Dungeon Tour Guide ch. 13 (Patreon)

“What do you mean, you can’t let them in here?” I asked. “And how did they clear but not the dungeon?”

“Give me a moment to explain,” Lisa said, sitting down on a convenient piece of rock with a sigh. “First of all, I need to ask a question.”

“Go ahead.”

“Were you spawned by the dungeon, bound to it, or something else?”

“Bound.” Not technically a lie. I hadn’t done that much reading on dungeon binds, but I knew that they did exist. Most of the time, dungeonbound were functionally NPCs, though—they’d offer to sell items at crucial points, offer healing before a challenging bossfight, stuff like that, but they never really did anything else. It wasn’t exactly what my situation was, but it was close enough.

“Alright. Just checking. It’s not unprecedented for a dungeon to capture someone, but it’s rare, especially around these parts, and it’s even more rare to encounter a dungeonbound that plays this active of a role. I have to say that those three are far too accepting of an intelligent human being greeting them in a dungeon.”

“Right,” I said. “I did tell them I was bound to this place.”

“Ah.”

“Anyway, an explanation?”

“Those three cleared the dungeon yesterday, and by the account that I managed to shake out of them, it was a near thing,” the Guild’s [Spellblade] began. “They made their case for you, stating that you helped save one of their lives.”

“They need a [Healer] or something similar,” I said. “In this dungeon, I can fulfill that role. I have strong healing abilities, which is more than enough to clear it.”

“They do require someone in a supportive role,” Lisa agreed. “None of them have the ability to heal themselves or others. Once they obtain their Guild licenses, we will ensure that they are paired with at least one healing-type class when they embark on future adventures.”

“Good.”

“However, there is still the issue of the dungeon. If you do not know yet, the slope of progression in terms of power for most adventurers is extremely steep in the early levels, stabilizes afterwards, and eventually starts sloping upwards again at high levels.”

“Right. And they leveled up.”

“Precisely. From level 1 to level 2. Especially for beginners, this power gain is not insignificant, even if they themselves did not notice it. You may have.”

“Their casters’ spells were stronger,” I said. “And Ryan was hitting harder.”

“And yet the dungeon once again would have killed them if not for your presence,” Lisa said. “The fact that the dungeon increased in strength so much in a single day—hells, there was so much different from their description what with the air traps, the snake waters, the new monsters in the final room—is unacceptable in terms of dungeon risk. We have dealt with dungeons that adapt dynamically to those who enter before, but those adaptations are always minor. No Dungeon Core ever increases in power this quickly.”

Am I that unique? Then again, I’d gotten the [Divine Healer] skill when I’d been reincarnated here, and that had essentially given me cheats for my healing. Maybe there was something similar for my dungeon half that I just hadn’t seen yet?

“So you’re saying that it’s too dangerous?” I asked. “Does that mean no one will be allowed in?”

The thought of not being able to chat with those adventurers again, not having another opportunity to watch them grow and guide them through the dangers of the dungeon I’d created… it left me feeling hollow inside.

Even if I couldn’t change Lisa’s mind, I had to at least try. Not being able to accept adventurers sounded exceptionally boring and lonely. I hadn’t been reincarnated in another world to spend the rest of my life alone in a cave, right?

Right?

“I have to consider it,” Lisa said. “There’s a whole fucking bunch of legal shit I need to sort through first, but the gist of it is that we’ll probably only allow higher level adventurers to delve this.”

Well, not alone, but…

“Do you even get high-level adventurers around this area?”

Lisa grimaced. “Not really. The recent presence of the Kingsguard might draw some attention, but this immediate area is kind of an affluent town. Not much activity.”

“Ah, fuck,” I sighed.

“I’m sorry,” Lisa said. “If you have anything else you’d like to say, I’m open to it, because you do seem like a genuinely good person. At the very least, I’ll drop by to chat.”

“Thanks,” I said, meaning it. “Still, do we have to close the place down?”

“If you have reasons to not close it that my bosses will accept, I’ll take it,” she said. “Regulations say that this place would have to be shuttered to sub-level 5s, but if there’s good reasoning then I might be able to bend them.”

“First of all,” I said, “Nobody’s in serious danger here. When I say I’m a tour guide, I mean it. This is more of a way to gain experience than it is to actually risk lives, because I’m a damn good healer and I can prove it.”

“My [Appraisal] doesn’t work on you,” Lisa said after a moment. “Strange, when [Insightful Edge] did. You must be an exceptionally high level healer. How were you even bound to the dungeon?”

That was probably [Divine Healer] in action. I hadn’t fully explored what that skill had done before I’d gotten reincarnated again, but I knew it had a bunch of bullshit inside that basically allowed me to ignore most threats to me. An [Appraisal] that could reveal my dungeon half counted as a threat to that skill then, perhaps? That was my best guess.

“I mean, I healed Ryan from near death,” I said. “And I wasn’t even trying.”

“Conceded,” Lisa said. “That’s one point against you down. It might require a more official assessment of this dungeon later down the line, but I think I can swing that.”

“Fantastic. What other points are there, again?”

“Building an overreliance on strong healing that won’t always be accessible to them, rapid evolving of the dungeon rooms…” Lisa trailed off, counting the points off on her fingers. “Oh, one really important thing. If the dungeon continues scaling like this, it’ll be totally inaccessible to newbie adventurers. If a new level 1 party enters this and the dungeon is a challenge for, say, level 5s, then they run the risk of dying before you can even heal them. And if they don’t die, once again, there’s that overconfidence issue—they’ll think they can handle another adventure that they’re underleveled for, and then they’ll die. I would much prefer to avoid that”

“Oh, the difficulty,” I said, the tension in my chest loosening. That’s manageable. “That’s the porblem, yeah?”

“Correct.”

“I can deal with that,” I said. “I haven’t revealed this to anyone else, so can I ask you to keep it a secret?”

“I’m required to log what I observe,” Lisa said. “I can leave out details, but I still need to report important information.”

“Right, of course,” I said. I need to watch my words, then. If I revealed that I was actually integrated into the Dungeon Core itself, there would be no end to the investigations that took place. Hell, I might even get killed and dissected for it, since this world had literally no precedent for that. “You know how us dungeonbound can get information from the Dungeon Core?”

“You can,” the [Spellblade] said, adjusting the sword on her back. “I am aware of this, yes.”

“I can get kind of an idea on how the dungeon works,” I said, picking my words carefully. “It can adjust its difficulty. It has been adjusting its difficulty.”

That gave her a pause. “Could I cast [Insightful Edge] on you again?”

“Go for it.” That spell could definitely suss out if I was lying or not, so I had to tread on eggshells here. If I was too honest, that could lead to problems for me, but not being honest would seal my fate for sure.

Lisa withdrew her blade, once again channeling mana through it, and it sang through the air with an [Insightful Edge].

“So far so good,” she said. “Still have those secrets, but I think I can excuse those. Allow me to ask a clarifying question or two. Forgive me if I repeat an earlier question.”

“No problem,” I said.

“Do you have any malicious intentions towards adventurers who clear your dungeon?”

“No. If anything, I want to uplift them as much as possible.”

“Fully a truth. Next question. Are you capable of preventing a level 1 party from losing a single member if they enter this dungeon?”

“Absolutely.”

“True in that you believe it, at least. Good. Your capabilities are high, I can see that much. Final question. Is the dungeon truly capable of shifting its difficulty, and will it do so for parties of different levels?”

An easy question. I did my best not to sigh with relief before answering. “Yes, it can shift its difficulty, and yes, it will do so to ensure that any adventurers who enter will face a challenge of an appropriate difficulty. Well, except the Kingsguard. They tried to kill the Dungeon Core and they tried to kill me, so those fuckers aren’t getting any peace from my end if they invade.”

“An intelligent dungeon,” Lisa said, raising an eyebrow and stowing her blade. “I have not run into one of your kind in a long while, now.”

“Well, here I am,” I said. “Are we good to go?”

“We are,” she said. “With this, it is possible that this place stays open. We may need to run a few trials before you meet the adventuring group again, though.”

“That’s fine,” I said. “So long as this place stays open.”

“Let us return to the party, then.”

“Fantastic. That reminds me.” I crouched down to the ground, activating [Replicate] a few times to generate a fistful of coins. Lisa watched me gather them up.

“You really do have a way to know what the dungeon is doing,” she said, a tinge of awe in her voice.

“Yep,” I said. “Now let’s go. They forgot their reward again, and I can’t let them leave before they get that.”