Three weeks passed before I was able to fill my entire cave. In that time I had done nothing but expand, not even talking to Emily. I must have filled and emptied my pattern several hundred times to complete the job. Though I was proud of my progress, I was terrified of how long it would take to advance further. With a soul full of pride at a job well done I decided to look around my cave and inspect my territory.
My cave was a little bigger than I expected. The ceiling of my cave was about ten feet high and littered with stalactites, it was smaller in surface area than my floor. The ceiling was around fifteen an a half feet across in both length and width. Many of the stalactites had water dripping from them onto a few of the stalagmites below. The walls of my cave were concave, with the top extending further than the base. They were rough and full of holes, ranging from a few feet in diameter to tiny holes only large enough for a few insects. Near the back of my cave there was a small hole that water was trickling through. The water was flowing down a small mound into a pond below. It flowed just fast enough to keep the pond full but not overflowing. The floor of the cave was twenty feet in length and twenty five feet in width. It was mostly in the shape of a circle, with a few irregularities throughout. The mouth of the cave was mostly free of any debris, having only a few stalagmites. However, from the rear to the halfway point the floor was littered with just enough stalagmites to make it almost impassable. The pond along the back wall was five feet in diameter and roughly half a foot deep. It contained crystal clear water which was stuffed full of minerals. My core was a foot from the pond, just to the side of the mound with the flowing water.
After inspecting the layout of my cave I spread my awareness to search for anything new. I was shocked to discover a few bugs and a strange flying creature. There was also a big swath of some green plant along the shore of the pond. I’ll have to absorb that to get its pattern. I pressed my will upon the green plant and attempted to absorb it. To my surprise, I couldn’t eat any of it.
Frustration building, I chose to move on and try to eat the bugs and flying creatures in my cave. I figured it would happen, but I couldn’t eat them either. I was flustered, the rocks, air and water were all tasty. But, the creatures within my territory looked delicious.
Confusion evident in my voice, I called out to Emily over our bond. “Emily, why can’t I eat any of the living things in my cave? They look yummy.”
Responding to me with a bemused tone she responded, “All dungeons ask the same thing.” She giggled at me and continued. Living beings have an aura just like you do, whether they be plant or animal. In order to eat a plant you must overpower its will, this is simple for small plants. Bigger plants such as trees are harder to overcome and will require you to chop them down. As for the bugs and bats, you will need to kill them to eat them.”
So those are bats? Interesting. “Okay, I understand. I’ll try the plant first, then we can discuss how to kill the bugs and bats.”
“Sounds good, but start with a small amount.”
“Why though?”
She chuckled and ignored my question. Shrugging my mental shoulders I picked a small section of the plant, a square inch, and began exerting my will over it. I pushed against it slowly at first, getting a feel for the amount of effort it would take to overcome it. I continued increasing my will until I felt the plant crumble under the pressure. Feeling like I achieved a great feet I gave myself a hoorah and tried to eat the plant. With great satisfaction I succeeded. I began receiving mana from the plant, but it wasn’t being absorbed physically. I continued to pull the mana from the plant, watchinto the plant intently. The mana from the plant was the most delicious thing I had ever tasted. I decided that I would only snack on it from now on. My pattern was filling much faster than with the air I was gathering, about ten times as fast. Once my pattern was about half full the mana slowed and the plant began turning a shade of brown. After a few more seconds of draining the plant it finally died. I felt a sudden shock run through my core as a large burst of mana slammed into me. The tiny patch of plant had released a surge of mana upon its death. I was dazed by the influx of power and my reserves were maxed out. I watched as an excess amount of mana floated around my core and was reabsorbed by the surrounding plants. I then noticed that the plants mana had a green tint to it and had been separated from the mana flowing into my core. However, none of my extra pools filled.
The elemental energy was lost and expunged from my core. I lamented the loss of something new and the excess mana. However, I recovered my wits after a few seconds and realized that the brown husk of the plant was still there. I began breaking it down and learning its molecular structure as I absorbed it. The plant was called moss, it liked damp environments and could grow anywhere warm and wet. I had learned the properties of the moss, but I didn’t receive any further mana. I intended to ask my wisp about this when I spoke with her. I searched through my memories and found the blueprint for creating moss within my mind. That alone was worth the loss of mana and energy.
I pushed a feeling of joy and excitement through my bond. Oh, I can send emotions too. “Emily, I did it. I even learned how to make it. The plant is moss and it was delicious.”
“I know what the plant is.” A feeling of smugness permeated our bond.
“You’re a joy killer. I was excited.”
“Sorry, I forget how exciting it is to discover new things. I’ll be more supportive in the future and try to push you to discover stuff I don’t know so we can be excited together. Is that okay?”
“I forgive you. But you owe me for hurting my feelings.” I sent an image of me sticking my tongue out at her, followed by a feeling of victory.
“Ugh, fine. I’ll concede defeat this time.” She said with a playful tone.
“Anyway, I can now create my own moss. The moss also completely filled my pattern, and there was still mana left over! Also, what element does moss have? I didn’t keep any of the elemental energy, so I didn’t learn about it. Wait, never mind, I’ll just create a new pool and force the new energy into it. Does creating moss work the same as creating rock? How do I make it? Why does it have so much mana? I thought I had a really good pattern? Is moss some type of miracle plant? There’s so much to learn!... why aren’t you responding? And why is your light dimming?”
She sent a feeling of being overwhelmed through our bond. “Asher, I understand that you are excited but, can you please stop bombarding me with so many questions and emotions?”
I hadn’t realized that I was sending emotions through our bond when I was speaking. I better apologize. “ I am sorry, you know you have the prettiest light?”
Emily shrieked in embarrassment, completely forgetting how I overwhelmed her. “it’s okay.”
I’ll have to remember to compliment her to get away with stuff. I snickered to myself at that thought and continued addressing my wisp. “Emily, can you please explain my questions?”
“Sure thing Asher. Let’s start with your pattern being full. Your pattern is a really good design, but you will need to further condense and expand it to be able to hold more mana. Before you ask, let me answer your other questions. Now that you have the blueprint for moss in your core you can create it. You do this by envisioning the moss and how much of it you want. You then fill it with mana and the required element and it will appear. As you probably guessed from that, it is different than rock because you have to put in several different things to create it. And no, it isn’t a miracle plant. You just need a bigger and more refined pattern to handle more.”
“Can I create it with a different element? Since I don’t have any of what it came with.”
“You still need the base element in order to create it, but yes you can. You can add elements to it to create a new effect. For example, adding fire to the plant might make it resistant to flames or make it burn to the touch. This all depends on how much of each element is in it and where you put said element in the blueprint.”
“We should definitely experiment with this.”
“I agree, but before you do something so time consuming, let’s talk about killing the creatures within your territory.”
“Hold off on that, I want to move my core.”
I looked around my cave for a suitable spot. I don’t know why I wanted to move, but my instincts told me I needed to be in a safer location before I tried to kill anything else. So, with those instincts flaring up I kept searching until I found a spot that would make me happy. I decided on making a small room for myself under the water’s slope. I pressed my will into the rock behind it and began digging. I formed small opening against the wall behind where the mounds bulbous side. The hole would be hidden from view unless you were right on top of it. I pushed that hole to the center of the mound. Once I reached the center I began digging into the wall, forming a small tunnel. The tunnel was two feet long and one foot high, at the end of which I began building my new room. I created a room that was large enough for my wisp and I to live comfortably. It was a a cube, with concave walls and a ceiling that formed a smooth dome. It was five feet on all sides. Once this was completed I moved my awareness to my core. I formed a small amount of rock around myself and asserted my will to move. My small mound and I scraped against the ground, heading for my new hole. The sound was akin to gravel grinding together, not loud but not quiet either. I made my way into my tunnel with no issues and moved my core to the exact center of my new room. I formed more rock beneath my core and pushed up until I was in the center of the room both vertically and horizontally. Once I accomplished that I sculpted a small bowl with which my core was at the bottom of. At the base of the bowl I sculpted an ornate looking stand for the bowl with three legs that curled at the top and smoothly arched down. I finished that and promised myself I’d use better materials at a later date. I then concentrated on letting a small amount of water energy and mana flow into the bowl. The two energies intertwined and formed a perfectly clear and sterile water. As a finishing touch I added a small amount of air energy to the legs, hoping I could draw in more ambient mana. I succeeded a small amount. My intent was clear, but I was clearly missing something. Air did flow in and out of my new room, but at an extremely slow rate. It would work for now. I’ll figure something else out later. “Hey Emily, come look what I made!”Unauthorized use: this story is on Amazon without permission from the author. Report any sightings.
“Coming, oohh I like the location of the hole. The tunnel is smooth, I like it…….” Emily then began laughing hysterically. She somehow managed to roll on the ground in laughter. Her light was pulsing brightly, basking my new room with the bright blue of her mirth. She continued laughing until I couldn’t take it anymore.
“Why are you laughing so hard!? What did I do?” I asked with restrained anger and confusion.
She answered me between fits of laughter. “you built…. A birdbath…. For your core…. It’s the funniest thing…. I’ve ever seen a dungeon do….” This made her laugh even harder.
“What’s a birdbath? Why would that be a funny place for me to sit in?”
My confusion just made her laugh even harder. I realized that I liked her laugh, it was bubbly, high pitched and made me want to laugh with her. After a few more minutes of uncontrollable laughter she finally rose off the ground and addressed me. “A birdbath is something humans build outside their homes, it’s a bowl where birds can take a bath. The humans like to watch them.” She continued chuckling after her explanation.
“Okay, but what’s a bird? And what’s a bath?”
“A bird is a flying creature with feathers. A bath is where you soak your body in water and clean your body in the tub.”
“I want a bird. You owe me from before, and for laughing at me. But I’m not changing my room, I like my birdbath.”
“I can’t just bring you a bird. I don’t have arms. I can only bring you very small objects.”
“well then go bring me a pretty rock.”
“You know what? I will!” she happily floated away, humming quietly to herself.
I had used up a good portion of mana working on my small room, so I began snacking on moss. I was careful to create a new pool for the elemental energy it contained. The energy separated itself out and I learned that it was called nature. Nature would help plant life grow and heal. There was more to it than that, I could tell. But, I would have to find more sources of nature to better understand it. I continued consuming a minuscule amount of moss until it died and filled my reserves to maximum. I absorbed the body of the moss, noting that I gained a little more nature with that. After filling my reserves I thought it would be wise to improve my pattern.
I looked within myself until I found where my pattern was wrapped around my inner core. I visualized adding five more infinity symbols to the configuration. Once I had the image cemented in my mind I began cycling my mana through it. Once it was full I condensed the entire structure, it shrank in size but increased in density ten fold. Increasing the density this much required my entire mana reserve to accomplish. Once that was held firmly in place I made it move throughout the pattern at twice the previous speed. I finally finished up and pulled out of my core to a very angry wisp.
“Do you know how long I’ve been waiting to give you your damned rocks? Listen here you overgrown pebble, you can’t just leave for several days without a word.”
“I’m sorry, I didn’t know it would take that long. But look what I did!” I said this hoping to distract her into calming down.
“Let me see.” She reached through our link and she looked and my pattern. “wow, I am actually impressed, you did it on your own without any help. How much mana can you hold now?”
Haha it worked, she’s not angry. “I’m not sure, I haven’t tried filling it yet. But it is pulling in ambient mana at a prodigious rate. Which reminds me, how can I get better air flow in my core room?”
“I can see that you tried infusing the rock with air energy, but in order to really increase airflow you will need runes and enchantments. I can’t teach you any of those, you will have to take it from an adventurer.”
“Well that’s disappointing. In any case, I will still get more from eating moss. I’m going to see how much it takes to fill my pattern really quick.” I turned my focus to my patch of moss and forced my will against it. With me new and improved pattern I was able to absorb about half of the patch I was working on. Leaving me with three more patches around the same size and half of this one. I’m going to need a better source of mana soon.
I looked over at Emily and voiced my concerns. “while I am happy about my progress, it now takes a lot of the moss to fill my pattern. I’m going to need a new source of mana plus a better way to get more ambient mana.”
“That’s easy, there are two things we can do now. You can create traps and monsters to kill other creatures for their mana, or you can saturate your territory with more mana to increase the amount of ambient mana it produces. I would recommend using the first option for now, increasing your ambient mana will draw too much attention from animals nearby and you aren’t ready for that.”
“That makes sense. Well, how do I create monsters and traps?”
“Traps are simple right now. You can just shape the earth to make holes or even make some of your stalactites fall. Early trap production will be a breeze, but later on when you need to add mana to the traps it’ll get much harder. As for monsters, you will need more blueprints. However, you can use your moss to be a trap monster. Once you edit it’s element it can gain trap like properties. I think we should start with the moss.”
“I don’t want to experiment too much yet, so what element should I use?”
“I would recommend fire, but you don’t have any. Actually, that gives me an idea. I’m going to go gather some wood. Here, look at these while I’m gone.” She had dropped the pebbles in my bowl before flying off.
There were only three pebbles, but I knew they were special. I began breaking down the first one, it was a light gray with black specks throughout. I learned its blueprint, I now had access to granite. Excitement filling my core I hungrily did the same to the other two pepebbles the second one was a clear rock with a crystalline structure. That one was quartz. The last rock had a gold sheen to it, I got excited thinking Emily had found gold. But I was a fool, it was pyrite, otherwise known as fools gold. I didn’t let my happiness fade though, I knew I could trick adventurers into thinking I had gold. I’d save this for a later date.
Emily came zipping into the cave then, followed by a swarm of angry looking insects. “I messed up! Kill them! Asher kill them!”
“They are so small though. How could they hurt you? And I don’t have a way to kill them dummy.” She began screaming in terror and flew into the pond. The angry insects buzzed and zipped around above her. One tried to dive bomb her and ended up getting stuck in the middle of the pond. I began getting excited, thinking it would drown and I’d get a new blueprint. But my luck wasn’t that good, the big jerk just walked on the water. Once it recovered the entire swarm just left the cave.
“So, wanna tell me what those were? And did you get the wood?”
She sent a feeling of rage through out bond, “What!? Not even going to ask if I’m okay? And no I didn’t get your god forsaken wood.”
“Well go get the wood, I don’t see how you’re afraid of those bugs. They can’t even touch you.”
“No. I will not. And I don’t care, I hate them.” With that she cut off our communications and started flying around the cave, her light flaring with a hint of red to it.
Well now what? I guess I’ll just make moss on my own.
I looked within my memories for the blueprint of moss. I chose to begin my experiments with a small one square inch patch, this way I could get a good estimate of how much mana I would need. I formed the patch in the blueprint and slowly filled it with mana and nature energy. It took roughly fifty percent more mana to create it than what was released from the natural moss. I watched as the patch of moss seemingly grew out of nothing and sprouted to maturity in a matter of seconds. I wonder if I can create it in its early stages of growth to conserve mana. I pondered this thought while I reabsorbed the moss. I noted that I got around sixty percent of the mana cost back. I then began editing the structure, adding fire mana around the edges of it at a ratio of one to four. Thinking this was a small amount, I was shocked to see the moss burst into flames and die. I tried different variations of the ratio with no success. Pondering it further I concluded that nature and fire just didn’t mix. What if I add another element. I tested my theory by adding equal parts water and fire just on the inside of the moss and quadruple the nature energy, the result was a massive success. The water and fire fused together within the moss and made the entire plant warm up. I theorized that this worked because the plant already had water inside it for its production of food. Then on top of that the mana forced it to form properly. I tested adjusting the elements and found that I could make the moss hot enough to burn something on contact without breaking the bank.
I formed a long strip of the moss in a circle around the pond. I didn’t have enough mana to fully grow it, so I attempted to form it in its early stages of growth. The moss formed without issue. I need a name for the burning moss. “Hey Emily, I created the new moss. I could use your help naming it.”
“Alright, let me look at it.” She floated over to my ring of moss and started inspecting it. “this is well designed, but why is it so underdeveloped?”
“I did that to save mana and complete the project early. It should only take about a week for it to finish anyway.”
“Well other than that it’s really well done. Let’s see…” she went silent and bobbed up and down while she thought about names. “How about, sizzling moss?”
“I don’t like it that much, but you picked the name so that’s what it’s called now. Now I need to find a way to get something to get stuck in it.”
“Honestly just add something shiny to it.”
I thought over her words and decided that she had a good idea, and I had the perfect material to get the job done. I started placing fools gold at evenly spaced intervals, poking up above the sizzling moss just enough to catch the eye. I inspected my now finished project and decided it was time to wait for it to grow.