It can quantify the stat but it can not give or remove it from someone. That is because it is based on a being's experiences, and the ability to learn from those experiences. It also touches on problem solving skills and a couple other things but experiences and learning from them is the majority of what makes up the state. Now what it does mostly has to do with the quality of skills classes and a light effect on the quality of crafted items. There are some skills that pull directly from the wisdom stat too but they are few and far in between.

As for the stats that the system can directly affect we will start at the top of the list.

Strength is the most straightforward of the states. It's your lifting power, your punching power and the like. A thing to note about stats is that there is normally one or more stats that if you invest too heavily in one you need the other to balance them out. For strength this is constitution. Because if you have too much strength you might be able to lift something heavy or punch something hard but your bones might break under the strain. From what I know a 5 strength to 1 constitution is the lowest you want to have. This same ratio goes from most other stats as well.

Agility is your speed, how fast you can move your body. Though keep in mind that once you hit a certain agility stat if your strength is too far behind you will start to notice that the increase of the stat no longer will give as much of a boost. You also want to keep your dexterity and intelligence up as well. The 5 to 1 ratio for both is recommended here too.

Constitution is a combination of your immune system strength and ability to take both physical and magical damage. It also has an effect on how long someone can live for non immortals. Though this does not start to show itself until well into the hundreds and even then only lightly. For constitution it’s best to counteract it with dexterity You can get to the point where you start becoming stiff if you don't have enough dexterity.

Dexterity is next and its primary function is body control with a minor effect on flexibility. So your craftsman and the like would want this stat. Dexterity is a weird one you want to have both strength and constitution to counteract it. Though you don't need both of them to be 5 to 1 but the combination of constitution and strength needs to add up to your 5 to 1. I'm not entirely sure how that one works but my guess is having the strength to unbend yourself and the constitution not rip yourself apart if you become too flexible.

Now stamina, just like strength, is rather straightforward. How long you can do something. It applies to both physical and magical activities. Not associated stat this time.

Lastly is intelligence. It is your ability to think and take in the world around you. For example it will help you read faster because you can take in more information at a time.

That's all the basics on stats. There are a couple hidden stats but they are not very important in the long run and I am not allowed to tell you what they are anyways. Also the system grants you stats but just like how a person can grow stronger through training they can also increase their stats. One other nice thing about the system is that it makes it so that your natural strength decays at a much slower rate. All stats are a representation of your abilities. And the system can augment them.”

That was a lot to take in. It is nice to know not only not to dump as much as you can into one stat but also that you don't need to round out your stats to be an effective combatant. There could be some rather interesting stat combinations to see. It also looks like those that want to specialize in specific fields can do so which is nice. It is also nice that we can still train to increase stats and not just have to focus on the ones we get from the system. So those with little combat experience can still train themselves up before they go into a dungeon.

“Thank you, I can't tell you how helpful that information will be.”

“No problem. Helping you helps me in a way.”

“Speaking of helping you, what do you get out of people going into your dungeon?”

“That is something I will be keeping to myself for the time being.”

“Hmm ok then. Do you know how long the skill I'm using works?”

“The skill that calls me lasts up to one hour but I can extend it at cost to myself but I can cut it short as well. Also the cooldown of the skill is one week.”

“Good to know. Next, how does class and skill leveling up work? We have an idea but knowing for sure would be nice.”

“Hmm let’s start with classes. They level up through doing actions related to the class and using skills from the class. You can also get experience from killing things but depending on the class it can be all but pointless. For example if you are a scribe killing a lizard of similar level to you would give about the same experience as writing one page of text. But if you kill a beast that you can get leather from you might get more experience for the fact that you can use the leather as a book cover. Now the exception to this is dungeons. But even then it is still better to do things related to your class then fight in dungeons for the fact that you will not be as good at killing and your skills will not level. Also the more dangerous a situation is the more experience you will gain. For example if you are a medic on a battlefield you will level faster then as a medic in a safe city. Then there is how difficult something is. It is much harder to pick the lock on a safe than someone's door. So a thief would get more experience for the former then the ladder.

Now skills are much the same but they don't have experience in the same way classes do. Leveling skills is all about using them. If you use them well they will level up faster. If you use them in a dangerous situation they will level even faster. To use the previous example, if you are a medic and have a healing skill, if you use it and properly heal someone on a battlefield you will gain more experience then doing the same in a city. Also if you do a bad job at healing the injury you will gain less experience too. The last and most important thing about skills is that they can’t level up and past the class that they are under and general skills will max at the same level as your highest class.

That is the basics of class and skill leveling. For the most part it is straightforward.”

That was about what we expected but still really helpful. It’s also nice to get confirmation on why Trevor was the only one leveling up his general skills. Knowing there is a bonus for dangerous situations is nice and that you can still gain experience from fighting in dungeons even if you don't have a combat class is good to know as well.

Now to the dragon in the room.

“Can you explain what the world boss title does?” Gareena looked a little surprised at this and said.

“Hum the system changed the name to account for your world's understanding. But it's also weird you already have one. Well a world boss is normally called a world guardian. It acts as the first line of defense to defend the world from outside focus. It is also not a permanent title should a world boss die; its title will be inherited to another powerful being that originated from the planet so I for example could never get the title. Should the world boss not die after 9 years, a world announcement will go out about finding the next world boss and ....” Gareena's voice went away in the middle of her speaking.

“Well I guess that is information I can not share. Well on another note if someone from your planet defeats the world boss the system will reward them and all those that helped them kill them. The title will then move onto another powerful being like if it died defending the planet but whenever a world boss dies it will take two months before the title can be held again.”

“That seems odd to reward someone for defeating the world boss?”

“Remember Viviana, the system doesn't care about life as long as it does not go extinct.”

If the dungeon break was not a great example of that, this was. The system is very odd in what it does. With that said, that was the last of the major questions we had. The rest she will either not answer or can't answer. With that in mind we discussed a handful of other small things until I asked my last question.

“Is there anything that you think I should know?” Gareena paused for a few moments and answered.

“Things will soon move extremely fast so don't waste the time you are given. Also my dungeon is no playground enter at your own risk because there will be death with in. With that I believe it's time to make my leave. I will see you next week Viviana.” Gareena then condensed and shot downwards into the dungeon.

That was a good reminder, between the dungeon breaks and the raids let alone the fact that she all but said a group of beings on this planet could get anywhere close to clearing the dungeon as of right now shows the power and danger it holds. Looking down at my notebook I realized I stopped writing at some point. Sighing sat down and started jotting down the important points of our conversation.

When I was done I walked back into the bar and had a discussion about what I learned.

The conversation was a mixed bag. Everyone had different shades of fear on their face. And I can't blame them, it is rather troubling. But it's not like we are going to be able to truly escape it if we want to level. Every dungeon in the world will have dungeon breaks happening, some will most likely be easier than others based on the fact that Gareena thinks she is one of the strongest dungeons on the planet right now. But still it is daunting. After I was done Todd spoke up

“With everything we know I believe that we should pick our classes and go into the dungeon. We can’t keep putting it off. The longer we do the less time we have to gain strength to fight back the dungeon break and raid bosses, and that is not even considering the fact we will be giving other people time to get ahead of us.”

“Yes I agree but who of us other than Vivi will be offered a good combat class? Do any of us have any martial or weapon experience?” Carl countered. There was a pause and then Steward, the twins and Edward raised their hands.

Steward spoke first, “I did some boxing in my teen years but quit after I started college.”

Next Angie spoke, “We both did karate and got to the highest ranked brown belts before quitting due to school being too much.” Everyone looked shocked at that. I guess they were not as helpless as we thought they were.

After everyone gathered themselves Edward spoke. “I did fencing up until a year into collage. Like the other school got in the way.” With that said, I spoke up.

“Well that is good to know. Now before you all pick a class and I do apologize for this Trevor but I have a skill that will help in giving you guys a better class. I'm not going to go into too much detail but like we discussed earlier wisdom affects class and skill quality and I have a skill that lets those around me borrow my wisdom when picking classes and classing up. So if you guys ever need to class up please inform me before you do so. I also expect you to keep this under wraps for we don't need another target on my back.”

At this point they did not seem surprised by my declaration. I guess they can only be shell shocked so many times.

“It's okay I classed up before I even knew you were a vampire so it's not your fault.” Trevor said. Clapping his hands Edward Spoke

“Now I believe it would be best to have those that get offered combat based classes that are moderate or better and you believe you will be competent in to choose them. Anyone else should pick the highest tier class that you believe will not only be easy for you to level but useful. We want things that are helpful. Based on what Trevor said and what we read online, different classes can have greater effects than we first thought. With Trevor being able to mix drinks to both get people more drunk and reduce how drunk they are as an example. That ability may not be that good but it shows that classes can give abilities that may be incredibly helpful if used right. So be smart with your picks.

Right now is our do or die time. While most people are still trying to figure things out we have both a powerful backer in Vivi and the dungeon to grow our strength and thanks to the show that Vivi put on we have the backing of the local residents. So let's get running while people are still standing up.” He looked at me when he was done and I nodded. I agreed with his assessment. So it was time to look into classes.

“I believe now is the time for us to pick out classes. Tomorrow we will look into the dungeon and depending on what we find the day after we will start our dive into it with those of you who get combat classes. I do not have any weapons for you if you pick weapon based classes. So if you have to decide between two classes of equal strengths and one is a weaponless based class I will recommend you pick that. Otherwise we will either have to make them or see if we can find anything of decent quality around here.

Now seeing you are all here go ahead and class up. My skill should be taking effect.