Lillene

Enjoy!

[Themes offered based on current circumstances: {}]

[Expand the Theme set by offering options]

That was remarkably unhelpful. What even was a Theme?

Wait, he knew that; Aki had talked about it. It was sort of like a setting, wasn’t it? Was a historical dungeon what this Voice was calling a Theme?

[A Historical dungeon is not possible at this location due to a lack of available significance]

The sinking of A’Atla wasn’t significant? Was it simply too long ago or was it because the constant mana flow had worn away at it? The Voice didn’t answer, so Serenity supposed he’d have to be content with his guesses.

On the other hand, the response meant that Historical was probably a Theme. That meant -

The brightness around Serenity seemed to ripple; colors spilled everywhere and they were all too bright to see. 

[Hurry]

The Voice had a point; he didn’t have time to think about it. Serenity tried to come up with as much of a dungeon design on the spot as he could. He was overthinking it; he knew what made a dungeon, even if he didn’t know the words for it.

It clearly needed to be combat-focused. A dungeon that looked like A’Atla made sense, both exterior and interior; many dungeons echoed their locations. What he’d fought here was a demon, snakes, and basilisks. 

The basilisks were clearly too strong for low Tiers, but perhaps they would work for high Tier optional encounters? You’d need a way to get past the manastream anyway if they were confined to the area where they were initially found. Good healers might work, too, at a Tier where the basilisks could reasonably be encountered. A good shield would at least blunt the effect of the curse; the problem was that no one on Earth had good shields yet.

[Location set. Basic encounter pool parameters set: Serpent, Elemental, Demon. Theme requirement overridden. Affinity requirement overridden. Affinities set: Stone, Demonic (Emotion)]

[Please design the initial area (first floor)]

There was a list of possible locations; Serenity grabbed “A’Atla’s surface” quickly, then picked “Fields” as the starting location. He didn’t take the time to read through all of them, but it generated exactly the sort of monsters he wanted as options. There were some elementals and one type of demon, but Serenity went with the basic snakes for the common enemies. That meant only three enemy types, but that was plenty for a first floor. 

He wanted a more difficult but still snakelike enemy, so the Lamia option seemed like a good choice. It would be the first spellcaster in the dungeon, but having a boss as the first spellcaster was a reasonable choice. It would also help to set the expectations for the rest of the dungeon, where the boss might not line up with the floor’s monsters. After all, he wanted to tell a story, even if it was a shallow one.

He didn’t get an option to choose the floor’s Tier, but he did get to name it. It really was too bad he didn’t have time to think about the name.

[Floor One Map design/theme: Snakes in the Grass. Terrain: Fields of Grain. Common enemies: Snake (constrictor), Snake (venomous), Snake (decoy). Boss: Lamia (Demon of Longing). Recommended Tier: 2]

Serenity felt it as the floor began to unfold. He didn’t really need to make any choices; the Dungeon Voice seemed to know how to populate a dungeon and didn’t require his assistance. It was honestly impressive just how few choices he could make and still have a full dungeon level.

When it finished, the same list of location options appeared for Floor Two. The next location was easy; there were really only three interesting things on the surface of A’Atla and Serenity didn’t see the need to show off the mountains yet. He might show them off later; mountains would be a great backdrop for a final boss fight. The dungeon wouldn’t go that deep; with it starting at Tier Two, he was only expecting three to six floors. That would take it to Tier Three or Four, and with Earth at Tier Three, anything beyond Tier Four would be unusual. 

Monsters were also easy. He wanted to keep the snakes coming but also add in some simple elementals for common monsters. That would tie the level back to the previous one while still letting him change the flow as needed. There was the new option of a “combined” monster for the boss; Serenity happily picked it. Combined monster had to mean either a multi-stage boss or a boss that had more than one defeat condition. They were fun to fight.

He didn’t expect the ‘Special Feature’ option, but it was probably a good idea to add more things when they were offered. A hidden area seemed to make sense; that would be a fun place to hide more “story,” even though the Dungeon Voice wouldn’t let him do something historical. It was also a good place to hide some demons; that way, people could have the choice to fight them or not.

Serenity was a little surprised when he saw the Tier recommendation; this dungeon was rising in Tier quite a bit faster than average; a normal dungeon was between one level per Tier and two levels per Tier. Tier Four from Tier Two was faster than that, but that was probably just for the hidden area. Hidden areas could be over the general Tier of a level.

[Floor Two Map design/theme: Urban Elementals. Terrain: Destroyed City (A’Atla’s surface). Common enemies: Snake (various), Rock Elemental (basic), Stone Elemental (basic). Boss: Combined (Building Golem / Stone Elemental Posse / Fear Demon controller. Multiple destruction options). Hidden Mission: Demon Enclave. Recommended Tier: 3 or 4]

The nexus felt a little more stable as the second floor unfolded. It still didn’t feel even close to right, however, which worried Serenity; the dungeon had to be able to anchor the nexus or this wasn’t going to work. He dove quickly into the third floor choices; he needed to get through this quickly. He already wasn’t taking the time to do any polishing.

From the city, the choice was obvious; the dungeon needed to head into the tunnels. Win the hidden demon enclave on the previous floor, a demon was necessary to make the floor continue from that point, so he picked a doglike variation on a Wrath demon; perhaps the other demons used them to hunt down the people who destroyed the enclave?

He limited the dogs to the upper area, which meant he needed tunnel enemies as well. A couple of fun new options appeared, so he picked the two that would be the most annoying: the two who could move through the stone walls. Two types of wormlike tunnelers would also help connect the snakes and the elemental theme. 

Making a trapped maze in the tunnels was definitely on-theme for running into tunnels below a devastated city, especially if the traps were mostly things like sinkholes and the dead ends were generally choked with rubble.

When the Dungeon Voice offered him a Special Feature again, Serenity knew exactly what he wanted to do: an evasion type encounter that chased the delvers into the tunnels. If they were strong enough, they could fight, but that wasn’t really what the encounter was for. 

Serenity wasn’t surprised when that choice removed his choice of a boss for the level. The Demon Hunters were probably stronger than an on-Tier boss encounter.

[Floor 3 Map design/theme: Escape to the Tunnels. Terrain: Destroyed City, transition to Winding Tunnels. Maze elements. Common Enemies: Demon Hunters (evasion / optional combat), Demon Dogs (Wrath), Rock Tunnelers (snake variant), Rock Tunnelers (elemental version). Boss: None. Hidden Exit to Floor 6. Recommended Tier: 4 (evasion) or 7 (combat)]

Tier Seven was quite a bit higher than Serenity had expected. Tier Four for the floor was weird, too; sure, he’d known it was possible, but Gaia was growing, not shrinking. That should mean her dungeons tended to lag her growth; dungeons tended to lag both ways. Was this because she’d once been at a higher Tier?

Come to think of it, that might explain why Serenity found it so easy to Tier up as well: he’d once been far higher in Tier.

Even though the floor was higher Tier than the planet, the Nexus still wasn’t stable. It was something of a relief to be offered another floor to set up, but surely this would be the last one?

It didn’t feel like it would be enough.

Serenity grabbed options quickly once more. This could be a very simple level; the previous one was odd, which meant this one ought to be straightforward. A labyrinth seemed to suit the bill; he could assume they’d gotten into a part of the tunnels that was in somewhat better repair … or, no, worse repair. Enough collapses that there was only one way forward and even that could be dicey would be interesting. 

If he could have laughed, he would have when he saw Wall Builder Elementals (stone) as an option. That gave yet another reason for the map to be confusing and twisted. The Rock Tunnelers should continue, so he chose them and a couple of smaller variants, along with elementals that were so in tune with stone that they could simply move through it. The level might be straightforward but it would be really annoying.

That did leave him with a lot of stone monsters, unfortunately; spellcasters would do great while those dependent on weapons, especially bladed weapons, would have more trouble. He didn’t want to just add a snake, so he scanned through the list until he saw something that fit the bill: crystal elementals. They were still stone-based, but a hit in the right place (or a stronger hit anywhere) could simply shatter them. They tended to stay in the back and use mana-based Skills and spells, so they were great for groups with the stone elementals, especially the Wall Builders.

A relatively straightforward boss seemed like a good idea, but Serenity couldn’t resist the combination offered when he saw it; it simply fit the level too well.

He meant to keep the level simple, but at the end he was offered a Special Feature again. This time, it needed to be something different, so he went with a puzzle area. It would be walled off by a manastream with a simple mana control puzzle to allow entrance. The internal puzzle would require mana control and puzzle solving skills, as you tried to move mana to meet the prompt while defending it from stone elementals that would absorb it to launch painful and irritating showers of gravel. 

The puzzle could be completed by killing the elementals then solving the puzzle or by simply controlling the mana better than they could; Serenity was certain most groups would kill them. It was easier.

If you lost all your mana or submitted a wrong answer, you’d face a challenge fight. The only real option for the challenge fight was basilisks, unfortunately, but at least they were noted as being “lesser.”

[Floor 4 Map design/theme: Lost Below Ground. Terrain: Tunnels of A’Atla. Labyrinth with secondary exit to Puzzle Area, Traps. Common Enemies: Rock Tunnelers (varied), Wall Builder Elementals (stone), Stonewalk Elementals, Crystal Elemental (basic). Boss: Stone Golem / Crystal Elemental Pilot (stone). Puzzle Area: Mana Balancing/Fill Game. Puzzle Enemies: Lesser Basilisks, Stone Elementals (mana absorbing). Recommended Tier: 5 or 6 (Puzzle)]

That seemed like a good series of floors, but the nexus still wasn’t stable. Serenity gave up on trying to guess when it would be done; he needed to figure out what the next level would be. He’d gone from the outside into the tunnels; maybe the next step was to go from the inside out?

Lillene

It turns out that I can still design dungeon levels while worn out from a ten-hour workday (plus commute). I’m glad this was a relatively easy chapter to write… because it means I can get to bed at a decent hour. We’ll finish the dungeon and see the consequences of some of Serenity’s choices in the next chapter.

I don’t think we’ll get to the consequence I’m really looking forward to until the chapter after that, but who knows; I’ve been wrong about how long things will take … pretty much every time I try to predict it.