Tasha suddenly awoke.
The scene froze as Victor charged into the ranks of legendary practitioners. His figure blurred into a mere afterimage, the monk's head exploding like a watermelon. The surrounding mages hadn't even had time to turn their heads. The plot seemed to have reached its climax, yet everything abruptly extinguished in that instant.
No continuation, not even a fade-out or fade-in effect. Without a single pause, the dream ended abruptly, without warning. It was as if a movie had reached its most critical moment, only for the big screen to suddenly go black. The lights flashed on, ending the story abruptly, leaving the audience utterly bewildered, unsure whether to stay or leave.
There was no option to stay. Tasha was already awake.
The scenes she'd witnessed lingered in her mind, packed with information yet laden with puzzles.
In this dream, Tasha had seen Victor for the first time. Surprisingly, he was a melee-focused Archfiend. Yet knowing the answer, it wasn't entirely unexpected. Spells were likely secondary to him. Most of the combat scenes Tasha recalled from his memories involved bare-knuckled, hand-to-hand fighting. Preconceived notions truly were deadly. Being polite, talkative, and scheming didn't mean he couldn't fight. When Victor attacked, he resembled a wolf shedding its skin—a well-dressed thug.
He didn't look like he'd lose.
Call it intuition or biased preconception, but Tasha instinctively believed Victor couldn't be defeated in this ambush. Even with four mages weaving a magic suppression array, even with three (or possibly more) legendary professionals blocking his path, he still seemed utterly at ease, perfectly aware of what he was doing. This was Victor at his peak, not the blustering failure he was now.
Therefore, it was even harder to pinpoint the dream's timeline.
In all four previous sleep cycles, the "dreams" Tasha witnessed had discernible patterns.
The first occurred after consuming the dungeon core within the Devouring Mage Cannon, granting her an upgrade. Tashar witnessed the signing of the Erian Declaration, whose timing could be roughly pinned down to around 450 years ago. During that dream, she had projected the message "The Heart of Nature is Here" into the sky. The dungeon earned the title [Keeper] and forged the Wolf-Headed Body for the first time. This dream likely stemmed from her earlier signing of the Forest Pact, where the Oak Guardian—keeper of the Heart of Nature—was her contracting party.
The second dream originated from recruiting the dragon knight Douglas. The remnant soul of that ancient dragon, left to guard within the bloodline of a friend, allowed Tasha a fleeting glimpse of the scene where the Prophecy Dragon's existence was revealed. This major event also had a rough timeframe—roughly three hundred years ago, after the Dwarven War concluded.
The protagonist of the third dream was a dwarf. When the dungeon acquired a new core fragment, it gained access to higher-tier magical technology artifacts, deepening its understanding of arcane knowledge. Tasha also witnessed the founders of the Magical Kingdom. In the dream, a female dwarf foretold the downfall of the Dwarf Kingdom to her father. This kingdom, powered by magical technology, had already begun its decline before the dragons departed. Following this dream, Tasha gained the [Dragon] attribute, and the dungeon underwent another upgrade.
Looking back, each dream's origin, the information it brought, and the progress made were all clearly connected. Thus, before entering this dream, Tasha had some idea of what to expect. This dream seemed to combine elements from the second and third dreams. The Dungeon Core Fragments smuggled in over the past decade had remained dormant, seemingly saturated with energy, until now—when the baptism of the Abyss and the Astral Plane finally triggered a qualitative leap. Tasha had considered whether she might dream of Astral Plane-related events, but Abyss-related possibilities were clearly more likely.
Indeed, the dream's content was tied to the Abyss, though it seemed rather distant from what Tasha hoped to learn.
The Erian Declaration, the Dragon Prophecy, the fall of the Dwarven Dynasty—each marked pivotal turning points in Erian history. So what did this dream reveal? The mage's words hinted at some great disturbance in the Abyss, occurring before Victor's death. That meant it happened before the Erian Declaration. What had the Abyss done then?
Too distant—so distant that records have faded. The Planar War four centuries ago, when the creatures of the surface expelled the Abyss and the Celestial Realm, remains a household tale. But pushing back fifty years marks the limit. The origin of human empire's recorded history is the Erian Declaration, itself the result of repeated retracing. "For Eryan, the humans of all kingdoms united and signed the Eryan Declaration." Replace "humans of all kingdoms" in this historical account with "all races of the Material Plane," and you have the truth as recorded by other races—if those displaced alien races still had records left.
For over the centuries of immense upheaval and war, too many truths have been lost to time.
Tasha had long wondered: Why was the Erian Declaration signed? What catalyst sparked it? For millennia, the Demon Plague had ravaged the Material Plane countless times, as had the religious wars orchestrated by the Celestial Realms. By all logic, Eryan should have long grown accustomed to its two powerful neighbors treating the Material Plane as their battlefield and chessboard. What finally pushed the mortal realms beyond endurance? What drove them to abandon their myriad disputes, accept immense sacrifice, and ultimately choose the monumental act of waging war against gods and demons?
Why did this rebellion choose to erupt precisely four or five centuries ago? What transpired during that period?
Tasha had once believed Victor's death marked the prelude to a planar war. Before the formal conflict began, perhaps the creatures of the Material Plane had already started clearing out the great demons stubbornly clinging to the land. Yet the dream suggested they did not pursue Victor. On the contrary, Victor seemed poised to depart of his own accord, while the forces of the Abyss appeared to be withdrawing from the surface for reasons unknown.
This dream offered too little information to determine if it was connected to Victor's death, making its temporal setting even more elusive. Nor could the anomalous behavior of the Abyss dwellers be linked to the catalyst of the Erian Declaration. Ultimately, the belief in this dream's significance stemmed solely from Tasha's personal conjecture, based on patterns observed in previous dreams. Even if it were later discovered that this dream actually depicted events surrounding the Demon Calamity a thousand years ago, Tasha would have no grounds to dispute it.
Among all these "dreams," this one was undoubtedly the most incomplete. The Dragon Dream had also been shrouded in mist, but at least Tasha could recognize which parts had dissipated. The flickering, like a poor signal, and the headaches hinted at missing pieces, giving her some mental preparation. Yet this dream, centered on Victor, ended so abruptly, as if the power had cut out midway, leaving it to be continued next time.
Perhaps it really was a power outage.
The droplets in the magic pool had reached the bottom. Though Tasha had created auxiliary magic reservoirs beyond the central pool, draining the main pool to such an extent was staggering. She swiftly redirected reserves from the other reservoirs, and as the pool water rose again, the dream did not return.
Tasha rose from the pool.
The immense magic drain was hardly surprising. Beyond upgrading Victor's scales and the dungeon, she had also fashioned a new body.
Emerging from the pool, she stepped out of the viscous water, her body unexpectedly light. Tasha shrugged her shoulders, feeling a lightness she hadn't experienced in ages, almost unnervingly so. Was it because she'd shed the nearly collapsing dragon-winged form for a new body?
Tasha quickly discerned the change through the subtle shift in her center of gravity.
On her back, the heavy, powerful dragon wings were gone.
With dozens of pounds of weight gone, it felt like an ascetic shedding heavy sandbags strapped to their body—no wonder she felt as light as a feather. Yet this also meant her flight ability was gone. Tasha sighed, beginning to miss her wings.
Swish!
As the thought crossed her mind, a pair of wings emerged from the position of her shoulder blades.
These wings were nearly as large as her former dragon wings, yet significantly lighter—indeed, almost weightless, much like they had been before unfurling. Where her former crimson dragon wings had been rugged and powerful, these new ones were jet-black, their membranes translucent and their bones slender—a contrast as stark as that between an eagle and a raven. Strange growths, somewhere between feathers and scales, lay smooth along the outer edges of the wings, gleaming with a dark sheen as if forged from thin sheets of obsidian.
Tasha attempted to spread her wings but lost control momentarily. Before they fully unfurled, the outer feather-scales abruptly bristled upright. They sliced through the air with a sheathing sound, their edges razor-sharp.
It took her a while to adjust, but she eventually succeeded in taking flight. Manipulating the new wings differed subtly from dragon wings. They required less effort, accelerated and turned more swiftly—like switching to a more responsive mouse. In strong winds, they might prove more taxing than dragon wings, and sustained flight might be less enduring. Yet, in terms of overall utility for Tasha, the new wings far surpassed anything she'd known before.
These were wings belonging to the Abyss, not to any common demon. Perhaps only when Victor awoke would Tasha learn what demon's parts these were.
Demon wings weren't purely physical; they were somehow tied to magic, which explained their lightness and ease of use. After a moment's fumbling, Tasha discovered how to retract the wings. The black wings vanished silently into her back, leaving her bare, smooth spine showing no trace of having concealed such large wings. Only two dark shadows remained where her shoulder blades sat, resembling delicate tattoos to the touch, indistinguishable from the rest of her skin.
Finally, no more clothes with holes cut in the back, Tasha thought. In this state, she could blend into crowds effortlessly without needing illusions.
The thought vanished as soon as it formed. Tasha chuckled, shaking her head, then looked down.
It was painfully obvious. Those were no longer ordinary human legs.
Her legs had grown longer and more supple, her jumping power and strength significantly enhanced. Where feet should have been, sharp claws now gripped the ground, their sharp clicks echoing like stiletto heels on pavement. Tasha soared upward again, soaring straight to the vaulted ceiling of the dungeon. Her dragon claws dug effortlessly into the rock, anchoring her form.
A single strike from those claws against flesh would surely tear it apart.
Tasha was quite pleased with this outcome. Mutating her feet proved far more advantageous than altering her hands. Her swordsmanship and the temporary claw ability already sufficed for arming her hands. Transforming her hands into claws would have been redundant, wasting an extraction opportunity. Today's elemental extraction had been remarkably favorable, yielding useful components for nearly every body part.
Essentially.
The claws released the ceiling, and Tasha descended, returning once more to the side of the magic pool. During her last body-shaping session, she had considered placing a mirror nearby and had indeed done so. Unfortunately, all such arrangements had been reduced to nothing during the Wrath Demon's visit. Under her will, the waters of the magic pool lay as still as a mirror, reflecting Tasha's face.
It was still the face she had borne in her dragon-winged form, her features and facial structure almost unchanged, save for one slight difference. This difference could be attributed to a shift in demeanor or aura, yet it was precisely this nuance that made her appear less like the same person and more like an evil twin of her dragon-winged self.
How to put it, Tasha mused. The notion that one's appearance reflects their heart was indeed unreliable.
Her expression remained serene and detached. On the dragon-winged form, it would have conveyed "otherworldly grace" or "forest nymph-like purity." On her current body, however, it radiated pure "cold spectator of the world's destruction"—a face that screamed "it is your honor to become my nourishment." Tasha suspected the pair of bone-white horns atop her head bore half the blame.
Amidst Tasha's raven-feathered, thick mane of hair, a pair of bone-white horns grew, each about the length of a palm. While Victor's jet-black curved horns resembled those of an argali sheep, the pair atop Tasha's head were closer to a goat's, their dagger-like curves marked by sharp ridges. Though clearly a trait of herbivores, when perched atop a humanoid creature, they radiated an overwhelming sense of oppression.
...But what exactly were they for?
Tashan silently touched the top of her head, tapping it. Hard as a rock. Some herbivorous beastmen also had horns, and they could properly transform and gore people with them. A horned deer's headbutt could teach those who looked down on herbivores a lesson in an instant. But Tashan couldn't transform. She considered the scenario of diving and goring someone with her head—the image was too beautiful to bear. The positioning of her twin horns wasn't ideal. Using them to butt someone would be awkward at best—more likely, she'd accidentally impale herself on the ceiling during a rapid ascent. The mere thought of that scenario left Tasha feeling profoundly embarrassed.
Rather than serving any practical purpose, the horns seemed more like a demon's mark. Though Tasha wasn't entirely sure why demons grew horns in the first place. She recalled Victor from her dream—his horns were truly formidable and terrifying, as large as his head. He could only sleep flat on his back, unable to roll over. Just thinking about it made her feel his hardship. While sympathizing with him, Tashan found her own horns (lightweight, allowing her to sleep flat or toss and turn without risking impaling herself on the headboard) far more agreeable.
The Archfiend Victor now lay submerged in the demonic pool, encased within a peculiar cocoon of scales. It was unclear how long his incubation would last. Thus, when Tasha voiced her disdain for the Abyss and its demons, no one stepped forward to defend them.
This new form—complete with demonic wings and horns—made it abundantly clear just how much Abyssal influence had seeped into the dungeon this time.
Above the magic pool, the Dungeon Heart rotated slowly. It resembled a bizarre organ, its origin unknown. At first sight, Tasha instinctively knew this core now mirrored those of any fully functional dungeon.
[Dungeon - Tasha]
Merging and restructuring in progress. Progress: 51/100
Attributes: Abyss - You once received the favor of the Abyssal Will. Though its gaze has long departed, the mark of having been its servant remains forever etched upon your soul / Nature - You have gained the recognition of the Heart of Nature; the will of the natural world watches over you / Dragon - You have gained the recognition of the lingering will of a legendary ancient dragon; the dragon from afar casts a glance your way. From broken to incomplete, and finally to the prefix-less "Dungeon," Tasha had finally completed the dungeon core.
On the dungeon card, the attributes appeared unchanged, but their order had shifted. The three attributes now rank from strongest to weakest. If each were a color, the Abyss undoubtedly dominates the hues enveloping Tashan.
The Abyss attribute's enhancement extends far beyond this new body.
New information within the Dungeon Core made Tashan hesitate, but since the Abyss's passage had reconnected, pursuing this now wouldn't violate her pact with the Oak Elder.
Tasha attempted to activate the Flame Rune.
An orange-red glow illuminated the dungeon. As with every previous summoning, a winged phantom appeared near the rune, a dragon on the verge of materializing. At that moment, Tasha pressed her palm against the phantom. Beneath her touch, the dragon that should have taken form began to shift.
When contracting with Douglas, who possessed dragon blood, Tasha acquired the "Dragon Blood Bath" skill. This one-time ability temporarily extracts dragon blood from the dragon knight and applies it to any dungeon structure, item, or member, imbuing the affected structure or item with dragon attributes. When she imbued the Flame Rune with dragon attributes, the entities summoned by the rune transformed into pseudo-dragons in the form of flying dragons.
A fully operational dungeon core can imbue objects within the dungeon with abyssal attributes.
She did not erase the dragon attributes from the Flame Rune; instead, she infused the power of abyssal attributes into the flame summonings before they solidified. The nearly solidified dragon phantom began to warp, like someone stirring embers with a poker—sparks flew everywhere, and the light intensified.
The dragon's image started to collapse. What should have been a creature the size of several oxen gradually shrank, shrinking to a size resembling a human form. From the dying embers crawled a creature utterly unlike the dragon. It reached only to an adult's waist, with crimson skin, an oversized head, and the proportions of a child. That hideous head could never be mistaken for human. This thing bore sharp fangs, horns, and wings. Compared to it, Tasha suddenly felt her own wings and horns were as beautiful as a celestial being.
This creature wielding a weapon resembling a steel pitchfork was undoubtedly a goblin.
It represented the first common stage most Abyssal Spawn evolved into—the ubiquitous cannon fodder of the Abyss, swarming like locusts during demonic calamities, holding a status akin to goblins in the Material Plane.
Tasha looked at the creature and smiled.
Having truly encountered the Abyss, she knew this monster did not originate there. It carried no Abyssal aura—a pseudo-dragon remained a pseudo-dragon, a dungeon-made construct merely clad in a new shell. It bore the appearance, attack patterns, and strength of a lesser demon, yet lacked its essence.
The Abyss wasn't as terrifying as Tasha had once believed. Its attributes clung to her like natural and dragon traits—mere appendages incapable of altering her essence. Dungeon creations remained dungeon creations: they had attributes, but no alignment.
Beyond attributes, this upgrade granted something profoundly significant.
Titles: Keeper (extracts elements from the protected to form a body), Dragon (you guard your territory and subjects as a dragon guards its hoard—extra dragon attribute bonuses), Planar Traveler (bearing a token of the Planes, armed with the courage to face it, you can journey forth once more).
New titles appeared.
"New Title: [Planar Traveler]"
"You briefly dwelled within the Astral Plane and passed its Will test. Your capacity holds but a single ladleful from the river of infinite knowledge, yet the experience of nearly being drowned by its currents ensures you won't perish so swiftly next time—your soul has been baptized by the Astral Plane. For reasons unknown, you left an anchor point there. It is fragile, yet it remains."
Tasha's heart leapt.
Was this saying she could return to that mysterious, terrifying, yet utterly captivating place?
"The experience of being submerged by the river prevents you from drowning too quickly next time." So next time she faced the Aetheric Realm, she wouldn't immediately lose her way, even if she stood there alone. The conditional explanation following the title seemed similar to a mage's lesson: as long as there were sufficient spell materials and enough mental energy to cast the spell, it could be used. What was the Aetheric Realm token? She didn't know. But there was always a glimmer of hope.
The Astral Plane was terrifying. Tasha still remembered the overwhelming dread she felt upon contact. Realizing one's own insignificance and ignorance was no pleasant experience, yet she yearned to return—for the secrets it held.
Beyond the world, there exists another world.
This could shed light on many unsolved mysteries: her own crossing, the disappearance of the Celestial Realm, the vanishing of countless races. Tasha had pondered countless times where the dragons might have gone upon their departure. Back then, her imagination stretched only as far as planar migration. Now, it seemed there were other possibilities.
What about the elves and druids? Did their Far Journey also lead beyond the world?
Why did no one speak of the Far Journey? Why had she never seen any records of the Astral Plane? Why could Victor name the Astral Plane yet never share such a conjecture with her?
Perhaps one day, she would find answers within the Astral Plane.
But that was a matter for the future.
Tasha sighed, like someone reluctantly ending a vacation to face arduous work. The threat from the Abyss loomed large. Only a few years remained—too many preparations needed to be made.
First, she must announce this news while minimizing panic as much as possible.