Wandering Dungeon

"Well, that was a short assignment!" Blixie quietly huffed while she hovered in a dark corner of the room near the ceiling. She had decided to wait in the cave she was in until the adventurers that were there left before leaving herself. She had just seen the big one leap across the room and smash the dungeon core she had been assigned so she figured he wouldn't be in much of a talking mood right now.

"Feel better?" The smaller adventurer asked as he walked into the room, a sheet of ice forming at his feet that suspended him above the spiked pit that had opened up at the door when the force of the big adventurer swept across the room.

"A little." The big guy spat. "I'm pissed that the weeklong journey here was for nothing." He crunched the remains of the dungeon core beneath his boot.

"It could have been something if we could have fed the dungeon and made it stronger."

"What was there to get stronger? There were no monsters. No treasure. Just traps. Whoever heard of a dungeon with no monsters or treasure?"

"It would have been a decent training ground for the recruits to practice noticing traps and dealing with them, besides I have heard of some dungeons starting to produce monsters after a monster trainer lost a pet to one or a stray monster was killed in it. This is why I keep telling you to think before you just smash things." The smaller adventurer sighed.

"Let's just get going." The big adventurer hoisted his sword-shield-axe thing, Blixie wasn't quite sure what to call it, over his shoulder and started toward the door. "The sooner we get back the sooner we can forget this trip happened, and the less time the guild master's daughters have to be lonely." He let out a big throaty laugh.

"Ugh. This is why I hate working with bardbarians." The little one sighed and followed after his companion.

After they left Blixie waited another ten or so minutes before coming down to inspect what was left of Garrett's core. "They really did a number on you huh? Guess I will wait a bit more until I know they have left what used to be the dungeon then start heading back for another assignment." She waited for another half an hour before heading out the tunnel and through the dungeon.

She flew quickly saddened by the open spike pits she saw. She believed that Garrett could have been a great dungeon, if only he had been able to summon some monsters. As she got closer to the exit cavern, she could feel a slight breeze blowing through what had been the first of Garrett's pressurized doors. The big one must have smashed it like he had the other one on his way out. "I wonder how long it will be before I get another assignment."

She flew through the final cave and was almost out of the cave when a flash of light and a light tinkling sound, like the ringing of a small bell, caught her attention. She looked back and laying on the floor was a small scroll. "Well, that was quick." She went and picked up the scroll, opened it, and quickly read through it. It was indeed her next assignment like she thought but quickly became confused. The scroll said her new dungeon core partner was near her. How? She wondered. Garrett was just destroyed and new dungeon cores could take years before they were ready for a guide, although it isn't unheard of for several dungeons to be ready in a year.

She flew out of the cave and up into the air. When she had a good view of the surrounding area, she focused on the ability she had acquired when she had become a dungeon guide. The ability activated and she could sense any dungeon near her and sure enough she was sensing a dungeon nearby. She could sense the new dungeon in the cave she had just left. That's weird. Dungeons are never born near each other let alone in the same cave system. I'm pretty sure there were no tunnels leading off of the main one that Garrett hadn't had his influence in.

Blixie was confused but she had a job to do, so she flew right back into the cave following her dungeon sense ability. She flew back through the tunnels dutifully looking for her new dungeon core partner and trying to ignore the pits she flew over. Her dungeon sense couldn't pinpoint where a dungeon core was but it could get her to within a few hundred feet so she checked all over the rooms and tunnels she passed through making sure she didn't overlook any possible hiding place the core could be.

She finally managed to get back to the cavern that had held Garrett's core after about a frustrating hour of looking. This is stupid. I looked everywhere and still no core. There are no other tunnels out of this room or Garrett would have found them. All that's here is this stupid skeleton. In a fit of anger, she flew over and kicked the skeleton's skull off and causing the body to tip over. If only Garrett could have summoned some monsters to give those adventures something to kill this wouldn't have happened.

The sound of the skull bouncing of the wall and rolling along the floor slowly subsided as Blixie slowly floated to the floor and sat down. I didn't think it would be this hard to lose a dungeon. Blixie thought sadly. I small green glow caught her eye.

She looked over to the glow and saw that it was escaping between the boney fingers of the skeleton. Another green core? Did we miss it because it is the same color that Garrett was? She stood up and walked over to the hand that was about the same size as her and slowly pried open the skeleton's fingers. Sitting on the palm was a small green gem with twenty equal sized triangular facets. It looks like Garrett's core. He must not have seen it because it was the same type as him. That's the only explanation.

Remembering how she couldn't hear Garrett's voice until she bonded with him, she quickly pulled out her small dagger, pricked her finger, and let a single drop of her blood splash onto the gem. "Hello!" She said with enthusiasm. "I'm Blixie, and I'm here to be your dungeon guide. I hope we can work really hard together to make this the best dungeon we can."

“Hey Blixie, glad to see you survived. I'm guessing those adventures are gone?"

Blixie fell to the floor mouth agape. "Garrett!?" Blixie managed to say after a few seconds. "How? Your core was destroyed."

"You say that like it's a bad thing." Garrett joked. "Let me guess, once a dungeon core is destroyed the soul is too."

"Yes. I've never heard of a dungeon coming back after its core is gone."

"I guess they should have been better friends to the god that put them in the core then." Garrett laughed.

Blixie was stunned by Garrett's sudden return and his apparent personality change. "What happened to you after your core was shattered."

"Well, I met am old friend." Garrett proceeded to tell Blixie about his meeting with George the god of stories.

"Let me get this straight. You're from another world entirely?"

"Yup."

"That would explain the lack of common sense then, and you said your friends from that world died and were reborn in this world as well?"

"That's what George told me."

"George, the god of stories who went to your world because he was curious, and you somehow made friends with him. Did he say what monsters your friends were reborn as?"

"No, but he did say their cores were unique and that they resemble the dice we used when playing our games. I'm hoping to go find them."

"How? You can't really move."

"You taught me how to move when I made my dungeon core pillar. I just have to move the dirt underneath me."

"You could do that, I guess. You might be able outpace a snail at least, but I think it would be very conspicuous for a dungeon core to be pretty much rolling around on the ground everywhere. Someone is bound to notice you and grab you. You would be defenseless without your traps which can't move with you."

Garrett thought for a minute and came up with what her thought was a great idea. He took the sword out of his inventory and used Unseen Force to swing it around. “I can defend myself with this sword at least."

"That's a little better but there are still a couple of problems with that. One, you can't even swing it properly. It looks like a child tied a rope to the handle and is just flailing around. Two, a dungeon core rolling around with a sword flying around it is just begging to be captured and studied. Three, active dungeon skills can't be used while there are other creatures inside your influence."

Garrett floated there staring at Blixie, the sword hanging limply in the air next to him. He thought about what he had done with his Unseen Force ability before and remembered playing with the coins. He tried using a mana thread at each end of the sword and controlled both at the same time.

He started slowly with just some basic swinging motions and found he had a lot more control than before. Following Blixie's advice, he soon had the sword spinning and slicing, stabbing and swooping from various angles that a normal person wouldn't be able to accomplish.

"That at least solves the sloppy swordsmanship you had before. It's not great, but it's better. It doesn't solve the whole flying sword above a dungeon core rolling around outside a dungeon issue though."

Garrett thought for a bit and looked around the room. "I think I have a perfect idea." Garrett said excitedly.