The first bout of class acquisitions was quite fruitful. One dungeon scientist, me, ready to make new, never before witnessed wonders, surely. A manager, Sol, primed to keep me on some kind of track rather than leaving my head in the clouds. Rath as our first smith, and Loamar as a treasurer, both sure to improve our loot. Reb jumped right on dungeon sorcerer, gleeful to unleash destruction. The other three feline fae however, are open prospects still. Rib seemed dissatisfied with all the available options, and wasn't willing to settle. Tria and Vronne, however, didn't qualify since they weren't bonded to cores yet. Despite that Tria latched onto dungeon commander. Vronne seems open to any class, or rather, wasn't particularly interested in any of them, but wouldn't mind them either.

"Still need to test more cores for Tria. So nothing for that. Have you decided on a magic type yet Vronne? I would like you to be a dungeon theologian, so moon and stars feel most thematic. But I could figure out and work with bones if that's what you've solidly settled on."

The black cat tilts his head, mulls it over a few seconds, then spreads his moth like wings. "I would like, to shroud the moon in my wings."

"Mmhmmm. Sooooool~ This is on you. Cause Ahnya said moon is one of those, poetic types I wouldn't figure out. And I did already test sun mana with dark and earth a few ways. Did not work. Meanwhile, guess I'll get, acquainted with my new skills."

"Moon mana doesn't seem as simple as sun mana was, it gives the impression of a deeper, subtler holiness. But I think I have a few ideas. I'll poke you after I figure it out."

"Kaay, well subtlety certainly ain't my strong suit. Loves 'n kisses hon, I'ma go stir up some real trouble in the depths." With that, I flick down to one of my deepest darkest test rooms, and take a moment to buy both of the remaining skills. Despite putting it off for the measurement and calculation assist, catalyzation dooooes seem pretty good too.

"'Use intent along with materials, specialty items, or crystalized energy to attempt to improve a piece of material or monster under your authority.' Hmmm, should have asked what was meant by specialty items. Eh, I'll figure it out. Start with crystalized energy, nice and simple, got lots of thooooooo-ohh. . . My cores are crystalized energy too. Would that, work? Vaguery of wording, or deliberate choice? Would it even be more beneficial than a crystal of the same type?"

Well, nothing to do but test it. I summon two dust golems, and place a mana crystal and a mana core next to the two. Simply deciding to catalyze the monsters with the two items causes it to happen. Though it does cost a little bit of all three base energies to do. I'm also left with a twinge of pain from the sacrificed core.

"Hmmm, promising." I absorb both monsters, feeling a faint echo of pain when the core enhanced one disappears. They leave behind three mana crystals, and a mana crystal alongside two clearly broken shards of a core, respectively. "How? What? . . . Sneaky. Catalyzation reagents are also used as loot. And are, multiplied? Magic resistance might scale based on crystal quality? Can't see how that'd work for magic absorption, since it counted a full core as a shard."

I absorb the crystals and shards to clear the room. "Next up. Fire elementals catalyzed with, fire mana, negative fire mana, and positive fire mana crystals."

After reading the windows, I stare at the monsters. There is no clear difference between the three, at first. But after a few more seconds, I notice the middle one, shrinking? And the one on the right has a pool of fire slowly spreading out from around its base. Having an idea, I order the last one to move across the room. It leaves a thin trail of fire behind it. "Fire drain is slowly killing that one, but fire creation is basically a fire wall spell? Peculiar. And apparently if it's too similar it fails. I'd guess it was meant to be, minor fire resistance, which is useless to a fire immune fire elemental. Worth knowing."

I absorb the mana from all three elementals. It takes several seconds after the positive fire mana enhanced one disappears for the fire trail it left behind to burn itself out.

"Okay, general trend on mana figured out. Ki would be, strength? Not sure on spirit, still don't wanna waste too much spirit but one test should be fine." I whip up another pair of dust golems for the next pair of tests.

"I uhhh. Huh. Vitality seems simple enough, and makes sense. But, what do you mean awakening?" There is no visible difference between the golems. After a bit, I shrug and order the two to fight.

The vitality dust golem is faster and its movements feel weightier. But the awakening dust golem smoothly dodges the first heavy punch, before striking back on the other golem's shoulder, somehow petrifying the limb. With the seemingly stronger golem down a limb, the fight quickly shifts. In under a minute the golem with awakening has frozen up and pummeled the other golem into the dust of its namesake, though its own hands have suffered a similar fate of being crushed from tough dirt clods into looser soil.

"Hmm, kinda don't want to waste this one. Figure out how to repair it later? For now, I need to try materials. Both ways, I guess. Ha."

I zip up to the metal magic core's room and look around for Rath. I find him in the corner, hammering away at a knife or short sword of some kind. Both the hammer and knife are held with telekinesis I guess? The anvil is a simple piece, probably directly made by the metal magic core. There is no forge or clear heat source, but the knife is still glowing hot. He is floating about a meter away, a safe distance it seems, but still close enough to keep a personal eye on the work.

Once he's clearly done with the knife I speak up. "Heey Rath, testing out your class too, eh?"

His orb spins around showing an expression of a smile with eyes closed. "Hey boss! Yeah, the skills are pretty simple. Smith tool handling, gave me basic knowledge of the tools o' the trade, and lets me use them remotely. Extra good for someone without hands. Temperature control, exactly as it sounds, though it does only apply to metal. Then there's measurement intuition, which lets me judge the size and shape I should make something so it'll fit or be wieldable by a given creature. I think I also got some knowledge about simple weapons and armor just from picking the class? Figured I'd get some practice in on arms and armor before I try making any original jewelry."

"Cool. Some monsters would be much tougher with gear. Well, I'm practicing my catalyzation. Just got a handle on using energy crystals to improve monsters, now I need some materials, both to improve monsters with, and to improve with energy crystals. Want to start with mundane metal, since that's a solid starting point. Still not sure what it meant by- KNIFE! Can I have that knife? I thiiiink specialty items might mean completed products, in which case, I may be able to improve a monster, with a knife. Like magically, instead of just letting it use the knife. Weird."

There is a whirling noise from Rath that reminds me of an old computer. "If you can use a knife to improve something, and you can improve materials like iron, what happens if you improve an ingot with a knife?"

"Dude. Bruh. No idea. Want me to try?"

He uses his, err, our shared core to create an iron ingot next to the knife. "Sure. Didn't take me too long to get it like this. Made close to the right shape while manifesting the metal I made it from in the first place, the hammering was mostly to give it a decent edge. Could do better if I had a grindstone to sharpen it more, but you know."

"Riiight right. We can work on making one of those. Figure out the size, shape, material, etc, find a method or mechanism to spin it. Should only require a little research. But for now. . ." The knife disappears and the ingot becomes a slightly brighter color.

"Sharpening? Buhhh, what? Hmmm. Did. Did I put the idea of sharpness, from the knife, into. . . INTENT!!! How did I miss the word intent?! Intent shaping how things work always, allllllways, is broken. My own ideas of what the mana crystals would do must have lead to the effects I found. But what else can I do by intending to use them differently? Just, add spells to any monster with an appropriate crystal? This is, this is too much. For a first level skill, at least. Make it a capstone at minimum. Like, excuse me, ma'am, you have just given a toddler some sort of, chain-saw shot-gun hybrid and set him loose in a petting zoo. This is not going to go well. Note to self, dungeon petting zoo. Plenty of cats already. Maybe I can selectively breed the ki beasts for friendliness?"

"Ohh-kay. What does the metal, actually do though? Is it good for sharpening other things? Or like, if I make a knife outta that, will it sharpen itself?"

"I would imagine the later, and since I imagine it to be so, it likely is. Intent. HA. I'm gonna break, eeeeeverything. But on your thing, we can figure it out. Oh! I forgot the analysis part of my logbook. Lemme see if that'll help."

"Four hyphens for a name? Guess that means blank, as in it doesn't have a name yet. Can't let this one slip away from me. . . Hmm, call it 'Whetsteel', I guess."

"Handy. Since my class recognizes it as a new material, I bet you can absorb it with the metal magic core to make more without my help. Hmmm. Is this, a recursive loop? Actually, I should have thought of that about my interactions with Aradain."

While I'm thinking, the ingot disappears in a silvery flash of magic. "Well, I'll be damned. It does count as a different metal."

"Idea! Forge a shield while I make a large metal monster."

"Uhh, I don't need to do much forging there. Shaping it with metal magic can do well enough for just making a shield. If I want to make a good shield it'd take more work, but it doesn't seem that that is too important for, whatever you're doin'."

"Oh. Well, kay then. A big bulky monster that you want to make extra defensive, and a shield, please. Just wanna enhance a metal monster with a shield. Thematic."

"Well, I haven't made anything too big or bulky yet. But I did make a living plate armor? That sounds suitable enough. Ha, suit. I accidentally made a pun."

After I humm my assent, a crude suit of full plate armor, and a so called shield that is just a flat slab of metal with a metal handle welded to one side appear.

"Riiight. Your spider automata look way better than that. Next time, forge the armor, then turn it into a monster. But it should indeed, do."

"Fortification sounds about right. But I am getting just, so many ideas now. Maybe I can bum some random items off of Aradain for special effects. Potions, weird weapons, heck maybe even food items?" I shake my nonextant head, then scoff. "Ah well. Have fun with the new metal and amped monster, Rath. I'ma go mess around more. Maybe check in on the other fae, see how they're settling, after."

"Alrighty then, see you later Dan." A crudely shaped, nearly edgeless knife appears on his anvil.

I zip to a test chamber, only to find Glitter clawing at the wall. He doesn't seem to be trying to escape, just, sharpening his claws. To some success. On a stone wall. "I should see how strong the basic stone I'm using is to tell how impressive that is. For now I'll just, uhh. . ." I hastily make a path to release him in the cat room.

After ensuring there are no other forgotten experiments in the room, I summon a fire elemental and an extra fire mana crystal. "Okay. Elemental, immune to its element, uses the element's effect in melee range, immune to physical melee. What do you neeeeeed? Range. I guess. So, my intent is. The ability to spit fire at a short to medium range."

"Eeeyup. Bet there are some limitations. Like, don't give a water elemental fire breath. But still, just so much I can do with this. Wonder how Sol is doing on the moon mana?"

I peek into where I feel her working.

"Hmm, I feel that moon mana cannot be destroyed by dark or nether mana, for the moon is a light born of the darkness. Therefor if I layer dark, then nether atop of holy and light? . . ."

That indeed, didn't entirely make sense to me. But certainly is an interesting idea. I zoom back to my test chamber.

"If, ideas have power. Can I catalyze a monster with an idea alone? Hmmmmmm." I absorb the fire elemental, then spawn a feliformic beast in the room. A simple black cat with white socks. "Purrfect~"

I spend a few seconds hyping myself up. "Now my purrrecious friend, I offer you, my love for cats." Then I trigger catalyzation.

There is a flash of pink smoke.

The feline has doubled in size, and become a softer gray color. Why, their socks have even turned pink! Also, extra fluffy.

I nod along with my own dialogue. "Mhmm mhmm. Makes sense to me. The power of my love has brought about greater catness than ever before. Now, if only I could pet you."

There is a tingle in the air, that shifts almost immediately into pressure. "How did you already break something?! It's been like, two hours! Oh. That is the cutest fluff baby I have ever seen."

"Aren't they just?" I agree with Vestria's stunned statement. "And I broke things already, cause you gave me too great a toolbox. I mean, seriously. Intent? Tsk tsk. Not that I don't appreciate the freedom it represents."

"We~ll. Cute cat aside. How are emotions meant to serve as an added reward for anyone who beats your catalyzed monsters?"

"First off, anyone who kills this cutie is getting a two ton anvil dropped on their head. Secondly, just crystalize the emotions. I mean, hatred already has power in the form of malice. Why not give other emotions power of their own? Love and friendship destroying evil is always a plus. Should be interesting to see what people do with them. At the very least, Aradain should have potent interactions with such a thing."

"You're, certainly not wrong. In fact, based on something I've seen that you have not, you're more right than you could guess. But, I don't really have a full grasp on what she's doing with my systems so far. Well perhaps, not so much her, as. Well, the 'guardian light system'. Hmmm. But, I, can't say I hate the idea? Ughhh. I may also want to adjust how catalyzation works for people who take the class in the future. Looking at your recent memories, you thought catalyzation should be a capstone. That could work. I'll just, make a more limited version of it for the first level skill and let them regain full functionality at level fifty. I'll let you having the full version already slide though. Just a tiny way of playing favorites, in this one case."

"Thank you, I would hate to lose such a fun toy so soon."

"Ha, I was right that you would like catalyzation then?" She giggles as her presence fades.

"Drat, she got me there." I laugh, then kick back and appraise the new form of the cat.

"Is that my subconscious at work again, or did Vestria do that?" I send the new felamour after Glitter towards the cat room. "Nooow, which other monsters can I catalyze with which other emotions easily?"

Chaos_Sinner777

Three dungeon chapters in a row? Sure, why not. Felt necessary anyhow. Next few should be main story. At least it was reasonable length. Maybe cause I focused on one thing instead of like, five? Kek.