4 Nothing Good Ever Happens After 2AM

Jessie closed the bedroom door behind her before putting her back onto the wood surface, letting out a heavy sigh.

It seemed like so much has happened in one night yet it also seemed like nothing happened at all when she was just goofing off with Mel.

Nexx flashed her a cursory glance while the feline circled around the core sitting on the bed.

Jess smiled, giving herself slaps on both cheeks to get herself clearheaded for the job at hand. 'Right. Get a grip on yourself. It's all in the past. Time to get to work.'

She approached the core with her right hand outreached to touch its surface.

For as long as she could remember, the orb has been sitting in her great grand-dad's study in the shelves like a trophy, never being used. It had always seemed like a shame to Jessie, really.

Every core is formed from underground in the earth's core like a diamond. Except instead of carbon, a whole fuckton of mana being pressurized by the ley-line version of tectonic plates pressing down on the pocket of mana to form a core.

Even in its natural state before they are processed by man to generate monsters, mana cores 'bleed' the mana from themselves to influence the environment around them, thus drawing in native creatures as the latter absorbs as much mana as possible. To the creatures, even with their primitive minds, the law of the survival of the fittest drives them to seek out mana cores.

(While it is true creatures build their nests around existing cores, It's not like they're called nest cores. The terminology of dungeon cores actually sprang from back in the olden days before the exodus to the Taydrien continent when beast cultivators would generate beasts in a secure facility generally built underground. Underground basements. Dungeons. Dungeon cores.)

For such a valuable rarity to be put on display, while it is a lavish expression of her family's wealth and history, just seemed impractical to Jessie. Maybe that was the biggest reason that she took it?

All that doesn't matter now, of course. Now she's gonna put it through the steps as it should have been intended.

Jessie removed her hand from the amber orb and turned away from it as she grabbed the can of spray paint that she had gotten from Mel before they called it a night. It was all wax-based so it would be easier to clean off the wooden floor after she was done binding the core to her ownership.

After testing the strength on the nozzle to control her lines, she got to work on drawing the binding ceremonial glyph from her memory. She might not have a real eidetic memory, but she had enough practice on the test dummy cores back home to have that particular glyph committed.

Once that was done, she confirmed her work before dropping the spray can back on the bed. The circular glyph that sprawled out nearly five feet in radius had come out nicely, the runes proportioned well within the three rings encapsulating everything. She stepped gingerly between the glyphs and laid the orb in the dead center.

The key component in place, the glyph began to draw power from the core itself to power it, the runes from the inner most rung began to glow blue and the illumination started to spread outwards like a circuit board coming to life. Jessie made her way back out to outside the glyph and laid her hand in another circle in the outermost ring that was just big enough to fit her hand in.

She pushed her own internal mana out, dying the circle green, and she continued doing so until the mana filling the glyph equalized to a bright cyan color.

… A faint buzzing itched, a sibilant call scratching away at the back of her mind. Was this normal when one binds with a real dungeon core?

She paid it no mind as she carefully prepared the next phase.

Jessie found an empty section of the glyph with her other hand. By the call of the ritual, if the orb was already in claim by another's ownership, the owner's mana print would flow out in this section and that would have been the end for Jessie's current endeavors until she found the owner and got them to remove their print. However, since it was empty, it proved that it had never been used or claimed before. A real oddity for a fully intact and workable dungeon core.

The buzzing in her brain seemed indignant for a second at her thought before dying back to a near static noise.

In rote movements, she pulled out her other hand and willed mana into her fingertips as she traced her name in green in that blank area. She paused as she lifted up her hand.

'Good. Nothing exploded. That's a good sign.'

With care, she began pulling back her internal mana from the glyph. When she was done, the glyph remained that same hue of bright cyan and she removed the hand off the circle as well.

'Yup. Yup. Very good.' She preened at her own success as the link was broken and the newly-mixed mana seeped back into the dungeon core, turning it to the cyan shade from its original amber color.

Now that the glyph has served its purpose, she didn't care if it got smudged so Jessie just stepped over the paint without caution to pick up her new core.

"Alright!" Jessie cried out with a grin. She would never admit it in public, but she twirled in place with the orb in her hand. "Now what to make for Mel?"

<... W...at... go...ng... o...?>>

The buzzing was started to clear up and it almost sounded like coherent words in her mind. She froze, trying to focus on the new voice in her head.

<<Wh...e... ..m... I?>>

<<Who... re... you?>>

<<Who dares to awaken me from my slumber?>>

Incredulity struck Jessie, but the numb shock faded quickly as she sat down while slapping a palm to her forehead. "Of course it would be too much to ask for everything to just go smoothly tonight."