He seemed to be honestly considering it as he looked through the options. His thoughts turned into memories as he considered all of the times that he had chosen the first or second option for the start of his dungeon. While monsters and critters were able to defend him, they couldn’t perform complex tasks. They couldn’t report on the happenings outside the dungeon, and certainly wouldn’t be able to do anything complex. Though, he couldn’t help but hesitate at the concept of giving something actual intelligence. He would be making a creature that would have to defend his dungeon with its very life, and never be able to allow it the freedom beyond the walls of the dungeon.

Though, that was the same for him wasn’t it? He was never going to be able to leave this place and know what the rest of the world was like. There would always be stories from dungeoneers, the odd ancient tome of knowledge dropped in, as well as even people directly giving him information if he got to talking with them. He would be trapped here without anyone to talk to if he never summoned up a minion. He would be alone.

Without another thought he pressed down on the option to have one minion and one creature unlocked. A dry feeling was in his mouth as he watched the option for monsters gray out, wondering if preventing that pain was the right decision. Though with a deep breath and a closing of the eyes, he clicked on the minions menu to see what the options were. His heart sank as he realized what a mistake he had made, looking over the three options for the minions that the system was offering to him.

1. Swamp Goblin - A small green humanoid covered in algae and wearing reed clothing. It is known for being stealthy, but still smells like a swamp.
2. Froggen - A bipedal frog known for being especially small and fast. Dangerous in large numbers, but overall weak otherwise. Can produce poisons through the skin.
3. Swamp Fey - A tiny humanoid that glows with ethereal light. Small and dangerous in large numbers. Capable of basic magical defense and offense.

These options were horrendous! How by any degree would he be able to get anything done with any of these as his minion?! The goblin stank in more ways than one, the frog was asking to be punted, and the fairy… Well the fairy had the most potential. Though he didn’t exactly want to be a fairy dungeon, since those couldn’t be inherently good or bad when it came down to brass tacks. Though with a sigh and a rub of the crystalline hand down his face, he finally pressed the option for the swamp fey to appear. Though he noticed that the other two options had greyed out, implying that he had locked himself into Swamp fey for at least the time being.

He looked down at his stomach as he felt a pull of something, before realizing what was happening. His magic was condensed into this projection of a physical form, so whenever he made something, it would weaken the form some. The red mana flowed from his stomach, causing the majority of his torso to become translucent as he spent the fifteen mana on it. That left him with eight mana to summon up some critters for his dungeon.

He watched as the mana coalesed into a small sphere in the air above the bed, a timer appearing on it as the fey took shape within the energy. It seemed that for the low level intelligent creature, he was going to have to wait a full minute. So as that began to tick down, he shifted his focus onto the next waste of his mana, the critter menu. Though the options there was far more interesting than that of the minion menu. He gave a pleased hum as he tried to figure out which of the three options that would be perfect for defending his home. He considered what happened with the minion option, and understood he would be locked into his first decisions for a while.

1. Tree Frog - A small frog that dwells in high places and known for fitting into small spaces. It has speed and agility on its size, but not much mass.
2. Crawdad - A small crustacean covered in an armored layer of chitin. This creature is not particularly large or fast, but makes up for that in attack and self-defense.
3. Spiders - A crawling arachnid that is known for weaving webs in unoccupied places. These creatures have great speed and attack, but are rather easy to kill.

As much as a tree frog would be a cute thing to have around, it was not nearly the bruiser he would be needing for the future. If the fairy was going to be his magic caster, then he needed to start producing a wall of tanks to protect the little squishy thing. The spiders were much in the same regard, too soft to be able to actually perform well. So he tapped his finger onto the button that was the Crawdad option. A small smile appeared on his face as he looked down at the floor, watching as the timer appeared in one of the stagnant pools. It was actually much shorter than the fairy, only ten seconds for one to spawn at a cost of two mana.

He smiled and gave a shake of the head, thinking that this was going to be so much easier than the last few times. Though as his first crawdad appeared from the stagnant pool of water, he couldn’t focus on its celebratory dance. A new window had popped up, this one being a simple notification box.

Alert! New Foreign Body detected: Common Housefly!

That was all the information he was given, not where it had appeared or why. Though he couldn’t help but scoff at the description. “Foreign body, that’s dumb. I’m not a damn organic system, just say intruder. Damn box.” He muttered as he glanced away from the box for a moment before looking back. His eyes widened with shock as he looked at the box changing through a burst of static.

Alert! New Intruder detected: Common Housefly x 28!

It said with his new word in place of the system version of it. Though he couldn’t help but swallow as he looked at the end. “Times… it’s still going up!” He shouted in panic before looking up with horror to see that dozens of little black insects were pouring in from the ceiling. He gave out a shriek and began to press the option for the crawdads again and again in the still open menu, summoning four more until his singular point of regenerated mana left his head and hands as the only remaining segments of his avatar.

Though he was deeply regretting the fact that he hadn’t chosen frogs now. They would have been the perfect counter to this mess. He watched as the crawdads ticked down and began to appear at the edges of their pools with similar claw raised dances to the first one. Though all they could do was snap at the air as the flies began to take flight into a singular shape. The swarm coalesced into the ball of hate it was always meant to be, and he couldn’t help but feel his missing heart drop as a new notification appeared.

Alert! New Intruder detected: Common Housefly Swarm!