Chương 32: Procedural Generation

When the last adventurer party left Blackstone Dungeon, Owen practically watched their backs until they stepped outside the entrance. Hurry up. A little faster. Good... they're out. The next instant, like a shop owner who had finally reached closing time, his entire core went slack and let out a long groan.

"Finally..." Owen swiftly set the dungeon to temporarily stop accepting challengers. There was nothing especially unusual happening outside the camp. Even if there had been, Owen did not want to bother with it right now. At this moment, there was only one thing on his mind. Now. While he had the chance. Hurry up and pull up the map beyond the Bronze Gate. Before getting started, he checked his current energy balance one more time.

[Soul Energy: 35, 086] This time, Owen did not cheer as wildly as he had yesterday, but he still opened the detailed records to confirm. Sure enough, today's challenge revenue alone had brought in more than twenty thousand Soul Energy. Even after subtracting the daily maintenance costs, the little bit of construction spending from last night, and the automatic repair costs for the earlier areas that had been repeatedly damaged, the final number remaining was still quite impressive.

Owen stared at that number for quite a while. Last night, he had still been agonizing over whether he should spend fifteen thousand to repair his core. Looking back now, that question suddenly seemed a little stupid. Moreover, he had discovered something rather strange. Normally, adventurers who advanced steadily achieved better results in a single challenge, but from the perspective of overall revenue, they were often not as profitable as those quick-in, quick-out parties.

"Huh?" Owen stared at the details in a daze.

"So Rayne's party actually generates less energy per unit of time?" That conclusion left him with a somewhat complicated feeling. Of course he liked Rayne's party. Watching them observe the environment, organize information, discuss tactics, and then break through the earlier difficulties step by step felt like watching a party he had personally raised slowly grow stronger. The problem was, the revenue report was clearly not that sentimental.

Every time Rayne's party came in, their progress was indeed not especially fast. They took time to confirm every step, and they did their best to avoid unnecessary deaths and losses. In exchange, their results were obviously much better. However, if every party was as steady as Rayne's party, his daily income would probably plummet. Owen fell silent for several seconds. Liking them was one thing. Revenue was another. Fuck. Why did this place have to drag him back into the painful memories of his previous life too?

For the first time, Owen felt that those reckless adventurers did not seem quite so annoying after all. At least on the revenue report, they even looked a little cute. Owen stared at the challenge records of those reckless parties for several seconds and suddenly felt a little guilty.

"Maybe... I should raise the drop rewards for normal challengers by just the tiniest bit?" That thought had only just appeared before he immediately pressed it back down.

"Ahhh, no. I need to finish the remaining areas first!" Still, since he had enough energy now, repairing the core came first. To be honest, Owen was quite looking forward to whatever new functions would appear after the core was repaired. Expectation was one thing. But he really hoped the system would not suddenly pop up with some bad news like increased consumption costs after the repair.

"At least patch the cracks on me, okay?" Owen could not help grumbling. He had finally saved up another pile of money. Please don't tell him that dungeons also had something like inflation. [Confirm core repair?] [Required Soul Energy: 15, 000] Owen did not hesitate for long and confirmed it directly with a thought. The next second, an ethereal blue light slowly lit up inside the Core Chamber. Even Owen's damaged core began to reflect the same glow.

Soon after, shimmering blue light flowed out from those fine cracks like liquid and wrapped around the entire core bit by bit.

"Mmm... that feels good..." Owen unconsciously let out a contented sigh. The instant he was wrapped in that light, even though he was now only a broken rock, he still felt a long-lost warmth. Warm and gentle. It felt like basking in the sun.... Come to think of it, how long had it been since he last saw the real sun? Whatever. It felt too good. Owen did not want to think about that right now. He only wanted this feeling, like lazily lying on a grassy field as a child, to last a little longer.

Before long, the broken stone that had once been covered in fissures had completely changed. The dim azure light from before had become a soft and stable halo. The fine cracks also looked as though they had been filled with shimmering blue light, leaving behind only a few extremely faint traces. If one did not look carefully, they would almost be impossible to distinguish. More importantly, Owen discovered that he could finally control his core and make it slowly float above the stone pedestal.

Although the floating range was still limited to the Core Chamber, and he could not even move too far from the pedestal, compared to being fixed firmly in place like before, this was already enough of an improvement to make him want to cry.

"This is awesome! I can finally move my body!" However, the very next second, a series of system messages he had never seen before popped up. [Core fully restored.] [Core Authority Increased.] [Basic Management Functions Restored.] [Welcome, Management Sprite.] [This ■■ and the ■■ System welcome your access.] [Connect to the Management Sprite Empathic Channel?] Owen stared at those lines for several seconds.

"... Why is there still garbled text?" His understanding of just how unreliable this system was deepened once again. Also, Management Sprite? Was that his official title? And what was an empathic channel?

"Wait. Is this thing basically a dungeon core group chat?" If you spot this story on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation. Owen's entire core brightened slightly.

"Seriously?"

"I actually have companions? I can finally communicate with someone else?" The moment that thought appeared, he chose to connect almost without hesitation. The next instant. All sound vanished. Then, countless shattered consciousnesses poured into his mind like a rotten tide. Hungry. Open the gates. Let the monsters out. Core tearing. Devour. Something was laughing. Something was screaming. Something was repeating commands that had long since lost all meaning, over and over again like a broken machine.

Those voices did not sound like communication at all. They were more like a cluster of things that had already rotted down to nothing but instinct, contaminating one another through some unseen passage. Owen even felt several consciousnesses notice him and abruptly turn in his direction. The next moment, he cut off the connection almost by instinct. The Core Chamber became quiet again. The ethereal blue light dimmed for an instant, then trembled violently. Owen hovered motionlessly above the stone pedestal.

Only after a long while did he speak in a low voice.

"What the hell... What kind of bullshit group chat was that?" Owen dropped heavily back onto the pedestal and absolutely refused to think back on everything he had just felt. Yet that disgusting, rotten, sticky sensation clung deep within his consciousness like maggots clinging to bone. He finally understood a little. When he had first arrived in this world, he had once seen those terrifying scenes. Monsters drowning the land. Dungeons rotting outward. Countless lives swallowed by Demonic Tides.

And those things just now... Those corrupted Management Sprites? No. Could things like that really still be called Management Sprites? He might as well call them demons. Owen remained silent for a long time before slowly making his core float again. The shimmering blue light trembled faintly. He still did not know how those demon cores had become like that. But there was one thing he could almost be certain of. Those things were definitely connected to the Demonic Tides.

And for some reason, he felt that in the instant those few consciousnesses had looked at him, something had quietly settled on him. It was not an attack. Nor did it feel like a curse. It was more like an extremely faint mark, or some kind of trace he could not yet understand. But no matter how Owen inspected his core or searched through the system interface, he could not find the slightest clue. In the end, he could only press down that uneasy thought for the time being.

The urgent task right now was still to finish planning the dungeon. As for those demon cores... He had absolutely no ability to deal with them right now.

"If only I could grow a little faster," Owen muttered quietly.

"That way, I could help more adventurers get stronger sooner too." Of course he knew that every path had to be walked one step at a time. No dungeon could become a true training ground capable of changing the world overnight. But that rotten channel just now, and those consciousnesses that seemed to turn toward him from the darkness, had made him clearly realize something for the first time. He might not have as much time as he had imagined. ◆ ◆ ◆ Owen did not dare delay any longer.

He quickly called up the system panel again and began checking the remaining new functions. First came the drop settings. Most of the previous drops had still required him to arrange them in advance. Even if he wanted to give challengers rewards, he had to create the items first, then place them in treasure chests or bind them to specific monsters. But now, things were different. After the core repair, he could finally set drop rates directly.

As long as challengers met the conditions, the system would automatically deduct the corresponding Soul Energy when a drop was triggered and directly create the reward. Owen stared at this function for several seconds, and his entire core slowly lit up. This function had arrived at exactly the right time. This way, he would no longer need to act like some shady GM hiding backstage, watching adventurers one by one and manually stuffing rewards into their hands.

However, Owen only gave it a quick glance before temporarily setting the drop settings aside. He could adjust those things slowly during the day tomorrow. The truly urgent issue right now was construction speed. He had far too many things to do tonight. The area around the church still needed functional NPCs. The forest path behind the church had not been laid out yet. Further beyond that, there was even the rough outline of a small town that, for now, existed only in his head.

If every small detail and every interactable unit had to be manually adjusted like last night, then tonight would probably get swallowed by time again before he realized it. So Owen immediately continued searching downward. Then he saw a function that made his entire core light up in an instant. [Procedural Generation] Owen froze for a moment.

"..."

"Wait." He carefully opened that option. The next moment, several lines of explanation appeared on the screen. [Automatically generates base templates for buildings, terrain, interactable units, and guard units according to specified conditions.] [Generation results will vary depending on condition completeness, material limitations, and Core Authority.] [Generated results can be manually adjusted after generation.] Owen stared at those lines for several seconds.

Then, the blue light inside the Core Chamber brightened little by little. A god-tier button. This was absolutely a god-tier button. As long as he set a few conditions first, the system could quickly produce the buildings, interactable units, and guard units he wanted.

Although the finished products might not completely match his aesthetic tastes, and the details would probably still need to be adjusted manually, at least he would not have to start from zero and slowly piece everything together brick by brick anymore. What did that mean? It meant he could finally use the system to pull out a rough framework first, then spend his time on the parts that actually mattered.

"Good." Owen's voice trembled with excitement.

"Starting now, we are entering the age of mass-produced templates." Owen first tried generating a section of forest path. He had originally thought the system would only throw out a straight, stiff dirt road, at most randomly planting a few trees beside it. But that was not the case. Every time he dragged out a new stretch of path, the positions of the surrounding trees, the distribution of the bushes, and even the rise and fall of the ground automatically adjusted according to its direction.

Occasionally, a few moss-covered stones or a patch of dirt lifted by tree roots would naturally generate along the roadside. The entire path did not look like an asset that had been forcibly pasted onto the map. It looked as though it had truly existed in the forest for a very long time. Owen was so moved that he almost shed nonexistent tears. The halo around the blue core rippled faintly, like a poor corporate slave saved by a productivity tool finally seeing the light at the end of the overtime tunnel.

Next, Owen adjusted the surrounding woodland along the path to make it look more natural. The areas farther out were sealed off by gray fog. After all, there was nothing there for now. Rather than letting challengers run into an empty forest and waste time, it was better to block the boundary off from the start. Owen was genuinely afraid some bored lunatic would show up and insist on hugging the map edge all the way around.

In addition, to prevent the forest area from feeling too empty, he did not make it too large. What truly mattered was the path extending out from behind the church. That road would lead farther ahead and connect to the next area. Of course, Owen did not make the road too long either. If he made the adventurers waste their time on meaningless running, even he would want to beat himself up. He would never forget how he had felt in his previous life when he played those utterly hollow open-world games.

They looked vast. In reality, they were just wasting the player's time and calling it content. Owen did not want anyone else to experience that pain. ◆ ◆ ◆ Next came the true main event of tonight. A small town. More accurately, a small town deep within the woodland that had once served as a gathering place for refugees, only to be gradually swallowed by shadow after the Demonic Tide drew near. Owen stared at the blank map for several seconds, then casually gave it a name. Graywood Town. Good.

This would be the first true large-scale challenge area after the church. When it came down to it, Sinner's Canyon before this had still been a relatively simple route. Challengers only needed to advance along the canyon, face several forks and encounters inside ruins, and they would roughly understand the rhythm of that area. But the town was different. Streets would branch. Houses would block line of sight. Battles would not necessarily begin from the front.

If he simply threw a few monsters into the streets and had challengers cut their way from the town entrance to the town exit, that would be far too much of a waste of this setting. What Owen wanted was pressure closer to a real fight. Parties could not afford to focus only on what was in front of them. Shieldbearers also could not simply raise their shields and keep moving forward.

If the archers, mages, and healers in the rear were too spread out, or too used to hiding in the back and waiting for others to protect them, they would soon discover that battles in town were not that polite. Here, they needed to learn to stay alert. They needed to learn to reform their formation when something unexpected happened. They also needed to learn how to judge, amid chaos, when to advance and when to pull back. The more Owen thought about it, the brighter the halo around his core became.

This was not simply a new map. This was Blackstone Dungeon's first true town-based combat area. He had to plan it properly. There had to be danger. There had to be tension too. But he could not simply throw adventurers into a tangled mess and torture them. It had to be the kind of experience where, after walking out covered in cold sweat, they still could not stop themselves from thinking, "Next time, we should be able to handle it better." Owen did not rush to plan every house and every alley.

That would only drag him back into last night's endless loop of "just one more tiny adjustment and it'll be better." This time, he changed his approach. First, pull out the overall structure. Details could wait. He entered the conditions for Graywood Town one by one. A ruined town. Enterable wooden buildings. Branching streets. Wreckage and debris. These conditions would first serve as the bones, supporting the most basic shape of the town.

As Owen selected the area range and pressed the generate button, the system immediately began operating. On the empty land, white light flashed in succession. The outlines of streets gradually emerged, and the silhouettes of wooden houses rose from the fog one after another. However, when the town had only been constructed halfway, a system prompt suddenly popped up. [Warning: Continuing generation will exceed remaining energy balance.] Owen's entire core stiffened. He glanced at his remaining energy.

After subtracting the fifteen thousand spent on core repair, then subtracting the costs of laying out the forest path and surrounding woodland, he only had around fifteen thousand energy left on hand. Haha. Well played. Apparently, this little pile of money really was not enough to build an entire town in one go. Once again, Owen clearly realized that his wallet was still painfully thin.

Even worse, he still had to design guard templates, add more interactable units, and leave at least some energy as tomorrow's maintenance and emergency reserve. In the end, Owen could only make a very realistic concession. Graywood Town would be built halfway for now. The back half of the town would temporarily be sealed off with collapsed houses, piled debris, and impassable barricades. This finally pushed the total cost of the entire area down to around eleven thousand.

Owen looked at his remaining balance, and his whole core dimmed a little. Money. My precious little money... But at least he would still have more than four thousand energy left, so he would not wake up the next day completely bankrupt after repairing his core and building a new area. He looked at the outline of the front half of Graywood Town as it gradually stabilized, then fell silent for several seconds. Then he sighed quietly.

"Fine."

"A half-finished product can have its own gameplay too." In any case, for the current challengers, Rayne's party was probably the only one that could reach this place in the short term. As for the other half... He could deal with it once he had money. Inside the Core Chamber, the blue halo rippled faintly. Owen stared at the half-finished town within the fog, but in the end, he could not hold back a laugh.

"I really can't wait to see Rayne and the others' faces when they get here." Owen thought happily, then looked again at the streets of Graywood Town as they gradually sank into the fog. Mm. Hopefully, this time, they would remember to watch their backs.