by Matthew Peed
I could probably influence the outcome without it being part of the deal. Much like I did with the last party that entered the dungeon. Stella was able to tell that I didn’t want them all to die, thus she called off her attack. Once Lance and one other person were the only ones left, I should be able to influence the monsters to stop.
“How about something else?” I asked, turning upside down almost unconsciously.
“The biggest problem is I would only be able to do it two or three times before I got found out. There is a system that shows who enters and exits the dungeon, after all.”
“Do you have a card or something?” I asked.
Lance reached into one of his pockets and pulled out a very battered wallet. It was being held together by duct tape. He retrieved a card that looked like it was made from steel.
“They have to be durable. Card’s more durable than my wallet. Supposedly could stop a bullet.”
I held my hand out. “Can I see it?”
Lance stared at my extended hand for several long moments before he just sighed and handed it over. Even with my ghost-like form, I was somehow able to take hold of the card. I absorbed it quickly. He did technically offer it to me.
“Hey!”
“Don’t worry!” I said with a smile as I floated to the ceiling. I pulled up my Creation skill and found the card at the top of the list of absorbed items. I created a copy easily enough, though the process did cost a little more Aether than I got for absorbing the card. I tossed it back to him. “See. Good as new.”
He glared at me, then looked the card over before putting it back in the wallet. I couldn’t help but laugh at his expression. “It’s not a laughing matter.”
I shrugged and did a spin in the air. “Is . . . this your card?” I asked, creating four cards with altered features on each one. I held them out with a grin. Thankfully, there wasn’t a barcode or anything on them like a credit card. It made this doable.
“Nifty, but still doesn’t change the fact that there will be live guards around the entrance that will recognize me after a few dives.”
I pouted, then curled into a ball as I thought it through. I was sure I could manually alter his features, but that would cost me Aether and time. Not to mention it would hurt him. I stopped mid-spin, wondering how I knew that. Chalking it up to dungeon instinct, I returned to spinning in the air.
“Be right back!” I shot through the wall without waiting for an answer and vaguely noticed that my form became completely ethereal after passing through the wall. I found Starburst sulking in his room on the second floor of the mansion. It was a bleak room that had the bare minimum in decorations. I had wanted to decorate it more, but Starburst wouldn’t let me. “Starburst!”
“Gah! What is it now?” he shouted at my sudden appearance.
“I want to do something dungeony. I want to make an item,” I replied, trying not to laugh at how surprised he’d sounded.
“Go ahead. Shouldn’t be too hard for you,” he said without pausing. “You do have a crap ton of Aether that is basically rotting away.”
“Can Aether do that?” I asked, worried that I should be using my energy. I hadn’t liked to waste things when I was a human.
“No. I was just being sarcastic.” Starburst seemed to take a deep breath, which was weird, given he was a stuffed animal. “What kind of item do you want to make?”
“Something to alter a person’s features,” I said, using my hands to change my face and try to make it funny. It was lost on Starburst, who just stared at me. I pouted as I lowered my hands.
“Pull up your Creation skill. Imagine how you want whatever you create to look, and what you want it to do. Please limit the amount of Aether you insert. You could cause it to change the person permanently if you create it with too much.”
“Aye, sir!” I said with a salute.
I pulled up my Creation skill, then paused as I considered what I wanted to do. Lance would need it to change his face, at the minimum. I could just make it a mask, but if something happened and the item fell off while the party was in the dungeon, the trick would be blown.
Plus, judging from how cut up his clothes were, he wasn’t too careful during a fight. It would need to be small. That way it wouldn’t be a large target. A ring, perhaps? Or an earring. Nodding at that idea, I got to work.
The magic took my idea and ran with it. Soon three or four dozen different earrings were presented on the screen in front of me. I went with a black one that had a bloodred gem in it, feeling it suited his style and was also something a guy would wear. Not that I really knew what a guy would wear.
Before I confirmed the creation, another idea came to me. I pulled the earring back to the creation screen and added a bit more magic to it. I made it so that it would tingle if someone with malicious thoughts were near Lance. I didn’t know what it considered malicious, but the magic accepted the idea, so I went with it.
I accepted the item creation, and fifteen hundred Aether drained from me. Next, I examined the item to see if it worked as intended. While I had planned to create two or three if the first failed, after using that much Aether, I was a bit more hopeful that the first one worked out.
Scales of Illusion
- Effect One: Wearer can change their appearance once every forty-eight hours.
- Effect Two: (Passive) If in the presence of people of ill will or evil thoughts, based on wearer’s ideology, item will tingle as warning.
Well, that was about what I wanted. I was worried about the fact that it was based on the wearer’s ideology, and not mine, the creator’s, but I would have to live with it. Lance seemed like a decent guy for the most part. Though I’d only met him twice so far.
I flew back to Lance with the earring and found him taking a bathroom. Curiosity got the better of me and I peeked. I was not expecting what I saw.
“You’re a girl!” I shouted without meaning to. She wasn’t packing much at the top, but with her clothes off, it was hard to mistake it, given the missing “limb” as it were. I remembered Starburst hesitating when talking about Lance. I guessed this was why.
Lance covered him . . . herself up and glared in my general direction. “Yes. I am. Got a problem with it?”
“Why hide it?”
“Various reasons, one of which is that I should have died a year ago,” Lance said, flipping a nonchalant hand at me. That only made me more interested in the story behind all this. What kind of secret would require her to hide her gender?
“When you are done, I have something for you,” I said, deciding to try again later.
She nodded, then went back to cleaning herself. Quite a lot of filth had managed to seep through her clothes. She was lucky there were soap and bathing tools provided in the room, more to complete the picture than for anyone to use.
She was putting a lot of elbow grease into getting the dried-on blood off herself. I decided to stop watching and flew out to see if I could see anything outside. I’d been meaning to try it for a while, but the divers had come into the dungeon and forced me back to the second floor.
I came to the edge of my field, putting me a few feet from the entrance to the old subway station. I could almost see the sky if I could push my field just over ten feet. I’d only tried to push it down before, so I didn’t know if I could push it up. It would be an interesting test.
Placing my hand on the almost solid wall of my field, I put a bit of force into it. Of course, the wall pushed back and didn’t move an inch. Still, I got the impression of more of plastic rather than a brick wall. Putting more force and even some Aether into it, I pushed again. I was not ready for what happened next.
Aether was liberally ripped from my core as my field flooded outside the dungeon. I was suddenly aware of everything for several hundred feet on the surface, including the remains of the old derelict station that once sat there, which used to have a few shops for a sort of mall. It had long been demolished, and only the empty lot remained.
A
parking lot, currently packed with cars and tents that appeared to have all sorts of equipment, was the main thing that caught my attention. People were moving around and doing various jobs. I saw people wearing white coats and others dressed like the people who had already come into my dungeon twice.
Finally, there were a couple dozen soldiers with really large weapons placed around the lot. Their weapons were all trained on the station, likely in case something attempted to come out of the entrance. Lance told me that was standard procedure until more was known about the dungeon.
I didn’t get to observe long before everything started to rumble. I looked around, not sure of the source, when I realized it was my own dungeon. The rundown station on the surface suddenly started to collapse like buildings I saw in the movies that had quicksand under them. I felt my Aether go up as everything was quickly absorbed.
The humans around my entrance all fled behind the soldier line as they armed their weapons. The divers also readied themselves for whatever was to come. I followed suit and braced myself, as I was just as lost as they were.
When the station finally vanished into the ground, the rumbling only grew worse. I cast my awareness around my dungeon as pain filled my body. It was only a moment later when the first-floor mansion broke through the surface. I could still feel full control over it, but I worried what the humans were going to do.
A good five minutes later, everything came to a stop with the entirety of the mansion on the surface. The humans also looked relieved that the shaking had ceased. I felt a ridiculously strong Aether signature appear in the sky, and a man dressed all in white landed behind the soldier line.
Unfortunately, I couldn’t hear anything that was being said. They were over two hundred feet outside my field. The man turned and looked almost directly at me. Not wanting to take any chances, I fled back into the mansion.
“Starburst! I broke something!” I shouted as I came into his room.
He was looking out the window that before had shown a stone wall. “I can see that. It’s out of our hands.”
Chapter 18: Helping the Dungeon
Lance Teron
I finished putting on my damp but at least not blood-soaked clothes. Thankfully, the dungeon wasn’t freezing, so I didn’t have to worry about getting sick from wearing the clothes. Just as I was about to head back to my room, the entire dungeon felt like it was coming apart under my feet.
As I wondered what the hell was going on, moonlight flooded through the window in the room. I made my way carefully over to it and glanced outside. We were rising up from the ground under the station. Thankfully, I was on the back of the mansion, so no one saw me in the window.
This station was about halfway up a rising hill in the city, allowing a decent view from my current vantage. A dungeon had never risen from the ground like this before. The closest parallel would be airports, which had sprawling dungeon fields that went on for miles. Maybe Azaria was some sort of hybrid, a new version of the subway and train-station-based dungeons. She was certainly intelligent enough to match one of the airport dungeons, if the stories about them could be believed.
The mansion finally came to a stop as it finished rising from the ground. I quickly left the window, as I didn’t want to risk someone seeing me. Back in my private room, I was relieved to see it still appeared to be cut off from the rest of the world. I’d been worried, considering it had been underground before.
Wondering what was going on, I’d only been resting for a few minutes when I heard some sound coming from the other side of the wall.
“Girl, is right now really a good time to talk to your little project?”
“She might be the only one who can help us right now!” Azaria said. I could detect just a bit of panic coloring her voice.
“Ah, so her secret came out,” Starburst said.
I gritted my teeth but could only curse myself. I thought that dungeon cores would be able to tell gender either way, so I didn’t think anything about bathing. While the world maintained a bit of sanity after the Aether shift, there was still a lot of hardship. Especially for three women alone in a rundown part of the neighborhood.
My little sister might be able to crush someone’s heart from over fifty feet away, but there were plenty of people who could blow up our house with ease. If she was the only girl, then there would be little merit for them to try to take her, since everything they could want her to do would likely result in their deaths. That was the danger of getting close to a person that could crush your heart with a thought.
Me on the other hand—I was powerless after the Shift. Perfect pickings for the slavers and other less reputable personages in the city. Kyle mentioned knowing my secret. I would have to find out how much he knew exactly. Just the memories of the day of the Aether Shift caused me to draw in a deep breath. Memories better left buried.
“I can hear you guys!” I shouted through the wall.
“We know,” Azaria said, popping into the room. Starburst followed a moment later, appearing out of nowhere next to her.
“Well? How do you think your government is going to take this?” Starburst asked, pointing his horn at me.
“Not sure, to be honest. This is the first time something like this has happened. At least if it hasn’t been buried under political fighting,” I answered.
“That’s not a lot of help,” Azaria said with a pout.
I shrugged, not really having anything to add. I had a feeling that Azaria tried to do something she wasn’t supposed to, and it bit her in the ass. She sighed and threw me what looked like an earring.
Scales of Illusion
- Effect One: Wearer can change their appearance once every forty-eight hours.
- Effect Two: (Passive) If in the presence of people of ill will or evil thoughts, based on wearer’s ideology, item will tingle as warning.
“Wow! This is top-dollar stuff,” I said with real enthusiasm now. It really was. Something like this would be worth anywhere from a hundred to five hundred thousand dollars on the open market. It basically alerted you to anyone wanting to sneak up on you if you used it right.
“Going back to our earlier discussions. I’ll compromise with you. Use this to lure people into my dungeon that you feel shouldn’t be around anymore. I can change your card once you use the ability of the earring to change your appearance. I still can’t guarantee your safety, but . . .”
It sounded like something was physically keeping her from talking. I really didn’t have a better option than this. I would have to pay a large sum of money to move to a new city. This would allow me to take a new appearance once every forty-eight hours. I could be anyone.
Plus, once I’d dealt with Kyle and cleared my name, I could go back to being Lance. Of course, if I raised my power high enough, I wouldn’t have to pretend anymore. Power was justice, as the saying goes. This would allow me the time to do so.
“You won’t be mad if I absorb things in the dungeon while diving it, would you?” I asked, just to clarify. I’d hate to come back to this room after a dive only to have it filled with traps.
“All things are fair while diving. If you successfully defeat something fairly, then it’s fair game.”
“Good deal. Alright! I’m in,” I said, holding out my hand to shake.
Azaria tilted her head while looking at the hand. “Are you trying to be funny?” she asked with a snort.
“It’s the thought that counts,” I said, still holding my hand out.
She looked from my face to the hand and back several times before she reached forward and acted as if she’d grasp my hand with hers. To both our surprise, her hand actually formed against mine.
Going with the flow, I shook it twice. “Pleasure doing business with you.” I gave her a grin.
~~~
Three days passed with nothing more happening. From what I understood no one had entered the dungeon yet. Likely, the Association wanted to come up with a reason for Azaria’s dungeon, or Station 64 as th
ey would have it labeled, rising from the ground. The few times I’d glanced out the window, I’d seen some of the real heavy hitters moving around in the lot in front of Azaria’s entrance.
I was pretty sure I saw Aires out there two days ago. The man was the size of a house, after all, and hard to miss. Then yesterday I swore I saw the Highlock couple. That was a husband and wife I didn’t want to cross anytime soon. The woman, Anna, or as she was known, Shield Goddess, looked right at me after I’d been watching for a less than a second. I couldn’t be sure if she realized I was a human or if she just thought I was a dungeon monster.
The real shocker was when a man dressed in black arrived this morning. He wore a sleek black suit that seemed to morph as he moved. I barely got a glance in when he looked directly at me. At that moment, I decided to find a monster that would give me Perception Awareness. I wanted to be able to tell when people were looking at me as well.
“All the people with massive Aether feelings left this morning,” Azaria said after she popped into my room.
“Thank god. I thought I was going to die when Neo looked at me a few hours ago,” I said, falling back onto the bed in my hideaway.
“Yeah. There were at least six people over the last few days that I knew could destroy my dungeon with a wave of their hand.” She wrapped her arms around her legs and spun in the air. For whatever reason, I was able to see her whenever she was in this room. I appreciated it, since it got old talking through that sourpuss of a unicorn.
“Six, I must have missed some. I only felt four,” I replied, biting my thumbnail.
“Two of them tried to hide their power, but they got too close to my field. I was able to sense them,” Azaria answered.
“Would that count as eavesdropping?” I asked, then shook my head. “Nah, it’s technically your body. They were the ones eavesdropping on you.”