A Bar a Vampire and the Apocalypse

In the next instant I felt it. I could feel the connection to the dungeon. I felt its vast expanse as it spread deep underground. I felt the ability to beacon its inhabitants to my side. It was a feeling like no other, the connection and extra awareness was almost nauseating. But it also was a glorious, almost intoxicating feeling. The feeling of more.

I staggered up the assault of the new awareness, but managed to catch myself. I looked to the being or rather Gareena who was still standing before me. She, at least I believed at this point it was a she, looked down at me and spoke.

“My handler, your job is to stop people who wish to do untold harm to my dungeon and to stop those who wish to destroy both me and my dungeon. Our time runs short and soon I will be recalled to the core of my dungeon. In one week's time using your new skill we can speak again. Then we will have more time as it will be you who summons me and not the system. At that time I will answer any of your questions and convey to you what I would like you to inform those who wish to enter my dungeon. In other words the rules I would like you to inform those who wish to venture in my dungeon. Until we can speak again. It was a pleasure meeting you Viviana.”

And with that Gareena condensed into a sphere and shot downwards into the dungeon below. All the pressure I was feeling left with her. Next a wave of light seemed to flow up the tree. Once it reached its leaves light started to drip from the leaves like falling stars. With that a system notification made itself known.

(The dungeon The Forest of Stars has been opened. Meet with the Dungeon handler to gain entry.)

Well shit I hope this does not turn into too much of a pain in the ass. I thought to myself. Taking a deep breath I got down from the mound that the tree sat on and walked over to Sarah. When she saw me coming she ran up to me and asked “Are you okay? And did you see the system message? Was it about that tree there?”

Sighing I said “Slow down with the questions Sarah I am fine if a bit frazzled, as for the system message yes I saw it and the giant tree is the entrance to the dungeon. AND! Before you ask, yes I am the handler for the dungeon just identify me.”

For a second she stood there with her mouth open then her eyes when distant. Her eyes then went wide. She then burst into speaking.

“How did that happen?!?! What is this about? Are you going to be ok?!?! Is it bad?!?!”

I grabbed her shoulders and spoke calmly, “Sarah breath.” Once she did, I continued “I am fine! As for how it happened I will explain once we're back inside as it seems the dungeon dodged the building.”

She nodded and I walked her back inside luckily there was enough room still to get in the back door. Going back up stairs I sat one the cough gestured for her to join me and explained my experience with Gareena.

“So in short you have a near absolute monopoly on this dungeon and with you being naturally one of the strongest beings on the planet almost no one has the power to remove you even before the help of the dungeon. Also the dungeon master is so powerful it could take on any being on the planet and stomp it into the ground by standing near it. Did I miss anything?” Sarah said with a look of total disbelief. To be fair I could not blame her. If not for the fact I have seen similarly crazy things in my life I would not really believe it. But at the same time I don't think she does not believe that it happened to me.

“Yeah that about sums up the important parts oh and I also got a bonus earned ability for being the first person the dungeon master talked to and accepting the role. Speaking of, I wonder what it does. Give me a second.”

Fruits of the Dungeon(Handler Ability)

While near/in the dungeon the chance of system generated drops are increased for all people in the dungeon.

I don't know how good this ability will be. It could be amazing or useless. But it's nice that it does not only help me but also everyone else.

“So are you just going to stare into space or are you going to tell me what it does?” Sarah said interrupting my musings

“Oh sorry, im not too sure how good this ability i got from the dungeon will be. It increases the drop chance of system generated drops for everyone in the dungeon while I'm near or in the dungeon.” Sarah looked contemplative at my words. She then spoke up.

“In some stories the system will create items when killing monsters and the like while in others you can only make items with things gathered from monsters. We seem to be in the former. Depending on the rate of the system giving out items, the power of those items and now much the increase is it could be amazing or it could be close to useless we will just have to see. Anyways, with the day we have had so far, I need a beer. Do you want one too?” she asked

“No, I think I will pass. it's still only 11 and I have learned my lesson about day drinking.” I said

“Fair enough, you want a soda then?”

“Yeah, grab me a Sprite please.” She nodded and went into the kitchen.

Sarah was right though, we have had quite the day so far. Then again the whole world has. In a way we are all restarting. Some will have minor advantages but right now anyone could rise to power. And that is truly terrifying. I have worked on my base of power and wealth for two millennia but now most of that is stripped away. I'm no longer going to be able to hold my properties and assets that I don't have hidden away or on me right now. Hmm I should make some phone calls before it’s too late.

With how things are now because I'm the handler of the dungeon my new base of power is right here. Hmm I'm going to need to plan. When the world stops changing, which I can't imagine will take longer than a week and people figure out a bit more about the system all hell will break loose. And those still standing at the end of it will be the people that will hold power for the foreseeable future, and right now I'm in prime position to be one of the most powerful ones. Maybe I should start soon rather than later. I can't imagine much more massive changes in the area occurring with there already being a dungeon here.

I have natural power that will give me a temporary advantage in the power struggle. I don't know how long my natural advantage will last me but if I use it right I can use this to get an even greater advantage but to do that I need information which I am severely lacking right now. I have two sources of information right now. First is Sarah, even if the knowledge she has does not turn out to be internally correct it will still be something to work off of. She can also navigate the forums and info boards better than me and will most likely have a better idea of what to look for. As for the second source, in one week I will be able to talk to Gareena, a being who has lived with the system for who knows how long. She will know a lot to help me take a step past everyone else. But this time frame is short.

“Hey, what are you looking so serious for?” Sarah said while she walked into the room and tossed me my Sprite. I looked at her and made a decision that would help write my path for the foreseeable future. I put down my soda and stood up and looked at Sarah and spoke.

“Sarah, like I asked you in college, I will ask you again but this time there will be no turning back should things go wrong. Will you help me gain knowledge and stand by me as I try to build a mantle of power. I don't know much about what is to come but one thing I know for sure is that once people realize the power they can gain all hell will break loose and those who are left standing at the end of it will be the rulers of the new world. I don't like being under someone else's thumb against my will so the best way to keep that from happening is to be one of those rulers. I have power that most do not possess. I have the dungeon that most do not have access to. But what I lack is knowledge and understanding about what is to come and how this system might work. And that is where I need you. Sarah, will you stand with me and take the reins of not only our future but all those around us?”

Sarah stood there, shock written all over her face. After a moment her expression turned to one in deep compilation. She was really taking her time with it. She ended up moving to the loveseat, sat and curled up in contemplation, slowly sipping her beer. I let her be and cracked open my Sprite. For all I knew I would not get to drink these for much longer. I don't know how much time passed before she finally spoke but it had to be a good 15 minutes.

“Viviana, what is your plan?” I turned to look at her and thought about her question for a second before speaking.

“The world as we know it is going to change and most if not all the power and wealth I have acquired over my very long life will most likely be stripped from me or become useless. So before that happens I want to use both until I no longer can and with the help of the dungeon I would like to build a base of power right here. Depending on how things turn out slowly expanding our claim of land to the surrounding area and build up a following so to speak of hopefully like minded people to populate the area.

Because I do not see being able to single handedly hold this dungeon for ever. I do have some people I plan on contacting but even then if a thousand people come down on us with the help of the system there is only some much we can do to stop them.”

Sarah took a deep breath and said “Viviana, I will join you in your quest. I really don’t have anyone else to turn to that I trust outside of my parents. So I will join you on the condition that should we succeed, you will help bring my parents here. They are the only family I have and don't want to lose them.”

Nodding, I said “Sarah I promise we should build a safe place here. I will do everything in my power to escort your parents here. Even then your parents are good people. I would not want them to be stuck in a bad situation.”

Sarah smiled and then broke out into tears.

“Are you okay?”

“No. Things aren't going to be sunshine and rainbows. For all I know, by the time we can get to my parents they could have died, and by god knows what.”

I moved over to her and hugged her curled up body. “It's ok, I'm here, we will get through this. Unlike almost everyone around us I have over two thousand years of personal accumulated knowledge and power to pull from. There is not any group of one hundred humans that can take me on without turning the ground I walk on into glass.”

We sat there for quite a while enjoying the quiet embrace of each other. It took her a while to calm down but when she did we got to work.

“Ok so first off you need to take the skill identify it will be the single most important non combat skill you can get. It will tell you the general power level of whoever or whatever you are facing. It will also give you a brief amount of information on them. Like how I knew you were a vampire. Should I face you assuming the stories are true I would want to face you in a sunny area.” Sarah explained. I nodded along the whole time. Information was key and this was the quintessential information ability. Sarah seeing my understanded ment went on.

“I don't know much about the earned abilities but from what I read online they seem to be some form of achievement based abilities. The earned abilities seem to be giving you credit to something you are uniquely good at and from what I read are extremely rare. Most people only have born abilities from what I read. Like photographic memory and the like.”

Nodding I cut in “I can attribute that not counting born abilities or the dungeon related ones, I only have 10 and I have been alive for over 2 millennia. So I would not count on gaining them. But something I can say is that it seems that special abilities will go in the earned ability category. That is where my dungeon handler abilities are located.” Sarah had a thoughtful look on her face and spoke.

“This is just conjecture but I noticed that the system makes a distinction between abilities and skills. If you look, classes have skills not abilities. Maybe it is a way to distinguish between what the system gives you and what the system enhances about a person. Tell me if I'm wrong but are your earned abilities better than what you could have done without the system?”

I thought back to some of what I read of my abilities and nodded. “Some of them yes others no. The best example is the hidden in plain sight ability. I have gone my whole life without humans knowing what I was. So to help me keep it that way the system made it so I could still do that even with the identify skill. But that leaves the question about my handler abilities.”

Sarah shrugged and said “I don't know what to tell you about that one. Maybe it's just the system did not want to take up your general skill slots so it puts them in earned abilities. I really have no idea and don't think we ever will.”

“Fair enough there is no reason to linger on the topic. So is there any other skill you think I should grab?”

“Well anything that gives you increased experience gain outside of that right now I do not know. I don't know if skills are permanent or not so I wouldn't risk filling your slots yet. I will try to see if anyone has tried to get rid of their skills in a bit.”

“Well in that case I'm going to look at some of the skills I was offered.” I opened up my profile and looked at the general skill list and stared.

“Ummm how do I open the available skills…?” I said with not a small amount of embarrassment in my voice. Sarah giggled at me before answering.

“When you're looking at your general skills, think about opening the list of available skills. It's a little weird but it works.” she said. Nodding I did as she said and an impressive list of skills was offered to me.

Absorb Stats (Advanced)

Ancient Archive (Advanced)

Adaptation (Moderate)

Appraisal (Moderate)

Aura of Ancient Authority (Advanced)

Beauty (Moderate)

Being of Twilight (Intermediate)

Bite (Basic)

Blood Lust (Intermediate)

Blood Rights (Intermediate)

Born Leader (Intermediate)

Brilliants (Moderate)

Bullet Time (Moderate)

Child of the Night (Advanced)

Clean Freak (Basic)

Collective Might (Intermediate)

Concealed Intent (Moderate)

Connoisseur of Fine Tastes (Moderate)

Cooking (Basic)

Dampen Sound (Moderate)

Denizen of the Night (Intermediate)

Duality of Good and Evil (Intermediate)

Draconic Alignment (Advanced)

Drowned in Shadow (Moderate)

Elder Vampire (Epic)

Enlightened (Intermediate)

Enriched Experience (Advanced)

Envious Existence (Moderate)

Eternal Student (Advanced)

Evolution of Times (Intermediate)

Experienced (moderate)

Farm Tool Proficiency (Basic)

Flexible (Basic)

Food Fanatic (Basic)

Freak of Nature (Moderate)

Freedom from Expectations (Advanced)

Goddess in Bed (Intermediate)

Harmony of Music (Moderate)

Harmony of Twilight (Advanced)

Harvest (Basic)

Heart of Gold (Intermediate)

Hyper Awareness (Intermediate)

Identify (Basic)

Instrumentalist (Intermediate)

Incognito (Moderate)

Instant Recollection (Moderate)

Jokester (Basic)

Jolly Presence (Basic)

Jump (Basic)

Keeper of Secrets (Intermediate)

Kill them with Kindness (Moderate)

Kill Streak (Intermediate)

Killer Instincts (Moderate)

Killer Sex Drive (Moderate)

Life Line (Intermediate)

Lingering Presence(Moderate)

Living Weapon (Intermediate)

Malicious Intent (Moderate)

Marked (Advanced)

Master Armorsmith (Advanced)

Master Toolsmith (Advanced)

Master Weaponsmith (Advanced)

Medieval Might (Basic)

Midnight High (Intermediate)

Moon Lite Strike (Advanced)

Multitask (Basic)

Musings of an Ancient (Intermediate)

Natural Weapon (Moderate)

Nature’s Blessed (Advanced)

Nature’s Guardian (Intermediate)

Nature's Mistake (Advanced)

Neutral Mentality (Basic)

Night time Guardian (Intermediate)

Old Dogs can Learn New Tricks (Moderate)

Operative of Chaos (Advanced)

Origins of Old (Moderate)

Patron of the Succubus (Epic)

Presence of an Ancient (Epic)

Pretty (Basic)

Public Speaking isn't That Hard (Moderate)

Queen to Be (Advanced)

Rapid Thought Process (Moderate)

Reproductive Control (Intermediate)

Running (Basic)

Seducer of the Gods (Epic)

Sex Crazed (Basic)

Sex Fiend (Intermediate)

Sex Goddess (Grand)

Shadow Step (Advanced)

Sprinting (Basic)

Star Jumper (Advanced)

Succubus in a Vampire's Body (Advanced)

Sudden Impact (Moderate)

Superior Reflexes (Advanced)

Tailor (Basic)

Tame (Basic)

Temperament of Age (Intermediate)

Test of Valor (Intermediate)

Ties of an Immortal (Advanced)

Unbound (Advanced)

Unbreakable Will (Advanced)

Undetectable (Basic)

Unfazeable (Intermediate)

You and Me (Intermediate)

Young and Beautiful (Advanced)