Valterra looked over the two prizes that he had received from the expeditions. They only confirmed his suspicions and inflamed his curiosity.

  Analyzing… request formed… sending data… information received.

  New Framework acquired!

  Aether-Mutated House Cat (Unique, Rank E - Bronze)

  Once a mundane creature, this feline has been genetically modified through various Aetheric rituals. Now more monster than animal, it has become a fearsome predator for its size. Its small size hides its extreme potential for growth.

  New Framework acquired!

  Error! Possible Sapience detected… inquiring… information received.

  This species is hidden from the sight of the gods. In order to receive this Framework, proper claimants must be determined. Claim this species and Name them in order to establish your claim.

  Valterra stared for a long time at the System messages. The first was Unique, and the second was a possible sapient. The longer he stared at them, the heavier the memories of his creator weighed in his mind. They would contain the answers to his questions. He was sure of that now. There were other things he needed to do, though, before he could release himself to relive his creator’s life. Some of his creatures were beginning to wake up.

  He darted to the first floor, where several Ascensions were reaching completion, the light dissipating into soft motes that winked away. A large beetle was the first to shudder awake. Its carapace was an ugly, mottled brown that blended in with the dirt around it. For all its ugliness, it looked heavy and durable. Valterra was pleased and doubly so when he received the message that he had received the Framework.

  Almost immediately, his attention was grabbed by a flash of brilliant light coming from a small distance away. One of the Dire Wolf Spiders he had spawned a while ago had attempted to sneak up on a beetle, now that it was done Ascending. Believing it to be weak, it had leaped forward, only to be blinded when the beetle’s dazzling carapace lit up like a torch in the night. The large spider was now stumbling around with its front legs, hiding its eyes in obvious pain.

  The beetle in question scurried off into the undergrowth. Valterra moved his Awareness to another kind of beetle entirely and watched as it buzzed into the air, its wings alight with Aether. He gazed at it with interest. This was one of the only true flying creatures he had. The first was his Wyvres, and the second was the currently still Ascending Deeplight Swarmer. What set the beetle apart was its normalcy. It was a natural Ascension and not Unique like his other flyers.

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  As he watched it fly, his gaze was drawn back to the System message that had popped up when he had received the Frameworks. They all contained the same message at the end.

  As the first dungeon to use such a creature as a dungeon monster, you will be able to create and modify its Path of Ascension freely.

  Warning! May have unforeseen consequences.

  Once more, Valterra felt the itch to play and create. He thought of his Aether-Grass and Aetherdew Mold, both of which were his own variants that he had created. The Deeplights and Wyvres were other such examples, with the former being a Framework he had wrought out of nothing but Divine Potential. He had learned many lessons while fashioning his Unique Frameworks. One of those lessons was that he didn’t need to sacrifice a Framework to get the result he wanted. It just required a more gentle hand.

  As he watched yet more of the beetles awaken and move off, he sank into thought. He knew he wanted more variants unique to his Dungeon alone, and he knew he was well on his way. What’s more, he now knew that his creator had possibly even created Unique creations of his own in order that Valterra might use them. The scope of such a project boggled the young Core’s mind. Having only lived a couple of months, albeit very tense and dangerous months, Valterra couldn’t fathom the time it would take for him to create something truly Unique without his special circumstances.

  He was aware that the Danian Ants had only come into existence because the Council had overseen it back when he was only pseudo-sapient. The mice were provided paths by Ile’Fen and his first Unique Framework, the Deeplight Belchers, would have failed if he hadn’t had Qual’Dorn’s help. For Calamvor to not only do it once but, as Valterra suspected, three times or more, it meant that his creator had dedicated years of his life to experimentation and perfection of his craft.

  He had called himself the High Architect of Krat’Imos, which meant that at a bare minimum, he was good at building things. Valterra didn’t know much of anything related to titles like Archmage or High Architect, but they had the same feeling to them that he got from his higher rarity Frameworks. It wouldn’t be such a stretch to think that Calamvor could have been good at modifying things, too. Perhaps even living things, if he had permission, and Valterra was starting to think he had been given permission.

  He had obviously had the ability to create a dungeon core artificially, although now Valterra was beginning to think that he’d had some help of a divine nature. Why that was so, Valterra didn’t know. Why would the gods want to create a dungeon artificially? Why did Calamvor place him here, or was he meant to have been placed elsewhere? And then there was his nature of being tiny. Was that a fluke or necessary to the gods’ plans? Or was he…was he just a prototype?

  Nothing in Calamvor’s voice had communicated such a thing, but as Valterra let the questions settle, a new fear began to fester in his soul. Was he simply a rough first draft, and Calamvor died before completing the finished product? “The gods are preparing for something,” Calamvor had said. Was it a coincidence that his creator had died right after he had been created?

  He would have to find the truth out for himself. He panned his Awareness around his Dungeon one more time, making note of everything before touching the first weighty memory. Darkness bloomed in his mind's eye before another place entirely filled his vision.