<div class="floatright">(https://i.pinimg.com/564x/fc/78/4f/fc784f193166c5ee736d20ecba2cd544.jpg)</div><div class="floatleft">(https://i.pinimg.com/originals/01/c8/d9/01c8d98d811e5906901453f06dee1486.jpg)</div>As a group with their newfound fortunes goes to Rosebloom Inn, outside having a blooming rose as a sign and once enter the central hall is impressive. The largest ale keg barrel (what group has ever seen) forming a central pillar were four smaller barrels with brass tubes going down to a circular bar where they serve high-quality dwarven malt beer. The place was comfy and homely, but minor signs indicate this is a higher quality establishment deserving the platinum guild tag in front of their door. Waitresses clean up using prestidigitation and the food was exemplary good and plentiful on each table four barkeeps regulated the traffic in the bar and food area.<br/><br/>In the back, an elven receptionist accept quests and rented rooms each one was posh quality fit for rich merchants and nobles alike many subtle but potent enchantments in a tavern kept visitors' identities and privacy as top concerns along with safety. Group can get their room, they were offered the grand suite which was nine rooms connecting to the main hall (the highest floor with a beautiful window view from each room to the surrounding Azure City). In the grand suite unseen servants handle all requests so long it's in the room and they can order food from the kitchen by writing it into a magical tome and the kitchen gets the order. The food is separately billed while every night in the room costs a total of ten gold per night per person.<br/><br/>Duncan who came along with adventurers and helped guide to Rosebloom Inn mentions that the inn has operated since Azure City was built and is so far kept the lead as the best inn in the city. Once everyone settles into the grand suite (and Mephis is informed her stays were paid in advance by her master and informed where the master's room was), Duncan becomes comfortable in the main room couch chair and says; "Okay, if you're ready for the lecture I can get started." He reaches into the bag to bring out a large sand hourglass, placing on the table he turns it upside down as sand starts to flow he says; "During an hour you can ask anything about the Guild, Dungeons or Adventures in general but you're on the clock now so make use of it wisely. I answer to the best of my ability and any and all answers are based on my experiences and thus are not absolute truths."<br/><br/>Duncan takes a deep sip from the pitcher he had bought from the bar and then speaks; "Let's start with the origin of living dungeons, at least speculated one as this is not confirmed but is so far accepted universal theory based on what most scholars agree on. After Akatosh was slain during Godswar, what followed was the Era of Darkness. The first mentions and records of living dungeons started to appear during Era of Darkness.<br/><br/>"However, only one dungeon survived the Era of Darkness and is known as the oldest dungeon today in the world which has reached the four hundredth floor, reason for that is that what living dungeon is what is called the dungeon core. It's a glowing crystal sphere, a sphere of infinite mana which grows in potency in time and by the size of the dungeon. An initial dungeon core if found early would be nothing more than a glorified eternal glowing crystal sphere, while dungeons whose dungeon floors go double digits can power powerful enchantments which can cover a castle or even small cities. Naturally many of the magical fortresses ran by Malgadians, a dungeon core inserted into a pillar of power provided many fortresses with uncanny magical abilities which helped defend it. Many such fortresses were destroyed in the war led by Blessed Heroes and many such cores were destroyed in the process. Without realizing what they were.<br/><br/>"Because of the speculated origin, some people refer call living dungeons as Children of Akatosh, there exist some religious cults which worship dungeons as gods or deities or otherwise treat them sacred. But living dungeons do not provide boons specific to followers of such faith or give them any special treatment in most cases. Albeit one dungeon I have heard has sort adopted followers of such faith and uses them as means to protect itself.<br/><br/>"Now what comes to living dungeons themselves; each one is unique and that's all that's common with them. Some dungeons have dual personalities, some have an animalistic mindset, some obsess over one theme above all else while others become very diverse. Scholars debate are dungeons more constructs or mimics and nobody has agreed which they closely resemble, but what is known they are sentient. At the start their minds are like children given a coal pencil, drawing random things onto paper. Over time they get colored crayons and more pencils and tools or papers to draw and over time their random drawings become more and more elaborate or stranger. Overtime their sentience and awareness grows and they can develop various methods to commune until they develop complete telepathy and even start to develop avatars created by themselves which they can use to present themselves.<br/><br/>"Some dungeons are absolute dicks, some are harmless tricksters and some can be very kind and benevolent, like regular people. Many scholars speculate the possibility of a soul in dungeon cores and most do agree, considering how varied and colorful living dungeons can be and they are considered some circles a race on itself. But others view them as nothing more than sources of power and tools to be used. But overall most adventurers treat them as people and give them respect as such. There is a tradition of adventurers greeting a dungeon upon entering it and giving it offers, an item, at the start of the dungeon.<br/><br/>"Now as the bridge, we go to how dungeons grow and develop. According to research and communing with sentient dungeons' capability for speech their growth is simply by material and mana consumption. They themselves produce overtime infinite mana but the amount depends on how big their dungeon is. But besides that, they need materials and foreign mana to get the ability to grow and create their dungeon floors and layers and including traps and monsters who live exclusively inside the dungeon. Absorption this case means if you drop a potion vial, if you leave, the dungeon immediately absorbs the material, including remains of the potion contents, into the dungeon and the dungeon can analyze the object and gain information on how to replicate or to fuse said item qualities to something.<br/><br/>"This fusion and absorption process leads to dungeons developing unique enchantments, and magical items, which not even the most powerful archmage in the world can create or duplicate easily. Many mages go to dungeons just to study and find such weird items, study dungeon goods, and hope to duplicate the enchantment and be able to re-create the process of how the dungeon created it but so far in that field only very few discoveries have ever been made. What more complex an item or object, the more beneficial it's to the dungeon. Even if it's an item that they already acquired in past, it gains energy and potential from such an item to build something into the dungeon. Now you can sort and manipulate what sort of dungeon you get based on what you feed to it basically. If want to influence the dungeon to be nature themed; bring logs of wood, flowers, berries, mushrooms, animal bodies, or flesh. If want a dungeon that has gemstones; bring gemstones.<br/><br/>"Now, the most gruesome part is this; the best possible component that a dungeon can ever get which is an immense boost to its growth...is somebody dying in the dungeon. If you die, and if you are alone, then your entire body is absorbed by the dungeon along with all your belongings. Meaning most means of raising the dead and resurrection will fail outright as you have neither body nor soul anymore. So thus why important you always enter as a group, if one of you happens to die on the trap, your comrades can carry your body out of the dungeon and prevent you from being absorbed. Albeit the dungeon will gain some amount of mana from your blood and brief loss of life but you can be raised and resurrected normally if can afford such service from the Guild. Now, having one person die, more so an adventurer with high-class levels is the same as you getting free top-tier meals next year. That much potential energy a living person has in the dungeon is energy value.<br/><br/>"Some darker corners in Free Nations and darker versions of the mentioned cults worship dungeons, kidnap people, and purposefully bring to dungeons and kill them there as living sacrifices to accelerate the growth of such dungeons. Such dungeons grow twisted, and dark, and have a malicious aura to them which is hard to not notice. So beware while near such dungeons or inside them; as they have grown to taste of sacrifices for devouring life of people and thus such dungeons seek to murder you more than most dungeons. But dungeons do not always go full bloodlust-driven designs; as dungeons can absorb mana and energy from adventurers depending on how long they spend in the dungeon. This leads to what we adventurers call dungeon mana tolerance.<br/><br/>"Dungeon entire environment inside is infused by the dungeon's own mana. Your body has its own mana. Now, your entering into a dungeon-like going swimming in the ocean and you have your own body of water inside your body as well which helps sustain your body. However long you are in the dungeon, the more you get infused by dungeon mana which is alien and not part of you. You become increasingly sick over time the longer you in the dungeon with thick mana. If you haven't built your tolerance you can fall sick and literally die from your mana overcome by the dungeon's mana and you become one with the dungeon mana and then end up absorbed. Now, in most cases dungeon mana is not dangerous in the first two floors, but near the core and deeper as you go to the dungeon, the more dangerous it gets. However, if you beat the dungeon, reaching the core, your bodies automatically adapt to such depts as a gift. So if you beat a dungeon with five floors, you are forever immune to the first five levels of the dungeon, and then up to the seventh floor, you're fine and then you start facing difficulties slowly. There are magic spells that help cleanse you while in the dungeon, but it's advised to keep most breaks in floors where you can tolerate mana better than when you're deep in the dungeon.<br/><br/>"One important piece of information that you need to know about dungeons is that any spells of teleportation between dungeon floors or any spells which manipulate the environment to great extent, like, creating holes in walls or changing walls, do not function in any dungeon at all. Some dungeons can provide a teleport mechanic, but you cannot use it to enter the dungeon or leave the dungeon beside the entrance of the dungeon. Many adventurers have died in ignorance of this rule and expect an easy run. However, the dungeons by their own innate law cannot block entrance to the core entirely nor prevent adventurers from leaving dungeons unless they fall into a trap that is hard to escape from. However, some dungeons produce unique items, like crystals in one dungeon, which allow teleport out of the dungeon. But this is not standard but if you hear such crystals on sale, buy them as they can be life savers in the dungeon which creates them. Also if you reach the dungeon core, some cores rejuvenate you and teleport out once you're ready to depart.<br/><br/>"Now, besides traps and monsters in dungeon there are what is called contractors, monsters, and people, who have made a contract with the dungeon. Contractors make a contract with the dungeon and if the dungeon accepts it, they become permanently imbued by said dungeon mana and gain power in doing so. They are powerful in dungeons, but unlike monsters who live in dungeons, they can leave the dungeon but they grow weaker by how far they leave the dungeon. But one perk of such a contract is that the contractor is immortal so long dungeon exists. But they also cannot stay too long outside, depending on how powerful the dungeon is. I know at least one city where the city mayor has made a contract with the dungeon and is the main supplier for a dungeon for material goods which he brings every week as an offering and he spends half the time in the dungeon and the other half attending his duties as mayor. He has run for mayor's office two hundred years by now and the dungeon is approaching the hundredth-floor milestone.<br/><br/>"Besides this benefit to contractors, the energy from the dungeon spreads from the dungeon itself and influences locals who live near the dungeon. The overall influence is that locals who live in dungeon become more active, more lively, and more productive. Other influences happen by type of dungeon; for example, a nature dungeon can make all future children born in the region develop hair and eye colors resembling plants or animals. Including even minor extreme mutations such as growing pairs of stag horns in children. On every third dungeon floor, there is an extra rush of energy which makes locals further empowered and energetic, so most people naturally grow addicted to this and become very protective of the dungeon and the radiant energy it brings to people's lives. Dungeon energy has been based on studies shown to have the ability to cure depression.<br/><br/>"However, even with this benefit, Guild for the initial point did the same what Malgadians did to dungeons; harvesting dungeon cores after helping feed dungeons to grow. That changed when one isekaid hero, who was not an adventurer but a renowned businessman and artisan, develop a way to stabilize dungeon goods which Guild quickly purchased secrets from and then made it Guild artisan only known secret how to do it. Since then Guild has started getting a strong interest in any dungeons, observing them and even preserving and protecting them based on the qualities the dungeon has.<br/><br/>"But, there are exceptions even among dungeons. Some living dungeons somehow, for some reason, grow twisted and dark, and instead of giving out the energy they drain it from locals and landscape and become vampiric entities that cause a great deal of harm and slowly spread their influence like cancer. Those are called Life Plaquing Dungeons or Undead Dungeons. Those are on immediately killed on sight dungeons by Guild and their cores are harvested. The final part about dungeon cores is that if you remove the core from the dungeon, it loses all it's sentience and becomes, in essence, dead dungeon core, but it still produces passively infinite mana and as mentioned the mana production depends on the size of the dungeon. A skilled magical artisan and architect can use that dungeon core as a means to power magical wonders, enchantments, and wards in building or use it as a base for forging a magical item even.<br/><br/>"Also, one part which often is forgotten with dungeons; is that the dungeon energy attracts monsters and monstrous races. It's an alluring siren song for them and leads the migration of monsters coming near to dungeons. Some monster clans infiltrate the dungeon core and infect it with their own monster energy and they start feeding from each other; monster energy is delicious to the dungeon and it leads the dungeon to radiate more energy which fuels and empowers the monsters. It creates a powerful fusion cycle but in the process, the dungeon core becomes permanently tainted and influenced by monster's presence and becomes slave to them like a drug addict in sense. So some Guild quests can involve in striking out against dens and nests of these monsters lurking near the dungeon to eliminate them as the threat from infecting the dungeon core. Some scholars speculate the reason for this interaction is because of innate Zatash influence in the monsters which taints the more vulnerable dungeon cores more easily than any other Akatosh creation."<br/><br/>After lengthy explanations Duncan takes a sip from his pitcher, drinking to half-empty one go and sighs of delight places his mug down, and says; "Now, that is the overall details of dungeons and what you need be aware of in general about dungeons. Some dungeons can develop quirks and unique features or dangers but that is always to specific dungeons and thus important gather intel before entering a dungeon about its dangers. In the dungeon you are planning to go to, they already sell locally rough maps and a list of expected dangers of the dungeon. Costs around fifty gold to buy from the local shop there. If have any questions, ask and I answer best as I can."