Chapter 103 Dungeon Core: “The Eternal Training Ground”

The start of the breakthrough was the same. As soon as it started, I felt the wonderful feeling that I have never felt anywhere but during a breakthrough. Usually, now I should be able to start allocating my breakthrough mana percentages, and while I felt could do it right now, my mind was bombarded with new memories from my parent that have finally been unlocked.

It was less information than I was hoping to get, nothing really earth-shattering. However, there was a quite vivid memory of my parent after he gained his trait and how under the guidance of a dungeon fairy, he figured out what trait he had. My parent seemed to have quite a simple talent which helped his monsters develop and control earth-type skills better.

The dungeon fairy guild seemed disappointed from the memories I saw. They started to visit the core room a lot less after that. His progression slowed down quite a lot and while my parent couldn’t see it, I could. They were purposely making it so he would reach his limit around the 35th floor.

Eventually, the dungeon fairy guild forced my parent to break off small pieces of himself, which would turn intangible and float away on the mana currents until they could find a suitable crystal to sprout in.

Slowly, my parent's core would heal itself, after which he was forced to do the same thing again. I was the 4th seed. Another way of releasing dungeon seeds would be to shatter the core, which would result in a lot of seeds. The memories of a shattered dungeon core would be a lot less structured, which is why shattering a dungeon core was quite illegal in the world.

I did receive a few new patterns. Two of them I already had; one was a different species of deer. Two that I didn’t have were a large looking turtle and a creature pattern of a pile of living rocks. The pattern and the information I had on it called the creature a rock golem.

What an interesting creature. I would need to mess around with the pattern because if it was called a rock golem, did that mean it could also be made out of different materials? Was it similar to how elementals got their species names?

But what I also received was a bunch of gold-rank talents. It doubled my current collection, but what was even more wonderful was that I could now understand and add them to the patterns. Unfortunately, to find out my own trait, I would need to finish the breakthrough. So, I got to work.

The first thing I noticed was the surplus of mana. I could seemingly do so much with so little, but then I realized it wasn’t the quantity, it was the quality I had access to. This breakthrough really was a qualitative change.

I already had the design for the boss room, and making it only took a few moments. I also didn’t need to think about what talent I should add to the twin Mountain Lion patterns, as they had already broken through a little while ago.

Now, however, I could see into the talent and understand how it worked and how it would develop over time. Now I also knew the second stage, what would come after the gold rank. During the gold rank, your talent would slowly get stronger, but it would also accumulate strength that you could not access right away.

That strength would eventually manifest when you reached the end of the gold rank, and it would either strengthen your original talent even further and by a lot or add to it a completely new effect. This time, however, it would not be dependent on what you already had but on what you had been doing during the time you were at the gold rank.

It was quite an interesting manifestation of power. The mountain lions had a talent that allowed them to enhance each other when they were close enough. It wasn't anything special, but if I were to rank the talent, I would say it was a strong A-rank, while a talent that would boost your strength by a little would be an E-rank talent.

When I was finished, it was time to move on to the next stage, but that didn’t happen because in this breakthrough, I couldn’t add anything to my skills, as my trait was using that mana allocation instead. I snapped back into consciousness to realize that the breakthrough was finishing now. I guess I wasn’t needed for that part. When I finally came out, I realized that two weeks had passed.

Memories of that time flowed into my active mind, and I quickly went over everything that had happened. The adventurers had finally found the hub station a few days ago, but nothing else interesting had happened.

I had expected the dungeon fairies to try something once again, but I figured out why they hadn’t. A lot of the Shadow Guild's strongest members had guarded the entrance room to my core floor. From their conversation, it seemed that they had noticed the dungeon fairy during the last breakthrough and were waiting to see if they would return once again during my weakest moment.

That was actually really sweet. Perhaps I should give them some kind of reward, but I was distracted when I noticed myself. First of all, I had expected the walls to be closer to my core, but instead, they were a lot further away. It seems that I had shrunk instead of grown during this breakthrough, and I was floating. Well, that explained the floaty feeling, I guess.

I just looked at myself for a while to get used to my new self, but I couldn’t wait any longer and started to follow the steps I had learned to try to figure out my trait. I dived into my core and saw myself surrounded by blue mana. Floating in front of me was the list of skills I had made, so I could easily look at them and see what rank they were.

Now came the hard part: trying to interpret what my talent did. I concentrated on the new part of me that I could feel in the mana sea around myself. A part of me answered back, and I pulled it into the clear bubble at the center of the mana sea.

Now that the trait was in front of me, I concentrated on it, trying to understand what it meant. It could take a while to get any understanding, but as soon as I tried, a word screamed back at me: intelligence.

So my trait had something to do with intelligence. That made so much sense, and I kind of wished I had a hand on the forehead to slap it against. There was more, however. It took me hours to figure out anything more. Next, I got the word 'evolution.' After that, I felt myself understanding my trait a little bit better.

I looked back at my life and, more specifically, at the creatures. Whenever I got the patterns, they were like any other patterns, but they did seem to change more easily than in the memories I had inherited from my parent.

Changing patterns by myself wasn't different, but the creatures themselves changing their patterns, or mutating, or evolving – whatever you want to call it – that happened easier for them. It also seemed so obvious now: the changes to their intelligence came the easiest.

This explains why the ants went down the path they did and how seemingly even some of the plants were slowly growing more aware of themselves. It also explained why I was so different.

A talent or a trait represented something that was already there, something in you that was different from the normal pattern. For me, it was my mind. Almost from day one, I didn’t feel united with my instincts but separate from them, like what happened to creatures when they grew intelligent enough to not just act on instinct.

A perfect example of this were the fruit flies. No, they weren't intelligent like me, but a few of them were aware enough to direct their skill development. This was something that shouldn't be possible with creatures so unaware.

Why they were able to achieve the status of one of the most dangerous creatures in my dungeon was because of who I was, and now this part of me would be amplified going forward. And then it clicked, and I could add another line underneath my skill names: Trait – Intelligence leaning evolution and...

At the end of that, I got something more, but it wasn't strong enough for me to figure out what it was. I would probably need another few breakthroughs before my trait fully manifested. Honestly, I didn’t care; I was already incredibly happy.

Everything had fallen into place, and I now understood myself so much better. It was time to flex my new power, and I did feel a lot more powerful. First order of business: finish the 20th-floor playroom, and then continue to expand.

Skills:

Creature Quantity: Rank A+

Dungeon Modification: Rank A+

Space Expansion: Rank S+

Dungeon Rules’: Rank A

Sub Dungeons’: Rank B

Outer Vision: Rank D

Creature Advancement: Rank E

Trait: Intelligence leaning evolution and…