"This is boring!" Lilian complained as I sat on the bed petting Elisia"s head. She had finished her shower and returned to the main room. It had taken all of three seconds for her to become annoying."Then get some sleep. It"s pretty late already." I replied.
"I"m not tired." the fairy replied her gaze shifting to the bag that contained all of Seth"s belongings. I hadn"t thought about it before, but while waiting I had realized it wasn"t a normal bag. Especially when I realized that a normal bag wouldn"t have needed instructions to use. Elisia had confirmed that it was a bag of holding. An overpowered item commonly featured in fantasy novels. Before that realization hit me I had been thinking Seth was pretty broke. Now I was just as curious as Lilian to see what was inside, but I felt it would be better to wait for Zephirah.
"Couldn"t we at least take a peek?" Lilian asked.
"No." I replied.
"Do you want Zephirah to absorb you after you steal something you shouldn"t have?" Elisia asked.
"Huh?" I asked.
"She is hoping to get first dibs on anything in there that the mana races would desire." Elisia told me.
"No!" Lilian objected unconvincingly. "I was just curious." she added in a much quieter more meek tone.
"Perhaps we should all just get some sleep." I suggested. "It might be best to wait until morning to look through the bag. Once we are rested and refreshed."
"You have to summon the serpent." Elisia reminded me.
I was silent my worries resurfacing. "Is that really a good idea?" I asked. "I want my family to be safe, or at least my sister."
"It will be fine. If my sire has spoken with the serpent head as he said he would, then the female they will send will be the best fit for us. Having a dungeon where both of them have children that get along will give them a neutral ground that they can use when important discussions need to be made." she told me.
I didn"t like the sound of that.
"Do not worry, if it is ever needed we will be well compensated." Elisia added.
I nodded then sighed. "So be it then, it is what it is and I don"t have a better idea." I said.
"Does that actually feel good?" Lilian asked looking at Elisia as she continued to wag her tail happily.
"Yes." Elisia replied simply. "I doubt it can match up to intercourse, but that won"t be possible until I obtain the form control skill at level twenty."
"So you work off levels too?" I asked remembering that the levels were exclusive to this dungeon world.
"Yes, my sire is a dungeon lord, I was born in his dungeon." Elisia told me. "Most of the magic beasts you encounter will be the same."
"So I will have to worry about their angry parents coming after me if I need to kill them?" I asked.
Elisia chuckled which proved to be just as disconcerting coming from her as it had her sire. "No, there are many dungeons in the different worlds of this realm, and few of the dungeon lords are as powerful as my sire and the serpent head. Even if you win this compet.i.tion and gain your own world to pillage and use however you see fit, you still only have a small chance at reaching their level." she told me.
"How strong are they?" I asked.
"I heard they were in the thousands." Lilian chipped in.
"My sire has not said, but if I were to guess given the different situations I have seen, I would say both of them have reached the tens of thousands." Elisia replied.
"Is there a level cap?" I asked curiously.
"Not that I know of. There are rumors that the overseer and some of the other ancient dungeon lords have reached the millions, but it has never been confirmed." Elisia replied.
I shook my head, I had no idea how powerful that would make them. Though I could imagine that they would be able to destroy me and my dungeon with just a thought. It was rather humbling.
"That reminds me, how much essence do you have?" Elisia asked.
"Essence?" I asked curiously.
The core flashed brightly.
"With every death the dungeon gains the mana from the defeated, however with it comes a bit of soul essence. Nothing like what we would have gotten from Seth, but the small bits would eventually add up." Elisia replied.
"I see, so we could form our own soul stones with that?" I asked.
"No, well yes, but the amount of free soul essence you would have to use wouldn"t be worth it. Instead we can use it to form other things that are beneficial to the dungeon." Elisia replied.
Lilian snorted.
"What?" I asked the fairy.
"Seems the puppy is an addict." Lilian said contemptuously.
"I am not!" Elisia growled in reply.
"Why do you think that?" I asked Lilian while I tried to soothe Elisia.
"There are only three things you can make with loose soul essence. Unless you pick up a profession that specializes in it, which is rare." Lilian told me.
"And that is?" I prompted.
"An impure soul stone, and before you ask you can refine five impure soul stones to make a refined soul stone like the one you would have gotten from Seth. A purified soul stone is a refined soul stone that has been further processed to amplify its power and ensure there is no lingering consciousness attached to the soul stone. It is worth a lot more so you got a deal on that part of the arrangement." Lilian explained.
"And the other two?" I asked.
"All the soul essence will have a hint of the being it came from. Once you have a taste of a being"s essence you can attempt to form a racial gem shard, but it can take a lot of essence. If you use the bare minimum your chances are pretty slim, the more you use the better your chances, though you can still fail even if you use the maximum amount of essence." she told me.
"So it"s a gamble?" I asked.
Lilian nodded. "It is, and if you fail all the essence goes to waste." she agreed
"And the last?" I asked then glanced down at Elisia as she tensed up.
"Dungeon tokens." Lilian replied with a smirk as she looked at Elisia. "It is the game of choice amongst the dungeon born. Soul essence is compressed into a special token which is used to play Dungeon Roulette. The lowest risk game has a fifty percent loss rate with mediocre payouts." she replied.
Elisia"s tail had stopped wagging despite my continued petting.
"I see, but is it even gambling?" I asked.
"Huh?" Lilian asked.
"It doesn"t sound like the essence has much use, so why not use it to gamble? If you lose it, it doesn"t matter, if you win, it could improve our dungeon." I explained.
The core flashed several times but Zephirah didn"t say anything.
Lilian sighed then shook her head. "You only say that because you don"t understand how important the soul stones are." Lilian told me.
"No, I understand, or at least I have an idea. You just forget our situation. While I am a Mana Lord and have an advantage because of that, our opponents will include rich kids whose parents, or clans sent them here with everything they could get away with, and after seeing this bag of holding, I am sure that could be a lot. We need to use every method we can consider to make up for that." I explained. "Will we be able to gain enough soul essence for an impure soul stone within a month?" I asked.
Lilian shrugged, "That is up to you and how much your dungeon kills." she replied.
"Which isn"t what Zephirah wants to focus on." I replied then looked at the core. It didn"t flash like it had before.
Elisia"s tail started to wag again. It seemed like Lilian might have been right. I didn"t have an issue with gambling, as long as it was looked upon as recreational and you didn"t go overboard with your betting. I wouldn"t want to include any kind of potential winnings from the gambling into my plans until we actually won it.
I was curious now so I summoned the dungeon screen to see how much essence there was and confirm what we could do with it. Essence was at the bottom of the list.
=========================
Convert Soul Essence?
Current Soul Essence - 3238
Dungeon Token: 100 Essence
Gem Shard: 1,000 - 1,000,000 Essence
Impure Soul Stone: 1,000,000 Essence
=========================
Seemed like Lilian was right. I glanced over at the core. "What are your thoughts?" I asked Zephirah mentally.
I got no reply.
"You didn"t say you wouldn"t be able to talk to me at all." I mentally reminded her.
Still no response.
I sighed the sprite was going to have to answer for ignoring me. I mentally sent an image of me spanking her. I thought I saw the core shiver but there was no reply from the sprite. Shaking my head I decided to use the essence as I saw fit.
I selected the gem shard option first to satisfy my curiosity.
=========================
Which Gem Shard will you attempt to create?
Slime
Giant Mouse
Giant Raven
Giant Fox
Giant Badger
Giant Snake
Giant Wolf
Human
Gemini
How much essence will you use?
=========================
I was surprised by some of the choices. I hadn"t seen the Fox or Raven. I would guess the badger came from the blueprint we traded for, and Seth, Vanessa, Elisia, and I should be the source of the Human, Gemini, Wolf, and Snake options. I would have to ask when we got essence from Elisia and Seth. Was this the other normal way of getting Racial Gems, win a shard and grow it into a gem?
I hesitated for a moment then chose the raven then input the minimum before agreeing to the attempt. I didn"t have any hopes of succeeding, however the screen had an animation where a fog flooded the screen gathering into a single point in the center of the screen. After a couple moments the fog stopped and dispersed leaving behind a note that we had failed the attempt.
I chuckled then selected the fox option for the same amount of essence.
"You are going again?" Lilian asked when I confirmed the attempt.
"We don"t have much else to do." I replied with a shrug. Stupid sprite was ignoring me.
Again the animation appeared on the floating screen. Elisia sat up to see the screen her whole body stiff.
Seeing Elisia"s actions I shook my head. I couldn"t give her access to the essence, though maybe I could use it as a reward for her. Would that be considered feeding the addiction?
Again the gem shard failed to form.
"Going again?" Lilian asked.
I shook my head. "No, I want to see the dungeon tokens." I replied.
=========================
How many dungeon tokens do you want to condense?
Current number of Dungeon Tokens: 0
Current Soul Essence: 1238
1 Dungeon Token: 100 Essence
=========================
I chose to make twelve then confirmed the use.
=========================
Choose a Roulette Wheel
Playing Around: 1 Dungeon Token
Some Risk: 10 Dungeon Tokens
Big Risk: 100 Dungeon Tokens
High Roller: 1,000 Dungeon Tokens
Moneybags: 10,000 Dungeon Tokens
Addict: 100,000 Dungeon Tokens
Donations: 1,000,000 Dungeon Tokens
=========================
"So the more tokens you use per spin, the better the prizes and greater the risk?" I asked looking to Lilian
"Got it in one?" she replied.
I chose the playing around level. A roulette wheel appeared on the screen with a spin b.u.t.ton at the bottom of the screen. There were ten slots on the roulette, five of the ten were black s.p.a.ces, while the other five had a prize on it. There were two varying stacks of iron coins, two different stacks of silver coins, and a gold coin as the grand prize.
I rolled my eyes then backed out to the previous screen and chose the small risk roulette. A new roulette wheel appeared. This one had fourteen s.p.a.ces, eight were black while six had prizes. The prizes on this were a bit better, one had a pile of gold coins, two had small piles of mithril coins, while the fourth had a gem shard like the one I got for Elisia, though it had an image of a red haired fox beside it. The grand prize was three gem shards; an eagle, a lion, and what I would guess was the hot version of a harpy. I pressed the spin b.u.t.ton which turned gray once I hit it. The wheel spun rapidly at first then gradually slowed down until it finally stopped on the fox gem shard.
I frowned at the screen for a moment then tapped the b.u.t.ton to receive my prize. A moment later a small box appeared in front of me then landed on my lap beside Elisia"s paw.
"We won!" Elisia cheered happily.
"Beginner"s luck." Lilian snorted.
I backed out of the roulette screen.
"What are you doing?!" Elisia protested.
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"We don"t have enough essence for this game." I replied calmly.
A pop up appeared on the screen.
=========================
Out of Essence for Dungeon Tokens?
Convert Mana into Dungeon Tokens!
1 Dungeon Token: 1000 Mana
=========================
I smiled at the screen, I had seen the bait and here was the hook. Seemed like people from other worlds fell for this trick too. I snorted then closed the screen and left the gambling screen.
"But we won!" Elisia complained. "We could have spared a little mana! If we got the grand prize we would be set!" she whined at me.
I shook my head. "No, the only way to win at gambling is to treat it as a game, and walk away if you do happen to win." I told her.
"What does that mean?" Elisia asked.
"If you are going to play, only gamble what you can afford to lose, if you get lucky enough to win big walk away. I played because the essence isn"t any use to us. I will not spend the mana we need to grow the dungeon on a game of chance." I told her firmly.
Elisia"s head drooped.
I reach out and petted her between the ears. "There are no easy wins." I told her.
I heard clapping. I turned to see the ancient serpent and ancient dire wolf had appeared at my dining table again.
"Convinced?" the dire wolf asked.
The serpent nodded. "I am rea.s.sured. I will chose her as you asked." he told the dire wolf then disappeared.
"Zephirah." I called looking over to the core.
The serpent gem flashed then disappeared along with the core as Zephirah appeared in her sprite form. "He made me do it!" she said as soon as she appeared.