Dungeon Configure: Book One Dark Exchange

by Troy Neenan

  With a flick of his fingers, David pulled out the note that he had gotten back from the dungeon.

  Gold is tough to make, need ingredients.

  While he was dancing around the hospital, the Dungeon and the Core had been exchanging messages. It had been the usual stuff at first, how the Core was able to access the storage space, why did the dungeon have human remains inside it.

  This went back and forth with neither David gaining any real information on the other's life so far. Eventually, the David’s came up with an agreement.

  The Core would send over everything that he could get his hands on. Rubbish, materials, and aluminium for some reason. The dungeon, in turn would turn those items into gold and other valuable items. The deal made, all that the Core needed to do was gather material.

  The idea of bringing in Cassidy had been a last minute thought. David was under no delusions that he could survive alone. Without any ID he needed help if he planned to get his old life back, and having a future lawyer owe you one wasn't a bad idea. Sadly, Cassidy was a wreck.

  Surprisingly, Judith took the lead. Her little head went this way and that, examining the shadows for any signs of threats. For being born yesterday she seemed incredibly mature, much more than her master who jumped every time there was a creak.

  When they got to the room, David had been expecting the smell to be truly horrendous, like rotting fridge meat, and while it was true that the room had a funk to it, it wasn't any worse than what it had been the other day. The bodies hadn't had time to decompose to that extent.

  Seeing the death and destruction that he had brought to this place, David took in a breath to steel himself. He didn't know if it was because of the dungeon's influence or because it was his own cynical self, but he didn't freak out at seeing the four corpses in the room.

  He moved to the real Judith. She had stolen from him, had laughed as her brother nailed him over the head with a cricket bat, and she had ran without seeing if he was okay. Did she deserve to die? David didn't know. For all he knew the pair had done this before and had killed some poor sod.

  He leaned down and tried to absorb the woman.

  Item is too big to put into storage.

  He had been afraid of that, which was the reason that he had confiscated one of the bone saws from the hospital.

  As he began to dissemble Judith's body, David wondered what he was doing. This was not him. He wasn't some deranged psychopath who sawed off limbs. He wasn't a butcher of men. Before entering that cave the only thing that he had ever cut up was a steak.

  He didn't feel good about what he was doing. The dried blood and the horror around him didn't give him a hard-on or gave him some sort of sick thrill. He attempted to try and place this feeling to something similar and what he found made him physically shudder. This was like mowing his backyard, an exercise no different than grooming or brushing his teeth.

  “This is wrong,” he said to himself.

  Judith watched as her creator began to dissemble her mother into smaller pieces, not understanding the reason for his actions. It wasn't until her creator held her mother's severed hand and caused it to disappear that she began to understand his reasons.

  The little girl moved to the body of her first victim. The old man's body just sat there, his face contorted in confused shock. She looked at him for a moment and then summoned her bone spikes.

  The sounds of angry hissing caught David's attention and distracted him from his grisly work. He watched in awe as the little girl jabbed at her uncle's ankle and smoke started to rise up from the wound.

  “It is so deeply disturbing that this is our first father daughter moment,” David said.

  Chapter Sixteen

  The landscape had changed greatly since the last time Zellio'zeri had been here. The first time that she had entered David's little realm there was a blanket of swirling fog and only place of interest was a small table.

  Now the tree found herself in what appeared to be a grand temple that was far superior to any unnatural construction that her primitives had made. She looked up at the high ceiling where strange clusters of fireflies hung, their luminescence so powerful that it caused the cave, or whatever this structure was to look as though it was day time.

  Instead of grass, her naked feet touched upon the skin of some tremendous beast. The creature's oddly red fur tickling her toes. She tried to imagine how large the creature could have been for its hide to stretch across the entire floor.

  Music the likes that she had never heard filled the cavern. It was thicker than the sound of the wind which whistled through her branches, and the tone of the melody was unlike the music that even her finest song birds could produce. She attempted to find the composers of this odd music, but the sounds seemed to come from the room itself.

  And at the centre of all of this madness was David.

  The little cave had changed much since the last time the pair had met. David had become less wide and his face no longer contained the ghastly wounds of his previous incarnation, but despite all of the changes, Zellio'zeri could tell who she was dealing with. The male dungeon sat on a cushioned chair and instead of a wooden table from before, now he sat behind a large slab of clear glass on metal legs.

  David smiled when he saw the tree, and Zellio'zeri could not help it but smile back. “Hello,” he said.

  “Hello,” the tree replied. Zellio'zeri marvelled at how much information could be shared with just a simple greeting. It was such a novel thing. The amount of feeling that two people could express with one primitive grunt was, in the tree's opinion, incredible.

  David gestured to his realm, “Like what I have done?”

  “Very. To have made this in such a short amount of time. David, you will have to tell me your secret.”

  “It's nothing. This is a replica of a hotel that I visited. I got rid of the slot machines and most of the furniture. It's pretty Spartan now that I look at it. How's the music? Too loud or do you want me to change it to this?” David snapped his fingers and instead of an orchestra playing, the sounds of nature could be heard.

  Birds chirping, animals moving silently, the sound of insects buzzing around. Zellio'zeri disliked it immediately. The sounds were accurate but they failed to grasp the true majesty of her realm. It felt distilled and synthetic, like when her primitives attempted to recreate an animal's call. “I prefer the music before.”

  The music changed and the tree felt her mood lighten. “I see that you have also managed to heal. I trust that your battle went well.”

  “What battle?” David said.

  “The reason that you had to have that monster. You were in the middle of a fight with what you called... Droog Atics.”

  “Oh oh. Yeah, that um. That was a good fight. Thank you for that by the way.” Settling down he waved his hand and couch appeared. The dungeon had considered something made out of leather but decided that comfort was better than style. “Care to take a seat?”

  This couch was from his memories. The piece of furniture might not have looked like much but David had gone to sleep on it far too many times to count. You couldn't do that with leather, it was too business-like.

  Zellio'zeri sat down and her eyes bulged. The item didn't look like much and it wasn't as soft as the previous chair had been, but this definitely had potential. “Are we to play another game, David? I trust that you have brought something that isn't as terribly diseased as the pitiful creature you had before.”

  “I do have something. You said that I had several cards that you were interested in. Would you be interested in trading?”

  Unnamed, rogue dungeon has sent you a trade agreement. Do you accept?

  “How is it that you can send me these bizarre formal requests? And how is it that I can understand them?” Though she would never admit it, the tree found herself feeling undereducated whenever she read such polite and refined letters. She also had no idea why David was unnamed or the reason behind his rogue title.

  “That
's probably my speciality. Before I became a dungeon I read a lot of fantasy books called LitRPGs and I think that it shaped my dungeon. Are you interested in these?” David pulled out his deck and placed it on top of the table.

  The glass surface glowed and showed the image of several bags of compost. Instead of a puny little card the image took up the entirety of the table.

  “No one likes a show off, David,” Zellio'zeri said. The tree was growing incredibly frustrated at this whelp's abilities to manipulate and furnish his realm. He was clearly going out of his way to impress the older dungeon, and Zellio'zeri was trying her hardest not to be.

  David smiled and wiped the glass slate with his hand, showing the image of a European wasp. “This is how you select the item.”

  “Now what did I just say?” The tree gazed down at the glass and copied her host's actions. “You have gathered many seeds since the last time that we met. Fruits, grasses, vegetables...” she hesitated when she saw the piles of dung that the Core had gathered. Despite his young age, David had amassed a number of fine valuables. “And may I ask what you would like for these items?”

  While Zellio'zeri did not have an understanding of trade routes, she had noticed that in the Great War that the pig-noses would trade her beloved forest animals and wood for spices and pieces of metal.

  David placed a small yellow disk onto the table, “I'm looking for this kind of metal.”

  Zellio'zeri examined the gold coin. Using her dungeon's abilities she instantly knew what the metal was. She decided to hold back that information however, “And this metal, what is your interests in it?”

  “The dumbarses of my world view it as a rare resource. It has almost no practical applications but is prized for its rarity. I intend to gather as much of it as I can and trade it for other goods which I can sell to you.” He left out the part where he would spend the majority of the gold on several blondes and a small hot tub.

  “Hmm,” David's explanation matched what Zellio'zeri knew about the metal in question. The metal's very existence had brought the tree nothing but pain and misery to her domain. She would have given a mountain of it to David just to be rid of the substance, but why do that when she could get something valuable from the diabolical metal?

  The tree went back to the card which contained the animal dung and compost. She then searched through her own deck and drew out a card containing an old chest that was made from the flesh of a tree she had once known. The very sight of it filled her with righteous anger.

  “Here,” she said throwing the card at David as if holding it physically hurt her. “For the dung and this compost.”

  David picked up the card and coughed as he viewed the contents. The entire thing was jammed packed filled with ancient gold coins that were so old that the metal had fused together into a block.

  Misunderstanding her host's expression, Zellio'zeri asked, “Is it not enough?” she had more, of course. The dungeon had gone to great lengths to bury the cursed things into vast stockpiles which lay forgotten within the pig-noses' crumbling cities, may they became dust.

  “I think we're good.” David said, trying to hide his giddiness.

  The compost and manure had only cost the Dungeon Core two hours. Human David had guessed that the tree would find it interesting. Animals shit in the woods all the time, but they are just recycling plants. And if she didn't want the animal dung, well his dungeon could find a use for it.

  David decided to ask another question, “Are you interested in the seeds?”

  The tree examined the unborn flowers and trees. It wasn't so much as a desire to have them in her arsenal as deciding the best place to put them. Her realm was all about balance and introducing foreign vegetation could upset her ecology. Then again, allowing such items to slip through her fingers would have been a mistake of epic proportions. Growing anything new took an absurd amount of time.

  This time it was Zellio'zeri who decided to experiment with what she could get away with. The rotten pig-noses had not just harvested the cursed metal from her domain but unusual stones as well. These stones had no value to the tree as they did nothing to add in the development of her creatures or plants. She decided to test her host.

  “I have gathered some interesting items, David. Please tell me if you are interested in trading all the seeds that you have for these. She pushed forward a single card containing a diamond earring.

  David looked at the antique. Realising what it was that he was seeing the Dungeon AI made a sound like he had a week's worth of constipation and he was trying to squeeze out a small brown baby. “I have no idea. I can check, but this is pretty old. Toss in a few more gold coins and you got a deal.” He honestly had no idea what the earring was worth. The thing looked older than Jesus and time had not treated it well.

  Both parties took their cards, feeling that they got the better of the deal. “I really thought that that would take longer,” David said.

  “I am a tree, David. A century is a blink of an eye to me. I will say that it has been... Interesting talking to you again.” She paused for a moment to look at her body. This was such a rare moment for her, to be able to feel as an animal did, to move as one of her primitives. She pondered what other sensations could she enjoy.

  She decided to just ask, “Do you want to mate?”

  ***

  Cassidy‘s attending doctor watched as the Dungeon Core placed his hands on his patient’s stomach. As a man of science he thought the idea of super powered healing was ludicrous. Then again, it was equally unbelievable that a woman who had suffered second and third degree burns over the majority of her face could now smile without it being the stuff of nightmares.

  David looked over Cassidy’s body. She was still wrapped in enough layers of bandages that a bed sheet caused the aspiring lawyer to find it difficult to relax. “So, are you interested?”

  Even if she was dealing with the devil himself, Cassidy would have gotten down on her knees and begged the Dungeon Core to restore her to her former glory, but she wasn't dumb enough to agree to anything that she didn't have to. “What's the pay?” were the first words she asked.

  With a flick of his fingers David produced a gold coin; he juggled it between his fingers and then returned it to his storage. “The role will be my personal assistant. You'll need to get a contract signed up. Basically, I give you a budget for the year, your pay and any expenses can come out of that. You can get every Saturday and Sunday off. You can also get your own staff. You can blow the whole budget on shoes for all I care, but anything I want, you get.”

  Cassidy would have preferred something more stable. A nine to five job at minimum wage would have been appropriate; this arrangement gave her new employer too much control over her life. “And I suppose you want…” she held back her snarky reply. At this stage if this guy wanted a blowjob every morning than that was just a price she paid.

  Defeated, she let out a sigh, “What's my budget?”

  “I have no clue.” David said and found it amazing how someone without eyebrows could express such bitter agitation. “Listen, this is going to be a learning experience for both of us. We'll play with it for six weeks and tweak it. Deal?”

  Cassidy’s phone played a catchy girl band song that had this effect of burning its way into people's brains. She ignored it. “Do I have a choice?”

  “You tell me. I'm not the one who has to wear a bra.”

  Cassidy looked down at her breasts or what remained of them. She hadn't been particularly proud of her chest, but even a pair of B-cups was better than what she had now. She turned her head away, “Alright. Hit me with whatever you got.”

  You have received a new ally. Cassidy Sasca has agreed to become your assistant for an undetermined amount of time.

  Name: Cassidy Hepburn Sasca

  Race: Human

  Profession: Student

  Job: Assistant.

  You have unlocked the job: Personal Assistant.

  Personal assistants are the r
ight hands to both kings and servants. Their existence is to make their master's job easier. For dungeons, assistants are able to work outside of your domain and are responsible for bringing in prey and resources.

  You are able to communicate with your assistant outside of your domain.

  You have unlocked profession. Student.

  Studying is the backbone of perfection. Before the greatest blacksmith raised his first hammer and arch mages threw their first spell, they studied their art. Remember, there is always something to learn.

  Before they take up a trade, professed students are able to learn from multiple disciplines. Under your influence, Cassidy will be able to learn new facts and skills at triple her usual speed. You earn 2 research points a day in the study of her choice.

  Cassidy saw that her new employer had stiffened up, “Problem?”

  “No, no. I'm good.” David said.

  He had not expected to obtain an upgrade just by hiring somebody. The concept alone had caused all manner of thoughts and ideas to cross his mind, namely the idea of hiring a professional sex worker on his permanent staff. Would they somehow transfer some kind of super sex ability to his dungeon? Would it cause the possible slimes that inhabited his dungeon to get kinky?

  He decided to leave that question for later and focus his attention on his new subordinate.

  David placed his fingers on Cassidy’s stomach and closed his eyes. What happened was immediate.

  The bandages that wrapped around the student's body evaporated. No smoke, they simply turned to vapour and were sucked into the dungeon's storage space. Both the attending doctor and Cassidy were left open mouthed as they watched the impossible happen before them.

  Then that hellish itching feeling happened again.

  “Oh, shit. Forgot about that,” Cassidy cursed as she braced herself for thirty minutes of torture. She had thought that it had been just a fluke but it was starting to look as if the itching was a by-product of the supernatural healing process.