Gina woke up, still feeling a little drained. She stretched her senses, spread throughout her house and her cave. She felt more alive and stronger than she did the day before.

The fish in the pond tickled as they chased the food brought down by the river feeding the waterfall.

Gina knew 2 things.

1. She was alive

2. She wasn't a lamp

Gina examined the lamp again, reassured by it's familiar shape. She felt grounded in the lamp, the sole constant that her old world revolved around. She continued to examine the room around it. Everything was too clean, especially the workbench, she would have to change that.

She settled on the ledge overlooking the pond, watching the fish dart around. She could eat whatever she touched, that must have been where her house and the tunnel came from, formed from her recollections. But that still didn't explain where her workbench had come from.

Gina had a suspicion; she imagined some wooden planks leading across a sunken and rocky part of the ledge that lead around the pond. As she pictured the boards they slowly formed, until they stopped. She focused harder on the outline of what she wanted, patterns and swirls filled it in, becoming more opaque, until it solidified into a solid board.

"Now that was some real magic..." she puzzled to herself.

She had seen demonstrations like that before. In her old life her master had practiced industrial magic and was able to use his fabricationist talent to manipulate metal. She had watched as he used his tools on the cold copper, intense blue swirls and patterns pushing the metal in response to his tools. But this was something different.

Goblins never had magic, but they always wished they had. She remembered the old goblin saying, "if I could summon diamonds, I still wouldn't pay your price". Most goblin sayings were about money or trade.

The display had left her slightly more tired; it obviously took energy. She could instinctively feel the amount she had left, like how she always knew how many hours of work a project would take, or how long it had been since breakfast.

That feeling of power had dwindled too, like the wood was filling a shelf somewhere, and that shelf was now empty. She wandered back to her room, thinking about how much stone she must have on hand. She couldn't find the animals she had devoured anywhere, apparently the mysterious shelf didn't hold living things. Bones though, she felt like there was a bag of bones.

Gina stopped in front of her bookshelf, there were books there but all the bindings were blank. She removed one book, moving it to the workbench, and then realized ithe book had just evaporated from where it had been on the shelf and reformed on the workbench without her touching it.

"Well, this adds to the mystery" she thought to herself.

Gina stared at the book, it faded for a second then lay open to a blank page.

"It appears I really am a magic lamp! Emphasis on the magic... I wonder what else I can do!" She excitedly closed the book, imagining all the possibilities in her new life.

"But first I need to know what I have to work with" She concentrated, still focusing intently on the book in front of her, trying to figure out what magical resources were at her disposal. As Gina focused on the book a golden glow shimmered on the worn leather, fading as words formed on the cover, the words simply read.

Status

Startled she looked again on the first page, instead of it being blank there was a simple chart.

She had seen something like this. Masters of fabrication with a high appraise could determine the nature of objects, rating their values on scales of 1-25. Her old master had this skill and would use it to criticize and belittle her hard work. Of course, his standards as a master were unfairly high, as if he forgot she didn't start crafting until the age of 12.

Status Race Dungeon Level 1 Age 3 Days Height 10cm Physical Health 50/50 Strength 0 Agility 0 Toughness 5 Mental Alertness 490/530 Intelligence 18 Deduction 16 Focus 19 Social Resolve 530/530 Influence 12 Slyness 15 Willpower 25 Racial Traits Limbless: STR= 0 Imobile: AGI= 0 Ruler: Social + 5 Energy 76/400

"So... I am now a dungeon" the realization came slowly, almost like a headache the knowledge of what she was grew into a bunch of wild thoughts then softened out into acceptance.

Gina didn't know much about dungeons, just what one of her dwarven friends had told her.

Dungeons apparently regulated the balance between life and magic. The dwarven stronghold was built over a dungeon, the magic it gave off helped in their enchanting and they would mine it for resources. The resources from a dungeon would respawn over time, but the danger offset the cost in a way where it was never easy to get but the real draw was reliable access to rare materials. It took many months of prodding on her part to get one of her visitors to tell her a bit about the traps and monsters that defended the dungeon depths.

The dwarf didn't share much more, he needed to deliver the parts he was sent to retrieve from her, he didn't ever bring up the subject again. Gina wished she knew more, wished she had asked, but the parts she made were always needed urgently and visitors never stuck around for long.

On the reflected page there was another chart

Abilities Craft Athletics Awareness Inginuity 18 Throw NA ESP 15 Glasswork 10 Swim NA Fortitude 21 Clothwork 4 Acrobatics NA Instinct 4 Metalwork 17 Reflex NA Notice 12 Leatherwork 3 Stealth NA Search 5 Stonework 5 Endurance NA Appraise 24 Woodwork 5 Run NA Solve 18 Utility Science Interact Boating 0 Chemistry 14 Bargain 4 Taming 0 Literature 2 Charisma 1 Cooking 0 Politics 0 Inspire 1 Locks 13 Math 21 Decieve 5 Fishing 0 Physics 18 Steal 0 Foraging 0 Biology 1 Intimidate 0 Hunting 0 Botany 1 Savvy 0

Gina cringed at this bare assesment of her abilities. If her soul wore clothing she would be pulling it closer to hide herself from the exposure. Anyone who looked at this would think she was a recluse who did nothing but work at a workbench all day.

"Touche" she quipped to her own critical thoughts.

She depressingly looked at the assement of her utility and interact abilities. How was she ever supposed to get monsters to help her out? And if she did manage to convince a monster to help her defend her resources, how would she lead them?

"I bet normal dungeons start out with some natural abilities to help them out" She moped to herself, refusing to look at the depressing numbers any longer.

She flipped the page to find one last chart

Magic Summoning Natural Industrial Inanimate 25 Possesion 0 Machinist 10 Animate 25 Plants 0 Chemist 0 Telekenesis 25 Friending 0 Elementalist 5 Teleport 25 Herbalist 0 Fabrication 12 Dimensional Athiest Fairy Illusion 0 Destrution 0 Revert 0 Spatial 5 Protection 0 Heal 0 Gateway 0 Dispel 0 Levitate 0 Runes 0 Resist 0 Enchant 0

"I AM a magic lamp" Gina excitedly spun around in a circle, unable to control herself. "This almost makes up for my awful abilities!"

"I can see where the summoning magic is part of being a dungeon, but where did the other magic come from?" She thought about it for a while, but without any kind of reference she found herself thinking in circles.

"I know what could help me!" She hurried to the bookshelf and brought another empty book to the table. She focused on the cover, imagining it was a history of dungeons.

The light glowed on the book, then the glow faded, leaving the title.

A History of Dungeons

Gina eagerly opened the book to the first page, only to be met with a single sentence "Gina is a dungeon" She bitterly closed the book and resentfully put it on the shelf.

"I already know I don't know anything about dungeons, you don't have to get sarcastic" She muttered as she sulked back to her workbench.

The rest of the Status book was an inventory of everything she had consumed. The most impressive entry was 2,000,000 Kilograms of various stone and minerals, followed by some small amounts of metal, bits of bone, some plant matter and even some water.

There was an entry for Wood in the book, but the number following it was 0. She couldn't find any lines for the animals she consumed or most of the plants.

"Where is all this stuff even stored?" she couldn't help wondering

She didn't feel tired, but this overload of information was too much...

"I need a drink" She thought. Then she thought again, this time rolling the sentance around.

The dwarves were renowned for their ale, the brew was rich and calmed the firey tempers of the dwarves. The drink only had enough alcohol to keep it fresh, not really enough to get drunk, but there was something to it that warmed the soul. Gina missed those mugs that came with her meals.

"If I can eat... can I drink?" Gina really wanted to find out. She tried her best to imagine a mug of the warm ale, sitting on the workbench next to the book. The air shimmered in the spot she was staring at and a stone mug appeared out of nowhere.

"All right! This magic lamp stuff is really going to work out!" She moved to consume the liquid inside to find it dry and empty. "WHAT KIND OF JOKE IS THIS!" she raged to the ceiling. She let herself drift to the floor, the thirst for warm reassurances worse than ever.

If she wanted the ale, she would have to make it the hard way. She knew the process, she had to learn it as part of an order she filled in her past life to build a new compact travel brewery. But she didn't have the material to make it, and she didn't have the grains to fill it.

Gina really wished she had someone to help her. She could just picture an army of little helpers doing all her busy work. She would often daydream when she was a goblin behind a workbench. The small parts that needed to be fetched, the endless orders of simple tasks that drained her willpower, almost breaking her with the repetition.

As Gina's imagination pictured the little helpers running across her workbench, she heard a *pop* then another, and then another. Suddenly Gina was aware of six little eyes staring at her. Before she had time to process what was happening, she fell asleep.