Dungeon’s Path

Zela flies behind Doyle. There is a stone statue replica of her on a marble pedestal. She lands on the pedestal and continues, ‘This wasn’t here a moment ago. In fact, it did not exist at all. While I am not a dungeon core myself by being a companion to Flisle, I can tap into some of the abilities, including this most iconic of traits. Dungeons are an eternal spring of loot and that all comes from their ability to turn energy into material.’

‘What better way to get rid of the pure mystical energies than to have all those adventurers walk it out for you? Better yet, unlike with normal energy to matter, mystical energy doesn’t directly turn into mass. The more significance what you convert the energy into has the more energy it takes. A mass of iron in the shape of a sword will cost more than the same mass shaped as a block of iron. Slap some fancy scrollwork and design it after a historical weapon and the cost just balloons. You can tell when a dungeon is overfed by how fancy their loot is.’

‘Anyway, I think we might have gotten a little sidetracked there. Where were we?  Right, you wanted to know when you start and who guides you. How about now and a random fae?’

Doyle was not paying much attention and just letting the info sweep over him, so it took him a moment to realize what she just said. In a panic he perked up, ‘wait, what do you mean by that?’ Then he blacked out.

---

Doyle slowly regains consciousness, ‘Yep, tired of this whole blacking out thing.’ This time he can actually see where he is. Of course, that where is an entirely boring and completely square stone room with a fist-sized purple crystal floating at the very center. The only thing that broke up this scene is a system window.

{Start Awakened Dungeon Core Tutorial?}

‘Yes? Yes, please? Okay, not reading my mind so probably like with status, [yes]’

{Tutorial Starting...

Detecting Entrance Type: Portal

Detecting Dungeon Type: [Choice]

Detecting Companion: ...

<No Companion Detected>

Pausing Tutorial}

{Summon Companion?}

‘I guess it requires a companion for this. Probably it assumes that if a dungeon became awakened in this universe, it was because of a companion and was written for that. It might even assume I am a bit dense. Welp, not going anywhere else without this so [yes]’

All the system screens vanish and a series of circles made of runes appear on one of the walls. They rotate and form a bigger circle as lines of power form between them. It spins faster and a small dot of light appears at the center. As the outer circles stabilize in their speed, this dot grows. Once the light is about shoulders' width across, all motion stops and it dims. A ripple spreads from the light and across the walls as space itself bends. He can hear a pop as a small winged form shoots out of the light.

The rune circles on the wall fade away as the figure comes to a stop in front of Doyle’s crystal core. Curled up in the foetal position, they float there as the last of the glow dissipates away from them. As they become visible they very much fit the classic fairy look. Crystal like butterfly wings with a dress made of leaves. And a girl, of course, because why not?

She stretches out and yawns. Then with a surprised yelp she commented, “oh, an actual dungeon core summoned me?” She floated around the room and crowed that, “they didn’t believe it would work! They claimed this universe didn’t have magic for long enough for dungeon cores to summon a companion.” All the while Doyle is just surprised that he can understand her when she isn’t speaking English.

The fairy turns to him and asks, “So how aware are you? My frienemies weren’t exactly wrong on it being too early for an awakened dungeon core. From what the queen of the court said, we should still be a couple million years from that point at least.”

Doyle mentally tells her, ‘good news for you is that I am as good as a human. Mostly because until recently I was one. Then the system came and stuff happened.’

She does a double take, “wait, you’re actually awakened? I expected you to be a baby that stumbled into summoning me. Though with you having been human, that could carry some baggage. How do you feel about killing people?”

‘Eh’, Doyle shrugs, ‘I guess it is a thing. If people don’t want to die, they can stay out.’

The fairy relaxes, “good, I don’t want to die this young. Anyway, my name is Ally and if you have a last name, I get it. One perk of being a dungeon companion for us fae. After all, names are power. Oh, and how did you end up summoning me? Since you’re new to this whole thing, that is probably a superb place to start for the both of us.”

‘My name is Doyle Huxley so I guess that makes you Ally Huxley. An interesting thing is at least with my culture the wife would take the husband’s last name when they marry. Then again, I guess we are together from now on so it isn’t too far off. Anyway, I started the tutorial for dungeon cores and while it was checking stuff noticed I didn’t have a companion. When it asked if I wanted to summon one I answered yes and now here we are. Besides that, the previous two things it got to check was my entrance and dungeon type. The entrance I already knew what it would be, portal, and my dungeon type was marked as choice. Though actually I should probably say [choice].’

Ally rubs her hands together and chuckles, “you’re perfect! Do you know how rare a portal type entrance is? Plus being early enough to choose your options is always welcome. Since you got paused in your tutorial to summon me, there should be an option for me to start it again. Probably something like continue? Resume? Activate? [Proceed]? Ah, there we go. That was the intent I needed.” She continues to talk, but Doyle is a bit distracted by the System window coming back.

{Dungeon Companion Resumed Tutorial...

Detecting Companion Fae Type: Autumn Court

Restricting Dungeon Choices...

Detecting Entrance Location: Task

Override Starting: Tutorial Entrance Instantiated

Setup Paused Till Tutorial Completion

Tutorial Finish Condition Change: Prevent over 50% of a Humanoid Tutorial Team from Completing Tutorial Dungeon Setup on First Life

Passing Tutorial Over to Companion}

A soft ping comes from next to Ally. She waves her hand and nods, “nice! Since you became a dungeon core in the tutorial, we get to ease you in with some newb parties. Plus you can prove what you said about not minding if you had to kill others. Anyway, first up the tutorial wants us to do a trust exercise. We need to both agree to share our status panels with each other. Since you did at least some of the regular tutorial, your guide should have explained how important it is that you don’t do that. To show the whole trust thing it won’t show you a quest for it, but honestly, who else could you trust? I will start this off, [share status with Doyle].”

The dwarven guide had warned Doyle against sharing his status, but he had to agree with Ally. If he couldn’t trust his system provided companion, then who could he trust? ‘[Share status with Ally].’ In front of them both their respective panels pop up.

{Name: Doyle Huxley

Race: Dungeon Core

Companion: Ally Huxley

Paths: 0

Level: 0

S[6] A[7] C[9] I[10] W[9] P[5] D[12] K[20] L[16]

Skills:}

{Name: Ally Huxley

Race: Autumn Court Fae

Companion: Doyle Huxley

Paths: Dungeon Companion I 10/10, Fae Magic I 10/10, Autumn’s Jester 3/100

Level: 0

S[12] A[9] C[12] I[15] W[7] P[9] D[7] K[18] L[10]

Skills: Tutor lv10, Fae Glamor lv10, Courtly Manners lv3}

Ally does a loop de loop in the air and cheers, “YES! I got a reset, a bloody system reset! All those wasted skill slots they forced on me, gone. All the paths I never wanted to travel, erased. Everything I wanted out of this came true. I escaped the court and get to start with an almost blank slate. Sure, I got loaded with a few skills and paths, but I would have needed them anyway. Now what have you got going for you? The complete lack of skills is to be expected. Chances of someone new to the system being able to pick up a skill that would work as a dungeon is near non-existent. Your strength and presence are quite low and we need to work on them. Especially presence as you need that to command your monsters. Karma on the other hand is out of this world. How did that happen?”

Doyle goes to shrug, not used to his lack of body, and his core bobbles in the air. ‘That wasn’t my original karma. In fact, that is how I ended up here. Apparently zero karma sets a dungeon’s entrance to portal, and that is why Flisle stepped in. Once I woke up as a dungeon core it had changed to what it is now.’

Ally scrunches up her face, “the floating islands dungeon? I guess that would explain you becoming a dungeon. Though that little fact about a dungeon’s entrance is dangerous. Just going to forget I heard that and you should do the same. Not that it would help much as a zero in any stat is rare enough to begin with. Most die before they are able to call up their status to check. With that karma, you are perfect to be a dungeon core. Your soul must be very focused and contained.”

A natural breakpoint comes in their conversation at this point, and the system takes the chance to insert another window.

{Quest Complete: Trust Exercise

Reward: Tutorial Continues}

Ally takes a moment to read the next quest and frowns. She has a look of concentration and then she speaks to him telepathically, ‘Can you hear me?’

Doyle confirms he can and she continues, ‘the system wants me to practice my telepathy skill to unlock the second dungeon companion path. I was never a fan of it since at least when a fae speaks aloud they have to speak the truth. Direct mind to mind communication gets around that restriction. The upside is fae are not as tricky as the myths but I preferred to avoid court politics in a situation they can lie. First skill level should pop, easy enough.’

‘Anyway, next up is to guide you through the choices you have for your dungeon. Just a side note. You can really tell the system has this setup so a companion can deal with a slow core. It says it has changed your settings so all your screens will be visible to me and it can’t be changed until after the tutorial. I also have permission to let the system choose a random option if over an hour has passed since it displays a choice.’

‘I am definitely lucky to get you. Just the thought of having to wait hours as someone bumbles around with some simple set up options. Even after the hour I wouldn’t be able to choose a suitable option, but rather be allowed to leave it up to luck and not the stat kind. Anyway, first up is to choose your dungeon type. Though now that I think about it, how would a companion be able to force the dungeon to open the choice in the first place? Wait, here it is. I can force the option to open up from the quest screen I have. But yeah, just say something about choosing your dungeon type so we can continue.’