Buttopia
patreon
Chapter 58: My Dungeon Core Pal & Me
🕑 Added 2024-12-24 00:00:05 +0000 UTCMy vision swam as my brain seemed to be rebuilding something within itself. I could feel neurons forming new connections. My consciousness felt bigger somehow. Focusing my thoughts on that strange expansion, what looked like a chat terminal appeared. What the hell was that? What had just happened to me? Without any other option presenting itself, I focused on the terminal window and started typing.
That was a new experience. I certainly hadn’t been expecting the equivalent of an older chat interface to spring into existence in my mind. Hopefully this didn’t allow for the core to have any direct control back over me. I was reasonably confident it didn’t, mostly because as useful as the chat may be for secret communication, it also was a way to segment my active thoughts. This may just have been the way my body chose to represent this connection more than an actual reality. What would happen if I added another dungeon core to the mix later?
For now, this was going to be a trial run on my connection with just the single dungeon core. As much as they may be apologetic for our first encounter, I wasn’t fully trusting them yet. In truth, I would have preferred a much less direct connection than what had seemed to form, but it was a little late for that. If everything went well with Corey at this level, I would consider the next level of my plan. First, though, the core needed to prove to me that it was a safe decision.
I opened my eyes and saw the faces of both Cecile and Elicec staring. Chip was still sitting on my shoulder, minding his own business, and the mallet looked virtually unchanged from before Core was inserted into it.
“So, what happened, Dave?” Cecile asked first.
“I think it was successful. Corey, before we try adding a mana orb, are you able to do anything with the mallet on your own?” I asked, curious if the word dancing meant what I thought it did.
“Yes,” Corey said as the mallet lifted off of the table and hung in the air for a second before taking a few empty swings and then settling back down where it had started. “It is much more agile than the snail I once inhabited. Thank you, Dave.”
“Glad you like it. Alright, now for part two,” I said, reaching for the imbuing mana orb. I moved it to near where I had previously inserted the dungeon core and fed it into the tool. The moment it was inside, I felt access to the associated mana skill return. It seemed I had found a way to add a seventh slot. I bet Karlinovo would have loved to see this if he were alive.
“Dave, do you have any spare skill points to invest into this orb? As it stands, you have placed nothing in it, and I wish to see if I will gain access to them when you do,” Corey asked. I did have the points, and while I previously hadn’t seen much use in investing ranks into this orb, if Corey could directly control it during combat, that would make this all the better.
“On it,” I said as I pulled up the menu and put the ten ranks into core projection that was needed to unlock the next tier of skills. I put another ten into magical durability, with a plan to max both of them if Corey was able to access them.
“I can feel both mana skills on the orb now. I will try cycling them both,” Corey said, and immediately following their words, I felt some of my newly regenerated mana flow into the mallet. Both because I wanted to test if I could and because I didn’t have a lot to spare at the moment, I tried shutting off the flow. It felt like flexing a muscle I hadn’t known I had, but it did work.
“Sorry for shutting that down, but there isn’t a ton of mana left in my core at the moment, and I need regeneration to keep going. Creating your new home was somewhat more intensive than I had thought it would be. The good news is though, it looks like that was a resounding success. Welcome to the team, Corey,” I said, smiling at the enjoyment of my own achievement. Building something had always been a surefire way to push my anxiety away. I really needed to remember that in the future.
“Welcome aboard. Always glad to add another head to the team,” Cecile added, smiling as well. Even Elicec had a grin on his face.
“I will do my best to make up for previous transgressions at our destination,” Corey said. We would see if that was true. As much as I wanted it to be, it was still best to trust but verify.
“Corey, you okay going into my storage for a moment? I want to try something,” I asked, wondering if our mana link would hold across the space.
“Yes,” Corey answered. I focused on the linkage to the mallet and tried to place it into my System storage without touching it. It vanished from the table and appeared in the storage. Instead of reaching my consciousness fully into the space, I pulled back up the chat window.
The mallet appeared back on the table. “Interesting, somehow we didn’t lose any connection while they were in my storage,” I said. I could think of a few potential uses for the mallet having that level of control, most of them coming unexpectedly to my defense. Could I build an army of tools able to do that? How far could I extend myself? It couldn’t be possible to daisy chain an infinite number of mana orbs into my control, could it? Even if it was, that would just increase the problem of actively controlling them all without instantly running my mana dry. Just another reason to hope this little experiment worked out in my favor.
“Dave, did you just gain another mana orb socket?” Elicec asked.
“Seems like it, yes,” I answered.
“I honestly don’t know if I’m jealous or a little scared of you at this point,” Elicec said. Was I scary?
“Ignore Elicec. He’s just amazed at how quickly you’ve grown, man. You are something else. I’m just glad we were the ones there when you appeared,” Cecile said, smiling.
“It’s alright, I get it. I’m surprised you two went through all this, honestly. You know you don’t have to come back to Earth with me; it’s okay to get out of my mess. I wouldn’t be angry about it,” I said, and I meant it. I was sure I wouldn’t have gotten this far without them, but they certainly deserved the right to get away from all this before it got any worse for them.
“I just said I was either jealous or scared of you, which means you’re the perfect person to stick with. We’ve already grown a lot faster than we’d have had a chance to without you, so no getting rid of us now,” Elicec said while his brother nodded along.
“Alright, if you’re sure. Could you guys take Corey back to the other cores so they can continue from where they left off? I’m going to play around with my mana skills a bit, then probably take a long sleep before we get to the desert,” I said, hoping a nap near Chip would get me mostly recharged before we arrived.
“No problem,” Cecile said, reaching for the mallet. Before he could grab it, it went airborne again and bobbed its way through the air back to the other table, with the twinog chasing after it. That was going to take some getting used to.
I leaned back into my seat and pulled up my mana skill menu again, quickly maxing out the two imbuing skills and seeing what that had unlocked.
Damage pool was a given. Damage redirection, on the other hand, was risky. I was willing to put a point into it, but until Corey passed the trust test to my satisfaction I couldn’t give them that level of access to hurting me in the middle of a fight. Instead of letting myself waste time waffling, I quickly maxed the first skill and put the single point in the second as I had initially considered. Then I laid back in my seat, finally letting my brain drift off into a relaxing sleep.
The children of the long silent sun have been absent in the politics of the Spiral for an age. While they still send representations to the Arena, they seem to have entirely withdrawn from all other aspects. As they do not allow visitors into their universe very often, the reasons for their isolation from the greater Spiral remain as much a mystery as ever.
Factions, Dynasties, Royalty, and the Holdings by Trig Plunderscan
