Chương 72: A Slice of Innearth's Life.

We'll start this journey with the delightfully clinical testing chambers of the central continent. Wow. This dungeon took a theme and ran with it. Instead of sprinkling puzzles throughout a poorly thought out floor this portal focused dungeon has done away with all the pesky background and set up a series of chambers with various themes and goals. -less "puzzles" and more challenges, many of the testing chambers can be completed in various ways and the rewards for innovation are immense.

Who knows how dungeons operate but I'm nearly positive this dungeon is the source of the crossroads existing in other dungeons. The first link I found traveled between The Central Continent to Murek. Ah, Murek, land of the dwarves and elves. You'll find other races scattered throughout but those are the two main ones famously known to be the most recluse.... that means you can travel for hundreds of kilometers across the land without laying eyes on an intelligent soul. This dungeon is full to the brim of surprises.

You'll find it has much more variety than typical for a dungeon; it's hard to even tell which affinities the dungeon even has! From floors of crystal, to halls of fire and magma. From what I hear some of the deeper floors have ice, sand, and even void! Beside the variety in flavors of mana, the number of different schematic types is quite varied for what I'm to believe is quite a young dungeon.

You'll find each floor or more importantly each "zone" has quite a variety of monsters to sink your teeth into and I'm definitely going to return here sometime just for my own interest. This dungeon does something I'm incredibly fond of which is start the difficulty scaling at a level even the newest of adventurers can access. Not enough dungeons do this if I'm being honest and its a shame. Going forward here's a surprise! I've actually reviewed some of these dungeons before.

For the sake of a more detailed review you can visit issue 254 for the "Liquid Saviour" Now known as the "Meneth Crossroads" – not sure I approve of all these name changes but I'm not going to abuse my high system favour to change it back. Issue 255 shows off the "The Dungeon of Eternity" or "Mur Crossroad" as they've taken to calling it nowadays. I've heard there's quite a bit of pushback from some religion about this renaming? Calling the act a religious sacrilege or something?

Either way, with how exciting that dungeon was to review the first time around, I'm heavily considering giving it a tour once again. I don't like re-reviewing dungeons but hey, it's a portal away am I right? Other than those two there is an explosively fun dungeon on "Okos" – that's not just a saying, the dungeon is full of monsters and traps that literally explode – and a dungeon on, if I'm not mistaken, the Lost Continent.

That one has some hoops to jump through to access but I don't think I need to tell you how exciting a passage to a continent we thought was destroyed is. This Continent is a landmass that used to be part of what is commonly known as "The Broken Continent" and contains ruins untouched for several millennia. Pre system ruins! I'm sure others share my excitement.

Anyways as an end statement, the possibilities offered by this network of cross-continental portals are immense and I'm looking forward to seeing how it progresses in the future. Excerpt from the popular serial "Tom's Dungeon Reviews Issue 299" A few weeks passed with no huge surprises. Innearth found that while he had put a lot more effort into claiming and securing his "Void bastion", Queen had explored more than him. She had sent several ascended monsters repeatedly into the void to scout…

and while she had definitely found out more than Innearth, the cost was staggering. Of her seven scouts, two hadn't returned. Of the five that did, three were heavily injured after demon skirmishes. … I can't risk any of my children that way. I can't see how Queen can see them as disposable. I mean… just look at them! Innearth was watching his ascended water slime operate heavy machinery.

The slime had gotten bored of its war games and had replaced itself with a blue rock complete with mini crown – then gone exploring. After moving about his dungeon using snakeways and sliding through traps the slime had found itself in the dwarf workshop. Immediately the slime had taken a liking to one of the failed experimental runeworks, a sort of digging and sorting machine.

Essentially this machine sort of dissolved walls – removed "useful" materials then compressed the "waste" into perfectly square bricks that could be placed along the side of whatever it was digging. The problem was that it needed to be operated by someone and had a nasty habit of squishing its operator while squishing waste leading to several nameless crystal dwarf deaths.

The slime however when squished ended up splitting – then reforming into a single wobbling and giggling child who immediately re entered and pushed the machine forward again. Not caring about Innearth's influence the slime was now digging off out of Innearth's influence. It left a meandering path like a drunk driver in a cornfield and left all kinds of goodies behind it. … ahh yes. Good stuff. Not risking the precious's life just to find out more about the void – no matter how curious I am.

Innearth focused on what Brutality Queen had learned and tried to make sense of it. Everything worked better in analogies and using a simplified explanation so that's what they communicated in. Innearth due to necessity and queen because she didn't much care. Essentially the information gained from scouts was that the void continued on in all directions and was completely empty... … but depending on which directions you focused on it was more or less dangerous.

The bastion could be seen to be sitting in "shallow water void". The liquid was thin and was almost closer to a gas – only allowing stuff to swim through it due to the lack of gravity. If you continued in what Innearth considered "three dimensions", this shallow water void continued on for kilometres in every direction without change – presumably being endless but Innearth didn't have a way to confirm that. There was a huge difference between endless and "really big" after all.

If you shifted your perspective from what Innearth considered "three dimensions" and moved in a different direction, the density of the liquid that represented space increased. As you dropped into deeper void water the number of demons operating/appearing increased exponentially. It still felt endlessly empty but when there were more "dimensions" in a given space… well this is where the analogy of three dimensional space started to break apart.

Imagining hundreds of overlapping "almost completely empty" spaces occupying the same "space" – each with a percent chance of containing a demon nearby and each that could provide a path from them to you... well it "worked" as a concept, but in the same way pretending gravity was just the earth holding people down with tiny invisible hands worked as a concept – wrong but close enough. There weren't discrete slices of different dimensions or overlapping areas.

Instead, everything flowed in together at different angles and created "denser" areas where they overlapped. These denser areas weren't fully like a sea getting denser in one direction and thinner in the other. It wasn't a straight path. Instead, it was closer to being a thin sky with thicker "channels" of deep void running through it – or blobby denser void splotches dropped onto a lighter void canvas. Usually while moving into one of those void splotches you would find yourself exiting a different one.

And that was all that Innearth had gotten from Queen. He wanted more but would never force or ask his own ascended monsters to explore… except his monsters could hear most of his thoughts and sometimes selectively decided to ignore his wishes. The illusionary wurm seemed to get tired of Innearth's constant questions about the Void and took measures into their own tail – disappearing into his gate. The wurm then disappeared for three whole weeks.

Three weeks was nothing in the grand scheme of things – and Innearth spent more time working on some designs – but every single day of that time was spent worrying they wouldn't return. It didn't help that he learned more about what the ascended monsters of Queen had gone through.

They had moved completely blind through the void floundering and getting occasionally damaged by the environment – which while not immediately dangerous to a creature that didn't need to eat or breathe, contained pockets that had incredibly high pressure and others that were essentially vacuums that rapidly attempted to rip them apart. … the only reason the five scouts that returned were even able to scout, or make their way back, was due to having ranked up – fighting demons at least once but on average twice.

These evolutions had increased their senses and allowed them to navigate the strange space more instinctively and more importantly return in once piece. Apparently the system itself – something Innearth believed to be a constant companion everywhere – began acting strangely the further into deep void the monsters travelled. Information appeared to lag, and their status screens would either appear half filled or not at all if they attempted to check.

The only reason two of Queen's survivors had returned successfully was due to evolving a sense that could feel the thread connecting them to the system and following that back – the other three had been close enough to either randomly chance upon Queen once more or "see" it in the distance. The thread of the system. I didn't even know that existed. I thought the system existed everywhere and it turns out that invisible link is the only way the two returned??? Come on illusion wurm. Why did you take this risk?

You've already levelled up plenty of times and hit a sort of wall of sorts. How are you going to advance in such a land without knowing what's out there? … Amy noticed something was wrong and after unloading his worries to her in a series of PM's he began feeling slightly better. Amy: listen. If you can't pin point the wurm while it's literally inside of your influence what makes you think a demon can? I'm sure they are fine, they are going to show up any day now unharmed okay?

I'm not just saying that to get your hopes up I'm positive they will return safely. Innearth:... seems arrogant to think just because I can't see them demons can't. I've been dealing with them pretty easily in the void so I've kind of stopped being as cautious but I haven't forgotten demons are slagging terrifying. Amy: trust in your ascended monster Innearth. Do you think they can do it? Innearth: maybe yeah? I'm just worried. Amy: so there. You don't really think they could fail do you? Innearth: no… Amy: got it.

Hey you've been drifting away from the Chat group lately. What's up? Innearth: I'm still there! I read everything posted and I respond to people… Amy: but you don't start as many topics. I'm not saying you are ignoring us but you... feel distant idk. I miss you. Innearth:... I just haven't had anything to talk about. I guess I can tell everyone more about the bastion and what I've discovered? Amy: of course! You've spent quite a bit of time on that! I also heard you were making some big boss?

You haven't shown that off yet! I want to see! I'm sure everyone else wants to see as well! Innearth: sure. I'll do that. The next few hours were spent nearly fully focused on giving a tour of his bastion and roach knight to his friends. He had already given most of them glimpses of various parts – Doc and Queen had already seen his current bastion and Doc and Abe had briefly seen the roach knight – but this was the first time he had officially shown everything off. ZeMadDoctor:...

I tried setting up a permanent base in the void once. But found most of my turrets got overwhelmed after a while. I can make a simple base there nearly permanently. But as soon as I start doing stuff like you. Like. As soon as I try building. The demons swarm it and it's fall is almost inevitable. ZeMadDoctor:... I'm almost jealous you are having better luck in the void than I am. It's supposed to be my thing, I'm the expert. Abe: Doc... actually getting jealous??? Wow. That's an emotion I wouldn't expect from him.

The author's content has been appropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon. ZeMadDoctor: I said almost jealous. It's a figure of speech. Hey Innearth. I was thinking. Do you want to try setting something like this up with a portal that travels a further distance? ZeMadDoctor: Say between our dungeons? We can try making a permanent base with the more dangerous demons. Your roach can defend it. Abe: Hey! This sounds fun. I want in on some of this action… Add me too! ZeMadDoctor:...

splitting a portal singularity into more than two is much harder. Abe:... harder but not impossible? ZeMadDoctor: I've done up to 4 before. But each entrance makes it more and more unstable. More likely for demons to be attracted to it. There's a reason I set up my hub inside my dungeon and connected the two way portals around it instead of trying to make a hub in the void. Abe: just us three? You can set up a three way portal and we can handle the increase in instability right? Brutality Queen: Hey!

I've also been exploring the void. I don't want to be left out of a combined experiment. ZeMadDoctor:... I'll have to experiment a bunch first. With this many people I might as well make it so everyone in the group can access it… but I can't even handle three safely just yet. I need time. Innearth: let me talk to you about void unrolling and some of the void materials I've found. I'm sure some of the stuff I've found will be useful for this. ZeMadDoctor: That would be appreciated. Abe: Alright!

While doc's working on that I have to say. How is your knight so strong? I thought we were pretty even on monster design but that blows what I can do up! And my monsters blow up! Innearth: ah, yes. The most important thing to notice is skill. By that I mean my skills are legendary: 3 Abe:... alright. keep your secrets.: 3< Fated Eternal Design: I haven't had a need to make a monster this strong yet but I have to admit…

In the stream the dungeon's were watching, a literal cloud of demon parts floated about backlighting the roach as it charged back and forth across the screen. The knight's straight-line movement moved so fast it left solid spear-like lines that lingered like a cloud had been pierced by a dozen nails. Its dashes were almost as fast as laser beams, happening faster than any of the dungeons could keep up with. Fated Eternal Design:... I have to admit I don't think I can make something this strong.

A large 30m round sphere floated across the screen before being shot straight through the middle – the following explosion of demon parts completely covering the screen for a moment before settling. As gore settled about the knight stood revealed in the middle of Innearth's bastion in all its glory – giving the impression of a military salute as it stared at the mess it had created.

Moving about, a piercing beam of light began shining brilliantly – melting scraps and blasting them away as the knight cleaned everything clumsily. Abe:???... if it had something that strong why didn't it use it to fight??? What is that blast. Innearth: OH! I should show off my Laser floors. Haven't done that yet either! After showing off his zones, Innearth flipped back to the bastion and started answering questions about his monsters and materials/techniques.

Innearth smugly basked in their praise for a while and then started explaining his whole methodology for building the roach – knowing quite a bit of it was something his specific group of affinities let happen, but he hoped it might give his friends some ideas. Partway through the description of the grains he was laying about and something started to nag on his attention.

A part of his focus that was spent enjoying all the delves had gotten shocked enough at an adventurer that it wanted more attention analyzing what was happening. Looking over the memories of what was happening Innearth immediately started redistributing priorities and changing the stream background. Innearth: Alright! Guy's I'm going to show off a high-level delver Flipping the camera over to follow the giant golem, Innearth was just in time to show his friends his mirror trial being shattered.

The runes flashed alarmingly and then appeared to crack when the trial tried to copy his skill. Abe: … was it meant to do that? Innearth: You've seen my trial working! No, that should not have happened. The group watched as the small adventurer printed a seemingly endless number of copies to delve for them and continued wandering about. Fated Eternal Design: So... he's a summoner? Someone who's magic is focused on making those fighters? Innearth: I didn't record it but he fought something a while ago.

I think he's just really strong. The group followed the adventurer all the way to the entrance and then started to wind down. Fated Eternal Design: Wouldn't it be great being able to print out monsters like that? Abe:... do... do you not realize? No one tell him. I want to see how long it takes for him to figure it out. Fated Eternal Design:... what? I'm just saying. Looks useful. Amy: FED, you're a dungeon. You print out monsters all the time. Fated Eternal Design:... I guess you're right.

I didn't really think of that. Amy: he seems familiar. ZeMadDoctor: Hey sorry. I forgot to respond. This adventurer came through my dungeon earlier. Did a quick level test. He's above level 300. Strongest adventurer that has gone through my dungeon before and I've had some strong ones. Polite though. He didn't smash through the walls like some of them. And, at least pretended to do my testing chambers. Even if he cheated by being overpowered. Fated Eternal Design: Oh! I think I've seen him as well.

It's been a while I didn't realize it was the same adventurer they all kind of look the same to me. When he came through my dungeon he was riding a small box like machine about. The printing is new. … After waiting a bit the adventurer exited the entrance to Innearth's dungeon and the group started to dissipate. Amy: I read an article about why adventurers – and sapients in general – don't travel between continents. How have we all seen the same adventurer? Abe: Bruh, He's High Level.

That means he breaks all the rules. Let me tell you about this one adventurer who delved my whole dungeon sitting on a chair by the entrance. … The moment the illusionary wurm returned Innearth jolted into action. The illusion that crept across his bastion was strange. Inverted and black it appeared to have whips of smoke pooling out of it into the surroundings. It looked slightly demonic, but the knight didn't even acknowledge the illusion's presence.

And then the illusion fell revealing a tired-looking wurm several meters to the side. It dragged itself through the air several small wounds releasing crystal blood. But more importantly, the monster looked normal not "demonic"... if slightly changed from when it had left. Innearth created a healing pool near the center of his bastion, pouring a stream of mana into filling it with healing potion.

He then waited as the wurm slipped in wounds closing and appendages being regrown in real time as the potion was consumed. Creating a slime booth beside the pool Innearth waited patiently then grabbed onto the connection and started receiving a stream of information. The wurm didn't appear to speak normally, instead they shoved concepts and emotions through the link and conjured illusions beside them to give a visual view of what they had seen.

The illusions looked strange before Innearth realized they were multi-dimensional, but after that hiccup he began exploring the void through his monster's memories. Unlike the picture that Queen's monsters had provided, wurm showed the breadth of demons that existed. There wasn't much physical mass in the Void – no lands, no buildings – but what did exist was symbiotic relationships. Giant, relatively flat demons flew about while various blobs and shapes stood on top of them and sparred.

Almost humanoid demons sharpened the twisted and beaten weapons they held – crafted from the bones of yet more demons. At the start of the telling Innearth started to wonder if demons could be reasoned with. Maybe crossing the portals into the real world made them insane? I mean it evidently did but maybe they started off more civilized? Innearth maintained that theory through several scenes of demons eating or torturing each other for fun. Gotta have a hobby.

Doesn't seem much different from some of the stuff I've heard sapients get up to. He maintained this theory up to the point the illusion wurm started being interjected into these scenes. That point was the illusion wurm being captured in a giant cage – kilometres across – that shrunk down and let the demons access the wurm... well that point broke Innearth's good cheer.

He watched in fury as a pair of demons closed the cage down onto the wurm's real body and started playing a game of ripping out body parts and seeing if the wurm were still alive. Innearth found out then how demons were made. Free floating bits of dead flesh or matter slowly warped in the void before becoming a true demon after various periods of time drifting. These small demons were then eaten by the tormenting pair that then grew ever so slightly bigger – giving Innearth more insight into how demons operated.

They didn't need to eat for energy, instead appearing to exist just fine in the void indefinitely – not even consuming mana like they did in the regular universe. Instead, they ate purely for mass – the strongest demons getting larger and larger nearly indefinitely, with the only deviation being growth in dimensions that made them denser and harder. The pair then pulled strands of a ropy flesh that had replaced the liquid crystal original from the wurm's hapless body.

These fleshy bits were used as a rope with which to carry their prize about and fish for more demons. Innearth watched the "Game" feeling hot, his influence clenching slightly as he attempted to grind a rock to bits in anger – it didn't work so he cut it up into smaller pieces and flung them about before returning to watch the illusions. A period of time comprised of this pair tossing the bound wurm into a patch of deep void then tugging it back with a stream of demons trailing along behind them.

They continued "fishing" for what felt like days and the only reason the wurm ended up escaping this period was when a third more bestial demon came in and ate the pair. The wurm quickly hid itself in illusions and unlike the tormenting pair this third party wasn't able to find them based on the cage and left. I think I preferred when demons were eldritch horrors I couldn't understand.

The following series of scenes was a telling of the wurm slaughtering and eating demons until they ranked up and infused the cage into its body. It then began searching for Innearth for what felt like several months – its illusions now effectively more "real" and able to attack for it and its main body somehow less "real". As if it transferred its "reality" from its main vulnerable body to its disposable illusions allowed itself to shrug off wide-ranged attacks that would have killed it previously.

The illusions also each contained a restraining ability that allowed the wurm to catch stronger and stronger demons to kill and eat – finally ascending a second time at level 128 and gaining an ability that allowed it to return to Innearth. That would have been the end of the story right there but while the wurm was able to transfer its reality about – and gained an ability to teleport itself between illusionary doubles – the void affected magic in weird ways.

In the real-world teleportation was travel through the void and in the void teleportation was moving "space" around with it being more malleable. Based on how the skill worked it should have made the wurm even more protected – but because of how the Void worked, all it did was briefly drop the illusion protecting the wurm. That allowed a creature of endless teeth to latch on as they shifted past ripping several chunks of wurm out.

That was the cause of all the wounds that covered the wurm when it arrived In Innearth's influence. Innearth took in all this information and came to an executive decision. Keep on burning demons to the ground and pay extra attention to the tool using humanoid ones. Despite being safe in Innearth's influence, when the wurm attempted to enter the real world it began feeling uncomfortable. Innearth carefully watched fearing the wurm would go insane before it returned to his bastion unprompted and calmed down.

<Squished feeling. Uncomfortable> The wurm finally moved to the slime booth and transmitted the emotions and feeling directly. Innearth stared somewhat lost of what to do. You can try and advance in the real world? Reach level 256 and see if that fixes everything? <Positive> The wurm curled up in an undisclosed location on his bastion projecting an image of it moving back and forth near the edge while its main body slept.

Several hours later the wurm awoke once more and – after confirming they would attempt to reach level 255 in the Void – pushed back out. It felt similar to how Innearth felt when Onyx left to make his own way. Are all my children going to leave me? … now that I think about it Rutile hasn't come back yet. He was only supposed to go until he finished helping Abe out – where's he at? Innearth: Hey uh… Quick question. It's been awhile how's the exchange student doing? He helping out? Abe: Ah!

Yeah the little buddy is doing great. He's figured out how to make all sorts of things… Innearth: He figured out how to make a X crystal equivalent for explosion mana? Abe: no… he made several crystal shrapnel grenades then stopped working with crystals for a bit. He did figure out how to make guns that re-summoned bullets pretty easily and making them unstable enough to explode when shot so I'm happy – that's all I wanted after all. Innearth: … so he's done? Is he coming back? Abe: …

I can ask the lil guy what he thinks he hasn't mentioned it yet. Just keeps flipping to different things. Innearth: … does he not want to come back? … I just thought out loud at my screen I didn't mean to type that. A moment later Rutile stepped through the portal. If he was that close by why hasn't he visited yet? Does he hate me? The dwarf moved over and sat down on a rock in the suppression array.

He lowered himself down out of sight of the gate in case an adventurer came past and then pulled out a strange tube covered in knobs. Twiddling with his tube, Rutile connected to Innearth directly – not needing a roundabout connection. Hey… what's up? Abe said there was something important you needed me for? Rutile spoke – his voice much more confident and strong than when he had left. … I have no clue why he would say that. Just wanted to see how you were doing? Wondering when you were coming back.

Instead of answering, the dwarf fiddled with his device for a moment – spinning it around absentmindedly and flipping a switch on and off as if trying to figure out what to say. Finally he spoke once more. I don't want to come back. In here I'm… just another dwarf. Before I advanced I was one of hundreds and after I was the third choice between Steve and Ilm. In here I'm nothing special but in Uncle Abe's dungeon I'm one of a kind. I'm special and can do stuff that no one else can.

Rutile spoke slowly gaining momentum. I like feeling needed and Abe hasn't figured out the trick of making anyone like me. His best attempt made some strange creature that left exploding shapes everywhere and that sort of instinctual crafting… sorry. Basically I like working in Abe's dungeon. He finished abruptly as if going to say more and then thinking better of it. It was at this point that Innearth noticed his other crystal dwarfs listening in to his side of the conversation.

Innearth's emotions were evident in the method he used to communicate with his dungeon monsters… and thus it felt unfair that they heard what he felt and still chose now to start speaking up. Steve spoke up first, joining the conversation. Well, I for one am not leaving. I have to figure out the trial room! I need to figure out how to prevent it from exploding with high levelled people! … so as soon as the trial is finished he might leave. Got it. Got it. Need to start sabotaging the trial then.

Just joking obviously. But maybe? Nah definitely joking... Innearth muttered to himself actively working to make sure his monsters couldn't hear him. Ilmenite's response was worse. I've been thinking of moving up to the town above us. You know how you haven't gotten much information about what has been happening? I could be your scout! Thinking of buying a nice little cottage and setting up a workshop. It will be great. I'm sure they have better booze up there!

Ilm excitedly laid out her plans this being the first time she mentioned them. … if that's what you want then sure. Innearth replied – intellectually understanding that the city above was much closer than Oynx had travelled… and that having a spy to tell him what was happening was a good idea… but emotionally feeling like he was being abandoned. Innearth: Does anyone else have issues with all their ascended monsters leaving them? Amy: Nope! All my monsters are content to live in their environments ascended or not…

most that have ascended need my water and there isn't really a lot nearby to satisfy them so they are stuck with me. Abe: … yeah most of mine dipped after a few days. Wonder how they are doing? Fated Eternal Design: My Ascended monsters have all joined my cult and… well somehow made it stronger? They are head priests I think I can't remember they travel about spreading the eternal gospel. Innearth: When does it stop hurting when they leave? Brutality Queen: Bah. Pop out a few more.

Little squirts are easy to replace. Hey Innearth, come check out my void defenses. Abe: Ah, I'm not a good progenitor Innearth. To be honest I'm glad when they leave. I don't really know what to do with them you know? Innearth: You're treating Rutile well! Abe: That's different! He's my little helper! Plus, you're my best bro and I'm making sure he's safe for you. With my own kids I just tell them not to blow themselves up - even if it would be cool - and try not to bother them. ZeMadDoctor: …

So you are saying ascended monsters are not valid test subjects? Innearth: Doc… no. They are precious. ZeMadDoctor: I think ascended monsters should share your hobbies. If I could mod my own core I would! Innearth: … I feel better. Thanks everyone. Today I've confirmed I'm not the worst parent. ZeMadDoctor: In other news I've figured out how to make a shared space by now. Splitting more portals off initially just gets messy and unstable.

But if I make several pairs and dump one side of the portal through one of the gates then each of those adds another possible entrance. Innearth: … you can do that? ZeMadDoctor: Yeah, I figured it out a few days ago I've just been stress testing it to make sure it doesn't break anything. Innearth: Hey, well whenever you think it's ready send me an endpoint I want in! ZeMadDoctor: It's ready right now. I'm thinking we set it up just between the two of us and add more points for others afterwards. Innearth: Sure!