The Dungeon Hound Vol. 1 pts. 19-20

((As I talked about in last week's weekly update, I've decided to rename the rewrite of TQH to The Dungeon Hound. So, TDH now!))

[Vol. 1 pt. 19]

I was in good enough health for the dungeon, so there was no getting out of my duty since it wasn’t one of my days off.

I was taken to the dungeon once more.

Though, I did learn that the guard who would usually escort me there only really roughed me up for the crowd. He was pretty nice up until we made out it to the public view where those in the stands could see us, and then he’d get a bit rougher with me. Guess that was part of the show.

I couldn’t really blame him in that case. To the people of the city, we were nothing but criminals providing entertainment for them. They didn’t want to see the guards get all friendly with us. What kind of guards would they be if they were making friends with the prisoners?

Regardless, I was back in the dungeon on the first floor again. That floating orb was staying as close as usual, always shifting around to get different viewing angles.

Alright. Let’s get this over with. See if I can make it any farther today.

Fighting became easy. Seriously easier than I expected it to be. Even though I only fought beasts within the dungeon a few times, they were all done in quick succession. I fought nearly every day against beasts, always struggling to survive, and I improved quickly because of that.

From my understanding of how the world worked, gaining levels was easy. Keeping levels was hard.

The faster one gained levels, the faster one lost levels. Those who spent their entire lives honing themselves would never have to worry about passive level loss. If it took somebody fifty years to slowly build up to a certain level, it would take them fifty years to lose all of that, and that was assuming they never did anything else to maintain their level for the rest of their life.

But if somebody was tossed into danger and survived, they would quickly gain levels. Somebody could go from level one to ten in less than a week, but they would lose those levels in the same amount of time it took to get them if they stopped being in such a high-risk environment.

So, as long as I kept on fighting in the dungeon, I would get stronger. Pretty quickly, too. It only took a few days for me to get used to fighting. My instincts and skill improved with every battle, and the repetitive nature of them allowed me to really feel like I was getting stronger with every repeated entry into the dungeon.

But I still always died in the end.

Even so, when it came to the rats, dealing with them was easy after a few more tries.

What I found out was that baiting them was the best way for me to deal with them. Whether there was one rat or two, I’d let them get the opening attack off by charging at me. I’d wait until they were committed to their attack and then jump up to land on the back of their head, letting me go for their neck from behind.

Their only chance of getting me off was to hope a second rat would or to try and knock me off by rolling around on the ground or slamming themselves into the walls.

All of those were dealt with easily. All I had to do was jump off and repeat the process: wait for them to commit and then get on top of them again.

They were just soulless beasts, after all. They were incapable of learning. The same trick would work on them over and over again until they died.

That was something else I realized I needed to keep in mind. I wasn’t fighting people or soul beasts. My enemies were all stupid and incapable of adapting to new situations. Seriously stupid. They would never learn my strategies no matter how many times I used them right in front of their faces.

Once I forced myself to keep that in mind while going through the dungeon, most of what I did during fights was study my enemy to try and learn their moves. In the same way that they would never learn mine, they would never perform anything other than their usual moves.

I wasn’t sure what helped me more in those first few floors of the dungeon: quickly gaining levels or studying my enemies. Then again, I wasn’t even sure if I was gaining that many levels. We were only read once a month, apparently, to build anticipation for the crowd and so that they could see larger bursts of growth. Reporting our growth every day or even every week apparently took the excitement out of it. Nobody wanted told of every tiny little bit of growth we experienced since then it would take up all the time and distract people from the main “show.”

But even if I could level up quickly within the dungeon and fight better because of it… I still had a massive problem.

My level cap was only twenty.

No matter how hard I fought in the dungeon, it wouldn’t matter after hitting level twenty. The only thing I would be able to do at that point was to try and go as broad as possible to learn as many different skills and abilities as I could. Even then, because of my level cap, I wouldn’t be able to get those skills up too high.

Though I wasn’t sure how exactly that part worked. All I knew were how levels and caps worked, and I knew that I was going to hit my cap quickly and then be screwed. The only way I would be able to get stronger after that was intense physical training to improve my muscles and practice new techniques and strategies to try and outsmart any enemies.

But even something like physical power received diminishing returns before long, and no amount of intelligent planning would work against something with such a higher level that it could force its way through even the best of plans.

Life was unfair in that regard. It was those with the higher-level caps who ruled. Meanwhile, the vast majority of people were like me with a cap of only twenty.

I wondered what Elanah’s and Fane’s caps were as I noticed the descending stairs to the fourth floor up ahead.

A single goblo stood between me and it. The beast had a wooden shield that looked ready to fall apart against the slightest attack and it wielded a short, rusty metal sword.

It looked at me and got into a defensive stance with its shield held out in front of it before approaching me step by step, more cautious than most beasts.

Most of my time fighting in the first three floors might have been spent on rats, but I got used to fighting goblos, too. I already knew exactly how I could kill the shield bearing beast without suffering any injuries.

I waited for it to get close enough to swing. It swung its sword down at me from above, crashing it into the ground right after I jumped out of the way.

Unlike the rats where going for their necks was the best route, going for a goblo’s ankles was the superior option. I jumped between its legs to get behind it and spun around to sink my fangs into the back of its left ankle. That dropped the goblo to one knee and took away its ability to move around. After dodging another swing of its sword, I took out its other ankle and jumped against its back to push it down onto the ground. From there, going for the neck was easy and killed it in an instant.

There was only one problem with being so methodical and practiced in my approach.

I had no idea if that was entertaining enough for the crowds. They liked watching people make mistakes. They liked watching people die rushing headfirst into fights without thinking about it.

But that was the opposite of what I got into the habit of doing.

I still tried to perform little tricks every now and then, such as jumping off the wall when going up against only a single rat at a time to get onto its back, but that was it.

I needed to get flashier.

I needed more style.

So, my two biggest issues were clear. I somehow had to find a way of dealing with my limited level cap considering that the only way to raise it was to die while at the cap and then be reincarnated into a new life with a higher cap, and I had to bring more style into my fighting methods to keep the crowd entertained.

I wasn’t sure what I was going to do, but I had to do something.

Then, while descending down the stairs to the fourth floor for the first time, a certain portal popped up and dragged me into it. It was the first time seeing the portal show up since—well, since the first time I saw it.

And on the other side of the portal was the same room and man from before.

“Welcome back,” he said. “Miss me?”

I was already annoyed.

[Vol. 1 pt. 20]

“Well, I have to admit. I never expected you two to get together,” the master of the dungeon said.

I had no idea what he was talking about, but he started talking and wouldn’t stop as soon as he saw me.

“You see, I am constantly aware of everything within my territory. That includes hearing everything. That includes hearing that girl—what was her name? Elanah, I believe. As I was saying, that woman has not stopped talking about you to the crowd lately. She has also gone into rather… vulgar detail regarding the time you have spent together, I must say.”

Having sex was one thing.

Knowing that people would feel jealous of me was another thing.

But… actually flaunting to an audience everything that she did with me? While she was fighting for her life in the dungeon, she was telling everybody about everything we did?

Part of me felt like I seriously got involved with somebody I shouldn’t have. Somebody insane and dangerous.

The other part of me felt… beyond happy. Out there was a girl so obsessed with me that she had no problem telling everybody about her obsession with me, including what we did in her cell, and that made me feel good.

Wait.

I was stupid. I was focusing on the wrong thing entirely.

Rather than focus on how that boosted my ego, there was something else I wanted to know. After all, she was the first girl who ever treated me that way. And, even though I knew that she was probably insane, I… kind of liked that about her.

“How is she?” I asked before remembering that he probably wouldn’t be able to understand me just like everybody else. I hadn’t seen her since I was dragged out of her cell. What little free time we had didn’t overlap again.

“Alive and well,” the dungeon master answered. “Well, for the most part. Her left hand was grabbed and broken with a crushing grip. Yet, rather than scream out in pain, she lit up with a murderous rage and stabbed her dagger into the face of my beast many more times than needed while shouting at it that you were the only one allowed to touch her. Do you know how long it has been since I’ve shivered? At least seventy years or so, easily. However, when I heard the unfiltered rage in her voice… well, let me just say that I wish you the best of luck should you stay with her. And I hope that she never turns that rage around onto you. If she does, I would run. And hide. Then again, I have a feeling not even that would make one safe from her.”

Elanah is scary. Seriously scary. Even this guy is afraid of her. But… I’m not sure why, but knowing she did that… is kind of hot. Wait, did he understand me?

He… actually replied to me. He understood me. I still wanted to confirm it, but I was confident that he actually understood me and wasn’t just guessing what I was barking like Elanah did. “Can you understand me?”

“What a foolish question. Of course I can understand you,” he answered.

“How? You’re talking and I’m just… barking.”

“I can understand everybody and everything. Understanding you is as easy as existing. Well, so long as you are within my dungeon, that is. I can flawlessly communicate with anything within my dungeon’s territory. If you were to step outside of my territory and attempt to speak to me from outside, however, then I would not have a single idea what you are saying.”

“I think I understand. Is that a skill or something?”

“Indeed. I have countless skills under the Dungeon category, and even more abilities related to them.”

“What are those skills even like?” I was curious. It wasn’t like I ever talked to a core before that turned into a dungeon. Plus it was a nice break from having to explore and fight, even if I did find him annoying.

“Giving me a chance to show off, are you? I appreciate it. There are not nearly enough of you who wish to listen to me. That being said, I have skills related to the expansion of my dungeon, summoning beasts within it and evolving them, communicating with all within my dungeon, creating resources within it—ah… talking about this has reminded me of my greatest failure.”

“I’m curious when you put it that way.”

“Good. I would not have brought it up if I did not want to talk about it. You see, as powerful as I may be… I have never figured out how to create new life. Truly new life, that is. I do not mean the fragmenting and combining of souls used to create ‘new’ souls for children whenever reincarnation does not occur. I do not even consider those souls new. If you were to break off pieces of bread from two different loaves and then combine them together, would you call that new bread? Of course not. What I want is to create new life. New souls. But… I have failed. I got as close to it as I could before hitting a wall that not even the strongest pick could break through. In the end, it remains something beyond my capability—beyond the capability of all of us.”

“How close did you get?”

“Not close in the slightest. The closest I got is having full control over all souls within my territory. Should somebody die, it is effortless for me to take their soul and return it to their body. Though, back before this game, I used to take those souls and place them in the bodies of my beasts to convert them into soul beasts whenever an intruder died to my traps rather than my beasts. In other words, I have near full dominion over souls within my territory, but only in regard to preexisting souls. I could even extract the soul from a living being if I so wish to.”

That… that last part is terrifying. He could instantly kill somebody if he wants to and there’s nothing that could be done about it.

Hearing him talk put things into perspective for me. I was just some guy who spent all my life out in a rural village helping my parents with the farm. I never had big dreams or goals or anything. I had a lot of dreams, but nothing anywhere near as big as what he talked about. All I really wanted was to get married and have a few kids. But here he was, talking about how he wanted to discover how he could create brand new life—new souls.

I felt like my dream was a tiny speck of sand compared to his, and his was a tall tower reaching into the sky going beyond the clouds.

“Why’d you want to do that?” I asked. I wanted to learn more about what would inspire somebody to that degree.

“To prove that I could,” he answered.

“Is… that it?”

“What? Did you expect some grandiose answer? If so, you will be disappointed. My only goal was to prove that I could. Well, that and it would have been nice to do something that even he never accomplished.”

“He?”

“I mentioned him before. He is another core that turned into a dungeon, just like me. An extremely arrogant, blunt, and annoying man who never stops singing his own praises and laughing while dragging his children everywhere.”

“Wait, you said he’s a dungeon? And he has children?”

“Yes. Absurd, I know, but ‘absurd’ is the best possible way to describe him.” He sighed. “To think that a fellow core could not only break free from his territory, but intrude upon my own and defeat me. Humiliating. My only chance at ever getting one up on him was discovering the secret to creating life… but I have already told you how that went.”

“Sounds like… you’ve been through a lot.” I felt an odd desire to comfort him. He sounded genuinely disappointed if not outright depressed. He usually had way more energy and was a lot more… haughty, but now he just sounded like any normal guy depressed with life.

“This topic is never a fun one. Let us move past it. Here are your choices.”

At the same table as the first time, my options showed up atop it. Three of them in total. One was a sword that had what looked like a red streak of metal running up through its core. The next was a ball of energy that looked like it was flowing with water, so probably something related to water magic. The last option was a single, gold coin sitting atop the table.

“A blade that steals life from those it cuts,” he began to explain. “Every time you wound somebody with it, you will heal your own wounds.” He placed his hands around the second option. “Jet Stream. A rather powerful magical ability that will launch a stream of water from your position capable of knocking away any enemies before you.” Next was the coin. “And here… a coin. A gamble. Do you feel lucky?”

“No,” I answered. There was nothing about my situation that was lucky. Well, there was Elanah. Elanah was the luckiest thing about my situation considering that I found somebody who helped me lose my virginity despite my new body. Taking that into consideration… I actually did feel pretty lucky. “Wait. I do.”

He smiled. His smile looked suspicious, but… for some reason, that only made me want to see what would be the result of the gamble even more. “Then, would you like to flip the coin?”

I probably should have thought about it for more than a few seconds, but I didn’t.

A blade would be hard to use given that I didn’t have hands and a water ability capable of knocking enemies away would probably have enough water that it might put me at risk given my tiny size. Not to mention that I could easily imagine it making the floor slippery and cause me to trip and die in some stupid way. Then there was the fact that I had no idea how to use magic.

So, I nodded.

It was time for a gamble.