Chapter – 1

Hikaru Mori awoke to nothing.

Not darkness. Darkness implied the existence of light somewhere beyond it, waiting to return. This was something else entirely. There was no sight, no sound, no sensation of warmth or cold. He couldn’t feel air against his skin, couldn’t hear a heartbeat in his chest, and when he attempted to move, nothing happened.

In fact, after several moments, a disturbing thought surfaced in his mind.

He wasn’t entirely certain he still had a body.

Before panic could properly take hold, words suddenly appeared within his awareness.

Or perhaps appeared wasn’t quite right. There was no direction in this place, no above or below. The words simply manifested themselves as naturally as thoughts, as though they had always been there waiting for him to notice them.

Conscious Thought Pattern Detected…..

System Initializing…..

Running Soul Diagnostic…..

Irregular Soul Signature Detected…..

Escalating anomaly to Higher Authority…..

Hikaru stared at the floating words.

Or rather, he thought he stared. Considering he couldn’t actually feel his eyes, he wasn’t entirely sure how that worked.

The text remained still for a few moments.

Then more lines appeared.

Request acknowledged…..

Permission granted…..

Stabilizing soul integrity…..

Soul stabilization complete…..

Generating compatible form…..

Generating status interface…..

System initialization complete…..

Hello, new soul. Welcome to the Realm of Esalia.

Silence returned.

Hikaru remained suspended within the endless void as the words lingered before him.

Questions immediately began piling into his head.

New soul? Realm? Compatible form? System?

More importantly—

Why wasn’t he panicking?

He should be terrified right now.

A normal person waking up in an endless void after seeing whatever that had been would probably be screaming or breaking down.

Instead, his emotions felt strangely distant, as though a thick blanket had been wrapped around them. Fear existed somewhere beneath the surface, but it felt muted and difficult to grasp.

The sensation bothered him.

It felt wrong.

Pushing the discomfort aside, Hikaru forced himself to focus on the last thing he remembered.

Fragments surfaced from the haze of his thoughts.

A cluttered desk. Sketches scattered around him. A half-finished design glowing on his tablet screen. Large ears, crystalline patterns across the fur, and handwritten notes squeezed into the margins.

His latest commission.

Then came the trembling walls, swaying lights, and books falling from shelves.

He remembered standing too quickly and rushing toward the balcony to see what was happening outside.

Then a misplaced step, fingers grasping for something that wasn’t there, and empty air beneath his feet.

Then darkness.

I died.

Hikaru remained still for a long moment.

The realization settled into his mind with surprising ease.

Strangely enough, relief reached him before fear did.

At least one question had been answered.

Unfortunately, it also raised a hundred more.

If he had died, then what exactly was this place? Was this some kind of afterlife? Heaven? Hell? Some bizarre cosmic waiting room?

Because if his eternal future involved floating in an endless sensory-deprived abyss, he was going to have serious complaints.

Slowly, Hikaru turned his attention back toward the floating words.

At the moment, they were the only things in existence besides himself, and hopefully, they had some answers.

However, after several moments of staring at the floating words, nothing seemed to happen. He couldn’t touch it, couldn’t change it or even interact with it in any way.

After exhausting all his options, Hikaru had a thought.

There was a System here. Or at least, something calling itself a System. If it could welcome him, maybe it could answer questions too.

Tentatively, he focused his thoughts outward.

“Hello… System? Are you there?”

The thought disappeared into the endless void.

For a brief moment, Hikaru wondered whether he had just embarrassed himself in front of absolutely nobody.

Then new text appeared.

Hello, new soul. Welcome to the Realm of Esalia.

Would you like to view your status?

Hikaru immediately focused on the second line.

Finally, something new.

Questions could wait for a moment.

“Yes.“

The response came instantly.

Opening Status Interface…..

The words dissolved before reorganizing themselves into a new screen.

Name: [Unnamed]

Race: Dungeon Core

Title: [Outworlder]

Class: Dungeon Lord

Skills: [Dungeon Authority] [Dungeon Creation]

Hikaru stared at the display for several long moments.

Well, at least he finally had one answer. He now knew what he was.

Unfortunately, that answer had only produced several dozen more questions.

If only there were someone who could explain what all of this meant.

Then Hikaru paused.

Or maybe there was.

“System, what is a Dungeon Core?”

He had read enough fantasy novels to have a rough idea of what dungeon cores were, but they always differed from story to story.

None of them really explained his situation. More importantly, none of them explained what exactly he was supposed to do now.

New text appeared almost immediately.

For additional information regarding status elements, focus upon the desired term to receive a detailed explanation.

This functionality has already been provided.

Hikaru blinked.

Did the almighty System just politely tell him to read the manual?

Whatever.

Instead of focusing on that, Hikaru did as instructed and focused on Dungeon Core within his status screen, willing an explanation to appear.

The status display did not disappear this time. Instead, another window unfolded beside it, appearing like a poorly designed tooltip clumsily attached to the side.

Dungeon Core: A sapient being with a crystalline body found throughout the Realm of Esalia. Dungeon Cores host the soul of a dungeon and are responsible for the creation and upkeep of dungeon structures and inhabitants. Among mortal beings, Dungeon Cores possess the unique ability to manipulate aether.

Hikaru slowly read through the explanation, nodding along as he went.

Most of it lined up with what he had already expected. Dungeons creating monsters and structures wasn’t exactly a revolutionary concept.

However, the last line made him pause.

Among mortal beings.

His attention lingered on those words.

Mortals.

Did that imply the existence of immortals?

Or perhaps gods?

He vaguely remembered the System mentioning Higher Authority earlier.

Then there was the other unfamiliar term.

Aether.

Was it something like mana? Some kind of magical energy?

And more importantly…

How exactly was he supposed to manipulate it?

Only one way to find out, really.

Hikaru shifted his focus toward the unfamiliar term.

Aether: The energy of primordial chaos. All affinities of mana originate from aether, from which the universe is formed. Among mortal beings, only Dungeon Cores possess the ability to perceive and manipulate aether.

Hikaru read through the explanation twice.

Primordial energy.

Mana’s source.

The thing that supposedly formed the universe.

Those were certainly words.

He had expected something straightforward—a magical fuel source, used to cast spells or throw fireballs around. Instead, the System had casually informed him that he apparently possessed the ability to manipulate the building blocks of reality itself.

That sounded absurdly overpowered.

Then again, this was also the same day he had died and woken up as a sentient dungeon, so perhaps his standards for absurdity needed adjusting.

Hikaru would have loved to learn more about the metaphysical structure of the cosmos and his own potentially overpowered abilities, but if he was being honest, staring into a black void while playing a game of twenty questions with his own status screen was getting old rather quickly.

He had already gotten the most important bits anyway. He was a Dungeon Core, and if popular internet stories were to be believed, he was now supposed to build the best and most unique dungeon in existence.

It was time for him to create his very own dungeon.

All he needed for that was aether…

…or was it mana?

Actually, how exactly did one build a dungeon?

“Um… System. What exactly am I supposed to do here?”

New text immediately appeared.

The Skills section contains detailed explanations regarding the abilities of a Dungeon Core.

Oh right.

Skills.

He had those now.

Meager though they might be.

Hikaru focused on the first skill.

[Dungeon Authority]

The familiar tooltip appeared beside the status screen.

Dungeon Authority: Used to form a domain for the Dungeon Core. Within its domain, a Dungeon Core possesses absolute control over mana and may manipulate it to alter terrain, shape structures, and interact with the surrounding environment.

Hikaru slowly read through the description.

Absolute control.

That sounded… ridiculously strong.

And very helpful for his current situation.

Immediately, Hikaru focused on the skill and concentrated, willing it to activate just like he had done with the tooltips.

For a moment, nothing happened.

Then the world exploded into existence.

Not literally.

The darkness around him rapidly peeled away like a veil being torn apart, replaced by a flood of unfamiliar sensations that nearly overwhelmed him.

He suddenly became aware of space.

Of shape.

Of distance.

Stone walls surrounded him on all sides, rough and uneven beneath a faint bluish glow coming from crystalline formations embedded throughout the cave. Jagged stalactites hung from the ceiling while small cracks and crevices spread across the rocky surfaces.

Hikaru instinctively tried to take a step backward.

Then stopped.

Because he still didn’t have legs.

Or arms.

Or a body.

Instead, he felt something else.

The cave.

No—that wasn’t quite right.

He could feel the cave around him.

The walls, the floor, the air itself. He became aware of everything within a certain distance as naturally as breathing.

It felt less like seeing and more like the world was simply feeding information directly into his mind.

And at the center of it all—

There was a crystal.

A small crystal formation rested within the middle of the cavern, faint purple light pulsing rhythmically beneath its smooth surface.

Hikaru stared at it.

Then stared a little longer.

“…Is that me?”

Affirmative.

Hikaru remained silent for several moments.

Then he decided to postpone his existential crisis for later.

He had more important things to worry about.

Like mana.

Or what he assumed to be mana.

Now that his perception had expanded beyond the endless darkness, he could feel something spread throughout his surroundings. It was in the air, in the stone walls, beneath the ground and around the crystals that surrounded his body.

It was everywhere.

The sensation was difficult to describe. It felt like an invisible layer of silk gently overlapping reality itself, brushing against his awareness no matter where he focused.

At first, Hikaru assumed it simply existed around things.

This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.

But the longer he paid attention, the more something felt off.

The mana wasn’t merely inside the stone.

The stone itself was mana.

The realization caused him to pause.

According to the description of [Dungeon Authority], he possessed absolute control over the mana within his domain.

Which meant…

Tentatively, Hikaru focused on a small stone resting near the edge of the cavern floor.

He wasn’t entirely sure what he was doing, but instinctively, he reached out toward the strange energy woven through it and pulled.

The reaction was immediate.

The stone disappeared.

Hikaru froze.

“…What?”

The spot where the stone had been was now completely empty, as though it had never existed in the first place.

For several moments, he simply stared.

Then his attention shifted inward.

The mana hadn’t vanished.

It had changed.

Or perhaps returned was a better word.

The energy he had pulled from the stone now floated loosely within his awareness, no longer carrying the rigid structure that had made it rock.

Hikaru went still.

Then slowly turned his attention toward the surrounding cave.

The walls. The ground. The air.

Everything.

A very dangerous thought entered his mind.

“…Can I just make things?”

Immediately, he began experimenting.

He still remembered how the stone had felt when he pulled it apart. It hadn’t simply vanished. Beneath it, he had sensed a strange pattern—the structure holding it together and the texture of the mana itself.

Tentatively, Hikaru gathered some of the loose mana around him and tried to imitate that sensation.

Nothing happened.

He tried again.

Then again.

Several attempts later, something suddenly dropped onto the cave floor with a soft thud.

A small rock.

Hikaru stared at it before comparing it with a stone nearby.

“…Huh.”

It worked.

Well, sort of worked.

The shape was rough and uneven, looking less like a proper rock and more like someone had taken a normal stone and aggressively squeezed it from several directions.

Still, it was a stone.

He had just created a stone.

Excitement quickly replaced his earlier confusion.

Rather than stopping to fully appreciate the absurd implications of creating matter from practically nothing, Hikaru immediately focused on his newly created rock and continued experimenting.

Changing something that already existed felt easier somehow.

He pushed at it mentally.

The rock stretched awkwardly before collapsing into a strange lumpy shape.

He tried again and flattened it.

The next attempt lengthened it.

Another twisted it into something vaguely resembling a chair suffering from several severe medical conditions.

Hikaru kept going.

He experimented with different shapes and sizes, repeatedly breaking apart and rebuilding the mana structures over and over again. Gradually, the strange resistance he had felt at the beginning started fading. Manipulating mana no longer felt foreign. Instead, it slowly began feeling familiar, almost natural.

Without realizing it, Hikaru had slipped into the same focused state he often entered while drawing.

Shape. Structure. Balance.

Those concepts had already been ingrained into him through years of sketching, designing, and endlessly adjusting details until things simply felt right.

One stone became several.

Several became dozens.

The rough and clumsy shapes slowly became cleaner and more refined.

Hikaru had no idea how much time had passed while he worked. It could have been hours. It could have been days. Without a body, hunger, exhaustion, or even a sun to track, he had no way of knowing.

At some point, he stopped experimenting and simply started creating.

Eventually, a human figure stood within the cave.

It wasn’t perfect. Some of the proportions were slightly off and a few details were rough around the edges, but it was unmistakably human.

Hikaru stared proudly at his creation.

Then immediately ignored it.

Because his attention had already shifted elsewhere.

Stone was nice and all, but now he wanted to see what other things he could make. However, aside from the scattered rocks and the glowing crystals embedded along the walls, he couldn’t find much of interest.

Then something caught his attention.

There was a faint hint of moisture in the air.

Not through sight. Through his strange perception.

He could feel it lingering within his surroundings like a subtle thread woven into the cave itself.

Curious, Hikaru focused on it.

The sensation didn’t resemble the earth mana he had been working with until now. Stone had felt solid and stable, rigid and unmoving. This was something else entirely.

Trying to describe it felt impossible.