In the dungeon, Doyle went on, not caring about the changes Ace had put into place. Well, not that he didn't care, so much as it didn't affect him. While Ace could make some changes within the dungeon, it didn't alter anything Doyle was doing. Even with the system, there was only so much people can do when it came to dungeons.

Though the reverse was also true. There was only so much that Doyle could do. If he wanted to do anything to Ace, it would require him to actually step into the dungeon first. An easy enough thing at the moment, though Doyle could certainly see Ace becoming paranoid enough at some point that he stops leaving his seat of power.

Doyle, on the other hand, cannot leave his own seat of power. Kind of hard to have any direct effect on things that way. So, Doyle filled his cares away in what for a human would be quite unhealthy, but for a dungeon was more akin to moving the information to a different area of a computer's drive. He didn't stop caring per se, instead he paused caring until something made it important.

Of course, Doyle doesn't quite realize what he did. He was just lucky that unhealthy coping mechanisms happened to line up with dungeon mechanics. If only everyone could be so lucky.

Besides, he had other things to worry about. Doyle needs to figure out arrays and formations, to gain a combined skill for them, and then combine it with his rune skill. Though that brought a question to mind. 'Hey Ally, when skills combine, what happens with the path points? Like, someone advances quite far with two skills, only to combine them and open up a slot for another skill? Sure, at the moment it feels like I'm swimming in skills, but from another point of view, it hasn't even been a year and I've got so many.'

Ally looks up from a news article, something about a new mine crashing the price of fire ora-tal metal somewhere quite far away. 'Eh, while it might seem like some amazing source of points, it isn't. For each magnitude, skills become harder to merge until the thousands where I don't think anyone has managed it? At least none that aren't beyond ancient.

'I assume some of those old monsters with skills like "combat" and "crafting" have done it. There are simply too many combat and crafting skills to have not needed to merge them later on. Though I guess it is just a question of scale? We're still swimming around in the double digits and you're probably expecting later levels to be harder.'

Doyle, 'Wouldn't they be? I assume it takes more to raise your level once you know so much.'

Ally shakes her head, 'While there is some increased difficulty, levels aren't marks on a scale going from nothing to all knowing. There is no point at which you are perfect with a skill.

'In fact, sometimes people experience greater skill growth at higher levels. It is at that point where they have the ability to observe things on a deeper level. A low level smith can only observe the gross physical changes caused by their hammer strike. A high level smith might be able to observe the metal structure of the entire item shift around with each strike.

'If a smith uses the best materials and observes closely, they might grow their skill by ten or more levels. The difficulty at higher levels comes not from the system making things difficult, but needing to learn new things.

'In the future, I will have to show you some of the auction sites. There are so many swords with the oddest of alloys floating around out there. Even if it doesn't make sense to use for a sword, smiths will try it, just to observe why it fails. All to level their skills even further.'

Doyle sighs, 'Let me guess, you can't show me now because the system wants us to travel our own path. Would be a bit of a give away on what to do if I got to see stuff like common magical alloys on an auction site.'

Ally, 'Got it in one! Which also means I won't be too much help for magical materials outside of what the system tells me to tell you. After all, while I'm not a blacksmith or anything, it would be kind of hard not to know at least a little bit. Kind of like how you likely know what steel is, at least on a basic level. It might seem silly to some, but the chance of a newly integrated world coming up with some odd alloy or another isn't zero.

'Better alloys? Almost certainly not. More efficient for certain jobs or just plain cheaper? Well, traders and such the universe over, all drool over those chance discoveries. Profit margins are vicious and saving even a copper coin on a massive batch of metal adds up over time.'

Doyle sighs, 'Not even in the apocalypse can the planet escape capitalism.'

Ally shrugs, 'At least it is tempered with other forms of government and economic theory. I don't know how your planet survived so long trying to be a pure capitalist society. While I won't say they always fail, well, they certainly try to.

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'Not that going too extreme on any other system works out, either. You need balance to support a populace. A little kindness here, some greed over there. Though I must admit that, it varies by species and even within species.

'Certain insect races can't survive without a monarchy. They have free will and are sapient. There is something about them that, without a queen at the top, giving the orders, that short circuits them. Though you might just as easily find on the same planet, a continent over, a group of the same insect race that while they don't mind a monarchy, are perfectly fine without.'

Doyle nods, 'So there isn't any one size fits all answer? Despite how much I'm sure some will claim there is?'

Ally laughs, 'Oh boy, do they claim otherwise! Though you have to be careful. You need to confirm any such claims. People can be pretty stuck in a rut over such things. There are more than enough examples of individuals dying simply because they believe they would. The best bet for anything like this is to make sure those who want out, can get out. Well, I guess if you have someone powerful enough take an interest in the situation, things get sorted out quickly.

'You do not want that to happen, though. Once someone is powerful enough to decide the fate of an entire planet, they tend to be a bit separated from normal concerns. If you're lucky, you end up with a population of culture cracked sapients. Things only get worse from there. Though your planet should be fine. While it certainly isn't clean, most powers don't bother with human populations. There are just too many of them out there.'

Doyle, 'What? There isn't a human deity out there trying to snaffle up as many as they can?'

Ally shrugs, 'That certainly exists. However, they just need faith. In what many see as an ironic twist, deities of the human race tend to keep their followers repressed. There is just something about being in an unpleasant situation that makes humans reach for the divine. In fact, most human deities are the result of some king, dictator, pharaoh, or whatever else they decided to call themselves, deciding to add "god" to their title.'

Doyle sighs, 'I hope Ace doesn't try that nonsense. He seems pretty agnostic at the moment, but we don't know what he'll end up as if he hits a bottleneck that he doesn't feel like he can break.'

Ally nods, 'A valid worry. Though I doubt the town will ever support enough people to get him to apotheosis. I'd honestly be more worried if he wasn't so insular. Being the strongest person post-integration has elevated more than enough people into being a deity. That is actually the most common source of style specific combat deities in this universe.

'Someone claims to be a deity of the sword? Odds are good that they "won" their planet's integration. While combat deities are common enough, by the time they consider becoming a deity, most will have explored many forms of combat to try and go further.'

Doyle, 'Whatever, we will deal with Ace if we have to. So far, he seems to be big on keeping stuff related to our dungeon secret. Though I feel a bit paranoid since they've reached my last floor once again.'

Ally shrugs, 'That will at least partly be the dungeon instincts. Since you still have room to grow deeper, having delvers reach the last floor will feel uncomfortable after a bit of time has passed. Early on, you were simply growing floors too quickly for the feeling to grab you and then they just weren't reaching your last floor.'

Doyle, 'What determines if I have more room to grow? This doesn't seem like the system is screwing around with me, so the condition shouldn't be too complicated.'

Ally laughs, 'Oh my, natural instincts can be quite complex. Though I will admit, for this there are some simple triggers. Obviously, the first thing it checks is your current max number of floors. Been a while, but that hasn't changed yet from the original 50.

'Though if it was only judged by that, some dungeons would never stop. No, it also takes into account how many boss slots you have left and how active your dungeon is. Dungeons are generally going to end on a boss floor, so if you don't have any slots left, even with more possible floors, you feel for lack of a better term, full.

'Then there is how active your dungeon is. This covers both the power gained in an average day and how often people delve the deeper floors. So if you're not busy enough to have a bunch of excess power? You're good for now. Though if people are sniffing around your last floor, especially if it isn't a boss floor? The instincts will want you to make more floors, or at least place a boss on the last floor.'

Doyle, 'Should I be placing more bosses? So far I only have the two and was sort of planning to wait till the 20th floor for the next.'

Ally, 'There is no correct method for placing bosses. I've said it before, but that varies from dungeon to dungeon. Some are boss rushes which focus on a new boss every floor. Others can go many floors between bosses so they can put as much into each boss.

'Dungeons aren't even self consistent all of the time. Like a dreaming man, wandering from one dream to the next, a boss rush might suddenly not have any bosses for tens of floors. Or a dungeon that has had a boss every ten floors will suddenly switch to every five or wait a bit to make a raid boss. Though I will admit, most dungeons do tend to stick to a pattern, it just won't be completely weird if you change it up.'

Doyle, 'Well, I certainly have enough boss slots at the moment to do whatever I want. Though I could have a mini pattern of simple bosses every five floors then a more complex, multiple boss slot encounter after ten floors. I don't want a full on five slot raid boss, but a multi-boss encounter could be interesting.

'I would be able to do something like having a kobold riding a goat, with both being a boss. It would certainly throw them off to face such a thing. While I'm not out for blood, it is kind of shocking that the town's core members have all lived except for Bill. Sure, Ace and Jim's teams are super competent, but the other core people are still pushing and yet not quite on their level.'

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