It was a rabbit. A really big rabbit with stag horns on its head and a blue collar with an orange stone set in it. The stone gave off a bright glow illuminating the area around the critter as it’s beady eyes stared at us and it’s nose twitched.

Knowledge : World Failure!

Knowledge : Arcane Failure!

With no intel I was cautious and placed myself in front of my minions. The rabbit was the size of a boar and carried a similar attitude. My internal sense of flight or fight kicked in and I put myself in a readied stance. Apparently that was the wrong response because the rabbit lowered its horns and charged.

Jumping to the side it narrowly missed me and raised its head as it turned. Its large feet kicked up and it jumped off the scouts face, flipping around to point at me to charge again. With reckless abandon it chased me around the room throwing its head around trying to gore me on the horns.

“Minions do something!” I yelled, trying to run around the room in circles. I slung off my backpack and threw it at the rabbit hoping to trip it up, the critter jumped over it like it was a minor inconvenience. “Come on, how is that fair!”

The rabbit let out some blood curdling battle cry as it redoubled its efforts and made me run even faster. With the pool of light bobbing behind me I had an indicator of where it was, and it was gaining ground on me. The room’s floor was slightly uneven and at one point my boot’s lace came undone and I started to trip.

Throwing my hands out I rebalanced myself and started to run again only to violently meet the ceiling as the rabbit ran into my back and threw its head up. The antlers tore apart my coat, tearing it from my body and I crashed onto the ground next to the intruder.

With my coat caught in its antlers and covering its face the rabbit went insane, flailing its head around and wildly kicking behind it. The drones returned with pieces of firewood and prodded the rabbit trying to get its attention while the scout snuck up on it.

The scout raising its walking stick brought it down with all of its might cracking it off the back of its head. The rabbit fell down in a heap and the drones cheered. The victory was short lived as the rabbit rushed towards the scout and set it tumbling down to the ground.

Getting back on my feet I dove towards the rabbit before it could stomp on my new scout and wrestled it. Digging my fingers under the collar I tugged on it hard enough to flip the rabbit over. It tried to slam it’s head backwards to hit me with the antlers but I put my knee at the back of its head holding it in place. With it grappled in my grip I lifted it up and held it in place.

The minions and the scout started to swing their improvised weapons, landing blow after blow on the exposed rabbits stomach and legs. Each time the creature screamed I closed my eyes trying to ignore the sound as it tried in vain to fight against the assault. Just as my strength started to wane the scout grabbed his walking stick with two hands and swung with as much might as he could muster.

The crack of the rabbit’s skull shattering silenced its screams and blood covered my hands. The rabbit’s corpse violently twitched once more before its dead weight became too much to bear and I released it. Opening an eye I saw the grizzly sight of the battered animal's corpse, with broken bits of teeth, bone and blood taking the place of its head.

The minions raised their bloody bits of wood and cheered. With the danger gone I leaned against the wall as sweat poured down my face and I shakily lowered myself to the ground. Drone 1 sent the other drones off to fetch something as he and the scout started to skin the rabbit.

Their sharp claws opened its belly like a knife and while the scout started to dismember the rabbit or tear off chunks of meat Drone 1 tapped them making them disappear. My stomach growled at the sight of the fresh meat and I knew that food would be an important resource. My mouth was dry from the exertion and I was desperately in need of a drink of water. As my head started to think about our needs I thought about better defences, because some weird rabbit walked in and nearly tore open my back.

The ends of its antlers were sharp, one good hit could have been the end of my career already and checking my back I was in luck only I had only a handful of scratches. We needed either dedicated fighters or some kind of trap for unwanted guests. I also needed to get stronger myself, I would be a laughing stock if I died to a bunny rabbit of all things.

As I looked at the rapidly vanishing rabbit my hand grabbed the collar with the glowing orange stone. The blue material was a sturdy cloth and the stone looked similar to the Icharian stone, just a lot less impressive. I found my backpack intact beside my destroyed coat and put the collar inside for later, grateful at least I hadn’t lost everything.

On the ground was only the rabbit's sizable pelt and its antlers after they had finished stripping it. The bones and flesh was probably with Drone 1. Speaking of the meat we needed more special storage for it. What good was it slaying critters if the meat rotted away before it was of any use.

I balled up my fist and started to lightly rap my knuckles on my forehead trying to remember anything about preserving meat. I had told myself years ago I would pick up one of those jerky making kits at work and learned how to do it in case I needed some long term meat storage. Instead I had to pay the ever increasing rent and silently I cursed my stingy old boss.

He wasn’t a bad guy but as the youngest manager in the store I was always looked over when it came for the yearly review of who would get the miniscule pay raise. Years of being polite and fetching coffee for the team did little good to earn me more dollars. Then again it was my fault for not applying myself to learning more old time skills, I could sew a button back on my coat and the like but that didn’t help when my coat was torn to shreds.

A drone tugged on my hand and clutched in their hands was a clay mug. It was covered in ash and looked like it had been left out in the sun for so long any colouration on it was gone. The drone had made an attempt to clean it out and inside was cool clear water. Raising it to my lips I drank the mug leaving a tiny amount that I poured on my head to cool off. The drone took it and ran off probably to fill it again.

Looking at the other minions I said, “do you guys need to eat or drink?”

They shook their heads no and I let my shoulders release some of the tension. If they only needed to worry about feeding me than that made it easier on our resource drain, still I would need a stable storage for the food and I made up my mind.

Looking at the blank free room I mentally commanded the drones to turn it into a kitchen and dining room to expend the last free use of furnishings. I did feel like I might be trying to cheat by combining it into the same room by thinking it of a mess hall but the drones set to work anyways. When the drone returned with the mug I drained it again feeling like my mouth finally wasn’t dry and he ran into the construction zone with it.

I peered into the room and the scout learned from the other side as we watched the flurry of construction. Four picnic style tables appeared to make out the bulk of the dining area and a counter appeared to break the room into a small cooking area. Behind it they mined out a closet-like area and put a metal door over it.

Quite curious, I walked into the room ignoring Drone 1’s concern and watched a copper block be set beside the door into the wall. A large dial took up the centre of the copper block and above it were dozens of tiny numbers. As I moved to look at it more closely a pop up appeared.

Knowledge : Arcane success!

This specially made cooling apparatus from Tired Lad is powered by either arcane powered crystals of low quality or from the passive energies produced from a keeper crystal. It is able to control the temperature of a small room and is able to cool it down to nearly freezing.

+1 XP gained.

“Awesome,” I said, pumping my fist up. “Food storage is now perfect, now we just need water.”

The drones started to summon little clear blobs in their hands and they stood onto each other's shoulders to stick them high up on the walls. As the blob touched the wall it started to glow like a light bulb and gave the mess hall enough light without my flashlight.

“Can we get more of those light blobs on walls?” I asked, jutting a thumb towards the main room.

The drones shrugged and went back to work ignoring me as they were absorbed in their work. I stepped around the counter and looked around the small kitchen. It was the same size as my apartment’s kitchen back home and had cheap looking cookware. The pots and pans had dents in them and were uneven, the only piece of relatively undamaged kitchenware we had was the mug the drone had probably found in the remains of the village.

My eyes widened as that fact hit me and I ran over to the scout and crouched down to look at him on his level. The scout adjusted his hat and wiped off the blood and dust off his shirt as he tried to appear more professional.

“Scout, can you go topside and try to find anything useful still in the town?” I asked him, after he nodded I added. “If it looks good bring it down here and if you need help just ask Drone 1 ok?”

The scout gave me a salute clutching his bloodied walking stick. He then took off in a sprint towards the exit running as fast as his little legs could carry him. I started to search around the construction zone looking at each name tag until I found who I was looking for.

The drone that had fetched me the mug was finishing the placement of a light and when he saw me waiting for him he ran over. The curious drone cocked his head to the side, wiggling his ears as he had a curious expression.

“Can you take me to where you found the water?” I asked.

The drone led me out the trap door and to the outside of the storage building. Thick bushes had reclaimed most of the building's side but between them was a well built stone shed and instead was an old water pump. The drone jumped up and crawled on top of the water pump grabbing the handle and struggling to move it. With two good pumps water started to flow out the spout and into a drain below.

“Drone every ten seconds move that handle. I want to see where this leads,” I said, walking away to follow the draining water.

Under my feet I could hear trickling water move under the dirt in a pipe and I followed it beyond the edge of town. It kept moving towards the woods until ahead of me I heard the sound of rushing water. Running forwards I found a wide stream that had a built up stone embankment and wooden pier. The trickling noise was coming from the embankment and I got on top of it to see what it was.

The stone embankment had two pools inside of it divided by a stone wall, each had pipes going to the town and towards the stream. A large stone wall stretched out into the stream and was curved forcing some of the current into one of the pools. Best I could tell one side brought water in while the other took wastewater away. It was rather simple yet effective, and the man made stonework allowed excess water to run over the top keeping it stable.

I wondered if I could tell the drone to stop from this distance and I narrowed my eyes. A small pop up appeared telling me my crystal currently didn’t have the range to pick up my command. I mentally dismissed it and saw down in the corner a list of waiting pop ups.

I should probably deal with those soon but first I ran back to the town and waved the drone to stop. The poor guy fell to the ground below panting trying to regain some strength. Moving the pump myself I first washed the blood off my hands and arms then pooled some water in my hands. The minion closed his eyes letting me splash him with the water to cool him off.

Aftering thanking him for his help we returned to the dungeon and found a heap of junk in the main room. The scout proudly jutted out his chest as Drone 1 picked up items and either threw it away or gave it to the other drone to take to storage.

“Hey guys I got some housekeeping to do so I’ll just be in the mess hall, feel free to relax after you're done here.” I said walking past the mounds of junk.

The minions hurried in their work and I smiled watching the ground pile appear in the storage room across the hall. Resources were trickling in which was good because soon I needed to think up defences. I sat down in the fairly cramped mess hall and looked at the first pop up.

A minion has defeated a creature!

XP reward has been divided.

+25 XP awarded to the keeper.

+25 XP awarded to the keeper's crystal.

That got me to raise a brow. It did make sense all these little skill checks added up to pennies while the slaying of a creature awarded a pile of experience points. Fifty by comparison was huge and I wondered if it had to do with me still being level zero.

Looking at the rest of my pop ups it was for sustaining damage and making combat progress but not earning enough for a skill increase. There were pop ups for minions finishing tasks and I reached one pop up at the top that was gold coloured.

Quest complete!

Survive first dungeon attack.

+100 XP awarded to the keeper.

My hands shook as the realisation hit me. I could level up! My mind wondered at how the system worked, did I sleep and wake up to new abilities or did I have to do some kind of personal training. My mind raced as my character sheet appeared.

Joshua Hale, Human, moderate size, Level 0 Keeper

137/100 XP

Do you wish to level up?

Yes/No

Strength 12

Constitution 12

Dexterity 11

Intelligence 14

Willpower 13

Charisma 11

I internally screamed yes and a new pop up appeared before me. The new box was currently sparse for choices but I took time to carefully inspect each part of it to determine what was important.

Unallocated skill points : 3

Using skill points you are able to increase the rank of your current skills. Skill points can also be exchanged for new abilities and talents. Certain quests and skill books can be found to gain skills or skill points.

Currently available to you.

Purchase a skill rank

Ranks I-V requires 1 skill point per rank

???

Strength requirement 10

Martial talent

Requires 2 skill points

This talent provides the immediate knowledge of how to effectively use armour and weapons. In addition you get one free novice level martial ability of your choice. Martial talent can be purchased again for one skill point to gain one novice level martial ability.

Intelligence requirement 13

Magic Initiate

Requires 3 skill points

This talent provides the knowledge of arcane style spellcasting and allows the user to wield magic. In addition the user gains spell casting pool rank 1 and two tier 0 or tier 1 spells chosen from a small list.

The list of options to me currently was rather disappointing but I was only going up to level one so it made sense. Looking around the pop up I noticed a strange arrow at the bottom and tried to activate it. A separate page appeared looking distinctly different as black runes were etched around the edge. The new popup gave me a slight headache looking at it and the skills to purchase here felt like they were on a distinctly different power level.

Knowledge of the keepers

Requires 1 skill point

Improve your knowledge skill bonus from your keeper crystal by increasing the bonus to +2. Additional crafting recipes will be added to you and your minions. New minion recipes will be unlocked and the cost of drones and scouts will become halved.

Mantle of Ancient Power - Channelling talent

Requires 2 skill points

Improve the combat effectiveness for all minions and creatures under your command within a small area of effect around the keeper. All physical stats are improved by +2 while you are channelling this effect.

Further Keeper talents are obscured because of low keeper crystal level.

It was a lot to take in but this could be the most important decision I would make. The one big question of course was nagging in my mind. What kind of character would I become?

Looking at my stats it was apparent I was slightly more focused towards my mental ability rather than physical. Sure when I played video games and tabletop games I felt drawn towards the more warrior kind of characters. Using a holy sword to slay an evil dragon to save a beautiful princess was a boyhood fantasy of mine but I had just gotten my ass handed to me by a rabbit. I only ended up winning because I ganged up on the thing with four underlings.

Like Paul said to me, I had a good head on my shoulders and it was about time I used it. I would have become some kind of wizard, with a bit of sword play if I could spare the points. If something got that close to me again and the minions were tied up it might come down to me slugging it out with some monster. The cost of that spell casting talent was high but that told me learning magic must be tough and this was a cheat to skip all that hard work.

I looked at the spell casting talent and dumped all my points into it. As I went all in, a strange sensation filled my fingers. A numbing sensation of cold fire that rapidly spread up my arms and into my chest. The fire spread so quickly all I could do was cry out and feel myself go limp. The picnic table zoomed in close as I crashed into it and my vision blacked out.

A feeling of weightlessness took me and I started to rise into the air. I looked at myself and I panicked thinking I had become a ghost as my fingers had become translucent and green. I tried to get my minions attention but my voice made no noise. The minions ran into the room and got me down on the floor pushing on my chest attempting what looked like CPR.

I tried to grab onto the walls but my fingers passed through the solid rock and I kept floating up towards the ceiling. In a panic I tried to swim and managed to move myself closer to Drone 1. A sensation of a rope snaking around my waist made me turn and I saw a long silver thread going through the ceiling. Not wanting to find out if I could be splattered in some out of body experience I tried to grab Drone 1.

My hands narrowly missed his ears as he suddenly knelt and put his head against my chest. He looked at the others and smiled meaning he probably heard my heart beat. That or maybe minions loved it when the dungeon keeper was pushing up daisies.

I could only hope they kept an eye on me as I tried to get myself out of whatever mess I just made.

Magic Initiate talent added!

Spell caster pool rank I added!