The First Dungeon, Raging Waves!

The goal was clear. Next came the actual work of creation.

Lin Ye continued waiting for the Firmament to explain the specific design process.

[Greetings, Mr. Lin Ye!]

[This is your exclusive dungeon design area. Here, you will have the ability to design dungeons.]

[The specific design rules are as follows:]

[One: In designing a dungeon, you may create anything, whether it exists in this world or not. In the Creation Space, you are God! You can command all things!]

[Two: The creation of any item in a dungeon, including but not limited to weapons, buildings, and technology, must follow logic. As long as you can reasonably describe the logic behind an item's creation, the Firmament can bring it into being!]

[Three: You may set various hidden mechanisms in your dungeon. Their construction must be reasonable and logical.]

[Four: Once you have completed your dungeon design, you must submit it to the Firmament for review. The dungeon will be given a rating, and once it passes review, it will be put into use on Azure Star.]

[...]

The Firmament had provided an extremely detailed guide to dungeon creation. Lin Ye naturally had no time to read it all, so he only paid attention to the most crucial rule: the second one.

The creation of any weapon in a dungeon had to follow logic!

That was easy enough to understand. For example, to make an AK-47, one needed to know the rifle's construction, as well as its gas-operated mechanism, rotating bolt, and so on...

The weapon didn't have to be identical to one from his previous life, but its principles at least had to make sense. He couldn't just make things up out of thin air.

Otherwise, it couldn't actually be created in the dungeon.

The same was true of a rifle, and of more powerful weapons.

These things could be said to be the fundamental reason this world's development was constrained. Any technology that could appear in a dungeon required real research and experimentation, no different from the real world.

But people's understanding was limited by their era. On a planet resembling Earth during its S1 period, that understanding was shallow. There were things they couldn't imagine even if asked to.

But those were the limitations of the era, not Lin Ye's!

As a genius military researcher, Lin Ye might not have had a complete grasp of Earth's most advanced technology in the twenty-first century, but producing things from Earth's S2 period was as easy as plucking them out of the air.

Never mind a researcher like Lin Ye. Even an ordinary twenty-first-century military enthusiast, placed a hundred years in the past, would have been a figure who reigned supreme over the world.

That was the limitation of the old era, and a cross-level instant kill across the gulf of the new era.

"Firmament? I already understand all these rules. I can start creating now."

"What should my first step be?"

[The Firmament reminds the host that the first step in dungeon creation should be designing the map!]

[The Creation System has unlimited capacity, so the host is free to design a map of any size.]

A map of any size?

Lin Ye's heart jolted.

Didn't that mean that, in this Creation Space, he could create a planet of his own, or even a universe, as long as he wanted to?

Those possibilities might be too grand; with Lin Ye's current store of knowledge, they would be difficult to achieve.

But creating a planet like the Earth of his previous life was hardly a flight of fancy.

"Firmament, can I create a map large enough for all my future dungeons to run on it?"

[Absolutely!]

[The Firmament encourages Dungeon Designers to create dungeon series! All dungeon creations are the designer's personal property. Whether to reuse assets or create new ones for later dungeons is entirely up to the designer!]

Excellent!

Since that was the case, Lin Ye already had his answer.

He was going to move Earth straight into the Divine Creation Space!

It would be a little troublesome at first, but he could reuse the map for all sorts of dungeons afterward.

He could conserve his strength now and be ready for the work ahead!

Earth Online would become the overarching series for all his dungeons, and the Five Permanent Members dungeons would be its first subseries.

Lin Ye immediately began feeding the information in his mind into the Creation Space.

Earth originated in the solar system, while the sun came from a primordial solar nebula composed mainly of hydrogen and helium...

After the sun formed, its powerful gravity drew in the surrounding gas and dust. This material slowly gathered and formed a new celestial body—Earth.

As Lin Ye continued recalling and thinking, a tiny planet slowly took shape in a pale world.

Seeing the tiny planet, Lin Ye felt an indescribable trace of joy, as if he were watching his own child being born.

Lin Ye continued thinking...

Earth was initially formed from a mixture of rocky materials. Its internal temperature gradually rose, causing some of the material to melt. It gradually separated into the core, mantle, and crust.

Early Earth experienced numerous impacts, including collisions with asteroids and comets...

Earth's temperature gradually rose, and the gases released formed its early atmosphere.

As time passed, water vapor on Earth condensed into rain, forming the oceans.

Tectonic plates collided... The crust shifted... Mountains formed.

As Lin Ye continued adding details, a blue planet finally took shape in the Creation Space.

Lin Ye pulled the joystick closer, and the tiny blue dot slowly grew larger, revealing all sorts of intricate details.

Gullies, folds in the land, forests, oceans—it had everything.

Of course, the process wasn't completed in an instant. Some details were still pixelated.

For now, this Earth was only an outline. Many microscopic details still had to be added bit by bit.

Fortunately, the Creation Space had no capacity limit. In his previous life, even the most advanced CPU would probably have choked trying to process a model of Earth like this.

The Earth Online map needed to be perfected bit by bit, but Lin Ye didn't need to wait. His first dungeon didn't need such a large map; a small piece of this fictional Earth would be enough.

He could design the dungeon while letting the map load, so neither task would hold up the other.

"The next question is, which of the Five Permanent Members' dungeons should I design first?"

Lin Ye began weighing his options.

They were all among the Five Permanent Members, but even among them, some stood above others.

The Five Permanent Members were divided into the top three and the bottom two. The top three were Rabbit, Eagle Sauce, and Russian Bear. The bottom two were Gallic Rooster and John Bull.

Lin Ye immediately ruled out the bottom two.

Both had enjoyed glorious periods in Earth's history, but those days were long past.

By the time the Five Permanent Members were assessed, they could no longer compare with the top three. Though their foundations remained, their spirit was gone.

If he made dungeons for them, he would have to use enhanced versions, but that would take too much time and effort and wasn't suitable for Lin Ye right now.

Since this was his first dungeon, it had to be a hit with the first shot. If he was going to play, he would play big.

He would choose from [Winter Is Coming], [Raging Waves], and [The Great Wall Watch].

Thinking of [Battle of the Imperial Sea], designed by Itō Hidetaka of the Great He Clan, Lin Ye made his decision.

He would start with [Raging Waves].

Those Shorties of the Great He Clan prided themselves on their lead in naval warfare. It was time to let them experience what real naval warfare was.