Fred opened up the bag, noticing that the food inside it was carefully wrapped to preserve its freshness, and most of the meat was salted – which helped to preserve it even further. He looked in the small kitchen space, noticing that the small glass jar that held the salt was now completely empty. He used the last of it…for me.
At the bottom of the bag was a small pouch, looking very similar to the one around Regnark’s neck, including a neck strap. He quickly slipped it around his own neck, feeling a surprisingly hefty weight to it. Opening it up, he saw ten copper pieces…and one precious silver one. He picked out the silver coin, holding it in his hand and running it through his fingers.
Throwing the bag strap around his shoulder, he walked out the door, looking back one final time at the house where he learned so much…and realized he still had a lot to learn. The table now held a large gleaming pile of silver coins, containing almost 500 pieces, which covered the majority of the surface.
Exhausted from the mana expenditure, he softly closed the door to the wooden house – and closed the door to that portion of his life.
Chapter 12
Two hours into his journey south, Fred felt a strange sensation tugging at him. Although, it didn’t feel like it was pulling him toward something; it was more like it was someone or something was poking at his chest. The impression he got wasn’t insistent, like he needed to go wherever it was indicating…but it was slightly familiar.
It was off to the southeast, off the “road” he was following; he wasn’t sure what it was at first, but as he continued to travel southward and got closer to whatever it was, he suddenly knew.
It was a dungeon core.
It was the same thing he felt when he had originally traveled outside his home; the feeling back then was a lot subtler, though that might be because of his familiarity with his parents’ dungeon cores. The sensation he felt back then was more natural, as if it belonged there; this new one, however, felt very unnatural and stuck out like a sore thumb. He wasn’t sure why that was, but he wanted to find out. And maybe even acquire some information in the meantime.
He left the road, angling his path for what he was sure was a dungeon and dungeon core. The trees this far south were shorter and weren’t grown so close together, so it was easy to navigate his way through the slowly melting snowdrifts and made increasingly good time. As he got closer, he ran faster, wanting to dive right into the dungeon and demand answers. Reason and rational thought left him as he neared the dungeon, replaced with revenge and retribution.
In the distance through the trees, he spotted an unnatural formation of rocks; it was unnatural, at least, for the fact that it was in the middle of the so far rock-less forest. It didn’t look exactly like his parents’ dungeon, but it was similar enough with a small opening in the front that he recognized it for what it was.
Fred’s feet pounded over the ground, rushing full speed without a care or a plan toward the entrance. He was 50 feet away when a large grey blur shot out in front of him, stopping right in his path. At the last moment, he realized that it was a massive Dire Wolf, at least twice the size of the one that he had barely killed to the north.
????? – Level ???
That was all he got a glimpse of before he ran straight into it, a humongous paw batting him into a nearby tree. His head hit the tree at an angle, and he heard a few distant *pops* and hollow *cracks* – before his vision went dark.
* * *
Fred woke up slowly, confusion marring any of his attempts to figure out where he was. Am I back at Regnark’s place? He felt the cold seeping into his back and legs through his clothes. On second thought, I doubt it would be this cold. He opened his eyes and noticed that it was dark, the night sky full of little points of light just barely visible. He could see just fine, of course, because of his enhanced dark vision – but the confusion only deepened.
He sat up gingerly, memories of the last few moments before unconsciousness filtering through his mind finally. Where he was expecting to feel some pain in perhaps his neck or head, there was instead nothing. A quick look at his mana totals showed that they hadn’t increased at all, which meant that anything converted had been automatically used to do something else. I’m going to guess healing me.
How long was I out? He looked around, expecting to see the entrance of the dungeon he had been heading for nearby, but he saw nothing of the sort. Just more trees. The worst part, at least apart from being swatted aside by a giant Dire Wolf like a cat playing with a mouse, was he couldn’t “feel” the dungeon core anywhere near him.
His bag was fortunately right next to him, placed with what looked like care; the opening was neatly closed and facing upwards, so that nothing would come out. Fred went to grab it when he saw something in his peripheral vision.
Walking out from behind a tree, the Dire Wolf he had seen so briefly before he was so casually brushed aside strode forward, strength and deadliness echoing through every inch of its 15-foot height. Another 30 feet from nose to tail, the massive wolf looked like it could swallow him up in its jaws but only provide it a brief snack.
Where did it come from and why did it bring me here? Thoughts of being brought back to its den as some sort of meal for its giant children ran through Fred’s head, causing him to quickly look around for anything else coming for him. Not seeing anything, he turned his head back toward the advancing wolf, coming face to face with it. How did it move that fast? Even he knew that was a stupid question, considering it didn’t really matter at that point. What did matter was how he was going to get out of the situation.
I’m not going down without a fight, at least. Since the Dire Wolf (which still displayed all ???’s on its name and level) wasn’t attacking right away, he slowly – and with a steadier hand than he thought he’d have considering the situation – moved his hand down to his belt, sliding his knife out little by little. It was halfway out of the sheath when he paused, a curious sight finally registering to his mind.
Whereas most wild beasts he had seen – including the prior Dire Wolf that almost killed him – sometimes had two or more mana types inside of them, it was usually 98% of one element and only a smattering of others. Dungeon defenders, of course, were all one element; it was only the wild creatures that sometimes had two or more – and were usually Earth and Nature-based mana. This Dire Wolf, however, was different: it had two equal elements comprising its makeup.
Fire and Water.
“Very good, Fredwynklemossering. It’s about time you used your head; your parents taught you better than that.”
He sat there, frozen in shock as he heard an obviously female voice inside his head. He was pretty sure there was nobody else around – including any dungeon cores – which didn’t make any sense, because he could’ve sworn that he just heard the voice the same way he used to hear his parents speaking between themselves. He looked the Dire Wolf straight into its eyes, which was hard because its head was so big and the eyes so far apart.
“D-Did you just talk to me?”
“Yes, Fredwynklemossering, I did. I’ve been trying to contact you for months, but I haven’t been able to get close enough to initiate contact. You just happened to leave when I wasn’t expecting it, otherwise I would’ve met you outside of that village.”
What? “Uh…who are you? And when did a Dire Wolf learn how to communicate?”
“I thought that was obvious – I’m the organically converted NDCIP you Created four months ago.”
“Whoa, hold on there – back up for a moment. What are you talking about?” Fred was thoroughly confused, which was only somehow mirrored in the face of the Dire Wolf, who tilted its (her?) head to the side.
“You don’t remember Creating me as an exact duplicate of the Dire Wolf you killed 5 months, 4 days, 3 hours, and 16 minutes before? And then directing your Newborn Dungeon Core Initialization Program to inhabit my new form, using the shards from your parents’ dungeon cores to power the transfer? I do have to apologize for not mater
ializing right away, but it took nearly a week to convert the system into organic form, as it had never been done before and there was no protocol for it.”
Fred felt like passing out again; this was too much for him. He barely understood a word she was saying, but he got the gist of it. “So, wait – you’re saying I Created you? How did I do that – especially since I don’t even remember doing it?”
“The exact details of how you accomplished it is unknown even to me, though I can hazard to guess that you were thinking too many things at the time of Creation, leading to this result. I’m sorry if you are unhappy with my presence. If you like, I will deactivate this body and you can reabsorb the mana inside of me at your leisure.”
“Wait, what are you talking about? Are you saying you’d kill yourself if I wanted you to? That doesn’t make any sense.”
“I was originally Created by your wish for help to understand the system and for you to somehow bring back your parents. Unfortunately, since they had destroyed themselves in the process of eliminating the remaining dungeon defenders that had invaded, their resurrection was not possible. However, by incorporating both of their crystalline shards you had in your possession, some of their consciousness was transferred to this form.”
He hoped that meant what he thought it meant. “Does that mean I can talk to my parents?”
“Not…exactly. Their presence in my systems is more like an echo or shadow of their former selves; it’s as if they are present and can experience everything this body does, but they cannot take control. Perhaps if you upgrade this form, they may be able to do more.”
He latched onto that last part. “So, you’re saying there’s a chance to talk to them again?”
“Theoretically, though I don’t want you to consider it an option at the moment. I’m not currently powerful enough to handle that kind of consciousness conversion without destroying both myself and any part of them that might be left inside of me.”
I’ll take that as a yes. “With what you can do, do you know who killed my parents and why they did it?” Maybe it won’t be so hard to find out, after all.
“I’m sorry, it doesn’t work like that. There are brief flashes of memory that I can access, but they mean nothing without references. Perhaps something you find in the future may help with adding appropriate context.”
And I’ll take that as a no. At least not yet. Now that he knew he wasn’t going to have his head bitten off, Fred relaxed a little and stood up, grabbing his bag at the same time. “Ok, say I buy all of this…what am I supposed to call you?”
“I don’t really have a name, though I suppose you could call me NDCIP, since that is essentially what I am.”
“Uh, that’s a little bit of a mouthful, just like my full name. How about you call me Fred, and I’ll call you…Deecy? How does that sound?”
“Deecy? Dee-cy. I think I like it. Thank you for bestowing a name upon me…Fred.
“You’re very welcome, Deecy. Now, before we go on our way, I need to ask you one more tiny question.”
“Absolutely, Fred – I am here to help you by providing any knowledge you may require, as well as do what I can to protect you from danger.”
Fred smiled at the thought of another bodyguard following him around. I thought I’d never feel nostalgic for Firbey and Frozzles, but here I am. He tried to keep the smile on his face when he asked the next question. “So, if you’re here to protect me, why in the world did you try to kill me?”
Chapter 13
Fred wasn’t expecting the answer Deecy gave, but he hadn’t been expecting a lot of things over the course of the last few days – so it wasn’t that big of a surprise.
“Because you were uncontrovertibly stupid. I may have been…a little heavy-handed with my reaction, but it was the only way I could think of to stop you in the short amount of time I had. Besides, you’re fine.”
“But you tried to kill me!” He couldn’t believe that Deecy was acting so casual about the whole thing, like it was his fault that he almost died.
“You’re much harder to kill than you think you are. Due to your dungeon core heritage, as well as your Core Structure, any normally fatal damage to your body can be healed. If you lose limbs, they can be regrown. Diseases and illnesses won’t touch you, nor will many effects that deal with aging, flesh rot, or bone brittleness. Even if your head is detached from your body, it will grow back – but it will take a while.”
“So, you’re saying I can’t die?”
“I didn’t say that; you can still die in many, many ways. If you are burned to ash in a fire, your Core Structure won’t have enough solid material to work with. If you are sliced up in enough pieces and your remains are scattered far from each other, there won’t be enough cohesion to sustain regeneration. If you are squished between two walls, your remains—”
“Ok, ok – I don’t need to hear all that. Essentially, you’re saying I should try to stay away from anything that will do massive damage to my body? I can do that.” He felt a little relieved that he wasn’t as fragile as he once thought he was.
“Yes, it would be advisable to stay away from any activity that would result in that. Aside from that, though, the most likely way you could die is if you were to run completely out of mana. If mana is required to maintain your body – and you have none – it will start to consume itself, which, if you haven’t guessed, is not the most pleasant way to die.”
Until he heard that.
He thought about his botched attempt to create the Dire Wolf fur for his “disguise”; if he had ended up using even another 20 or so mana, that would’ve been it for him. He doubted that he would’ve survived long enough for Regnark to find his body, bring him inside, and nurse him back to health.
“Ok, say for a moment I believe that you didn’t try to kill me and knew I would survive the hit without permanent damage. Given that, why did you stop me in the first place?” That was – after every other revelation at least – the most important question on his mind.
“I told you, it was because you were being uncontrovertibly stupid. Going into a dungeon in your state – and by yourself – would be a death sentence. That was an Earth-element dungeon, which frequently likes to employ rock-crushing or spiked pit traps, either of which wouldn’t go well for you. You might survive falling down into a pit full of spikes, but if you couldn’t get your impaled body off of a spike, your mana would slowly drain away keeping you alive and in unimaginable pain until there was nothing left. And I already told you what happens after that.”
That stopped him cold. He had been so sure that he could just walk right in and easily bypass all of the traps, get to the dungeon core in charge of the dungeon, and demand answers. He was an expert when it came to his home dungeon’s traps and would probably be able to identify where the traps in a new dungeon were by looking at mana signatures. However, he couldn’t be sure that he would be able to successfully navigate them even if he saw it was there. In fact, when he thought about it, there had been a couple of traps back home that he had spent weeks or months memorizing the patterns for before his parents even allowed him to attempt them.
She was right – Fred was being stupid.
He was so blinded by rage and revenge and the need for the answers he wanted that he hadn’t stopped to think – he just reacted. In the end, he was actually fortunate that Deecy had stopped him before he made a colossal mistake. He wasn’t ashamed of telling her that, either; he was well aware he still had a lot to learn and wasn’t about to turn away a friend…especially since he had just lost the only one that he had.
“I’ve thought it over, and I agree that I needed to be stopped before I got to the dungeon, even if I don’t necessarily agree with the methods used. Nevertheless, I want to thank you. However, next time, try to be a little gentler with your approach – you don’t necessarily need to knock me out to get my attention.”
“You are very welcome, it’s what you Created me for. And I didn’t just knock you out;
I actually ended up breaking your neck, your back in three places, and crushed the back of your skull. Fortunately, there wasn’t major damage to your skin, so there was no major loss of blood – it was all kept internal. I would, of course, have been able to defend your recovering body from all the predators smelling your blood from miles away, but I’d just as soon not have to.”
“You’re not helping by telling me that.”
* * *
They continued Fred’s temporarily aborted journey down south, traveling through the trees instead of by road. Deecy had brought Fred’s body back up north while he had been recovering from the damage it had sustained – just out of range of the dungeon core he had sensed previously – so it wasn’t long until he felt the now-familiar sensation. Tempered by the knowledge that going into it would be suicide at this point, he acknowledged its presence but ignored it after that. However…
Dungeon World: A Dungeon Core Experience Page 9
