After several hours of absorbing and creating Steve was just about ready to create his third room. Steve had decided to two more room with corridors in a long straight line. In each room he would summon skeletons. In the first two rooms he would give each skeleton a basic copper sword and in the final room he would give them all irons swords and iron armour which would leave him with 60 points for his trap, loot and entrance.

After working on his new room however he found something very strange. He was absorbing the rock and was about a third of the way through his room when he encountered something new. Before when he found the metals and the quartz he had just absorbed them along with the rock but for some reason he wasn’t able to absorb this. It was white, really really white. After absorbing some more of the stone around it he realised that it was spherical, about half a meter in diameter. Frowning to himself he returned his awareness to the core room to consult with Nova.

“I was just creating my third room when I found something.”

“Hmm? Did you find a new metal or gem?” Nova asked.

“I don’t think so. Whatever it is I wasn’t able to absorb it anyway.”

Nova seemed to blink, which was even more impressive than the eye rolling because of the lack of any eyelids. He would have to ask her how she did that one of these days.

“You should only have trouble with absorption is if either one of the sentient races was within your dungeon or you were trying to absorb something still alive. What exactly did you find?” Nova was thinking that he must have found an insect or perhaps a burrowing creature.

“I found a white sphere. It doesn’t seem alive. Then again I suppose I’m a red sphere and I don’t seem alive just by looking at me. Maybe it’s another dungeon?”

Nova was started to get a bit alarmed by this now. “Bring up a projection and let me have a look.”

“Bring up a what now?”

Sighing Nova explained what she meant. “You can view any part of your dungeon from within your core room without having to move your awareness their. Simply think of the area you wish to view and project that onto one of the walls so I can see.”

“I really wish you would tell me about these things before ordering me to do something”

Following Nova’s instructions Steve concentrated on the third room he had started to create and a beam of light started coming out of his core pointed at the wall. Looking back at the wall he was now able to see into his third room and could clearly see the white sphere half in and half out of the wall. In fact now that he was looking it seemed to be shake slightly every few seconds.

“Get it out of the wall and summon some skeletons so they can bring it in here. QUICKLY!” Nova practically shouted.

“What's the big deal?”

“Hurry damn it!” Nova all but screamed at him.

Grumbling to himself about how he was supposed to be in charge around here Steve obediently returned to the third room summoned a group of skeletons. He had them take a hold of the sphere while he finished absorbing the rock around it and commanded them to take the sphere back to his core room. Once there Nova quickly took command and had the skeletons place the orb directly on front of my side of the pedestal and then ordered them to leave the room.

“So what's the big deal what is this thing?”

“This is a celestial containment sphere. I have never seen one myself but I have heard them described before. They each contain an Angelic Guardian and have been found scattered all over the world. Some buried like this one, others in hard to reach or dangerous places. In each case, once found the spheres soon opened.” Nova explained in a rush.

“Wait. So something is about to come out of that thing? Then why did you have me bring it here? We need to get the skeletons back!”

“No you fool! Once it opens the Guardian will bond whichever race it first meets. It will take on traits of that race and will eventually grow to be incredibly powerful. If it were to see one of the undead first their is no telling how that could affect it. If you were worried about outsiders destroying you before, believe me you would be hunted without rest if you corrupted one of the Guardians like that.”

“Is that why you had the minions put it next to me? Won’t they be made that it bonded to the dungeon race?”

“Maybe, but it’s better you than the undead. Besides once it realised that the skeleton were basically enslaved to you I imagine things would go downhill pretty quickly.”

Steve had begun to stare at the sphere with horror. When he focussed on it a blue box appeared but it wasn’t very helpful.

Name: Containment sphere? Quality: (Unknown)

Description: You have been told that this sphere contains a celestial being known as a Guardian Angel which will bond with the first race it meets.

The sphere seemed to be shaking more violently now and if he needed to breathe Steve would be holding his breath. After a few more second the sphere stopped and became perfectly still. Then the sphere seemed to glow brighter and brighter until even though he didn’t have eyes it was starting to be painful for him to look at it. After he averted his vision there was a bright flash followed by a very high pitch sound like something breaking followed by silence.

When Steve looked back the sphere had vanished and in its place was a white glow. After a few moments the glow moved towards his core before stopping. Then the glow seemed to pulse and new a pale red started to seep from the centre of the glow spiraling outwards until it was equal parts red and white. Soon after the glowing light started to spread out and take shape. The red started to take the form of a humanoid with arms outstretched while the white flowed into three places creating a pair of large wings forming from the back and long shining white hair flowing from the head. Finally the white seemed to separate somewhat to form into a flowing white robe that covered the creature but with a bright red ball in the centre. Once everything seemed settled the creature was floating above the ground with its head back, face pointed towards the ceiling while slowly lowering its arms.

There was complete silence in the core room now as both Steve and Nova watched in amazement to see what would happen next. Unfortunately their amazement soon ended as whatever force was holding the creature aloft apparently vanished abruptly causing it to fall to the floor and topple backwards landing on its behind.

“Owwwwww!” The apparent angel moaned while rubbing its backside. Apparently it wasn’t expecting the fall either.

Steve looked to Nova and although the skull was as stationary as it always was he got the feeling that she was struggling to hold in laughter as strange sounds kept coming from it. Metaphorically rolling his eyes Steve turned back towards this new creature.

“Are you alright down their?”

The angel seemed to come back to itself and abruptly stopped rubbing itself before getting to its feet. Now that Steve was able to get a closer look he saw that its eyes had red irises with glowing white pupils. Despite considering for a moment he couldn’t tell if it was supposed to be male or female. Though as far as he knew, maybe it didn’t have a gender at all.

“I’m fine!” The angel said before standing there and staring at the dungeon core.

Silence reigned for an awkwardly long time as everybody seemed to stare at one another.

“Soooo....” Steve said, mostly because he couldn’t think of anything better and the silence was really starting to get to him.

Nova did her eye rolling thing again before speaking up. “Welcome. I am Nova, the appointed assistant to this newly created dungeon core.”

“Thats me, my name is Steve.”

“Hello, Steve and Nova.” The angel responded.

Another awkward silence followed.

“Err. And what is your name?” Nova finally asked.

The angel frowned. “I do not yet have a name, this duty falls to my bonded, the one who released me. Once selected my name will influence every facet of my future including my gender and depending on the name, personality and potential future growth.”

“I see. Then we should take great care in selecting an appropriate...” Nova started to say before she was cut off by Steve.

“Oh! I know, how about Azrael?”

Congratulations! You have bonded with one of the Celestials which you have named Azrael.

From this points forwards Azrael will actively assist you in your endeavours and will work towards the betterment of your race. The consequences of this bonding will be far reaching and you may not discover the full effects for some time.

Azrael once again began to float upwards and took the same pose as before with head back and arms outstretched. He then started to change slightly, growing taller and broader across the shoulders. He was also obviously a he thanks to the increase in size and change to his facial features. Once his change had finished he once again abruptly stopped floating however he seemed ready for it this time and managed to unfurl his wings and land on his feet.

“What is wrong with you? I was literally just saying that we needed to carefully consider an appropriate name! Why did you choose Azrael?” Nova shouted towards Steve.

“Well. I'm not entirely sure, but he just looks like an Azrael, you know?”

“Oh...my God. Why? Why would you leave me with him? What did I ever do to deserve this?”

Steve assumed she was pleading with Bob the God but he personally felt she was being a bit harsh.

What's wrong with Azrael? I think it's a great name. She’s probably just jealous she didn’t get to pick the name herself.

Azrael seemed happy enough with his change and was examining himself before turning back to the pedestal where his bonded and the talking skull were resting.

“Thank you Steve, my name is perfect.” Azrael took a step forwards and place his hand on top of Steve's core. Immediately there was what felt like a deep throb though no sound could be heard and the air had suddenly gotten heavy like the gravity had drastically increased but again their was no real change. That is until Azrael took a step back and everybody looked to Steve's core.

“Huh. Look at that, I’m white on the top half and red on the bottom half.”

Congratulations! You have gained access to celestial energy.

As you are a dungeon core you will now be able to use this energy to infuse the things that you create for a wide range of benefits and effects. The options available will grow as you do. WARNING! Infusing Celestial energy into an undead creature may have adverse side effects. Caution should be taken before use.

Well that sounds....ominous.

Just as with his Animus a new amount had appeared at the top of his vision labeled Celestial energy and was currently showing 1000/1000.

“Steve? Are you okay?” Nova sounded worried, presumably because of the change to his core.

“Yeah I’m fine, but I have gained access to something called Celestial energy.”

Azrael seemed surprised by this. “Really? I thought only God Touched creatures could use Celestial energy. Touching you was the last step in completing my bond, I knew it would mark you but I did not think it would do that.”

Nova seemed to fix her gaze on Steve. “You mentioned your quality before though you didn’t say exactly what it was...”

“Well, it's God Touched. Isn’t that normal?”

“No its not normal! I honestly thought you might be a basic quality because from my experience, cores with a higher quality tend to take on more complex forms. I even saw a Legendary quality core once and that was a Zocchihedron, a perfectly formed 100 sided gem. Even the common ones take the form of pyramids or cubes.” Nova explained.

“Well I am a perfect sphere. In effect I have an infinite number of infinitely small sides.”

-Elsewhere-

Bob the God and another person, who were standing in a pure featureless space, seemed to be in the middle of an argument. The other man was wearing very heavy looking armour with a massive two handed sword strapped to his back and others sheathed about his person

“You put him there on purpose!” Shouted the armoured man, pointing his gauntleted finger at Bob.

“Oh please. How could I have know their was a Celestial buried there? You know full well that all of the Celestials are hidden from our site until uncovered by the mortals.” Bob responded calmly.

“What, you expect me to believe that this dungeon core, the one that you have spent the last of your Power to create just HAPPENS to find a Celestial buried right next to it!?” The armoured figure was obviously getting himself worked up.

“If you think that I have somehow gained the ability to locate the Celestials then I would have created dozens, HUNDREDS of dungeon cores next to every single one of them! Not pour all my power into....Steve.”

“Humph. I’ll be watching you and your little dungeon core. I don’t care what any of the others say, you are no true God and I will see you stripped of your power!” So saying the armoured figure turned and strode away before disappearing after only a few steps.

Bob turned his gaze from the armoured figure and looked downwards. “A very interesting development. I’m not surprised that Kothos is so upset. It seems my newest dungeon might just have a chance to save me after all, particularly with an Angel of Death to guide him...”