Dungeon Diving
After I left the bedroom that I had the young girl in, I walked over to my couch and sat down. I had been curious about this power I have. "MENU," I thought, the translucent, light blue screen appeared, with a ding right on time. Since I entered this human world I have had, what I like to call the menu. I don't know why "it" gave me this power, but it must be for a good reason, and I intend to use it.
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*2 years ago just before the first gate appeared*
The world I lived in wasn't like this world, we didn't have huge buildings, cars, phones, and technology in general, But then out of seemingly nowhere, a huge red gate appeared. My heart started to beat faster and faster, as I looked at this gate, and I couldn't help but feel fearful of its origins, and why it was here. But then out of nowhere the matter around us started to get heavy, and it felt like we were getting pulled in as if we were attached to a rope and someone was pulling on it. I tried to resist but it was too powerful. I was the first one to get drawn into the red gate, and then I heard it. "Aha it seems you made it," said this strange voice. It felt as if my head was going to explode, as this voice talked. I instinctively replied, " Why am I here!" I shouted my heart throbbing like it's going to blow up. "Because I have big plans for you," the mystical voice said. But then I felt an insane amount of agonizing pain sear and surge throughout my whole body. I yell out in sheer pain, and all I heard was "in due time". At that moment I blacked out and I had awoken with the menu open outside of the red gate, and I hear a soft ding in my head.
{Name: Wilyn Zike}
{Race: Dragonian}
{Age: 18}
{Stats}
{Inventory}
{Skills}
I look at this in shock, " What is this?" At this point, I wasn't sure where I was, nor did I know what was happening to me, but then strange beings started to come towards me. I was laying on my back on the ground winded, with the so-called window open, but it seemed only I could see it. "w- where am I?" I said curious but cautious, then they all started screaming at the sight of me as if I was some sort of beast, a monster.
A group of people with metallic-shaped objects started to walk towards me with them pointed at me, at this point I was scared, in a new world, and most of all excited. Back in my world I was the outcast, but here with this power I have gained I could do anything, I could concur with the whole universe. Ok maybe I'm ahead of myself, so first let's get out of this situation.
I stood up, bent my knees and took off. I pushed off the ground with all my might and I blasted away from the group of people, moving at speeds they couldn't match. That's how it all started.
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I zone back in from reminiscing, and I start drifting off to sleep. It had been a tiring day hadn't it, but it's not like I feel remorse for stealing that money, after all, humans did kill, hunt, and torture my kind. I have no sympathy for them in the slightest, and one day I will get my revenge, but for now, I guess I'll get some sleep. I start to fade in and out from the dream realm and reality, and eventually, I fell asleep.
3 or 4 hours later I suddenly woke up to a loud noise that could be heard. coming from all around my bunker.
shocked suddenly, at the fact a loud noise could be heard from every direction, is it an earthquake, I learned that earthquakes are an anomaly that can happen now and then on earth, but this didn't feel like an earthquake, it was much more intense. My heart starts pumping erratically, I could feel the hot blood being moved around my body. I rush up my ladder, as I get closer to the top of my bunker I could feel my body pulsating but for some reason, it feels like this is familiar in some way. I haul ass to the top of the ladder, and then I open the latch for the bunker's hatch, and what I saw shook me to my core.
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*on the other side of the city*
" we finally made it," said, Ray as he was breathing extremely heavily, blood could be seen on the end of his spear, but it wasn't... normal blood. Fred came up behind Ray from out of the gate, patting him on the back seemingly hard, "yup we got out of there all in one place huh" Fred said with a smile. They seemed to be coming out of the gate, but not all of them came out unscathed. "we may have made it out but we didn't get anything important" Shawn said, but it seemed like he has cuts and buses all over his body, then the two women walked out of the gate practically unharmed. Fred grabbed the giant duffel bag on his back and placed it on the ground under him. At first glance, it seemed to be packed full, as he started to undo the zipper, it revealed stacks on stacks of a crystal-like substance, it was a green crystal, that was about half of someone's palm large, "that's a pretty good haul huh" Ray said with an excited expression on his face "yeah we got a decent amount of spirit crystals this time" behind them the gate that the group had just exited from started turning from red to blue. "guess we can't go back in for a while huh" Ray shrugged. "lets cut the small talk and sell those crystals I want my pay" Shawn urged the rest of the team.
The hunter group entered a black limo and headed towards the inner city. eventually, after a 30-minute drive, they reached a large skyscraper and walked through the doors. They ended up reaching a till and handed over all the spirit stones and in return for the low-grade spirit stones, they managed to get around $3,000 of profit. Fred proceeded to hand out $600 to all group members to split the profit evenly. All, the group members seemed to be joyful, but Shawn had his usual bored expression. The group decided to do another dungeon dive in 3 days, and they went their separate ways for the time being, but a loud noise could be heard in the distance as if something big is happening, but Fred shrugged it off as an earthquake and left himself.
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All I felt was fear as I stepped outside of my bunker, I was in awe at what I was seeing. I rubbed my eyes, maybe I was daydreaming, no luck, it was here, and I was face to face with it. Just above my bunker, a massive red gate had appeared, seemingly out of thin air. It looks close to the one I had seen back in my world but I know this wasn't it, this one was different. the energy was overflowing out of this gate, it was almost as if I was underwear suffocating, but a question crept into my mind. What was behind this gate? where did it lead?, what happened if I walk through it? These were all ideas that flooded my mind. Before I do anything ill need to figure out everything about these gates.
I opened my bunker hatched and rushed down the ladder. I quickly grabbed my laptop I had only recently bought, and that I had taken a liking to. I pulled up the search engine on my laptop and began doing my research. After about 45 minutes to an hour, I have figured out just what gates were. Gates were collections of this substance called energy, and when you enter a gate it transports you to what humans like to call a small world. depending the output of energy the gate has is what decided how strong or weak the small world will be. There are also "artifacts" that can be obtained in small worlds from completing the scenarios. Scenarios are quests that must be completed to gain rewards and they can vary from fights to simple tasks. Then there is the boss scenario, this is the scenario you need to complete to leave the small world, and it is also what gives the best benefits. when beating a small world main/boss scenario you have a chance of gaining an awakening essence as a reward. Awakening essence has a very important use as well. An awakening essence is what allows people to use and manipulate energy, and it allows them to gain, learn, and cast skills, these skills are extremely useful, because they can do a lot of damage in a short amount of time, but the only way to use them is with essence, and your essence supply can only be increased by lots of training.
After absorbing all this information it felt like my head was going to melt, I knew right away this is what I was meant for, but something confused me if the only way you could manipulate energy was after gaining and using awakening essence, then why was I able to sense all that overflowing energy coming from the gate. After I thought about it, I concluded maybe it's because of the menu. To test this theory I quickly thought "MENU" In my head, and just on time, I heard the soft ding.
{Name: Wilyn Zike}
{Race: Dragonian}
{Age: 20}
{Stats}
{Inventory}
{Skills}
As I looked at the translucent blue menu I saw the words "stats" and "skills". Does this mean that I don't need awakening essence to use energy and skills? I point my finger towards the "stats" icon and I click it. A prompt I haven't seen yet appeared.
{Level: 26}
{Title: none}
{Race buff: Dragonian +36 strength}
{Vitality: 427} +
{Strength: 583+36} +
{Intelagence: 272} +
{Energy Manipulation: 27} +
{Energy Sense: 67} +
{Stat Points Available: 52}
I look in interest, a fire could be seen burning in my eyes as a stare at this panel. I always thought that it was weird that only I have the menu, I haven't seen anyone with it, and it's only visible to me. Was this, the plan of that weird being that talked to me 2 years ago, or is it something else...