Who Designed This Underworld Dungeon?

Dungeons, a most magical existence.

They are filled with traps and monsters; logically, they should be places where normal people would never set foot.

Yet the treasures that can be found within, surprising wonders such as lost ancient magic, legendary heroes' armor, swords that could slice through iron like mud, and even sealed vampire girls!

Thus, adventurers from all over the world go crazy for dungeons.

At the deepest part of the Sain Dungeon, hidden lies the City Lord's room.

Gong Qiying sat atop the dusty altar, his withered and wrinkled body falling into deep thought.

How should one put it? An hour ago, he was still overtime at a game company, dealing with the aftermath left by a coworker who had quit and was responsible for map design. As someone clueless about map design, he was rushed by his leader to clean up the mess. Then, after dozing off at noon, he woke up to find himself transported to another world.

He had become the City Lord of the Sain Dungeon— "Animated Corpse" Gedwin.

And was faced with the dire situation of having less than a month to live.

Not long after, Gong Qiying, who had fully accepted Gedwin's memories, understood why this City Lord was running out of life.

Because his dungeon was too simple!

Other people's dungeons: Endless monsters, cunning and underhand traps, strong and powerful elite monsters, treasure chests filled with excrement.

Gedwin's dungeon: A smattering of weakling monsters, obvious traps that even fools could see through, a straight path leading right to the final Boss's room, purely decorative elite monsters, and decent quality treasures.

Considering these conditions, the result was...

His dungeon had become a playground for rookie adventurers, where even the clueless newcomers could clear it in one go, brimming with a sense of achievement! A constant stream of people!

However, this was not good news.

Many researchers were puzzled by one thing—how do dungeons generate monsters and treasures? Even after killing the monsters and taking the treasures, they would reappear the next time one entered.

This relates to the operational logic of dungeons.

In simple terms, all of the monsters and treasures in the dungeon are conjured out of thin air by the City Lord using spiritual power, which is why they respawn.

And the source of this spiritual power is people.

The joy, anger, sorrow, and pleasure of people, every action and movement, would emit spiritual power, which the dungeon would automatically absorb to maintain its daily consumption.

But these are far from enough!

When adventurers die in a dungeon, they would burst out with tens of times more spiritual power, and the stronger their abilities, the more power released!

Only by absorbing a large amount of spiritual power from the deaths of adventurers could a dungeon operate normally.

And Sain Dungeon... no one could die there.

"Is Gedwin an idiot..."

Using his City Lord Authority, a micro model of the Sain Dungeon appeared before Gong Qiying, and just a few glances left him speechless.

Gedwin's dungeon design level wasn't just ordinary; it was disaster-class.

Adventurers entering from the entrance could take one path straight to the Boss's room. There were plenty of branching paths, but they housed treasures; monsters like slimes, minotaurs, and ghosts that roamed the maze had useful bodily materials; due to special ley lines, one could even find special mineral resources just steps away...

Gong Qiying kept sighing, the person who designed this map was practically doing charity work; it was a whole treasure vault.

"No good, I must make major changes!"

He was a layman in map design, but fortunately, he had one advantage: he had played enough games.

His favorite was the soul-like series known for its maps that were interconnected in all directions, full of malicious traps, terrifying monsters, and frightening loss of sanity—

Dark Souls series!

He stroked the City Lord's ring on his left index finger, and a series of information appeared in front of him.

[Sain Dungeon, remaining spiritual power: 1806, daily operational spiritual power required: 78]

[Available structures: Ruined Village, Poison Swamp, Ancient Architecture Complex, Underground Mines, Invisible Bridge...]

[Available Monsters: skeleton monsters, Minotaur, Slime, rotten wild dogs, Blood Mosquitoes, ghosts, Goblin Group, Low-level Snake-man, Mad Living Corpse]

[Dungeon Micro Model]

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"First, redesign the Dungeon into three levels: upper, middle, and lower, significantly reducing the area and reclaiming the excess structures into spiritual power. There must be a gate-keeping Elite Monster at each connecting point between levels. Since my current spiritual power isn't enough to create strong Monsters, I'll opt for those in large numbers that can fill up the quota!"

After some consideration, Gong Qiying decided to deploy thirteen rotting wild dogs with high mobility, a strong desire to attack, and venom in their teeth at the first connection point.

And only three would be visible, with the other ten hiding in concealed spots.

"Heh heh, let the three rotting wild dogs that are visible turn their backs to the adventurers. They'll think they can launch a surprise attack, but it turns out they'll be the ones getting wrapped like dumplings,"

Gong Qiying revealed a "plan succeeded" smile.

The second connection point was set with two Elite Minotaurs, one hidden above the ceiling, which would jump into the fray with an AOE attack once its comrade was reduced to half health, entering a frenzied state and prioritizing enemy Magic casters.

Naturally, the types of monsters wandering the Dungeon had to be drastically changed. Now there were Goblin Groups that moved in packs, and each Goblin Group had to include a Shaman to cast BUFFs.

The wild Minotaurs were removed and replaced with cost-effective skeleton monsters, disguised as scattered bones on the ground. They would rise up for a surprise attack when adventurers passed by and, when reducing to critical health, would automatically collapse and pretend to be dead, needing only a few minutes to revive at full health.

Ghosts were replaced with Blood Mosquitoes, which would inflict anemic DEBUFF on the enemies in swarms, and even obstruct their vision, disrupting the battle. The only downside was their weakness to fire.

After all the meddling, the spiritual power needed for creating monsters had actually decreased.

Gong Qiying observed the Dungeon Micro Model, feeling that something still wasn't quite right, and after careful thought, he nailed the issue.

"The map design isn't cunning enough!"

So, he turned a must-pass area on the upper level into a Poison Swamp, a nasty staple of soul-like games.

Previously, the exterior of Sain Dungeon was a densely packed cluster of Ancient buildings, imposing and free to explore.

But under Gong Qiying's manipulation, the map's size was substantially reduced, replaced with a model featuring a main correct path, supplemented by branching paths that can loop back to the correct route, and additional false pathways leading to dead ends. The freedom to explore was reduced, the environment turned darker without light, abundantly ominous.

The majestic Ancient architectural complex was gone, replaced by an upper level dominated by abandoned villages and poison pits, a middle level mainly of sparse ancient buildings mixed with forest, and a lower level focused on underground mines.

These scene and building choices have no intrinsic meaning; they were picked randomly from the available buildings.

There were also tricks like adding a multitude of twists and bends to necessary paths, hiding Cunning Monsters behind them for ambushes, or turning treasure chests into Treasure Box Monsters or teleportation traps, and so on.

The corners of Gong Qiying's mouth could not help but rise; he had found joy.

The traps were also an essential part to be experienced, but he found a problem.

"I'm running out of spiritual power,"

Even after constantly cutting costs and reducing map size, deleting monster types, and skimping on treasure rewards, the spiritual power he had left was only enough to last for another seven or eight days.

[Remaining Spiritual Power: 631, Spiritual Power Required for Daily Operations: 77]

In seven days, once the spiritual power ran out, as a City Lord whose soul was bound to the Dungeon, he would vanish into thin air, and the Dungeon would lose its vitality.

"Maintaining one day's operation only needs the spiritual power equivalent to two or three people, I'm really energy efficient,"

Gong Qiying sighed and had to temporarily give up on traps.

And why is the spiritual power needed for daily operations only a little less than before, even in such frugal circumstances?

Because he stacked monsters, that's why~

Not only did he stack monsters, but he also placed some rewards that could only be obtained in-game.

Such as ordinary weapons with Combat Skills, Enemy Attraction Skull, various mosses, Forging Stones, and the like – distinct and cheap in bulk items that cost few spiritual powers.

According to Gedwin's memories, these items he placed did not exist in this world and might become an attractive feature.

When he has plenty of spiritual power later, he can place higher-level rewards to attract more people.

After all, merely imitating the difficulty of soul-like games won't do; if it's too hard, no one will come, so there must be sufficient enticing rewards.

"Boom... Boom..."

The muffled bell sounded, signifying the start of a new day for Sain Dungeon and the opening time.

Countless newcomers full of aspiration for the adventurer profession arrived for practice, passing through maps with no danger, defeating weak Monsters, obtaining valuable treasures, and finding confidence.

However, what awaits them ahead is...

Malice from another world!

Death lies ahead, turn back.

[Reminder Before Watching: The Dungeon has rewards! Rewards! Rewards! Don't say I've forgotten about human nature's greed or that no one would come without rewards! Behind this, I've even brought out prizes like Ring Capture and the small scythe and Swift Slash!]

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