248 Cat Dad’s Backrooms Dungeon – The Prelude
Chapter 248 – Cat Dad’s Backrooms Dungeon – The Prelude
RUMBLE
Having infinite currency in VDO games could ruin the sense of fulfillment and half of the game’s fun. However, having constant mana to expand the dungeon gave Xiaomao a sense of thrill and joy. Seeing how the dungeon floors stacked and widened, Xiaomao couldn’t wait to see the reaction of the future intruders.
After tampering with the dungeon for a while, the dungeon reached its limits due to the max mana capacity.
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<strong>Dungeon Levels</strong>
First Floor – The Cave
B1 – Lobby (10,000 SQ/KM Backrooms)
B2 – (Empty Floor)
B3 – (Empty Floor)
B4 – (Empty Floor)
B5 – (Empty Floor)
B6 – (Empty Floor)
B7 – Tower Bridge/Boss Room/Treasure Room
B8 – Fire Ant Nest
B9 – Residential Area
B10 – Mermaid Lake
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Aside from the first floor, B1, B7, B8, and B10, every level’s space was 1,000 square kilometers. These humongous levels were stacked on top of each other like sandwiches in the hologram map.
Unfortunately, to create a new floor, Xiaomao had to complete a certain task.
DING
<Your dungeon has reached its limit. You can exchange your Dungeon Points (DP) with the DP Store to increase the dungeon levels.>
Xiaomao sighed. Although dungeons were nice and dandy, they did not allow players to expand infinitely. Increments, conditions, and currency inflation prevented him from creating zillions of floors or turning the entire dungeon into an invincible hideout.
‘Bummer.’
Xiaomao turned his attention to the blank floors. He pursed his lips, wondering what kind of traps, mazes, or sentries he should build on these places.
While Xiaomao was thinking, Meowmeow’s voice entered his mind.
‘Are you done, munya?’
Xiaomao came back to his sense, “Yes, senior. I’m done, munya!”
‘That takes you a while. I assume that you added more floors to your nest, yes?’
“Yes. I created five more, and they’re huge.”
‘I can tell. I heard an SOS sound transmission from the mermaids that they’re lost in the B1 because of the new floors. You forgot to add stairs and paths to the lower level, munya!’
“Whoops! I thought it was automatically generated.”
‘No. You have to manually link them first. Then, the dungeon will automatically shift or change the pathways if you set the maze mechanism to “Randomize Exits & Entrances”.’
“…”
The dungeon building was more complicated than Xiaomao had imagined. He ended up opening the treasure room’s door and invited Meowmeow to teach him how to operate the OS.
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Hours later, Xiaomao and Meowmeow created staff-only teleportation devices, which only the workers, sentries, mermen, fire ants, and guests of the dungeon could see and operate. Hidden platforms were located in multiple locations of the mazes, including dead-end areas.
New paths, stairs, and trap doors linked the B1 floor to the five new floors. In addition, instead of setting the B2 to B6 levels in order, Meowmeow helped Xiaomao put these five floors into a complex rotating maze – The newly created floors now could be shuffled whenever Xiaomao wanted. Therefore, an intruder might mistake the B3 floor for B2, or Xiaomao could make intruders on the B6 floor go back to the B2 floor by shuffling their locations.
The shuffling hell was set. Both cats evilly snickered.
“Senior, this is too evil, munya!”
“This is nothing compared to what’s to come, munya. Give me the authority to manage those floors. I’ll play with them some more. You can go see your dog and rest, munya. It’s been a long day.”
Xiaomao appreciated this deity’s help. He bowed to him and was about to sort his warehouse, but he recalled something odd.
When Xiaomao examined the dungeon core a few days ago, the dungeon expansion feature was disabled. But today, he could use the dungeon mana and the dungeon shop.
Xiaomao turned around, “By the way, senior. By chance, can you detect changes to this world if Pangu’s henchmen do something to the game world… I mean this world, munya?”
“Game patches, right, munya?”
“Oh, you knew, munya?”
“Meh. We all knew all along. How else would I and Mimir know that you are all PLAYERS, munya?”
“Right…” Xiaomao scratched his head.
Meowmeow yawned, “I know what you’re worrying about, munya. Whenever Pangu did something to the game world, THIS WORLD, I always sensed it. Well, when they stopped broadcasting the guild war matches, those guys indeed did something to it, munya.”
“They did, munya?”
Meowmeow closed his eyes and transformed from an orange cat into an orange catopus. He inwardly curled his tentacles, meditating in a weird position. After that, he opened his right eye and told Xiaomao a piece of bad news.
“It’s not Pangu or Pan Mei. It’s Solomon and all his stupid 72 demons. They completed the Landlord Patch and secretly updated the game, munya.”
“!!!”
“Finish what you’re doing here and go back to the human world, munya. I’ll take care of the blank floors. You go out there and get more info from the player’s side. I can’t tell the detail what they did, munya.”
“Okay!”
p-a- n-d-a-n-0-v-e-l、(c)om Xiaomao trusted Meowmeow. He granted the deity the dungeon authority to edit the B1 to B6 floor. Then, he dumped all excess items in the treasure room and rushed out, heading to the residential area next.
He didn’t notice that Meowmeow secretly flickered his tentacle and sent a small droplet of his blood into Xiaomao’s skin. As soon as the blood entered Xiaomao’s body, the bicolor catopus farted. Then, his belly roared.
“AW, CRAP, MUNYA! CRAP! CRAP! CRAP! LITERALLY CRAP, MUNYA!!”
Xiaomao sprinted with eight tentacles, rushing to the outhouse in the boss room while farting.
PWWFFFF PFFF PFFF
The sound of someone losing a battle attracted the attention of Mimir, Taotie, and Cernun in the boss room. The calm ones smirked while Taotie cackled and mocked Xiaomao.
“Ayo, shitbreak cat! Don’t dirty the playroom, you hear?!”
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After Xiaomao had left the treasure room, Meowmeow snickered.
Cathulhus were creatures that could consume and use all impurities, substances, and materials. What Taotie taught to Xiaomao was a fracture to the true ability of the oldest race in the universe.
However, there was a problem with Xiaomao’s constitution. He lacked the right training as a cultivator, and he didn’t have the foundation of Bone Marrow Refining, Meridian Opening, and Essence Gathering, which were necessary for the higher stages.
As they were short on time, Meowmeow secretly gave Xiaomao a gift, which his notorious father had when he was a mortal.
‘I wonder how he will react when his consciousness enters his pocket dantian. Too bad he doesn’t have Dion or Devil’s system to assist him with what Mao Miaomiao had. Speaking of which, that guy is really talentless. He literally lived a trillion years in his pocket dantian, but he couldn’t become a proper sage. If Xiaomao had the same luxury, he could have been stronger than Hongjun or Kishin Douji. What a shame.’
Meowmeow complained in his mind and shook his head. He reverted into a cat and jumped on the dungeon core.
‘Alright. Time to work!’
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While Shepherd sneaked out to visit his affairs, Andrew and Peter duo also came out of the boss room. Each carried a massively large backpack. They gazed at the tower bridge, which was devoid of patrol units and mermaids.
Both dwarves smirked and put the backpacks down. Then, they brought out two structures that they smuggled from the Guild War World.
Two unfinished obelisk towers appeared out of nowhere and stood on the cliff on the boss room’s side. They faced the opposite side of the cliff while the entrances of the towers faced the boss room’s gate.
Fortunately, the tower bridge level’s ceiling was tall enough to keep the two towers inside. Both dwarves climbed the towers and assembled parts to complete the buildings.
VRRRRR
When the last components were installed into the buildings, the tower lights lit up. Both dwarves rushed to the control room and turned off the power. Then, the light was off.
Peter and Andrew broke a sweat. They rebooted the tower and input several commands as if they were experienced software engineers. But in reality, they were simply reading the HELP note and experimenting with the console.
It was not difficult for them to learn a new thing. While the dungeon trembled because of Xiaomao, the workaholic boys figured out 30% of the console, command list, and programs. Even though they didn’t understand everything, they now knew how to manually shoot the beams and assign friendly units to the [Don’t Shoot] list.
The men snickered and took a short break on the ground in front of the bridge. They set up a BBQ tool and cooked a portion of Cookie’s meat, which they got from Xiaomao as a gift. Also, they secretly bought beverages from the Guild War’s fountain area and brought them out for this occasion.
While the dwarves cheered and chugged fine whiskey as if they were water, James and John came out to find them as they didn’t see the dwarves in the resident area.
Upon noticing the obelisk towers, the two Js dropped their jaws.
Andrew cackled and waved his hand, inviting the boys for a private party. James and John accepted the invitation and got to enjoy Cookie’s meat.
But when they ate it, they received an alarming notification message.
<Warning! You have been cursed!>
<Phoenixes can detect your location, and they will find you to avenge their comrade!>
“…”
The men stared at the message. They looked at each other.
“…”
“…”
The boys shrugged and continued eating the BBQ chicken. John brought out chili pepper, New Orleans spicy chicken spice, and homemade BBQ sauce to compliment the meat. As for James, he introduced the boys to a rice cooker, which he had scavenged from the warehouse. He began cooking rice, only to find out that they had no electricity for the device.
Andrew and Peter cackled and mocked James with their expressions. John shook his head and grabbed the rice cooker’s plug and used one of his lightning spells.
Zap!
DING
The rice cooker’s light lit up. The dwarves widened their eyes while James was surprised.
John winked at them at first. But after 10 minutes, he sweated profusely while the others laughed at him because John was forced to become a human battery to cook their rice. After the rice was cooked, Mimir walked out of the boss’s room and found the boys.
“Do you have more rice to trade? Taotie ate all my supplies. I’ll pay for it.”
James happily shared some of his rice. While he was at it, Mimir glanced at the rice cooker and John.
“Do you know that you can simply light a campfire and cook rice with a pot?”
“…”
John facepalmed while James and the dwarves’ laughter got louder.