Alright, since I can’t figure out how to distinguish between human knowledge and dungeon knowledge I just need to find something that no-one knows but that I can figure out relatively easily; I could try and do something like ‘flipping a coin’ by creating a magma ball and placing it on top of a steam wall and having the help function guess what side it’ll land on though that seems quite frivolous, I’d rather avoid questions that are completely useless after all, and it might just be able to work out which side it would land on by observing what I can perceive; I mean you would’ve expected my perception of the dungeon to get less precise as it grew but if anything it’s more detailed now, I can almost make out the individual fibres of some of the webs at this point, though I’m starting to notice a distortion effect where the points furthest away from wherever I’m focusing start to become compressed slightly so it’s likely I won’t have infinite range to this detection and will end up with an area that I can focus on at any one time and move around at will and given the area of the distortion I think it will end up being about 100m diameter total once it’s been completely separated from my territory as a whole. That was quite the tangent huh… how about ‘how far down is the nearest gas pocket’? Since my cave hasn’t been discovered yet the general geography should be unknown right? Sure there’s a chance it might have enough information from other dungeons for a guess, especially if they go quite deep as well but I doubt it could actually be at all reliable with that. Okay let’s go; how deep would I have to go to discover a natural gas pocket?

Answer: the first natural gas pocket below your current location is 457.942m with minor deviancy towards the north east. Next question in 172,800s.

‘Okay, so it might actually maybe be omniscient, that’s certainly something I suppose. I don’t have enough here to make any big claims for certain but I definitely did NOT expect that to work… also the cool down just straight up doubled I really hope it doesn’t do that every time… though I basically just guaranteed it by saying that now didn’t I? I’m slightly regretting not taking divination magic now but elemental looks like it’ll be worth it in the end anyway so I shouldn’t complain too harshly.

As I expanded further out towards the 458m~ value I was given I managed to discover a surplus of interesting things, the caves where still mostly a mess of tunnels but I found a couple of slightly larger caverns that where anywhere between 3m and 20m in diameter approx that all had one trait in common, they had a small natural waterfall. Though in all honesty that term was far from accurate as it was closer to a slight dribble of moisture that had carved out a groove for itself in the rock which then was absorbed by the slightly porous rock and trickled into an underground river system which as soon as I incorporated into my territory I got a notification telling me Natural resource discovered: water source. With no accompanying changes of any form which was slightly concerning but I simply hoped that it would bring benefits in the future and continued my expansion. Once I reached the radius of 458m I’d already spent most of the day on expansion, leaving me with only 5 days left till discovery, and Natural resource discovered: methane gas. That was far too precise for me to ever believe that the help function had figured out where that pocket would be simply from averages and past data no matter what or how anyone tried to convince me otherwise. So that means the help function, and in extension the system itself, has some way to detect things pretty much at will. I’m going to assume, If only for the sake of my sanity, that some divination magic is involved in the process and just write it off like that for now because we have far more important things to worry about, mainly expanding our territory to prepare for this whole hostile invasion of an unknown militant force thing we’ve got going on here. After expanding to a radius of 600m I discovered a sealed underground lake, some pockets of carbon monoxide, more methane, some trapped water in porous rock and an absolutely stunning cave far to the north of my territory that I had only begun to scratch the surface of but it was full of karst (a hanging formation formed of calcium carbonate if I remember correctly), stalactites and stalagmites as well as some stupefying pillars of crystal, mainly a cloudy white but others have tints of other shades running through them, that seemed to tower up endlessly as they reach a staggering height, some more than 10m tall.

It took half of the third day, but I finally reached my goal of a 10^4m radius. I haven’t noticed any signs of the surface or even other cave systems not connected to mine but my tunnels seem to be trending upwards towards the south, hopefully that means the invaders would come from that direction and I can prepare in advance, though I believe the surface can't be that much higher than 2,000m since I was rendered unable to expand upwards after reaching 1,000m in that direction, flattening my sphere considerably. It was finally time to start planning my distribution of creatures since I’m about to put the flora in place. My territory can largely be divided into 4 categories: the nest area, the large cavern about 10^4m from end to end composed of three caves. The central cave is 400m on the wide side that goes north to south and 600m on the long side which goes east to west, on both the western and eastern ends there are caverns attached directly to the nest but filled with rubble due to cave ins that make them mostly unusable for now and thus will be, mostly, ignored until I can have them cleared. The entire nest acts as the centre and heart of my dungeon, it has three major tunnels that branch out: two that face southwards while intersecting, overlapping, splitting, merging in ways that boggle the mind and one that extends down northward diverge into a myriad of dead ends, only one leading to the crystal cavern I’d discovered before. I intended to make this the colony for my tyx hive as well as where I’d place the majority of my reavers, hogs, shade bats and pigeons so I would also be placing some of all types of vegetation other than the pine trees here, however I’m not exactly hopeful about anything other than the lichen and shade phlox’s chances. My thinking was that since this was the only area with the high ceilings required for flying life it necessitated me placing the pigeons, shade bats and thus reavers here but the reavers could still stalk the corridors only using this area as a place to rest and eat whereas my Tyx would be me central forces and even if I haven’t taken the Tyx spawners because they are necessary for a long term defence even though they won’t be cost effective in the short term which unfortunately led to me taking the decision to ignore them in favour of the Burrowers which can be used for terraforming purposes an ability that is going to be revolutionary while we are only starting out, I will still be taking the spawners immediately at the soonest available opportunity, with the bonuses granted by the terrain type it is basically mandatory.

Next is the crystal area, the natural cavern full of natural cave formations that made it completely stunning to the eye which after fully expanding my territory I found was 300m wide at its shortest side and closer to 400m on its longest being vaguely oval shaped and the longest side pointing towards the nest area, as you advanced further from the nest area and thus deeper down the oval the colours became more vibrant, the rock patterns in the wall became more striking and the architecture of the various structures became even more bizarre till it seemed physics defying and right at the very end there as the chaos reached its climax there was an area of calm: containing nothing but a 1m diameter, hexagonal crystal pillar that was a mesmerising shade of magenta. I was tempted to fill the place with panstips in order to light the place up and fully draw out its beauty but when I fought about the mushrooms potentially destabilising the place I couldn’t bring myself to do it, besides, meddling with the place just seemed so wrong. The entire place seemed almost sacred and from what I’d read about how easily disturbed areas such as this where I intended to leave it completely untouched.

The tunnel systems is a sprawling mess that covers a rough circle 9*10^3m that I wanted my wolves to make use of and composes the majority of my total surface area, I hope to have a total of 10 packs each with 10 members patrolling the tunnel systems as well as some boars for the sake of food and I intend to make the place be positively vibrant by filling it with any and all plant life that’ll stick except the pines and phlox, the pines because I’ve chosen not to make use of them anywhere for the lack of space and resources as well as how unlikely it is they will adapt to this environment and the phlox because I want to make that exclusive to the large nest cavern. The reavers will also roam the tunnels closer to the cavern but their habitat will be strictly within the cavern itself.

Finally are the alcoves, the interconnected network of small caverns all part of the same underground water system, I primarily want these to be the dens for my wolves and will fill them solely with panstips to enhance the feeling of their “uniqueness”. Some of the smaller ones, however, i instead plan to make the homes of the vipers as well as placing some rabbit warrens in others to fill the tunnels with life underfoot both friendly and hostile.

As I spread the plants across it took me 10 essence only to place all the shade phlox in the nest cavern, plants and creatures don’t need hourly essence to maintain themselves like monsters but they still have an initial cost attached so they’re not exactly ‘free’. When I placed the plant life it was like I was watching the entire growth process on a time lapse as some small buds quickly sprawled across the entire ceiling to create a sky of vibrant purple stretching out endlessly across the horizon. I then began to liberally distribute the pop lichen and panstips across basically any free surface I could find while scattering some ferns and patches of grass here and there. It was the second I placed the ferns I noticed something was off. The leaves where completely ghostly white and so was the grass, a sign of them being albino if I remembered correctly, nothing strange about that; at least not it every single fern I’d placed shared the same trait… albinism is a mutation that only occurs very rarely so it must be something else for it be occurring this consistently… it only took me a second to realise the cause ‘there’s no sunlight down here so they have no need for chlorophyll… therefore it just got completely removed… but I don’t know anything about this happening naturally under any circumstance let alone it happening instantaneously. Does that mean that what I place gets automatically adapted to the environment I place it in? That could be useful… maybe the pine trees and stags aren’t useless after all.’ I decided to stick with the current plan at least for the moment and continued distributing the same plants as before until I’d spent a third of my total essence leaving me at only 100 left and took a moment to look over the new nest. It no longer felt as barren and hollow as it did before but the pale plant life and faint glow of the panstips created an eerie atmosphere that made you feel as if there was something right behind you at all times and that the very air you where breathing was an enemy, it had a mystical grandiose to it that was subtly and subconsciously hostile.

Looking around I took a pride in my work that I hadn’t been able to feel for quite a while, even when I was still alive, it was just so cathartic so have everything come together so beautifully. I quickly did the same in the caverns, using more ferns and grass in the far sections to act as cover for the wolves and snakes while using less of the panstips and placing them behind outcroppings of stone in the closer tunnels to provide ample shadows for my reavers to shroud themselves in for camouflage, their stealth and ambush skills as well as they’re dull grey colouration should make them a fish in water with this environment and draw out the full potential of their skills. On a whole the tunnels are a nightmare enough to navigate just by their layout alone but now with some lighting tricks and how generally cluttered the space is with a dense undergrowth of white ferns, panstips and lichen it is easy to get yourself lost constantly going in circles, hopefully the Burrowers will amplify that effect. The lichen also has another effect to wear down an invaders nerves, the pop that comes with every misstep will not only slowly start to stress any delvers but it will also help with alerting the wolf packs throughout the tunnels, I don’t know if they’ll actually need to ‘find’ the invaders or if I just directly control them or if they have some kind of ‘dungeon sense’ but I figure the fail safe can’t hurt. The occasional areas of respite throughout the maddening tunnels are small alcoves that have a constant drip… drip… dripping of whatever to continue the mental fatiguing of our guests and the chance of an entire wolf pack coming back to settle in for the night will force them to be ready to awake and make a run for it at any time will stop them from getting any decent rest and to further the need for constant vigilance there’s the ever present threat of a venomous viper that could climb into your bedroll while you sleep. I think that this area will help instil a far more aggressive sense of dread that would serve to intensify the more subdued terror of the nest through contrast. By the time I was done I’d spent another 50 essence but I’d spent a lot longer on specific details so I had recovered more than that in total, making a gain of 15 essence.

After placing all of the flora it was time to place the creatures, while I’d spent nearly the entire remainder of the day on the plant life, there was still three days left till discovery, and it was only going to get more expensive from here so I decided to take things slower and pace myself. It was nearly time for the next question and I already knew what I was going to ask, when is my next monster unlock. But for now it was time to place the creatures, I placed the ones I was worried about least first: the shade bats and immediately noticed what I was growing to expect was a theme. They had snow white fur that was adorned by hypnotic, piercing purple patterns and eyes of the same colour. The skin on their wings however, had no fur and was completely black meaning they blended in with the darkness while in flight but when resting and eating they camouflaged with the shade phlox and if they ended up on the floor they could hide amongst the ferns and grass. I next went to summon a pigeon, fully knowing what to expect by now, and as I expected I got what was better described as a dove. At this point I was extremely curious about how this palate change to match the webbed environment and the pale plant life would effect all of my other creatures so I quickly summoned one of each of the insects that the Tyx had as creatures however, while they had white shells that allowed them to disappear into the fibres of the web in all honesty it wasn’t that interesting so I went ahead and summoned the hog. What I got out was so completely bizarre, yet mundane, I was stunned for a second. It was a boar, standing at a height slightly taller than a meter hoof to head and looking far more dignified than it had any right too with a thin white coat; all expected at this point but what surprised me was the faint yellow blotches it had covering its flanks that crackled and popped as it walked, that was pop lichen! It seemed my dungeon creatures could incorporate plant life into themselves in what I assume is some form of symbiotic relationship though I fail to understand what either party gets out of the situation.

After spending some time on experimentation I finally was off cool-down and could ask ‘when do I unlock my next monster’

Answer: level 5. Next question in 345600s.

‘Well uh… that was abrupt… it’s a goal though I suppose and it’s better than some vague answer like ‘when you’ve proved yourself’ or something’

With that swiftly dealt with I could go back to my creatures and soon enough my entire dungeon floor was bustling with life, even if it took me most of the fourth day to do so, I would be able to start placing monsters tomorrow with nothing left to distract me and then, I would be ready.