Dungeon at the End of the Universe

Things proceeded much smoother than the first time around.

I sent out four Dungeon Seeds at once, one at the point nemo island and three at continental shores in a triangle formation around the island, and immediately had them start working on the Dungeon network underground.

Once some animals wandered inside I could start working on my mole tunneller again, but that would take a while.

In the meantime, we had adventurers to train. Faellen once more performed the transportation ritual, with me powering it. Somewhat surprisingly, we once more got the trio of Ram, Prshky, and Dittillapp.

Perhaps things like the exact time, space, and other minor variables don’t matter for this ritual? Because otherwise I’d have expected it to select someone else at random.

Either way, we had the first group now and it was time to train them. I left that to Faellen while I went ahead and put much more focus onto the sky. This time I’d catch that deity as soon as it arrived.

Dittillapp was a peculiar one. The day had long ended and they were as tired as anyone else would be at that point, yet they made no attempt to go to sleep. Not even brushing their teeth, putting on pyjamas, or lying in bed waiting for sleep to take them.

Instead, it appeared as if they were listlessly waiting for something. Or someone?

A few more minutes passed, and at some unknown signal, they stood up. Dittillapp walked out of their home, taking nothing with them. Not even a jacket for the slight breeze outside.

Yet more minutes went by. A gust of wind blew by and, as if it had whispered something into Dittillapp’s ear, they looked up. Just in time to see the descending pillar of light envelop them.

The next thing they knew, they were no longer standing on the streets of their home town, but instead on a strange and alien landscape. But despite that, they were not surprised. The alien wind, the twinkling alien crystals, the rushing alien water. No matter how weird it all was, it all still whispered to them in that familiar tone.

Dittillapp, or Ditti as they would be nicknamed in approximately a week, was not a completely normal Sipalian. Ever since they were born, they had an innate sense for… things. For the future.

Now, while I dislike sharing secrets, this one is not too grand: Ditti was born already Aspected. That Aspect of theirs has many names – fate, luck, destiny, future – but they all meant the same thing, more or less.

And as someone with the Aspect of Fate, a Primary Aspect, Ditti had to embody it.

A major benefit of having an Aspect since birth is that there’s nothing to conflict with it. There’s no battle between one’s personality and the Aspect’s. So, as Ditti had been embodying their Aspect since birth, they always knew what to do, where to go, what to say.

Always, up until now.

Ditti walked forth, expecting to find a cave with a glowing orb that’d grant them something called a ‘System’. Then they’d descend further underground and meet some more people.

But none of that happened.

Instead, what they walked into wasn’t a cave. It was a village. A village of Sipalians.

Ditti stopped, and so did their Aspect. It had been a long time since anyone had surprised Fate.

Thing’s seemed to be going well, even if there was still no sign of Zemis.

Both Ram and Prshky were much more eager to explore my moon landscapes when they saw a familiar village in the distance. The only exception was Dittillapp, who instead froze in their spot.

Strange, from what I saw last time around they were the one person in this group who was almost absolutely infallible. They were never surprised of anything. What changed?

After a few minutes of nothing happening, Faellen sent out one of the – moon Sipalians? Moonalians? Sipaloons? - to go check on them.

I – well, mostly Faellen – had tried to keep our Sipaloons’ language mostly in line with what was spoken when we were sent back in time, but language shift is inevitable. Still, they should be able to understand each other well enough.

The Sipaloon – a, sigh, a priest of mine – approached Dittillapp. Some words were exchanged and they both slowly walked back to the village. Our rogue-to-be was still unsure, walking on unsteady steps and looking all around for something.

At last, all three of them were in the village where they could finally meet. This time before facing a construct enemy on their own.

As soon as Ditti saw the other two, they regained at least some of their bearing. As if seeing something familiar in this strange moonscape.

The three of them exchanged some words, mainly questions about where they were which none of them could answer, but were soon ushered into a meeting with the chief or mayor of them town. I refuse to call him high priest. He fulfils the function of mayor, he is the mayor.

Just as planned, the mayor explained to them how to gain System access. Because, since I now had at least a bit of data, I decided to change things up a bit and proceed to version 0.2 of the System.

It would be less game-like, yes, but that was also the point. Can’t have my Users too divorced from reality and making the wrong choices.

Which meant that instead of being able to choose whatever class one wanted, they’d have to go through challenges. Yes, class trials were now online.

Three tough but possible challenges hand designed by Faellen for my three starting classes. They were sort of like mini-Dungeons, except that everything was still on them moon (so a part of me). But if I wanted to place some trials later on on Lapis, I’d likely have to do it through my Dungeon Seeds.

But that’s neither here nor there. It was time for my original adventurers to pick which trial they want to undergo.