"Welcome to the Dungeon Maker" The digital screen showed those few words bright and clear.
A selection appeared right in front of Jin. Improving old dungeons or creating a new dungeon?
"Well, let's check on the old dungeons and see if I can give them a good revamp. In addition, there are some building blocks on it so I can use that as a learning experience before I build my own dungeon.
Jin pressed on the first option and the dungeon maker gave a list of available options for Jin to choose from. All three dungeons were available for him to edit. The goblin dungeon, the zither mistress dungeon and the Great Wall of China Dungeon. He selected the goblin dungeon and noticed the entire room change its landscape to suit the dimensional space of the forested area where the goblins resided. A large cinematic screen similar to what Jin had seen in the underground stores were activated right in front of him.
Other options such as AI characters and monsters on loan appeared on a separate digital screen. Jin knew that this current dungeon format was something similar to an arcade style where players fought their enemies in waves.
"I should create a short storyline while utilising the monsters I have in this dungeon." Jin thought to himself and checked the budget for Goblin Dungeon. Jin found that, surprisingly, the budget allocated for this dungeon was not even half used so he decided to take a look at the AI characters and monsters on loan available.
"Hmm, Boar Knights? That would definitely be interesting." Jin thought for a while and finally decided on a short storyline. He started to put a few AI characters in, repositioned the goblins and even added more goblins to suit the all-new storyline. After he was done, he checked the budget and discovered that he was barely within the budget. And just like that, he pressed the finish button.
"System is calculating storyline viability and interest." The same female announcer spoke in the Dungeon Maker instance and Jin waited for the results as the room he was in started to show stock images of dummy players trying the dungeon. In less than a minute, the system gave an approval rating of B+, which meant that he was allowed to publish this particular dungeon.
However, he did not realise that upon using the budget to the maximum, the cost of the dungeon had increased by another 100 Yuan. "I think the new storyline should be worth it for the cultivators. Besides, it would be on modified difficulty, which would be slightly easier for newcomers to try."
After Jin published his dungeon, he suddenly saw a pop-up. "Congratulations on creating your first dungeon! A new creature has been given to you for your efforts. Please check your creatures list for more details."
"Wow, a new monster?" Jin quickly opened the digital screen that contained his monsters and he found a creature that might actually suit the Zither Mistress dungeon. He did not know whether the system was trying to help him indirectly or it was just a coincidence. However, Jin had been encountering too many coincidences that he started to question whether the system was directing him towards a certain path in life.
He checked the stats profile of the new creature and it was the Sand Witch. According to the profile's description, the Sand Witch was a lady with extraordinary abilities in the manipulation of sand, dust and dirt. Her ability to create the sand-related summons was on par with high tier mages.
Next, he opened up the Zither Mistress dungeon to revamp it for a better storyline. Unlike the Goblin dungeon, he did not keep the original monsters. Instead, Jin decided to remove the wyrm ants and in exchange, he placed the Sand Witch in it.
"I think this scene would be great for Zither Mistress." Jin had decided to change the dungeon landscape by adding an open-air theatre to the grasslands. Once again, he added the necessary AI and monsters on loan and he carefully added lines of possible dialogue for the AI to speak.
According to the manual, the AI needed to know what their motive was in the particular dungeon, what role the AI was playing at and how extensive the role would be. Jin, the dungeon creator, could add in additional lines and dialogues for it to understand its roles better so that it could better interact with the cultivators when needed.
However, unlike the goblin dungeon, Jin was required to use the demonstrate play option to create stock dummy players to simulate the scene as he had trouble visualising some of the aspects of this particular new storyline. "This is much harder than I envisioned it to be." Jin did one last test run before submitting the new storyline to the system.
Fortunately, he was able to get a B rating and he was given some constructive criticism by the system to improve on certain things. "If Sand Witch interrupts the play at scene C, it would have a more dramatic effect than it coming in scene D." The female announcer explained to him.
"Hmm, but won't it affect scene E and F if I do that?" Jin asked
"That is where the customers' choice comes in. Give more room to your customers and it will be a better experience." The female announcer stated.
"Alright, let's try that," Jin said and changed his design around as recommended by the system. For some reason, Jin suddenly felt that the system was fairly reasonable and knowledgeable in the aspect of dungeon making. He thought that it would be more cold and calculative, similar to what was written in the fantasy novels he had read.
"Now, time to create the new dungeons with the new creatures I just caught." Jin stretched his hands and did some waist turning before proceeding to create a new dungeon. The interface for everything remained the same and he started by choosing the situation he wanted the cultivators to be in before he started to add in various modifiers.
"Hmm, with them acting as a group, I think this is the best situation to go forth with…" Jin pressed on modern settings option and chose a bank building while he started to get creative with his placement of monsters and AIs.
"Hahaha, Bank Heist. This will be great to let the cultivators play hero." Jin laughed as he tried all sorts of options he was permitted to by the system to fit the storyline. To top it off, Jin had already been in the Dungeon Maker for nearly 8 hours straight and he did not feel a single bit of fatigue at all.
"Perhaps, I should restrict the amount of time he is allowed to stay in there…"Yun started to get a bit anxious when Jin was creating his dungeons a little too joyfully.