“Would it be a good time to absorb his karma?” Alysia asked.
“To what purpose?” I frowned. “That still leaves Lydia, Celeste, and Terra unable to see the entrance. I’m not sure about Shao.”
I glanced over at her, and she gave a small shrug. “I’m aware of its existence because you’re aware of its existence. However, if I want to go down it, I’d have to follow the fake one.”
So, if I took his karma, Shao would be able to follow because of her nature, but there was no guarantee the others would. I scratched my chin. This was another aspect of dungeons that was like a video game. Mobs had boundaries that they were locked inside. In a standard dungeon, there was a particular group of mobs on each floor, and they rarely crossed. Of course, there were exceptions, such as during a dungeon flood or when the dungeon master allows it, but in general, mobs couldn’t do certain things.
One of those things was passing safe rooms. They couldn’t see them, and if you put a mob in a safe room its connection to the dungeon would be cut. This could cause a myriad of effects. The mob could go nuts. Alternatively, they could gain lucidity, if it was the dungeon causing them to go crazy. If the monster’s power was based on miasma, it might start taking damage, and they would certainly become weakened and vulnerable in such a room.
This is why dungeon masters usually didn’t go into the safe room after you. They could… but their greatest strength was always their connection to the dungeon, and they wouldn’t be able to access it in a safe room. Other mobs that gain intelligence could also know about and enter a safe room based on their will, however, if a dungeon wanted them to leave it’d usually make an alternative exit around the safe room. What I was looking at before me was one such alternative exit, although it wasn’t created with the intent of mobs moving through, or maybe I should say the lore of this dungeon didn’t plan for the hero to reach the boss room through this shortcut, and thus these NPCs didn’t have such a program.
“I’m sorry, I have no clue what you’re looking at.” The Hero spoke with an awkward smile on his face.
“Should I just pick him up and toss him down.” Alysia offered.
“I just had a thought.” I shrugged and lifted my hand. “Portal.”
I was a bit surprised, but a portal began to open up. I turned to Shao for confirmation, but I didn’t need it because I could see the other party members making noises of surprise.
“Where does this lead?” Alysia asked.
“The boss room.” I sighed. “I’ve already been in this dungeon, so I’ve already mapped out our route to the boss room. Technically, this is a new place in a new location, but it’s an exact duplicate created by the original lore. It stood to reason that the mana signature between the two would be the same.”
That’s not saying I could have created a portal to this location when I first came to this world. First off, I didn’t even know that this was the inevitable end location. Secondly, the dungeon wasn’t in the same place, so I wouldn’t have been able to locate it to portal to it. However, from within the dungeon, following the same path I had followed that scientist, I was able to create a portal directly to the boss room. While the hero’s party couldn’t see the shortcut, it looked like they could at least acknowledge portals.
“Master, we’re going through!” Alysia declared, shoving Hero through.
I glanced at her with a raised eyebrow. “If you were just going to toss him anyway…”
She stiffened. “He smiles too much… it was just getting on my nerves.”
It seemed like even Alysia was getting tired of this Hero. I didn’t take offense. That just told me there could only be one of me.