Dungeon Core Online 30 Chapter 30

James opened his eyes as he felt the warm gel releasing him, the neural connection with his immersion pod breaking. Blinking his eyes a few times, he got groggily out of bed, stretching as he did. After spending a night of immersion as a floating orb, having limbs again felt strange. He grinned as he flexed his hands, before heading about his daily routine, preparing for the day ahead.

After he showered and got dressed, James grabbed his AR glasses, grinning as he slid them on and they powered up. He could see the time at the top left screen, showing him he had a little over an hour and a half till 9am, when school started. Before he left his room, he grabbed his special earpiece that had come with his AR glasses, figuring he would need it for the day. The earpiece fit nicely inside of his left ear, and was practically invisible. If he was going to be watching movies during school, he didn't want to get caught.

By the time he left his house, having made himself pancakes and bacon for breakfast, the sun was already making its way in the sky, and James couldn't help but enjoy the feeling of it on his skin. His grogginess had fled, and the excitement of what was to come was filling him with energy. He couldn't stop grinning as he walked towards the train station, barely able to stop himself from pulling up his internet browser on his AR glasses while he walked. The moment James sat down on the train, his patience broke.

AR glasses had advanced eye tracking, which would enable users to control everything they wanted to with their eyes, including sending text messages. However, once James sat down, he opted for a faster approach. No matter how fast his eyes were, typing and utilizing a mouse was faster .James set his hands just above his legs, lifting his wrist slightly. The motion activated the bracelets that James wore on his wrists, sending out beams of light that were nearly invisible to the naked eye.

These lights formed a typing surface, and to anyone with AR glasses on, it would appear James had a keyboard in his lap. As he began typing, his fingers passed through the portions of light, and these disturbances were what the system tracked as his keystrokes, allowing him to type in his AR field of view.

As much as he wanted to hop right to the reddit forums, in order to see what people were saying about DCO, James had made a list of things he needed to do. First, one of his most striking tasks, was to figure out what Monty Python was. He pulled up Amazon, the one stop online shop for any and all services, and began searching. It didn't take long, for James to have digital copies of Monty Python and the Holy Grail, Monty Python's Life of Brian, and Monty Python's The Meaning of Life. He couldn't' believe people were referencing these movies, considering they were form the 1970s and 1980s. James was eager to find out what made them so memorable.

Just as James finished making his purchase, preparing to search next for the name Old Man Jenkins, he noticed a message icon appear at the bottom of his vision. Normally, the only messages he got were from his parents, but they had told him they would be unable to reach out to him for the next week, because of some top secret event going on at work. As such, James was curious just who was sending him a message.

Because he already had his keyboard and mouse light fields activated, James quickly moved his right hand down, dragging a mouse cursor over the icon, and clicked on it. The moment he did, a message appeared.

From: Rue

Subject: Don't start slacking on me

Hey Glyax, I'm not sure what you're up to in the real world, but just wanted to make sure you didn't start slacking on your duties. Time is still ticking in DCO, and you've got plenty you can do while you're logged out. Do your best to check in frequently whenever you have computer access, so that you can utilize your resources and manage your dungeon. Being the dungeon core is a full time job, after all. Besides, you are off to such a great start. Don't let me down.

<3

Rue

James read the message again, blinking as he did. He knew some people created virtual AI to send them messages through the day, usually cute female avatars they called Waifu's, but James hadn't thought DCO would have a similar feature. The more he thought about it though, it made sense. Because a dungeon core was a singular player, James was certain it wouldn't be hard for the developers to put in a piece of code that allowed the AI to contact the core in the real world. James grinned as he sifted through his app screen, selecting DCO. He could only imagine having constant access to his account all day through his AR glasses was going to allow him to get so much done for his dungeon. He could hardly wait.

Before he pulled open the app though, interested in what the interface would look like, he figured he should respond to Rue. She may be an AI, but he felt it was proper. After all, she seemed extremely realistic to him, and he was growing fond of the pixie. He clicked the reply button, and typed up a quick response.

Rue,

Obviously I have no intention of slacking off. I plan on becoming the best dungeon ever, even if my pixie is forgetful, and didn't mention I could still play dungeonville during the day. :P. I will do what I can through the day, and look forward to seeing how the adventurer's react when they see our new floor.

Glyax

Grinning to himself, he hit send, and pulled up the DCO app screen. It opened up onto a dark screen, showing him his character sheet. It took him a moment to comprehend what he was looking at. When he had gone back to his home screen, with 1 hour left in immersion, he had 1013 resources. Now, he had 1498 resources. James realized that his hours in the real world must still correlate to 24 hours in game, meaning he would need to constantly be spending his resources through the day, if he didn't want to waste any time.

James looked at the tabs, and saw Dungeon Creator listed in the app. As he pulled it up, he quickly scrolled through the options. He didn't have a good idea yet of how he wanted to design his second floor, but he knew he was planning to spend some Dungeon Tokens when he did. He had 18 after all. As such, he selected another Resource Storage unit, clicking on the 1000 cost object. The moment he did, a small x1 appeared on it. If James had to guess, he could make purchases in the app, and then when he logged into the game in immersion, would be able to use those items. At least, he hopped that was the case, as he looked down at his character sheet, seeing his resources were now at 498 of 2200.

Next, with excitement growing, James opened his research tab, figuring if his hypothesis was correct, his tier 3 research, which was set to take a little over 47 hours, should be complete. Sure enough, he was greeted with a completed Rank 3 enhanced research, as well as a few new research options. He had forgotten hitting Tier 2 gave him more research options. Scolding himself, he selected to rank up his enhanced research again, noting it would take just over 93 hours in game time, meaning roughly four hours of real world time. Just as he was going to close his research window, he paused. The options hadn't greyed out like they normally did, and after a moment, James remembered he was now able to research two items at a time, as a Tier 2 dungeon. Chuckling to himself, he activated loot research again. James was confident he would be able to get most of his research projects to rank 5 at this rate, before his next dive.

Scanning through the app hurriedly, he was tempted to see about his mobs, when the train announced they were nearing his stop. Sighing, James lowered his wrist, putting away his keyboard and mouse, and excited out of his DCO app. He activated notifications for the app, so that he would be notified when his research was complete. Then, he started his walk towards school, deciding he would check out the reddit pages once he got there. He was anxious to see what people were saying about his dungeon.

Chapter end