Dungeon of Assassins [LitRPG Through the Eyes of the NPCs]

The dungeon heart skimmed the endless list, then gave up.

<Okay, now I could use some advice.>

The fairy looked at her fingernails with interest.

<Selvara?>

"Oh? Are you talking about me?"

<I'm sorry I ignored you for so long. I was too enthusiastic about my theory.>

"Well... I, I forgive you. On the condition that we finally make a pact. It's best if we go through the text and its meaning step by step. "

<Is it the usual wording handed down from Travis to the library dungeon?>

"Travis... the old gossip. Now I realize how you humans know so much. Yes, the wording fits."

<So then: I offer you, Selvara the Dungeon Fairy, a pact of partnership. No partner shall be an enemy to the other. No partner shall be able to knowingly lie to the other. You shall have free passage through my dungeon. None of my dungeon powers, monsters or traps shall be able to harm you. You shall feast on my power... Wait, what does that actually mean?>

"Dungeon fairies only need magic to live. Mana. Your dungeon monsters survive without air, water and food. If you accept me, the same goes for me. It won't cost you a noticeable amount of mana besides your monsters."

<A small price for your company. So continue: You shall feast on my strength. In return, you will advise and support me to the best of your knowledge and belief. If one falls, we both fall. If one dies, we both die. This pact shall last until both of us dissolve it together. So be it!>

The text appeared in the air in front of Selvara in a translucent parchment. The words "Accept" and "Reject" were written side by side at the bottom in slightly lighter ink. She carefully checked the text again and tapped "Accept" with her finger.

Both felt a brief tugging sensation in their heads, then a message from the world voice appeared:

Pact agreement concluded.

Malvorik had a strange feeling. A stone in his shoe, or a hard spot in the mattress. He concentrated on it, feeling the sensation in his mind. Then he understood. It was Selvara. He could feel exactly where she was in his dungeon. A somehow reassuring feeling.

Selvara flew a quick loop and let out a cry of joy.

"I finally feel complete. The other fairies always said their dungeon hearts felt greedy and aggressive, but you're more curious and relaxed."

<I can also sense that you can hardly wait to give me a memorized lecture.>

"Well, you probably already know most of it. But let's start with the basics. At the moment, you can only see and influence a small area. You can only influence what is in your field of vision. You can find the current range in your character sheet. You can only create things that you have already dissolved and analyzed once. For more complex objects or even living beings, you will need larger quantities or a very high quality sample. So far, your repertoire of patterns is probably limited to rock."

<Not quite.>

"What do you mean?"

<On the way, we tunneled through a coal seam and a small silver vein. There's also shale, but I can't think of what to do with it yet.>

"Wow. Silver. That's pretty handy. Normally, you wouldn't have gotten it until the first adventurer who dies in your dungeon. But that only works if his comrades don't salvage his equipment. Everything you have analyzed once can also be recreated with magic. An ability that only dungeons have. Mages need level 9 spells for this and even these are much more limited in their use."

<I know, I know. Inside my dungeon, I create items or monsters as a mana construct that disintegrates immediately outside the dungeon, but costs very little mana, or as real matter that remains stable. Presumably with significantly higher mana costs.>

"Stable matter costs ten times as much. But you can also simply rematerialize something that you previously dissolved. This costs nothing and still remains stable outside the dungeon. Of course, this is limited to the amount of matter that you have dissolved. Of course, this does not work with living creatures. Your monsters can never leave the dungeon. Exceptions to this require very high-level special skills."

<Wait a minute, then crafting loot will be quite exhausting for the adventurers. Permanent iron already has a huge cost in mana, but gold? It takes days for a few coins. Do dungeons spend months producing loot?>

"They actually do that a lot. But only for the remaining artifacts and treasures. The coins that are left behind when someone destroys a monster are a gift from Golgoroth. You don't have to worry about that. Unless you want to use monster hearts, but I'll explain that later. If you want to leave extra loot behind to attract more adventurers, you'll need to set it when you create the monsters and invest the mana."

<I didn't know that.>

"Sometimes Golgoroth also fills chests if a group of adventurers has particularly impressed him. But normally that's your job."

<I can also dissolve monsters and enemies, analyze them and then recreate them myself?>

"Yes, but only if they're dead and not inside the blockade of other intruders. The problem with living creatures is, well... There's always a good reason why they're dead. So you only get badly damaged cadavers for analysis. It usually takes you up to a dozen specimens before you understand the pattern well enough to recreate it as a mana construct."

<If you use undead, you probably have an advantage here.>

"Yes. Undead can be used immediately. But until you have a full analysis, they're not very effective. Drooling, shuffling zombies that flail their hands aimlessly."

<How far can I analyze living opponents?>

Stolen novel; please report.

"As long as they're alive, not very good. You get character classes and levels, but no information on skills, attributes or race. You can't analyze worn equipment. Only when someone leaves something lying around and there is no enemy in the area can you break it down and analyze it."

<It's really good to find out that I haven't been teaching complete nonsense for the last few decades. It's not so easy to see from the outside. Especially with the completely inaccurate and exaggerated reports we get from adventurers afterwards.>

"I'm glad I can at least confirm your knowledge. Not that I feel completely useless."

<You probably know a lot of things that I don't even know that I don't know. Let's take my starting monster, for example. Am I going to be stuck in one direction forever? What would you recommend?>

"You are a level 1 Dungeon Master. This means you only have one race of monsters. However, this is also your most powerful monster at the moment, your end boss. End bosses can be significantly stronger than normal monsters. However, you only have one end boss monster. Later, you can create another slightly weaker boss monster for each floor of your dungeon. Boss monsters are great. If you choose rats, you get a single rat. However, this will be a level 5 giant rat. You could also choose a goblin warrior, but that would be more of a level 2. Goblins are level 2 monsters and the skills and equipment for a warrior consume 2 extra levels."

<That still sounds very puny for a boss monster.>

"You're not building an entrance at level 1 yet. Wait until you're at least level 6. Until then, you'll have more races, more rooms and traps. The highest level your normal monsters can have is your dungeon master level. Bosses have four levels more. You can later place the old boss at the entrance as a guardian or use it somewhere as a boss monster. Some dungeons are so attached to their first monster that they keep it in the heart room or at least in a room next to it."

<I can't imagine I'd like a monster in my heart room. A guard at the entrance sounds more appropriate. A race that attacks from ambush would be best. It's easiest to surprise enemies right at the entrance. Especially if they haven't yet realized that they're in a dungeon.>

"Then take a Lurking Shrike."

<These are the monkey-like monsters with the big hands and short legs?>

"Exactly. Just over a step and a half tall. Disproportionately long arms and fingers. For their size, they have a monstrously strong stranglehold. Once they've got hold of you, it's really hard to get free. They can cling to branches with their feet and hang down to get at their opponents from unexpected directions."

<Bought.>

Malvorik chose his first monster race.

<How can I summon it now?>

"You don't need monsters here deep underground yet. You should also create a room for it to stay in first."

<Creating spaces. That sounds good. But this room here fills almost my entire field of vision.>

"Exactly. That brings us to the next point. You need to expand your sphere of influence. I bet that's one of the things you didn't learn at university."

Malvorik let the status screen disappear from his field of vision, where he had already found the corresponding dungeon management menu.

<No. Where would that come from? I'm beginning to understand why dungeons need a fairy. I just don't yet understand why she has to be so pretty too.>

"Flatterer." She grinned involuntarily, despite her somewhat gruff tone. "There are many things that make up a dungeon. The most important are range and sphere of influence. Your reach is the maximum distance you can extend your sphere of influence. Always centered on your crystal. Your range depends on the size of your crystal. Within your range, you can charge an area with mana and make it your area of influence. Only within your sphere of influence can you see, create, transform or dissolve things. Let's start by enlarging your crystal. In the dungeon administration menu you will find the item: "Crystal growth."

<Found. I then select "Initiate growth"?>

"As soon as you do this, all your mana and everything you regenerate during the process is channeled into the process. You lose consciousness until then. As soon as you have accumulated enough mana, your crystal expands and you awaken again."

<How does this work with a dungeon that has already been discovered? Is that then completely helpless?>

"The monsters and traps in the dungeon still work. You just can't control them anymore."

<Can I leave that to you?>

Selvara's wings faltered and she fell a hand's breadth before she caught herself again: "Wow. Well... No. But thank you. As far as I know, no dungeon heart has ever suggested such a thing. The pact only makes me an advisor and prevents us from harming each other, it doesn't give me access to your abilities."

<Maybe our connection can be deepened.>

Malvorik chose an area in a corner and formed a circle one step in diameter as a deep groove in the stone floor. He then materialized all the silver he had collected so far and filled the hollow with fine silver dust. In the center of the circle, he carved the runes for friendship, contract and attraction. While he was supported by the menu for circles, squares and other geometric shapes, he had to draw the runes by hand, so to speak. This took him several attempts. Fortunately, he was able to smooth out the ground again using one of the menu functions. Then he channeled mana into the silver and activated the only ritual he could already use again: <Call of the Familiar.>

Selvara looked around indecisively, then her gaze was drawn to the circle. "What are you doing? I suddenly have a slight urge to step into that circle. But I can easily resist the call. It doesn't seem to be a compulsion, more... an invitation?"

<I'm not just a dungeon, I'm also a mage. Mages have familiars. You're far too powerful for a level 1 mage, so you'd have to take the covenant willingly for this to work.>

Selvara hesitated: "No one has ever tried that before. I have no idea what effect it could have on us. Besides, familiars are just pets. Cats, toads or ravens."

<Common animals imbued with magic are the usual familiars for young mages. Pretty much anything else is too powerful. At higher levels, completely different options come into question. Very young dragons, constructs, undead, various magical animal species and of course some fairy creatures.>

"Fairy creatures?"

<Our dean had a fairy dragon as a level 8 mage.>

"Wow. And what would I get out of it?"

<Normally familiars grow wiser and learn to speak, but that shouldn't be the case with you. They live at least as long as their mage... How long does a dungeon fairy live?>

"We can live up to 400 years."

<Then that would be more of a very long-term advantage.>

"Dungeon hearts are immortal, but most are destroyed before they are 10 years old."

Malvorik was silent for a moment, then mentally shrugged his shoulders. In principle, that was nothing he hadn't already known. He just hadn't thought about the fact that it applied to him now.

<I can cast spells on my familiar at a range of up to 10 miles. As long as he is within this range, I can cast spells on him as if he were standing next to me and looking through his eyes. Or make him see through my eyes, which never did much good with my old dog. Poor Snuffles. After he got run over by a troll wagon, I never took a new familiar. No matter how far apart we are, we always know how the other person is feeling and how they are doing. But the best reason why you should join in is something completely different.>

"And what?"

<It's something that's never been done before. You would be the very first Dungeon Fairy Familiar.>

Selvara looked up at his crystal for a moment, then stepped resolutely into the ring. The silver dust swirled upwards and formed a cylinder that closed under the ceiling above her. Silver light made her blink. Selvara felt the magic fill every part of her body. The light became blinding, forcing her to close her eyes.

Malvorik's crystal gaze remained unimpressed. He watched attentively as the fairy's aura changed. He had not yet mastered any analysis spells with his first familiar and had therefore not been able to follow it. While other mages usually replaced their familiars at higher levels, he had kept his faithful dog until his death. Threads of mana detached themselves from Selvara's aura and whipped around uncontrollably. Was this normal? Had he made a terrible mistake? The fairy's aura weakened as more and more mana erupted from her. The fairy, which had just been hovering above the ground, fell down. More mana bled out of it.

His mind raced. The ritual was primitive, he couldn't have done anything wrong. What was different here? Circle, silver, mana, mage... All the ingredients were there. Was his aura incompatible? The ritual was designed for human mages. Not for dungeon hearts. Once again, he hadn't thought long enough before he started experimenting. Llurd's mind!

The fairy went to her knees. Sweat appeared on her small forehead.

He reached out with his mind for the mana tendrils spraying into the void and pulled them towards him. As soon as the first one touched his crystal body, they all whipped around and drove into him. His aura merged with Selvara's. The mana stopped flowing out of her and flowed back and forth between them until a solid bond took shape. Slowly, her aura stabilized.