Problematic Reporting

Chapter 19

Finally, after half an hour, the points counter stabilized and showed +6/2. It looked like the deaths were the cause, and something had been wrong with the counter. That was a relief. Mostly anyway.

On the one hand, it was good that I was right. Points were gathered by an easily understood if objectionable method. That parts of the system could malfunction was less than ideal.

I decided to focus on the fact that I had four points more than the required two for my tithe. That was soothing. As for why I looked the reports over and could only guess at the odd tagging. If I were in a betting mood, I'd have laid a pretty hefty amount on the N standing for neutral, C for Chaos, E for evil, L for lawful, and finally G for good.

As I considered that, the death reports shimmered briefly before revealing just what I had suspected. Now spelled out clearly instead of abbreviated. It also looked like I lost points for killing those of my own alignment but gained them for any other.

That was definitely something I'd have to be careful about since I couldn't filter who entered my dungeon. At least not at the moment. I'd have to look into it.

Feeling better, I wanted some additional information. When it came to interface and system matters, they were something I couldn't do anything about on my own. I tried summoning some kind of help desk or ticket system. Since the system was following a similar pattern to a game interface, I felt like it should have a Q&A section.

Despite rephrasing the idea multiple times, nothing happened. It seemed like there wasn't such a function or that I didn't have access to it. That reminded me of the notice about the text to speech function for the interface. I had to upgrade to gain access to it. Maybe other features would unlock or improve if I put points into them.

That wasn't ideal, but at least it would potentially improve. Thinking of points, now that I had some, I could use the excess in the store.

The point-buy section had been a greyed-out tab during the tutorial, but now it opened easily. I began browsing excitedly, wondering what kind of cool shit they'd have on offer. If I could get a potion of regrowing limbs for fifteen mana, then points should net me some pretty awesome things.

Four minutes into my search, I was disappointed. The majority of point items for sale were core upgrades and features. They were all practical in nature but not the powers cosmic I'd been envisioning before.

The only one that really had anything to do with aesthetics was the ability to change my core's appearance. I shamelessly played with that one for a while but didn't buy it in the end. As rad as making my core look like a giant dragon's eye was, I couldn't justify the expense.

Once I got over my disappointment and stopped screwing around, I approached the options with more tempered expectations. As far as utility went, the choices were pretty good. The best would have been to upgrade the core's quality from E rank to D rank. Unfortunately, it cost a stomach-churning hundred points.

There was also a mystery component required, but I couldn't find out what at the moment. The entry was greyed out without so much as a tooltip to explain things. At a guess, I needed to have the points on hand or fulfill a mystery requirement to know more. Possibly both.

The affordable upgrades were [Increased Mana Output], [Increased Durability], [Increased Hardness], and [Minimize]. Suffering from a bit of PTSD from the tutorial, I leaned toward [Minimize]. If I maxed it out, my core would be the size of a large apple at the end. Good luck hitting that fucking archers.

It wasn't a practical choice at the moment, though. Not when I had so few points. I put it on a list to buy later when I was less strapped. I studied the other options in more depth.

Increased hardness was similar to armor. It would make the core more challenging to damage in the first place. Conversely, increased durability would give it extra hit points. They made for a good combo paired together.

Both were a good thing, but I flinched at the idea of letting someone get close enough to take a shot like that. I would be a lot happier if they never got that far in. That left increased mana output.

It would grant me an extra fifty mana per day at refresh. That would give me a lot of room to play and better overall versatility than everything but a core rank upgrade. The only trouble was that it cost ten points.

Shit. Everything looked good, but the two things I actually wanted were too expensive. I closed the shop tab. I felt reluctant not to buy anything since I didn't know if I'd lose all my extra points at the end of the year or not. Despite that, I didn't want to spend them on things I didn't really want then find out I kept them.

Remembering the issue I had with the interface, an alternative occurred to me. It only cost one point to upgrade the last time a prompt for it had appeared.

"Upgrade interface," I said, and the confirmation screen showed up.

"What do I get?" I asked. The prompt expanded to show an outline of what I'd receive for my one point. This felt like another bit of weirdness, and the fact the new information was in a different font from the rest of the system felt like it confirmed my hunch.

[Interface Upgrade Level 1 to Level 2]

[Cost: 1]

[Interface quality increase: F 1 to F 2 grade]

[Store interface increase: F1 to F 2 grade]

[Crafting interface grade increase: F 1 to F 2]

[Communications enabled]

I had an E grade core but an F grade interface. I didn't know how to feel about that. For one point, it was a good deal just to enable communications. Both Agony and the hood had indicated that we could talk to each other, but I hadn't seen how with my current setup.

If it also happened to include a support desk, I'd be ecstatic. Even if it didn't, though, the other upgrades were probably worth it on their own. Crafting, in particular, interested me.

I made up my mind to upgrade but closed the prompt. I needed to set up proper defenses before diving into that. There was no way to know until I triggered it, but I'd undergone a blackout period when I initialized my core.

That had been an unavoidable risk at the time, but that wasn't the case now. It was time to get to work. Though I had almost no mana to speak of, it was easy to rearrange existing tiles. A few careful stalactite and stalagmite placements and the entry tunnel was nearly impassable.

It wasn't enough to entirely prevent entry. I didn't want to set off a build alarm, but it discouraged idle curiosity. I wove in garbage grade traps I'd gotten from the tutorial since they had few placement requirements.

Though it wasn't much, my new defenses significantly improved over the prior complete lack of them. I changed the tunnels around so they'd be confusing to navigate due to monotony and doubling back. So long as an actual adventurer didn't find me, I felt confident most people would end up hopelessly lost.

Despite the improvements, I didn't make a move to upgrade yet. I wasn't short on points, which meant I could take my time. I could afford to spend a day or so building things up more securely. With that in mind, I turned my attention to researching the monsters available to me.

Their needs and wants would be the guiding principle behind a lot of my layout choices. Aesthetics were important to me, but function would be the limitation that dictated how I developed the form.

Getting into the zone as I read, my hand started to unconsciously move. I wanted to take notes, and it felt like a habit which was kind of weird. I understood what and why I was doing it but had no idea why it seemed so natural.

"Someone was a research nerd," I muttered derisively to myself. I wasn't her. At least not in a meaningful sense, but I couldn't help curiosity. My life started while hers ended as a rideshare driver having a shit day.

Everything up to that moment, including the decision to work a gig job, had been her choice—everything after it had been mine.

Was that her first day? What would she think knowing how things had turned out? Was this a turn of events she could have lived with? I had lots of questions but no way of finding answers.

Knowing there was nothing to be done, I got back to what I had been doing. My hand moved to take notes again, and I wished I had some way of writing. Knowing that things would sometimes reveal themselves if I found the correct command, I gave it a try.

After a few tries, a black pen had appeared along with a blank white prompt. Curious, I started writing and found it worked like paper. My handwriting flowed smoothly as I played around with some quick doodles.

Eager to put the new feature to work, I picked some monsters and jotted down their relevant details. Treating it like a sticky note, I felt more confident I wouldn't make pointless mistakes about placement.

Traps went next and were just as complex in their needs. Once I had a good grasp of them, I started formulating a plan. Sketching out a general layout map, I marked down where I wanted to place things then wrote what they needed next to them.

If a section needed certain features or a specific size, I mapped it out. My shorthand was to fill the area with slanted lines to indicate it wasn't done yet. To meet those needs, I harvested tiles from the existing layout and moved them around.

Once the floor plan met the minimum requirements, I started doing the subtle alterations to the spaces to make them work. The work was repetitive but in a Zen kind of way rather than tedious.

Essential defenses came together painlessly. I had a rock-solid foundation to work from, thanks to the tutorial. It had lacked advanced tactical advice, but I wasn't starting from scratch.

By the time refresh was about to hit, I was confident that no randos would be able to walk in and kick in my core. When my mana refreshed, I felt a soothing sense of calm. I wasn't broke and nearly helpless. I did still have a house guest, though.

Weighing my options, I decided it would probably be better to wait until he left to do an upgrade. Several minutes after reaching that very logical conclusion, my more base nature made some persuasive arguments to the contrary.

Yes, I could wait, but I had no idea how long it would take. The kid was a potential threat, but I'd beefed up my defenses, and four bandits hadn't been enough to take on my hounds. What was one kid going to do?

Thinking of the hounds, I decided to pay them a visit. They were down in the lava area I'd hastily set up, enjoying themselves. I found Stalin lounging in the pool while the lady hound was jumping off the diving rock I'd set up.

She was most of the way down when I realized a fundamental problem with the scenario.

"Wow, wai-" I started only to fall silent as she plunged into the pool. Instead of smacking into a solid, she splashed down like it was water. I felt my orbs flicker as I stared in confusion. Lava wasn't a thin liquid. She shouldn't have been able to do that.

"Mistress?" Stalin called from where he was sitting. He was covered in lava and shook it from his coat before walking over to me. His stately bearing marred by enthusiastic tail wags.

"Uhm… So, I was thinking about upgrading my interface," I started only to trail off. The lady hound was doggy paddling over to us, which was another what the fuck visual to take in. Maybe it was a thing she could do because she was an elemental.

I wanted to ask but didn't. I felt like the answer would be 'magic, duh' or a blank look, and I wasn't prepared for either thing spiritually.

"You have enough points to do that? I didn't think that lot would be worth much," Stalin asked.

"Wait, you know how many points I should get?" I countered. Somehow I was more surprised by this than the fact he could talk in the first place or that lava was weird in my dungeon.

"I don't know exactly, but my previous masters always cursed if they killed certain types of people. They complained they weren't worth anything. Did I misunderstand?" Stalin answered, the other one nodding in agreement.

"This isn't the first dungeon you've been in?" I asked. One question leading to another yet again.

"This is my third," Stalin said, still confused by my reaction.

"My second, I was captured as a pup and bound to the system," Stalin's companion said. The name thing really needed to be addressed soon.

"I was older. You did well to level to such an extent from a pup. Most never mature," Stalin said, and his companion nodded.

I'd assumed that monsters were spawned by the system itself, not organically occurring creatures added to it. That felt shittier on a certain level.

"Uhm… Do either of you know what happens when someone upgrades? I blacked out for a while when I initialized my core, and I'm worried that will happen again," I asked honestly. It wouldn't do me any good to pretend I wasn't anxious and avoid asking.

Both hounds looked at me for a moment then at each other. They might not have witnessed the event, but I hoped they had.

"Mine always thrashed around on the ground for a while," the lady hound replied.

"The same with mine the few times I observed it," Stalin agreed.

"Oh, like… An hour or two?" I asked, feeling a bit relieved. If it was that short a time, it wouldn't be a big deal to upgrade now.

"What's an hour?" the lady hound asked. I looked at Stalin. He didn't seem to know either.

"Uhm… So the time it takes to say "one Mississippi" is about a second. Sixty seconds is a minute, and there are sixty minutes in an hour," I explained.

"Lots of minutes, not an hour!" the lady hound said emphatically. Stalin agreed with a nod and a woof for emphasis. That made sense, neither one of them seemed to have that long of an attention span. Minutes were even better for my needs, so I didn't mind a bit.

"Okay then, I'm going to upgrade. You guys guard the core, okay?" I asked.

"Yes, Mistress!" The hounds said in unison.

Feeling reassured, I reopened the upgrade interface and selected yes. A timer appeared, and I felt nervous as it crawled forward. I'd had no idea how long ten seconds could feel when you truly weren't looking forward to something.