Space Core

I stared at the system window in front of me, it showed multiple different images of human-like beings who all seemed numb to everything. It was really creepy. Whenever I focused on one them, a short description of a personality and age appeared with an option to 'choose' the helper.

Now normally that would've been fine, the problem was that the options I had were... lacking to say the least. There were four guys and four girls shown, all of them with empty eyes, I took a moment to compose myself before starting to look through the different descriptions.

Most of the choices were described as easily irritable or incredibly lazy, to say I didn't want to meet them was simply logical. That left me with two choices, a guy who looked like a dwarf and was described as hardworking but slightly snobbish or a girl that looked like a traditional kitsune from any anime you'd normally watch, she described as a bit lazy but helpful to those who asked.

Of course, I chose the girl, now one might say I chose her only because of her gender, but I argue that she was the best choice as her being described as helpful.

(author: yep, one of the main characters is an anime girl. Now don't worry I don't want romance in this book, don't know how to write it anyway.)

I concentrated on the 'select' button next to the girl's description, the system window suddenly disappeared for a short moment before reappearing blank.

"What?" A blank screen was unusual, normally all system windows had at least some text on it.

A scream then reached my non-existent ears as the girl that was just an image before, fell out of the system. She was rather strange looking, dressed in an off-white wool sweater and brown leather pants. Her hair was a rather bloody shade or red with some light shade of pink at the ends.

"Fuckin' hell, what was that? Just got my core destroyed, couldn't I get a break?" Expressed the girl under her breath. It was strange to actually hear someone after all that time by myself.

Deciding on a safe course of action, I tried to make myself sound friendly, "Uh, hi?"

The girl, apparently not noticing me before now, turned her head at breakneck speed to stare directly at where my 'vision' was located.

"Wha- who are you? Why did you bring me he- ...Oh, so it's my turn to be the guide huh?" Somehow calming herself down in about three seconds, the girl sighed before looking at me a bit more calmly.

Based on what she said, I guessed that she was probably the help provided by the system, whatever that meant. Though she did seem to understand what's going on. "Could you tell me what you're doing here?" I asked.

She looked at me as if I was stupid, "You chose me as your guide didn't you?"

I quickly responded, "Well, yes, but I don't really know what that means... it just showed up without warning." Though I wouldn't say it out loud, it felt nice to actually talk to someone again.

"Really? Guess Ima have to explain everything... so, you're a new core right? Well sometimes new cores gets dead dungeon as guides to help them make their own dungeon. Though I didn't think I'd be transported to a new core directly after dying."

That seemed to make a good bit of sense, after all who would be better at teaching a dungeon core how to make a dungeon than another dungeon core?

She continued talking once she saw that I understood her, "So I'll be here for quite a while to help you grow. By the way, quick question, are you an Iner-Worlder or Outer-Worlder?"

While it was nice to know that I'd get some help from someone experienced in dungeon creation, that last part confused me a bit, "...What do you mean by that? The Iner and Outer Worlder things."

"Oh, yeah right you wouldn't know. You see, all dungeons are reincarnated. Though usually the one being reincarnated is just some normal knight or adventurer, those are Iner-Worlders. But from time to time, there are those that comes from outside this world. They're called Outer-Worlders as a way to know to be careful, some of them were decidedly crazy, saying that everything was some sort of game or whatever."

I internally winced at the answer, it would make sense that some other people would've reincarnated into another world like me. The fact that some of them treated it as some sort of game also made sense, as the system and everything that surrounds it does look like it was ripped straight out of a video game. I'll have to be careful though, some of those guys might have given Outer-Worlders a bad look.

Preparing myself for the response of the one who'll serve as my guide, I answered her question. "I'm an Outer-Worlder..."

A moment of silence passed before the girl who I still didn't know the name of responded, "That's good."

what?

"You guys usually think outside the norm, and while it is detrimental in some ways, in others it is highly beneficial for you. Dungeons typically all follow the same kinds of patterns and designs, making them predictable and thus easier to kill."

While her logic did sound good, my mind was still frozen in surprise. Aren't Outer-Worlders frowned upon? From what she had said it certainly looked like it...

I quickly resorted my thoughts, apparently Outer-Worlders aren't hated, just seen as the weird ones.

I took a bit of time to respond to her during which she started inspecting my single room, where I asked a question that I felt was important. "So what's your name?"

Apparently surprised, she turned to look back at me, "I... kinda forgot it. There's no real use for names as a dungeon, at most a title but not really anything like a name."

I... hadn't really thought about that, It made sense that one wouldn't have a need for a name when all alone though. Why have a name when there was no one to use it?

"Can I give you one then?" I really hoped she said yes, I had a funny name for her.

It took some time for her to respond, but she told me I could, as long as it wasn't a ridiculous name. I already knew what I wanted to name her, a joke that only those from my world would understand, though one did need to know at least a little bit about Greek mythology.

"Why not call yourself 'Lethe' It's simple and nice."

She took a moment to consider it, "Yeah it sounds good, guess you can call me Lethe then."

How Ironic, someone who forgot their own name being named after the river of forgetfulness...