Arc 1: Preparing Chapter 2 Part 4: The General’s Class (V2)

The Third Core

Questline Bareen's Quest

Details You were promised triple the regular resources, and the last part missing is a third core after your own and the core that was modified to provide you with knowledge. You can now choose whether this should be a dungeon core or a spawn core.

However there is another point influencing your choice. There was a second soul either trying to attach or to attack your soul before I snatched it from your afterlife, and as a result I also got it.

I do not know if it was friend or foe, and you can now choose to either dissipate it and take its energy as 100 dungeon point, or to collect it and reincarnate it into one of your spawns.

Reincarnation without memory loss is an ability that requires at minimum [Very Low] rank - the reincarnation will always be limited to one rank below the ability rank.

Your choices are [Dungeon Core] or [Spawn Core] and [100 DP] or [Stored Soul]

Hints If the other soul was a friend you should choose a spawn core as that will give you a better helper. If you disperse the other soul, your best choice would be a dungeon core that you can use either as a fake diversion or later make it a secondary dungeon slaved to you.

Rewards 400 XP, Core of Choice, either 100 DP or soul "Gunny Parkinson"

“WHAT?!? Master Gunnery Sergeant Parkinson tagged along?”

“Again I might say” – you could hear a grin from the souled dungeon core.

Level Up

Level 2 Experience Cap 200/200 reached.

Excess Experience stored for next level.Cost for Level-up to Level 3: 2 MP (61 MP available)

Do you with to level up [yes]/[no]? Warning: EXP overstore state (I) added

You now have enough excess Experience to enable multiple level-ups. For each excess level beyond the first you'll gain one stage of the overstore state, with each such stage halving all regeneration values (HP, IP, MP). You are now at 50% Regeneration until level-up.

"OK, not nice - both [Level-UP] to level 4 now. Booble, what would happen if several more stages of that state would bring mana generation to zero? It is extremely low anyway, I'll need months to gain the mana for the floor creations."

"But that would make them dependent on the adventurers and could be used to control them - besides the fact that it is another way to strongly point to an early opening for most dungeons, something I can't risk."

I hope those quests and the floor creation give enough EXP for level 11, so that I can reincarnate Gunny before opening the dungeons - that would really help.

But damn it, the mana regeneration is extremely low - I'll need one or two months to get the energy for creating the first three floors, and about half a year until the floor crystals are at maximum and I have to open. It would be much better to increase size and influence as they are important as well - but I'm already boosted there and every point in power reduces the waiting time...

[two free points to Core-Power]

"Booble, to plan everything and especially for this map I need to be able to write lists down and so on - is there any way how I can do that?"

“For a computer, yes, but n...”

[Ping]

[Xenotic] Ability triggered

Skills learned Manage Gallery [limited] +1 (0/100) Allows you to store a memory of what you see at the moment inside your Gallery. A higher skill makes this process faster and easier, while higher Ranks allow for more options. Manage Rumors [limited] +1 (0/100) You can create your own records of rumors that you heard somewhere. These entries will appear as unconfirmed in your Knowledge sections. Each rumor can have up to 50 letters. Limited Rank allows for three rumors to be stored, higher ranks increase this maximum number. This skill might also be usable with some room structures available at higher ranks.

Manage Art [limited] +1 (0/100) You can create your own pictures and store them as your art in your Gallery. Limited Rank allows for three pictures to be stored, higher ranks increase this maximum number. This skill might also be usable with some room structures available at higher ranks.

Read/Write (limited) +1 (0/100) Ability to read and write different texts. Skill value affects reading speed and skill rank affects how difficult to understand a texts theme can be. You'll need a high rank to read a book on advanced magical theory Draw [limited] +1 (0/100) Ability to draw pictures. Skill value affects drawing speed and quality, while higher skill rank gives more tools and effects for the art. [Limited] rank means thick painting brush and black/white color only, [Average] would be comparable to pencils in twenty colors.

“A screenshot of what I see? Where is that map again…”

“Art and Rumors are not what I would consider good options to work with, but if there is no other choice…”

….

"At the mountain and the swamp I can focus the view from the scouting eye even to get some glimpse of the underground caverns there, but if I try the same at Rivansea things get fuzzy - why is that?"

"OK, in that case I should make a rumor note about those fuzzy spots in the swamp as well..."

....

OK, several screenshots of all interesting map positions made and stored in the gallery. The eye has four hours left - I don't want to dismiss it early in case I get another idea, so let's configure the rest of my class for now.

[Configure Core Class]

Each level I gain one core type and one skill or ability. I can see [Limited], [Very Low] and [Low] ranked cores and abilities now. I can still change the [Limited] slots for levels five to ten using any of the [Limited] options. If I want to use a [Very Low] option now it would block two level slots - and there are more than enough [Limited] options available. I can't use any [Low] options, that list is for planning purposes only.

Let's start with the abilities.

"Booble, I can use abilities one rank higher early if I assign two slots - is there something like getting abilities that are lower for less slots?"

I already have Floor Awareness, Dungeon Alerts and Identify Explorer as skills and Illusion as magic ability. I could change shield magic as I'm not yet level 5, but I have a few ideas to turn that into traps, so I'll keep it. Gaining bonus DP based on rank sounds good, but it would prevent me from gaining one of the other skills.

Manage Transfers[Below Average] is available on limited ranks??? Oh - it's a bonus triggered by the Remote Entry Rooms that use a transfer portal. OK, definately a must-have but it can wait to level 10.

Floor Reconstruction makes my walls harder to damage and cheaper to repair if adventurers try to break through - definately a must because a labyrinth that can have its walls breached is useless. Manage Respawn makes it easier to replace spawns when several parties are going through the floors, that is also nice.

Forget Attack Magic - too low in rank and damage to be of any use later, so I have four options left for slots 8 and 9. Recharge Magic is not exactly healing, but it would allow me to help any defender I have - Attraction Magic again has too low effects for now. Dungeon Tokens allows me to make coins or similiar tokens to connect functions or rewards in the dungeon - that could be used in a lot of ways, better than that managing of traps and plagues.

That's it for now, I can't set the reincarnation ability on the [Very Low] ranks, that will open sometime later. Let's switch to the core options.

OK, Cores have no rank limits but they have prerequisites - I can only chose a copper core after owning a coal-core. Cores are always created at the rank I want or need them to be as long as I can pay for that rank. And there are different types of cores both for spawns and nodes.

Spawn-Cores are of a class, and if I create a spawn with a class-core then that spawn can increase in rank on that class, up to its maximum rank. So I was right in selecting a ranger-core for spawns that scout and fight independently, and an elementalist core for spawns that can use elemental magic.

Node-cores define what a node can create, giving mixed advantages to the dungeon or the adventurers or both. An animal-type node would reduce spawning cost to all spawns based on that animal and might be usefull to either tamer or breeder adventurers, but few other people. A metal-type creation node would be a minor or average help with room construction or golem-type swarms, but much more usefull to adventurers, especially if it is a precious metal.

One mistake I made - the "Wooden Tools" node selection for level 5 I made a few hours ago turned into selecting Wood for level 5 and Tools for Level 6. Doesn't matter, I can keep that.

But I need at least one class core usable for animals, or most of my spawns will be stuck at their level.

[Set cores for levels 6 to 10 as Spawn-Type Hunter(Animal) And Node-types Coal (Material), Flowers (Life) and Rodents (Life)]

The last two aren't really usable but they are required for better cores...

Quest Completed, +150 XP.

No new quest in the Dungeon Training Questline?

"Now the third core - choose [Spawn Core] and [Stored Soul]"

Quest Completed, +400 XP, Spawn Core Ranger-Class [Heroic], Soulcrystal "Gunny Parkinson" gained.

Level UP

Level 4 Experience Cap 400/400 reached.

Excess Experience stored for next level. Cost for Level-up to Level 5: 4 MP (65 MP available)

Do you with to level up [yes]/[no]?

Warning: If you do not level up, Excess XP will cause a reduction in Regeneration

“OK, [Levelup] and [Status]”

Infos/Titles Quests Gallery/Knowledge History/Log [Locked] [Locked] Status Storage Core Class: unchoosen Defense Values Skills Abilities Name general public Title: N/A Level (L) 5/120 Experience (XP) 310/500 Core Rank mythical Floors (F) 0/5 free Attribute Points 1 Needs: Core-Density (CD) 12/120 Health (HP) 46/110 Mana 65/5 Core-Power (CP) 23/120 Mana (MP) 61/165 DP 0/0 Core-Influence (CI) 16/120 Influence Points (IP) 46/130 RankedEscapees 0/0 Core-Size (CS) 17/120 Dungeon Points (DP) 60/135 RankedKills 0/0 Regeneration and Gain Values HP (10% CD/day) 1.2 MP (10% CP/hour) 2.3 [Locked] IP (10% CI/day) 1.6 DP (L/Level-Up) 6 [Locked] Temporary Status Effects Name Effect

Mmh... Health and Influence regenerate very slowly, but I haven't been here for a full day. Their maximums increase with levels even without adding points to the attributes, which confirms that I can ignore core density for now. They don't go up as high as the MP-maximum where I put additional points into Power, but it should be enough for now.

So I should place the Entrance now before the last hour of the map runs out, and then try to gain as much templates from the two remaining scouting charges to see what I can place in my dungeon.

And after that it'll be like watching paint dry to wait for the floor crystals to fill with mana...

"Booble, any comments before I select the position of the Entrance to be inside that cave like we discussed before?"

"OK, [Select Entrance Placement] as this wall in the back of the second branch of that cave."

Placement of Dungeon

Anchoring out-of-phase entry point

Transferring Floor Crystals, Scout Charges, other Cores and the Soulcrystal to Core Storage

Placement complete Quest Completed

+100 XP, new Environment: Natural Caves [Limited], no special effect

New Quest Available

Excavate your First Floor

Questline Dungeon Training

Details Now that your entrance point is selected, you'll need your first floor next. If you have not yet finished designing it with the Floor Crystal, please do so and then place it.

You need to decide what type of core should be in the floor node when excavating. Your own core will also enter the node of your deepest floor automatically.

Hints You need to wait and fill up the Floor Crystal with your Mana until it has enough to excavate the floor in one go.

Excavating the floor will give you 1 XP per square meter excavated in addition to this quests rewards, but please keep in mind that the result needs to be able to defend you against adventurers - a completely empty level without walls will not help and it will only bring a few added XP.

Rewards 100 XP

OK, that's it - I now have to use the remaining scout charges to see what templates I can gain.