Book of the Dungeon Maker

by Nathan Valerio

  I looked at my mana and saw it had dropped by 30 mana.

  “Havorine, how much mana does it take to make a fireball spell?” I called out.

  “Around 30 for professionals and 45 for an adept mage, novices usually use around 60 mana until they learn mana control.”

  I thought for a moment and looked at the floating book. The ‘Fire’ and ‘Ball’ runes were shimmering.

  I began to imagine something a bit different. With a football shape spinning. I keep my eyes on the book and notice how the ‘Fire,’ ‘Ball,’ and ‘Spin’ runes lit up. Then I put the intent to accelerate forward, and both respective runes lit up. When I stuck my hand out the five runes appeared for an instant before spinning themselves into a football shaped fireball that was spinning and rapidly accelerated forward and slammed into the wall causing the fire to spread to around three meters around the impact area.

  Havorine looked my way shocked.

  “You were able to cast a spell so soon?” he asked.

  “Tell me, when you use magic, do runes appear before making the spell?” I asked.

  “No, since I use a staff they appear from the tip but I never saw runes appearing,” he said.

  I looked at the staff in his hand and then at the orb in his hand and saw nothing engraved at the top.

  I nodded then took out the other book that remained untranslated.

  “Let's see…” I muttered.

  The others had their eyes on me.

  “Let's go with ‘Water’ and ‘Ball’ plus this one that is supposed to mean ‘Compress,’ and ‘Accelerate’ plus ‘Forward,’” I said taking out my pen. In the air, I carefully wrote each rune in the following order.

  ‘Compressed Water Ball Accelerate Forward.’

  As the final rune shone, it spun and formed a water ball that became as small as a pebble and shot forward making a ‘plop’ sound like a droplet hitting the ground as it hit the wall.

  You have discovered the ‘Shrink’ rune.

  “Okay not what I expected…” I muttered but looked at my index and saw the new rune flash into existence.

  I thought for a moment and flipped through the book finding ‘pillar.’ I started a new spell.

  ‘Air Pillar Spin.’

  I wrote facing up, and quickly got out of the way, but what I got was dense wind balls rapid firing upwards in a spinning fashion from the runes that cast them.

  You have discovered the ‘Shards’ rune.

  “Shards huh…”

  Next I wrote, ‘Earth Shards Accelerate Forwards Spin.’

  I felt a bit dizzy, but I saw a group of five earth shards springing out, spinning and hitting the wall.

  “Ace, please calm down with the spells, you're using too much mana,” Havorine said. “Focus on control training first. Leave experiments for a little later.”

  “Fine, later can you get someone to bring any books about magic formations to my room. I am searching for a rune to delay the activation for now, but once I do I want to make projectile formations,” I said.

  “That is fine, here drink this and try to control yourself a bit,” he said and I nodded.

  For the next few hours, I alternated between meditating, reading through the books, and controlling my mana trying to make effects with the mana like making a fireball without the runes. I could make a mana ball but any of the elements I had runes for needed a rune before the spell activated. That said, I compared it to Misaki's own fireball when she learned it and it seemed that mine always came out about 10% bigger and stronger.

  It might be the effect of runes as a magic symbol, and it was a good thing to know since I would naturally be a stronger magic user the more I studied.

  After that, I split up from Misaki and was led out of the castle into a different building at the back of the castle area where a large workshop was located.

  Inside was a blacksmith.

  “This is our royal blacksmith, Grunt Drift. He will be your blacksmith master,” the maid that was leading me said.

  The smith in question was a giant of a man. A huge belly, about one and a half meters wide, muscular arms that looked to be as big as my head, and he was over two meters tall.

  “So squirt, you're my new protégé? Looks a bit squishy for my taste? Ever forged?” he asked.

  “My world was already industrialized so forging was something near extinction already,” I said.

  He sighed.

  “I heard you’re some dungeon builder or something,” he said.

  “Yeah, I think it’s different than what is commonly known, I guess I make a dungeon to kill monsters with traps to kill them and not people,” I said.

  “How do you build something like that?” he asked. I shrugged and pulled out the book.

  “Said I needed to store the layouts, so I think I am supposed to build corridor sections, then in the book I plan out the layout. Same for the rooms,” I said.

  “I see. In other words at this moment you need blacksmith basics to learn to make basic stuff like nails for just a basic room and corridors,” he said nodding. “Good, I get that I am not getting some master crafter so let's get started.”

  He pulled me inside, and until long after the sunset I worked back breaking work with him before returning to my bed and falling asleep.

  Your previous day’s training has rewarded you with status points.

  For figuring out a few function of the world's magic system, +2 wisdom.

  For training magic control, +2 intelligence.

  For doing manual work in Blacksmithing, +2 strength and +3 endurance.

  You have learned your first craft. Skill Crafter has leveled up to level 1, Blacksmithing has been added to crafting skill repertoire.

  For training magic control and meditation you have gained the skills ‘Mana Manipulation,’ and ‘Meditation.’

  Mana Manipulation

  Level 1

  A skill that shows your skill in controlling mana and using magic.

  Decreases mana consumption by 1%.

  Increases control of magic by 1%.

  Meditation

  Level 1

  Meditation is the art of calming one's mind and controlling the flow of energy in one's body. When used properly it allows you to gather mana from the air at a faster pace and counter the effects of mana exhaustion.

  Increases rate of mana recovery by 1%.

  I woke up with a strange window about new stat points. After blinking a few times and waking up, I read it carefully and understood something new about this world. You didn’t immediately receive stats or skills unless it was knowledge based like runic writing/language skill. You needed to rest and let your body recuperate, and the system would cause your body to strengthen during your sleep so that you could adapt better to your work. The harder you worked during the day the more you would gain. That must explain why I didn’t get anything for the sword skill.

  Frowning, I got out of bed and felt the morning chill. I got up and put my clothes on—it was still the butler like clothes—and grabbed my artifacts. In the dining room, the maids were setting up food for the already awakened heroes.

  The longsword guy was there and so was Misaki. Most of them were eating rather quick, so I did the same.

  As I finished and looked at the waiting Misaki, I got up as did she and we headed to the training ground.

  “Try and guide me and fix my form, let's put our all in to sparring from now on,” I said.

  “Of course,” she said. We found a corner where I started trying to attack her, and she used a wooden blade to attack me while correcting me in a painful manner, by hitting all the weak points.

  By the end of the sword training, I was hurting all over.

  “Did I go too far?” she asked

  “You're asking that now?” I asked.

  She simply diverted her eyes with a blank expression.

  I sighed and faced myself up on slightly trembling legs. “I will simply learn some healing magic to deal with this
then,” I said as we both headed inside while the others remained outside. Only those that gained close range classes were actually outside, but we had extra time for magic approved by the queen.

  We reached the training room and I went to a corner where I opened the book of runic language.

  “Heal, heal, heal… oh regeneration… wait the system didn’t record it so that means it's not it. Hmm maybe I can be creative in this,” I muttered and took my pen.

  ‘Regeneration Light Ball.’

  I wrote and the runes crumbled into dust.

  “Not it huh… let's see… how’s about just regeneration light,” I muttered and wrote the runes. They collided forming a single rune that began to release a gentle green pulsing light, and when it washed over my body, I began to feel relief from my injures.

  You have discovered the ‘Slow Healing’ rune.

  “Nice, an AOE heal spell,” I said and began to move around it, finding it had three meter diameter, so one and a half meter radius.

  “Small scale but useful,” I said.

  I moved my pen and found that I could move the ball around.

  After a minute, the rune crumbled to dust. When it ended, I finally noticed how the others were looking at me.

  “What?” I asked.

  “That was healing magic right?” Misaki asked.

  “The system called it the slow heal rune. The combo I did was slow, heal, and light, so yeah it was healing magic,” I said.

  “Slow heal is the lowest class heal over time magic that lasts one minute,” Havorine said and cast it in the same manner. “So, the runes for it are that one and the light rune, interesting,” he said and walked over to examine them before casting the spell again. At that time, I noticed the two runes appear, merge, then release a strong gentle light hiding themselves inside.

  “Interesting, the runes stabilize the magic. Yes, quite interesting,” he muttered.

  I pulled away my book because I didn’t feel comfortable with him getting free knowledge and getting stronger.

  I ignored his inquisitiveness and sat down to begin meditating and doing mana control until he left. I recovered my mana a bit before getting back to experimenting.

  By the end of the day, I found three more runes successfully. Explode, lunge, and upwards.

  Also, it seemed that every five runes I discovered gave me a level in runic language.

  I had a basic list of spells, but I still hadn’t found a delay rune. I also got a magic formation book to see how they made it, and found it was a large number of unknown runes so I could only sigh and look at the structure to see if I could make a small scale one.

  At night, I reported to Grunt the blacksmith Grunt and began another night of gruelling work learning to forge.

  Chapter 4

  It had been a week since we were summoned, and I had finally understood what made the hero group exceptional over common folk and why Altgar had the custom of summoning them instead of dealing with their own problems. Take a look.

  Status:

  Name:

  Ace Cross

  Class:

  Dungeon Maker

  Level:

  1

  Health:

  780

  Mana:

  800

  Strength:

  75

  Intelligence:

  75

  Agility:

  52

  Wisdom:

  85

  Endurance:

  92

  Vitality:

  64

  Skills

  Dungeon Archive

  Level 1

  This skill allows the caster to seal constructed parts of the dungeon within the Book of the Dungeon Maker and make copies.

  Can currently make layouts for 3 dungeons.

  You can store only 5 different corridor layouts.

  You can store only 2 room types.

  You can Store only 5 different traps.

  Magic Hole Formation

  Level 1

  This skill allows the caster to open a magic hole into a separate dimension where the constructed dungeon exists, it allows monsters in and out openly. The magic hole draws mana from the air making the dungeon more comfortable. Eventually, if seeds are planted or brought in by the dungeon targets, it can make natural drops like magic plants.

  Can currently make 1 small magic hole.

  Crafter

  Level 4

  This skill allows you to learn all craft skills for the purpose of making a dungeon.

  This skill level will grow with the overall skill of all crafts learned.

  Current crafts learned:

  Blacksmith Level 6

  Carpenter Level 5

  Short Sword Mastery

  Level 4

  Your master with the short sword.

  Increases damage by 4%.

  Short Sword Arts

  Level 3

  Arts that only masters of the short sword can learn.

  Level 1: Double Slash

  Runic Writing/Language

  Level 5

  This Skill corresponds to the level of comprehension towards the Runic Language and how many runes you have learned and can use properly.

  Current runes known: 40

  Can be found in runic dictionary within the Book of the Dungeon Maker.

  Decrease mana consumption when using Runes by 3%.

  Increase magic control when using Runes by 3%.

  Mana Manipulation

  Level 1

  A skill that shows your ability in controlling Mana and using magic.

  Decreases mana consumption by 1%.

  Increases control of magic by 1%.

  Meditation

  Level 1

  Meditation is the art of calming one's mind and controlling the flow of energy in one's body. When used properly it allows you to gather mana from the air at a faster pace and counter the effects of mana exhaustion.

  Increases rate of mana recovery by 1%.

  Rune Index

  Elements

  Shapes

  Unique

  Directions

  Fire, Water, Air, Earth, Light, Dark, Ice, Lightning, Sand, Iron, Mana, Wood

  Ball, Spike, Shards, Pillar, Chain, Sword, Spear, Lance

  Enchant, Harden, Accelerate, Shrink, Explode, Trapping, Lengthen, Shorten, Widen

  Forward, Upwards, Curving Left, Curving Right, Backwards

  Weak effects

  Action

  Slow Healing, Slow Poison, Weak Antidote

  Lunge, Spin, Revolve,

  My stats had risen by a shocking degree, I was told that we had different growth rates for leveling, but we would get between 1-5 stats in all stats for each level. It all depended on each class, but training stats still improved our strength and we were only training stats.

  I had expanded my magic repertoire making me quite strong and being beaten by Misaki had made my body rather hard.

  I learned carpentry as well, it was rather easy after the first day and I leveled rather quickly. With the help of the two masters, I was even able to start planning how I should build the layouts and ways to keep them from collapsing.

  That said, we had all been gathered in one of the war rooms for some kind of meeting.

  The room was wide and at the center was a large round table with a 3D carved map of the land. I could only see a single glowing pillar over one point.

  The table was almost 4 meters in diameter and had plenty of space for everyone to be spread around the table while giving the royal family members space to remain near and gather everyone’s attention on them.

  Before going, we were given different kinds of armor and I got some riveted leather armor with padding on the inside so it was rather comfortable. Misaki also got leather armor, but she had hers look a tad bit more like a samurai while having leather armor that looked like her shrine maiden outfit.

  “Now then, thank you all for joining us so quickly. As regretful as it is, we would ha
ve preferred to allow you all to train more before this happened,” the queen said.

  “What happened Your Highness?” pretty boy asked.

  The queen suddenly shut her fan, did a small tap on the table and a line began to stretch around a specific area circling it. The rest of the map vanished before the space stretched like a zoom.

  “Wow…” I muttered.

  The area became more detailed and I saw that the light was falling on a city.

  “This table is an artifact left behind by a hero. Using his knowledge from his world plus our own magic he created this. The function is to allow heroes, who possess blessings from the gods, to teleport quickly to places in danger. At the start you can only see a single ray of light which is where we currently are, this room. Whenever danger arises within the nation this table displays it,” she said tapping the table again causing several balls of mana to gather and turn into moving stone monsters.

  One was a huge almost gorilla like monster with two huge tusks jutting out its lower jaw. Another was several small wolf statues and next to it were short scrawny men with swords dressed either in rags or different types of armor. Some statues had the little men on the wolves.

  Another looked like a fat cyclops, while others looked like the little men only they were naked and held three tipped tridents and had bat wings on their back.

  They all came from the same direction.

  “Each piece or pieces shows different demon tribes that are moving through our nation. The area in black where they passed is where they have already caused damage or passed through,” the king said clutching his fist and grinding his teeth.