“Graverra. I want to show you something.” Hecrux’s voice boomed into her chambers. Still wrapped up in her reading, Graverra flinched and threw herself over Malfunctions of Magic as if that might actually keep it there, should Hecrux have decided he’d changed his mind.

He didn’t sound angry, though. Just loud. And maybe a little excited?

“Really?” Graverra didn’t sit up just yet. “What?”

“Telling you is not the same as showing you.”

He had a point there… But was he actually going to show her something or just expect her to intuit it and humiliate her when she struggled? There was, unfortunately, only one way to find out.

“Coming.” Graverra called, already weary. Which wasn’t right; the both of them should have been back up to full by now.

Secondary Core Mana Reserves: 3,000

The information came to her while she placed Malfunctions’ ribbon bookmark and shut the book, no grimoire necessary. Still, Graverra frowned. She didn’t want to dread speaking with Hecrux. How was that supposed to work out in the rest of forever?

✨ 💀 ✨

“Summon your grimoire.” Hecrux demanded the moment Graverra set foot over the threshold between her chambers and his lair.

Graverra walked closer to the dungeon core cautiously. The last time he’d threatened to show her something… She guessed it had still just ended in being offered a wall full of incomprehensible books, but that just got her thinking again about mana madness and whether or not Hecrux had it. If she had caused it. “May I ask why?”

“So that I can show you something.”

Graverra held back a nervous smile as she cast one last look at Hecrux before doing what he had asked. She held off on summoning the table or her chair, or even just the throw blanket to sit on. For all she knew, they were going to fight again, and if that was going to happen, then Graverra would rather just leave.

The grimoire appeared in Graverra’s arms, and she let it flop open as she held it out between herself and the dungeon core. Hecrux, of course, didn’t need it, but if he was going to be so insistent on her having it out now… The typical dungeon stats hardly got a chance to form on the page before Hecrux bid the book to show the dungeon map. And even that had only just spread over the pages when a system message flooded both the grimoire and Graverra’s mind.

Place ‘Ravaging Homunculus (Undead)’ for 5,000 Mana?

[Y] / N

Graverra’s stomach flipped at the cost. Or maybe Hecrux was tapping into her reserves for it. Maybe she can just unsummon it while Hecrux is inactive next, which would be soon enough at that rate. But as the little sketch darkened in her grimoire, Graverra began to see the appeal.

“It’s a homunculus.” Hecrux explained, even though he clearly knew the system had already told her as much. It’s made of-“

“So many bodies…” Graverra finished for him, on the verge of being in awe. If she had still been a normal, mortal necromancer, something like that would have only been possible in her fifties. Levels-wise. And it would have taken into her actual mortal human fifties just to source all the parts. It was a terrible, hulking mishmash of limbs and mouths and eyes. Truly befitting of their dungeon’s theme. “It’s awful. I think… I think I love it.”

Hecrux didn’t respond, but Graverra can still feel his sense of pride over it. Until a rapid series of system messages and the heady sensation of mana use overrode the feeling.

Place 100 Basic Dungeon Segments for 2,250 mana?

[Y] / N

Place 25 Interior Walls for 250 mana?

[Y] / N

Apply Style ‘Drethi’?

[Y] / N

Place ‘Basic Study Furnishings’ for 500 mana?

[Y] / N

Apply Style ‘Drethi’?

[Y] / N

…

It all happened so fast. Suddenly they didn’t just have the facade of a castle, fully drawn and inked into the grimoire’s map, but the bare bones of an interior as well. The grimoire flipped pages of its own accord, showing Graverra the floor plan for the first floor.

Entryway, receiving room, drawing room, dining room, ballroom, kitchen, pantry, study… Graverra might have swooned from the sheer opulence of it all. They wouldn’t even be able to use any of that, not the way things like kitchens should have been used.

“Did you know we have something called styles now?” Hecrux asked his question before Graverra could voice any of hers. And he still didn’t sound upset, even though that should have bothered him. That had to have been her fault. “They’re like themes for rooms.”

“Well- Well what did you do all that for?” It couldn’t have been for her sake. He was upset with her, wasn’t he? This was a waste of mana, wasn’t it? This shouldn’t have even been allowed. They weren’t allowed to have multiple levels yet; why wasn’t the system yelling at Hecrux about it? Whatever happened to initial dungeon training for optimal performance?

“You wanted a castle.” Hecrux stated matter-of-factly as ever. “And you thought you were homesick.”

It was what she had asked for, which made it all the more confusing. Hecrux hadn’t seemed particularly keen on the idea. Not enough to just go and do it for her in one fell swoop.

“Is it wrong? Did you hate it there?”

“No. I…” Graverra squinted at the map. She wished she could see into the rooms better, but it was easy enough to pick out the familiar weave of the rugs and the gnarled but somehow still elegant wood of the furnishings. “It’s more and nicer than anything I ever had when I lived there.”

It had only been eighteen years. Drethi was a glut of oddball classes, mage or otherwise. Which worked out well enough when working towards something like necromancer, but not so much after the fact when Graverra had been in want of a proper party. But of course Graverra missed it; Drethi had been home. She’d always thought she’d return to it, eventually, but now…

“You’re welcome.”

Graverra hummed her amusement. She hadn’t thanked him yet, but now maybe she wouldn’t. And besides, wasn’t this all an apology for the book argument? It felt like it should have been.

“May I actually look at it now?” Graverra didn’t need to ask; she would have summoned her crystal ball either way.

Hecrux squinted at her. “What is your obsession with going into the dungeon itself?”

“I’m not going down there.” Graverra reached mentally for her crystal ball, still on the table in her chambers. It should have been as easy as summoning her grimoire, or nearly. Instead, it felt sluggish; there was a mental strain Graverra hadn’t felt since early levels. She frowned and pulled harder.

The crystal ball popping into existence at what could be considered Hecrux’s feet should have cleared the rest up for Hecrux, but his assumption had just given Graverra something new to latch onto.

“I get the not going down there, or out there, or whatever when the dungeon is open and all, but we haven’t even been placed yet.” Graverra said as she set the crystal ball to ‘walking’ through the dungeon again. She was going to have to find a way to drum up more spellcrafting points soon; the nothingness that encased their dungeon felt thicker than a moonless night, even with the addition of scattered light sources.

And it dragged. Just the same as summoning it had.

“Because.” Hecrux’s brief pause worried Graverra they might be having the book argument all over again, but this time he at least tried to use a few more words. “I don’t want you to.”

Graverra chewed her bottom lip. She could just leave it at that. Surely, there would be things that she just didn’t want him to do. And look at all he’d just done for her…

Inside the castle — Graverra knew it was a bit presumptuous to call it that, but it could be, one day — was the wrong kind of eerie. The shadows cast by candlelight were warm enough, but there is a sterility to the newness of it all. There was no dust and no cobwebs; every piece of furniture sat too squarely in its place.

“It’s only the basis of things.” Hecrux said, still clipped and guarded.

“No, I know!” The last thing Graverra needed was for him to misunderstand that she was rejecting his gift somehow. “It’s so much more than I expected we could get done and so quickly...”

And they hadn’t had to argue about any of it either.

Hecrux seemed to relax again. His expression softened as his heart avatar slowed down. “You can fuss with it more when your mana reserves have regenerated.”

“Right.” Graverra wasn’t bothered. She had expected even just the homunculus needed to tap into her reserves, and she had quickly decided that was well worth it. Just so long as Hecrux didn’t make a habit out of it.

Secondary Core Mana Reserves: -750

“Wait.” So that might have explained the struggle with the crystal ball. “I thought you said we weren’t supposed to do that?”

“Only a little.” Hecrux grumbled. He sounded sore to have been caught. “It was worth it, wasn’t it?”

“Well, yeah, but…” Malfunctions of Magic hadn’t said anything about negative amounts of mana, at least not in the chapter on mana madness, and Graverra certainly had never been given that option before. There had to be a drawback; otherwise, what had been stopping Hecrux from doing that before adding her to the dungeon? “There’s a reason we’re not supposed to, isn’t there? I mean, where is it coming from? Are we going to have to pay it back at some point?”

“You don’t have to worry about it, Graverra.”

Graverra leaned forward and crossed her arms over the top of the crystal ball. She frowned at Hecrux as she studied him over, trying to decide how best to bring up the idea of mana madness, or if she even needed to at all. “Maybe I’m worried about you.”

Hecrux blinked once before his lower eyelid came up the way that Graverra took as smiling. “You don’t need to do that either. It’s time someone worried about you.”

Was that what he thought he was doing? Graverra fought back a smile in anticipation of telling him, “Apology accepted.”