No Need for a Core?

Moriko stretched lazily in her bed as she allowed herself the luxury of waking up slowly. It was a luxury she rarely had at the temple as one of its disciples, and even on a vacation, her mother wasn’t likely to let her sleep in either. She finally opened her eyes to find herself alone, which was not surprising if a touch disappointing. It’s not like the man needed to sleep.

So, since she couldn't find a reason to stay curled up any longer, she rolled out of bed and onto her feet and made her way over to pick up her previous day's clothes, which had dried out from last night's wash by now. She was a bit torn on if she should wear this or her normal clothes. Her dress was now enchanted to be rugged enough for her explorations, and she wanted to show off and flirt with her new paramours in it, but the temple uniform was a more practical design, and she hadn't remembered to wash out the dress. She also wasn’t heading home immediately and would have time to change after she'd cleaned it.

With a sigh, she hung the dress up in the bathing room to remind herself to clean it later and went to her pack, where she pulled out her uniform and other boots. Mmm, she also had some food left. She should probably eat before she went out. Though, now that she thought about it, “Hey, I know I can’t take things out with me, but is it fine to keep eating food created in the dungeon? It doesn't just make me not hungry, does it? It can sustain me too, right?"

It may have looked like she was talking to empty air, but she knew that a dungeon could always see and hear what was going on inside of it. Besides, she was also directing her thoughts toward the two presences sitting in the back of her head. Kazue’s voice appeared in her mind first as their attention swung her way. “Oh, good question, um, I don’t know for sure but I think it’s fine OH MY GOD WHY ARE YOU NAKED!” And the kitsune’s mental focus suddenly snapped away with waves of embarrassment coming off of her. Moriko had to resist the urge to drop into fits of giggling at the reaction, which apparently Kazue could notice; there was a brief cycle of building embarrassment on her behalf and amusement on Moriko’s before Mordecai stepped in (metaphorically speaking), using his presence to both distract and calm.

“So to answer your question, food and other basics of sustaining life do not count as ‘loot’, and can be given away freely, so long as they are consumed while in the dungeon. Same with things like healing spells.” His awareness did not pull away like Kazue’s did, though he did seem to be a bit distracted. It felt like he was talking with Kazue at the same time.

Moriko smirked as she started pulling her clothes on. “Thank you for the information, but it seems to me that my pervert husband enjoys having the attention of two beautiful young women at the same time. Sigh, and one of them is half-naked too. Tsk tsk.”

The response from Mordecai was a wave of warmth, amusement, affection, and comfort that made her stagger a moment before she caught herself. It wasn’t just his feelings, it was realizing how much of it she returned. Not that it was love per se, or at least not romantically so, yet, but she could tell all the bits were there and ready to grow into it. It took her rather off guard to feel all of that so soon.

“Hey, it’s okay. We get to skip all the layers of wondering what someone else actually feels, and honest attraction and affection are hard to not respond to. It’s a bit of a feedback loop, but it couldn’t happen without genuine emotions starting us off. If we weren’t compatible at all, we’d be getting the reverse.”

Wonderful. So her emotions were not entirely her own- Moriko interrupted herself as soon as she felt his understanding and sympathy. “Oh, hush. I get it really. They are mine, but just amplified by you returning them, and yours amplified by me returning them. So everything is sped up and we get to bypass all the normal figuring-each-other-out crap. We also lose some of the fun in a slower build up too you know; I’m not normally so easily attached this way.” Or tied down, as in she was married now, and she stubbornly refused to be entirely not grumpy about that even if she was actually starting to not mind the idea, which was just foolishness dammit! “Off with you, go focus on the redhead cutie and let me get dressed in peace.” What felt like the mental equivalent of a dramatically exaggerated leer washed over her as his mental touch dissipated. Damn the man, he was still slightly amused at her mood.

Of course, she wouldn’t really like a man who was intimidated by her either. Amused wasn’t dismissive, and was mixed with understanding without giving in to her too much either. Knowing that he was good at that from experience navigating previous long-term relationships was both comforting and mildly infuriating; part of her felt like it was a bit unfair, it was making her doubt that she'd learned enough from her short-term relationships and she was starting to like him more than she wanted to ye -ENOUGH-.

She cut off that chain of thinking as she cinched the belt to her temple uniform, understanding herself well enough to know that she was just reacting negatively to the fact that she was starting to fall for him fast enough that it was a bit scary. Which was stupid. She was a 36-year-old half-elf, she was more than capable of handling her own emotions even if circumstances were intensifying them a bit. Maybe she wouldn’t have felt this way at all if not for the bond, but it was there and it was happening. She wasn’t going to be one of those idiots who waste all their time denying their own feelings, but she wasn’t exactly a sappy lovesick puppy either.

Now, with that out of the way, she gathered what things she intended to use for collecting samples later, and a little bit in the way of snacks. A big breakfast was going to be in demand before she went out though. One final check and she left her room to go find out what her dungeon people were up to now.

Even though she was expecting to find something unusual, the littered remains of straw dummies strewn across half the room still took her by surprise. While she stood on the top tier surveying the carnage, Kazue spotted the half-elf and bounded up to her excitedly, and gave her a tight hug before letting go and pointing at all the slaughtered targets proudly. “Look, look, Mordecai helped me learn magic! Well, he keeps insisting on the word ‘unlock’, but it’s the same thing here. And I already had a couple of small magic tricks, but they weren’t all that useful. Anyway, it means I can cast real spells now! Well, only a few really, but I got a neat thing I can do too. Watch!” She jumped away and briefly gestured at Moriko, who was suddenly covered in a brief blue shimmer of energy.

Moriko blinked as she recognized the spell, though it took her a few moments. “Wait, was that a shield cantrip? How’d you cast that on me instead of yourself?” The tiny, quick spell only lasted a few seconds really, but that protection could make a difference.

The little kitsune nodded eagerly. “Yep! It looks like my magic style is called a ‘psychic’, and that this is one of the things that some psychics can do that wizards and the like can’t do. Oh! He also helped me invoke my foxfire! I was never able to get the hang of it, but turns out more than a few of his previous avatars were kitsune designs too, so he had some experience! Though he says it’ll probably be a while before I can try out lots of different avatars.”

Huh, she’d heard of that style of magic before but had never met one. “Well, that’s good, but how’d you jump to casting so fast? Even the little bit of magic I have took time to get down.”

“Oh, that’s thanks to me being a dungeon! Turns out dungeon cores are much faster at processing some things than brains are, and since my brain is an extension of my core, it can provide feedback. So once I managed to cast a spell, my core kind of recorded it, and then fed it back to me when I tried casting the spell again.” The kitsune frowned a bit. “It’s still going to take me some practice to get it all down, and since my body is an extension of my core, I can’t get stronger unless my dungeon gets stronger, but just learning I could have done this when I was first alive is kind of cool.” She made a face. “You don’t want to know all the things Mordecai put me through in order to figure out what magical talents I have. That part wasn’t so cool, I think my brain still hurts. My first real spell lets me do this!” Kazue happily demonstrated by using two fingers to point at a pair of targets while she whispered a quick chant. An arc of electricity suddenly connecting the two objects, and whisps of smoke rose up into the air.

Moriko glanced at Mordecai with a raised eyebrow. Really, starting off the hyperactive one with an electric cantrip? Mordecai just shrugged and gestured at the target dummy remains. It did seem the girl had aim at least. “Well, it seems like you’ve gotten the hang of it. You two have more plans for the dungeon while I’m out?”

“Yep! There were some tiny crystals in the soil samples you brought me, along with the rocks. I think I know how to make them bigger, and I was thinking of making the second floor a set of crystal-covered caves! It’s amazing what you can do with crystals, I think I can tune some of them to be musical, which also gave me an idea for a puzzle. They don’t have to be gems to be pretty and useful.” Kazue was clearly excited. “I think I am going to try setting up my path more slowly this time and build each puzzle before I do the next room. I only get so much mana at a time, and it takes some to make each room with. It uses less to alter a room, but I'd rather not waste the extra mana if I can. And I seem to get some back when I make good designs, so I think I’ll be able to get more done this way. Oh, and when you head out, you should take the other path, to go meet our first boss. His name is Zushi, and he’s super fluffy and cute!”

Moriko was amused, of course Kazue’s first-floor boss was going to be something cute. Probably weaponized levels of cuteness. Hopefully, it would still help against people who didn’t care. “Alright, I’ll do that.”

Mordecai spoke up then. “If you can, some bats might be helpful. Bird wings would look wrong on anything rabbit-shaped, but I think bat wings could work, and I’d like to make some fliers. A lizard or two wouldn’t go awry either, variety is good.” And Moriko was sure neither of those requests had anything to do with being some of the superficial features of dragons.

Apparently, her mental sarcasm was leaking, because he just grinned at her. “Hey, it’s also good for Kazue. I could feed her the data I’ve got stored, but she learns more from doing the analysis herself. Variety is both spice and nutrition for dungeons.”

“Right, I’ll keep that in mind. You guys want stuff that is new to you more than you want stuff that others might consider ‘valuable’.” She thought a moment. “If I find bones, or have to kill a predator, do those still help?” Kazue was making faces at the thought, but Mordecai was the one who responded.

“Yes. They don’t help as much; Living creatures can be invited to be guests, and having lots of happy guests can help a dungeon thrive too, so where possible living creatures that can fit in are a better idea, but Kazue should be able to learn from just about anything you bring back.”

Well, she’d do what she could, but she was much better in a straight-up fight than trying to sneak around and hunt things for capture. “Alright, I’ll see you two later then.” After some parting hugs and kisses for each of them, she went out to see just how cute this floor boss was. Her slightly stoic, ever-in-control persona failed utterly in the face of the giant round ball of fluffy fur with the twitchy nose, and she couldn’t help but fall into that ball of floof and embrace it. “Oh goddess, this guy is unbearably cute! And I just want to sink into him!”

Moriko couldn’t help but love the little, er, giant, rabbit, and lost another half hour to enjoying the cuteness combined with talking with them about how Zushi could absorb most attacks to an extent, and literally absorb items that stuck to him. Not much of a real danger if you realized you could just go around him, but it was certainly a dangerous setup to weaken a party moving further into the dungeon.