Chapter 7: level 1 Finally!

The sun shone brightly over the trees casting dark shadows on the ground as I walked through the park, the fresh smell of morning dew tickled my nose while I gave side glances to the flowers on either side of the stone pavement. Most of my attention was focused on the beautiful woman sitting with her legs crossed on a patch of grass in front of a small pond.

I approached with steady steps and sat down without saying anything. She didn’t even glance at me, but, as if knowing beforehand I was there, she leaned towards me and rested her red hair on my shoulder, in response I grabbed her hand. We stayed like that for a little, then she turned her head towards me and said with her soft voice “Essence from life forms in the dungeon has been gathered +21.4.”

I woke up from my daydreaming with a blue window in front of my face, mocking me for my inability in protecting her. I KNOW! OK? I waved it away and went inside my garden room, a nice jungle had taken foot, small insects and little animals such as rabbits, foxes and bats had taken home in my dungeon and I was earning big money thanks to them.

Status, don’t be shy. Come here and say good morning to daddy

Name: Dungeon of the great mage Azorious

Level: 0

Essence: 48.6

Creatures in your sphere of influence:103(1 follower)

Size:80 m^3

Skill points:15

2 days had already passed from when I had planted this little jungle and the results didn’t wait to arrive. First were the insects attracted from the pale light of the plants or maybe some sweet smell. Then came animals feeding on the insects, and before I noticed it, a little ecosystem had established itself with the fox kinda being the ruler. Well, at least before she tried to eat the star worms and was devoured from the inside out.

Those little bastards are the scariest part of my dungeon, for now. I saw them hunt literally anything, last time I saw a moth get too close to a Bellflower and one of the worms caught her dragging her body inside the flower. I’m starting to feel these are not the normal kind of star worms the bestiary described, my mana feed must have affected somehow, and I don’t think this just because of their hunting efficiency, their big brother, aka: the firstborn, had stopped coming out of his flower since yesterday and I noticed a cocoon growing inside. I haven’t mana fed it yet because I’m afraid of breaking the balance by creating a monster.

After all, thanks to this little balance I earned the achievement: “working ecosystem”, which gave me 15 skill points.

Speaking about cocoons, I stared at the big lump that was my soul linked rat, after 2 days it still hadn’t opened, what are you waiting for, you lazy bastard!

As if on cue the cocoon trembled a little and cracks appeared on the surface, I stared dumbstruck at the scene, a clawed hand broke out first, then another, and finally with the cocoon totally cracked the body of the rat emerged on his two legs.

Congratulations! You have heavily modified an animal raising his strength to low tier monster. +5 skill points awarded.

I stared at my creation, it’s back was a little arched and the rat face totally destroyed its aesthetics. However, maybe because of the proportions I gave him, he looked to be slightly anthropomorphic. His first action of looking at himself and at his new body was totally understandable, what he did next tho, was surprising, he kneeled down and gave me a low growl I interpreted as thanks.

Now there’s a problem, he is already the size of a 9 years old kid, I can’t let him stay here, he would just scare off or eat most of the creatures in the dungeon, the only choice is… “go get me more seeds!” send him away, when the dungeon will be bigger I’ll find him a place to stay.

He got up, bowed to me and left the dungeon running on two legs and then on all fours to sprint, his furred tail saying behind him. Now, let’s see if I can get another 5 easy skill points by evolving some of the star worms.

According to the bestiary, they would evolve into little butterflies that once eaten would depose hundreds of eggs inside the predator’s stomach. However, it was just too boring to let my apex predator become a suicide unit. Studying the bat’s wings and their talons I finally comprehended how to add them to the star worms. The process wasn’t simple and around half of the 6 cocoons, i tried it on exploded, giving me just enough to reach 50 Essences and attempt the level up.

Congratulations! You have reached level 1! Skill points awarded: 4. Since you have gained power over this node by magic, all your magic related abilities will be restricted until you reach level 25, good luck surviving. As an additional reward for reaching level 1, you will gain the skill: Random monster summon (low tier)

Wait, I what- My thoughts were interrupted by the vision-related skill. The same group of men from the time of the seed skill were placing stones on their formation. I recognized those stones, soul crystals, some powerful creatures would never awaken their souls to practice magic but they could still grow them inside their bodies, the results were soul crystals. From the sight of it, they should have slaughtered an entire nest of wyverns to get so many big crystals. The formation activated just like the other time, however this time on the pedestal didn’t appear a seed, but a black gelatinous blob.

One of the researchers came close and prodded it with a staff, big mistake in my opinion, a tendril lazily extended from the thing and moved around the staff, the mage tried to pull it back but the tendril was too strong, and maybe offended by the gesture pulled the staff inside, the small blob somehow absorbed a staff bigger than him and arcane runes appeared on him and before anyone could do anything it breathed fire on the unarmed researcher who turned to dust in a moment.

The other men tried casting spells to kill it, but anything they used was promptly absorbed in the black jelly, in retaliation, it shoot out tendrils that caught most of the researchers and devoured them one after one, only one managed to escape the room as the others screamed for mercy in vain.

“It grew, day after day. Nothing worked, he could eat anything we threw at him, at some point even a dragon sank in the black blob and before we knew it, our world had fallen. We should have never assumed we could control something as powerful as the chiasm.” Chiasm lead researcher Dr Li

Maybe it’s just me, but did the chiasm just threatened me by having me watch this? Be careful, like I conquered this node I might be coming for you next.

No more surprises came after that, hmpf coward. Ok, first let’s expand, I feel like the walls are crushing me, with a big push I widened the garden, the walls grinded with fatigue and 1 hour later my garden was at least double its size. But I felt something was lacking… Oh yeah! A door to my private room! Sometimes some bugs would get inside and I would have to devour their souls to get them out, but what if someone came into the dungeon? He could just waltz straight to my beloved bedroom! Unfortunately, i couldn’t totally close it off as otherwise I would lose connection to the room.

Skill shop! Give me something to block the way.

Door generator: Generates a mana reinforced door, can only be opened with a key. Skill points cost 20.

Perfect! I’ll buy it! While I’m here I’ll also buy the attracting smell of the other time, might be useful.

The two visions were boring and short, some guy wasting a month to build a perfect door and a plant using pheromones to turn men crazy before devouring them.

“The door duality has always been fascinating me, it’s something that blocks your path or something that allows you to continue.” A woodworker’s rant. “ The air was full of promises, I just kept following them while recognizing the smell of women, wine, gold and power. Now I understand there was something wrong, how could I smell power? Nonetheless, i followed it until a weird tree. That’s all I can remember.” An unfortunate adventurer’s tale.

Yeah, very interesting, now, let’s start. First, I use the door skill, a wooden door without any features appears blocking the path to my love, easy enough until here, I ask mole to hit it with its claws but it doesn’t get even a splinter out of place. Next, I ask mole to take out the key, with difficulty since he can’t even reach halfway to the doorknob. I look at him amused then I decide to give him a hand creating a few stair steps out of my floor reaching the knob.

I decided the best place to hide it is inside a tree. Mole places it together with a seed and I grow it around the key, thankfully it works. Now unless someone goes around chopping my trees they shouldn’t be able to get inside.

Next I use the smell skill, apparently, it works by having every creature with a nose or olfactive senses smell the thing they wish for, slightly scared by what this could attract I set it to work only on insect and small animals. I don’t want Wolves or Murtors coming here and eating all my essence source.

I guess I earned a small break to be with my girlfriend.