Anima: A Divine Dungeon Series (Artorian's Archives Book 6)

by Dennis Vanderkerken

  Still, it got everyone’s attention. Waking or no.

 

  Chapter Fourteen

  Canting was a strange experience.

  Particularly, because there was nothing to experience. The mind moved into the Core, and felt like floating through a long, dreamless slumber. It merely woke when it was time.

  The last thing Artorian remembered was closing his eyes in Jotunheim as his body shattered. His view snapped to darkness, his mind moved to the Seed Core in the Silverwood Tree. Once there, it felt akin to snacking on a nightcap and falling face first into a mountain of pillows and blankets. He was asleep right away.

  The first thing he saw when he woke back up was the inside of a hungry mouth. It was a rather big mouth. Lots of saliva, big sharp teeth. The maw was trying its sincere best to bite or chew his head off. Hard to tell. He blinked, taking a moment to re-establish himself in this A-ranked Mana body. Still Mana? Cal hadn’t Incarnated yet then. Good, he supposed.

  The maw again clenched down on him with a loud, snarling chomp. Seriously, what was trying to eat him? “Excuse me. What in Cal do you think you’re doing?”

  A very hungry and confused carnosaur jumped back when the supposed meal started to speak. The primal beast paced about, looking its prey up and down to try to understand why it wasn’t successfully eating this food. Artorian returned the look, studying the feather-coated bipedal critter. “Just what are you supposed to be? I’ve never seen something like you before. Are you from the moon?”

  The dinosaur didn’t ‘do’ speech. It hissed at him in a pattern the old man didn’t understand. Now that he considered it, where was he? He didn’t recognize the surroundings. He’d check in a moment; one problem at a time. First was checking in. Being dumped on a continent after decanting was not something he considered natural.

  Cal didn’t respond. Instead, a screen popped into being in front of him. Artorian fussed at it before even reading the message, from the gesture alone. “Is our great spirit avoiding speaking to people again? Did I not slap him hard enough last time? I swear if I have to hit the S-ranks just to do that again, I will.”

  Grumbling to himself like an old codger, he read the screen while the monster kept trying to—very unsuccessfully—bite chunks out of him.

  “Welcome back, decanted individual!

  Dani, remind me to update this screen so it shows the person’s name instead?

  This doesn’t feel like personalized writing. This is how you leave a comment on a document, right?”

  Artorian already had to knead his brow. “We’re off to a great start.”

  He skipped to the next paragraph, as the prior involved Dani and Cal having a full-on conversation.

  “We are currently in version fourteen of realm resets.

  Now, before you ask! We’ve had to do a reset at least once every decade, so far. Not having supervisors accelerated certain developments. Good news!

  You’ll have plenty to do when you’re back!”

  Artorian held the side of his head with trepidation. “Fantastic.”

  “You’ll notice many things have changed, and realms aren’t the way you left them.

  If you’re a supervisor, please have a look around before imposing your will. Access to old features have been temporarily revoked. Please focus on sealing the rest of the borked items. We should be out of the creature variants. If you’re a chosen, please feel free to go wild!

  Dani, what else was I supposed to put here?”

  The academic felt old as he suffered through this mess of an explanation. Rather than read the rest, he took the edge of the screen and hurled it at the critter that just wouldn’t stop biting at him. He didn’t feel the chomps, because the carnosaur was C-ranked, but it was annoying! *P’thunk*!

  The screen dinged the dinosaur’s skull, and the creature fell over in a twitchy daze. Wait. Really? Those screens were kinetic now? The rectangle flickered and flashed while embedded in a tree. Entirely unharmed. Wanting it back, he stretched his arm out towards it. “[Telekinesis].”

  When nothing happened, he shoved his hand to the scene again, but there wasn’t a difference. Had Pylon access been revoked? How annoying. He tried to pull up the shop and the edit screen, but neither succeeded. How was he supposed to work on items if he didn’t have the tools? “Dangit, Cal! He must have made the messages out of order, and revoked the access after telling the supers what to work on. Then completely forgot they needed one to do the other. Sounds like a Cal thing to do.”

  Moseying over, he physically tugged the screen out of the tree. The edges must be sharp, because it sliced deep. On inspection, the screen didn’t even appear to have edges. How did the darn thing work? He fiddled with it, but ended up having to scroll to the bottom before it winked out.

  {*Ding*!

  You have gained a title!

  Title gained: Administrator

  Please slot this title to gain access to features relevant to the title!}

  “Why is nothing standardized?” Artorian stared at the text that hovered in front of him before it dissipated. He felt exasperated. “Explain things, Cal! Add the what to the where? How?”

  Sound behind him made it clear that the carnosaur stirred. The massive beast was getting back to its feet, and it was clearly unhappy with the snack that had slapped it. Artorian had long lost the mood to be patient. “You behave!”

  Fielding his Aura, A-ranked pressure fell on the carnosaur with all the impact of it suddenly being *smushed* at the bottom of an ocean. The beast gasped for breath, heaving as it was unable to do that otherwise very easy and basic thing. What was a C-rank beastie even doing in Jo… was he in Jotunheim? It didn’t actually feel like it. Pulling his Aura back around himself, he rolled his shoulders as the panicked dinosaur finally managed a breath. It twitched on the ground, shivering and fearful as it was unable to cope with what just happened. The carnosaur simply didn’t have the mind for it.

  Well darn. Now he felt bad for the face chewer. “Alright… alright. Let’s have a look at you and see if you’re hurt.”

  The carnosaur was too afraid to move a muscle, doing its best to play dead as the not-prey picked it up without a shred of difficulty. Its head was moved, maw opened, eyes checked, and claws measured. The carnosaur didn’t know what feeling violated was, but it wasn’t dead, being eaten, or really being harmed. So it didn’t think about it twice until the not-prey pressed its oddly soft non-claw to its forehead.

  The dinosaur didn’t do language, until the not-prey spoke a word of power. Then, the carnosaur understood what language was. Pain shuddered through the dinosaur’s body as a new Beast Core formed as a crest right on the front of his skull. It hurt! Yet new power pulsed through his form, bulking the frame and tightening the muscles as the C-rank two creature shot straight to the zenith rank. It’s prior, minor Beast Core was consumed by the new one.

  It had been named.

  Artorian pulled his palm off the forming crystal crest. “Not a sun this time? Odd. It had always been a sun before. Still, Cal had mentioned on his screen that things were different.”

  Best to just assume that meant nothing was the same, and he needed to learn the ways of the world all over again. Including the ‘title’ thing. He could swear that had come up before… something about his chosen having a lineage?

  He snapped his fingers as the information came easily when he called upon it. The nap had clear and distinct results, and his memories were clear as day. “Titles!”

  He remembered now. Still, that didn’t tell him how to apply them. He crossed his arms, and glanced over to the writhing dinosaur that was going through adaptive changes. He nodded at the positive alterations. “Looks like that went smoothly. Can you understand me now, Voltekka?”

  Vol got to his feet, head shaking as clarity filled his eyes. Sapience had kicked his door down as the dinosaur grew entirely new brain matter. In addition to increased intellect, the new
raw size and power increase streamlined his form. Teslaic force rolled from his legs, and crackling energy emanations similar to Odin’s freely blitzed across his feathers and skin. The effect formed lines of bright teal energy between individual feathers when he had a shake.

  Vol blinked at Artorian.

  He had been addressed, but wasn’t up to speed with what he had been asked. He needed to be faster. The desire roiled through his connection, and the adaptive energy still coursing through Vol followed suit and streamlined him further. The electricity internalized, vastly improving the carnosaur’s reaction speed, ability to notice and process, and physical mobility.

  The Administrator gave the dino plenty of time getting his bearings as Vol siphoned some power from him. Artorian was working through his own problems. Mainly, how to slot this blasted title. “Slot Title. No? Open Menu. Also no. Title list! Nothing… uhhh.”

  He tried to enter the senate, heard static, and found he could not. “Oh come. On. Let something work.”

  Vol fell over several times during his improvement phase of the chosen connection. His building muscle adjusted, and readjusted as he suffered through the transfer progress of Mana trading down to Essence, while that Essence smothered him in cascading power.

  He felt like a fresh-hatched, learning how to walk again. Except that his basic trudge now was now as fast as his previous, wildest, outright run. Vol broke trees as he rolled, thrashing around and flattening a broad section of the local thick jungle.

  Artorian said nothing as it reminded him of his own Long problems. Oh. Right. He needed to work on that as well. “Titles. List. Options. Cal toys. Status. Bl—oh, that worked!”

  With the correct keyword, Artorian’s personal status popped up as a screen before him. He jumped for joy and punched the sky. His exuberance cleared the cloud layer above, a literal hole opening from the exertion of his Mana. He should be careful with that. He was at maybe a B-ranked… nothing? Why could he not feel his own rank, or how much Mana he had stored?

  This felt awful.

  Relief rolled over him when he saw the information listed on the screen he had just pulled up. Finally, something to work with!

  Player: Artorian.

  Body: A-rank zero.

  Reserves: A-rank zero.

  Last used ability: Naming a Chosen.

  Artorian scratched his head, crossing his arms after as he could only see a little of the screen at a time. “‘Player’? What is that about?”

  Was Cal considering them as pawns in a game? He wouldn’t put it past the dungeon. Scrolling down, he found there was much more information on the screen, but he couldn’t make heads or tails on what half of it meant. “This is organized incredibly poorly. Oh, there it is. Titles!”

  Moving a digit to try and press something, the relevant section lit up. Another one of those message screens popped into view nearby as well. Joined by Cal’s voice playing a recorded clip.

  }Please slot the desired title from the list!

  Titles can be combined for special effects, when I get it to work.}

  “That one even has a backward bracket! Fix your notifications!” Given he had no other options available in the list he was shown, Artorian pressed down on ‘Administrator.’ A screen asking if he was sure appeared when he did so. The prompt asked a simple yes or no confirmation, so he went ahead and pressed yes. Then, he felt ‘normal’ again. “Ahhhh, there we go.”

  He could feel his Mana, his rank, the senate access, the editing ability, and all his tools return to his fingertips as if he’d just remembered how to do all of those things properly. “Oooof. What a feeling. That’s dangerous. Revelations like that could be downright addicting.”

  He rolled his arms and shoulders, getting a feel for the A-rank zero body. It felt natural, moved as he remembered it, and could do the things he wanted it to. He hovered up and made a stairway of light platforms in a circular pattern. Drafting a stairway to heaven so he could stand on his homemade lookout tower to find where he was. “Midgard. Definitely Midgard.”

  He looked down, and saw Vol still having a rough time. Poor baby, he’d naturalize eventually. “Kiddo! You take your time, alright? Just let me know when you’re feeling better. You’re going to feel like aces when you can be out and ab—”

  Vol bashed his face into a tree and roared in pain. Artorian backtracked his plan and hopped down, grabbing the panicked creature. He effortlessly pulled the carnosaur’s head into his lap, sitting down cross-legged with the reborn baby. Artorian tenderly brushed his hand over the heavily breathing boy’s feathered head. “Never mind. There’s not a chance in Cal I’m letting you do this alone. This is far more difficult on you than I thought it was going to be, so I’m going to be here until you’re okay.”

  The size difference between them felt awkward. Artorian thought of a solution, and molded his Mana like he did in order to form the owl wings. Save that he formed a full-body copy of himself, merely in a far larger size of his current shape. The idea was similar to the construct form he’d made for Cy. When he formed the larger body, Artorian diminished the golden luminance of the light construct so as not to blind his boy.

  After the size increase, Vol’s head lay in a lap that could easily hold it snug. The dinosaur had been afraid. Afraid and in pain. He still thrashed, but caring hands kept him close. The harm stopped as soothing warmth rolled off the bright creature currently holding him. The heat felt nice, reminding him of lying in the clutch when he was young.

  Vol stopped thrashing, feeling sleepy only a moment before conking out. Artorian proudly kept him tight. “It might be the only technique I got right, but heavens is it useful. You have a good nap, my boy. I promise, you will feel better when you wake up.”

  Something else roared nearby.

  Artorian glanced over to see a Tyrannotitan charging him. To the massive predator’s sight, the glowing object didn’t seem scary, and a sleeping snack was laying in its lap! The charging predator didn’t get very far, as a luminous hand squeezed its approaching trap shut. Turning that roar into a half-hearted *flurp*.

  Creatures in the vicinity learned it was a great idea to give that particularly bright spot some space, as a Tyrannotitan took speedy space flight lessons away from that location. The carnivore was hurled all the way to another realm, screaming before it broke out of the Midgardian orbit. Artorian vented his frustrations, yelling after it while shaking his fist, though it was long out of earshot. “Jaws off my baby!”

  Chapter Fifteen

  A few days later, Artorian perched on a light platform high in the air, watching Vol hunt. The newly renamed ‘Teslasaur’ had figured out how to dim his bioluminescence today, and was successfully pulling off a stalking. Grand!

  Vol hunched down, cautiously lurked, and lunged! Artorian made tiny squeaking jumps, clapping his hands together as his boy successfully landed himself his own meal! “Wonderful! So proud of you.”

  Fleshy chunks were torn out of a dinosaur Artorian didn’t know the name for. He winced, deciding he didn’t need to see the whole event of Vol eating. The Beast Core creature had needed but a scant few days to get a grasp on what he now was. Vol didn’t quite have the mind of his other chosen, but his instincts were sharp. Perhaps it would come over time.

  Artorian didn’t have a solid grasp on how long it had taken Halcyon, he hadn’t been around for that. He’d hopefully have better luck with Tekka here.

  Still, Vol was all set to be on his own now. He could defend himself, hunt, and roam free. Granted, he was roaming free at Mach one. From zero to zoom if Vol wasn’t careful, since he caused thunderclaps by taking off into hunting sprints. On the upside, that electric bite of his paralyzed prey, but that effect barely had time to register. Between the speed and power of the bite, he swiftly killed what he chomped.

  Artorian turned, wondering what to do first now that nursemaiding had concluded. Vol wasn’t even paying attention to him anymore. The hungry boy was a creature of independence, and the wild. This T
eslasaur was not one to linger in the nest.

  Artorian tried to enter the senate, and *tsk’d*. Static. Still static. He had access, but the senate wasn’t functional, and neither were the forums. He wasn’t able to initiate private connections, and his personal methods equally just fuzzed over. No dice on communication. Next plan. Where to next… aha!

  A beacon!

  Artorian ran through the sky, veering straight down to an overgrown, dirt-covered teleportation pad. It was unpowered, and seemed to be dead. Still, progress! Continents were so dang spacious, so he was elated to have found something he recognized. Kneeling onto the beacon, he hurriedly brushed it off with his hands. Clearing dirt off so the entire platform became uncovered. He could have used Mana for it, but only thought about it after he was already done.

  Though, the last time he’d shifted his Aura to a starlight configuration, the plants in his surroundings had eaten it up. Flora had begun to spontaneously mutate, and that section had to be burned down for… safety reasons. A large toothy lizard with lightning in its blood? Sure! Plant life that could eat said toothy lizard and reproduced faster than he committed stupidities? Nyope!

  So, how to power a dead beacon? Don’t suppose he could just… shove some Mana into it? He stepped a foot down, and spiked some of his power in.

  *Fuff*.

  Artorian blinked. Floating in space. “What? How did I end up in the middle of nowhere?”

  He checked his surroundings like he had done when stuck in The Between. Oh! This is where the moon used to be! The orbit path seemed right, it was just the actual moon that had been placed elsewhere. Yup, it was over yonder now. Still, he didn’t land on a beacon. Had the network just saved the space coordinate of where it would have been? Why not bring him to another active beacon?