11 Sinister plots.

11

Katelyn.

Abby was in her pixie form again as she flitted about while Katelyn walked through the other girl's cavernous interior, no real pun intended, though the amusing comparison ‘had’ crossed her mind

The monster wore a pair of the dungeon's black tights, refitted for Kate's more curvy and shorter proportions, a set of simple red flats, and a comfy hoodie all provided by her friend and landlord, who had requested, hot or not, that Katelyn actually ‘wear’ something while she strutted about inside of her.

As it happened, the mimic didn't really ‘feel’ the same sense of propriety she'd previously held for casual nudity as her body wasn't really meant for the same thing as it had been intended in her previous life, biologically speaking, of course.

More, and perhaps somewhat curiously, ‘embarrassment’ wasn't the only member of a now somewhat dull range of emotions. Ones that had most definitely existed within her prior self, and still did to some small extent, yet it might be easier to say that they weren't exactly ‘prevalent’ in her head when they otherwise should be.

Though, from Abbys perspective, Kate did understand her reasoning. After all, she had added in all the fun bits for future application, should the interest or opportunity arise. Yet, they didn't really bother her whilst all out and the open and breathing fresh air.

Sadly, the reality of it all was that Kate found many aspects of her old self slipping, one of those being a waning sense of propriety.

All the same, the clothes the dungeon-girl created were of top-notch quality and exceedingly comfortable to move in. Honestly, she hadn't realized just how much she missed large fleece sweaters until she'd been without them, wandering around a dark cavern like some mindless beast snuffling around the den of another.

It was one of those things that was hard to put one's finger on, sort of like partaking in a good foreign meal.

She might have adored it during, but probably wouldn't have given it a second thought until it had been pushed in front of her again, and not because she’d gone and sought it out.

Either way, Katelyn had to admit that life since agreeing to ‘work’ with the strange ‘entity’ all around her, was, without question, comfortable.

Currently, the pair of monstrous women were strolling through Abby's most recent addition to her dungeon, a new room that would appear only once at a time in a rare shard that she was provisionally calling a 'death run’.

The plan, as it were, was for Katelyn to totally wipe out whatever party encountered her special variant upon an otherwise standard delve, ensuring that there were no survivors to tell any tales.

Likewise, should they get unlucky and receive a party that was too powerful for her to safely combat, let alone overcome, then she would simply hide and wait them out using her shapeshifting powers to appear as unimportant and uninteresting as possible.

So far as they went, it wasn't a horrible gameplan.

However, Abby did note with some malignant glee that Kate's stats were rather ‘disturbing’. In a good way, so far as the dungeon girl was concerned, but abnormal nonetheless.

They apparently far exceeded what a monster of her level ‘should’ possess by an entire order of magnitude. Which was, as the dungeon had explained, in part related to her mysterious managing of all the prerequisites for a very early evolution.

She still hadn't told Abby what ‘precisely’ was going on under her hood, but not for lack of prodding. No, that had remained as something Katelyn felt was fairly important to keep close to her chest.

Yet, in reality? Her bizarre rapid progress could absolutely be attributed to the yet still secret system fuckery on the end of her spiritual form.

Her monstrous changes had been a power boost of sorts that was unique to monsters alone, and that one meant to outright multiply their stats.

Not all creatures could evolve, and not all evolutions had linear paths. Monsters were ‘less’ a specific thing and more a broad category.

As an example, a lizard, should it gain enough intelligence, could transform into a kobold. From there, said kobold might one day turn into a larger lizard, if powerful enough, returning to a similar form to where it started.

However, it ‘could’ turn into dragon-kin and, from there, a drake or wyvern as well. It was all interconnected, though, due to how the system handled it, given most monsters weren't smart, also quite confusing and horrendously vague.

With each subsequent evolution upon a rank up, assuming one met the requirements, stats were applied with an additional multiplicative modifier.

This meant that, while Kate was low-level and rank, she was still powerful relative to a normal human. And that scenario wasn't wholly unique, as many monsters could differ wildly in potential, but universally, stats for stats, they were generally better off than something like an elf or dwarf.

Her own tomfoolery with the system and her glitchy extra stat sheet simply meant she was just ‘that much’ more dangerous…

Still, Abby did warn that, if they could, they should leave suppression teams alone as their absence would be much more noteworthy than unseasoned rookie delvers.

The compromise between them was that Abby would, in her power as a dungeon, wait upon Kate hand and foot for anything she needed, a phrase she admitted sounded much worse than it really was, given the servant-like implications.

Abby was apparently akin to some kind of super-processor who had been ‘dumbing’ herself down to speak with her new and less-enlightened monster friend.

The slightly disheveled and ill-put-together young woman whom she'd met was, much like Kate’s own visage, fake.

Sure, it played the part it was meant to all well and good, and might have even been successful in its mimicry. However, it was ultimately a means to an end that stood to aid in retaining her humanity more than anything else.

The real Abby was, again, not the small pixie that she roamed around as because it was easy, but quite literally ‘everything’ around Kate that could be said to be a permanent fixture.

It was all a lot like a body, Abby explained, but instead of focusing on exterior stimuli, which she could, the majority of what happened in her purview existed at the cellular level, as it were.

Her focus primarily set ‘inside’ her own depths, and whatever might transpire as people delved her dungeon's interior with the intent to pillage her goblin villages.

Thus, in exchange for acting as both apartment, servant, and resurrector should something unfortunate befall her, Katelyn would continue to act as she had previously before, only with a custom setup and the house in her back pocket.

Though Abby did explain that while any adventurers were inside of her, she couldn't ‘close’ the shard or significantly alter it, that didn't mean the setup couldn't be rigged from the start, nor was she prevented from wandering around herself in her pixie form to cause shenanigans.

Which, as it happened, was a big part of their plan!

Undoubtedly, theirs was, in point of fact, a codependent relationship.

Abby was not yet ready to start fighting back on her own, as she was still building her strength to fully emancipate herself.

Katelyn needed a safe place to feed, keep herself sane with creature comforts, and, much like the other girl, a way to grow in strength.

She wanted to visit the outside world, but after what she'd seen and listened to some of the ‘war stories’ Abby had shared of her younger days, Katelyn decided that she'd want to be as strong as she could manage before making an attempt.

Despite the dungeon's promise to return her to as she had been, Katelyn didn't ‘like’ the idea of dying again, regardless of the girl's assurances that all would theoretically be fine.

If she was going to leave this place, then she had better be capable of defending herself… and, as she was, strong or otherwise, she was at the very beginning of her new journey, not its end.

Honestly, as far as it went, it was a pretty win-win scenario for them both as, with any luck, Abby could gain enough soul stuff in as quiet a manner as she could to achieve her goals while Kate got security and a means to make the most of her talents.

The only issue was a single problem arising from Abby's end of things, who, in no uncertain terms, let her know that she was now technically a ‘boss’ monster, as only monsters of the lowest tier could populate the first floor under most circumstances.

And, creatures of her own status, now tier one or bronze as Abby had confusingly referred to her, had to be classified as bosses on the current floorplan.

Abby had a hard limit to the number of creatures and power levels she could incorporate into her current size and layout, which, with Katelyn as she was once ranking up, meant that, in practice, she had to waste her current opportunity to expand, possibly to an entirely new level, and instead enlarge her current design to accommodate Katelyn's new and ‘special’ chamber.

And, when asked why she had to name it as such and, evidently, it did supposedly matter, the reply was—

"Else the universe will step in to ‘tip’ the scales back towards balance."

Kate really hadn't liked how that had sounded, and while the other girl had refused to elaborate, stating it was less a desire to keep quiet and more a restriction, she'd agreed they needed to keep things just fair enough to avoid any potential conflicts of interest with possible grumpy deities...

The reality of it all was that Abby was investing quite a lot of her very limited resources into Kate, the other woman not batting an eye in admitting that she was desperate and long since fighting for survival against the ropes.

She was throwing the world at Katelyn, or what she could manage of it, and, honestly, it was all just a little endearing to her.

Call it camaraderie in what was left of their earthling hearts.

Call it accepting a bribe with willingly greased palms.

Call it her own selfish desires, wanting a return to a taste of her former life and a living servant to rub her feet, of which she would have the pixie attend to.

Regardless of her reasons, the monster knew she wanted to help the dungeon, even if they hadn't known each other very long.

And, though she hadn't said anything yet, the other girl intrigued Katelyn just enough so that she wondered to what ‘degree’ Abby had been, as she’d said, embarrassed by her naked glory.

She even wondered what kind of fun toys that dungeons could pull off when their minds were set toward the perverse, of which Kate wasn't at all shy of admitting her interest.

Like most people, she was a sexual creature, at heart, and she was far from ashamed at admitting that fact.

Delightful food for thought.

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There had been discussions, of course, to simply open up another floor and send Kate down there. However, Abby thought the appearance of a new level might be such a shocking deviation from the status quo that nobody would actually go down…

Or, instead, some ‘would’ go down while others ran away, tail between their legs, and all with the hopes of selling the information to the highest bidder.

Oddly, she would also be expected to have a loot table, as ‘concerning’ as that implication was for her. Moreover, her room would need to be of a unique design, so no dead-end hallway leading to nothing but a shiny new piece of gear.

What was more, the layout and theme also needed to resonate with the rest of the dungeon, or else Abby assured her that adventurers would refuse to go near it.

Suspicious rubes, the lot of them.

While often young and inexperienced from a practical standpoint, many delvers were academically trained and not at all mentally deficient. The real issue, however, at least when it came to what Katelyn wanted to do, was the ‘limitation’ on the dungeons' total monsters.

Abby had explained that it wasn't ‘just’ so simple as dropping the little beasties into a cave when she saw people coming, but instead, more like a sort of programming.

She had pre-existing rooms that had a chance of appearing in various states throughout herself, and she was already maxed out on creatures, even with the new room. An issue that the dungeon had assured her was actually Katelyn's doing, as she now technically ranked as high as Grog.

However, even if Kate wouldn't be appearing every run, her mere ‘potential’ presence to manifest still counted against Abby's top end.

Thus, annoyingly, anything that went into her little ‘scenario’ wouldn't ever appear anywhere else, essentially locking those resources down for a very narrow scope of her overall design.

If Kate's reincarnated life could be said to resemble anything, it was that of a horror movie where she was the big bad chasing terrified teens as they scurried through a dark mansion.

Abby's, by contrast, was decidedly more of a spreadsheet. Closer resembling a city-building game in design than the horror slasher of her new friends hunting extravaganza.

Again, not an issue as far as Abby was concerned on paper; however, the problem for it all lay from an accounting perspective.

"They've been farming me for longer than your parents have been alive…" Abby stated, voice dull as she floated through the mockup they'd put together over the past few days. "I know it sounds weird, but time is obviously funny for me, and it seems like it doesn't exactly run parallel with what's going on back on Earth…"

The pixie paused, taking in a deep and exhausted breath as her little body outright wilted as she spoke, "They have catalogued every goblin, every trap, every piece of loot that I have and know ‘exactly’ the quantity of valuables and experience delvers should be leaving with based on their level.

"I'm, quite honestly, and without even joking, their ‘entire’ fucking economy! Or at least its backbone. And if that changes by any considerable degree, then they're going to want to know why. So, I'm getting rid of all the useless stuff...

"The low-chance rooms, the extra pathways, the areas people don't usually bother with… old traps that never worked, but I never got the chance to deal with, all of it to make room for ‘your’ idea… That's why I can't give you as many goblins as you want or make Grog show up here.

"We're just going to have to make do with what I can spare, at least," the girl continued, sounding as despondent as she was clearly frustrated by her situation, "for the time being…"

"Think ten goblins is enough, though?" Kate asked, looking up at the large stairwell carved into the stone itself and leading to a dark cage that loomed above the monstrous encampment. The upper sub-level of the room being just barely visible in the dim light once one got closer.

Abby breathed through her tiny teeth, clicking her tongue in thought and without much certainty… "I don't know, honestly. And, truth be told, it might already be too much. The average party size is like, four people, and with ten goblins, mhmmm, they ‘might’ just look at it and talk themselves into doing the morally wrong thing…"

"Even with four of them standing on the platforms?"

"Mmm-maybe?" Abby asked, shrugging as she did so. "It's not like we can't tweak things going forward, but it costs me more power than I'm willing to spend to keep fucking around with stuff ‘after’ it's locked in, so I'd really rather not until, you know, we start seeing some results."

"I'm honestly not completely sold on certain parts either," Kate admitted sourly, looking at the cage with concern. "I know visibility is a whole ‘thing’, given I need a chance to hide, but what's the point if they can't ‘see me’ up there?"

"You know, I should really ask how you're planning on acting, assuming people do find you, before you know, pulling the trigger on all of this…"

Katelyn looked at the other girl, suddenly sniffled, and then adjusted her vocal cords while forcing fluids from her eyes. "Help me! Please! I-I don't want to die in here…"

Though the effect was partially muted by the fact that she was wearing casual attire, standing with both hands in her pockets and grinning, Kate had to say the ‘voice’ was pitch-perfect for misery and desperation.

"I like the tears." Abby nodded, tilting her head as she regarded Katelhn with a degree of rather intense scrutiny. "Think you can throw in some eyeliner and messy smears for the cheeks?"

"Yeah, I was going to go that route anyway." She agreed, the flow from her still-watering eyes subsided as they continued their inspection. "Also going to need some tattered clothes from you, rags I guess, or just torn underclothes and the like… Probably going to have to make myself look pretty filthy as well… The ‘smell’ might be an issue, but I figure it might be overlooked. Honestly? I’d prefer not stinking like shit, but…"

"Well, you're in luck! Elves, even demi ones, have a tendency to smell somewhat flowery, even with the body odour, so don't go for outright stunky with those ears all out and about."

"Even better."

"But also, don't go overboard either. It's not like perfume exactly; there's still a bit of ugh... ‘naturalness’ to it."

"I've got a decent idea…" Katelyn murmured.

Though not mentally present, her memories still remained, and she had more than enough first-hand experience to sort of get the idea once she actually knew to go looking for it. All that was needed to happen now, was to test her plan.

Katelyn yawned as she sat in her room, quietly reading a book that Abby had duplicated for her from the girls' own and rather large collection.

Evidently, adventurers left all sorts of things inside of her, and they didn't even need to die either; just lose, abandon, or forget about their own personal possessions, whereupon she would scoop them up and tuck them away.

As it happened, Kate now had a rather significant pile of books, already having made a sort of mental list regarding the order in which she wanted to burn through them.

Sadly, sometimes, expectation and reality weren't exactly always aligned.

Back home, authors had many tools at their disposal to aid in their literary endeavors. Proofreaders and editors immediately coming to mind for the comparison.

And while she had read her fair share of stories that lacked much in the way of polish, even with all these boons of modern civilization, this world had evidently not reached the same societal ‘peak’ as her own.

If she had to read how similar Chadwick's jaw was to polished marble one more time on the current page, she ‘might’ just consider dropping the book altogether, entertaining romance or otherwise…

Something about seeing the same phrase used over and over and over and over again without deviation really ruined the fantasy and immersion of it all…

Maybe it was just her; maybe she was being too hard on those poor authors out there who were all just doing their best to keep the rabid dogs at bay...

But either way, that was the joy of freedom of choice.

Nothing was forcing her to sit here and push through to save her own interest in the story.

Still, Katelyn felt it might just be a little time for a break, all the same.

Stretching herself and appreciating the process for what it was in her current form, she rose from her cushioned seat and sighed.

"You know…" She spoke aloud, head tilted slightly to the ceiling. "I sort of thought that someone would be sent to this shard sooner or later, but this feels ‘decidedly’ later…"

There wasn't much of a reply for several moments, but then, a piece of paper sort of just ‘appeared’ on her desk, Katelyn glancing at the words before offering them a shrug.

"The methodology can do that," it read, the flowing script upon its sheet continuing after what Katelyn assumed was meant to sort of be an attempt at a sighing emoji. "Sometimes, it might feel like days or hours for some shards to be populated; others just have people swarm them back to back. It is ‘evening’ outside as well, which, obviously, means things are quiet."

"I get that." The monster nodded, a hand reaching down so she could brush her fingers along the wood's surface. "But, I guess I'm just not used to being stuck in a bedroom with, not your fault, but, so little to, you know, do…"

"Meditation helps," another note replied, the dungeon's answer making her scoff as she turned away.

"It's not like I can even ask you to replicate Netflix or anything… I mean, sure, I've got to imagine a computer isn't impossible, but the content?"

Several moments passed in silence as Kate expected to hear the soft shift of another page land upon the others. Yet, when none readily arrived, she figured that the other girl had bigger things on her mind.

She wasn't sure what running a multi-dimensional and monster-filled cave structure was like, but she figured that if it was easy, then Abby would have more to show for her supposed hundreds of years spent at the helm.

Bored, she once more moved to her mirror, looking at the figure within and eyeing it with a critical eye.

Everything from the smeared makeup of her face to the dirt, bruises, minor abrasions, and the semi-wild sweep of her hair had been carefully and ‘artfully’ designed to project a certain and very specific image.

She looked every part of the naked, wounded, and filthy captive that she had intended herself to be, with ‘just’ enough Hollywood pizazz to keep herself attractive.

Aiming for the, 'Sure, I've been surviving in a post-apocalyptic and waterless downtown New York for a few years, but damn, let's have filthy sweaty oral sex anyway!' Tinseltown nonsense that everyone always seemed to eat up, even if they called it corny.

Sex sold, after all, and given how the slight majority of adventurers she'd seen had been men—well, one ‘did’ have to play to their audience to get what they wanted.

Together, she and Abby had gone over the idea of restraining her as well, using ropes or chains while brainstorming and largely just throwing darts at the board of ideas. Yet, in practice, it was simply too hard to really manage.

After all, she didn't want to be sitting around waiting while bound and gagged. Well, not ‘her’ bound and gagged anyway... but who knew, maybe Abby was willing to match her ‘freak’ and consent to some light BDSM.

Katelyn had always liked it when she broke out the riding crop and leathers when she wanted to give Brandon a ‘reward’ for being a good boy, and, if there was something that she could admit to missing, it was breaking another human over her knee while they begged her for more.

“Hmph… it's weird that the ‘horny’ isn't as reigned in as the other emotions.” She silently mused, noticing, and not for the first time, that she was feeling slightly hungry, only, for a wholly ‘alternate’ kind of sausage.

Then, after smiling at the absurdity and shaking her head, she forced her mind to a different subject that wouldn't keep her at the precipice of irritation.

"Hey, no rush or anything,” she began, attempting again at discourse with her supposed ‘ally’, “but could you throw it together something like a chessboard or the like when you get the chance? I'm not good at it, but I figure it can't hurt to break up the monotony in my free time…"

Again, nothing was forthcoming.

Part of her sort of just assumed that Abby was ignoring her, again, simply far too busy to pay attention.

However, another part of Katelyn, a far more suspicious and apprehensive sort, wondered if there wasn't some ‘alternate’ reason she wasn't responding.

Their whole process of communication when the fairy version of Abby wasn't around, was sort of like texting one of your friends.

Sure, sometimes you wanted an answer sooner than later, but spamming them with messages was just genuinely annoying behaviour.

It wasn't like she didn't think the other girl hadn't heard her, but…

Slowly, Kate found herself inching closer to her room's false door.

Placing a small hand upon the stony surface, she pressed, and it silently shifted in a revolving manner, revealing the latest boss room to Abby's dungeon and a pixie that was waiting on the other side, hand raised as though having been about to push it herself.

“Oh… hey…”

"Shhh! There's no time! A group is already heading towards you, and fast!"

Katelyn paused, then sprang into action, turning to reset the hidden door before she took up her chosen station while the dungeon girl moved to whisper in her ear. "I sort of lost track of the fact they were here for a few minutes, so they're sort of ‘just’ in the next over."

"How the hell do you lose track?" She hissed back, less annoyed and more amused than anything else.

"Ask me again after you've tried running a dungeon! Shit just slips my mind sometimes!"

"Okay, well, we're going to have to work out an early warning system that doesn't involve you coming to wake me up 'cause this is fight number ‘one’, girl! The literal first one!"

"Yeah, I know; please just focus for me. I've got a lot riding on this."

"Dude, I've got this, just—go hide in a corner or something and chill out, you're way too anxious…"

So saying, the pixie nodded her head with almost jittering anticipation, all while flying erratically around her head like some infuriated wasp looking for revenge.

Her skittish and anxious state making Kate wonder if the girl might squeal from the excitement of it all before she darted away on her tiny wings. Disappearing into the inky gloom that was the high ceiling, trailing faint glimmers of dust as she departed.

It felt strange to be talking so casually with someone after all she’d been through, her brain fuzzing for a moment as she made the strange connection interposed over her overarching situation.

Somehow, acting with a semblance of how she might have been back home and with her friends, all while visually still stuck in a dungeon filled with goblins and adventurers was—weird…

Almost Twilight Zone-y, in all honesty.

Still, she reined in her thoughts and re-centered her focus.

Shifting her features to appear just a little more despondent, the monster readied herself as she saw torchlight illuminate the distant tunnel, her posture slipping to an exhausted lean as she pressed herself against the bars, eyes closed as if too weary to sleep.