by Marc Robert
Marc Robert
Legendary Dungeon Seed (Book 1)
A Dungeon Core Monster Girl Fantasy
First published by Other Earth Press 2020
Copyright © 2020 by Marc Robert
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, scanning, or otherwise without written permission from the publisher. It is illegal to copy this book, post it to a website, or distribute it by any other means without permission.
This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author's imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.
First edition
This book was professionally typeset on Reedsy
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Contents
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Help Me Create --> LEGENDARY DUNGEON SEED
Born Again
Forged In A Falling Star
Soul Stats
Clobbered
The Dungeon Sprite
Ravenous Mushrooms
Spells & Skills
Monster Menu
The Curse
Night Of The Living Demon!
Dungeon Type
¡ Scrambled !
Old Friend
Amanita Muscaria
First Thrall
Acknowledgements
Help Me Create --> LEGENDARY DUNGEON SEED
Facebook Groups
LitRPG Group
Behind-The-Scenes Secrets #7 ... “Prophecy”
About the Author
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Help Me Create --> LEGENDARY DUNGEON SEED
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Born Again
Osman Spar’s Soul Stats flickered to life before his eyes.
The game? … What am I still doing inside the game?! the young man thought. I had just … I had …
He had just been killed by a demon, of all things, on that muddy road between The Esk’lyn Wood and The White Keep, which meant that he should have been automatically logged out of Other Earth.
So then: how did he end up here, in this cavernous room?
Had he …
… had he died for real?
Like … IN THE REAL WORLD?!
Or had he somehow been transported to some other level of the game entirely?
His Soul Stats flickered again, the letters and numbers wavering in the air before him as if beset by some glitch or ghostly interference, before solidifying at last:
Name: Osman Spar
Race: Dungeon Core
Mana: 0 / ∞ (MP)
Health: 50 / 50 (HP)
Class: Crafter
Level: 1
Rank: Novice
Alignment: Chaotic
Primary Skill: Sorcery
Innate Abilities:
(1) Night Vision
(2) Soul Scrying
Minions:
(1)
(2)
(3)
Thralls:
(1)
(2)
(3)
Items:
Hooded Cloak (black); Tunic (black); Trousers (black)
Cursed Mana Core (Dungeon Core) (1)
“Oh no … ” Osman whispered, “This is not what I meant. This is not what I meant AT ALL when I wished that I had taken that dungeon sprite up on her offer!”
He stared down at himself.
Where were his white paladin’s robes … and all his items? His bear-skin satchel? His belt and scabbard? His boots??? (He was barefoot!) Where was his rune-sword?! Light-Bringer!!! He had worked so hard to convince Sir Karras to entrust him with that sword.
WTF?!
He was back at Level 1 again!
And … he was cursed!!
He was a living dungeon!!!
That’s right: he was this place — and the person who was meant to rule over this place — all rolled into one. But with zero Mana Points to work with! This had to be some kind of cosmic joke …
Osman focused inward, opening his mind’s eye, and brought up the logout screen, which — after glitching in and out for a few heart-stopping seconds — managed to replace his damning new Soul Stats in the dank air before him. He could feel himself starting to panic, his breath seizing in his chest. But everything was gonna be all right. Everything was gonna be just fine! The logout screen was there now and it seemed like the game still worked like it should and so he focused his mind on the exit button and elected to go.
To get the hell out.
Now!
… Right now!!
But …
But nothing happened!
He tried it again, but …
… still nothing!!!
No response …
And then he saw it — the exit button — it wasn’t white, like it should be, but grayed out!
“Ohfuckohshitohfuckohshitohfuckohshit,” he whispered, “This isn’t happening! This CAN’T be happening!!!”
But it was happening.
Just then, as if on cue, some old school, 8-bit theme music started to play. Synthy Castlevania type stuff. Pretty retro, to be honest. But it frightened Osman nonetheless.
The logout screen suddenly disappeared in a puff of white smoke accompanied by a little “gust of wind” sound effect. And then, as if descending from the heavens itself, a huge logo scrolled down out of the pitch black directly above Osman’s head: LEGENDARY DUNGEON SEED it read in blocky gold letters.
The young man took a step back so that he could see the words more clearly.
No! Effin’!! Waaaaay!!!
It was EXACTLY what he had wished for. (And exactly what he hoped WASN’T happening right now!)
The retro theme music suddenly changed tempo and the logo faded away, replaced by a simple prompt:
{Would you like to start a new game?
YES / NO}
Osman’s jaw dropped.
You can’t be serious …
His whole entire body screamed “NOOOOO!”
NO …
… NO! …
… NO, NO …
NOOOOOOO!
(HELLS NO!!!)
But it didn’t really seem like he had a choice.
He looked around at his surround
ings, really looked at them for the first time. He was in a large, cavernous room — some kind of underground chamber. It was pitch dark, yet: he could see in the dark. There was the sound of water dripping off in the distance somewhere: that slow kind of drip …
… drip …
… drip, drip …
… drip that could destroy one’s sanity if one had to spend all of eternity all alone listening to it and only it, day in and day out, forever and ever and ever.
Osman shuddered at the thought.
The air smelled wet and moldy. He sniffed at it, wrinkling his nose, then peered around at the rough, uneven walls made out of what appeared to be … rubble? It was as if a once-opulent stone temple had collapsed and fallen into the bowels of the earth itself and he was standing in the hollowed-out ruins of what remained.
Was there really no way out?
The cavernous room was roughly circular in shape, but Osman saw no doors, nor tunnels, nor openings of any kind.
And then he looked up at the ceiling. And, as soon as he did, he really wished that he hadn’t looked up at the ceiling. It was FULL OF STALACTITES! Dozens upon dozens of menacing stalactites of varying lengths and sizes all smiling down upon him like an uneven bed of spikes about to impale his body.
Osman quickly shifted his gaze from the stalactites to his bare feet. This whole room would make a pretty cool reverse spiked pit trap, he thought, but right now it felt more like a threat to him than something he could shape or harness. He wiggled his toes, then rocked back on his heels on the cold stone floor of the cavernous room. He closed his eyes and pressed the palm of his hand to his chest and breathed through his nose, tried to focus on his breathing.
After a moment or two, he opened his eyes again — a little bit calmer now — and caught sight of a shiny black puddle that had formed on the floor from the water dripping down from the ceiling. Osman walked over to it, cocking his head, wondering if the water (or, what he thought was water) was drinkable or not …
He glimpsed his own reflection then, in the shiny puddle: short, spiky brown hair cut high and tight and hazel eyes, his brow furrowed. A slight smile crossed his lips and then he grimaced. But the smile … that smile lingered on the reflection of his face for a second or two longer than it technically should have.
That was weird!
Maybe the game really was glitchy, Osman thought. Or maybe his mind was playing tricks on him?
But it didn’t matter. He could deal with whatever it was later. The most important thing right now was that he still looked like his real-world self, even though his race and class had been drastically altered by whatever the hell had just happened to him when he died.
The young man knew that having an avatar that resembled his real-world self was par for the course for other Other Earth games as well — that a player almost always started a new module in a body that reflected his or her own real-world one — so it didn’t surprise him. In fact, it actually reassured him a little. If LEGENDARY DUNGEON SEED operated like the majority of Simulah Corp.’s other games, then Osman knew there would be some more radical physical options and evolutions in his near future — if he elected to play, that is. Maybe he COULD do this after all …
He sniffed at the air: it was musty, and it stank of moldering things, but at least there was air. At least he could still breathe. At least he was … STILL ALIVE. And maybe that was it … What had his Soul Stats said? That he had 50 Health Points. So his body was still living — his body AND his mind — at least in the game, anyway.
No mana though …
But still, at least he could see his stats. Check them … Work with them … That was something! And definitely enough for him to get started.
Osman bit his lower lip and tried to think things through, then he dug around inside the pockets of his unfamiliar new trousers until he found it: his mana core.
It should not have been outside of his body, of course … but there it was!
And it was not the brightly-colored gemstone that it should have been either, but opaque, its surface clouded, oddly-marbled: cursed! It was a dungeon core now, and his soul was bound to it, trapped inside the marbled gem. He held it in the palm of his hand and peered down at it and thought about what to do. Then he put the core safely back into his left pocket and looked up at the prompt again:
{Would you like to start a new game?
YES / NO}
He clacked his teeth together, deliberating.
Maybe he could PLAY his way through this …
Like everyone else, he had heard the horror stories of players getting stuck inside Other Earth or one of Simulah’s other full-dive VR-MMORPGs. It did happen. Not very often, of course; but it did happen. But usually when it did, it only lasted a couple of seconds, or a few minutes tops, until the AI detected that something was wrong and fixed whatever glitch or bug was causing the error.
More recently though, there had been some players who reported being trapped for a few hours, or even a few days, in the game. But those were fringers who played using sub-par or homemade gear rather than the official, Simulah-brand haptic suits with the big, white “Ö” emblazoned on the chest. And even THAT was super-rare. Although, it did happen! And it did happen enough, and had been in the news enough, that he and Kendall had actually talked multiple times about what they would do if it ever happened to either of them.
Kendall Raines was the girl of Osman’s dreams. She was smart as a whip and cute as hell with a little athletic body, perfect breasts, and a mischievous lopsided grin. And of course, being as smart as she was, she kinda already knew that Osman was totally in love with her. And he knew that she knew it, especially after his interest in her had caused a major rift between him and his best friend, Bock. However, even after all that, Osman and Kendall still hung out a couple times per week and played Other Earth or did other things … but just as friends!
Although Osman was intent upon changing that. In fact, it was his current mission in life.
He didn’t intend to be friend-zoned forever!!!
Ending up stuck inside the game as a dungeon core was admittedly a bit of a set back, of course; but still …
When they had talked about it in the real world a few months ago, Kendall had said that if it was her who got stuck in the game, she’d probably pee in her pants right then and there, which had made them both laugh. But then they got serious. And they had even made a plan. They both vowed that, if one of them ever got trapped like that, the other one would come and find them — maybe not to rescue them per se, because probably that was something only the AI could do — but at least find them and stay with them, to help them through the situation as much as they could.
That’s one of the things Osman loved so much about her. Kendall had a good heart — she was a kind soul — who tried to help anyone and everyone she could, no matter what. And so he was certain that as soon as she realized that he was missing, and that he was somewhere inside the game, she would come and find him just like they had agreed to do, and then everything would be just fine.
Osman took a deep breath thinking about that and felt even more calm.
He wanted to believe it.
He had to believe it.
And, if he did believe it, then the best thing he could do was to just start playing this new Dungeon Seed module. Otherwise, Kendall would NEVER be able to find him, because right now he was just in this … this limbo-place — totally off the grid — buried under a ton of rocks and rubble. Entombed, so to speak. (For sure, the irony of that was not lost on him, him being a living dungeon now and all.)
So, without any more second-guessing, he reached out and tapped the glowing white {YES}, even though his body still screamed HELLS NOOOOO!, and the theme music suddenly shifted, this time to something decidedly more … funereal. A real deep, dark orchestral dirge, but slowed down — way, waaaaay down — subterranean.
And it was the onset of this ultra-bleak theme music that caused Osman to remember the dungeo
n sprite whom he had met in The Esk’lyn Wood only a few hours ago. She had been mind-meltingly hot with close-cropped hair and a slim body and perky breasts that curved upwards. The feeble attempt at a bra that she wore was really just two bright green leaves held together by an old piece of twine. And her panties — if you could even call them that — were composed of the exact same material: one tiny green leaf strung between her pale thighs.
Osman’s eyes had roved over her body as he shook her hand. He and Kendall always played Other Earth in “lewd mode,” which meant that they had seen LOTS of steamy things during their time in-game, but the dungeon sprite was on a whole other level! Osman had never encountered anyone quite like her before, whether in Other Earth or anywhere else for that matter.
