The Dungeon Child

Dillon Brown nudged the camera with one finger, then stepped in front of the black curtains and righted his clip-on tie, keeping an eye on the timer. Right as it hit the one-second mark, he pasted a wide smile on his face.

"Good evening, friends! As usual, this is Honest John, talking to you from Cali like always. Today, we're discussing a theory on history."

His viewership, indicated by a small number in the corner of his screen, slowly climbed as the live stream got underway, and he grinned internally. He was up to two hundred followers, and since he'd been doing theories on Tube-It for a full year, he had a bit of a reputation as a professional crackpot theorist.

He made sure to keep his gestures flowing as he spoke, mentally reciting the top ten tips for being a famous Tuber. "This particular theory's been building speed on forums, and I thought I'd bring you up to speed on my take on it." This was a blatant lie. His idea was completely new, but if he said he'd heard about it from someone else, people were less likely to discredit him for simply talking about it.

"So, basically, the long and short of it is this: Magic. Real or not?"

His viewership halved, and he panicked. "Whoa whoa whoa, hang on a sec, okay? I know what I'm talking about, just hang around for a minute!" It stabilized around eighty or ninety viewers, and a bead of sweat rolled down his forehead. Regardless, he kept his smile up.

"Now, as I was saying; Magic. Sounds like the sort of thing you'd hear all over the place, a bunch of hooey and fakers using sleight-of-hand over the centuries and messing with people in power. I hear you - that's what I thought for a long time, too. But then a forum-poster named Ibis427 started noticing things."

His smile grew deeper as he leaned forward. He had them now, he was sure of it! "Every culture in the world - every single one - has stories about magic. They call it different things - voodoo, blessings, or even signs from God. But the fact of the matter is, they all have similar stories."

Opening his mouth to continue, he was suddenly interrupted by a young voice. "Dill, are you done yet? Dinner's almost ready!"

He froze, his mouth hanging open in a comical parody of a confident grin, and then he shouted over his shoulder, "Charlotte, go away! I'm recording!"

"Again?"

He heard the sound of bare feet running downstairs, followed by, "Mom, Dillon's making stuff up again!"

Sprinting over to his door and almost tripping over a piece of dirty laundry, he slammed it shut and locked it, then walked back over to the camera and grinned shamefacedly. "Sorry about that. Family stuff, you know how it is."

Coughing, he folded his hands. "Like I was saying, Ibis427 noticed that magic's been found all over the place, and started wondering why and how. Where did magic come from? Where did it go?" It took a colossal amount of effort not to say anything about cotton-eyed Joe, but he managed it somehow. "More importantly, why could only select people use it?"

Steepling his hands, he continued. "This forum user started looking around. Paying attention to little things. For example, the pyramids! Were they built by aliens, or were they built by powerful magicians to augment their strength? Maybe they were a sort of storehouse, used to contain their artifacts, and to defend them! Or Stonehenge! What sort of stuff might we find if we figured out how to apply magic to it?"

He shrugged animatedly. "Even if it's just a theory, it's interesting to think about, and I decided to explore it a little further. And to that point, I present to you: Isekai."

His viewer count dropped again, and he hurried on. "I'm not talking about your average every-day manga isekai, although that's a pretty good comparison. I'm only using the term because it's both convenient and describes what I'm talking about so effectively."

Dillon began popping his knuckles as he spoke, making sure to maintain eye contact with the camera. "What I'm talking about is really, really powerful people from alternate dimensions using massive amounts of magic to essentially break into ours. I purchased some magic sensors from a guy online-" He held up a battered-looking laptop. "-and placed them all over town! This will be the first time I boot it up, so give me just a second."

Pulling a wooden stool over, he flipped the laptop open and hit the power button, waiting. Once it was done starting up, he logged in with the password 'illumantisuckas' and opened up the program. Turning it to the camera, he crouched next to it, wrinkling his dress shirt and black pants. A small loading symbol appeared and then was replaced by an enormous red blotch overlaying an outdated map, offshoots of blue and green peeling off it.

Dillon literally flinched when he saw it, then picked up a filthy brown notepad, flipping through it. "Wait a sec, that can't be right - that'd mean there's a crapton of magic nearby! Is one of these mysterious magicians living in California?"

The display flickered for a moment, then looped. His heart sank as he saw the comment section explode. "Whoa, hang on! I swear this guy was legit, all right? He had a lot of good reviews - it's probably just a..." He trailed off with a sigh as his viewer count dropped into single digits, and rolled his eyes. "Fine. Whatever. I'll see you guys tomorrow, and I'll try and have this thing figured out by then." He leaned forward, ending the live stream.

The buggy laptop was still looping, and he slammed it shut in irritation. The guy he'd bought it from had been far from reputable, but the technology still connected to the weird nodes that came with it, and he'd taken it for granted. So much for that.

Someone knocked on his door. "Dillon? Are you in there? We talked about this!"

He slumped in his ratty swiveling chair, sweeping his mug of coffee off his desk. Ignoring the dark posters decorating his walls, he logged into his PC and checked online for the guy's profile again, running through his search history for a moment.

The person outside knocked again, harder this time. "Dillon! If you're doing another one of your theory videos-"

He called back, "Mom, I swear, I'm not doing anything! I'll be down in a minute!"

"That's what you said yesterday too, and you didn't come down until eight thirty!"

He rolled his eyes irritably. "Look, give me like five minutes, okay?"

There was a short silence, and then she responded, "Fine. Just make sure you don't miss dinner this time!"

Dillon could hear her going down the stairs and returned his attention to his PC's square screen. Finding what he was looking for, he clicked on 'PM' and started typing.

://user(ludicrousspeed): dude what the heck

He took a sip of his coffee, one foot tapping on the floor as he waited for a reply. His eyes drifted over his walls as he waited, looking at his unmade bed and the giant green triangle with an eye drawn over his pillow. He was certain magic existed - he'd done too much research for it not to, and this guy was his ticket to fame and fortune!

In all reality, he wasn't a truth-seeker or an online detective genuinely trying to find the cure for cancer or something. No, he just wanted to prove magic existed so he could A) learn it and become super powerful, B) get really famous, and C) profit from it somehow.

His computer dinged, and he looked closer.

://user(h1GH81hOf01): Is there an issue?

://user(ludicrousspeed): yeah there's a prob! ur laptop doesn't work

://user(h1GH81hOf01): In what way?

://user(ludicrousspeed): it says thers a ton of magic nearby

://user(ludicrousspeed): and keeps lopping

://user(ludicrousspeed): *looping

://user(h1GH81hOf01): What do you mean by 'a ton of magic'?

Dillon rolled his eyes again. Did this guy think he was stupid?

://user(ludicrousspeed): look i want a refund

The response came with shocking speed.

://user(h1GH81hOf01): Of course. I'll come to you and pick it up - no need for mailing costs.

He shrugged in his chair, typing his reply rapidly.

://user(ludicrousspeed): thanx

://user(ludicrousspeed): most creepy ppl on the net dont give rfunds

://user(h1GH81hOf01): No problem. I'll come as soon as I can.

Dillon nodded at his assertiveness. Closing the window and the chat, he picked his coffee up and was disappointed to find it empty. Sighing, he glared at his locked door, a poster for a space-themed movie taped to its surface. He was going to have to go downstairs and get a new cup, and he'd likely get roped into eating dinner with his parents and his younger sister.

Gazing hopefully at his cup, he groaned and stood, ambling over to it and heading downstairs.

The kitchen was an open area, with a marble-topped island in the middle and pleasant white lamps hanging from the ceiling. A pair of windows were open, propped that way with hardcover books placed on their spines. A current of cool air was circulating around the white-walled room, the delicious smell of home-baked bread drifting along with it and making Dillon's mouth water in spite of himself.

A middle-aged woman with brown hair, damp from sweat, stood up with a pair of oven mitts, holding a metal tin with the bread in question gently steaming inside. She looked over and saw him, smiling. "Dillon! You're just in time for dinner."

Raising his cup, he protested, "Oh, no, I'm just grabbing a cup of-"

Her eyes narrowed. "Dillon?"

He broke eye contact. "Right, yeah, okay. Whatever."

She beamed at him, turning to a black cooling rack and tapping the bottom of the bread pan until the loaf dropped out. Behind Dillon, his dad was putting four ceramic plates on their dark wooden table, spacing them evenly and lining the forks up like the perfectionist he was, and Charlotte was already sitting, legs kicking under the table.

Dillon closed his eyes, mentally berating himself. It turned out he was having dinner anyway.