We discovered some new things while we were distracted. One is a parasite that feeds off and lives solely on the hosts mana. This greatly enhanced our mana leach capabilities as well as showed us how to make it undetectable to the host themselves. And due to the nature of the mana heart the longer we lurked, the more mana we took, the more the hosts mana heart grows. What this meant for us was we could then siphon more without the host noticing exponentially, increasing our mana even if we couldn’t take the host confidently.

We also discovered that we have neglected a very important source of infection. BUGS. As hated and decimated by most races/parts as they are, they are truly everywhere. The humble mosquito for example injects its venom into every living creature it can find while sucking its blood. Replace the blood-thinning venom with a tiny contagion parasite and guiding it away from anything that might catch the parasite and try to develop a ‘cure’ for me, and I have a weapon of mass infection! And best of all these creatures throw themselves at all my animal hosts with abandon begging to join us!

But the most exciting thing is one of my rabbits found the opening to the dungeon that Chia suspected was nearby! I am so looking forward to meeting a primitive self! The knowledge we can share the methods we can debate! Chia tells me that these dungeons are all over this planet. They have already sublimated that far! The mere thought of there being a second younger CORE-self existing somewhere sends my generators on overdrive. When I have the power, I simply HAVE to bring it to meet my own CORE-self! I fear I don’t know exactly how much power that would take nor even in what direction I need to jump towards but that can wait till later.

We shall enter the dungeon with just Chia and the panther-self since I don’t want to seem too threatening. In my excitement I had forgotten that I would look no different than a demon monster-tamer classed invader to the dungeon.

We arrived at the entrance that was hidden behind a tree and several bushes clearly trying its best to stay hidden. It looked like an unassuming cave if not for the stairs as it made its way down. Strangely it seems all dungeons must have stairs to change floors or at the entrance on underground dungeon. Why would you go through the trouble of finding a hidden place to make an entrance if you put stairs to announce that you’re not some cave or something else mundane? Still its not for me to question a self on the details for our first meeting. I instruct Chia to put her hand on the wall of the entrance and call out to the dungeon.

“greetings dungeon-otherself. This would be our first-time meeting; I hope to learn from each other.” Then I waited for a reply…. And waited… O-o-ok. Perhaps I need to be deeper in the dungeon to attract the dungeon’s attention from whatever it is doing at the moment. Chia says that dungeons require no rest and can always observe anything in their territory just like our selves so no chance it is sleeping. It’s not lost on me that the first time I tried talking in this world was a failure. I hope it’s not always going to be like this. We went down the steps and entered the first room where there was a single goblin waiting for us. It said something unintelligible and attacked with its club.

It would be very easy to kill it like the panther did a few times before, but it would be bad if the dungeon was offended by killing its selves. So, we allowed the goblin the first hit on Chia’s arm before pinning it down and infecting it with a small cut. Chia didn’t even feel the impact thanks to the armor, so it was really, just a show of self-defense. Once we took over the goblin, we left it fully intact so we could return it to the dungeon when we were done. One thing that was different from all the other creatures we encountered is there was a vague pressure to defend the dungeon. Nothing more though so perhaps the dungeon doesn’t directly control its monsters so much as just gives orders. We wondered through the halls of the dungeon looking for the dungeon core while encountering goblins in groups of somewhere between 1-5 but never more than 5 at once. The wide halls and their small bodies allowed them to stand side by side and attack, but it was to no avail as nothing harmed us. Occasionally, we would come across a pitfall trap and usually Chia would notice it beforehand but sometimes we would fall in. The pitfalls were so shallow though it wouldn’t even sprain an ankle on Chia before I rebuilt her bones let alone now. There is a growing line of goblins behind us as we went through this maze. Unfortunately, not even one of the 40 we found so far know the way.

Finally, we found a door down one hallway that likely lead to the boss room. As we opened the door, we are greeted with 10 goblinas. Yes, every single one is female with animal skin dresses. There are 2 with bow and arrows, 1 with a staff, 3 with swords and shields, and 4 with spears formed up in a neat formation with the shields fallowed by spears then the mage flanked by archers. It was kinda cute to see all the mini weapons that matched the goblina’s size. They stared at us with bows drawn while we stared back. No one moved. Finally, I figured I should have the dungeons attention by now, so I tried to introduce ourselves again.

“hell- “before I could get any further the archers seemed to have been startled by me suddenly talking and fired their arrow. The others took that as the signal and started attacking us as well. These bladed weapons hurt as they tore through the skin covering the bio-armor but that was all. The biggest problem is that these goblinas where too smart to let one of us flank around while they focused on the other. A few goblins we took over died in the crossfire, so I sent them out of the room while we charged the frontliners. The first ones to strike were the spear women. 3 stabbed at the panther while the last one on the left went for Chia. I ignored the attacks on the panther since his armor is far thicker than Chia’s I've even incorporated his fur as thin filaments of armor. For Chia I dodged the spear head and grabbed the shaft using it as a pole to throw the shield-woman forward and off balance. I let go of the shaft and used a small dagger to stab the stumbled goblina to infect her before jumping at the spear line behind. Just as I closed in and stabbed the spear-woman that just caused the formation to break, I was hit by a lightning spell. It didn’t hurt much but the trauma I had to being hit by lightning when I first arrived on this planet triggered me. I dove through the entire line and charged the mage with nothing but brute force. I felt two spears stab my back while an arrow hit my shoulder, but I shrugged it all off as I ran full speed at the mage. I could see the fear in her eyes, but my rage still didn’t abate when I reached her. She fired a fire arrow at my face, but I swiped it away with my shield and snatched her throat while transforming Chia’s nails into claws to pierce her neck where I grabbed her.

Once I was sure the mage was full taken over I turned to the archers, as the panther had managed to finish the frontliners in this time, only to find they had retreated to the corner making themselves as small as they could in the fetal position. Weapons left abandoned. Just huddling there like they thought they couldn’t be seen if they hid like that. It was honestly kinda cute in a way. I decided to leave them as I retrieved the dagger I had left in the spear-woman goblina in my blind rage for the mage then headed for the door on the other side of the boss room goblin army in tow.

Behind the second door was a pedestal with a small glowing orb on top of it and a small demon child that looked maybe 4 space cycles old. The demon child huddled in front of the orb and held it protectively while she looked at me in terror. Then she looked at the goblins and goblinas that came with me and started shouting at them.

“Get the intruder! Protect me! Why wont you listen? Please I'm sorry if I offended you and that I used you to defend me but please protect me!... please?... please I don’t want to die… you wouldn’t kill a small child of your own race, would you?”

The two uncontrolled goblinas had come into the room and embraced the little crying girl with a look that seemed to say at least we will die together. I felt the urge to do the same from the other goblinas that I controlled though no such urge came to the goblins for some reason. Well what now…. This is hardly the grand meeting I had imagined. While Chia supplements that the dungeon can take any form to try to keep from being broken from attractive women to impersonating a fallen comrade, anything to persuade the opponent to let them live. It’s still kinda awkward when I only came to meet a primitive self, not conquer the dungeon. It seems she thought her tactics were semi-effective as she began to try and press her point.

“Please if you let me live ill give you what you want! Is it money? Maybe a weapon or armor? Maybe some rare metals or magic stones? I can’t do much since I only a young dungeon but ill give you everything I can so please let me live! If that’s still not enough then ill owe you and when I become older and more powerful you can come collect from me…. Please don’t hurt me.”

Haaaa what the heck man. I get it’s a show they put on to keep spreading but if this is what it takes to keep assimilating without any parts destroying you, I'm not sure I could take it. Call me prideful but I'm not wanting to just grovel to get by. So back to the question: what to do now? Is there still some worth in conversation? Well lets at least try for now.

“I’d like to talk to your CORE-self. How can that be arranged?” I said through Chia

“Umm the core and me are tied together as the same person” she replied choosing her words carefully

“No not your core I mean the central CORE. The control center. The original core.”

“umm I'm sorry but I don’t know? Is there anything else I can do for you? Please don’t kill me for not being able to answer!”

Well another failure. Is she disconnected like me? Or was she left until she grew enough to join the collective? Or maybe I misunderstood what dungeons really are. Its hard to tell. What should I do about this one in the meantime? She has seen a bit about how I operate so just leaving could spell trouble if someone else gets here and pumps her for information. Hmm since she isn’t part of any collective then maybe I could have her join mine? That would make sure I have detailed truthful knowledge about how dungeons work.

“I won’t harm you, but you will have to join us.”

“I'm sorry but I can’t leave the dungeon so I don’t know how I would join you?”

“that won’t be a problem.” I said as I sheathed the dagger and walked up to them.

First a I touched each of their faces near the eyes like I was wiping their tears. Then I rested my hand on the orb. The first to join were the goblinas. The girl was blank on the inside with no blood organs or anything, so I focused on the core that resisted me stubbornly with the largest mana pool I've seen to date other than my own. I looked at the wide-eyed girl and said, “don’t resist”. Slowly her defenses fell away, and she joined us as the first ever dungeon-self. It ended up being the most profitable takeover for me since I arrived.