Steve decided to just go along with Nova’s suggestion and make a pillar for them both of them to rest on. Focusing his will towards creating a pedestal a new box appeared before him.

Construction materials currently available:

Stone, Dirt.

Of course I just have stone and dirt.

Sighing to himself he thought about using stone and then imagined a pillar forming directly below himself which branched into two parts at the top. The pedestal was a smooth cylinder made of the same grey stone that the floors and ceiling were made from. The two split parts at the top ended flat with four small protrusions so that they could hold his core and Nova’s skull securely. Once again he felt the same sensation of something vital leaving him as he created the pillar, though much less this time. Once finished he thought about moving himself to the left pedestal and was pleased to see his core float over and settle into place.

“Good, now have your boss over their pick me and and place me up there with you. And be CAREFUL!” Nova commanded him.

Grumbling to himself Steve directed his thoughts towards the skeletal boss and ordered it to carefully place Nova onto the pillar next to him, which it then proceeded to do, though its movements were a little shaky at first.

“Nova, what is this sensation I keep feeling when I create something?”

“Oh, that's just your Animus leaving you and infusing into whatever it is your are trying to create. Speaking of, how much do you have left?” Nova asked.

“Um...”

As if in response to his thoughts another blue box appeared with the relevant information.

Animus: 389/400

Oh. It would be better if I could just see that all the time.

And with that thought the blue box disappeared and a new display materialised at the top of his vision were his current Animus levels.

“I have 389/400. I guess I used some in creating the skeleton and this pillar.”

“That is correct. For a basic decoration like this it will only take 1 animus and the basic skeleton will cost 10. More advanced decorations will cost more and similarly more advanced minions, when available, will also cost more. Managing your Animus levels will be extremely important going forwards, particularly in these early stages as you need to allow yourself enough to complete your dungeon so you can Announce yourself. You don’t want to run out of Animus making a dungeon with a bunch of detailed decorations only to find you can’t fill it with minions to protect yourself.” Nova explained to him.

“What happens when I run out, how do I get more?”

“While creatures are inside your dungeon they will provide a slow but constant stream of Animus upto a certain limit depending on the creature. So there's little point in just having creatures move in and stay as they will eventually stop providing you with any more Animus. The quickest way to get more Animus though is to have something die in your dungeon, which is where the adventurers come in.” Nova seemed particularly eager at the thought of things dying though Steve was less enthused.

“Hmmm. I guess that's another reason to have treasure in my dungeon then, to tempt the adventurers in the first place?”

“Exactly. The key is finding the right balance between risk and reward. If a dungeon is too risky then adventurers won’t come in at all, if the rewards are lacking then they would have no reason to come in. Conversely if the dungeon is too easy then you won’t gain any power because nobody will be dying and providing better rewards costs more Animus.”

“This is a lot trickier than I thought... Ok, well let’s just outfit the boss as you suggested then we can work on the rest.”

Focussing on creating equipment, as expected, another blue box appeared.

Materials available for crafting items:

None

“Wait, what?”

“What's the problem?” Nova asked.

“It says I don’t have any materials available for crafting!”

“Oh right I almost forgot. Most dungeons will naturally expand intuitively so they have access to more area and building/crafting materials. I guess giving you a personality early on has stunted your natural instincts. Probably also explains why I seem to have to explain every little thing to you. You will need to absorb new materials before you can get much further. Try expanding and creating another room.”

“Well how was I supposed to know that?”

Concentrating on the wall in front of him, with the thought of creating a room, he expected another blue box to appear but was surprised when nothing seemed to happen.

“Why can’t I create a room? When I focus on doing it nothing seems to happen.”

“Well you’re not actually creating a room, it’s more that you are absorbing the rock which leaves a space behind. As you do this your influence will naturally expand into any area left after you absorb something. You just need to keep doing it and shape a room that way.” Nova patiently explained.

Concentrating again, this time not on creating but on absorbing he found that it was actually very easy. Once begun he was surprised that he had any trouble to begin with and soon had a corridor that extended approximately 10 meters forward. He then started to absorb a wider area until he had made a rectangular room around 25 meters wide, 15 meters long and he decided to leave the ceiling at the same height as the core room and the corridor, around 4 meters.

While he was absorbing the stone he again felt that pulling sensation that he now recognised was him using his Animus. Once he had started the corridor it immediately dropped by 10 and once he started the room it dropped by another 20 so he was now down to 359/400.

Once finished with absorbing/creating his new room another blue box appeared.

Congratulations! You have discovered Copper. Congratulations! You have discovered Iron. Congratulations! You have discovered Quartz.

Congratulations! You have completed your next step towards announcing your dungeon to the world.

Progress 2/3

“Yay! I found copper, iron and quartz! Plus I finished the second part of my Announcement.”

“Not surprising. The old man wouldn’t have put a new dungeon core someplace without any natural resources close by. I imagine you will find more once you expand, though the iron and quartz are very good to have initially.” Nova seemed quite pleased by Steve’s discovery.

“I get why iron will be helpful, but what would I use Quartz for?”

“Quartz is useful as an enchanting ingredient with many uses and is also valued for it’s natural beauty. If you have some Quartz growing in your dungeon you will be more likely to attract crafters and other magic users.”

“Does that mean I will be able to create enchanted items using the quatz?”

Nova seemed amused by Steve’s excitement over the prospect. “Not yet. You don’t know any enchantments and creating enchanted items is probably going to be a little expensive for you right now. If an somebody with enchantment skills dies while inside your dungeon you will have a chance of learning some of those skills. This is also the main way that you will learn new things since you can’t very well go out into the world and study them first hand.”

“Wow, I can’t wait!”

Thinking of all the amazing magical artifacts that he was going to create one day Steve once again brought up his list of crafting materials.

Materials available for crafting items:

Copper, Iron, Quartz.

Deciding to make his boss’ equipment out of iron Steve was expecting a new box to appear with the options that he had available but nothing happened. Not wanting to ask Nova and have her sigh again he decided to figure it out himself. Thinking back to when he created the pillar he realised that he didn’t get a list of decorations he could create, instead he had just thought about what he wanted to create and how it would look. Deciding to give it a go Steve thought about creating an iron sword roughly 1 meter in length. He wanted it to have edges on both sides and to be pointed at the end with a cross guard on the handle. Since he planned on also giving his boss a shield he didn’t want it to be too big. Feeling the now familiar sensation of his animus leaving him he was happy to see a sword seemingly grow from out of the floor.

“Yay I did it!”

Nova seemed to be amused with Steve. “I can’t believe how excited you are over creating a sword.”

“It may be something you have seen a thousand times but this is all new to me and I plan to enjoy as much of it as I can.”

Nova seemed to pause for a moment before replying. “Fair enough Steve, fair enough.”

Steve went back to creating the rest of the gear for his boss and soon had a helmet, breastplate, greaves, bracers and a shield all made of Iron. Now that his boss was properly equipped he seemed much more imposing. Checking his Animus he now had 345/400 available.

I wish I knew how much things were going to be before I create them.

As he thought this he felt something change. Wondering what it might be, he considered creating more items and found that he was naturally able to feel exactly how much Animus it would cost. He could see that each piece of armour cost 2 points and the shield and sword each cost 3. He could also see that to make them out of copper they would each be 1 point cheaper.

So that means that if I equip my basic skeletons with iron equipment like my boss, they will be around 23 points total but if I just use copper equipment they will only be 18 points each.Then again I could just given them a copper weapon without any armour and then they would only be 12 points each, meaning I could have almost twice as many instead of having them fully outfitted.

“Nova, do you think it would be better to have more minions with less or poorer equipment, or fewer with more and better quality equipment?”

“Hmmm.” Nova seemed to consider this for several moments before replying. “Both options have their merit as if you decide to opt for having a large number of poorly equipped minions they will be better able to swarm their prey and overwhelm them with numbers. The problem with this strategy is if you face a group who are knowledgeable and can fight with some level of tactics. If they are able to force your minions to attack in a more confined area like a doorway their numbers will not be much help, in which case better armed and armoured skeletons would be more useful. Of course the reverse is also true, if your numbers are too few and you are forced to deploy them too spread out then they may be outmaneuvered and taken out with little danger. Ultimately it will depend on how you wish to build your dungeon.”

“I see what you mean, I guess their is alot more to this than I considered. I’ll think about it while I continue to expand and create some more rooms.”

“Don’t forget that you will need to save some points for at least one trap, some loot for the adventurers and you will also need to make an entrance once you have Announced yourself.” Nova cautioned him.

As he didn’t have a great deal of Animus to work with Steve considered his options. Right now he knew that to create another room around the same size as the last would cost another 20 points and another corridor would be 10. If he wanted to have a squad of 5 armoured skeletons in each room then he would need to spend 115 on skeletons for the room he had already created and another 145 for each room with connecting corridor after that. That would leave him with only 85 points left and he still had to create at least one trap and some loot.

Sighing to himself he realised that this would likely not be a good option as his dungeon would be very small with few creatures. Having run through some quick calculations he finally made his decision and got to work.