《Reincarnated As A Clicker Dungeon》 Not Today, Truck Kun Despite the blistering heat and musty smell of the panel van, Stew Vos felt pretty good about life as he made a crisp right turn and accelerated toward his last delivery of the day. He was about to make his first perfect run. On his dash, the routing app glowed a cheerful green. He let himself savor the solid four minute lead he had managed to accumulate through the day. That was how he missed the somber-looking young man until the man stepped off the curb right in Stew''s path. The shockingly handsome college student had his head deep in "Quantum Physics For People Who Think Other People Are Dummies" and was absently flipping a wicked looking balisong knife in his free hand with what appeared to be hard-earned skill. All of these details seemed oddly clear to Stew as some subtle influence urged him to drive straight over the young significant personage to be. Stew was too experienced a driver to let that happen. He swerved with all he had, tapping the brakes to avoid skidding. He managed to barely miss the young student. In his mirror, the student continued on with no indication he had even noticed the van. Stew had just enough time to look back to the road from the side mirror before slamming into a phone pole head-on. The cheap, frayed seat belt separated, releasing. Momentum carried Stew through the windshield. Shock carried him through the traumatic loss of important body parts and fluids. He could smell the sharp scent of his relief bottle emptying itself somewhere nearby. As he lay on the sidewalk, he saw his shattered phone screen, the app was red, registering a delay and deviation from the one true route. The last thing he heard was a warning tone, indicating his pay had been automatically docked. Then, for a long time, there was nothing at all. In the nothingness, text appeared.
WELCOME ADVENTURER! ... ? WHO ARE YOU?
Stew found he had no mouth. He thought his name toward the nothing.
RECALCULATING Please answer the following questions to calibrate your next incarnation. If you were a tree, what kind of tree would you be? 1. Demonic 2. B-Tree 3. Family 4. Shoe 5. The Larch 6. I am not a tree. What is this? What''s going on here? Please help me!
What? 6.
The Management would like to apologize for any inconvenience. Who shot first? 1. The Chicken 2. The Egg 3. Han and/or Greedo 4. Chaos 5. Can I just talk to someone? Please just explain what''s going on.
This is ridiculous. 5.
You are walking in the desert. You find a bottle with a genie inside. The genie is on its back, kicking its tiny legs in the air. You''re not making a wish. Why are you not making a wish? 1. I am a young master who will one day challenge the very Heavens! 2. Genies are notoriously unreliable. 3. I prefer a good, old fashioned demilich skull any day. 4. Genies make good snacks for a hungry dragon. 5. Can I just wake up now?
5. A long time passed again.
We apologize for the inconvenience, but it seems that you are not qualified for any of the currently open principal incarnations. Please select an alternate incarnation. 1. Military Foot Courier 2. Rower (trireme) 3. Laborer (brick pits) 4. Dungeon Core
It was hard to stare with no eyes, but Stew stared at the list with his mind. He wasn''t stupid, he could see what this was. He hoped his disappointment came through. Am I just cursed? I''m supposed to work my tail off every life, just to make somebody else''s numbers go up? There was no answer, so he reluctantly thought "4" at the menu.
Select A Core Color 1. Red - The blood is the life. Prey on adventurers and their pets alike, turning their suffering and pain into raw power. 2. Blue - Harems. Tentacles. Harems! Also arguments about harems. 3. Green - Weave an endless garland of floral peace for the gentle folk of the forest and glade. Help them solve their endless relationship problems. 4. Orange - Feeling cramped? Not enough room to live your dreams? Make it worse as a spatially constrained dungeon!
Now you''re just messing with me. That''s it? These are all the options I have? Do these options have anything to do with me at all? The menu blinked away. After a beat, it returned.
Select A Core Color 1. Red - The blood is the life. Prey on adventurers and their pets alike, turning their suffering and pain into raw power. 2. Blue - Harems. Tentacles. Personality conflicts. Also harems! 3. Green - Weave an endless garland of floral peace for the gentle folk of the forest and glade. Help them solve their endless relationship problems. 4. Orange - Feeling cramped? Not enough room to live your dreams? Make it worse as a spatially constrained dungeon! 5. Gray - A dungeon with a special focus on efficiency and optimization of resources. A dull life, for a dull soul.
This was just like the time he had taken those extra Christmas shifts because his boss convinced him it would look good when promotions came around. He had worked himself sick, then ended up with a "satisfactory" and a cost of living increase. His boss got a bonus and a Caribbean Cruise. Enough was enough. If he had to live another life, he was going to pick easy mode this time. "5" The System didn''t even bother to reply. He felt a rushing sensation like falling backwards in a chair in the dark. Then. Another menu.
Actions Remaining: 1 Perform an action to coalesce a core and get started. 1. Coalesce Core
OK then, "1" This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere. Something. There was something now, rather than nothing, but he wasn''t sure exactly what. He had a sense of being in a particular place and having a body of some sort, but he wasn''t able to move or see. He couldn''t breathe. He started to panic, but realized he wasn''t feeling any urgency about breathing, just an absence of something he knew he needed. It wasn''t air, but what? Am I a dungeon core now?
Unnamed Core Rooms: 0 Mana: 0/10 Actions Remaining: 10 Perform actions to generate mana. 1. Generate Mana
"1"
Unnamed Core Rooms: 0 Mana: 1/10 Actions Remaining: 9 Perform actions to generate mana. 1. Generate Mana
"1"
Unnamed Core Rooms: 0 Mana: 2/10 Actions Remaining: 8 Perform actions to generate mana. 1. Generate Mana
He clicked until he had 10 mana.
Unnamed Core Rooms: 0 Mana: 10/10 Actions Remaining: 0 Use mana to create a core chamber. 1. Generate Mana 2. Create A Core Chamber (10 mana)
"2"
You do not have any remaining actions. Please wait for actions to recover.
"What?"
Unnamed Core Rooms: 0 Mana: 10/10 Actions Remaining: 0 Action Recovery: 1 / day Use mana to create a core chamber 1. Generate Mana 2. Create A Core Chamber (10 Mana)
"I have to wait a day just to click again? How do I even know when a day is done?" The System didn''t answer. He tried asking for different things, hoping to unlock some secret option to generate more actions or show the time, but he finally gave up. Maybe I can just get some rest. It''s been a really long, weird day. That was when he realized he wasn''t tired and he had a strong feeling he didn''t need to sleep, ever. He still didn''t have any eyes to close, but he could feel something. His body felt dense and compact, rigid. A dungeon core was probably some sort of crystal then, just like he imagined it when he thought about the name. Was he buried in some mountain somewhere? The thought made him feel panicky again so he decided not to think about it. Instead, he tried to zone out and not think for a while, but time started to feel strange. He checked the menu and nothing had changed. He could swear it had been a week in the dark. Without even a heartbeat, he couldn''t tell if time was passing in seconds or eons. I''m going to lose it if I don''t keep track of time somehow. All he could think to do was count. "1. 2. 3." He tried to wait one second for each, but he couldn''t be sure if he was going fast or slow. He just kept counting. How many seconds in a day? He stopped counting and tried to do the math. Why had anyone ever thought sixty was a good base for time? Stupid Sumerians. He got the number of zeros wrong then caught himself and tried again. He really wished he had a notepad or something. He tried thinking about notes, journals, logs, but nothing happened. Multiplying 3,600 by 24 was another pain. He reminded himself he didn''t have anything better to do. 14,400 plus 7,200. No 72,000. So 86,400. He did it over again just to make sure, then started counting. He checked the menu every 10,000, just in case something changed. Nothing had changed by 90,000. He told himself he was just counting a little fast, but all the panic he had pushed down since the accident surged up and smothered him. He couldn''t move, he couldn''t see, he couldn''t breathe and maybe the menu was never going to change. Maybe time worked differently. Maybe it was all some cruel joke. Of course it was a cruel joke. How could it be anything else? He couldn''t even scream. He had no sense of how long his panic attack lasted, but it did end, or at least fade enough for him to check the menu one more time.
Unnamed Core Rooms: 0 Mana: 10/10 Actions Remaining: 1 Action Recovery: 1 / day Use mana to create a core chamber 1. Generate Mana 2. Create A Core Chamber (10 Mana)
One! I have one action point!
Unnamed Core Rooms: 0 Mana: 11/10 Actions Remaining: 0 Action Recovery: 1 / day Use mana to create a core chamber 1. Generate Mana 2. Create A Core Chamber (10 Mana)
"No!" He stared again at the menu. "I didn''t mean to select 1. Give it back! Undo! Undo! No!" He felt the panic rising again, but pushed it back hard. He''d had enough of that. The first day had passed. So would another. He started over, deliberately counting slowly. "1. 2. 3." By the time he hit 80,000 he had another action point and he found something in himself he had never felt before. A sort of grim glee at the stupidity of his situation. He genuinely didn''t care how long it took, he wasn''t going anywhere, and he wasn''t going to let the System wear him down. He was ready when he saw:
Unnamed Core Rooms: 0 Mana: 11/10 Actions Remaining: 1 Action Recovery: 1 / day Use mana to create a core chamber 1. Generate Mana 2. Create A Core Chamber (10 Mana)
"2" He felt an openness all around him, though he still couldn''t see. His sense of touch was so sensitive and precise he could feel an empty cube of space around him and knew it was three meters on each side. Waves of freedom and relief broke over him. He still couldn''t move, but he no longer felt what he now realized had been the rock pressing against him on all sides. He could also smell the dusty scent of the rock and even taste it. I''m a rock taster now? I taste rocks.
Unnamed Core Rooms: 1 Minions: 0 Mana: 1/10 Mana Recovery: 1 / day Actions Remaining: 0 Stone: 0/10 Use mana to summon a minion 1. Generate Mana 2. Create A Room (10 Stone) 3. Summon A Minion (5 Mana)
Any selection just gave him the "You do not have any remaining actions" message. He began to count again, finding it easier and easier to keep the count going, even when he let his mind wander. It was half way through the second day while he was pondering the difference between a minion and a monster, when an unexpected message appeared.
Achievement Unlocked: Tick Tock 13:05 Like a metronome, you mark the time with tireless precision. Now enjoy the passing of moments, hours, days and epochs with your very own, reliable, internal clock.
So there are other ways to unlock achievements besides sitting around and waiting? He left his stats up and watched the clock tick for long enough to find that it was a 24 hour clock. Whatever world he was in had a 24 hour day. Did that mean anything? He waited, accumulating mana and actions until he was ready to burn all but one action point on mana. He selected "Summon A Minion"
Select a Minion Type 15:24 1. Cow (produces milk) 2. Goblin (produces loot)
Milk? Either that, or I''m supposed to be responsible for a little green person that worships me and might die defending me? What good is milk? He made his choice and just like that, he could see. He was standing in a small room made of pale rock so smooth it glistened in the reflected glow emitted by a small crystal in the middle of the floor. He swung his head around and saw that his body was broad and his side was splotched with white and black. Past his flicking tail he could see a broad doorway. Bright sun shown outside on grass and wildflowers. Thick-trunked trees surrounded the glade on all sides from what he could see. He turned back to the crystal and bent down to it. It had no scent. Without thinking, he reached out his tongue and wrapped it around the stone. Cool to the touch, but thrumming with some inner power. It didn''t budge. It was fixed to the floor. So this was his core. It was faceted, pointed on the top and flat on the bottom like an upside-down gem emoji. It was hard to tell with the light from the open doorway, but he supposed it could possibly be gray. He left it and turned around carefully. The small chamber was a tight fit. He sniffed the air at the doorway. His stomachs growled at the smell of rich grass, but his back tensed at another scent. Acrid. Dangerous. He stood staring and sniffing out the doorway for a long time. The grass and leaves and sky all looked to be different shades of blue. Bright yellow and pale tan flowers dotted the ground. I was a rock. Now I''m a cow. He concentrated on being back in the core. He could no longer see, but he could sense the cow as if he was touching it from every angle. He could also taste it. He couldn''t stop feeling or tasting it, so he switched back to the cow''s perspective with a shudder that came out as a wet snort. He realized he could feel the mind of the cow beside him looking out of the same eyes. She wanted a bite of grass. This was going to take some getting used to. He found he could back off his control and let the cow drive. She took one dainty step forward and began cropping at the grass. Her ears flicked, listening for any danger and her tail swished with mild anxiety. Was she worried about that scent? Some sort of predator? "I don''t like wolves, but I''m more worried that you haven''t bothered to add any defenses, not even a door," the cow said. He had no eyes of his own to goggle, so he goggled figuratively and fled back to his core. "You can talk? Wait, can you hear me?" "What use would I be as a minion if I couldn''t talk to you?" She didn''t turn her head or pause in her chewing. Her voice came only in his mind, sounding patient, maternal and feminine. The voice of a nanny or a kindergarten teacher. "Are you going to offer me a contract or what?"
Cow - Level 1 Mana Cost - 1 / day Health 10/10 Agility 2 Strength 4 Constitution 5 Actions: 1/1 Action Recharge: 1 / day Special attack: Scold Produces Milk Offer A Contract To This Minion? Y / N
Loopholes "A contract, like an employment contract?" If Stew had a head, it would probably hurt. "You. Summoned. Me." "It''s my first summoning, I don''t know how any of this works." "Really? Isn''t that interesting." The cow chewed her cud for a long moment in thought. "My status looks odd here. I don''t think I''ve ever seen a System this simple." She scuffed a fore hoof at the stone floor. "No diagrams, no candles, no whiff of binding magics in the air." She made an audible snort that came as a delighted laugh in Stew''s mind. "You summoned a demigoddess, unbound, right into your core room. I''m starting to see a pattern in your behavior, little dungeon." Stew felt a chill deep in his core despite his lack of body. He could sense the hard rear hooves of the cow so close to his exposed core. She was all muscle. How much damage could she do with just one kick? Would it be enough to kill him? Again? "Easy, little one. I am a daughter of the Moon Goddess. You are very lucky you summoned me first, and not some greedy goblin or kobold who might pry you up and sell you to some wizard or demon." She shuffled around until she was facing the core. She could tell how he was feeling somehow, but she wasn''t doing a great job of comforting him. Was she serious about goblins? Did she know that was his other option? Could she read his mind? "A contract is how you bind a summoned entity to your service. Usually you offer something of value and specify exactly what you will get in return. If you summon an imp into a binding circle, the only thing you might have to offer is to release it in return for signing the contract. That sort of coercion is all too common, sadly. It wasn''t always that way." She swished her tail and waited. Stew realized he could feel her mind even when he wasn''t in her body. She felt. Warm. Amused. Curious. "I''m not sure what I have of value to offer. I''m very new at this." "Well as a contract entity, I would be able to subsist on your mana without needing food or water. As long as I was in your domain, I would heal automatically, and since you are a dungeon, I would have opportunities to gain skills, grow in strength and evolve. And if you name me, then I will be essentially immortal as long as you exist yourself. Not," She waggled her head displaying her horns which Stew realized were a perfect crescent. "That I wasn''t already immortal, after a fashion. Are you sure you aren''t deceiving me with all of this?" She gestured at the tiny, empty chamber with her prehensile lips. "You''ve just done a very good job of making me sell myself on signing your contract." "I promise you, I''m. Well I''m just what I seem, whatever that is. What¡­" Stew thought fast, he had learned so many things in just a few minutes talking to the demi-goddess, but not what he really needed to know. "What could you do in return?" She raised her head and turned to look at the door. Afraid he had offended her, Stew added, "I apologize, I really don''t know what to ask for. I just need any advice you can provide, your¡­ your goddesshood." She laughed again. "Bright Lady will do fine for now, but you continue to surprise me. It''s rare to find a polite dungeon. Especially a young one." She flicked her tail. "First I could help you understand the perils of this world, and the defenses you might need. I can help defend the dungeon myself, and command a level for you. And, of course, I can provide as much divinely infused milk as you need, if we can create the right conditions." Stew wanted to ask about the milk, but first things first. "How long do these contracts last? Are there. Other things. Standard terms or whatever that aren''t explicitly stated?" "I''m relieved, Little One. You seem smarter than I thought at first. Not your first life? Contracts are until the death of the parties unless explicitly released or a condition is set in advance. Standard terms include the parties may not directly harm each other, and the summoned entity may not enter a contract with another summoner or be summoned by another." Stew thought about it. Forever was a long time. Stew had been through enough labor negotiations to sense the traps in those standard terms. Words like "directly" really stood out. A lifetime of bad jobs stretched out in Stew''s memory and he decided he had enough of it. No more. "OK. I think I have an offer, but I don''t like this idea of entering into a contract with no termination clause, and that all sounds very one sided. I''d rather offer you an agreement as equals. I''d rather have you work here because you want to, not because you have to. So how about this. I offer you mana, healing, growth opportunities, and name you as my, what? I guess my first level boss? In return, you will provide me honest and helpful advice, help defend the dungeon, train my, um, monsters? And provide magic milk as required. Neither of us will ever intentionally cause harm to the other, and either of us can terminate the contract at any time with thirty days notice. How does that sound?" "That seems unreasonably fair for a dungeon contract. I notice you left out any penalties or punishments. Was that intentional? They are superfluous, in that neither of us can break a contract''s terms anyway, but they are traditional." "I didn''t know that, but I don''t think I want to add any of those. That sounds awful. I''m hoping neither of us will want to break the contract since we each get what we want from it." "I would like that. Agreed."
Cow - Level 1 Mana Cost - 1 / day Health 10/10 Agility 2 Strength 4 Constitution 5 Actions: 1/1 Action Recharge: 1 / day Produces Milk Offer A Contract To This Minion? Y / N
"Yes"
Cow - Level 1 enters your service! Name Cow? 1. Tanit-la 2. Selene Ascendant 3. Aegyptia 4. Other (select your own name)
Stew described the options he saw. "I don''t recognize those names, so they are all somehow connected to you and your former life, but they probably come with some unstated implications. Names are powerful. You should pick something that has meaning to you." "OK. And you won''t be offended?" "I will be fine. I have plenty of names already. I didn''t choose them either. Go ahead." Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings. "OK then."
Bossy - Level 1 Boss Cow (Demi-Goddess) - Level 1 Mana Cost - 1 / day Health 10/10 Agility 2 Strength 4 Constitution 5 Actions: 1/1 Action Recharge: 1 / day Special attack: Scold Produces Divine Milk
"As I said before, your System is a strange one, but I believe you will see some new options now."
Unnamed Core 17:12 Rooms: 1 Minions: 1 Mana: 1/10 Actions Remaining: 0 Action Recovery: 1 / day Stone: 0/10 Use mana to create a minion 1. Generate Mana 2. Create A Room (10 Stone) 3. Create A Monster (1 Mana)
"It looks like I can create monsters now. Well, tomorrow, after my actions recover." "Your monsters will be based on the theme of a specific level. You haven''t created any rooms, so you don''t have a level or a theme, but having placed me as the level boss your monster options should be based on that." "It''s asking for stone to create a room. How do I get stone?" Bossy cocked her head again. "You live in a hole in a mountain and you wonder where to get stone? Can''t you just extend yourself and devour the mountain? That''s how it usually works." Stew concentrated, imagining roots growing out into the stone from his core, but nothing happened. He tried to imagine absorbing stone or dissolving stone, but still nothing. "I don''t think it works that way for me. Or maybe that needs actions too?" "Such a strange system. I see that I have an ''Action.'' Are you able to use it?" He selected "Create A Monster"
Select a Monster Type 17:35 1. Golem (produces stone) 2. Slime (produces mucus) 3. Kitten (Very active!, requires a Cow Minion) 4. Skeleton (produces loot, requires a Cow Minion) 5. Giant Rat (produces meat, requires a Goblin Minion)
"It sounds like you need a golem then, to dig," Bossy said when he described the list. "Yes, although, you said the theme would be based on you as the boss. I wonder." Stew tried to make a selection, imagining using Bossy''s action, but nothing happened. "It looks like we''ll have to wait." "Then I believe I will get some sleep." Bossy folded her legs and lay her head across her own shoulder. She closed her eyes and was immediately asleep. Stew was about to ask a question, but thought better of it. She slept through the night, the next morning and into the afternoon. He was starting to get worried, but as soon as his actions refreshed she woke and stood as if she had set an alarm.
Achievement Unlocked: I''ve Created A Monster! Level Customization Options Unlocked
Kitten - Level 1 17:10 Mana Cost - FREE Health 3/3 Agility 10 Strength 2 Constitution 5 Actions: 0 Action Recharge: Special Special attack: None Can Convert Each Divine Milk Into Two Actions Name kitten? (Y/N)
A small bundle of fluff and razorblades appeared next to the core and immediately began to purr. Stew named him "Fluff." "You picked a kitten. Your first monster to defend the dungeon. I hope you''re only expecting adventurers made out of bells and feathers." Bossy bent down to sniff the new arrival. "I hope there''s more to you than meets the eye, little warrior." For a moment, Stew was afraid the Fluff would swat her and start a stampede, but the kitten leapt onto her back and started to knead and purr instead. Bossy relented. "Aww, He''s hungry." "I have an idea." Stew entered the kitten''s mind and for a moment was disoriented by the totally different senses. The room was as bright as daylight and he could hear Bossy''s heart beating and her stomachs working. She was very warm, and it was making him hungry and sleepy at the same time. He shook off the kitten''s feelings for a moment and thought about using Bossy''s one action to produce one milk. He was a little worried about what might happen next, but a glass bottle of milk appeared in the corner of the room glowing faintly. Stew/Fluff jumped down and walked over to the bottle, eyeing it warily. He reached out a paw and swatted it gently. The milk vanished and he suddenly felt energized. Checking Fluff''s stats, Stew saw just what he had suspected. He now had 2 actions, and there didn''t seem to be an upper limit for the kitten. "Interesting," Bossy could apparently see Fluff''s stats too, maybe because she was the level boss. "Now let''s see how far this can go. Do you have a limit on how much milk you can create in a day?" "With this System? I have no idea. I didn''t even feel it, it''s strange, but I don''t miss the old way, I can tell you that." For the first time in this new world, Stew finally felt like he understood something important. Something useful. He used Fluff''s two actions to produce two more milk and those two milk to produce four actions and so on, watching for any sign of exhaustion or problems with Bossy or Fluff. He was shocked when there weren''t any at sixteen. He was dumbfounded at one hundred twenty-eight. This had to be some sort of error. It seemed like the only limit was how quickly the little kitten could back and forth between the bottles and Bossy. He used two of the actions to generate mana and produced two more kittens, a piebald kitten with a black eye he named "Socks" and a pure black kitten he named "Boo." The tiny chamber was a bustle of activity, and crowded with all of the milk bottles. "I think you might want to start digging," Bossy said. "I think you''re right." Having proved out the cycle he stopped and converted all the milk. "Everyone over in that corner with Bossy. I''m going to make a golem, and I don''t know how big it will be." He opened the menu and selected the golem. A two meter tall stone mannequin appeared with a crude angular face and a barrel chest.
Stone Golem - Level 1 Mana Cost - 1 / day Health 10/10 Agility 2 Strength 5 Constitution 3 Actions: 1/1 Action Recharge: 1 / day Special attack: Bash Assign Task (1 action): 1. Dig 2. Defend 3. Delegate Action
He moved his focus into the golem, and again, his senses changed, but these were much more like human senses than those of either the cow or the kittens. He could see and hear and feel. He didn''t try to taste anything and he didn''t seem to have nostrils or a sense of smell, but when he looked at his crystal he could clearly see it was gray, and looking out the door, the grass and leaves were bright green and the flowers were many colors, not just yellow and tan. The kitten and cow didn''t have full color vision, but the golem seemed to. Then he noticed something, a flicker of red in the treeline. It was like a haze that moved and changed. It took a few moments of staring, but he realized he was looking at the heat from a deer''s body as it grazed just beyond a bush. He looked back at the cow and kittens and saw heat from them as well, and something else. Something intricate and purple. Mana? Thin lines of it connected each of them to the crystal. The golem had a similar thread coming out of its chest. His pondering was interrupted by another flicker in the treeline. One. Two. Three. Half a dozen, moving lower than the deer and they seemed to be moving to surround it. They had to be wolves. He looked at the empty door frame, then down at the kittens. He set the golem he was in to "Defend" and sent it out the door, then generated another and sent it to follow. They both took up positions on each side of the door, so he created another one and stood just inside, blocking the door. The heat aura of the deer froze then bounded away. He was hoping the wolves would follow, but they seemed to turn back and gather at the edge of the glade, watching the golems. They stayed hidden in the shadows between the trees. He couldn''t see anything except their body heat. They seemed smarter than he had hoped. He stepped forward in the third golem. I can''t underestimate these wolves. Touching Grass He underestimated the wolves. As soon as he stepped into the grass, the wolves broke cover. They stalked, stiff-legged into the glade, snarling. There were seven of them and the two wolves in the lead looked different from the rest. Instead of hair, their coats seemed to be made of interlocking metal scales. The armor extended down to their metal claws, up to their necks, and over their heads to form smooth helmets. He couldn''t tell if the metal was part of their bodies or something they wore, but it didn''t hinder their movement. "Have you ever seen anything like this?" He thought back to Bossy. No one answered. "Bossy?" He didn''t dare turn his back. He was just about to step backward into the dungeon when the wolves charged. The two golems on defense raised their fists like boxers and widened their stance. He tried to imitate them then realized he was being foolish and set his golem to defense, letting it take over. He concentrated on switching back to the core to make more golems. Nothing happened. Then the wolves leapt and everything was a blur as the golems punched and tossed wolves rhythmically. They were effective at first, but the wolves kept coming, snapping and clawing and grabbing at the stone defender''s arms. The golems were too predictable and too slow. The two iron wolves, as he thought of them, both grabbed the right arm of the golem on the right and pulled it over. It thrashed on the ground, struggling to get up as the other wolves mobbed it to keep it down. The golem on the left stepped forward to attack them, abandoning its post. Which is when the iron wolves circled and grabbed his own golem''s arm, nearly repeating their success before he took control again and crouched, laying an uppercut into the side of the topmost wolf''s head, the female. Her eyes only inches from his own glowed faintly amber as she reared back to dodge the punch. He didn''t have time to think about it as three wolves leaped onto his back and overbalanced him, toppling him to the ground. The dungeon was now completely exposed behind him. As he fell, he tried to roll to his feet, but the golem''s body was awkward and stiff. He ended up on his side looking back at the doorway. The last golem standing moved to try to cover the doorway and that was when he noticed it didn''t have the thread of mana he had seen earlier connecting it back to the core. Neither did he. Beside him, the first golem shattered into pebbles. He should have paid more attention to Bossy. She had said something about "his domain" and he was beginning to realize what that meant. Out here, beyond the door, he couldn''t heal or headhop or do anything that required his focus to be in the dungeon. He started crawling, ignoring the two wolves worrying at the back of his neck. He could feel them doing damage. Maybe their teeth are metal too? He thought. It was his first dungeon battle and he was about to lose the whole thing to a big helping of canned canine. Just then the third golem stepped forward and landed a solid blow on one of the wolves. He was about to shout at it to go back and guard the door, assuming he could shout when he saw that the door was filled with a face out of a nightmare. Wicked curved horns, and a steaming breath that flickered with pale fire. Bossy''s eyes were like headlights. Or full moons. "You should be ashamed of yourselves!" She bellowed. The sound had weight and force and bowled all of the wolves back. Some yelped. The others leaped to their feet snarling. Stew kept crawling, reaching a finger toward the threshold. As his finger crossed the invisible barrier, he suddenly felt the core''s connection again. He moved his focus back to the core and created another golem. He could see Bossy from behind, still blocking the door and guarding the prone golem with its hand-stretched over the threshold. Outside, the wolves were regrouping. They seemed diminished, slinking rather than stalking. They were turned sideways as if ready to run. "What was that?" "Apparently, that was [scold]," Bossy said. "It''s an interesting attack. It seems to have reduced all of their stats by half and blocked any health regeneration." One of the kittens, Boo, peaked around the door frame at the wolves and hissed, raising his hackles and waving a claw. "You tell them, little warrior," Bossy said, then added over her shoulder, "Let''s talk about doors." Stew recalled the two golems outside and had them stand just inside the threshold, blocking the doorway. He pulled up his core stats, remembering something about customization. A new menu appeared. "Level Customization." There were only a few options, "Dungeon Entrance" and "Other" with no more detail when he selected them. He selected "Dungeon Entrance." The ghostly outline of a door appeared and seemed to follow his attention. It became brighter at the doorway and snapped into place. He concentrated, confirming the location. A very solid-looking wood door with metal bands appeared, blocking the entrance and casting the room into darkness except for a few rays of light that came through an arch-shaped barred window set high in the door. "Can''t I just build a room there with no external doorway and close us in?" He knew somehow, deep down that there was no way it could be that easy. "Don''t. You can''t block the flow of mana, it would blast through anything that blocked it completely, and if you did somehow manage to build something sturdy enough to survive the pressure, you and all of your mana-dependent minions and monsters would suffer, me included." She thought for a moment. "Well, that''s how it works with other dungeons. Even with your strange system, I wouldn''t risk it." The room had been tight quarters before, but now it was cramped. He was afraid one of the golems would step on his core. He turned the new one around, pointed it at the back wall and selected "Dig." He expected the golem to magically manifest a shovel or something, but instead, it just started slamming its fists into the wall. It looked painful, but the golem didn''t seem to mind. He switched his focus to the golem and didn''t feel anything but a satisfying thud as each fist slammed into the wall. The golem didn''t seem to feel pain or grow tired and he couldn''t find any hint that it had a mind or feelings. It was like a big stone machine. It was cathartic pounding solid rock like a boxing movie montage. He wondered if the golem could jump rope. After a while the sensation started to get old, so he switched back to his core. If you discover this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the violation. Watching the golem still made him feel sorry for it, working away without any tools. The off-white wall and the steady work reminded him of one long summer spent hanging drywall to build a fairy circle of cardboard McMansions. He got screwed out of his last paycheck when the builder went bankrupt. The whole project rotted empty until it burned down. Watching all that work go to waste still bothered him. Work should have a purpose. It should mean something. He had a lot of time to think as he watched the golem pound away. Chips and dust fell around its feet then vanished, absorbed. His store of stone increased steadily. There wasn''t room to put the other two golems to work on the back wall, and he didn''t want to expand sidewise. That would just increase his exposure to the outside. After exactly one hour of work, the golem had pounded out a rough room, five meters by five meters, larger than the core room. The golem lowered its arms and stood perfectly still.
Room Customization Unlocked - You may now choose a purpose for each room and choose different fit and finish options. Customization options for your new room: 1. Theme 2. Surface and Environment 3. Fixtures 4. Furnishings
He flipped through the menu looking at all of the new options. There were themes for a treasure room, trap room, puzzle room, conservatory, storage, utility, a level entrance, and level exit. He selected "utility" and found that there were sub sections for "corridor straight" and "corridor curved". He chose "corridor straight" just to see what happened. There was a confirmation, then the title of the room changed to "dungeon corridor." He looked at "Surface and Environment" and saw there were a few options for lighting, floors, walls, and ceilings. He chose "well-lit" and selected plain stone just to keep things simple. The room changed, becoming smooth and perfectly square. He selected fixtures and found an option for only a door and wall torch. He wondered if this was because of the theme. He tried to go back and change the theme to trap room but found he couldn''t change it until he went back to Surface and Environment and switched it back to default which was a new option. When he changed the theme to "Trap Room," the fixture options changed and he found he now had "simple pit trap", "simple spike snare", and "moving wall (1)" each with a cost of 1 mana. For Furnishings, he found two carpets, a table, and chairs, a "loot chest (small)", and "random treasure (loose)" with no cost for any of the items. He selected "random treasure, loose." A scatter of dull coins appeared on the floor along with a pair of shoes and a folded robe. He had the golem pick them up and saw that they were "iron coins," the robe, and shoes identified as "closed shoes (common)" and "traveler''s robe (common)". On a hunch, he selected one of the carpets and had the golem pick that up too. He switched back to "loose treasure." As he suspected the treasure reset with a worn tunic, sandals and a "tiger''s eye" semiprecious stone instead of the robe and coins. I have an infinite junk machine! He tried the small chest and found it contained a tin cup, a wooden plate, and a rusted iron hammer. Not exactly treasure, but he had the golem put everything else in the chest and keep the hammer. One practice swing with the hammer against a bare place on the wall confirmed that it was junk too. It shattered into pieces which vanished when they hit the floor without adding anything to his inventory. He switched the chamber back to a bare corridor segment, played with the lighting options and floor, changing it from stone to "dungeon grass" then back again, and called it good. He had the lead golem dig another four rooms straight back, setting each to "Dungeon Corridor" then sent the other two golems back to make some rooms off to the side. At Bossy''s suggestion, he checked the room customization options for the core room and saw that there was a "Move Core" option. He tried it and found he could swap the core room with any other room. He tucked himself away in one of the side rooms and dug out a larger room with a dungeon grass floor for Bossy and the kittens. He worked with Bossy and the kittens to generate all of the actions and mana they could. The mana cap still made things awkward. They eventually grew tired and napped, which surprised him. He hadn''t expected dungeon monsters to need sleep. The golems didn''t seem to need to rest, so he and the golems worked through the night until he had a good start on a layout for the first level. He broke-up the straight corridor and instead tried to make more of a maze with one, larger boss room at the very end, just before a small core room. He couldn''t make it very complicated though. There seemed to be an upper limit on the number of finished rooms, although the size of each room didn''t seem to make any difference, even though larger rooms required digging multiple raw rooms.
Unnamed Dungeon First Level 01:08 Theme: Dungeon Entrance Rooms: 10/10
Everything seemed to come with limits. It seemed like he could keep digging if he wanted, but the stone would be wasted, since he could only keep ten. Creating the level changed his stats, but not by much, replacing the total room count with a level count.
Unnamed Core 01:12 Levels: 1 Minions: 1 Monsters: 6 Mana: 10/10 Actions Remaining: 253 Action Recovery: 1 / day Stone: 10/10 1. Generate Mana 2. Create A Room (10 Stone) 3. Create A Monster (1 Mana) 4. Customization
The golem with which he first started digging earned an upgrade on completing the last room.
Your Monster Has Leveled Up! Specialization Unlocked Apply "Mining" specialization? 1. Yes 2. Maybe Later
That sounded interesting. "1"
Mining Golem: Level 2 Mana Cost - 1 / day Health 12/12 Agility 2 Strength 6 Constitution 4 Actions: 1/2 Action Recharge: 2 / day Special attack: Bash Assign Task (1 action): 1. Dig 2. Defend 3. Delegate Action Name Minion? (Y/N)
"Y" "Big John" The golem changed, stone hands flowing into new shapes. The right arm became a pickaxe, the left a hammer.
Big John Mining Golem: Level 2 Mana Cost - 1 / day Health 13/13 Agility 2 Strength 7 Constitution 5 Actions: 0/2 Action Recharge: 2 / day Special ability: Prospect (20 Mana) Assign Task (1 action): 1. Dig 2. Defend 3. Delegate Action
"Prospect" sounded interesting, but he didn''t have a way to spend 20 mana at once, and there were, literally, wolves at the door. He had the beginnings of his very first dungeon level, but it was just a bunch of empty, default rooms. Time to add some flair. And some traps and monsters. Soon I Will Be Invincible One of the wolves scratched at the door and sniffed around the edges. He could feel it as if the door was his skin. When the wolf decided to take an experimental bite, it HURT, so he decided it had to be one of the weird ones in armor. He switched his focus to Big John in the new boss room at the back of the dungeon. He had floored the room with dungeon grass. Fluff was imitating Bossy and cropping at the grass. The other two kittens were sleeping. The big room gave Bossy and the kittens space to move around, and he set the lighting to "daylight" which was pretty convincing although the ceiling was still as low as the other rooms. There wasn''t a way to make it follow a day cycle. It was still late so he set it to "dimly lit." He would just have to remember to change the lighting every few hours. He turned Big John to face Bossy. "What are those things and why do they even want in?" Bossy''s reply sounded thoughtful in his head. "I haven''t seen them before, but I assume the two evolved wolves were created for some army or horde. Eventually, they must have become separated and joined a pack of natural wolves." "I saw plenty of game outside. They were stalking a deer when I stepped out there." Stew braced himself as he felt teeth worry at the wood of the door with more determination. "Why does a wolf care about a walking statue and a hole in the ground?" "Because you fed them." Bossy tossed her head in disgust. "Now they''ll never leave." "Fed them? I don''t have any food to give them. I just fought them." Both Bossy and Fluff looked at him now, each cocking their head at the same perplexed angle. "Even that fed them experience, but you really don''t know any of these things? How is that possible?" "I didn''t exactly get a manual for all of this." He lifted Big John''s hammer and pick in a wide shrug. "I just woke up as a glowing rock." "Any magical entity," she nodded toward the sleeping kittens, then Big John, "has a core. You fed that pack leader and her pup two golem cores, plus experience toward their next level." "Well, crap." Stew looked over his shoulder, down the hall toward the entrance. "So they want more." "They smell us, and our cores." She snorted. "They smell you." "So I''m a delicacy." The door was holding with no sign of weakening, but he suddenly felt completely exposed again. "Just how long do dungeons last around here if we''re on the menu for everything?" "New dungeons are rare. Some younger dungeons are tamed and under the protection of a country or power. Ancient dungeons are vast and powerful and offer so many useful resources and chances to gain experience that only the most greedy or foolhardy attack their cores." "So that''s why we do this." "What do you mean?" "The whole luring the unwary to their doom thing." He left Big John in the core room and jumped to another golem, turning it around and walking toward the entrance. "It seemed so grim, and I guess it is. I couldn''t see why I would want to do those sorts of things." Now he could feel two sets of metal teeth tearing at the door and they were beginning to make progress, tearing him apart. "But since I''ve met the welcoming committee here¡­" He reached the end of the hallway, with one section between him and the entrance room. He looked down at the ground and switched the theme to traps again. He selected "simple pit trap." The floor looked the same except for an all too visible crack across the middle. He tapped it with the golem''s foot, keeping his weight on his back foot. The floor fell open in two sections. It was three meters deep and had smooth sides. "This might be a problem for the regular wolves, but this doesn''t look very dangerous to the big ones." He looked across the open pit. "Even the regular wolves could likely jump out if they aren''t caught off guard." He moved one room deeper into the level and set a "simple spike snare." This one added a plate across the middle of the room, just as obvious as the crack in the floor for the spike trap. He didn''t have anything to throw at it, so he walked the golem to it and stepped on it. Hardened stone spikes sprung from the ceiling crushing the golem more than piercing it. It hurt terribly. The golem crumbled to pebbles, the same as the ones he had lost outside. The debris vanished, reabsorbed by the dungeon floor, leaving only a small crystal. He didn''t feel too bad about it since he had never noticed even a glimmer of awareness in the golems. He found he could reset the spikes, then created a new golem where the old one had been standing. With the new golem''s eyes, he could see the crystal was a smoky gray. So these were valuable, and he could create them for the price of one mana. It gave him an idea. Wolves weren''t going to be interested in a pair of sandals or a few coins, but a core like this might make useful bait. He just wished he had better traps to bait with it. Next he looked at his monster options.
Select a Monster Type 02:32 1. Golem (produces stone) 2. Slime (produces mucus) 3. Kitten (Very active!, requires a Cow Minion) 4. Skeleton (produces loot, requires a Cow Minion) 5. Giant Rat (produces meat, requires a Goblin Minion)
The skeleton seemed like a bad idea versus wolves. Although a running bundle of bones might make good bait. He started to ask Bossy what she thought, but saw she was asleep again. Support the author by searching for the original publication of this novel. He created a slime.
Slime - Level 1 02:40 Mana Cost - 1 Health 10/10 Agility 3 Strength 3 Constitution 5 Actions: 1/1 Action Recharge: 1 / day Special attack: Digest Assign Task (1 action): 1. Generate Mucus 2. Defend 3. Assimilate
A translucent green blob appeared on the floor. "Hello?" He was hesitant to move his focus into the slime, with no idea what kinds of senses it might have. The little slime burbled and raised a pseudopod straight up. A crude eye appeared. The eye immediately slid down the pseudopod to the ground and disappeared. Oh, boy, here goes. He moved his focus into the slime and found it wasn''t that different from being in the core. He could feel and taste both the stone and the air very precisely. He concentrated on seeing and felt another eye form. By concentrating still more he was able to keep it from dissolving and keep it still. Like the kittens and unlike the golem, he felt the presence of a personality in the little slime, eager and curious. Did it want something? He couldn''t quite put it in words, but he assumed it had something to do with the [Assimilate] action. He switched back to the golem and thought about his options. Assuming each monster cost 1 mana for daily maintenance, he could only keep a few. The kittens were free, but fierce though they thought they were, they were useless in a fight. He could use them as bait, but the thought made him shudder, so he pushed it aside. Even the slime felt too cute to be cannon fodder. The wolves had taken a break outside, but they started on the door again with extra ferocity. It wasn''t going to last forever. He moved the golems and the slime out of the way and set to work. The entrance couldn''t be customized, so he put a pit in the second room. It would give him a chance to learn just how cunning the wolves actually were. He decorated the room with a round rug and some loose treasure which turned out to be a straw hat, a pair of cloth work gloves and a woven basket full of berries. He set the lighting to none, to better hide the crack in the floor. For the next room, a puzzle room required 30 mana. A conservatory was an outrageous 100, so those were out. He was curious about treasure and storage rooms, but those didn''t seem like a priority right now. He was going to have to make do with traps and monsters. He brought the slime to the middle of the room and tried out the "assimilate" option. The slime blurped and spread out as if it was melting. It kept spreading until it completely vanished. "Well that was dissapoi¨C"
Your Monster Has Evolved! Stone Slime Stone Affinity Unlocked
"Oh. What does that mean?" He focused on the slime and suddenly he was a floor. It felt strange, but oddly relaxed. He could still feel the slime, but it felt more substantial and sedentary now. He found it had fewer options, and different stats, but it was still level 1.
Stone Slime - Level 1 03:20 Mana Cost - 1 Health 10/10 Agility 1 Strength 3 Constitution 15 Actions: 1/1 Action Recharge: 1 / day Special attack: Digest Assign Task (1 action): 1. Generate Mucus
"Mucus. Fine. Let''s do that. 1" The floor began to glisten. Stew stepped forward in the golem and immediately slipped and fell. No matter how he scrambled he could not even get to his knees until he managed to slide to the edge and get a hand on the dry stone in the next room. He still struggled to get to his feet and was dripping with goo, but if the golem could smile he would have been grinning wide. This could work. He decided the surprise would be wasted this close to the entrance though, so he asked the slime to move to room five. It gathered itself into a puddle the same color as the floor and oozed slowly away. With a new plan, he left the second room empty. A little false confidence might be useful later. He worked through the rest of the early morning hours, combining everything he had learned into traps in rooms two through seven. Room one was the entrance, room nine was Bossy''s room and ten was the core room. In room eight, a wide room. He readied Big John and seven more golems, all he could support with the mana cap. He noticed something interesting. Once the big golem dried out from the mucus dip, Big John''s agility had gained a point. He wasn''t sure if it was from experience scrambling to find his feet or some effect of the mucus, but the latter seemed more likely. On a hunch, he sent the other seven golems for a dip in the mucus. Their increased agility confirmed his guess that the mucus had some positive buff for the golems that affected agility. Would it wear off? Would it give the wolves the same buff? That might be a problem. Back in room five, an extra long room, he turned the entire floor into a pit trap and put spike snares in rooms four and six. He opened the pit and asked the stone slime to spread itself over the pit instead of the trap floor. He wasn''t sure if it could do it but it seemed able to extend itself just far enough, covering the floor of the pit and the sides in glistening mucus. He decided to name the slime "Sluice." He brightened the lighting in the room and gave Sluice the golem''s core. The slime placed it in the very center of the pit in plain sight. Leaving the pit doors open, Stew practiced controlling the spike snares. There didn''t seem to be a way to remove the pressure plate altogether, but he found, if he concentrated, he could have a golem step on the plate and still keep the snare from triggering. Stew walked the golem back to room eight. He was feeling pretty clever until he did one last check over everything and realized there really wasn''t much to his first "level." He prodded Bossy''s with his attention and felt her wake. "And what have you been up to?" "Just trying to make some preparations for our visitors." He described his traps and ideas, and the more he described them, the less confident he felt. Ten rooms were no maze. There was barely anything to the traps and he had a few golems to fight, that was it. "I''ve never done this before." "I think." Bossy paused as if deciding how much truth he was ready to hear. "I think it would hardly even slow a first-level adventurer." We''re doomed. "Should I start over?" "No. This level doesn''t need to slow an adventurer, right now, it needs to stop a pack of wolves." He felt her stand and nudge the kittens awake. "One does not learn anything if one does not take risks." He felt his way around the level one more time and decided to add spike traps in rooms six and seven, they were small rooms that formed a corner before the entrance to room eight. He had had some vague idea of blocking the line of sight to the squad of waiting golems, but now it seemed like a better idea to fill every available space with spikes. There wasn''t time to do much else. The wolves were almost through the door. Children Of The Night He considered just opening the door and letting the wolves in. He was ready, and their gnawing hurt, but he decided they might be more eager if they made it through the door on their own. He could hold out a few more minutes. Then, all at once, they were through. As soon as the first wolf crossed the threshold, Stew saw red, literally.
YOU SENSE INTRUDERS! 04:38 A party of delvers has entered the dungeon. Building disabled for this floor. Monster generation disabled for this floor. Action regeneration paused. You''ve met your first delver party: Stat-o-vision? unlocked.
Stew barely had a chance to read the message before something uncoiled in his mind. A visceral, physical reaction spread through his thoughts and dungeon body. His every wall and fixture feared and hated these intruders. He was reeling with a deep, sick feeling. "Bossy, can you feel this? What''s happening?" "Wolf, cat or arcane dungeon core, you are all predators, driven by instinct and need. Can you see yourself? Do you see your reflection in your guests, little dungeon?" The rage lashed around and through him. He felt something in his core that wanted to reach inside Bossy and wipe her soul for daring to question him. It felt like something he should know how to do. "No!" He pushed the feelings down. "No." It was the hardest thing he had ever done. "It''s not me. This isn''t me." "We''ll soon see won''t we?" She didn''t sound frightened, but her thoughts had an edge to them. The warmth he felt there before was missing, replaced with cool reserve. He focused on clearing his mind. He tried to pin down each feeling and name it. Rage that anyone would dare to step in his domain. Fear because these wolves were coming to harm his dungeon, to kill his monsters and minions, to destroy everything and devour his core. But the sick feeling beneath it all was the most disturbing. He was HUNGRY. He had to fight to remain in control as his every weird crystal nerve told him to throw away his plans and march the golems in, swinging. He wished he could take deep breaths, but he did the best he could, checking over each of his traps and monsters by touch and forcing himself to think through the plan. That helped. It also helped that instead of rushing ahead, the wolves each squeezed through the hole in the door then milled around the entrance room on alert. The leader explored every inch of the floor. He couldn''t see her, but from what he felt, she was crouched low with her ears forward and every muscle tense. Her iron hackles stood straight like knives along her spine. She froze, tense and still, and the pack froze with her in midstep, their ears flicked forward and their noses high. He waited too, relieved for the time to get a grip. He had things almost together when the leader stood erect and raised her tail high. She started trotting forward at a casual pace. The rest of the pack followed with the other monster wolf taking up the rear. The wolves walked straight into room two, undeterred by the darkness. As the leader reached the middle, she stepped right over the pressure place without triggering it. So did the wolf behind her. He triggered the trap himself. The floor dropped open beneath them, dumping them into the pit. Each wolf dropped three meters without missing a step, then, one-by-one, leapt back out and into room three. Even the regular wolves moved smoothly without any pause or sign of effort, not so much as a yelp of surprise. Room two and three were supposed to give them false confidence, but maybe that confidence wasn''t so false. He was a delivery driver, not a naturalist. "How am I supposed to know what a wolf can do, let alone some magic wolf monster?" "Are you talking to me?" Bossy said. "Wait. Stats." There was something nagging at him. He gathered himself, and realized he was missing something. Something he had been too distracted to see before. Stat-O-Vision? It sounded like some cheesy corporate sponsor for a fifties TV show. Bossy had mentioned how the level would form itself around her as the boss, maybe the System formed itself around him too. There had already been several things that seemed to be based on what he knew and expected. What would something called "Stat-O-Vision" do? He focused on the pack leader who was taking her time exploring room three, a long, brightly lit hall. "Right, show me some stats then."
Iron Wolf Paladin - Level 2 04:50 Though few in number, the wolf paladins are fierce protectors of the ancient woodlands and those who dwell within. Bound by a sacred oath to defend the natural world from despoilment, these noble beasts wield tooth, claw, and holy power against any who would bring harm to their wilderness home. Their keen senses guide them through the densest thickets in pursuit of poachers and despoilers, while their devout spirit empowers them to confront creatures of darkness and drive them back with radiant light. Health 18/18 Agility 3 Strength 4 Constitution 14 Wisdom 5 Charisma 4 Special Attacks: See more with Stat-O-Vision? Deluxe! Abilities: See more with Stat-O-Vision? Deluxe! This delver is on a quest.
"Oh. Crap." He focused on the other Iron Wolf.
Iron Wolf Squire - Level 1 04:50 Though most wolves roam as simple beasts of the wood, a rare few feel the call to a higher purpose. These inspired individuals seek out the noble wolf paladins, beseeching to join their sacred cause despite not yet wielding the holy power of a full paladin. If judged worthy, the squires pledge themselves in service to a paladin mentor until they learn the necessary discipline and skill. Eager to please and quick to learn, wolf squires act as faithful companions on patrols, flushing out poachers and alerting their mentor if darkness stirs. Though limited in might, they can use their sharp fangs to aid in battle and even channel a hint of their mentor¡¯s power to heal wounds after the fight. With training and experience these devotees may one day stand vigil as paladins themselves, guarding the ancient places and howling back encroaching evil with divine retribution. For now they follow, they watch, they learn - and stand ready to fight against forest despoilers wherever their path may lead. Health 12/12 Agility 3 Strength 3 Constitution 10 Wisdom 3 Charisma 2 Special Attacks: See more with Stat-O-Vision? Deluxe! Abilities: See more with Stat-O-Vision? Deluxe! This delver is on a quest.
How does that explain the other wolves then?
Wandering Wolves 04:51 On a moonlit night, you might spy distant shapes flitting across a snowy clearing - lean forms with shaggy fur and eyes that gleam in the pale light. Drawn by the scent of fresh prey, a small pack of timber wolves has traveled far beyond their den in search of food. Normally these elusive beasts avoid contact with humanoids. But hunger can make them bold, and they will close in to investigate any unfamiliar creatures that cross their path. Though they prefer the flesh of deer, wolves have been known to pull down a stray goblin or even an unwary ogre if game is scarce. And if their pack numbers are great enough, they may decide that even an armed party looks like easy meat after a long winter with empty bellies. The chilling sound of their haunting howls is often the only warning before these wild hunters attack. These Wolves are currently sworn to a Wolf Paladin¡¯s Quest Pack Timber Wolf (Matriarch) - Level 3 Health 15/15 Agility 4 Strength 4 Constitution 12 This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it. Special Attack: See more with Stat-O-Vision? Deluxe! Timber Wolf (Mother) - Level 2 Health 12/12 Agility 3 Strength 3 Constitution 10 Actions: 2/2 Special Attack: See more with Stat-O-Vision? Deluxe! Timber Wolf (Father) - Level 2 Health 12/12 Agility 3 Strength 3 Constitution 10 Special Attack: See more with Stat-O-Vision? Deluxe! Timber Wolf (Yearling Pup) - Level 1 Health 8/8 Agility 2 Strength 2 Constitution 8 Special Attack: See more with Stat-O-Vision? Deluxe! Timber Wolf (Yearling Pup) - Level 1 Health 8/8 Agility 2 Strength 2 Constitution 8 Special Attack: See more with Stat-O-Vision? Deluxe!
Maybe it was just his new ability, but their stats looked different from those he had seen for Sluice or Big John or even Bossy. That just confirmed what Bossy had said about his System being weird. He would have to compare later. The Paladin had nearly reached the end of the hall that was room three. "I thought you said these iron wolves were just some deserters from a horde looking for monster cores?" Bossy didn''t answer. He realized she might not be able to see the stats he could see. "The big one is a Paladin. They''re all on a holy quest against creatures of darkness, and I''m guessing dungeons qualify as creatures of darkness. So this was never about cores, was it. Why didn''t you tell me?" "I didn''t know." "How could you not know?" "I''m a cow." He couldn''t argue with that. "I can tell you that¨C" "Hold on. This is it!" He could feel Bossy''s irritation, but he had to focus to keep from screwing up the next few seconds. The paladin stepped carefully into room four, a square room and the first spike snare. He wasn''t surprised when she stepped over the pressure plate. It took everything he had to hold back from triggering the snare. It was his plan to hold off anyway, but now he was feeling conflicted. Am I really doing this? He had a terrible feeling about where this was all going and the sick hunger he felt didn''t make it any easier to feel good about any of it. He wanted to suck them all dry and grow fat like a tick. Feeling that made another part of him root for the wolves. Sluice''s pit was wide open before them. He moved his focus into Sluice, hoping for some relief from the hunger and found that Sluice was feeling just as ravenous. He asked Sluice to form a discrete eye in a corner of the room to watch as the pack leader stared at the monster core in the middle of the room, then hopped down into the pit with a "whuff" that sounded positively dismissive. The other wolves entered the pit in ones and twos, spreading out until he started to worry they wouldn''t all enter together. The squire held back warily until the paladin looked back, beckoning. The paladin then continued forward, head and tail high, almost to the monster core. As the squire landed, Stew sprung the trap. The spikes slammed down in rooms four and six. Sluice began to release mucus over the entire floor and walls of the pit. Two of the timber wolves went down with a scrabble and a yelp, falling and rolling back up again and again, their coats covered in the preternaturally slippery mucus. The rest of the timber wolves were soon in the same situation, as was the squire. The paladin braced all four feet in a sturdy stance and stepped carefully forward, one paw at a time, her tail low with concentration. A quick check of their stats showed that the mucus, rather than increasing their agility as it had with the golems, knocked a point off for each wolf. He assumed it was because they weren''t part of the dungeon. He had them right where he wanted them. Sluice burbled hungrily in his mind. The stone slime wasn''t sure it could digest them all at once, but it was eager to try. The paladin seemed to sense the threat. She let out a low growl and leaped halfway across the pit in a single bound, nearly making the edge of room six before tumbling back into the pit. Sluice''s hunger just magnified his own. Thoughts kept chasing each other around his head. He didn''t ask these creatures to defile his domain. They''ve earned this. So hungry. Defile. That''s not me. I don''t think like that. The horror of the moment stood in stark relief for him. The paladin struggled to get to her feet with unwavering determination. She was powerful and driven, they all were, but they were at his mercy for just a moment. He could wipe them out so easily. And become what? He couldn''t do it. It didn''t help that it sounded like such an awful way to die. Maybe he could hold them here until they were tired and hungry, then let them out the way they came? Maybe this didn''t have to be a bloodbath. He didn''t believe it, even as he thought it. The paladin made it to her feet and leapt without hesitation, catching a stone spike in her teeth and using its leverage to pull herself onto the tiny ledge between the spikes and the pit. If he could have held his breath he would have, but it was just a moment before she bit down with incredible force and shattered the stone spike. She grabbed another and another, worrying at them until they broke one after another. He had hesitated and now it was too late. He could still swallow all the other wolves, but she would keep coming. He slammed the spike trap in seven shut too, but he knew it was just a matter of time. He still couldn''t bring himself to unleash Sluice on the other wolves. Sluice was not happy about it, he could feel that, but the slime would respect his wishes. It did dissolve the eye he had formed, so he took that as a suggestion he find another focus for now. He moved his focus to Big John and waited, shoulder to shoulder with the other golems in room eight. "I''m sorry. I''m not cut out for this," he said to Bossy and the kittens. "Now they''re going to be coming for you. I''m guessing that you won''t be able to respawn if I''m gone. I''m going to do my best to stop them here." The kittens, fierce as ever, seemed unimpressed. Bossy was reserved. He realized he had cut her off earlier. He was about to apologize for that too, when he ran out of time. The paladin tore through the spikes faster and faster with more and more of the pack joining her in the tunnel she created. He remembered how they had made short work of the golems outside, but maybe he had learned a few things. They might win, but he wasn''t going to make it easy. It still seemed gruesome, fighting them with fists and hammer and pickaxe, but it felt more fair than dissolving them in some horrific trap. What was I even thinking? Did that matter to the wolves? Did they care if they died fighting a slime or a golem? I''m just not a killer. I can''t do this, not even to save myself. Then he realized he was ready to try, if only to save Bossy and the kittens. If I fight hard enough maybe they''ll give up. This again rang hollow even as he thought it, but it was all he had. The paladin made it through the last spikes. He braced himself, raising the hammer and the pickaxe as all the other golems raised their fists. His eyes met the paladin''s amber stare. He didn''t see the fierceness of an animal. Maybe he imagined it, but it felt like a look of resigned disapproval. The paladin leapt. Big John swung the pickaxe to meet her. She dodged it easily, using his own arm as a springboard to extend her leap over his head and all the way into the grass of the boss room behind him. Frantic, he swapped to Bossy''s eyes. Afraid of what he might see next. The rest of the wolves crashed against the golems like a wave of teeth, tripping one after another then tearing them into rubble, but the sheer number of golems slowed them. Only the paladin was through to the boss room so far. Panting, the iron wolf paladin locked those amber eyes on Bossy and walked forward. The kittens tumbled out from behind Bossy and spread themselves between the wolf and the cow, arching their tiny backs, walking sideways, spitting and hissing. If he had a heart, it would be breaking. They didn''t have a chance against even the one wolf. He looked at Fluff with his new ability.
Fluff 05:20 Spectral Panther Acolyte (kitten) - Level 1 Born of shadow, spectral panthers in the wild are mercurial and elusive. Some spectral panthers feel called to higher purpose and may devote themselves to a deity with an affinity for shadow. These spiritual cats pledge themselves as acolytes, using their phantom abilities to act as messengers and agents of divine will. Though spectral panthers tend toward capriciousness, acolytes dedicate themselves wholeheartedly to their patron once devoted. They emerge from darkness to mysteriously guide lost worshipers to safety and convey mystical omens to faithful priests. Their spectral forms make them natural spies against foes. And their ability to briefly turn incorporeal makes them perfect couriers for sacred texts and holy relics too valuable for mortal hands. No cloister or secret prayer glade is safe from an acolyte¡¯s phantom intrusion if their god wishes information. Once an acolyte takes up a quest in service of the divine, they will pursue their mandate with supernatural focus until their goal is achieved. Mana Cost - FREE Health 3/3 Agility 10 Strength 2 Constitution 5 Actions: 0 Action Recharge: Special Special attack: None Can Convert Each Divine Milk Into Two Actions
Spectral Panther? He felt more and more out of his depth. Still, none of this made Fluff and the others anything more than a snack for a hungry wolf. The same wolf that took two steps forward, unphased by the kittens'' doomed bravery. Then the fearsome, implacable Iron Wolf Paladin curled one paw beneath her and bowed her head, kneeling to Bossy. Stunned, he made the golems stand down. The wolves immediately stopped attacking. They filtered into the room, joining the Paladin and kneeling on the grass. Among the pack there were a few scrapes and bloody noses and a limp here and there, but for all their fighting they seemed mostly unscathed. The golems hadn''t fared as well, three were down and two were missing limbs including Big John who was missing his head but still standing. Looking out through Bossy''s eyes, he felt something like a chuckle in her mind. "I don''t understand." "I''ll show you," Bossy said, and the lights went out. Stew found himself floating in darkness again, only this time his vision cleared and he could see an endless plain of long grass lit by a titanic, full moon. In the darkness, he saw the faint outline of wolves limned in a red glow. The iron wolves each glowed with a denser, amber fire. Faint wisps of green balefire shaped like large cats sat at attention before them surrounding a white radiance so bright against the dark background that he couldn''t make out any details at first. He realized he was looking at Bossy, who towered over them all, sitting on her haunches with regal poise on a raised dais of stone with the moon resting in her horns. One by one, the wolves raised their heads and began to howl. Bossy raised a hoof in benediction. Each of the cats turned to look directly where Stew floated, bodiless, their eyes glowed a piercing, emerald green. "I have just learned a surprising truth." Bossy''s voice came to him in his head, all of the previous warmth and humor returned. "These brave souls came on a holy quest to rescue me from the foul dungeon which had summoned and imprisoned me. Now they are singing a hymn of praise. Listen to them. What music they make." "It''s nice, really." Bodiless as he was, he still felt completely exposed as each of the wolves now turned to look at him. "I''m thinking I should have named you ''Bela.''" I Have No Face, Yet I Must Palm The otherwhere in Bossy''s mind faded from view, replaced by the boss room in the dungeon. Here the wolves lounged around on the grass as the paladin and squire visited them in turn, apparently healing them. Stew switched back to his core, trying to make sense of what he had seen.
Achievement Unlocked: Moonglow 13:02 The Bright Lady, mysterious queen of the night, has granted you a blessing, but be vigilant, the light of the Moon may conceal as easily as it reveals. Mark her passage and discover new secrets if you dare.
More time passed in that strange place than he thought. What was up with Bossy? Maybe everything he saw there was filtered through his memories? Either that or Bossy could read his mind. Not ominous at all. The Moonglow achievement didn''t seem to change anything in the system menus or anywhere in the dungeon that he could find. He would have to ask Bossy later. Speaking of the dungeon, as he felt around, it was a wreck. Considering everything, his first attempt at building a level may have, almost, worked, but it was also a complete disaster. The only reason he was still around was because it turned out the Big Bad Wolves were actually Good Bois, or at least claimed to be. Now he couldn''t start repairing the damage or healing any of the golems until Lassie and her rangers decided to go save someone else. He decided to leave all of his other questions for now and just asked Bossy, "How long are our guests planning to stay?" "Now that they have fulfilled their quest, most of the pack would like to go back to their home on the higher slopes of the mountain." Bossy cropped grass as if nothing happened, but he still detected a hint of humor, likely at his expense. "Most?" "To reassure them about my situation, I explained my contract to the paladin and her squire." "And?" He could see where this was going. "They would be interested in contracting with you, provided they work under my direction and remain on this level." These wolves, especially the paladin, were terrifyingly effective. They would be powerful defenders, but he wasn''t sure how he felt about having them so near his core. What if this was some sort of trick? Then, a contract should make all of that moot. Wouldn''t it? "I might be interested in doing that, but I''m going to have to work to keep up with the mana for this many mo¡­ allies." "How is that possible? Mana is what dungeons are." "As you''ve pointed out. I''m not like other dungeons." He explained the caps on mana and stone, about mana recharge and actions and the action refresh. "Each point of mana requires your attention and effort. That is very different from other dungeons as I understand them. Your System is, it seems, very deliberately stunted. I wonder if this is because you have not yet earned a name." That raised all kinds of questions, but he decided to stick to the most important one. "Then the first party of adventurers that comes along, we''re all doomed." "Possibly." Bossy continued to munch grass. "Possibly not. Regardless, what do you want me to tell the wolves?" "It sounds like we will need all the help we can get. I''ll offer them a contract." The contract menu popped up immediately. He started with something similar to her contract and made a few modifications since the wolves wouldn''t be bosses and they had asked to report to Bossy, not directly to the dungeon. He talked it through and let Bossy translate, then offered the contract and both wolves accepted immediately. Despite the details of the contract saying they would report to Bossy, he immediately felt their minds as clearly as Bossy''s. It was so soon after a bloody battle, and he hadn''t forgotten what it felt like to be angry with them. The feeling was gone now, but he was still hesitant to change focus and share their minds. He did send a "welcome to the dungeon" and felt a wordless, polite response. Whether that was because they couldn''t think in words or chose not to, he wasn''t sure. He saw two mana immediately deducted from his total and used two of his few remaining actions to replace it. He was going to have to do this twice every morning from now on, now that he had more than ten mouths to feed. It had been interesting at first, but he was starting to see how all of this mental clicking was going to get tedious. The timber wolves remained and rested until late in the afternoon, then, on some signal he didn''t recognize, they all stood. The matriarch touched noses with the Paladin. Without a sound or backward glance the pack turned and filtered around the motionless golems and through the shattered spike trap. Stew retracted all the spike traps and closed Sluice''s pit and the pit in room two. The iron wolves lay back down in the boss room and seemed to have some sort of conversation with Bossy. He ignored them for now. The pack trotted out the broken door without looking back, but they seemed solemn, not that having the two iron wolves on the payroll gave him any wolfish insights. It was just something about the set of their ears and tails. It was like watching elves walking off into the west, like they should have been singing something low and sad. Maybe they were singing in wolf. Or maybe they were just tired and hungry, and he was still weirded out by Bossy''s dreamworld. Wait. Are there elves? There were goblins, so maybe? Were there humans here? What was the world like outside that door? Bossy mentioned a mountain. Was his front door set in a foothill of some huge mountain, maybe there''s a whole range? He hadn''t had time to ask. It was really hard to learn about a place when you can''t see out the door and can only talk to a sarcastic cow, even if she was a demi-goddess. The moment the last wolf stepped out the door, repairs and customization were re-enabled. He had been worried there might be a cooldown after delvers left. Now that he had described it to Bossy he realized his most urgent issue wasn''t repairs. Instead he needed to figure out this problem with caps. To give himself a clean canvas, he swapped his core room with room seven, then he reset what was now room ten to default and looked at the "Store Room" in the menu with Stat-o-Vision?. There was more to the descriptions now, but they were still cryptic.
Store Room 17:09 Cost: 10 stone / 10 mana A basic square chamber providing secure storage space for collected resources, materials, treasures, and miscellaneous magical artifacts.
So it''s expensive, and what exactly does "secure" mean? He selected the theme and immediately noticed something odd. The room generated without a doorway. He hadn''t noticed any other rooms doing this and he was about to add one, remembering Bossy''s warning about mana flow, when he noticed that the room had a small vent with a stone grill, just a few inches across, connecting it to the boss room. Interesting. The way he built the rooms, having a golem dig each one-after-another, they had always started with an empty doorway or wide threshold depending on the theme he selected. On a hunch, he tried removing the door from his core room, ready to scramble to replace it if it turned out to be a bad idea. Removing the door seemed to automatically create the same sort of ventilation system. Two in this case, one connecting east to room six and one connecting north to room eight. All this time, he could have had his core room closed off to any attacker larger than a ladybug? It couldn''t be this easy. He thought about the way the iron wolves had torn through stone spikes, and it seemed reasonable there they weren''t the only type of attacker who could dig out or damage stone, so maybe it wasn''t perfect protection, but it was better than having a wide open door. He looked back at the storage room. It was just an empty cube. He checked the menu for fit and finish options.
Store Room Fit And Finish 17:28 Customize your store room with special containers. Enjoying the story? Show your support by reading it on the official site.
  1. Treasure Vault (10 gold)
  2. Wardrobe (10 cloth)
  3. Armor Chest (10 leather)
  4. Weapon Locker (10 iron)
  5. Magical Item Chest (100 mana)
  6. Pantry Cabinet (10 meat)
  7. Ore Bin (10 stone)
  8. Apothecary Cabinet (10 reagent)
  9. Mana Glass Repository (10 mana)
Out of everything, he could only possibly create two of the containers. Even then, his action pool was depleted and he didn''t have any stone or mana left. Time to get milking. "I have an idea on how to improve those caps we were talking about, but I''ll need some help from you and the kittens." He explained what he saw in the menu. Working together, he and the kittens began to work the milk/action/mana cycle. He wanted to start generating some stone at the same time, but the kittens required all of his attention. It didn''t take long to generate all of the mana he needed for the repository, but it was a tedious, repetitive process. He selected the option and the repository appeared without a sound. He didn''t feel like spending mana on a doorway just for an eye to see, so he had Sluice crawl up the wall and through the grill. He was relieved to find that Sluice seemed to have forgiven him for the missed meal earlier. Using the stone slime''s eye, he examined the repository. The cabinet was made of some dark red, polished wood engraved with symbols he didn''t recognize. Two doors opened out and away to reveal ten rows of ten slots inside. All of the slots appeared to be carved from a single piece of the same red wood, and each slot was padded with felt, about one centimeter wide, and stood a little less than ten centimeters tall. It looked like a fancy, impractical case for phonograph records or vintage CDs. He checked his stats and didn''t see any change to the mana cap. I''ve blown twenty mana and I''m no closer to solving my problems. I should have just bought the ore bin. He moved his focus to the golems and saw he had three undamaged. The others had minor injuries except for two missing limbs and Big John''s missing head. All of the injured golems would require stone to heal and he didn''t have any. He sent the three undamaged golems to the east wall of the boss room and set them to digging to generate stone until he had enough to repair Big John, then he sent Big John over to help dig while he repaired the rest. The mining crew quickly generated 10 surplus stone. He used it to create an Ore Bin. The ore bin appeared in the far corner from the Mana Glass Repository. It was raised a bit off the floor with a sturdy looking stone fence around it supported by four thick posts. It was empty. A prompt appeared to set an ore type. There were options for iron ore, gold ore, and "raw stone." He picked stone and checked his stats again. The entry for stone was gone from his main stats page which gave him a moment of panic until he saw the new "inventory" option. Selecting "inventory" he saw that he now had entries for "stone (0/110)" and "mana glass (0/100)." Did I miss the inventory menu earlier when I created the repository? He decided he probably had, since nothing else had gone missing to make him look. As an experiment, he gathered more stone and saw that bin fill with small gray cubes. He had seen much weirder things in the past few days, but this felt more magical than slimes and golems somehow. It was nice to know he wouldn''t have to send golems to carry all of that to the store rooms. He made more mana, then used that and the stone to make another ore bin beside the first. His inventory now showed "stone (0/210)" which was a relief. He had been half expecting some new requirement or cap. He wondered if there was a cap on ore bins but now didn''t seem like the time to explore that idea. With his stone capacity increased, he focused on repairing the remaining golems and put them all to work digging. He staggered their activations so that he could just cycle his attention around, click, click, click. Each golem ran for exactly one hour before needing to start again. First they would use up their own actions, not that any of them had any left after the fight. Each click after that used an action from his own store, but thanks to the kittens, he had actions to spare. Big John was no different than the other golems, he just produced twice as much stone in the same time and started with two actions. Every seven and a half minutes he had to remember which golem was next and catch it just as it finished or risk losing a few seconds and throwing off the rhythm. After the first cycle, he was dearly missing a timer. Watching the clock had him itching to optimize things. He really needed a timer and alarm to do this right. Or something much better than a timer? What if he could delegate the whole thing? He checked the kittens, but they worked about the same as the golems. He could ask them to do something, but it consumed an action. It just happened that one of their actions could indirectly create more actions, but those went to his pool. They didn''t seem to understand him when he asked them to do something more than once. Then, they were kittens, however spooky, so that made a kind of sense. "Bossy, can you try starting one of these golems digging? I''d like to hand-off mining to you to supervise if I can." "I do seem to have the ability to direct them." She replied. "This one has stopped. I''ll try it." Golem three, the one next to Big John, stopped then started again. "That''s great. Please start Big John again when he stops in a few minutes, and so on around the loop." He felt a rush run through him. I finally figured out something useful! This was going to make a big difference, especially if it meant she could also do this with the kittens to generate mana. He''d have to ask¨C "It didn''t work." Bossy sounded disappointed. "It was a good idea, but whatever an action is, I only had one, and I used it on the first golem. I don''t have another to spend on Big John." "Thank you for trying." "Such a polite child." Bossy''s tone felt sincere. "I am sure you will figure it out." The moment''s relief made his frustration cut that much deeper. He opened Big John''s stats to click him and get him started again.
Big John Mining Golem: Level 2 Mana Cost - 1 / day Health 13/13 Agility 2 Strength 7 Constitution 5 Actions: 0/2 Action Recharge: 2 / day Special ability: Prospect (20 Mana) Assign Task (1 action): 1. Dig 2. Defend 3. Delegate Action
There it was, right in front of him. It had been there all along, but he had never stopped to think what that might mean. Then again, he had been pretty busy trying to survive, so he could cut himself some slack. Big John was the wrong golem to try this with though. He needed Big John for his digging output. The next unnamed golem, number 5 in line, finished and stopped.
Stone Golem - Level 1 Mana Cost - 1 / day Health 10/10 Agility 2 Strength 5 Constitution 3 Actions: 1/1 Action Recharge: 1 / day Special attack: Bash Assign Task (1 action): 1. Dig 2. Defend 3. Delegate Action
"3."
Delegate Action This golem may delegate actions from your pool of available actions. Delegating will cost one additional action to begin, and that delegated task will run until the action pool is depleted or the golem is commanded to stop. Specify action to delegate (Y/N)?
After the earlier frustration, he was only cautiously optimistic. "Yes."
Tell the golem how to spend your actions.
That was pretty freeform. Just how much would a golem understand? "Do I need to learn some kind of programming language?" The System didn''t answer, so he decided to just try to keep it simple. "You, um." He realized that talking to a golem about other golems was going to be alot easier if he gave this one a name, so he backed out of the menu and did that first, coming back to the action prompt. "Johnny 5. I want you to keep all of the other golems digging until I tell you to stop." Without hesitation Johnny 5 stepped back from the wall where they had been digging and stood behind the line of golems. Big John and number 6, which had stopped in the meantime, began to dig with the others. "Whoop! Yes! That''s the way!" If his core could bounce he would be bouncing around like a dot over a bunch of song lyrics. That made him think of music, and he basked in the glow of his own brilliance while the tune to "Powerhouse," a busy song they used to play in the factory scenes in old cartoons played in his head. Cartoons. Crap. Instead of busy machines, he suddenly had visions of brooms carrying slopping water buckets. Did I just create a Sorcerer''s Apprentice situation here? "Johnny 5, stop!" Nothing happened. He started to panic, then realized he had only told Johnny to stop clicking on the other golems. It would take another few minutes for the next golem to stop. It was a very long five minutes. Number seven stopped and did not start again. "Ok, good to know." He had burned an action point, but it was worth it to know he hadn''t just started a tunnel to the next continent. The pause also let him spot how the gap in the line where Johnny 5 had stepped away was going to turn into a division in the middle of the tunnel as the others dug deeper. He focused on each golem in turn down the line and shuffled them to the left as they finished digging. It would leave a notch on the far right, but he didn''t mind. He set the golem now in slot five to dig the division away until the whole mining face was even again. It cost him an hour, but it made him feel better. He was only thirty stone short of full capacity now, so he created another stone bin, just to have room to try again. He wondered how much he had to explain to the golem this time? "Johnny 5, start them again." One by one, each of the golems in line started digging again. This opened up all sorts of possibilities. "Hey Bossy, guess what!" Moonglow By the time he filled the last ore bin it was early evening, and the wolves wanted to go out to train in the forest. The intent was clear in their minds without words. He had no problem with them going outside if they wanted, but the way he had things pulled apart right now, they would have to pass right through his core room to get to the newly repaired entrance door. It was a tense moment for him, but the wolves didn''t give his core a glance or slow their trot until they were at the entrance. He half expected them to scratch at the door, but they just waited. He realized he hadn''t named them, so he did that before he opened the door. The paladin he named Lassie, because why not? The squire was more of a Rin Tin Tin. The wolves didn''t seem bothered or even interested in the names or the process. Having a name might not help much outside of the dungeon, but then maybe it would. He wasn''t clear on how respawning worked. He made a mental note to test that out with a named golem at some point. As the wolves left, he closed the door and was about to begin repairing the spike snares. He hesitated. Was there any point in keeping the snares? They hadn''t worked as a barrier, and using them as intended was just too gruesome. He remembered seeing moving walls in the list of traps. Maybe he could make more of a labyrinth with changing paths? Ten rooms still seemed like far too few for anything really challenging. He opened the menu and noticed a new top-level theme he had never seen before, "Moonglow." Why hadn''t he seen it when he looked after the achievement first appeared?
Moonglow 20:30 The light of the Moon has revealed new possibilities. Apply any of the following room themes while the Moon is shining. Options available may change depending on the phase of the Moon. 1. Twilight Cavern (100 stone, 10 mana) 2. Secluded Hollow (10 stone, 100 mana) 3. Lunar Forge (10 stone, 10 mana)
The "Lunar Forge" sounded interesting. He reset room six and converted it. Rather than an empty cube, the room became a larger, roughly circular cave, offset slightly to the east to support its larger size. It still connected to rooms five and seven by short tunnels. The cave was already furnished with things he couldn''t quite make out by touch, so he sent golem number six to have a look. The center of the room was taken up by a domed, stone firebox with a chimney next to a large anvil. To the side was a similar but taller domed firebox. Various workbenches with vices, grindstones and other tools lined the cave walls. The chimneys exited the room through a skylight, and the room was lit by the glow of the fires and a half Moon and stars that showed through the skylight. Looking at the hole in the ceiling, it looked like the top of the cavern was only about a foot thick. It seemed impossible from the brief glimpse of the slope he had seen outside. He had been busy fighting wolves, but he definitely would have noticed if there had been a flat place. He would have to take a trip outside and have another look to be sure, but it was only the skylight''s second biggest mystery. The biggest mystery was the Moon itself. There was no doubt that this was the very same moon he had always known. How could that be? It did help explain the twenty-four hour day and how he had found recognizable cows and cats and wolves, even if they didn''t behave the same as the ones in his world. This world might work differently than the one he knew, but it was also the same world somehow. He wasn''t sure how that helped him. He still didn''t even know what continent he was on, and he wasn''t enough of a stargazer to figure it out looking at the sky, assuming that was actually the sky. He looked around and found a long rod on one of the workbenches. He picked it up and used it to prod the skylight. It stopped as if hitting a window, but when he scraped the rod across it, the sound was like scraping the rod against stone. Not a window, an illusion, or magic of some sort. The chimneys were dumping smoke into the sky somewhere. Or were they? The Moon was pretty conveniently centered too, now that he looked more closely. He doubted it was actually in that position outside. One more mystery to solve, but it would have to be later. He put the rod down and looked at the rest of the room. The menu told him that the central firebox was a "Forge." It didn''t have any description or options, just a message, "You lack the required materials." The other firebox was a "Smelter." It did have options.
Smelter 1. Refine Tempered Stone (10 stone, 1 mana) 2. Refine Mana Glass (1 stone, 10 mana)
He had no idea what Tempered Stone might be, but he had at least seen Mana Glass mentioned before. He changed focus and worked with Bossy and the Kittens to generate a few more actions, which he then turned into enough mana to top off his supply. He selected 2.
Mana Glass created. Achievement: Learning The Craft This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there. You have crafted your first item! You''ve earned 1 gold as a reward.
Gold? He would have to look at that later. A rectangle of clear green glass appeared on a shelf at the front of the smelter. He was hesitant to touch it since it might still be hot, although it seemed like the fire was just for show. He wasn''t worried about burning his huge stone finger, but he thought the glass might still be soft. He prodded it gently. A new menu appeared.
Store item? (Y/N)
This worked differently than digging stone then. He said yes and the slab of glass disappeared. He switched his focus to Sluice who was still in the store room. Just as he expected, the slab of glass was now neatly stored in the repository. He checked his stats to see how that showed in his inventory and there it was "mana glass (1/100)." He also now saw an entry for "Gold (1/1)." He almost missed the much bigger change.
Unnamed Core 21:05 Levels: 1 Minions: 1 Monsters: 11 Mana: 0/11 Actions Remaining: 0 Action Recovery: 1 / day 1. Generate Mana 2. Create A Room (10 Stone) 3. Create A Monster (1 Mana) 4. Customization 5. Inventory
So that''s how I grow my mana pool. It was a slow process, but he now had a way to deal with that too. He explained what was going on to Bossy and set Johnny 5 to automating the milk loop with Bossy and the kittens for more actions. In the forge room, he started out driving the golem himself to create and store the glass until the mana cap reached twenty. Once he had that headroom he handed the glass making off to the golem. He thought about naming the golem Smith, but that seemed a little dry so he called him "Smittee." It took Smittee two actions to first make the glass, then store the glass in the repository. Fortunately, Smittee was able to understand a two step process. Once Johnny and the gang crossed twelve hundred actions, he switched Johnny to generating mana and let Bossy and the Kittens get some much needed sleep. He started out with a wait step in Johnny''s instructions, so he wouldn''t get too far ahead of Smittee, but they kept getting out of sync. He moved Johnny into the forge room and told him to make ten mana every time glass appeared on the smelter tray. That worked much better. The process went as smoothly as the digging once he worked out the kinks. Not counting generating the actions in the first place, each sheet of mana glass cost about five seconds, so they were finished in less than ten minutes and he had capacity for 100 mana. He had just enough actions leftover to make twenty-four mana. He was itching to fill that capacity full or even make another repository, but he didn''t want to wake Bossy and the kittens or the wolves who had returned and joined them while he and the golems were busy. Even Sluice had wandered back to their pit and dozed off. He had plenty to keep him busy while they slept. He used some of the mana and stone to convert the entrance into a "Twilight Cavern" just to see what that looked like. He had been pretty sloppy, just arbitrarily repurposing rooms for the forge and store room, he had a plan for the cavern if it was anything like what he expected. He was surprised to see the cavern was much bigger than the original entrance hall. He realized he had been creating rooms all wrong from the beginning. He thought he had to dig out the room then finish it. The menu even called it "finish" but that was just his lack of experience with magic it seemed. The cavern was much bigger than any space he had carved out. From now on, it seemed like he just had to make a "room" then set it to what he wanted without digging the whole thing out, although that did seem to work too for making standard rooms larger, as it had with the boss room. The cavern was vast and complicated. It came pre-furnished with a natural looking entrance through a narrow passage made by a tall, thin crack in the rock wall. Hundreds of long stalactites and stalagmites made the chamber seem ancient, and a huge rock rose from the middle of the uneven floor almost reaching the ceiling at its highest point. The ceiling varied from thirty meters at that point down to just half a meter at its lowest point along the western edge of the cavern. From the finish options in the menu, it seemed like all of these features were customizable. His favorite feature was an option to add hidden passages. He couldn''t make the entrance a hidden passage, unfortunately, but he used one to connect the cavern to room two. His golem couldn''t see any indication of the passage even when he turned the ambient light to its brightest. He could feel that one of the stones set low along the wall triggered the passage to open or close when pressed. Mages or thieves or whatever they had around here might be able to see it better than the golem, and it was likely experienced delvers would figure it out even if they couldn''t detect it some other way, but it was much better than a wooden door with a window. He started to turn the light completely out then noticed something new. Moonglow had added a "Natural Light" lighting option to all of his rooms. He moved his focus and set the boss room to that lighting and immediately saw with Big John''s eyes that the ceiling of the room vanished to be replaced with a sky full of stars and the half Moon. The Moon was lower in the sky now. He switched back to Smittee and checked the skylight. As he suspected, the Moon hadn''t moved at all there. He named the golem in the cavern, "Bashful" and walked him through the crack in the wall to take a peek outside. The moon outside matched the position and appearance of the moon in the boss room, but not the forge. The forge skylight really was just a cheap decoration like the fake fires. Bossy had told him more than once that his System wasn''t like any she had seen. He had put it up to being from another world at first, but now he was starting to think it had more to do with being a "gray core." How many other gray cores were out there? Did they not last long, so no one had ever heard of them? Or was he the first? Who would know? Were there scholars out there that studied dungeons, books or whole libraries about them somewhere? Maybe the dungeons themselves knew something, assuming they were aware, like him. Was there any way to reach them? Was that even a good idea? He knew so little about this world, and since he had been in it, he had been too busy to stop and find out more. That was going to change. He looked in on his sleeping residents. It would have to be tomorrow. The Elephant In The Room Before he had a chance to ask Bossy anything, the morning brought one more surprise. As he reset the spike snares and pit traps to empty, default cubes, a barrage of blue notices exploded in his mind.
Your Monster Has Leveled Up!
Your Monster Has Leveled Up!
Your Monster Has Leveled Up!
All seven of the remaining first level golems had leveled up, and the menu offered to give them each a mining specialization. His best guess was that none of them could level up until he repaired or removed any damage in the level, or maybe any damage in the whole dungeon? It was impossible to tell with just one, unfinished level. He accepted the specialization for each of them except Smittee and Johnny 5. Someone had to keep their hands, even if they were more like stone mittens. The big, three fingered hands of the golems reminded him that he needed to find some way to take notes. With all of his questions, and the idea that would have to wait, he was afraid of missing something. Not to mention that he now had a whole dungeon full of minions and monsters to keep straight. He felt like a kindergarten teacher on the first day of class. First there was Bossy, the Boss Cow, and her retinue of spectral panther kittens, Fluff, Socks and Boo. Also in the boss room under the brightening rose and gold light of a false morning stood Big John and the other mining golems. He named the five remaining mining golems, DeWalt, Milwaukee, Caterpillar, Komatsu, and Dwayne. They each looked identical to Big John. Smittee the smith and Johnny 5 the foreman stood in the Lunar Forge, and Bashful still stood in the entrance crack in the first cavern, looking out of place with his hammer and pick. Sluice had grown bored after Stew deleted his pit, and was wandering. From the confusing impressions in Sluice''s frothy mind, the stone slime seemed to be taking his pet monster core on a, very slow, tour of the dungeon. "It seems you''ve been quite industrious in the wee hours." Bossy said, snapping him back to the boss room. "I like the new approach, not so square and close." Through her eyes, he could see that the boss room now looked like a secluded paddock, surrounded by stone walls. He poked around a bit in the menus then switched back to her view to find that he could set the "Natural Lighting" option to apply to the walls too. They vanished, replaced with an unobstructed view of the forest and grasses outside to the west and south. The northern wall, toward the hillside, was still visible as a dungeon wall, and the section to the east where the golems stood was raw dirt and stone. "Even better. This seems to be a true view of the outside, so we can now see trouble coming." She munched thoughtfully. "Well, most trouble." "Speaking of trouble. Things have been happening so fast, I''ve barely had a chance to ask you some important questions, and I haven''t listened well enough when you''ve tried to offer advice. Sorry." "Accepted. One makes allowances for children." "I''m not a child! I lived a whole other life before this one¡­" He stopped. Embarrassed. If he was trying to impress her with his maturity, this wasn''t it. "No. I am new to this world. I see what you mean." Besides, he hadn''t been all that great at adulting in his first life. He found himself randomly missing his Mario socks, popcorn, food in general. He was so lost in reverie he missed Bossy''s response. "...only remain unnoticed for a short time," she said. Sluice wasn''t the only one wandering, he realized. "Sorry, I was distracted by some memories. Could you repeat what you just said?" "I said that you have some time to grow and become stronger, but that you can only remain unnoticed for a short time, especially if you find a way to grow your mana like other dungeons." "About that." He told her everything he had learned over the evening. For once, Bossy stopped chewing. She looked toward the treeline and flicked her tail. "We had better work quickly then." "You said I should be hard to find with so little mana. How much mana is too much, and how did Lassie find me?" "The paladin found me, not you. She was drawn by her quest. They could feel I was near and were searching the area, but they didn''t notice you until you sent the golems out into the glade." She returned to grazing. "As for how much mana is too much, it depends. Do you want to try to stay small and hide, hoping to avoid trouble, or do you want to grow and prepare and be ready for whatever may come. I can help you, but it has to be your choice." Hiding forever didn''t seem like a great idea, but just trying to grow and drawing every threat in the area before he even knew what he was doing seemed like an even worse idea. "I just don''t know enough about this world to make a decision. I saw from the sky last night that this world is somehow like mine, but there are so many differences that I don''t know where to start asking questions. There''s no magic in my world, no dungeons or golems or slimes. Cows exist but they don''t talk and wolves aren''t made out of iron." "Well most cows don''t talk here either and most wolves aren''t made out of iron, if that helps." "I guess my first question is where are we? Are we ten minutes from some big town full of adventurers armed to the teeth or out in the wilderness? Are there other dungeons near? Do most dungeons talk like I do? That''s more than one question, but let''s start with that." "I wasn''t sure where your dungeon lies until I saw the stars last night, and had a better look at the forest this morning. I believe you are in the foothills of the Alpen mountain range near a place known as Cloudtop Pass. There are ruins of an ancient great dungeon there called the Altar Of The Hungry Flame, but no living dungeons nearby." Unauthorized tale usage: if you spot this story on Amazon, report the violation. "What about towns, people, roads?" "There will be farming villages to the west and south. A disused but substantial road passes to the west of here leading south to the city of Surus''s Rest. It is one day''s travel from here on the western bank of the Rhenus. Surus''s Rest is also just a memory of what it was centuries ago when it was called Flame''s Leap and served as the launching point for expeditions to the great dungeon." "What about dungeons? Are they like me? Aware, I mean?" "The Palatine Dungeon is said to be very talkative, but it claims to have existed in one form or another since before people first settled the Seven Hills." "Ok." He tried to imagine what the world out there might be like. It sounded pretty organized, developed, and there was something else that gave him a cold feeling in the pit of his missing stomach, but he couldn''t quite place it. "I think we''ll have to do both, stay hidden as long as we can, but build-up carefully so we can protect ourselves or have something to trade. Something you said makes me think there might be a way. Maybe we can convince people this dungeon is just a ruin like that Hungry Flame place?" "Possibly. I may have some suggestions toward a ruse, but first, you will need a skeleton." "A skeleton?" He really didn''t like the idea of the undead. He hated zombie movies and jump scares. Could he stand to have some creepy bunch of bones crawling around inside him? "At least one, maybe more. I''m shocked you don''t have skeletons already, frankly." Then again. Slimes were pretty creepy too if you only ever saw The Blob, and Sluice had been all right, ignoring the ravening devourer incident. He couldn''t hold it against Sluice when he had been just as bad himself. "One skeleton, coming up." He opened the monster menu and created a skeleton. It appeared directly in front of Bossy.
Skeleton - Level 1 11:26 Mana Cost - Free Mana 10/10 Mana Regeneration 1/hr Health 5/5 Agility 5 Strength 4 Constitution 5 Actions: 1 Action Recharge: 1/day Special Ability: Create Loot Spells: - Darkness (1 mana) - Creates an area of persistent darkness, 3 meters, 1 hour duration. - Novice Enchantment (1 mana) - Enhances one loot item with a random improvement. - Magic Missive (5 mana) - Delivers a message to one target. Target must be in line of sight or soul bonded. Missives cannot be blocked. Enhanced Room Customization Unlocked - Sinister Decor
The kittens jumped to attention and the wolves leapt to their feet and sprinted to stand between Bossy and the new monster. Apparently everyone took skeletons very seriously. The skeleton ignored all of them and looked up at the nearly noonday sun. It was a human-looking skeleton of about average height. Its bones were yellowed and stained. The bones looked solid with no cracks, and none were missing that he recognized. It stared into the bright image of the sun for a dangerously long time, but then, there were no eyes in its sockets, just glowing purple embers. It finally looked back down and made a refined bow to Bossy as if it was asking her to dance. "I''ll take it." "Take what?" Stew asked. "The contract. I do rather like the decor, none of that dreary crypt aesthetic one sees so much of since that foolishness at Luxor." "Careful," Bossy said. The skeleton nodded. "My apologies. I must say, I haven''t seen a System quite like this, fascinating." He seemed to concentrate for a moment. "A gray core? That is also new to me." He chuckled. "And nothing is new to me." Another word Stew recognized, sort of. "Wait, what was this about Luxor?" "Beautiful temple until an upstart necromancer remodeled and just ruined the place. Tacky." He gestured to Bossy. "I''m sure you would agree?" "That much we can agree on." Bossy rocked her head and changed the subject. "It sounds like you have experience in dungeons?" Stew wasn''t quite so ready to move on. "Wait. I mean, you mentioned Luxor, that name sounds familiar, is that a big black pyramid, with a light on top?" Both the skeleton and Bossy paused for just long enough to make the silence a little uncomfortable, then Bossy said, "No. Even the necromancer had more taste than that." The skeleton didn''t even dignify the question with an answer. "I have had considerable experience serving in some of the better dungeons." Bossy stared, unimpressed. "Yet you are still first level. Name two dungeons where you''ve served." "I was skeleton number seventeen in the Tomb Of The Blood Prince, and I served for over one hundred years as a hidden skeleton in the second rank beneath the mulch in the Grasping Forest." He cocked his head and leaned in as if sharing a secret. "I was behind the pyracantha bush." "So you''ve served in two dungeons which were famously completely overrun, and you''ve somehow seen no combat at all." "Not true, Bright Lady!" The skeleton placed a hand against his chest. "I saw two gnolls and a wereboar adventurer have a very nasty confrontation just thirty meters from where I hid beneath the pyracantha." "Fortunately, we won''t need your prowess as a warrior, at least right now." Privately to Stew, she said, "I think we can make do. Go ahead and offer the contract. We can talk through my ideas as he gets started." He offered the contract, and the skeleton accepted it. A little too quickly, Stew thought. He named the skeleton "Cecil" because he sounded like a Cecil. I wonder if I can get him a top hat and monocle somewhere? The wolves and kittens seemed satisfied. Bossy asked Stew to create three more Mana Glass Repositories and two more Ore Bins. He brought Johnny 5 back to start generating actions. He also brought Bashful back to the rock face and delegated Big John to set them to mining stone. He could see he really needed another foreman, so he sent Dwayne to the Lunar Forge to manage Smittee. It left him with only four miners, but that was less important than delegating all of the micromanaging so he could listen to Bossy. "Dungeons and dungeon levels need a theme, a logical progression, a reason to be, all of which have been sorely lacking in the current design." The wolves waited attentively as Bossy described each of the rooms in the previous attempt at a level and why they failed. Lassie and Rin Tin Tin shared a sidelong look that wasn''t lost on Stew. Bossy went on to describe the new features provided by Moonglow to catch Cecil up with the rest. "And we can take advantage of the Moonglow rooms and features to create some misdirection as well." She nodded toward Cecil. "We will need you to play the traitor in room five." "My specialty," he said. "I''m sure." She snorted. Stew had to admit the plan sounded good. He felt a growing excitement at the activity and the increasing stores of mana and stone, but he had learned so much about his new world in such a short time that he felt like he might have missed something vitally important. Also he forgot to ask about elves. That would have to wait until later though, because he now had enough materials to start on Bossy''s new level design, and the moon was starting to rise outside. Nothing To See Here "A good dungeon level is a fish trap," Cecil said, his hands on his hips and his neck craned to look up at the top of the cavern in the first room. Stew had the lights all the way up, so that Cecil and Bossy could see the layout of the room, even if it ruined the effect. "It is a fish trap that the prey feels safe following although the way narrows and narrows, taking away options until the prey is inevitably caught, wiggling and helpless." He made a motion as if stabbing with a spear. "Then it kills them." Stew shuddered mentally. "We''re not going to just¨C" "I believe," Bossy interjected, "what our overly enthusiastic friend is trying to say is that a level must tell a story. This is what was lacking in your first effort. It''s understandable. This was your first attempt and you had so little time to prepare, but there was no point to it, no narrative. It was just a series of traps with no compelling reason to risk them. Each step and decision of the delver must feel natural, never forced, even though the outcome must be inevitable." "What outcome is that?" "I think in this case, the outcome we want is for the delver to feel that they have discovered a forgotten, but long dead branch of the greater dungeon. They should feel they have thoroughly explored what little there is to find. They may gain some small benefit, just so they have some reason to head straight home, but the overall experience should be disappointing. They should be discouraged from exploring further, or taking any special effort to tell anyone." "So we''ll play dead?" "With Cecil''s help. Yes." "Excellent. I''m quite good at lying around under things. I have this trick I can do with a reasonably large boulder and my hip joint¡­" "That is not what I had in mind." Bossy stepped around the rock and looked directly at the hidden door to the secret passage. "Well not initially, anyway. First we must do something about this entrance room. If our goal is to convince our delvers that they have found all of our secrets, it will not do at all to immediately teach them that we hide things. You should remove this secret passage and replace it with an open and inviting path to the next room." Stew gave a mental shrug and switched the hidden passage to one that looked like a natural cave opening to room two. He was a little disappointed. He really hoped to convince at least some delvers that there was nothing here but a small cave. Maybe that was wishful thinking. Cecil and Bossy walked forward and stood in room two which was now just a default dungeon room with bare walls and floor. "Here we can be much more creative. Are you able to make another cavern here, something that looks natural?" Stew spent the mana and stone and the walls and floor melted away until there was a cavern as large as the first, but with a different shape and layout of dripped stone decorations. "What can you do to make this room seem significant? There should be something striking about it, something that draws the eye." Stew poked around in the new Sinister Decor options and found some useful bits. He chose the ruins of a small temple with stone scattered around the floor. When he made his selection, the rubble appeared surrounding two steps and a worn foundation. The broken remains of one wall jutted up at the back. It was all convincingly discolored and crumbled with age. He found a lighting option that added a dramatic, ghostly beam of light pointed at the center of the temple foundation. "Yes, I believe we can work with that." Bossy turned to the east wall. "Can you connect a passageway from here to the third room?" She took a step and paused, thinking. "Also add a passage from the first room to the third room. It''s important to give the illusion of choice to our guests." Stew did as she suggested. "I believe you mentioned you could create puzzle rooms and treasure rooms? These next rooms will be making use of that. There should be some sort of mysterious puzzle to solve to open the passage to the fourth room. The fourth room should then be a treasure room." He was starting to see where she was going with the level. He had a good time creating the puzzle for room four, though he had to scrap his first idea when Bossy cautioned him that it couldn''t be too hard. The point was to make the delver feel smarter than the dungeon. For the "treasure room" he didn''t seem to have much control over what appeared for the treasure. The one thing that was consistent was that it was all worthless junk. Apparently he would need to level up to make anything interesting. "Cecil, do you have any magic that can make something glow?" Cecil tapped a finger to his lower jaw bone. "Hmm I have a darkness spell, but not light. I could keep enchanting things until something happens to glow, I suppose." "You don''t have any control over your enchantments?" Bossy asked. "Apparently not. At least, not yet." Cecil shrugged. "Not to sound ungrateful, but do you realize how odd the System is here? It''s so¡­ rudimentary." Stew ignored the dig, intentional or not. "If it''s that random, we could waste a lot of actions and time. Even if we found something, there''s no telling what the item would actually do to someone once you found an enchantment that just happened to glow. I have another idea." He added torches to the wall, then kept resetting the contents, sending Cecil in to grab anything interesting and save it in the next room. Eventually they collected some small chests and shiny plates in various metals. Using the chests as makeshift stands, Cecil arranged them like mirrors until the torchlight shone faintly on a single, flawed yellow topaz, just enough to make it noticeable. The whole point was to create a clue that the light beam in room two was important, and that this gem might have something to do with it. With rooms one through four sorted, Stew turned the passage to room five into a standard dungeon corridor, curved. Room five was going to be Cecil''s stage for his big performance to lead the delvers astray, so Stew made it a slightly larger dungeon room with a big feast table and "bait" food that, according to Cecil, would never spoil and would be especially enticing to delvers, though it had no nutritional value. Stolen content warning: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences. "Right, magic twinkies." Stew stocked the room and put more torches on the wall for that dungeon feel. There was a chair, larger than the others, at the head of the table which would work perfectly for their plans, and Cecil used his loot special ability to create a cheap brass crown with quartz gems for his costume. Room six would either serve as another puzzle or as a way to wear out the delvers if they didn''t fall for Cecil''s story. It would also give the golems a great place to level up their fighting skills in the meantime. Now that Stew knew he could move rooms around and that they didn''t have to have doors, he set the storage room and the core room off to the side with only vents to connect them to the other rooms. Vents also connected all of the rooms now, even if they had passages between them, since some of the rooms would have closed puzzle doors. He moved the Lunar Forge to room nine and connected it via a "secret passage" to Cecil''s room five, giving delvers a way to bypass room six with Cecil''s help. He put a closed, but unlocked door between rooms five and six. He connected room six to the boss room in ten, but also locked the door between six and ten unless the delvers solved the puzzle in room six. He had trouble explaining the reasoning behind his puzzle in this room to Bossy and Cecil, but they agreed that delvers could probably figure it out given enough time and maybe some hints from Cecil. In room ten, he added "Stairs Downward." They came with a conveniently locked stone door. He set it directly across from the door back to room six to keep delvers from looking around too much. Sinister Decor gave him some stone rubble he could use to fill the bottom of the stairwell. He left the grass and natural light options alone in room ten. The illusion of wide open spaces and an unobstructed view back to the forest just helped sell the idea that there was nothing to hide here. He opened a notch in the wall that would allow Bossy, along with the kittens and the wolves, to stand out of sight, hidden by that same illusion. As they walked back to room two, Stew created eleven new golems for room six. He named one of them "Don" and set him up to delegate actions. He named the rest, then set Don to start working through the bracket starting with "Rocky" and "Chuck" while Sluice took up his position in the ring to help with cleanup. Sluice was thrilled. "Now what do we do about the temple?" Stew asked. Bossy turned to Cecil. "Can you make something of value we could highlight?" "What sort of thing do you have in mind? Some kind of key?" "A sword," Stew said. "That will feel more important." Plus he secretly wanted to see what kind weapons he was up against in this world. "Can you enchant it?" "I can, but this is a loot sword, so the enchantment will be random, and at the current dungeon level the quality will be low." Cecil stepped onto the temple platform next to the beam of light. "Do what you can," Bossy said. Cecil raised his right arm and an old looking bronze short sword appeared in his hand. Even without a face, he managed to look frustrated. "I can try again, just a moment." "No. That will be fine." Bossy said. "In fact, that will be perfect. Now what enchantment can you place on it?" Cecil ran his left hand up the blade then back down as if wiping it. He peered at it. "Well it does provide plus one to strength." He was quiet for a long moment. "And it causes the bearer to snore loudly." "Just great," Stew said. "We''ll be here all day. Just start over. No one will pick that up." "This might not be a problem." Bossy didn''t sound any more bothered by the minor curse than she had been by the low quality of the sword. "Only a person of relatively high level will likely have the ability to appraise an unfamiliar item in a dungeon without special tools." "That''s true," Cecil said, perking up visibly. "All they will potentially see is the name we give it." Cecil held it over his head like a general addressing his army. "I shall call it, ''Dread Blade Of The Troubled Night!" "No." Stew didn''t know much about magical worlds and magical swords, but he had played enough games to cringe. "A sword with a name that long is always crap. I bet that''s true in this world too." He watched as Cecil wilted and Bossy nodded. "So let''s really sell it. How about ''Echoing Thunder''?" Cecil brightened and Bossy snorted. "That should do nicely," she said. Stew spent the next hour trying to think of some way, any way, to jam the sword into the foundation or trap it in a boulder. Neither Cecil nor Bossy could understand why he thought that would be impressive. Finally he just summoned three new golems and had them stand in a group, each grasping the sword as if they were fighting over it while holding it straight up in the beam of light. Then he had them freeze in that position like a sculpture, which, he guessed, they actually were now. He wanted to name them "Huey", "Dewey", and "Louie" but Bossy talked him out of it once he tried to explain the names. Instead he named them "Mystery," "Might," and "Magic," but kept it to himself that he thought of them as "The Post-It Brothers." Cecil and Bossy walked through the level from the entrance to the boss room, talking through how each part would work and options if things went wrong. Stew wished he could automate more of the details, but he would mostly just be waiting for things to happen, then unlocking doors or making things change himself, not that he would have better things to do with delvers in his only level. As soon as they finished talking through the last step, a new prompt appeared.
Level Complete! Name This Level? (Y/N)
After talking it over, he set it to the deliberately vague, "Shrine Of The Cold Moon." That, in turn, opened a new prompt unlocking the option to start a second level. He was about to begin poking at that when Bossy called his attention back to room ten. "This timing cannot be accidental," Bossy said, watching the south wall where "natural light" allowed them to see a robed and hooded figure stepping from the treeline. The mage would have been an ominous sight, but she immediately caught her robe on a bush and spent the next few minutes beating the vegetation with a short, wooden staff. "She doesn''t look very threatening," Stew said with relief. She stopped flailing and blasted the bush with a spell of some kind. There was no flash or fire, but the bush crumbled to dust. Stew was about to take back what he said, when a heavily armed and armored man stepped out of the trees a little farther down, followed by a bearded man in colorful clothing, then over a dozen others who wore mismatched leather armor and had their faces painted like skulls. These last bunch looked like a cross between Robin Hood''s Merry Men and a death metal band. They were of all shapes and sizes. One had scales and huge eyes; one of them definitely looked like an Orc, and there were at least a couple that had to be Elves. All of which made Stew feel both terrified and vindicated. Cecil shaded his empty sockets with one bony hand and stared. "What are a bunch of bandits doing with two Guild adventurers?" "I would say they are attacking," Bossy said. "Go get your crown. Everyone, to your places!" Professional Development One week earlier, in the city of Quies Surus, "Surus''s Rest," the morning sun was well clear of the River Gate. This meant not only was Eira Wainmender late, but she had to dodge fresh dung, horses, and ox carts in the busy street as she ran down the Decumanus Maximus on her way to the Forum. Her worn sandals slipped on the smooth stone, and her singed and stained apprentice robe flapped behind her catching on wagon wheels and slapping irritated bystanders. Her staff, a plain wooden stick lacking even an F-rank focal crystal, was even more of a hazard, if only because she completely ignored how it waved behind her as she ran with it sheathed across her back. She was no athlete, but she ignored the stitch in her side and the ragged breaths hammering in counterpoint against her racing heart. Her attention was completely absorbed by the bronze amulet cupped in her left hand. It was as long as her thumb and oval shape, carved with intricate thorns, symbolizing her grandmother''s family. For all her life those brambles had surrounded a smooth dome of the same metal. But not now. Now the cover had retracted. She didn''t even know it could do that. Instead a brilliant blue eye, bright as a jewel stared, unblinking from the amulet. As she ran it pointed to her left, unerringly gazing to a point north and a little west. She could feel powerful mana thrumming through the family heirloom, her only connection to the Briar family besides the Death Mana that flowed inside of her. "Hold up now!" A teamster shouted as she collided forehead to forehead with his ox. The great beast loomed over her, as she sprawled on her back, the amulet flying from her hand. The ox''s capped and knobbed horns blocked out the sky above her. Its expression was the same one she had seen in so many people over the years, slightly confused, but ultimately unimpressed. I hate cows, she thought, almost as much as I hate people. "Get up and move along, you!" The driver called. "I need to get this load delivered." She retrieved the amulet from the gutter and wiped it on her robe, not bothering to dust off herself. She ducked her head and made her way around the cart, not meeting the driver''s eyes. "Watch where you''re going and stay to the side of the road or you''ll come out worse." He called after her, ignoring the implied threat of her mage''s robes. No one had ever ignored her grandmother like that, or any of the rest of the Briar family. She gripped the amulet hard in her hand and resisted the urge to drain the life out of the loudmouth with a gesture. Not that she would do something like that, not really, but she could still feel her mother''s disapproving frown anyway. After what the Briar''s attempted, after the trials and sentences that followed, Eira''s mother, Rose, had turned her back on magic and had grown up to marry a wealthy merchant. Rose had inherited the family temper the same as Eira, though, and the thought gave Eira a smile as she found her way to the side of the road and continued to the forum at a safer pace. Had her mother been there, she wouldn''t have blasted the hapless teamster, she would have bought out the carter he worked for and sent him packing without a job. Then her and Eira''s father, Gaius, both would have insisted Eira run the carter''s service for a year and turn a profit. They were keen for her to find any business besides the one she wanted. Her grin turned into a frown again and she started shuffling faster. She was almost at the Forum. The crowd thinned before her. Columns surrounded an open area with the temple of Juno to the south, the baths to the east and main intersection of the main roads, the Cardo running north and south and the Decumanus running east and west. The center of the Forum was dominated by the statue of Dying Surus. The huge war elephant seemed to kneel as its head lay beneath the sandaled foot of Scipio, its tail in the air. Eira slapped the elephant''s stone rump for luck as she jogged past, speeding up again now that there was room to run. "I would say that you are late, but it serves no purpose to remark on things that never change. The sky is above, the ground is below, and Eira is late." Theus stood beside the rostrum, the very image of a Greek tutor, fit as a fighter and as well groomed as a senator. The effect was only slightly ruined by his raspy, speaking voice, a consequence of having been poisoned twice before he escaped Athens, first to Rome, then to this town on the frontier. "I will comment that my wealthiest student might show more respect, if not for herself, then for her family who pay so much for her tuition. Such a respectful student might arrive smelling less like a stable." "Yes, magister. Sorry, magister." Eira ducked her head and rushed through her standard morning apology. "But I was delayed by something amazing!" She looked down at her robe, now filthy from the road. "And there was an accident." "Yes, the sky is above." Theus gestured toward a line of benches against the temple wall. "Why don''t you take a rest and catch your breath while you tell me what is so amazing?" "Thank you, Magister." Eira settled to the bench, first with relief then with a wince at what was certainly going to be another bruise. She opened her hand and showed the amulet to Theus. "This has been in my family for generations." "Well, yes, that is amazing. If your ancestors were anything like you, it''s a wonder they didn''t carry it off a cliff into the ocean long ago." Theus sounded disinterested, but he took the amulet. "Interesting, the eye''s gaze is very persistent, regardless of the amulet''s rotation." "Family legend says that the amulet points the way to places of power." She lowered her voice, although there was no one nearby. "Like dungeons." "Dungeons!" Theus bounced the amulet in his hand like a ball, its chain rattling and laughed. "There''s no dungeon within a month''s travel." He nodded toward the statue. "Not for a century and a half, thanks to doomed Hannibal''s ambition. Though I can see where a family of merchants might repeat such a story. I once knew¡­" "Pardon, Magister, but this is not an heirloom of my father''s family. This is an amulet from my mother''s family." The color drained from Theus'' cheeks and he dropped the amulet back in Eira''s hand as if he held a live scorpion by the tail. "I did not know that any of your grandmother''s creations still existed." Eira raised her hand. "No, no this is much older than that. It was specifically excluded from the decree. It''s harmless." "Yet here it is doing something unexpected." He reached into his pouch and withdrew a device made of crystal and wire. "Empiricism requires that we not make claims without evidence, but only based on observation and experiment. Place that thing here on the bench like so, and do not touch it again until I''ve inspected it." "Yes, Magister." She did as she was told. He spread the wires apart until they formed a set of articulated legs and adjusted the crystals until they aligned above the eye. "Yes, just so." He peered through the crystals. "It is certainly active itself. An open spell structure, recycling mana from the environment, masterful work, really." He muttered more to himself, lapsing into Greek which Eira could only follow with effort, something about "metamorphic canulae." Then he picked up the apparatus and moved it around in a circle around the amulet, then raised it to point across the Forum to the northwest and moved it around in circles there before snapping the device closed and placing it back in his pouch. "It''s not necromantic, thank Bubo. The power source seems to be just a very well designed but unremarkable mana sink. But I find no evidence of the sort of massive mana flow disruptions a dungeon might create, in that direction or any other." He waved a hand toward a group of adventurer''s guild fighters walking south toward the amphitheater. "In fact, I''m quite sure that half the guilders in the city would already be mounted and on their way if there were any such disruption. It''s almost impossible to hide a dungeon, it would have been found centuries ago." If you stumble upon this tale on Amazon, it''s taken without the author''s consent. Report it. "What if it''s a new dungeon?" Eira picked the amulet back up and slipped it around her neck, hiding it under her robe. "The histories describe new dungeons forming, but they are usually created in the mana-rich environment near existing dungeons or natural mana wells. Perhaps there are such things far off in the frozen wastes beyond the Orbis Terrarum, but there is nothing of the sort in Cisalpine Gaul." He took a cloth from his pouch and wiped his hands as if to remove something noxious. "Put that thing in a box somewhere and forget about it. It''s well made, but if its purpose is finding dungeons, it is obviously defective. If it''s actually meant for something else then all the more reason to bury it somewhere and forget it. Now, I have another appointment unless you are going to shock me and tell me you want me to review your arcane geometry assignment that was due last week?" Arcane geometry was the least magical topic of magical study she could imagine. She sometimes wondered if the whole field was just something Theus had made-up to spend more time talking about Pythagoras. "No, Magister. I didn''t finish." "The ground is below." He rose and set out toward the baths. "See that you have it tomorrow." "Yes, Magister." She kept her eyes averted so he wouldn''t see how angry she was. How could he tell her to bury the amulet like so much garbage? He had never tried to conceal his revulsion for her grandmother''s crimes, but even for him, this was disrespectful. Garrik had been right. These so-called tutors were nothing more than babysitters. Garrik! He would listen, and he might even have some ideas for how to prove the amulet was right. She jumped up and started running, forgetting about her previous misfortune, following after the fighters toward the amphitheater. She found Garrik at the training grounds between the amphitheater itself and the city walls. He was working through some complex drill with the other guilders that involved six of them ganging up on him and trying to flank him while he used a skill that allowed him to whirl around in a blur, his wooden sword spinning like a windmill. One of his opponents used another skill that allowed him to charge forward at incredible speed, slipping inside Garrik''s guard and knocking him flat on his back with a shoulder to the gut. Eira was impressed. She couldn''t recall ever seeing anyone take down Garrik with one attack before. Garrik calmly tapped the other on the back with his sword. A trainer, off to the side, yelled "Point!" "It''s not a bad idea, but you should probably stab the dominant arm next time instead," Garrik said as they helped each other up. "Or we could just stand back and put arrows in you, or can you deflect those now too?" Eira called as she stepped onto the field. Garrik sniffed. "Juno''s dimples, what did you step in?" He turned around. "Rather, what did you wallow in?" Eira sighed. "It''s been a very long morning. Can we talk?" She looked pointedly at Garrik''s sparring partner, Decimus. "Privately?" Decimus smirked, "I''ll just go stand in rank with the other plebeians." Eira frowned. "I didn''t mean¨C" Decimus shook his head and waved over his shoulder, "You never do." His expression as he looked back was good natured, with just a touch of pity, presumably for Garrik. Eira shrugged it off. "I do need to train, Eira." Garrik grounded his practice sword and leaned on it. It was shaped like his sword "Cyclone" so it was twice as long as the gladius the others trained to use. "Can''t this wait?" "You train every day, and what do you spend all of that hard-earned skill doing? Chasing off bears, harassing starving brigands?" Eira waved her staff like a sword. "Sparring with trees?" Garrik sighed and tapped one huge knuckle on the hilt of his toy sword. "That''s what this place is for, Eira. It''s an expensive vault where our families keep their most troublesome valuables. We''re safely stored away here to earn our ranks without embarrassing our families by dying, or worse, making a name for ourselves. There''s nothing new to say about that." She looked around to make sure no one was watching too closely, then pulled the amulet from the neck of her robe. "What if I told you there was a brand new dungeon somewhere northwest of here?" Garrik''s eyes snapped to the amulet and his stance tensed. "Dungeon?" He narrowed his eyes then relaxed with a frustrated grunt. "There''s nothing out that way. I escorted a bunch of scholars from Alexandria up that way to visit the remains of the Altar of The Hungry Flame. There aren''t even any scavengers out there anymore. It''s completely picked-over." She stepped closer, ignoring Garrik''s wrinkling nose. "This was my grandmother''s. Understand? This eye has never opened before, and it is supposed to point the way to powerful mana sources, specifically dungeons." "Really?" He scratched at his chin, shaved clean in the Roman style, but starting to show stubble again though the day had barely started. "New you say? Maybe not well established. A small party might be able to conquer it, train it into a gymnasium like the one in Rhodes." "All I want is a good focus stone for my staff. I''ll never make full guild status without one and there''s nowhere in this nursery to earn one. But just hypothetically, what would they call someone who conquered a dungeon and trained it to do tricks?" Eira grinned. "Hah! Wouldn''t that spoil old Pater''s grapes!" Garrik stared off into the distance for a moment smiling. He pitched his voice low and disappointed, "Well son, you''ve made a Dungeon Master of yourself, despite all my guidance and good family name. You''ve fallen to violence and low commerce, it''s your mother''s influence, I''ve no doubt. Barbarian to the core." He looked Eira in the eye. "I''ll do it. When do we leave?" "How soon can you be ready? I just need to grab some writing materials, and..." She trailed off, thinking. She had never really been on an adventure before. "I suppose some food?" Garrik laughed. "Don''t worry, I''ll do the shopping. And the cooking. But you must promise me you won''t tell anyone else." Garrik motioned for her to hide the amulet, looking around the busy training field. No one seemed to be paying any attention to them. "If anyone else knew about this we wouldn''t stand a chance of claiming the dungeon for ourselves." Eira nodded. "I told Theus already, but he didn''t believe me." "That should be fine then." Garrik was also one of Theus'' students. "He hardly ever listens to any voice save his own." He slung the practice sword over his shoulder and waved an arm to the trainer who shrugged and nodded. "We should get started though, just in case he mentions it over his cups tonight. This way. I know a good vendor for salted meat leathers and fermented tubers." Eira tried not to gag. "Wonderful." Garrik''s campaign experience, mundane though it was, shone brightly over the next few hours as they gathered supplies for an extended hike. They decided the two of them could more effectively scout the location alone than with even a small party. They were high enough level that nothing in the forest would be much of a challenge and they wouldn''t try the dungeon until they had a better idea of what skills they might need. The markets were near the baths, and they had to step behind a merchant stall at one point to avoid Theus who was deep in some serious conversation with a man in a brightly colored tunic and leggings. He didn''t notice them and soon left. "That''s the last of it. I''ll make bundles of it all we can carry on our shoulders." Garrik had the whole load for now wrapped in a large ground cloth and thrown over his own shoulder. "We can head out at dusk, but first, and I have never in my life said this, before we head out into the wild to face hardship and rough nights among the beasts¡­" He looked her in the eye and said in an earnest tone, "you have to go bathe!" She grimaced. He wasn''t wrong. She said her goodbyes and headed toward the baths. While she was there she could send her robe off to be washed and delivered to her apartment. Which reminded her she should leave a note to her landlord, host really since they didn''t charge her as a favor to her parents, and another to Theus so that he wouldn''t worry, or worse, inform her parents she was absent. A few hours later, she was early arriving at the south gate and had to wait an unbearably long time for Garrik. He finally appeared, carrying his armor and their bundles over his shoulder. He wore Cyclone slung across his back like her staff. They stopped just long enough for her to repack her bundle with her change of robes, writing materials, a comb, a flask of oil, some perfume, and a scraper among other small necessities. She had decided while soaking earlier that she was going to at least try to stay presentable, even in the wilds, if only to protect Garrik''s delicate sensibilities. They set out through the south gate, past the amphitheater, just to throw off anyone who might note their leaving. It would seem like they were heading toward the farming villages and villas that spread southward along the west bank of the river, a common destination for city dwellers on holiday. She watched the road behind them as they went, but after a few hours, she was confident they weren''t followed. A Long Walk, Interrupted They walked for an hour before leaving the road and circling back north through the forest. Garrik suggested they avoid game trails and clearings until they were farther from the city. Eira didn''t argue, but she regretted the decision immediately when he deliberately took them through tangled underbrush. They climbed, crawled, and walked until sunset, took a brief rest, then continued by magelight until well into the night. They didn''t make camp that first night. Instead, they ate a cold meal with no fire and dozed against tree trunks. Garrik took the first watch and Eira was grateful. Her legs were already sore and her hair was a mass of twigs and leaves. When the time came to start her watch, Eira was startled awake from dreams about geometry and bushes by a loud snap, followed by a louder curse. "Pus and pox! You could have warned me you were warded. I called to you twice before I tried to shake you. Sleeping so sound, you''re lucky I wasn''t a bear." Garrik rubbed his hand and stretched his arm which was probably numb from the shock of her ward. "The bear is lucky then. A beast like that doesn''t have the resistance you do." Eira stretched and yawned, scratching more twigs from her hair then pulling it up into a loose bun and tying it off. "Sorry, for the nap, and the shock. It won''t happen again." She used her staff to get to her feet to take her watch. She was less sore now, but the stiffness in her knees and back told her it wouldn''t be long before it all came back. Garrik was asleep the moment he rested his head. She spent an uneventful few hours wondering what they might find and alternately convincing herself it would be nothing at all or more than they could manage. At first light, they had another quick meal then took a sighting with the amulet and started out. "This is going to take us well away from the main road by the end of the day." Garrik pointed his thumb back toward the rising sun and Surus'' Rest. "We can make a proper camp starting tonight. How far do you think we''re going?" Eira thought about it as they walked, her legs were already loosening up and she was beginning to appreciate the quiet sounds of the forest, and the cool air in spite of herself. "I don''t have a way of knowing directly, but when I look east, I notice that the direction of the eye''s gaze related to the side of the amulet is slightly different here than it was when we turned off the road to the south. So I imagine this forms a triangle with its point¡­" She stopped walking and tried to work the math. "Maybe three days?" "That will be right at the edge of the foothills. We better get moving." He passed her on the left, careful not to brush up against her. "I won''t tell Theus you were paying attention to his lecture on Pythagoras." She climbed after him. "I shouldn''t have told Theus about the amulet. He is likely writing to both of our families right now." "Let him. What is he going to tell them? We went for a walk? Something more scandalous? Let him." Thinking about it that way improved her mood considerably. She looked up at the brightening sunlight filtering through the trees and took a deep breath full of the earthy scent of leafmould blending agreeably with the deathly sweetness of the hawthorn. It reminded her pleasantly of playing knucklebones as a child with the ancient caretaker, Yuyu, in the atrium of her grandmother''s house. Yuyu, an ancient but well preserved revenant, had that same earthy smell. Their day was a pleasant walk for the most part. The land began to slope upward, but the underbrush cleared out. They only had to backtrack once to find a place to ford an icy cold stream. It was dusk by then, so they made camp in a thicket just a few minutes walk past the ford. Now that they were well away from the road, they lit a fire and made themselves comfortable. That was when the bandits revealed themselves. One moment Eira was bracing herself to try a hot porridge Garrik had made from barley, fermented turnips, and mashed carrots. Next, they were surrounded by bandits with their faces painted skull white. Her staff was leaning against a tree near to hand, and Garrik''s sword was just an arm''s length away, but their weapons might as well have been stored back in the city as easily as the group had surrounded them. There had to be some sort of skill or magic at work that she hadn''t sensed. None of the bandits had their weapons drawn, and the archers hadn''t even bothered to string their bows. Eira was both encouraged and insulted. Garrik didn''t look up, he just continued to spoon porridge into her bowl. "I didn''t make enough for company. I hope you bunch aren''t planning to stay long." He lifted the bowl with both hands and caught her attention as he handed it to her. He gave her a squint that said "don''t." She considered her chances. She could drain the life out of almost every living thing ¨C tree, insect, or bandit in the thicket without much effort. Garrik was high enough level she could keep his damage to a nosebleed, but the bandits looked to be mostly low level. One big Orc and a higher level Fae might have some resistance, so Garrik would have to fight those two. She took her bowl and sighed. She had to take his warning seriously. Garrik fought bandits all the time, but even he wouldn''t want to take on twenty at once, too many chances for a surprise skill or special ability. "That does smells delicious, but no need to share." The same merchant in colorful clothing they had seen talking to Theus earlier stepped through a gap in the bushes. He didn''t stir a leaf. "We''ll be camping just to the other side of those trees." Eira cursed to herself. This close and she couldn''t sense him at all. A high-level rogue, no doubt. No one else moved like that. Even a casual glance was enough to spot his expensive and likely enchanted gear. He didn''t even wear a weapon, at least not one visible. She kept her voice casual and spoke only to Garrik. "It seems our tutor has betrayed us." "Not at all!" The merchant bowed slightly. "My name is Raek Hannichusor Faber. It is a pleasure to meet you here in the wild, but, as you''ve guessed it is no accident. Wise Theus hired myself and my companions here to help guide you and ensure your safety." He smiled at his gang, who ignored him. They just continued to stare at Eira and Garrik with false boredom, though it was obvious they missed nothing. "We are quite familiar with these woods." Eira and Garrik ignored the implied threat. There was no point in trying to run and hide, not that they would have been inclined to try. "Well if you''re not going to eat, please pardon us," Eira said. She spooned some of Garrik''s creation into her mouth. She took a bite from the spoon and was shocked to find the taste sweet and tangy. She finished the rest hungrily, forgetting about bandits for the moment, they could feed themselves. True to their word, the bandits withdrew and set up their own camp a short distance away. It was obvious they would be keeping a careful lookout through physical and likely magical means against any attempts to sneak away, but they at least gave Garrik and Eira the illusion of privacy to talk. "Do you think he''s telling the truth?" Garrik said. "We did see him talking to Theus." She respond in a loud voice, keeping her tone light. "It sounds exactly like something the old layabout would do, and he''ll probably bill our families double for their fee." She lifted her empty spoon to her mouth and lowered her voice to a whisper, "None of which means they won''t kill us when we find it, whether Theus intended that or not." Garrik nodded and reached for his own bowl. "Whatever may come later, they need us right now. No one with their senses intact would touch a Briar family heirloom except you." This Garrik also said loudly enough to be overheard. "If they''ll be watching us, they can take both watches tonight." He scrubbed the cooking utensil and bowls with dirt and packed them away, leaving Eira to bank the fire. They both turned in and slept surprisingly well, though Eira doubled her ward and Garrik slept with his sword beside him. ### The next morning they woke to a big orc clearing his throat from just outside the thicket. "Sun will be clearing the trees soon. We should try to make the foothills before sunset, the land out there gets rough." This story originates from a different website. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there. Eira stretched and yawned. Garrik was obviously faking sleep. Whether it was out of spite or duplicity, she couldn''t tell. She tossed a stick at him. To the bandit, she said, "You spend time out here? Why? There''s nothing here." He gestured toward the East. "The old road to the Altar Of The Hungry Flame isn''t far from here. There used to be a good amount of traffic back and forth with scavengers. They liked to hire security, protection from bandits, trolls, that sort of thing." Well who better to protect from bandits than the bandits themselves? She thought, but aloud she asked, "Trolls? Here? I''ve never heard any reports of trolls back in the city?" "They come down from the pass every now and again, running from the Helvetii up on the plateau." He shuddered. "Dangerous bunch, the Helvetii." Garrik made a dismissive sound. "Trolls? And what do they have to fear from Helvetii? Aren''t they just a bunch of barbarians?" "The Helvetii? They collect trolls, stake them out in the sun to turn them to stone then use them for decoration. I met a troll who had been frozen that way for eight years until some passing fae took pity and freed him." The big bandit wrinkled his nose and spit. "Those Helvetii painted him bright colors and put him by the village well to scare off rusalka. Humiliating." "What was humiliating," Raek said, as he joined them, "was old Chert''s cabbage soup. That troll was the worst camp cook I ever hired." He stuck out his tongue. "No taste buds. Not like Ba''Rush here." He slapped the orc on the back. "Now can we all gather ourselves and set out?" Ba''Rush nodded to Eira and Garrik. "Porridge with boiled pears and honey on the go for breakfast today. Get yours before it''s gone." Once they were on the move, they made better time than Eira and Garrik had been able to by themselves. Normally going from a party of two to a party of twenty would mean slowing down, but the bandits proved they did know the woods well, and with no reason for stealth they were able to take the easiest, most direct path. Raek and Ba''Rush, who seemed to be Raek''s second in command as well as the camp cook, walked nearby. Ba''Rush was silent and vigilant for the most part, but Raek kept up a friendly yet insistent conversation. "And this eye amulet, has it reacted to anything before? Did you happen to look at it when the herbalists and alchemists commissioned that disaster of a display last Floralia?" "I didn''t look, but it has never reacted to anything like that." He was referring to the poorly conceived enchantment commissioned for the city walls during the festival of Flora. The flowers had been pleasant enough to look at on the first day, but they had been a rotting mess by the end of the festival, staining the stonework and streets. There was a rumor the alchemists had done it intentionally to sell wagon loads of bleaching wash. Raek nodded, then whistled a command, as the way ahead opened up and they stepped from the trees into a meadow. Eira noted that the rest of the band spread out automatically making a less compact target for any random mage or archer. They had experience and training. She and Garrik had made the right call avoiding a direct confrontation. Raek dropped back into deep thought for a moment seemingly oblivious to their surroundings again. "I wonder if your amulet might sense some remnant of the dead dungeon? I''ve heard parts of a dungeon can live on without the core, sustained by a mana well, or a powerful monster or summon." He sighed, making a gesture that took in all of his band, or maybe all of the forest. "Things were so much better when there was a dungeon here. My countryman did us all a great disservice destroying such a wonder, don''t you think?" Garrik chuckled. "I think that was the idea. Carthage and Rome have never had much love for each other." Raek raised his palms. "No love, but such a terrible price for us all." "If Scipio had his way, they would have razed Carthage to the ground." Eira couldn''t keep the bitter note from her voice. She had no love for the legions or their leaders. Raek laughed. It was a deep, rolling sound like something he had stolen from a man twice his size. "As long as Carthage and her fleets are queen of the air and sea, I doubt even the Romans could do such a thing." He sobered quickly. "But imagine it, what if there is some remnant of the old dungeon that could be revived, or even a new one, some child of the Altar, if such a thing is possible? To witness the start of a new dungeon." "So you wouldn''t want to just plunder it, take the core, and sell it to the highest bidder?" Garrik asked, his tone neutral. "I wouldn''t even want to step inside. That''s a fool''s game. Risking one''s life for one harvest when there is a lifetime of riches to be made and more, enough to establish a powerful family." He made a coin appear from nowhere and flipped it. "The money is not in the delving, but in supplying, counseling¡­" He winked. "And taxing the delvers." He made the coin disappear again. "You mean robbing them," Garrik said. Eira stiffened. Just when I thought we were going to avoid a fight. But Raek just laughed, quieter this time, though it sounded genuine. "Not at all. Even a bandit must settle down someday, buy a tavern and a patronage and settle into a life of quiet corruption like any good politician. No need to rob the willing." Ba''Rush gave Raek a sharp look. "Don''t let Lithel and his crew hear you say that." He turned back to scanning the trees and Eira realized he might be watching the other bandits as much or more than he was watching for beasts. From his tone, Eira didn''t think he was joking. She wondered which one was Lithel. The name sounded Fae, so by the process of elimination she assumed it was the high-level Fae she had seen earlier. She wished she was able to see the status of sapients the way she could see it for beasts or the undead. She knew Garrik had gained an ability to see titles and levels with his martial [Assessment] skill. Maybe he could also see names? She could ask him later. But she had lost Garrik to his favorite topic for now. "Your plans assume it''s a well-managed dungeon core," he offered. "It would have to be properly trained so that you aren''t dealing with some arcane miasma or a dungeon break every month." Eira stifled a groan. Now Garrik would go on about dungeon management in minute detail for the rest of what was becoming a very long walk. But Raek seemed just as bad. "It seems we may have a similar outlook on things." Raek smiled. "Theus thought we might. How would you start to gain the core''s trust, assuming it''s too young for speech. Animal offerings?" Eira listened to the two of them trading dungeon facts and knowledge they had learned from traveler''s tales and scrolls, and it turned out that Raek had even been to the Palatine dungeon as a child. She tried to ignore them. As far as she was concerned they were dividing up the yield for seeds they hadn''t even planted. She did have to admit, if only to herself, that she had dreams of her own. At the mention of the core, she couldn''t help but think how fine an actual dungeon core would look on top of her staff. Not the stick she was carrying around now, she would mount it on a mithril and fine ebony staff to support it properly. A focal crystal like that would put her on the path to restoring her family''s legacy, if not their name. She might even raise some relatives to help settle a few scores. They reached the edge of the meadow and neared the trees again. She pulled the amulet from her pouch and checked their course. "Hold!" The eye was now pointing almost directly north. They had to be close. She showed the others. They turned and retraced their steps for a few minutes. The eye''s gaze noticeably changed direction. "We''re very close." After another hour''s travel the eye was moving noticeably with even a few paces travel side-to-side. Raek, Garrik, and Ba''Rush leaned over the amulet. "If this is pointing that way." Raek pointed through the treeline, toward a steep hillside that led higher and higher to become the edge of the mountains. "It''s not the old dungeon. The old dungeon and the pass are that way." He pointed westward in the direction they had been traveling. "Though I suppose they could be connected in some way." "Or this thing is an elephant bone finder." Ba''Rush rubbed his chin. "You said this was a Briar family heirloom? Maybe they would have been interested in finding big bones to raise. This place is bound to be full of them." Everyone turned and looked at Ba''Rush. He shrugged. For her part, Eira was intrigued. There were the remains of an entire army around here somewhere. Then she shook her head. "No. It''s too wet. Bones only last a few decades in the ground in this kind of soil." Now everyone stared at her, including Garrik. "What? You know swords and wine." She shook her staff. "I know bones." What she didn''t say was there were plenty of bones around here, walking around inside the bandits. They might make a nice start for an undead army, if she had that dungeon core. They set out, through the trees, and Eira led the way eagerly. Suddenly, she broke through the treeline into a glade full of grass and flowers. She could see a large crack in the rocky hillside just in front of her. She rushed forward, not thinking about danger and something caught her by the robe and nearly yanked her off her feet. Furious she whirled and pulled at it. The robe''s fabric was caught in a bush. Mortified, she yanked her staff free and blasted the bush with [Superior Drain Life]. She felt only a tiny trickle of vitality drawn into her veins by the spell, but the bush crumbled to dust, releasing her. She stood for a moment, gathering her dignity, before realizing that, out of habit, she was also waiting for a victory notice and experience. For a bush. Now, even more embarrassed, though no one had seen her, she turned to call the others, but they were already stepping from among the trees all around her. Everyone''s eyes were on the opening in the hill. She gathered her tattered dignity and raised the amulet. The gaze confirmed what they all already knew. Whatever they were looking for, it was in that cave. The Friends You Yeet Along The Way "I don''t like the way that crack will force us to fight single-file," Garrik said. He, Raek, Ba''Rush, and a Fae in skull face paint that Eira assumed must be Lithel gathered together just inside the treeline and out of sight of the cave. Ba''Rush shrugged and adjusted the big cleaver he used as a sword. "It will do that, but defenders will have to fight single file too. I don''t mind that at all." "If it''s a dungeon, the monsters are only part of the challenge. I would be more worried about traps." Lithel waved a long-fingered hand back toward the cave. "Traps like a long, narrow passage that can squeeze shut to crush everyone inside." "So we need someone who can take plenty of damage and laugh it off." Eira slapped Garrik on the back. "Enjoy yourself." Raek pressed a thumb to his chin. "A strong fighter in good armor for the lead and the rear usually makes sense, our Garrik here or Ba''Rush." He shook his head, "But Lithel makes a good point about traps. I have trained [Detect Trap] to a good level and I have a Limited Invulnerability charm that should allow me to survive any surprises long enough for us to retreat if necessary. Eira exchanged a look with Garrik. A charm like that would likely be consumed when used. It was an extremely rare and valuable item to spend on what Raek had continued to insist was just an escort mission. He either had great faith in his chances of building and keeping a dungeon city, or he had some other lucrative plan in mind that he hadn''t shared. She couldn''t fault the logic though. Raek could take the lead. She hadn''t trained to take punishment like the martial classes, but she would keep a close eye on him. She suspected they all would. They spent the next hour preparing. Garrik and Ba''Rush put on their heavy armor. Lithel donned a lighter set and strung one bow while storing another, unstrung, alongside a full quiver. He also wore a needle thin sword and a small ax. Eira, for her part, cast what few beneficial spells she knew on the small party and herself along with the ones they could manage for themselves. The other fae she had noticed before, a woman, joined them as a healer and Eira heard Lithel call her "Sella." Sella apparently could sense Eira''s death magic, she curled her lip and glared as if she might snarl. When they chose a marching order, Raek took the lead, followed by Garrik, and Lithel, then Eira, Sella, and Ba''Rush. They were barely across the meadow toward the cave and Eira was already feeling her back crawl with the expectation Sella might drive a dagger in it before the day was over. She welcomed the feeling. It keep her from becoming too complacent. These bandits were not friends. The crack in the stone was narrow enough that Garrik and Ba''Rush had to walk sideways. It became pitch black after only a few steps, so Garrik mounted a glowing stone in a socket in his helmet. Eira followed his lead, waving her staff until it glowed. More light came from behind Eira, presumably from Ba''Rush since both Fae would be able to see in darkness by mana sight. Raek continued forward, slowly, but confidently, using a folding rod to prod the floor now and again, but seemingly unconcerned about the walls to each side. After a much shorter passage than she expected, Eira stepped out into a large cavern decorated with centuries of dripped stone. It looked natural and undisturbed. The ceiling curved far overhead, partially obscured by a boulder the size of a large building in the center of the room. The way was clear to the left and right. On the left, there was a long dark opening at knee height. She thought at first it might lead to another chamber, but when she crouched and thrust her staff toward it she could see the faint reflection of the cavern wall just a few feet inside. It was a perfect place for something dangerous to lurk, but it seemed empty. Noticing her gaze, Lithel nodded and said softly, "This cavern would make a perfect den for some beast, probably generations of them, but there is no sign of any ever making a home here, not by spoor, leavings, or scent." "Maybe the crack just opened?" Garrik asked. "That would be a bad thing." Raek whispered back to them without turning. "It would mean we are at risk of collapse." "It''s not recent," Ba'' Rush said from the back. "Or not natural if it is. There''s no rubble, not a pebble." They explored the cave carefully, finding that the way curved around to make a circle around the big stone in the center and even Eira, who was not one to spend time visiting caves, could see that it was oddly clean and tidy. Two passages led on, larger and more rounded than the crack through which they entered, and here also the floor was flat and relatively smooth with a regular width that seemed artificial. Maybe someone had carved out the floors to make these paths? "Left or right?" Lithel asked. "Start left, stay left," Garrik said. "First rule of mazes." Raek nodded his agreement and they followed him down the leftward passage. It was tall enough for them all to stand comfortably and wide enough they could each walk facing straight ahead, even Ba''Rush. The next chamber was as big as the first, but instead of a big stone filling the center, there were ruins of what seemed to be a temple, fallen to disrepair. An odd beam of light came through a hole in the cavern ceiling to highlight a jumbled-looking statue in the center, carved in dark stone. "Is it a fire altar?" Sella asked before she could properly see around the others. "It doesn''t look like one." She added once she stepped from behind Eira. "It''s not." Ba''Rush said. "But what is it?" The ruins where a simple, flat platform that had originally been enclosed by stone walls. "Etruscan?" Eira doubted it, even as she said it. There were no columns at all and the roof seemed like it had been curved into arches. The statue in the middle was surprisingly preserved. In fact when she looked at it, it didn''t seem like a statue at all. "Careful, that part''s alive!" Lithel looked back at her with an amused grin. "You''ve noticed, have you? golems. Three of them." She held out her staff and Garrik did something to brighten his stone. With more light from the sides it was easier to see that the jumble of limbs belonged to three golems frozen in some sort of struggle over a bronze sword which was the bright point of the obviously magical light''s focus. They fell back into battle order and drew closer carefully, weapons ready. Once they were close enough, being monsters, she could see their status, three golems, each level one, and each with a name, "Magic, Might, and Mystery." The party waited for some time, but the golems didn''t seem to be aware of them, or perhaps their instructions didn''t include intruders. It was always difficult to tell with golems. "They certainly seem interested in that sword," Lithel observed, a hint of greed in his voice. Raek chuckled. "The sword''s name is ''Echoing Thunder''. It''s low-quality bronze, but it does have a strength enchantment." "Sounds like a name meant for a hammer. Is it cursed?" Garrik asked. "Oh yes." Raek nodded. "But Sella could use it, if she wanted a sword, she''d be immune to the effect." Sella frowned. "What effect would that be?" Raek shrugged. "It doesn''t matter, you don''t use swords." "Well, if no one else wants it, the thing might be worth a few coins as a curiosity, at least." Lithel shook out a thin hide, covered in faintly glowing glyphs and patterns. He wrapped it around his hand and stepped up to take the sword. "Shouldn''t we explore a bit more before we start looting the place?" Garrik said. "Yes." Raek said, but did nothing to stop Lithel. "Where''s that eager bravado you adventurers are so famous for?" Lithel tugged but nothing happened. The golems seemed indifferent. He stored the hide away in his satchel and stepped back into formation. "Satisfied?" Raek said. The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation. Lithel didn''t answer, as they all continued through another passageway. Eira looked back over her shoulder more than once to make sure the golems didn''t follow them. The passage led to a small room with a stone door. The floor was cut with channels in which stone blocks rested. Each block was, in turn, carved with symbols that were difficult to identify in the dim light. Raek spent some time exploring the room on his own, examining each corner and block. "The door has no obvious lock mechanism, but I would think it must be tied to these blocks in some way, just because someone went to the trouble of creating them." "A puzzle." Garrik''s voice was thick with excitement. "We are in a dungeon then." Eira frowned, but it was Sella who said what she was thinking. "The air would be thick with mana in a dungeon, and we would all feel it weighing down on us. Do you feel any pressure?" She looked at Eira. "How about you, bone botherer, you feel any mana flowing through these walls?" Eira shrugged. "Not like I would expect, no, but there is something¡­" She couldn''t describe it, but she did feel something, an affinity in the mana in the golems and the stone of the floors and walls, but it might mean nothing. They were likely all made from the same local stone. "Something." Lithel''s tone was mocking. There was a deep scorn behind it she hadn''t noticed before. Sella didn''t like death magic, but what was Lithel''s problem with her? "There''s no lock here for me to work, so we will have to determine what to do with these blocks. It looks like they move along these channels." Raek demonstrated by pushing one of them a few inches. It grated loudly but moved. No traps fired, and the ceiling didn''t fall on them. They spread out and walked around, looking at the blocks from different angles and bringing the light closer. "Maybe we need the sword," Lithel said. That sounded wrong to her. She looked at the channels and the blocks. "These carvings look like the phases of the moon. Maybe we should put them in order?" She pushed a stone she took to be the new moon and moved it down the channel to the font. She had to move other blocks around to the side channels to swap them so that she could get past them and back to the main channel. Once she finished the first, the rest of the party joined in, and they soon had all of the blocks in order. Nothing happened. "Maybe it''s a dead dungeon?" Ba'' Rush offered. "Part of the old dungeon?" Eira shook her head. "The eye says otherwise." "Then maybe the blocks should start or end with the current phase of the moon?" He pointed. "It should be gibbous, not quite full." They set to work and re-arranged the blocks, ending with the current phase of the moon. As soon as the last block was set, the door slid open. It was quieter than moving the blocks. "What''s with all of these plates?" Garrik said as they entered the next room. The room was the same size as the puzzle room, but it was lit by torches burning on the walls and there were tables covered in seemingly random junk. Plates were propped up on wooden chests around the room. "Is it a trap?" Lithel asked. "Does someone seriously think we would just grab a plate?" Eira didn''t point out that this was exactly what Lithel did with the sword. "Look over there," Sella pointed to a yellow stone that reflected light from one of the plates that seemed angled specifically to highlight it. "Even more obvious." Lithel made a derisive noise and looked at Eira again for some reason. "No traps that I see." Raek had been checking under tables and using his rod to check between the walls and table legs. "And still no magic," Sella said. They left the contents of the room alone and continued through the next door and down a finished corridor that curved to the right. It ended in a feast hall, brightly lit with torches. The table was set with mounds of food. "Who is their chef?" Ba''Rush sounded offended. He took a deep sniff. "This mess makes less sense than a millionaire''s feast. Garum marinated meats and candied fruits in the same dish?" He seemed completely oblivious to the only thing in the room that held Eira''s attention. At the head of the table, a skeleton slumped to the side. A dull crown still mounted on its skull. Raek was looking in the same direction she was. "Hmm, poison maybe?" "Another puzzle?" Garrik asked. Maybe we''re meant to do something with the food? "I''m not touching that stuff," Sella said. "Like Ba''Rush says, it smells wrong, yet I find myself hungry. It''s bound to be a trap." Raek nodded. "Agreed. It looks like our path takes us through this next door so we¡ª" As Raek spoke the skeleton jerked, nearly dropping its crown, but steadied it with a hand and sat up. "Welcome," It said in a hurried mumble. "That is." It continued in a louder voice. "Welcome! You have awakened me from my endless slumber, but still I am trapped here. Will you help free King Cecil from this vile curse and gain the reward and my gratitude." The skeleton waited, fixing Eira with a gaze that seemed halfway between longing and terror. Eira found the whole display embarrassing. Who would give a first-level skeleton a job like this? "How can his sleep be endless if he just woke up?" Eira whispered. Garrik shrugged. The skeleton paused for a long moment as if expecting an answer. Eventually, he continued. "Long has my spirit been imprisoned here by a foul monster that can only be slain by the enchanted blade, Dread¡­, that is, I mean to say, Echoing Thunder. Take heed of my advice, and know that the yellow light of the Sun may free the treasures of the Moon!" The skeleton then slumped dramatically. The crown finally fell from his head into a plate of fish. Eira frowned at the skeleton and his stats. It being undead, she could see a great deal. The only true thing that he had said was that his name was Cecil. They all shared a look. In silent agreement they turned and left, back the way they came. No one spoke until they were across the meadow and back in the treeline. "Golems holding a sword we''re meant to take to some skeleton king. This is the part of the story where we unleash some ancient evil, right? That''s how this story goes." Garrik said. "Those golems are level one, barely even a nuisance, let alone a threat," Lithel said. "Pathetic." Eira nodded, "The same for that skeleton, that''s no ancient king''s restless spirit, it''s just a first-level summoned skeleton mage." Ba''Rush wasn''t convinced. "Who keeps those torches lit, the food fresh? Maybe this is a dungeon after all?" Sella shook her head. "There''s barely any mana in the air. If this were a dungeon the mana would be so thick it would feel like water." Lithel glared at Eira. "It is precisely as if an apprentice wizard created all of this as a ruse to convince gullible delvers this was a dungeon." The others also turned to look at her, even Garrik. The question in his eyes hurt more than she would have expected. "I didn''t! I wouldn''t! I haven''t ever been this way. Garrik can tell you I''ve never traveled more than an hour from Suru''s Rest since I came to this blasted province! Look, if this is a hoax, they''ve done something to fool my amulet, and I don''t believe that''s possible." "What is this amulet anyway?" Lithel demanded. "Why should I think that''s anything more than a cheap cantrip on a cheap bauble?" "She''s a Briar," Sella said, with barely contained disgust. "I wouldn''t trust anything she tells us. Better to gut her now before she tries something." Raek raised his hands in a calming gesture. "Yes, she''s a Briar, and that''s precisely why we should take the amulet seriously. It''s a family heirloom that is claimed to be able to find places of power, like a dungeon. I don''t think any of us doubt the Briar family would have such things? We go back in, and we find out what this is all about. This may be a simple fraud, but that explanation doesn''t fill the bucket for me." Raek shook his head. "There''s something more here. Something hidden, I know it in my bones." "I''ll go, but if this turns out to be a waste of time, it''s going to cost you," Lithel said. "I''ll share what we''ve found with the others before we return. Sella, with me." Raek and Ba''Rush were silent as the two Fae walked back to the line of bandits. Garrik started to ask a question, but Raek silenced him with a look. "Fortunately we didn''t use any provisions on this delve so far. But I agree with Lithel, we need to make some profit off this venture to make it worth our while." Eira, still angry at being accused said, "Here I thought you were just¨C" But Raek silenced her too with a serious expression, then scratched his ear. Suddenly she understood the same thing Garrik had realized. Fae had exceptional hearing. Raek gestured with his eyes and eyebrows toward the bandit line, then carefully reached down with his hand, to the side hidden from anyone watching from the treeline. He made a dagger appear from nowhere then vanish again. "We need to make very sure that everyone is fairly compensated for their time." He continued, as if admonishing Eira. "That''s ALL I''m saying." With the message received by everyone, they waited without further conversation until Lithel and Sella returned. Most of the bandits came with them. "It seems we only need a small guard out here, but there''s no telling what we might find in such a mysterious dungeon." Lithel''s smile was a hard, glittery thing. "It''s best we bring reinforcements." Raek just nodded and smiled as if it was his own idea. "Are we ready then?" Garrik nodded and loosened his sword in its scabbard. All the earlier excitement seemed gone now, replaced with businesslike focus. She couldn''t tell if he was blaming her for getting them into this situation, but how could he not? It was obvious now that whatever happened in that place, regardless of whether it was a fraud or a dungeon. Not everyone was coming back. As they set out across the meadow, Raek, Ba''Rush, Garrik, and Eira walked surrounded by bandits who didn''t bother to hide their hostility. Lithel and Sella led the way. With the course set so clearly, Eira found herself relaxing. She''d spent so long trying to please everyone. First her parents, then Theus, even Garrik. She had always known, somewhere deep inside, that they would betray her. The thought of what was coming didn''t bother her as much as she had expected. Things were so much simpler this way. She found herself, finally, smiling. First Impressions "Did you see Her?" Cecil''s emotions were a tumult of terror, awe, and adoration. The capitalization came through clearly. "Why did She spare us?" Stew ignored him. In what now seemed like a routine occurrence, Stew''s world had just turned upside down. He watched the delver party walk silently out of the dungeon, feeling the dungeon rage simmering inside. He controlled it. Just barely. If anything, it was worse than when the wolves had entered the dungeon, but he was more ready for it. What he wasn''t ready for was the cold horror Stat-o-matic? revealed to him.
Unnamed Delver Party - 6 Members 10:08 Delver parties, essential for dungeon exploration, consist of diverse adventurers with unique skills and roles, combining their strengths in numbers to strategically navigate traps, defeat monsters, manage resources, and engage in social interactions, ensuring a well-balanced and specialized approach to overcome the multifaceted challenges presented in the depths of dungeons. ?? ENEMIES BEYOND YOUR ABILITIES?? Members of this party include: ?? Point / Traps: Raek Level 15 Rogue Shadowmaster ?? Front Guard / Tank: Garrik Level 10 Blademaster ?? Ranged Damage: Lithel Level 12 Silvan Ranger ?????? Ranged Damage (Magic) / Siege Weapon (Magic) Eira Multisoul (Dominant: Level 4 Wizard Apprentice / Latent: ????? - ????????) ?? Healer / Multi-role Damage (Magic) Sella - Level 11 Nature Mage ?? Rear Guard / Tank Ba''Rush - Multiclass (Level 6 Gourmand, Level 13 Shieldbreaker)
What''s the difference between multiclass and multisoul? Why were these high-level adventurers suddenly walking through my door? "And why are they all speaking Latin?" Stew started with the question that confused him the most. "Where am I?" Cecil stopped panicking long enough to say, "What?" "Nevermind. What are we going to do! Maybe we should come clean?" "Clean what?" Cecil looked down at the crown in his plate. "It means. Maybe we should just tell them the truth? Maybe we can make a deal?" Bossy spoke. "Eventually, that would be ideal, but for now, you are the most valuable thing in your dungeon. They will probably want to add you to some magic item or grind you down for potion ingredients along with all of our mana cores." Her voice in his mind, while still calm, held an edge of concern he hadn''t felt before. "That''s out then. So what do we do?" "I don''t know." Bossy returned to cropping at the grass. "But I want to thank you for an entertaining incarnation. Brief though it might have been. I will remember you fondly." "Really helpful, thanks." Stew tracked the delvers as they neared the door, painfully aware that he couldn''t change anything until they left. His mind was a whirl of confusion. He had done everything the System asked, followed the advice of his supposed Level Boss, spared the wolves that had attacked him. It had all seemed to be working out. He had made progress. He had powerful protectors. Now that he saw what he was really up against. He realized it had all been a big joke. Just like the System had tried to tell him. I should have just taken the rower job, or the courier, some job where there was somebody who could tell me what to do. It''s all I''ve ever been good at. I''m not cut out to be in charge. Cut out? The delvers were almost through to the cave exit. He had just a few more seconds to feel sorry for himself, but he decided he was already finished. I may not be born for this, but I better learn fast. Thinking of cutting he felt something warm deep down in his dungeony self. He grabbed every specialized golem and sent them through the stairwell in the boss room to clear the rubble. He had been so busy listening to everyone else he hadn''t done the most obvious thing. He set the golems up as a digging team and got them started on a second level. It would take time but he only needed a couple of rooms to get started. If he dug them both at once he might have enough time. "We''re all going to the second level. We can give them this level and maybe they will still believe it''s abandoned. Cecil, I''ll need you and the 3Ms to stay since they''ve seen you." "I can''t go," Bossy said. "I''m the level boss." "This is no time to worry about that. Let''s just get you to safety." "No, I mean it''s not possible. I''m bound to this level." "There has to be some way." "Probably, but we don''t have time to find it. Go ahead though. I''ll be fine as long as you keep your core safe." "Then the wolves and kittens and Sluice can come down to the second." He knew as he said it that they wouldn''t budge, and he felt their resistance immediately. Even Sluice refused. He could theoretically force them to do it, but that seemed wrong, and, really, he didn''t see the point. Bossy was right. As long as he protected his core he could fix this later. He was pleased to see that the System let him start the second level even though there were delvers on level one. That had been a guess on his part, and it would have been all for nothing if it hadn''t been true. Then, big dungeons had to be able to repair empty levels while delvers were still present on others or there wouldn''t be any dungeons left. They would just be overwhelmed with wave after wave of delvers. The party left through the crack, so Stew shifted his vision to Lassie, who happened to be standing next to Bossy and looking in the right direction. The wolf''s mind was warm and calm, completely opposite from what he expected. She ignored him and remained watchful. Stew considered the delvers through the bossroom wall and wondered if he should turn this off when they came back to make the dungeon seem more abandoned, or make it seem like a hoax as those elves, Fae, had suggested. The golems worked steadily, but it was going to be a race to finish the room before the party returned. The wait wore on Stew and he tried to think of anything else he could do. Since everyone seemed determined to make a last stand, he could, at least, try to give them the best shot he could. He asked Sluice for some mucus and got the golems good and oiled up for the flex-off. It wouldn''t make much difference against this crowd, but it was something. While he was at it, he noticed that Sluce still had the mana core he had given it to lure the wolves. The slime seemed to really like it and carried it everywhere. Stew didn''t see much use for it right now, but he''d keep it in mind. When he saw the party turn and head back, his heart would have sunk if he had one. Not only was the delver party coming back, it looked like they had all of the skull bandits with them. At least they were dressed like bandits. Seeing the skull face paint, he finally made the connection to the overpowered foe warning in the System menu. That must be why they wore it, some sort of bandit meme. But everyone had been speaking Latin. Were they church bandits? Was he in some sort of alternate Medieval Europe and this was the inquisition? If I survive this. I have a lot of questions. This story has been taken without authorization. Report any sightings. The golems finished the first room just as the delvers reached the entrance to the cavern. He had seconds to clear out the golems and swap his core to the second level. Now it was just sitting at the bottom of the stairs, exposed to anyone who opened the door, but he couldn''t swap with the second room until it was finished. A System Prompt appeared about the second level, but he didn''t stop to read it. His attention was fixed on the approaching delvers. The delvers were just entering the ruined temple room when the golems finally finished. He swapped again and put the golems at the foot of the stairs, closing off the core room to the right. Now only vents connected it to the rest of the dungeon as he had done on the first level. He felt a little safer, but not much. He immediately set the golems to digging straight back from the stairs. If he could get another two rooms in a row to work with, he could swap an entire block of stone between him and the delvers. He switched to Might''s eyes and watched the delvers pour through the passage. With so many, the room felt small and cramped. They gathered around the temple foundation, looking up at the golems. It gave Stew a kind of vicarious stage fright. Were they going to go get the topaz and try the whole "the yellow light of the Sun may free the treasures of the Moon" thing? He had really hoped they would go talk to Cecil again first. Maybe Stew could reason with them using the mage as a spokes skeleton. "You said that thing is cursed?" Sella asked. "Slightly. It causes the bearer to snore." Raek smiled. Several of the bandits chuckled behind their hands, but were all business when Sella turned to look. "Fine then. We''ll take it." Lithel pulled out the hide again. "That didn''t work last time," Garrik said. Lithel didn''t even look at him as he drew his ax and whirled neatly cleaving all three golems in a single motion. Stew felt the whole thing and yanked his consciousness back in pain. The attack inflamed his dungeon rage. He had to restrain himself from sending everyone into the room to attack. Instead he felt the golems collapse to the floor of the temple, the small mana crystals in each one rolling free. He couldn''t stand the thought of the greedy Lithel getting those also, so he absorbed them along with the rubble from the golems. Then he regretted doing it. This would surely prove to the delvers that they were in a functioning dungeon. Lithel just took the vanishing crystals as more signs of a hoax. "Nothing but illusion! Pitifully weak magic." He stowed the sword away in his satchel without touching it. "And yet." Sella had ignored the whole exchange. She wandered to the other side of the cavern, her hand raised as if feeling the air. "There is some magic here. I didn''t pay attention earlier since it was nothing like a dungeon''s pressure, but I feel something in there." She pointed to the store room. "And there." She pointed directly at his core. Eira pulled out some device that looked like a necklace and moved it around. "Yes, the second one is what we came for." Sella whirled and raised both her hands, beginning to sketch something in the air. "Enough, not another word from you!" Eira raised her staff and narrowed her eyes, but otherwise didn''t move. Stew noticed Eira''s heartbeat remained perfectly steady, while Sella''s was beating fast. Hey, I can feel their heartbeats! He realized he could feel every heartbeat in the dungeon, then he tried not to think about it because it was overwhelming. Lithel stepped between the two magic users. He turned his back to Eira. "It sounds like we should explore the first source you sensed." It occurred to Stew that maybe Lithel couldn''t see Eira''s stats the way he could. They were treating her like she was just the Level 4 Wizard Apprentice and not, whatever the rest meant. He wondered what her stats looked like to herself. Did they have stats they could see? The delvers headed to the treasure room ignoring the plates and the now useless topaz. Sella walked to the north wall and touched her hand to the stone. At first Stew thought she was trying to find a secret door. She was obviously sensing the store room which was on the other side of that wall and behind three meters of raw stone, so she was out of luck. Or so he thought. More pain ripped into Stew, and this time he couldn''t escape it by moving his attention. Something like worms ate into his wall and it was just like they were eating into his body. He wished he had eyes in the room to see what she was doing to him. He felt the long thin tendrils weakening the stone until they began to rip huge chunks from the wall. The tendrils were longer, and branching now. He realized they were roots, or vines. Along with water and wind, the natural enemy of stone. So this was what a Nature Mage could do. In only a few, agonizing minutes she had broken a small hole through into the storage room. There was no light there, since Stew didn''t need it, but she seemed to see just fine. "There are storage bins full of stone and wooden shelves stacked with green glass." She closed her eyes and cocked her head. "The glass is where the mana is coming from, a good amount of it." "Mana infused glass?" Raek peered over her shoulder. "I''ve never heard of that." "Neither have I." Lithel looked back at Eira. "Care to explain?" Eira smiled back. "How would I know?" The smile seemed to give Lithel pause from the way his muscles tensed, or maybe he just didn''t like backtalk from junior wizards. Thankfully, Sella didn''t try to widen the hole. Instead, she sent more of the vines or roots in to gather the mana glass. Stew watched his mana capacity drop with each looted brick and that hurt almost as much as the hole in his wall. He was really starting to not like these people. Since he was in the menu, he remembered the notification from when he opened the Second Level and opened it.
Hidden Depths 12:15 You''ve reached down for comfort and found solace in stone. Now if only you had something to lure your foes away from you and, preferably, to their doom. New Bait Unlocked - False Dungeon Core A false dungeon core creates an alluring and convincing decoy which perfectly simulates a real dungeon core. Creating a false dungeon core requires a mana core of at least level 10. Decoys retain their integrity so long as they remain in the dungeon. Once removed, they quickly degrade and eventually dissolve. Create a more durable decoy by using higher level mana cores.
A level ten mana core. "Do delvers have mana cores too, or is it only creatures I create?" Cecil responded before Bossy could answer. "Any sapient with a class has a mana core. That''s where levels come from. Do you really not know these things?" Stew didn''t bother to answer. He wasn''t sure what would happen if someone else found out how he came to be a dungeon core and now was not the time to find out. With grim resignation he looked at the stats for the eighteen members of the party. Did Cecil''s explanation mean Ba''Rush had two cores? What about Eira? But the numbers only added up one way. I''m sorry Garrik. It''s you or me. Not that he was sure he could do it. Nevermind bringing himself to do it. Did he have any way to take out a Level 10 Blademaster. That sounded pretty ominous and the sword across Garrik''s back looked formidable. Lithel had wiped out three golems in one swing with his tiny hatchet. While he was thinking, the delvers finished looting the store room and entered the feast hall. "Welcome back adventurers! Have you brought the mighty weap¨C" "Silence." Lithel drew his bow and took aim between Cecil''s eyes. "Tell us who raised you and what they commanded you to do, or I will pin you to a post and keep you for a cloak rack. "I.." Cecil struggled. "I was raised by the necromancer, Tothsek in the third year of the reign of Berenice III Philopator¡­" In his mind he called. What shall I say? Stew thought fast. "Tell them you built all of this, that it''s a hoax to try to scare away intruders." "They won''t believe me!" "Just try." To the delvers, Cecil said. "I have roamed for many years and found this cave, a part of the ancient dungeon, now long dead. I built these distractions to frighten away the curious or, at least, convince them to leave. I¡­" Lithel put an arrow through Cecil''s empty eyesocket, pinning him to the chair. "That was entirely unnecessary!" Cecil reached up to straighten his crown, which the arrow had knocked askew again. "You asked me a question and I answered." "With lies!" Sella shouted. "This is no part of the Altar." She sniffed. "Every stone of the Altar of the Hungry Flame resonates with its faded presence still. There''s none of that here." "Then I was wrong, but I didn''t¡­ Oh now stop that!" Lithel had placed another arrow through Cecil''s other eye socket. "I''ve worked in much better dungeons, I''ll have you know. This sort of thing never happened in the Tomb Of The Blood Prince, I can tell you that." "Leave it." Sella said. "We won''t learn anything from this one." Lithel lowered his bow. "So it seems." He nodded his head toward the big double doors to the next room. "It seems he''s trying to keep us from seeing what is in that room." "Cecil!" Stew said. "Remember the plan. Tell them about the hidden door to the Lunar Forge, maybe that will draw their interest." "They won''t believe me if I do." Cecil grumped back. "And at the moment, I don''t feel particularly inclined to warn them away from getting a good dozen golem fists in their face." Lithel sent two bandits to open the doors while the rest covered them with ranged weapons and magic, and whether Cecil was right or wrong became moot. The doors opened, revealing Stew''s final puzzle. Parting Gifts They stepped into Stew''s arena puzzle, and he was already wishing he had created something more dangerous. The room was a boxing ring, minus the ropes. Two golems, Rocky and Chuck, stood on a platform frozen in boxer poses. More golems lined the walls waiting their turn, or, at least, that had been the idea. He had wanted to paint one combatant red and one blue, but didn''t have any paint, so he had Cecil mark a big line on Rocky''s back and and two big lines on Chuck''s back with a copper coin. The "mat" was really Sluice who was there to keep them properly lubricated and to collect any debris for cleanup. The golem named Don was standing in the center of the ring to start the fight. There was a table between the ring and the door with two buckets, each marked in the same way as the golems. A single coin lay between them. The idea was for delvers to "bet" on which golem would win. Only if they guessed correctly would the next doors open. If there had been enough time, Stew had planned for this to be the place golems trained and leveled-up. It had seemed like a good idea at the time, but now it felt like a joke in bad taste. This was nearly his last line of defense. Lithel raised his bow and rapidly shattered both fighting golems with one shot each, delivered Legolas-style. Sella took down Don with some sort of plant grenade that exploded then wrapped the golem in vines that did the same thing to the golem that they had done to Stew''s wall earlier. Stew sent the other golems charging across the room to attack the delvers, but, being stone golems, they weren''t charging very quickly. "Can you do anything Cecil?" Cecil reached up and tugged on the arrows in his skull. He pulled one free, but struggled with both hands at the second. "It seems not, but I will keep trying." "Aren''t you a mage?" "All I can do is make it dark." "Then do that!" Cecil waved and both rooms plunged into absolute darkness. Stew moved his attention to a Golem named Pound. Through the golem''s eyes, the bandits were flickering ghosts of pale light in the dark. He could barely make out the shape of some, others burned more brightly. Some of them seemed hampered by the darkness, standing still or walking with a hand out. The two fae glowed with a pale white flame from every inch of their skin, Sella''s glow was brighter than Lithel''s. Eira was illuminated as if she stood in a deep violet spotlight. Hers was the only light that seemed to illuminate the room around her. She seemed to be able to see the others. The fae also didn''t seem to be bothered by the darkness. Lithel continued to knock and pull arrow after arrow. With each arrow, another golem fell. Lithel turned his attention to Pound, and Stew tried to throw the golem out of the way, but there was no chance of avoiding the arrow. The last thing he saw through Pound''s eyes was the glowing outline of Sluice moving around the floor with a galloping, scooting motion, gathering mana cores. So much for taking out Garrik. I can''t even keep one golem alive. At least the slime, simple creature that he was, seemed to be enjoying himself. Maybe Sluice would get to eat one of the bandits before they brought him down too. As he thought of Sluice, the slime reached out to him with its mind, excited as a puppy with its first chewed pair of slippers. "What is it? What do you have there?" The slime sent an image to Stew''s mind of a stack of mana cores and an image of the Lunar Forge. "Sure, I guess?" If the little slime wanted to spend their last moments playing on the equipment, Stew couldn''t argue. Nothing else they were doing made any difference. The "battle" wound down, with not a single golem even making it across the floor to land a punch. Cecil finally pulled the other arrow from his skull and slipped through the hidden door to join Sluice in the Lunar Forge. "Oh, isn''t that interesting," Cecil said. Stew moved his attention to the skeleton, noting a couple of arrows through the eyes hadn''t affected his vision, or done much damage at all. The skeleton''s hand was on the Lunar Forge. As Stew changed his focus, the Lunar Forge menu appeared. Only this time it had options.
Lunar Forge The light of the Moon has kindled a subtle fire. Use the forge to shape and improve magical implements, gear, and weapons. Items: Living Stone - (5 Stone, 5 Mana Core Levels) Mana Core Level 2 - (3 Mana Core Levels) Mana Core Level 5 - (6 Mana Core Levels) Mana Core Level 10 - (11 Mana Core Levels)
"Sluice, how did you find this?" The slime burbled happily and shared images of mana cores and the menu, also, for some reason, a floors-eye view of the bottom of a golem''s foot. Stew took from this that Sluice had stumbled on the menu because Smittee stepped on it. Maybe Sluice touched the forge while flinching away? The menu must have appeared because Sluice had mana cores in its inventory. Stew could see it now because he had the three cores he had picked-up from the 3Ms stored away in his core room. Stew switched to Sluice''s perspective and used an action to turn eleven, level 1 mana cores into one level 10 mana core. Then he sent the mana core to storage and switched back to his own perspective to create a False Dungeon Core. He had hoped it would ask him for a color, but it seemed he could only make it the same as his own. It was more information than he thought he should reveal, but he was out of options. He turned the room at the bottom of the stairs into a second core room and placed the false core on a pedestal. The golems had been busy meanwhile and had just finished another room on the second floor. He swapped his real core room again to put more stone between him and Sella''s vines. He used a golem to take a quick peek at the false core. The gray crystal glowed faintly. It was smaller than the level 10 core he had spent to create it. He wondered which was worth more. He checked its stats.
Unnamed Dungeon Core (Gray) Dungeon cores control and oversee a dungeon which they typically have created. They coordinate the movements and actions of all spawned minions, monsters, traps, and puzzles within their domain. Destroying this core will cause the dungeon to die. This core is of an unknown type, and its qualities are mysterious.
So this is what I look like to everyone else. There was no time to send someone into the core room to compare the decoy with the original. He had to hope it was convincing and do his best to sell the ruse. He gathered the remaining golems to defend the false core. He set Big John to guard the top of the stairwell, right behind the door. Back in the arena, Stew couldn''t tell if Cecil''s darkness had faded. There were no golems left to see, but he felt a few more mana cores on the ground and snatched them before anyone found them, storing them away in his core room with the others. He let Sluice keep the one he still had. The delvers were gathered at the doors to the Boss room. They used some attack too fast for him to sense to bash them open. "Look at that." Garrik said, as he walked out on the dungeon grass under the false sky. "Tell me this isn''t a dungeon now." "Simple illusion," Sella said, but she sounded uncertain. Raek tapped on the wall. "Not one I''ve heard of. It''s perfectly clear, and positioned exactly as if the hillside didn''t exist at all." Eira held up the necklace in her hand and showed it to Ba''Rush, apparently not wanting to antagonize Sella any more than she had to. Ba''Rush took a look and nodded, then pointed. "It''s through that door." He turned toward the entrance to the stairwell and readied his cleaver. Stew flinched. Couldn''t they have just brought out the bronze sword and let him do his "Open Sesame" trick? Did everything have to be a smash and grab with these people? He realized he had never unlocked the Boss Room door, so he unlocked the door to the stairwell, just in case. Raek was the first to step forward, using his rod to check for traps. He held up one hand and reached out with the other. He carefully grabbed the door pull, holding it between his thumb and first finger. The door opened easily. Big John''s huge pickaxe filled the open space, swinging for Raek''s head, but he dodged it with no sign of effort. Ba''Rush was the first to respond to the attack. He smashed the big golem in one stroke with his cleaver, then stepped back with Raek to let the archers clear the rest of the golems at the bottom of the stairs. Stew watched in quiet horror. It took only seconds, and it was done. The delvers all gathered at the top of the stairs, staring at the core. "It''s true," one of the bandits muttered. "Never doubted it," Raek said. "But¨C" He was interrupted by the need to dodge a sword thrust aimed at the back of his neck by Lithel. Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon. With that signal, the bandits attacked. Garrik, Raek, Ba''Rush, and Eira were immediately surrounded and fighting for their lives. Garrik blocked an overhand attack and another from the right, Raek swayed like a reed and deflected an arrow with a well timed dagger parry. Ba''Rush just took a blow across the shoulders of his armor and knocked back his attacker with a metal-reinforced elbow to the face. Only Eira ignored the bandits, her eyes never turned from the core. Her heartbeat finally accelerated for the first time since she entered the dungeon. The muscles in her legs tensed and she leapt down the stairs. "Eira, No!" Garrik shouted. Ba''Rush made a grab for her, but she was out of reach. Raek materialized a dagger that seemed meant for her back, but seemed to think better of it. In three reckless strides she was down the stone stairwell. Her hand touched the false core. Stew''s world shredded into fragments of searing pain as Stew literally lost his mind. Nothing remained but the dungeon. The dungeon did not feel fear or anger toward the delvers, only hunger. The dungeon recognized that the delver touching the false core had unleashed a titanic pulse of raw death magic focused through the false core itself. The delver stood on the second level so the dungeon could not create any monsters or summon any minions to devour the delver. With no opening to attack, it ignored her. On the first level. all of the golems were already gone. Bossy, Lassie, Rin Tin Tin, Fluff, Socks, and Boo evaporated. Only their mana cores remained. The dungeon gathered them. Of the dungeon''s defenders, only Cecil and Sluice in the Lunar Forge remained untouched. Most of the bandits lay dead. The dungeon was about to loot them and gather their cores and biomass when the delver, Eira, started up the stairway carrying the false core. It chose to wait to see if this offered more opportunities to feed. The high-level delvers survived, but even they were badly injured and stunned. Eira might finish them off, or they might recover and finish her. Either result might provide high value cores and useful loot. As she stepped onto the stairway, the second floor unlocked and the dungeon immediately generated two slimes. The delver was too fast for them, sprinting up the steps and slamming the door. The dungeon let the door shut, satisfied with the success of the false core bait. The dungeon ordered Cecil and Sluice to the Boss Room to help finish the stunned delvers and held the other slimes in reserve for the right moment. With growing hunger, it turned its attention back to the bandit corpses and their cores. Sluice advanced, but Cecil cried out, "I can''t control my body!" As he did so, the dead bandits began rising from the floor with unnatural vitality. The dungeon saw that they were mostly low-level revenants now, but with limited resources it couldn''t create any more defenders to attack them. Weighing the choices, it ordered the new slimes and Sluice back down the stairs and through the vents to the real core room to form a last line of defense, and ignored the defective skeleton. Sluice changed course and moved toward the stairwell, nearly knocking Eira down as it flowed under the door. Sluice followed the example of its suddenly decisive creator, and paid no attention to the necromancer otherwise. Eira, for her part, was fixated on the core in her hand as she moved to stand behind the revenants. Cecil also joined ranks with the revenants, complaining as he went. The stunned delvers began to recover. The living and the undead divided themselves into three new parties. Each faced off against the other two.
Named Party: House Briar, First Cohort - 14 Members 14:08 Delver parties, essential for dungeon exploration, consist of diverse adventurers with unique skills and roles, combining their strengths in numbers to strategically navigate traps, defeat monsters, manage resources, and engage in social interactions, ensuring a well-balanced and specialized approach to overcome the multifaceted challenges presented in the depths of dungeons. ?? ENEMIES BEYOND YOUR ABILITIES?? Members of this party include: ?????? Commanding: Lady Briar (Eira Wainmender) Paragon Of House Briar Necromancer - Level 25 / Wizard Apprentice - Level 4 Archers Level 3 (revenant) - 4 Light Infantry Units Level 2 (revenant) - 5 Heavy Infantry Units Level 3 (revenant) - 2 Rogue Units Level 2 (revenant) - 2 Mage Level 1 (skeleton) - 1
Unnamed Delver Party - 2 Members 14:09 ?? ENEMIES BEYOND YOUR ABILITIES?? Members of this party include: ?? Ranged Damage: Lithel Level 12 Silvan Ranger ?? Healer / Multi-role Damage (Magic) Sella - Level 11 Nature Mage
Unnamed Delver Party - 3 Members 14:09 ?? ENEMIES BEYOND YOUR ABILITIES?? Members of this party include: ?? Point / Traps: Raek Level 15 Rogue Shadowmaster ?? Front Guard / Tank: Garrik Level 10 Blademaster ?? Rear Guard / Tank Ba''Rush - Multiclass (Level 6 Gourmand, Level 13 Shieldbreaker)
Deep inside the dungeon''s core. The fragile overlay of thoughts and emotions that was Stew began to stir, but only barely. The core''s base functions were still in charge, but he began to be aware again. What happened? He tried to piece together the last few moments. Whatever attack Eira had unleashed immediately killed the bandits, Bossy, the wolves and the cats, it had stunned everyone else and even affected him. But it had not affected the dungeon core itself, or, apparently, Sluice or Cecil. It seemed like important information, but he didn''t know what to do with it just then. He was still in danger. "You''re outnumbered now. Surrender!" Garrick called out to Lithel and Sella. He, Ba''Rush and Raek held a position against the wall to the right of the stairwell. "You think she plans to let you live?" Sella snarled. Holding a defensive spell covering herself and Lithel against the undead bandit archers. Garrick''s eyes turned to where Eira stood a little apart from them all with her revenants. Two of her archers were also covering him and his allies of necessity. Eira herself seemed to be in a kind of daze, her eyes fixed on the core in her hands. Garrik''s face hardened. "Eira, tell these two it''s not worth more bloodshed." Eira blinked. She looked around as if awakening from a dream, but when she spoke her voice was firm. "I can''t let them live." She didn''t make eye contact with anyone. She seemed to speak only to herself. "Sella, I''m sure we could defeat this rabble eventually, but don''t we have better places to be?" Lithel''s expression was calm and his voice was light. His heart rate told a different story to Stew. He was worried. Then, so was Garrik, and Ba''Rush tightened his grip on his cleaver. He couldn''t read Raek at all. Eira seemed to snap out of it and looked at Garrik as if hearing him for the first time. "No. No you''re right." She waved her hand at Lithel and Sella. "Go, just go. No one is going to listen to a couple of bandits anyway." The two backed out of the room without responding, and made a quick retreat out of the dungeon. But no one in the boss room lowered their weapons. "We''re keeping this." Eira raised the core. "I know you youngsters had other plans, but Eira needs this. You can''t understand how important it is to her future." "You don''t know what you''re doing. That''s not¨C." Garrik started, but Raek interrupted. "What do you mean her future?" Raek''s expression said he already knew the answer. "Small minds stripped this child''s legacy from her. I had to act to give her a chance to restore our family honor." Understanding dawned on Garrik''s face. "She''s no child. You lived your life and paid the price for your choices, let her make her own." "You think some prefect is going to give her a choice? She''s always been one wrong word or gesture away from the headsman''s block, just for her family name. The only thing that will give her a choice is power." Lady Briar raised the core in her hand. "Power like this. I''ve never heard of a core like this. It has a subtle pliability, and yet¡­" She looked up. "I''ll let you live, handsome boy, because she cares for you, though she doesn''t admit it even to herself. And you other two haven''t earned my wrath.." She turned and headed for the door. "Yet." The undead bandits fell in behind her, covering her exit with wary looks and weapons still drawn, Cecil among them though he was unarmed and only held his hands out in a threatening gesture. "Help me!" Cecil called out again to Stew. This time, Stew was aware enough to respond. "What can I do? How is she controlling you?" "My bones respond to her power. I don''t know how to break free. She holds me as firmly as she''s holding your core." "That''s not my core." Stew almost said, realizing Cecil never saw him create the false core, but wasn''t sure how much he could trust the skeleton. Maybe the necromancer would take control of his mind next. With everything depending on the decoy, he couldn''t take any chances. "I may not be able to speak if she takes me from the dungeon. If you break free, try to return me here." Cecil was silent all the way to the cave exit, then replied. "I will find a way. I promise." He sounded so sincere that Stew almost told him anyway, Then Cecil was gone and the chance was gone too. The three remaining delvers stood in the boss room, silent and unmoving with weapons drawn. Eventually Ba''Rush said. "Are they gone?" Raek nodded, straightening his vest. Ba''Rush sighed and sheathed his cleaver. "You know those two will be planning an ambush, for her, for us. For all I know, they have another twenty arms off in the woods we never saw." Raek nodded again. "She will likely welcome the extra recruits. That''s not our problem right now." To Garrik he said, "I hope you''re right about this." Garrik''s face was grim, but he sheathed his sword. "I am." He turned around in a small circle looking up at the false sky. "Dungeon, I know you''re still here. If you were watching, you saw that we never meant you any harm. We were betrayed." Stew wished he had at least one Golem so that he could smack himself in the face. The walls and ceiling, the torches in the other rooms, he should have doused them all as soon as Eira picked up that false core. He had been too stunned by Eira''s attack, but still, he could have shut them off as soon as the core was out of the dungeon if he hadn''t been so focused on Cecil. If he did it now it would just prove Garrik''s point. What he could have done didn''t matter now, these three had seen through his trick, and they were each powerful enough to defeat anything he could have thrown at them even at his best. Now they were only a few feet from his core and his one and only finished level was wiped out. "She''ll be back when that false core dissipates. We should be prepared," Raek said. "If her elder keeps control inside that head she will only grow more powerful," Ba''Rush looked at Garrik, "We may want to try to make for the city, then find passage south." "Eira won''t accept being controlled." Garrik''s voice was confident. "When the false core dissipates, she''ll get control again. When she comes back here, we can reason with her." "Maybe," Raek shrugged. "Either way, she''s had a taste of power. We may have to offer her something more valuable than our own flesh and bones, or there may not be any talking at all. We''ve only cleared the first level. There''s no telling how deep this dungeon goes. Maybe it has more treasures to trade with her." "The dungeon''s going to be preoccupied with repairs right now, as long we''re enemies and still on this level." Garrik looked to the ceiling again and spoke louder. "We formally withdraw from combat and offer a truce. We know a few things about managing a successful dungeon. If you let me advise you, I can help you grow stronger, and help keep you safe, but we need some sort of real treasure to trade with the Briars first. Do you have anything to offer?" Terms And Conditions Stew was getting tired of sucking at the afterlife. First he couldn''t hack it, so Bossy gave him pointers, then Cecil came along and gave him more advice, but at the last moment, a slime turned out to be smarter than all of them. This was no way to live, or even survive. Now the guy with the big scary sword was standing in his boss room with a big friendly smile and an offer he couldn''t refuse. He was glad he hadn''t shanked Garrik for his core, but even though the fighter had his helmet on right now, Stew was sure this guy had Management Hair under all that metal. All he needed was an Eddie Bauer shirt and some Axe body spray. He was just one more in a long line of volunteers, all come to tell Stew what to do. Now it looked like he was either going to have to sign his life over to this guy or end up a shiny ornament on the end of a stick for Princess Bonebotherer. There had to be another option. He pulled up his stats.
Unnamed Core 14:30 Levels: 2 Minions: 1 Monsters: 3 Mana: 6/10 Actions Remaining: 14 Action Recovery: 1 / day
It was interesting to see that Cecil was still showing up in the count. That was good to know, but the most important things right now were the mana and actions. He might have just enough. The adventurers seemed to be waiting patiently for an answer, but he needed a way to answer them. He couldn''t summon or respawn anyone on level 1, but he could still summon on level 2. Another skeleton would work, but he wasn''t ready to trust the undead again so soon. Level two. Wide open space for a fresh start, not just a monster, a new minion. He shifted his attention to the second level and opened the menu.
Select a Minion Type 14:32 1. Cow (produces milk) 2. Goblin (produces loot)
He was pleasantly surprised to see more detail in the descriptions here too.
Goblin 15:24 Goblins are the most popular choice for early level dungeon minions. Greedy, bloodthirsty, ill-mannered, and crude, goblins are basically green humans except they tend to be smaller and smell better. Summon a goblin minion? (Y / N)
The goblin appeared at the foot of the stairs next to the empty pedestal, surrounded by golem rubble. "Nice place. You wreck it yourself?" He wore a ragged fur kilt, a hide cap. and a sharpened jawbone pushed through a sinew belt around his waist like a dagger. One of the goblin''s pointed ears twitched and he took a long sniff. "Oh you''re the dungeon." His eyes grew big. "Forgive me, Master. How may this lowly goblin serve?" This is just what I was afraid of. "No need for all that stuff, and keep it down." Stew projected into the goblin''s head. "What''s your name?" "You want to know my goblin name? Why?" "What, is it forbidden? Will it give me some sort of creepy power over you or something?" "No, just never had anyone but a goblin ask. My name is Femur Crusher, Rat Snare Warden, Apple Thief, Last To Contract A Cold In Winter." He shrugged. "I keep busy." "Can I just call you Femur?" "Sure, that''s what my Mother calls me." The goblin looked up the stairs at the faint light around the door. "What''s the job?" "I''d like to offer you a contract to be my second level boss." Stew decided it didn''t make sense to hold anything back. "And I need you to negotiate a hostage situation." "Who''s the hostage?" "Me." Femur sighed. "It''s always something isn''t it? I guess that makes sense if you''re making fresh-summoned goblins your level bosses. Who has level one, anyone I know?" "It''s a cow." "You''re going to be fun. I can tell." The goblin rubbed his hands against his cheeks. "Right, Mom always said I was bound to get boiled in a bigger pot than I could swim out of some day." He adjusted his kilt and put a hand on the bone dagger. "Let''s do this. Show me the contract." Stew shared the contract and the goblin looked it over carefully. "It''s not often you see a desperate dungeon. I''d be a fool not to take advantage of you. Also you misspelled ''abattoir'' here." "That''s arbitration."
Femur Crusher, Rat Snare Warden, Apple Thief, Last To Contract A Cold In Winter (Femur) Goblin- Level 1 Mana Cost - 1 / day Gold Cost - 1 / month Health 8/8 Agility 6 Strength 4 Constitution 6 Actions: 1/1 Action Recharge: 1 / day Combat Skills: Dagger - level 1 Dodge - level 3 Special attack: Flay Special abilities: Produces Loot Once per day, may summon a Giant Battle Rat (15% chance of a Giant Plague Rat) Confirm Contract With This Minion? (Y / N)
Stew confirmed the contract. Then checked to make sure Femur''s name stuck since it had been set in the opposite order from naming Bossy. "Ok, stand on the bottom step of the stairway. I''m going to redecorate." Stew reabsorbed all the golem rubble and the pedestal and switched the theme for the room to treasure room. This let him add a desk with an ornately carved wooden chair. He added three plain chairs to face it, then for the sake of negotiation, made those chairs lower and the big chair taller. He wanted to put some paper and books on the table, but couldn''t find any options. It took him too long to realize what he was looking for were papyrus, a reed pen and an ink pot. He put some torches on the wall, a rug on the floor and a candle on the table for sealing wax and extra light. "Good. Take a seat in the big chair and shout up the stairs that you''re ready to see them. Once they get down here, I need you to convince them I''m much older and more powerful than I am." "How old and powerful are you?" "Not very." "Right. And in what language?" "What?" "What language should I shout up the stairs? I''m guessing we''re not negotiating with Hidden River goblins here?" "Right, um. Latin. Do you know Latin?" "Tell me I have to know Latin." "What?" "Command me to speak to them in Latin." "Speak to those adventurers in Latin. I um, command it." "Now I know it." Femur cupped his hands and hollered. "Descende huc. Paratus sum tecum loqui!" His voice was surprisingly deep. Stew switched his focus to the boss room. The three delvers looked at each other, then at the door. They didn''t move. "Tempus abire!" Femur shouted. "Time''s wasting!" Raek checked for traps again, and opened the door with Ba''Rush looming behind him just as before. When no attack came, Garrik joined them and they looked down the stairs. They didn''t seem overly surprised to see the little office at the foot of the stairwell where they had just destroyed golems guarding a false core room. Femur gestured for them to come sit. While they descended the stairs, Stew caught Femur up on the offer, the false core, the necromancer, and the angle he wanted to take on the negotiations. Raek led the way, but once they reached the bottom, they stood around the chairs unwilling to sit. "I represent the dungeon. If the dungeon intended you to be dead, you would already be dead, you squishy little mayflies." The goblin gestured again. "Now sit." The three sat. "Stall them," Stew whispered in Femur''s mind. "Tell me about this offer of yours, but first, tell me more about your qualifications. Why should we be dealing with you instead of that promising young necromancer?" Garrik and Raek launched into a long sales pitch. Ba''Rush looked bored but added the occasional comment. Meanwhile Stew switched his focus back to level one and respawned Bossy and Fluff. He had to burn actions for mana to have enough. When he was done he had only 2 actions left. "I''m pleased to see you survived." Bossy said. Neither she nor fluff seemed the worse for wear. "Did you make a deal with the delvers? I see some of them are still alive." "Not yet. I sent them to procurement on level 2." "A goblin. I see." Bossy whuffed, a cow''s version of a sigh. "And you trust him to handle it himself?" "Seems like a solid guy, but right now he''s just stalling. We have to work fast." Stew started to use an action to generate milk then saw that Bossy respawned with an action already. Fluff had also spawned with an action, unlike when he was first summoned. That was something to file away for later. He used Bossy''s action to create milk, Fluff''s action to consume the milk and generate two more actions and then used those to continue the cycle until he had ten actions, just for safety''s sake. Then he respawned Johnny 5 and put him to work on the action cycle. He checked in briefly to hear how things were going downstairs. Femur was insisting each of the applicants list their lineage back ten generations, and they were taking him seriously. Ba''Rush was even drawing a family tree. This story has been taken without authorization. Report any sightings. As the actions accumulated, Stew used a few at a time to generate mana and recover first Boo and Socks, then Lassie and Rin-Tin-Tin. He respawned Chuck, and Rocky next, arranging them as before. He left the boxing gym audience for later. Instead he respawned Mystery, Might, and Magic and had Magic grab a pewter cup from the treasure room. He posed them under the light in the temple room with the cup taking the place of the sword. It wasn''t enchanted, but it made things look deliberate. Once he respawned Smittee he sent Don to help him restore the mana glass while Stew repaired the storage room wall. Fortunately, he still had plenty of stone. The only thing he couldn''t do was respawn Cecil. He wondered how the skeleton was doing. As he thought of Cecil, he heard his voice in his mind. "My patron! I''m so glad you''ve survived. I thought that crack might be fatal." "Crack?" Stew asked before catching himself. He was so surprised to hear Cecil that he forgot he was supposed to be a piece of loot right now. "When She bound you to her staff, you suffered a crack. I don''t know if you can feel it, but it''s obvious from where I''m standing." Cecil sounded terrified, but also angry. "I wish I could have told her off right then, but I can''t speak of my own volition. That''s no way to treat such a rare being. I''m so sorry I can''t be a better protector." Hearing Cecil worry was just too much, Stew couldn''t keep lying to him. "Look, Cecil. That''s not me. It''s a decoy. Maybe it''s providing a link of some sort that''s letting you talk to me, but it won''t last. It''s degrading now. Once it''s gone, Eira is going to come back, and I''m hoping she''ll bring you with her. Maybe we can make a deal for your release." "You lied to me?" Cecil''s voice in his mind was neutral, flat. No emotion leaked through at all. "I did. I''m sorry¡­" "You''ve come so far in such a short time! Excellent tactics, sir!" Cecil''s thoughts felt genuinely relieved. "Fortunately my contract makes it impossible for her to control my spirit, but it is always better to be safe. We''ll make a ruthless tyrant out of you yet!" "Just keep me posted. If she makes a move, let me know. And remember, if that decoy decays any more, you may lose contact, so try to get a message to me if it looks like it''s about to go." Stew was equally relieved and annoyed by the surprise report from Cecil, but on balance, he''d take it. The weird little guy was starting to grow on him. The first level was completely repaired and the mana glass repositories were almost full, so he checked back in on Femur and the gang. "That''s outrageous!" Garrik shouted, leaning across the table to get right in Femur''s face. Femur seemed completely unphased. "I''m sorry, but the application fee is non-refundable and can only be waived in extraordinary circumstances." "What did you tell them?" Stew asked. "Just the usual things. Half their lands and holding, and my weight in gold from each of them." "Oh is that all." Stew had no head, but he had a headache, how could that even happen? Femur said "One moment" to the adventurers. He held up a finger. To Stew he added. "I did suggest they might sweeten the deal by adding an option on any first born they may have at some point. For research purposes." "We want them to accept the deal, not give up and slaughter us." "My uncle Tendon used to say removing a thorn feels better than pushing one in." "And that means?" "Any offer you make is going to sound much better to them now." The goblin took a moment to give the Delvers a shocked look just to keep them guessing. "So tell me what you really want from them, and I''ll let them know how lucky they are that you looked on them favorably." Stew thought about it. What did they even have to offer him? The first and most important thing was protection, but admitting he was that weak would put him in a hopeless negotiating position. Femur had mentioned gold. Right now, the only gold he had in storage was a single coin he had earned from unlocking crafting. He would need gold to pay Femur, and any other goblins he might hire. Maybe he could use it to hire delvers as guards? He could also use it to trade for things he might need once he knew what those things were. How much is gold worth around here? It looked like it was worth a month''s work to the dungeon, so maybe he could go by that. "Tell them this. I''m willing to try out a business arrangement. If it works out we can expand the agreement." Stew described the details. "You''re sure that''s all you want?" Femur looked scandalized. This made the delvers even more nervous. "No, but let''s start there." He really didn''t care what the deal was as long as they left and gave him a chance to get back to building. Femur made a show of cowering. "You are very fortunate. Our patron has taken into account your attempt to protect the dungeon and will make an exception. In return for keeping your lives and other valuable consideration, you will pay a sum of five gold per month to the dungeon. You may have a non-exclusive right to sell items and resources provided to you and you may keep fifteen percent of the profit. This is for a period of three months. If both parties find this arrangement beneficial, then our Patron may be interested in doing something more substantial." Garrik and Ba''Rush turned to Raek who looked thoughtful. "Please thank your Patron for taking our actions into consideration. I would ask that we also be permitted to provide further service to the dungeon. If we register a claim on the dungeon with the adventurer''s guild, we can provide some limits on the number and level of delvers who enter." So they want to setup a booth and charge admission? That was more than Stew had hoped, they would be bound to try to keep him healthy just for the sake of their own pockets. With the trade that might be enough to keep him alive long enough to figure out what he''s doing. Of course, he was going to have to make the ride more interesting for delvers or no one would buy tickets twice. Garrik spoke up, "We also know dungeons need to devour fresh meat to create and support monsters. We can make sure you get a steady supply of livestock for sacrifices." Meat? He hadn''t needed that for anything so far. Was this why dungeons had such a bloodthirsty reputation? "But." Raek raised his hands over his head in a shrugging gesture. "Before we finalize any agreement, we must also come to some understanding about what to do about Lady Briar and her undead." "She''s bound to come back when she realizes she took a false core." Garrik frowned. "I don''t want to fight her, and if it comes to that, I''m not sure we would win. But we might be able to separate her from the amulet if there''s enough confusion. Is it possible that you might bring some of your more powerful defenders from lower levels?" He looked around at the bare stone walls. "Just to distract her until Eira can regain control." Almost anything he said would reveal just how weak he was, that this was the lowest level and that the most powerful defenders he had didn''t even slow them down. He had Femur tell them to wait a moment. He had something to show them. He respawned Bashful and sent the golem to the lunar forge. While Smittee and Don worked away creating mana glass beside him, he inhabited Bashful and brought up the menu for the Forge itself. He took the level one and two mana cores he gathered during the battle and created two level ten mana cores. He wasn''t surprised to see that this unlocked new recipes.
Lunar Forge The light of the Moon has kindled a subtle fire. Use the forge to shape and improve magical implements, gear, and weapons. Items: Living Stone - (5 Stone, 5 Mana Core Levels) Mana Core Level 2 - (3 Mana Core Levels) Mana Core Level 5 - (6 Mana Core Levels) Mana Core Level 10 - (11 Mana Core Levels) Mana Core Level 20 - (3 Level 10 Mana Cores) Mana Core Level 30 - (4 Level 10 Mana Cores) Mana Core Level 40 - (5 Level 10 Mana Cores) Mana Core Level 50 - (4 Level 20 Mana Cores)
But the next notice was completely unexpected.
Achievement Unlocked! Popular Dungeon Your dungeon has gained enough notoriety that you are collecting a surplus of mana cores from your unfortunate foes. You may now consume mana cores as an alternate method to increase the power of your core.
He didn''t have time to think about it. He had to get the last of this current bunch of delvers out of his dungeon so he could get some time work. And think. He pulled three mana glass bars from storage and gave them to Bashful along with the two cores, then walked them down the stairs to the waiting delvers. They rose from their seats, hands on their weapons. "Sit. Sit. Don''t be alarmed," Femur said. "This golem has brought a small sample of our wares for sale." Stew put the three mana glass bars on the desk between the two mana cores. Raek considered them carefully. His expression revealed nothing. "These are quite valuable." Garrik looked at the two level 10 cores and his eyes narrowed. "You want to sell cores? Aren''t these the whole reason you lure delvers in the first place?" He turned to Raek. "Either this dungeon is so young that it''s still leveling just from building, or.." Femur didn''t even need any prompting. "Or our Patron has become powerful enough that growth requires far more powerful cores." Garrik didn''t respond or flinch, but, with golem sight, Stew could see Garrik''s cheeks cool as the blood drained from his face. "Ask Raek if he thinks Eira would accept a core, and how much each of these types of items are worth to him." Raek''s stats showed he was a Rogue. From that and things he said, Stew had a hunch he had some sort of appraisal skill. Either that or he just had that much experience buying and selling. Femur shared the question and Raek responded, "Lady Briar will have to speak for herself, but these are powerful cores. One of these might be very tempting to her. As for pricing for sale, both types of items are unique and problematic in their own ways. I think enchanters and crafters will be very interested in the mana glass, maybe mages as well, but I''ve never seen anything like it, so I can''t say there is an existing market. My guess is that each bar is worth roughly five or six aureus. The cores¡­ Any mage will be able to tell if these are from a sapient being. By law and treaty in most places, possessing an unregistered core from a sapient being outside of wartime is evidence of murder and punishable by death." It was weird having a bandit call him a criminal. Maybe this will help my rep? "Tell them these are from creatures. A mage should be able to confirm that." Femur repeated the message. "Creatures? Then you''ve been fighting with other dungeons, or hunting outside?" Garrik''s shock had passed. Now he looked eager. Spotting an opportunity and remembering what little he had learned about local history, Stew whispered in Femur''s ear. Femur listened and smirked. "My Patron says, ''Things have been much quieter lately with that obnoxious Altar gone, but I like to keep fit.''" That shut Garrik up, but it wasn''t clear whether he believed it. "Assuming we can confirm these cores are from non-sapients, they would be worth 100 aureus each to me. How many do you have to sell, and how many of the glass bars?" "All you can buy" was the truth, but that would probably drive the price down, so Stew replied instead with "Two cores and twenty mana glass bars per month. You can take these as samples and an advance against the first month''s total." Femur added. "Do we have a deal?" Stew walked Bashful back up the stairs and left the details to Femur. Once they reached an agreement, he read over the final version and offered it as a contract to a special party Raek formed to include the three of them. If people were able to use the System like this without a dungeon, it seemed like the law was probably pretty simple to enforce in this world. He followed them as they left his dungeon to camp by the entrance. They seemed suitably impressed by how quickly he had reset his simple first level. Then they were gone. For the first time since he woke up as a glowing rock, Stew felt like he had a moment to think. He left Johnny 5, Bossy and the kittens working on generating actions while he sent Big John and the other specialized mining golems down to the second level to start digging. He also sent Don back to the arena with Sluice and got those golems fighting. He had a hunch they could be leveled into much tougher, specialized fighting golems with time. With those things handled, he turned his attention to the big question. How and why was his System so different from what people like Garrik and Raek and even Cecil and Bossy had encountered before? Was every dungeon different? He had to think it had something to do with the color of the dungeon cores. Even the System Eira and Garrik and the rest lived with outside the dungeon seemed different again. Was there a world core too? If the core decided the rules, then he had a gray core System. What did that mean? It had seemed from the messages he had exchanged with whatever it was that had greeted him on his death, that it or they had come up with the gray core option in a hurry. Had it maybe worked too quickly and made a mistake? Or was this weirdness intentional? A cow was the first choice in his list for a minion. The Lunar Forge grew from that option tree and some achievements. He looked at the achievement notice again.
Achievement Unlocked! Popular Dungeon Your dungeon has gained enough notoriety that you are collecting a surplus of mana cores from your unfortunate foes. You may now consume mana cores as an alternate method to increase the power of your core.
Alternate method? This sounded like a way to level up, so maybe the standard way was by digging and creating more dungeon levels. He hadn''t finished a second level, and he hadn''t won any battles yet to find out if there was something like experience he could gain like his monsters and minions. Something else seemed off. The message and Raek''s worries implied he should have gathered these cores from defeating delvers, but he had created these cores from cores he had picked up after his own monsters and minions. Was he not supposed to be able to pick those up? He had seen Sluice do it and thought it was a normal thing. He was starting to think Sluice might have its own secrets. He opened his core menu again and saw he had a new "Consume Mana Cores" option.
Consume Mana Cores Though a dungeon is, in many ways, "made of levels," your ferocity has unlocked another way to grow more powerful. Like the great and terrible predator that you are, you may consume the arcane energy stored within the mana cores of the fallen to fuel your own growth. Unlocking a dungeon level also unlocks Wonders and Mysteries available at that level, but be warned, level appropriate Terrors will also be unlocked. Unlock Level 5 Resources (10 level 5 mana cores)
Interesting. Stew sent Bashful off to help dig. He created a new golem, and being in a more serious mood, named him, "Mana Core Processing" or "M.C.P." for short. The golems on level two had just finished two new rooms, so he took one as a room to stage the processing line and the second room as the processing floor. In the second room he put a spike trap on one end and a pit on the other. Then he positioned M.C.P. in the staging room and taught it how to operate the spike trap, how to generate golems, and how to set them marching. After a few minutes he saw the rubble and mana cores were piling up and not falling into the pit like he hoped, so he renamed one of the new slimes "Sweeper" and reassigned it to help keep things flowing. Sweeper also shared some mucus to help speed the golems along. Stew did some mental math and decided things could run on their own for awhile. He was about to turn his attention back to the Lunar Forge when he noticed Femur standing in the doorway to the processing rooms with a puzzled look. "Did you have a question?" Stew asked. "I thought you said you weren''t very powerful. Wasn''t that why we were stalling? And I thought this was your lowest level." "Both things are still true." "I don''t feel any mana in the air, so that follows, but where are you getting all of the mana and meat to make monsters? "Clicking a cow." Femur nodded as if this could possibly make sense. "I talked the rubes into paying two months in advance. Where do you want me to put the gold?" "Keep it. I don''t really have a use for it right now." The goblin grinned and slapped his purse to make it jingle. "I love this job." Level Check While M.C.P. and Sweeper generated mana cores, Stew reassigned the mining golems to dig straight down. If "leveling up" was related to how many dungeon floors he built, then digging one stairway after another should give him some quick answers. He sent the remaining slime to help speed the miners along. He named it M.U.L.E. which could stand for Mine Utility Lubrication Entity, but really he just liked the idea of a prospector''s mule to go with Big John''s "Prospecting" ability. He was itching to try that one out as soon as he had a chance, but there were more pressing concerns right now. He had to get stronger. He turned his attention to the overall dungeon. He felt like he was seeing it for the first time. It was random and poorly thought out. He had built it all in a hurry, but now he felt like he had been half awake. His thoughts, which had seemed fuzzy since first awakening in the core, now felt much clearer, crisper. Something had happened when he lost consciousness and his core''s base personality or whatever it was took over. Even though he hadn''t been awake to experience them, he still had memories of those few minutes. He could feel what it had been like to be the core ¨C cold, calculating, ruthless. He realized the "dungeon rage" he had been blaming on his core was all him. It was just plain fear and anger, and a craving he didn''t even know he had. He was tired of getting kicked around. He wanted more. He wanted to be free to make his own decisions and he was realizing the only way he would get to do that would be to become the most powerful dungeon this world had ever seen. Now that he was clearer-headed, he could feel the part of himself that was a dungeon core. It felt like a personal assistant, an A.I., only directly connected to his thoughts. In fact, it was just like a very smart golem. Maybe there was a reason this dungeon favored golems, why HE favored golems, why a gray core was a perfect fit. The miners reached level five, but he didn''t see a level up notice. He hadn''t expected it to be that easy, but he had to be sure. He probably needed to finish out a floor, turn it into a named level, to get the benefit. No problem, he had faster ways now, but he did have a use for a five-story hole in the ground. He couldn''t move Bossy from her level, but what about moving the entire level? He looked at the level menu and found what he was looking for. [Assign Temple Of The Hidden Moon To New Floor: (1-5)] He tried to assign it to the fourth floor, but that failed with a message. [Level 1 Boss Required] Instead, he tried swapping with Femur''s level, and that worked. Now the bottom of the stair that led to level two ended at the entrance crack that had been outside before. Otherwise, the level was identical to when it had been at the surface. Even the [Natural Light] effect in the boss room looked the same as it had, showing the meadow, the trees, and a small camp the delvers had set up by the entrance. The actual dungeon entrance had changed though. Femur''s level only consisted of the treasure room office, the mana processing rooms, and a stairway to the second floor, so Femur''s office was now the new entrance room and it had the same default wooden door to the outside that the wolves had torn down. Was that only three days ago? Stew was now able to move the temple to the fourth floor. Now he could really get started organizing things. He moved the mana core processing from the first floor to the fifth floor, along with his core room, the storage room, and the arena. The golems, kittens, wolves, goblin, and cow seemed unaffected by the changes, although Femur remarked on the disappearance of the mana core processing rooms. "How do you make changes so fast? I''ve never heard of a dungeon that could do that." Femur stared at the blank wall that had been a golem-grinding machine just seconds before. Stew paused his rework long enough to respond. "I don''t know. I''ve never met any other dungeons. How do they do it?" "I''ve always heard they take years of digging to make levels." Femur waved his hands. "Not that I''m complaining. Don''t hand me a shovel!" "Don''t worry, I don''t need more shovels. You have the first level now. I''ll come back to it in a little while, but in the meantime be thinking about anything you need." "I could use a bed, maybe a freshwater spring, and a spit to roast some rats and mushrooms?" Femur looked around the bare office that was now his entire level other than the stairwell. "Come to think of it, I could use some rats and mushrooms. Living on mana''s fine, but I like a good meal now and then, and none of that dungeon bait. Real food." "I''ll see what I can do once I finish downstairs." Stew switched his attention to the fourth floor and filled Bossy in on the changes. "I was just asking Femur, but I''ve never asked you, is there anything you need on this level?" Bossy looked around. "This is a bright, cheery sort of place. Green grass, blue skies." She cocked her horns to the side in a cow''s grin. "That''s not my preferred aesthetic." Stew remembered the vision she shared with him when the wolves swore their loyalty. Yeah, not that kind of gal at all. "What do you need, then?" "I would like to think about it while you work. Please ask me again later." She pointed her nose toward the busy kittens and golem generating actions from her milk. "I have some ideas." While he was looking at the fourth floor he thought about the Lunar Forge. He didn''t think he would be able to move it since it was unlocked by Moonglow, but it swapped to the fifth floor without complaint. Now he had all of his processing on the same floor. That''s when he noticed that he had left Smittee with nothing to do for several hours after he moved Don back to the Arena. He had enough mana cores now and he could have been forging bigger ones or at least generating more mana glass this whole time. He needed a better system. He couldn''t afford to lose production just because he became distracted chatting with his level bosses. Which reminded him to go process the milk and generate more actions. It was getting annoying having to do that every few minutes, worse it was keeping him from getting other things done. He had to solve that too, but one problem at a time. First, he needed to get the forge productive. He created two new golems and named them "Forge" and "Smelter." He put Smittee in charge of the room and had him direct Smelter to do Smittee''s old job of generating mana glass and set Forge to merging every six level one mana cores into one level five mana core. He switched his attention to the arena where Don was working through a list of combatants. Stew watched for a little while as each pair of combatants faced each other, using Sluice as a mat. The battles took just a few minutes and one or the other would be reduced to rubble and a mana core. Sluice would clean, then things would start again with the next pair. The victor from the last bout would just stand around until their partner respawned and their turn came again. Out of twenty fighters, only two were accomplishing anything at any given time. Love this story? Find the genuine version on the author''s preferred platform and support their work! It occurred to Stew that he was looking at it all wrong. He had been so enamored by the idea of a fighting bots puzzle that he hadn''t thought properly about what he was trying to accomplish. He wanted these golems to level up. To do that, they needed to fight as much as possible. He stopped the current fight and tinkered with Don''s instructions. Suddenly every golem in the room was fighting every other golem with the exception of Don whose job now was just to respawn golems and set them to fighting. This didn''t generate mana cores as quickly as the mana core processing pit, but with time, they would yield higher-level cores. A nice side benefit would be tougher fighters to help defend the dungeon. He watched the new system run and decided, assuming fights continued to take about two minutes, that this room would pass the M.C.P. room in efficiency once the average fighting golem reached level four. Unless¡­ He had twenty fighters and ten mana core golems. If he named those ten, they could level up too. He could rotate the golems in groups of ten between the arena and the processing pit on a regular schedule. That way all of the golems would level up and he would get the benefit of processing ten higher-level golems every thirty seconds in the pit and another ten every two minutes in the arena. And now he had to go feed the kittens again, so no time to think about that. His system was running, churning out mana cores, mana glass, and fiercer fighters, but there was enough going on now that it was getting hard to stay ahead of the action cost. He was running Bossy and the kittens ragged, and once the kittens and Bossy turned in for the night, production would have to stop. The good news was that Forge had just finished 10 level 5 mana cores. That hadn''t taken long at all. [Popular Dungeon] [Consume Mana Cores?] Here goes. [CATEGORY 1 CORE ACHIEVED!] [Congratulations! You have ascended to Category 1. As your power grows, so does the depth of your dominion. Unleash new potential and discover the mysteries and wonders of the abyss, but beware, for the abyss also hides terrors unimagined.] [Wonder Unlocked: Big Red Button - This big red button may be pressed once per second.] [Mystery Unlocked: Dungeon Moss - The release of arcane energies has caused a strange, glowing moss to grow in cracks and crevices throughout the dungeon. It grows better in some places than others.] [Terror Unlocked: Stone Weevils - Shaped like tiny drills, these small but hungry parasites are attracted to enchanted stone, weakening it as they feed.] [Unlock Level 10 Resources (10 level 10 mana cores)] "Category 1," What am I a hurricane? And stone weevils!? He stretched his attention out through the dungeon and found the moss almost immediately, thick growths in some places and almost none in others. He wasn''t sure how he felt about having moss growing on him, but he was absolutely sure how he felt about being infested with bugs! He ignored the moss and kept searching until he felt an awful itching sensation. Sure enough, it was in the storage room. The ones he felt were in the walls, but he had a bad feeling about why they might be in that room in particular. Sluice was busy in the arena and Sweeper and M.U.L.E. had their own jobs, so he spawned another slime in the storage room. He switched his attention to the new slime and formed an eye, but still couldn''t see because he hadn''t set the lighting back in the storage room after the attack and repairs. He turned on the light as bright as he could. There was no moss growing here, but by changing the shape and size of the slime''s eye, he managed to see tiny specks crawling on his wall. This was bad. The mana glass was covered with them, and that was worse. Two bars collapsed into green dust as he watched. He checked his stats and confirmed that he had just lost two mana capacity. He lost ten more as he was looking. "Can you eat those weevils?" He asked the slime. The slime crawled up the mana glass repository and spread itself over an infested bar. It slurped at the bar like a lollipop cleaning off the weevils and trapping them inside itself where they immediately began to dissolve. The slime moved on to the next bar and the next. Stew was relieved to see that setting the slime to de-weeviling duty had only cost one action. It would take it time to eat all of them, but it looked like it was winning the battle. He checked around the rest of the dungeon and found more weevils in the mana core pit and the arena. He added weevils to both Sweeper and Sluice''s menu of things to clean up. He couldn''t think of a way to add that to M.U.L.E''s work for free, but he also didn''t find any weevils among the miners. He thought about naming the new slime "Timon" or "Pumba" but instead just called it "Exterminator 1" with the expectation that he was going to need more. He did his best to focus, but having an itch he couldn''t scratch was too distracting. It wasn''t until Exterminator finished with the mana glass repository and the three slimes started cleaning his walls and floors that he could relax. He left the lights on in the storage room though he wasn''t sure Exterminator 1 needed light to find the weevils. He was glad to see Smelter had already started to replace the lost mana glass. And, of course, it was time to feed the kittens again. Once he finished that, he finally had a chance to check his stats. [Unnamed Core] - Category 1 Gray Core [13:41] [Levels: 5] [Minions: 2] [Monsters: 48] [Mana: 127/365] [Actions Remaining: 14] [Action Recovery: 10 / day] [1. Generate Mana] [2. Monsters And Minions] [3. Build] [4. Customization] [5. Inventory] [6. Consume Mana Cores] [7. Press The Button] The menu was different, but he was disappointed to see how much it stayed the same. The system now acknowledged that he was a gray core, and he had about ten times the activity regeneration which was nice, but kind of irrelevant. He still didn''t have a name or any idea how to get one. It didn''t seem to want to call him "Stew." He had hoped for some new kind of monster or defense ¨C turrets, turrets would have been good. The level count made no sense. He only had one named level, and a long stairway. He could see calling it three levels, but why did his stats show five levels if the System wouldn''t give him the category credit for them? He poked around and found something under "Customization." [Show partial levels? (Y/N)] When he selected "No" it didn''t do quite what he expected. It showed one level, but added "Floors" to his stats and a "Levels" menu item appeared, which seemed to be just a shortcut to the Customization options for that level. That might be handy later when he had more levels. [Levels: 1] [Floors: 5] He also found an option to turn off the clock. That had been a nice feature when he was stuck in the void, but now it made him feel like he was late to work. Way to focus on the priorities, Stew. He knew he was stalling. He wanted to believe he was too wise to fall for the big, candy-like option at the bottom of his menu. After all, It had come bundled with mystery moss and weevils, but he knew he was going to give in eventually. No matter how he resisted, he knew he was going to Press The Button. But first, he had to feed the kittens. Room To Graze "More kittens?" Stew was beginning to wonder if he was going to regret asking Bossy what she wanted for her level. "And more cattle. A herd." Bossy was standing by the treeline in the meadow, munching on fresh flowers while watching the wolves run between the trees looking for deer. Stew was almost positive they wouldn''t find any. It had all started when he came to feed the kittens again. He had been so busy with remodeling and fighting for his life, that he hadn''t even noticed that none of his minions or monsters had leveled up since before the delvers arrived. That changed all at once. [One of your monsters has leveled up! Sluice is now a Level 2 Stone Slime.] With the upgrade, Sluice''s mucus became [Mineral Oil] which allowed any stone-based creature to accomplish twice as much in one action. Stew immediately had Sweeper assimilate some stone too, evolving into a Level 1 Stone Slime. That would keep the pit and the arena balanced. [One of your monsters has leveled up! Smittee (view specialization options)] [One of your monsters has leveled up! Johnny 5 (view specialization options)] Johnny 5 now had an option to specialize as a [Controller Golem] and Smittee had two options [Controller Golem] or [Crafting Golem]. [Controller Golem No longer limited to simple tasks, the Controller Golem specialization allows a golem to accept a desired outcome then derive an optimal strategy to achieve that outcome based on specified constraints. For any sustained task flow, the Controller Golem has a 1% chance per hour of identifying a small improvement in that task. Gains are remembered if the task is paused and resumed, but forgotten should the controller golem switch to managing an unrelated task.] [Crafting Golem Practice makes perfect, and the Crafting Golem is no exception. The first item of a given type created by a crafting golem has a 1% chance of failure. This chance of failure reduces by 0.05% for each item of that same type created by the same golem. Once the error chance reaches 0%, each item a crafting golem makes of that same type has a 0.05% chance of being of a higher grade or lower material cost than the last item of that type made by the same golem. Higher-grade items produced by this process will still count as practiced items regardless of any differences in quality or description. Higher-grade items produced by this process will not require additional materials, even if these are required for standard recipes.] The Crafting Golem specialization sounded amazing, but, assuming Smelter wouldn''t be far behind Smittee for crafting, Stew chose [Controller Golem] for both Smittee and Johnny 5. And surprisingly even Exterminator 1 leveled up. Apparently, the little guy was earning experience for "defeating" each weevil. [One of your monsters has leveled up! Exterminator 1 has evolved into a Level 2 Toxic Slime.] So rather than assimilating something, Exterminator 1 found a sort of combat adaptation and invented pesticide. This meant there were two ways, at least, of evolving slimes. Stew filed that away for future thought. The big news came with a flurry of notifications from the rest of the Milk Run Bunch. [One of your monsters has leveled up! Fluff is now a Spectral Panther Acolyte (Juvenile) - Level 2] [One of your monsters has leveled up! Socks is now a Spectral Panther Acolyte (Juvenile) - Level 2] [One of your monsters has leveled up! Boo is now a Spectral Panther Acolyte (Juvenile) - Level 2] Each of the kittens was now the size of a Labrador Retriever. Instead of generating two actions per milk, they generated five for every two milk. They still had no special attack, but they had added a new special ability [Shadow Walk] that sounded very interesting. None of that compared to the news for Bossy. [One of your minions has leveled up! Bossy is now a Cow (Demi-Goddess) - Level 2] He looked at her stats. [Bossy - Level Boss, Temple of the Hidden Moon, Fourth Floor] [Cow (Demi-Goddess) - Level 2] [Mana Cost - 1 / day] [Health 20/20] [Agility 3] [Strength 5] [Constitution 7] [Actions: 1/1] [Action Recharge: 1 / day] [Special attack: Scold] [Special Ability: Follow The Herd] [Passive Ability: Room To Graze] [Produces Two Divine Milk Per Action] It was mostly underwhelming except for the doubled milk production and the new abilities. [Follow The Herd] [You may add one additional, nonsapient, cow to your herd for each one hundred milk produced. Each cow will provide one milk when the herd matriarch produces milk, and will cost one mana per day. There is a 5% chance that any cow summoned will be a bull. Each bull increases milk production for all cows by 20%. Each bull also provides one [Defense] for the herd. Cows and bulls do not advance in level, but may be upgraded for 100 mana each.] So each cow would be an action multiplier. That was already sounding good, but adding a bull for an extra bottle every five for the whole herd could make quite a difference with enough cows, especially with Bossy''s doubled production, but what was [Defense]? The next one was a very big deal. [Passive Ability: Room To Graze] [Nothing''s better than grazing with your herd in the wide open spaces. Find all the best forage while keeping an eye on the horizon for trouble. Turn one [Secluded Hollow] into a pocket dimension, decorated to your taste.] Pocket dimension! Stew didn''t even wait to talk to Bossy, he spent the mana and turned the boss room into a [Secluded Hollow]. Nothing at all happened. The room looked exactly the same when Stew looked out of Bossy''s eyes. Stew moved his attention to Lassie and looked again from another angle, something seemed strange about the open door. It now led to the banquet hall since Stew had moved the Arena to the fifth floor, but that wasn''t it. There was something strange about the edges. Stew switched back to his core and experienced momentary vertigo. It took him a moment to reconcile the precise feeling he had for the dimensions of the boss room and the rest of the dungeon with his simultaneous certainty that the boss room was now much, much bigger. He could feel the edges, but they seemed farther away than his dungeon sense could manage precisely. He switched back to Lassie and, with her permission, walked forward until he reached the wall beside the door to the banquet hall. He took one more step and walked right through. There was no sense of a wall at all. The door just stood in empty space. From behind, there was no trace of the door either. Lassie took a deep sniff on her own and Stew could feel her excitement. The boss room had always smelled like a dungeon to her, regardless of the visual illusion the walls and ceiling showed. Stew realized the dungeon grass was gone too, replaced by grass and flowers from the meadow. The boss room section of the meadow merged seamlessly with where the real meadow would be and it filled in the space that should have contained the hillside and the dungeon. There were flowers and bushes and trees, but Stew didn''t see a single bird or insect. "We''ll need more kittens," Bossy said, strolling out into the meadow. The two wolves ran off into the trees, chasing a scent. The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement. "More kittens?" "And more cattle. A herd." Stew thought it over. The kittens, well, cats now, didn''t seem to have any limit on how much milk they could turn into actions, but there was a practical limit on how fast the process could happen. They were close to the limit now for what Stew could do himself, but the new production numbers meant he could finally automate the process completely. With a [Controller Golem] and [Mineral Oil] he could double the current rate even without the greater production, but if he was going to continue to scale it, Bossy was right, they would need more kittens. He watched Fluff and Boo for a moment. The growth had changed them, rather than tumbling around playing the way they had as kittens, they had taken to stalking each other and attacking with a much more serious attitude. Socks just attacked whoever ended up on the bottom. They were solid muscle, and their fangs and claws were now big enough to look menacing. "You said you wanted to redecorate? Is this more what you wanted?" Bossy watched the disappointed wolves returning, then glanced at the floating door leading to the stairwell. She turned to look at the door to the banquet hall. She waggled her head. "No, I think I can come up with something more appropriate. With your permission?" "Sure." The banquet hall door shrank into the distance so fast it looked like it was falling. The sky darkened and stars came out. A huge moon rose, revealing a changed landscape. It was the dark, grassy plain from Bossy''s vision. Behind them a stone platform rose. It was square with stepped sides and a flat top. There was a smaller temple in the center and the sealed door to the next floor was now inside of that. Stew reached out his senses and found the banquet door now opened in a cliff face that was part of a barren mountain range that surrounded the plain. He couldn''t sense anything beyond the mountains. They seemed to mark the edge of the world. The banquet hall and tawdry treasure room were the only things left on this level that didn''t fit, so he discarded them, connecting the moon puzzle room directly to this door into the boss level. He was just relocking the door when Boo appeared out of nowhere right next to it and pounced on Fluff who was hiding in the grass right across from the door. Then they both vanished into thin air, or rather, back into the shadows. Stew was startled and a little miffed that they were delaying action production, but he couldn''t blame them for trying out their new abilities. With more kittens, he could start to rotate them and let them have some fun. They might enjoy the arena. The wolves would probably like that too. Once the cats were back near Bossy and Johnny 5, Stew used Johnny 5''s new abilities to begin optimizing and balancing action and mana production. He wasn''t sure what to expect, so he planned to check back in, but it was a relief to know he wouldn''t have to drop everything to feed the kittens now. He switched his attention back up to the first floor to check with Femur. "So you want mushrooms," Stew said as he switched to Femur''s perspective. "I''m thinking for that you''ll want caves?" "And rats." "Right, rats. Let''s see, we can start with this." Stew created another [Twilight Cavern] and saw that he was starting to run low on stone again. He had stopped the miners because it felt wrong, somehow, to just dig tunnels to nowhere. He would have to look at his options there soon if he wanted to work on the rest of his levels. He bounced some ideas off of Femur, but he had a pretty good idea of what the goblin wanted, and he found that he had goblin-specific options now that Femur was the level boss. After a few false starts, he created a creepy-looking cavern with half a dozen different types of mushrooms including one called [Cauldron Cap] that glowed a dull red and gave off heat. The mushrooms made him wonder if potions were a thing here. It seemed likely. Maybe he could unlock alchemy or potion-making or whatever they called it here? He created a pen for the rats and created four rats to start, two males and two females. They were the size of pigs and acted more like boars than rodents. It was weird enough he had to ask Femur. "You''re sure they''ll just stay behind those low fences? Why would they do that?" He expected an answer like "Magic." Instead, Femur shrugged and said, "They''re domesticated." That almost made sense, though looking at their legs and the height of the pen he just couldn''t see how it worked. Stew also built a small cookfire and a hide shelter with a straw bed and a small chest inside. Various tools and blankets came for free. There was a new [Cavern Glow] lighting setting which spread an ever-changing green glowing mist that flowed around the ceiling of the cavern like toxic gas. It barely lit the room, but Femur seemed to find it cozy. "I have to ask. This seems like a pretty rough way to live. Don''t you want me to make you a better bed, at least? You seem¡­" "Smart, not just a dumb creature waving a club and gibbering?" "I didn''t say that, but yes, I guess that''s what I was thinking. Are all goblins as smart as you?" "Goblins are as different as anybody else, but sure we''re all pretty smart. That is, except my cousin Toad Licker. He''s an idiot." Femur struck a spark from a tinderbox Stew hadn''t noticed and began to blow the fire to life. "Then why do you live like this?" "Tradition." Femur added a few twigs on top of the kindling as the flame caught. "Some spend their time chasing after the easy life, clothes, metal tools, chickens. It just makes them soft. Hidden River goblins like to keep to the old ways." He grinned. "Also, rat meat gives me a fifteen percent experience bonus for one hour." "Good to know." Stew was just about to ask him if he could actually see his experience and how gold figured into anything when more notices suddenly appeared. [One of your monsters has leveled up! Rocky (view specialization options)] [One of your monsters has leveled up! Chuck (view specialization options)] [One of your monsters has leveled up! Bruce (view specialization options)] [One of your monsters has leveled up! Pound (view specialization options)] [One of your monsters has leveled up! Smash (view specialization options)] And five others, with more of the same. These were ten of the twenty fighting golems training in the arena. The acceleration from [Mineral Oil] was paying off. Then there were two more he had been waiting for. [One of your monsters has leveled up! Don (view specialization options)] [One of your monsters has leveled up! M.C.P. (view specialization options)] He confirmed [Controller Golem] for both Don and M.C.P. then renamed all of the newly leveled fighters Fighter A-001 through Fighter A-010. The leading zeros might be wishful thinking, but he would regret it later if he didn''t do it. He renamed the rest of the fighters Fighter B-001 through Fighter B-010, and put all of the pit golems in group C. Then he rotated group A to the pit and group C to the arena. Group B should level up next, so that would keep things flowing nicely, or at least he thought it should. He would just keep moving them as they leveled up. Everything should work fine until the golems became too tough for the spike trap. While he was watching the arena and the pit, he saw that the slimes had really kept the stone weevils in check. He looked back in on the storage room and saw it was in good shape too. He was surprised to see the moss growing there now. Did the stone weevils eat the moss too? That didn''t seem right. He did another quick check around the dungeon using eyes where he had them and checking light settings where he didn''t. The pattern jumped out at him after a moment. The moss liked light, which made sense, and it liked mana-dense areas, but only if there was light. Mana dense. That worried him. He had Johnny 5 stop generating mana for a moment and had Smelter stop making mana glass, then he watched his stats. He was afraid he already knew what he would see. The moss was probably feeding on his mana. [Mana: 285/462] But what he saw was just the opposite. [Mana: 287/462] And ten minutes later. [Mana: 288/462] He found Exterminator 1 and grew another eye to look closely at the moss in the storage room. It was moss. It glowed. Kicking himself, he thought to try [Stat-o-vision?]. [Mystery Unlocked: Mana Moss] [Mana moss is specially adapted to dungeon environments. Growing wherever it can find support and good light. Mana moss thrives in high mana environments and generates 1 mana per hour for every 10 centimeters of coverage.] Free mana. Could he farm this stuff? It also made him think again about alchemy. Surely this had to be something that would make a good potion. He set Smelter and Johnny 5 back to work and just enjoyed watching the numbers go up for a little while. By the time Bossy and the cats were ready to turn in, he had a full mana charge again. [Mana: 500/500] He built one more mana repository and set Smelter to fill it with mana glass. He would let the moss run through the night and see how much mana he gathered. Forge had been busy too. Stew now had eight level ten mana cores. He could level-up again by morning if he was feeling adventurous enough. With the resources growing steadily, monsters and minions leveling up, and the delvers, at least by contractual non-aggression agreements, on his side, but more importantly out of his dungeon, he felt a sense of peace for the first time since he woke up dead. He decided now would be a good time to press the button. [Big Red Button - This big red button may be pressed once per second.] It was a little bit of a letdown because, as far as he could tell, no actual big red button had appeared anywhere in the dungeon. He was hesitant to use it without knowing what it did. It might cause problems, but he was at least reasonably confident it wasn''t something apocalyptic. From the description, he might want to press it every second and that also meant it likely wasn''t some consumable, one-time thing that he would lose if he used it. He selected, "Press The Button." [Button Bonus 0.001%] He pressed it again. Nothing happened, so he waited a second and tried again. [Button Bonus 0.002%] Again. [Button Bonus 0.003%] He waited two seconds and pressed it again. [Button Bonus 0.003%] So it goes down if you don''t maintain it. But bonus to what? He couldn''t use [Stat-o-Vision?] because there was no physical object to observe. At least nothing blew up. Even as he was thinking it, he knew he was tempting fate, but nothing more happened. Nothing went wrong. The peace lasted for many hours. It was past midnight when a new notification appeared. [You have received a missive from Cecil. Read it? (Y/N)] I have mail? Y "The false core shattered! She knows she has been tricked, and she is marching us back toward the dungeon. I believe we will arrive before dawn. Her power is weakened without the core, so I may be able to break free. If I do, I will attempt to delay Her." ¨C Cecil (via [Magic Missive]) Return Policy Finding out what the button did would have to wait. He spawned a golem on his fifth floor and named it "Drinking Bird." He set the golem to press the button every second. The bonus percentage should reach 86% in twenty-four hours. Hopefully, it would be easier to see whatever the bonus was actually for when there was more of a difference to work with. Meanwhile, he had to prepare for company. He started with the golems that had gained their fighting specialization. Where [Mining Golem] caused a big change in appearance, modifying the hands of those golems into mining tools, the changes for [Fighting Golem] seemed more flexible, but just as significant. All three training groups now sported deeply engraved lines in their surface that made them look like walking suits of banded armor. They had the same sort of armored kilts or skirts that the two delvers, Garrik and Ba''Rush wore. Their heads changed to resemble helmets with eye slits and a thin crest. The armor reminded him of something from a gladiator movie which was fair considering how they were spending their time. Come to think of it, only Raek and a few of the bandits had worn pants. Everyone else was in robes or what looked like long shirts. He hadn''t thought about it before. One more thing to ask about when he had a chance. He might need to know what armor people expected if he was going to create more loot. The fighting golem''s movements changed too. No longer slow and clumsy, they now moved with a grace and precision none of the other golems showed. As he watched a battle, one of the newly leveled Group C golems, number six, ducked a punch only to turn the motion into a fluid sweep to the leg of its opponent. That opponent, a Group A golem, number four, leaped over the sweeping leg to plant a powerful kick to C-6''s face, sending its head rolling. C-6 didn''t seem to mind the loss, launching itself up the now-exposed back of A-4, driving an uppercut with all the power in its legs and body. Its fist smashed through the center of its opponent, shattering it into pieces for a comeback victory. The surviving golem didn''t waste a beat celebrating. It turned to attack another golem that had also just finished off its own sparring partner. But C-6 did seem to be at a disadvantage without its head. It faced its opponent squarely using some sense, but it completely missed a spinning kick to the chest, and it made no attempt to block or dodge. C-6 exploded in a shower of gravel. The surviving golem, A-2, landed gracefully with bent legs, but it was so heavy the sound still echoed like a boulder smashing into the dungeon floor. If they were this awesome after a day of training, he couldn''t wait to see what they were like after a week or a month. Watching the fight, he realized he might get more out of them if they came to each fight at their best. A-2 had taken out C-6 with a cheap shot instead of out-fighting its opponent. He added automatic repairs to Don''s task schedule, even though it would cost a bit of stone and mana. He also took a peek at the updated stats for these martial golems. [Health 12/12] [Agility 6] [Strength 8] [Constitution 3] They were still weak compared to even the lower-level living bandits, but they might be enough against Eira''s zombies. He would still rather have some turrets. Or for zombies, maybe a few flame throwers. Flame throwers. Not a bad idea. He moved his attention back to Level 1 and the [Cauldron Cap] toadstools. [Cauldron Cap This extraordinary dungeon mushroom, with its cap resembling a bubbling cauldron, is a mesmerizing fusion of nature and elemental energy. The Cauldron Cap is a living furnace, radiating intense and constant heat. Its cap, resembling an inverted cauldron, pulses with a red glow. The air shimmers with the waves of heat emanating from this fire affinity fungi.] It already put out considerable heat, but maybe he could improve on that. He spawned a new slime and set it to assimilate the mushroom. The slime was tentative, stretching a pseudopod toward the heat, then drawing back. Stew was disappointed, but it had been a long shot. He was just about to send it back to help Exterminator 1 when the little guy tried again, this time with more confidence. It engulfed the mushroom. The inside of the slime began to bubble and boil. Several bubbles broke the surface releasing steam. Stew watched in horror. He hadn''t meant to sacrifice the slime. He quickly named the slime "Test" to save it from being killed entirely, but before he could call the whole thing off, something changed. The little slime suddenly turned a reddish color and the mushroom dissolved. The bubbles stopped, but waves of heat still rose off the slime. [Your Monster Has Evolved! Thermal Slime Thermal Affinity Unlocked] That was a relief, no grilled slime. It wasn''t the blowtorch he had hoped for, but the slime was putting off even more heat than the mushroom. Either the bubbling noises or the heat woke Femur who was snoozing in his hut a short distance away. "What are you up to?" He peered out of his rathide shelter with bleary eyes. "Sorry, just an experiment. Go back to sleep, and I''ll move this down a level," Stew answered, then remembered to add, "We probably have some zombies coming, so get some rest. I''ll wake you when they get here." Femur scratched his cheek and yawned. "Ah fine, they''ll make for quiet neighbors." He rolled over and went back to sleep. Stew realized Femur had never met Eira and the zombies. Never mind, he could catch-up later. Instead, he sent little "Test" down to the second level. It was just the one empty room right now with a stairwell at each end, but that would make a perfect temporary lab. Stew wasn''t sure what he could do with a mobile radiator, but it would depend on just how hot the slime could get. Better safe than sorry. "OK, Test, can you show me what you can do? What''s the hottest you can get?" The slime burbled in acknowledgment, then grew still, as if it was thinking or preparing something. The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident. Suddenly the slime burst into flame and began to slide across the floor like an especially fast snail. It left a flaming trail behind it. The heat was intense. If the ceiling wasn''t made of stone it would probably be burning already. [Test] [Fire Slime - Level 1] [Mana Cost - 1] [Health 10/10] [Agility 2] [Strength 3] [Constitution 15] [Actions: 1/1] [Action Recharge: 1 / day] [Special attack: Incinerate] [Assign Task (1 action):] [1. Generate Lamp Oil] Not a flamethrower, but it might work out just fine. Stew renamed "Test" to "Flamer 1," then immediately spawned "Flamer 2" through "Flamer 5" and sent them to assimilate their own mushrooms. There weren''t enough [Cauldron Cap] mushrooms to go around in the single-room cavern, but Stew was able to replace them with dungeon repairs. Once they each had a turn to assimilate a mushroom, he brought the new [Thermal Slimes] back to the second floor. Fire seemed like a good theme for this new floor, so he called a couple of [Mining Golems] and M.U.L.E. up from the fifth floor and put them to work expanding the level while he cut grooves and channels into the floors with customization. He spent some time looking for a way to add ducts through the ceiling, but that wasn''t an option, at least not yet. He found that his new core upgrade allowed him to double the number of rooms on the level. He took full advantage of that to make a long and meandering gauntlet between the first floor stairwell and the one to the third floor. It would take some time for the mining golems to finish their work and for the slimes to prepare their welcome. He let M.U.L.E. run the operation. While they worked, he checked his mana and saw that even with the new slimes, his mana stores were still about where they were when Bossy and the kittens knocked off for the evening. This had to be the moss. He set all of the rooms on the second and fifth floors to maximum light to see if that might encourage more to grow. There probably wasn''t much mana on two yet, but maybe the slimes would be enough to get things started, assuming the heat didn''t kill the stuff outright. [You have received a missive from Cecil. Read it? (Y/N)] Uh, oh. "We''re almost there! I can see the top of the hill through the trees. She is very irritated. The older soul has mostly retreated with the core gone, and the younger soul is having trouble controlling so many of us. I''m finding myself able to move on my own as long as her attention is elsewhere. I''m doing my best to hide my freedom, but will try to slow the advance. Oh look, one of the others just wandered off. This may be my opportunity! If I don''t make it back, this has been an entertaining contract! Please give Sluice my regards, but tell him I still don''t get his jokes." ¨C Cecil Sluice is a him? Jokes? So the necromancer was having some problems. If he could talk to Cecil, maybe they could hatch some sort of plan. Now seemed like a good time to do something before she got her act together. Hmm. Yes, it would be great if he could talk to Cecil, just like when he had the false core. Stew suddenly had a terrible, dangerous inspiration. After all, if this went wrong, he would be giving her exactly what she wanted and destroying his advantage at the same time. But right now she had a gaggle of low-level zombies, barely under her control, and this might be his only chance to take the initiative for once. He might be a dungeon, but that didn''t mean he had to sit around and wait for trouble to come to him. Or maybe it did. If he was different from other dungeons, it was time to prove it. He reached out to Don and M.C.P. and sent a special order down to Forge. Thirty Fighting Golems snapped to attention. Missing arms, heads, and legs began to regrow as the controllers repaired them. Once they were whole, he set instructions for the controllers, giving Don Group A and M.C.P. Group C. He split group B between them, giving B 1-5 to Don. Those five had special instructions. He sent Sluice with Don and Sweeper with M.C.P. The golems formed in rows of five in the arena room with the controllers to their side like drill sergeants. He gave the command and they turned in unison to face the south door, three steps exactly, moving in perfect sync. Rather than march them across the plains of level four and up five stories of stairs, he swapped the whole arena with a room on the second floor. Each of the five group B golems in the first rank grabbed a [Thermal Slime] to match their own number. Once the slimes settled onto the golems'' shoulders, Stew swapped the arena again. This time he swapped with Femur''s office on the first floor. The door the golems faced was now the dungeon entrance. Stew reached into the customization menu and turned the simple wooden door to the outside into a [Temple Entrance] with a four-meter wide opening screened by large columns of gray stone. Five shallow steps led down to the grass of the meadow. "Femur, wake up. I''m going to need you to talk to our delver friends again." Stew grabbed the mana core from Forge and used it to form a new [False Core] right next to Femur''s bed. "And grab that, we''re going to need it." Femur yawned and stretched, then picked-up the core. He put it in a rough sack and slung it over his shoulder. He strolled over to the cave entrance and stopped, gaping at the arena that had replaced his office. His gaze moved to the assembled Golems. "Where are we going?" "Hunting." Stew gave the order and the fighting golems began to march. Their feet hit the stone like a single drum the size of a mountain. Femur grinned and joined in behind. Stew moved his mind to Don where he marched beside the third rank. In the meadow, the delver''s scattered out of their camp like rabbits. Stew had to admit he had hoped that would be their reaction. It didn''t hurt to keep his bluff in, but he wasn''t here to fight them. "Tell them that Eira is returning with her undead. We''re marching out to meet her forces," Stew said to Femur, then added, "and tell them they can join us, but I have to test a couple of things, so stay back and don''t get caught in the middle." Femur cocked his head and looked at the ranks of golems. "I''m guessing this Eira isn''t an invited guest?" "Let''s say she had a defective product, and I''m going to introduce her to the Customer Service Team." Femur shrugged and walked over to the delvers who were crouching in their bare feet with weapons drawn. Only Ba''Rush was fully dressed. He had apparently been on watch. While Femur kept them distracted, Stew tested that he could swap his mind back and forth between Don and his core down on the fifth floor. Just as he suspected, the [False Core] worked like an extension of his domain, at least for that purpose. Now the second question. He set C-2 through C-10 to attack C-1. They destroyed their comrade instantly. Stew respawned C-1 right where it stood. He had C-1 pick-up its own dropped mana core and toss it back into the dungeon where he could absorb it and send it to storage. He couldn''t be sure he could still respawn the golems while under attack, but it was promising. "How is this possible?" Garrik was staring at the golems where they stood silent and still as statues. "Cores can''t control their monsters in a dungeon break, not outside of their domain." "Don''t compare oaks to acorns, kid." Femur grinned and shook his head. "Now get your skirt on and let''s go smash some bones." It took the delvers only a few minutes to get into their armor and fall in beside Femur. Using Don''s golem vision, Stew had been tracking a few firefly-like, violet lights moving deep in the forest. They were coming steadily closer. He saw that they gathered around a much brighter core of the same deep color. Another glowed with a pale gray light. That had to be Cecil. Interestingly, there were just as many lights off to the right and these were much brighter. They were red with life. Two familiar lights glowed so brightly that he could nearly see their faces, Lithel and Sella. They and their new friends moved rapidly toward Eira''s position, so he wasn''t surprised when he heard from Cecil again. [You have received a missive from Cecil. Read it? (Y/N)] "Great news! We''re under attack!" Yes, yes you are, Stew thought. He set the first rank of golems on fire and gave the order to march. Flamethrower Diplomacy The heavy drumbeat of the golem''s march was the only sound until they reached the treeline, where it was replaced with the snapping of branches and twigs as the golems marched right through the underbrush without pausing. Up ahead, Stew could make out the mana glow of the two other forces converging in the forest. The undead had stopped and were now gathered closer together while the bandits spread out into a long line to the right. He couldn''t tell much more through the trees. He had Femur catch the delvers up on what he knew while they marched. He left out Cecil''s messages and any mention of the false cores, just implying that he could see the two forces approaching from far away, which was strictly true, if not the whole story. "The new band with Lithel will be the main threat, you might attack them first," Raek offered. "Eira''s not your enemy. You can reason with her," Garrick added. "What about that other spirit that''s possessed her?" Ba''Rush gave the young fighter a grim look. "You think it''s left anything of her to reason with?" "That''s her grandmother. Her soul must have been hidden in that locket. You heard her, she''s doing all of this to protect Eira. She would do anything to protect the last of her line." Garrick shrugged. "She just was, is, a very direct sort of person." "I know that story," Raek said. "And it was your father who led the vote in the Senate to wipe out Eira''s family. Do you think Eira knows that, because I''m sure Lady Briar did, so maybe you are one of the things she''ll do anything to protect Eira from?" Stew had no idea what they were talking about, so he stuck to his original plan. He aimed the golems straight at Eira. He could decide what to do about the bandits later. The Flamers and burning golems in the lead left smoldering footprints behind them, but the forest was damp enough that no open fires started. Four zombies burst through the brush, charging straight at the lead golems. They wore weapons but didn''t draw them. Instead, they gnashed their teeth and clawed the air, throwing themselves against the burning golems. The fire spread to the zombie''s clothes and bodies, but they gnawed at the golem''s stone necks with no hint of self-preservation or reason. The Flamers took the opportunity to cover them in burning oil to help the fire along. The golems didn''t react or slow and the zombies were carried along until they fell off, still burning, only to be ground under the feet of the marching golems. There were only charred rags and splintered bones by the time the delvers and Femur reached the remains, though one still tried, feebly, to claw and bite. This had to be more of what Cecil had described. It didn''t look like Eira was controlling these four at all. The front of the column marched through the same bushes up ahead and came upon Eira''s main force. Her undead were gathered around her in a tight formation. These zombies had their weapons drawn and looked alert and aware, though they seemed oblivious to the arrows that covered them like porcupine quills. Stew spotted Cecil standing in the back right behind Eira. He had picked up a sword from somewhere and was holding it awkwardly. Eira herself crouched in the center of her monsters, her face drawn and pale and dark circles under her eyes. Just then, a short, heavy arrow from somewhere deep in the trees struck one of the lead golems, shattering its head with the force. A volley of arrows just like it followed, most missing or glancing off the stone bodies, but some doing considerable damage where they struck true. Stew repaired the lead golem himself, relieved to see he could still do it in combat, then set the controllers to manage the rest of the repairs. Fortunately, the controllers themselves were on the far side from the bandits. The noise and commotion seemed to draw Cecil''s attention, he looked over at the column of golems and waved excitedly. "You got my message!" His voice came to Stew''s mind. "I wasn''t sure it would work. I''ll just finish Her off and we can head home." Cecil raised the sword high in both hands with the point aimed at Eira''s back. "Wait!" Garrik crouched down to look Femur in the eye. "You don''t have to kill her. Let me talk to her." "You''re a strapping boy." Femur craned his head around the golems to have a look at Eira where she crouched. "You should look for a mate with more muscle. Stronger kids." He glanced around at the zombies and his eyes widened. "Oh, SHE''s the necromancer. Good choice. Almost as good as a shaman and they''re great at making friends. How much is she worth to you, say five gold?" "Hold on." Stew said to both Femur and Cecil at the same time. Femur''s comment and something the goblin had said earlier about the zombies making quiet neighbors gave Stew an idea. Maybe it was time to start thinking like a dungeon. "Cecil, tell her I''m willing to accept her surrender. Femur, tell Garrik to talk to her, convince her to stand down." Femur nodded. "Boss says you get one shot. Convince her to surrender, and we won''t feed her to the rats." Stew moved his view to Cecil and told him to give Eira the message. Cecil lowered his sword and crouched slightly. Arrows still rained all around. "The Lord of the Dungeon would like to offer you the opportunity to surrender. It will not be offered again." Eira''s head snapped around. She squinted at Cecil then sighed. "This is no good. Now I''ve lost control of you too." She continued to herself, muttering. "I told you this was too much too soon. I can''t control this number on my own." "Talk to him!" Garrik shouted from behind the golems. "Make a deal." Then to Femur, Garrik added. "If you offer her a deal, she''ll work with you. She just wants to grow her magic, and learn. She''d make a good ally. Her and her grandmother, both of them." Some of the zombies in the front of the huddle sprouted flaming arrows. Maybe the archers were inspired by the burning golems, or maybe they had planned it all along, but these arrows were much more effective on the zombies. One, and then another fell as the flames spread. They burned like candles. If you encounter this narrative on Amazon, note that it''s taken without the author''s consent. Report it. "Eira," Garrik called out. "This is pointless. If these bandits don''t hunt you down the Legion will! You need an ally!" Eira cursed and rubbed her eyes. "Fine. I''ll listen. What are the terms?" Another zombie fell, burning, but her voice was firm. "I need to be able to trust you," Stew said, speaking directly through Cecil. "Surrender, and I''ll throw my support behind you against these bandits. In return, you enter my service for five years as a minion." "Will you stick me at a banquet table and make me tell some ridiculous tale to delvers?" She glared at Cecil. "Because that''s not going to impress the battlemages Rome will send after me." Her face changed, becoming more serious. There was someone else looking through her eyes now. Her gaze bored right through Cecil and Stew felt like she could see all the way to his core. "I don''t know how strong you are. You feel like a fresh incarnate. You may be of some help to my granddaughter against these bandits, but can you stand against the Republic''s legions?" More arrows struck and more zombies fell while Stew tried to think of an answer. Legions? Republic? When AM I? A flaming arrow struck Cecil, but just rattled around in his ribcage and fell out, seemingly doing no damage. "Let''s talk more about legions later. Right now, isn''t surviving this attack enough to start?" "Give me another one of those crystals and get me close to their lines. I''ll end this. Then we can talk." This was just what he wanted to avoid. There was no way he was going to let her know he had brought another false core. "I have another idea." Stew set the golems marching until they were assembled between the zombies and the bandits. More arrows landed from a seemingly endless supply, but they weren''t flying randomly, nearly every strike did damage now. The golem''s controllers were repairing the other golems constantly, but Stew had to repair the controllers himself. But the burning arrows had no more effect on the golems than a regular strike. And neither seemed to have any effect on the slimes at all. Stew spread the formation into a hollow square. Eira, Cecil, and her remaining zombies gathered in the center with Garrik, Raek, Ba''Rush, and Femur. The archers kept to cover at first, but when they saw that the combined formation didn''t move forward and that they had no ranged attacks of their own, they began to step from cover and take longer to fire, trying to pick off the living hidden among the stone warriors and the dead. "What are we doing?" Garrik asked. "We''re dead if we just stand here." "True," Raek spoke for the first time. "But I''m assuming our host has a plan." Plan was too strong a word. Stew waited until not just the archers but the rest of the bandits gathered in a skirmish line in front of the trees. The two Fae were there with them, Lithel in line with the archers and Sella hanging back, just watching. When the golem''s sight showed Stew there were no others hiding back in the trees in reserve, he finally gave the order. There hadn''t been time to practice, so he was surprised to see how gracefully the flaming golems lifted their companions and threw, one-armed like siege engines attacking a castle. The golems, soaked in oil, and still burning, sprinted forward, following immediately after the slimes. "Wheeee" Stew could feel the thermal slimes'' excitement as they flew through the air, driving their temperature up to the maximum. Unlike cannonballs or flaming barrels from a catapult, the slimes spread themselves flat in the air and glided toward their enemies, favoring the archers. The next few moments were a gruesome cacophony of screams, sizzling noises, and the wet thump of stone on flesh. The bandits were completely caught off guard by the counterattack, but they fell back and to the left to regroup. Seven of them were down and unlikely to get back up. Lithel was the only surviving archer. The Flaming golems and slimes reformed also and turned to press the attack, but vines launched themselves from the forest entangling the golems'' feet and drilling into the stone of their bodies. Speaking through Femur and Cecil in unison, Stew shouted "Attack!" and sent the entire formation sprinting at the remaining bandits at a dead run. Eira sent all of the zombies with them. Garrik, Ba''Rush, Femur, and Cecil followed close behind. The bandits put up a fierce resistance for a few minutes, but the combined force of zombies and golems outnumbered the survivors more and more as the bandits fell. It didn''t take long for them to accept that their enemies didn''t mind losing a limb just to gain an advantage, and healed as quickly as they were injured. Sella, overwhelmed with her healing efforts, had no more time to summon vines. Cecil swung his sword wildly, doing more damage to himself than any enemy, but Femur managed to get in several jabs with his dagger, leaping between the golems'' legs. Then the high-level delvers arrived, coming around the flank of the combined force and finishing bandits in one blow as they went. That broke the bandits'' line. They scattered back into the relative safety of the forest. Lithel and Sella weren''t the first to leave, but they weren''t the last. Stew held the golems back from pursuing, thinking they might be at a disadvantage in the tight spaces between the trees. Eira held the zombies back also, with considerably more effort. More and more of them were acting feral after the fight, but they soon quieted and stood in a rough line. He could see the bandits retreating fast through the forest. There had been maybe twenty or twenty-five at the start. Now there was only Lithel, Sella, and six, maybe seven more. Stew looked over his own ranks and saw the golems were dinged and damaged, but would be fully repaired in another minute or two. The slimes all seemed to have had a fine time and didn''t have a scratch. Arrows, swords, clubs, and axes had no effect on them it seemed, and the Flamers at least were also immune to fire. This was a very good thing to know. The zombies were in worse shape but almost all of them were still standing. Maybe Eira could find some fresh recruits among the fallen. We won. Stew realized this was his first actual success since awakening as a dungeon, and the plan and execution had been his own. The wolves had been terrifying, but now they worked for him. The delvers, the bandits, and the necromancer had all seemed fearsome, but they were working, if not for him, at least not against him now. He should move fast to consolidate his power before the next threat showed up. He doubted these bandits would give up easily, and they probably wouldn''t make the mistake of bringing archers to a flamethrower fight next time. Eira had also mentioned Rome and legions. That didn''t sound good at all. He realized he had other things to worry about right now. The crackle and pop of small fires sounded all around them and the smoke was starting to get thicker. The delvers and Eira were covering their faces and falling back. Femur had a dirty rag tied around his face and moved from fallen bandit to fallen bandit, finishing off the wounded and looting the bodies. The golems and slimes might not mind the flames, but a forest fire was starting all around them, and that was likely to be bad for the health of the rest of his compatriots. It would also likely draw more attention. "Fall back!" He had Cecil shout. "Regroup at the dungeon entrance." He didn''t trust Eira enough to send her back to the dungeon with Cecil, Femur, and the rest, but the delvers could probably handle her zombies if it came to that, and they were under contract to protect the dungeon. Just to make sure, he started spawning more first-level golems down on the fifth level. Groups D, E, and F. If worse came to worse he could smash all of these and respawn them back at the dungeon too. As the others retreated from the smoke and flames, he sent the golems forward to try to tear out a fire break and stomp out the fires, but he didn''t know the first thing about firefighting. It didn''t look like it was going to make much difference. Big Red Button Sluice and Sweeper weren''t as fireproof as the Flamers, so he kept them back along with Don and M.C.P. The Flamers were right in the thick of it. This would have been a big help except the thermal slimes enjoyed the heat and kept encouraging the fire along. Just as the golems managed to stomp and tear out the worst of a hotspot, the Flamers would helpfully set it all alight again. Stew was having trouble expressing himself to them in a way they understood. "No! Stop. No fire!" The slimes just replied with enthusiastic confusion as if he was praising them. It occurred to him that these slimes weren''t as smart as Sluice for some reason. He didn''t want to be responsible for burning down half of the forest, but he was running out of options. The crackle had grown into a low roaring sound, and where there had been whisps of smoke, now the billowing clouds of it were as thick as fog. It hid the sun and sky so well that it felt like dusk. Maybe there was some way to use the Flamers to make a backfire? He had no idea how that worked, so it would probably just make things worse if he tried. There had to be something more he could do. These were thermal slimes. Maybe he was just using the wrong concepts to explain things? He tried "Not hot." But that didn''t seem to make any difference. "Cold. Let it cool off. Let it get cold." That had an immediate effect, but it wasn''t what he expected. Every one of the slimes suddenly turned pale blue and grew so cold that ice began to form on the golems carrying them. The temperature change was so sudden that two of the golems developed serious cracks. Still, that was better than setting more fires. On a hunch, he had a golem toss Flamer 1 into the hottest part of the fire. "Go! Eat that fire! Make it cold!" Stew projected to the slime. Flamer 1 burbled back cheerfully and crawled up the most involved part of a tree, spreading itself in a thin sheet that smothered the flames while absorbing an incredible amount of heat. An icy mist began to spread out from the slime that was paler than the smoke. Everywhere the blue mist touched, the fire snuffed out immediately, and frost formed. Stew wondered if the haze was some kind of magic or if there was that much moisture in the air. He had the other golems toss their slime companions, aiming at the other hotspots, then sent B-1 to poke at a branch on the first tree. The branch shattered at the golem''s touch. The wood was well charred, so, at first, Stew thought it might just be burned through, but when he next prodded a branch still covered in green leaves it shattered too with a glassy tinkle. A clear liquid was beginning to drip from the slime. It smoked as it fell, evaporating before it hit the ground. Stew watched the drops and it all began to make sense. He remembered a chemistry class and a thermos full of liquid nitrogen. Ms. Graves had dipped a rose in the thermos and shattered it against the counter, just like the leaves had shattered on the frozen branch. With the help of the thermal slimes, the flames were soon extinguished. He spent another few minutes using the slimes and well-placed stomps to put out any remaining embers. It helped that golem vision seemed to be as good at sensing heat as it was at sensing mana. It took longer to find a way to convince the slimes that lukewarm could be fun too, but he finally got them back into a non-lethal temperature range. He sent word back to Femur that they had the fire out and turned toward home, his mind full of new ideas for level two. Meanwhile, the others were gathered around the delver''s camp, resting and treating small nicks and cuts from the battle. No one seemed seriously injured, although Eira looked like she could use a good week''s sleep. He moved his focus to Femur and asked a question that had been bothering him since he had seen the bandits approach. "Just who are these people, Lithel, Sella, their friends? How did you end up with them?" Raek looked up from a dagger he was cleaning and oiling. "We hired them on after our company had to¡­" he glanced to Ba''Rush and they shared a look. "Our former band had to rest for a while. Lithel''s band was a bunch of Aquitani Gauls like Lithel and Sella. Mostly human since the Fae tribe they''re from had exiled them." "Their people thought they might be untrustworthy," Ba''Rush said with mock seriousness. "Yes, a well-founded concern as we''ve seen," Raek continued. "But this bunch, the new bunch they were with just now, those weren''t Aquitani." He shared that look again with Ba''Rush. Neither one of them smiled. "Helvetii." Ba''Rush said it the way someone might say "Cancer." "If Lithel and Sella weren''t already working for the Helvetii, it seems like they are now, and they will be telling them about this place." Rake looked to Garrik and then to Femur. "We may not have long before they come back with a large force. Your patron''s abilities are impressive, but are you prepared for a besieging army?" He patted a medallion pinned to his sleeve. "I need to update Theus anyway. We need to talk about our options." "We should let our friends know too," Ba''Rush added. "If Merlin and the Helvetti send a large enough force, they may find them. They''ll be vulnerable." "Who are your friends?" Stew asked. "And who is Theus? Why do you need to update him?" "He''s our tutor and mentor," Eira said. "Garrik and mine. He hired Raek." "So you work for this Theus?" Femur asked on his own. "We''re colleagues. We share some common interests and sometimes work together." "You''re spies," Garrik said with a sour expression. "I don''t know how I didn''t see it before. If my father knew he would¨C" "Your father knows where Theus'' loyalties lie, and mine," Raek responded lightly, not even looking up. Garrik gripped his sword and tensed. "Careful. My father is loyal to Rome." Raek smiled with a wrinkled brow as if Garrik were a toddler who had said something unintentionally funny. "Of course, your father is loyal to Rome! But he''s a good senator and makes sure to build diplomatic back channels and special relationships. That''s how things get done. I will be updating him also. We may need his support before this is all said and done, and Rome''s legions can be here faster than the Golden Fleet or the Barges Of The Sun." "You want to bring the legions here?" Eira frowned. "Out of the pot and into the flames." Garrik reached out to put a hand on her shoulder but drew it back. "I could talk to my father. He could send Gaius. They''re good friends, and he owes my father." The golems and thermal slimes arrived then, and everyone got to their feet. The golems were covered in soot but whole. They marched in unison right up the steps and into the dungeon. The delvers watched them in silence. Each of their faces said they were deep in thought. Stew had more questions now than he had started with, and he was about to ask them, but Eira spoke first. She turned to Cecil rather than Femur. "Tell the dungeon I''m ready to talk about our bargain. It has delivered on its promise." Stew spoke directly through Cecil. "As we discussed, five years as my minion. I will give you a core, a level to manage, and the ability to respawn after any defeat." Stew thought for a moment. "But I need contracts from both you and your grandmother, individually." This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience. They talked more about terms while Eira''s zombies milled around aimlessly. The other delvers didn''t seem concerned by them. so Stew ignored them. His attention was split between that conversation and transferring his golems back to the fifth floor. He put Femur''s office back on the second level. It looked a little strange through the wide entrance and columns, so he changed it around to just a stone bench and some torches. Then he put a large stone door over the entrance to Femur''s cavern. He had some ideas for that too, but wanted to talk to Femur first. It might be good to have more goblins for the first level, but he wasn''t sure how to pay them. Maybe that was something Big John could help with that [Prospecting] special ability, assuming it was anything like it sounded. Stew left Femur and Cecil to negotiate for a bit and checked in with the mining golems. With all of his attention on the fighting golems, he had left the miners standing in front of a raw workface on the fifth floor for almost a day and a half. When he checked in, M.U.L.E. had become so bored that the slime had taken to stretching itself into a convincing imitation of a snake so that it could climb around the frozen golems like its own personal playground. Stew realized the difficulty of keeping up with all of the different parts of the dungeon was just going to get worse. In fact, he was already forgetting to restart the arena and the golem harvester pit. He felt so scattered. He needed a checklist, some sort of task management. Maybe he would get Cecil or Femur some paper and pens to start keeping lists. In fact, he could¡­ Stop. Just stop. He wanted to think, just breathe, even if breathing was impossible. He felt a little like he had when he first awakened, trapped and confused, unable to move. There was an army coming, an army. He took a moment and counted to twenty. First things first. He created a new golem, naming it "Mining Controller 1." He set the new golem to drive the mining golems to mine more stone, all except Big John. He opened Big John''s menu and looked at the [Prospecting] option. [Special ability: Prospect (20 Mana)] [The Prospect ability enables the Mining Golem to detect and classify various types of minerals and ores present in the underground environment. It can unlock valuable mundane and arcane resources with remarkable accuracy. Likelihood and value of discoveries increase with Mining Golem level.] That did sound useful and twenty mana wasn''t a very expensive cost to find out if it was worth doing. He selected it. The golem turned in place until it faced the wall. [Your monster, Big John, has found something!] [Stone Quarry discovered] Great job, big guy. Yes, yes we''re digging up rocks right here. He added Big John back to mining. Maybe it would get more interesting when the golem leveled up. His attention focused briefly on the wall and he was surprised to see it now had a System tag. [Stone Quarry (level 1) - This quarry will yield 100 [Stone] per day.] Sorry Big John, looks like I was a little too hasty. This is¡­ interesting. It wasn''t much stone compared to digging out rooms, but it did mean he could just set the miners to work in a particular place each day, and it had a level. Maybe it would get better too. He let Mining Controller 1 take over while he had M.U.L.E. assimilate some stone to become a Stone Slime, which was something else he had forgotten to do. Then he left them to work while he checked in on M.C.P. and Don. The two controllers now had twice as many golems to manage, but neither seemed to be overly taxed by the chore. He set them back to running the mana core farming and golem training, wondering what their maximum capacity might be. Then he remembered to check back with the goblin, the skeleton, and the necromancer. "And just what kind of research requires a firstborn?" Eira said, leaning down until her face was level with Femur''s. From Cecil''s vantage, Stew could see that she was gathering the fingers of her right hand, whether to punch Femur or curse him was hard to tell. Stew borrowed Cecil''s voice again. "Hold on. I thought we talked about this last time." "We didn''t?" Femur said with a puzzled expression. One more thing to remember to do. "No firstborn, no weight in gold, no half your holdings," Stew said, rubbing Cecil''s eye sockets. "Just your services as a level boss for the term, your allegiance, and your support in defense will be sufficient." "See," Garrik said. "I told you to wait until his Patron returned." Stew made the changes to the same contract he had been improving each time and shared it with her, but found he couldn''t share it with the grandmother. "Do we have a deal? With both of you?" "I need assurances that you won''t just turn me over to the Legion when they arrive," Eira said. "They won''t have any reason to bother you. As far as I''m concerned the dungeon killed all the bandits." Raek said. "I believe that is what we all saw, isn''t it?" Garrik and Ba''Rush nodded. Eira sighed and accepted the contract. "I''ll need a contract from both of you." Stew gestured at the locket. Eira nodded and touched it with her left hand. Her face changed immediately, growing more serious and wary. "Let me see that." The elder Lady Briar took a long time reading through the contract but eventually accepted it too. "It looks fair, but if you betray us, I''ll find a way to grind you into a glittering paste." "Ah get off it." Femur snorted. "You evil inanimate objects need to learn to get along." "You are a vile little man." Lady Briar glared, but there was a twinkle in her eye. "But since we are colleagues now, do you happen to keep any toadstool wine around?" Her shoulders hunched and her head shook as Eira retook control. "You will not pour some goblin concoction down my throat. Remember this is my body!" "When you''re ready, come to the second floor and we''ll start on your level," Stew said with Cecil''s voice, as he swapped the thermal slimes down a level. He would keep Femur on the first floor, put the Briars on the second, and have the thermal slimes on the third, in between them and Bossy''s level, and even more importantly, between the necromancers and his core on the fifth. Not that he didn''t trust them, but he didn''t trust them. He mentally checked his nonexistent to-do list. That was everything, right? It still felt like he was forgetting something. He had levels and, apparently, an army to build, and was anxious to get to it, but something kept nagging at his mind. He turned his attention to the slime level and tried not to think about it in hopes something would remind of whatever it was later. He had just learned that setting the thermal slimes to train like the golems had the interesting effect of turning the third floor into a wind tunnel when a notification reminded him of at least one of the other things he had been forgetting. [The Big Red Button Is Fully Charged] And exactly one second later because he hadn''t thought about setting a limit for Drinking Bird''s button pushing. [Big Red Button Pressed - All minions and monsters will spawn at 100% higher level for the next five minutes.] And one second after that. [Button Bonus 0.001%] Stew switched his attention to M.C.P. and watched the mana core processing pit. The first round of golems smashed went in as mostly level 2 fighters, although he spotted two level 3s from the B group that had gained extra experience in the fight in the forest. They shattered and respawned. [Fighting Golem - Level 4] [Fighting Golem - Level 6] [Fighting Golem - Level 6] And again. [Fighting Golem - Level 8] [Fighting Golem - Level 10] [Fighting Golem - Level 10] Maybe level 10 was some kind of cap? [Fighting Golem - Level 10] [Fighting Golem - Level 10] [Fighting Golem - Level 10] [Max monster level for Category 2 Core] Level 10 wasn''t bad, and he knew what he had to do to raise his category. It looked like he could check "build an army" off his list too, or would be able to soon enough. Right after he got those levels built. He let the golems go on training just in case they were learning skills beyond just leveling. "Cecil, I need you to grab some papyrus and pens from the first floor and meet me on the second. I want you to take notes." "I do not see any of those things on the first floor." After a moment, he added, "Femur says you removed them." "Make a note of that too. We need to get more organized. Bossy, how''s your memory?" "Eternal and flawless." "Even better. Start a list. We need to finish levels one, two and three. I need to build an army and maybe some steam-powered siege weapons, those would be good. Also did someone say something about ''Merlin?'' " To Do List Stew remembered a mandatory training for time management. It had been pretty basic and they hadn''t provided any coffee or snacks, so he had mostly zoned out. But he remembered a metaphor they had used for packing a schedule. It was like filling a jar with rocks, gravel, and sand. The trick was to start with the big rocks, then add the gravel, or the sand would take up all the room, and you would never fit everything in the jar. He started his list of "things to do to survive as a dungeon" with his big rocks. First there was what he wanted to do. Learn. Grow. Build. Then, there was what he had to do. Make myself too tough to kill, even if they try. Everything left were things he hoped to do to make the other things easier and to buy him more time, which he could sum up as: Make myself more valuable alive than dead. So he listed the actual things he could think of to do, in no particular order. Find a way to generate more mana, faster. Finish the slime level and pick a boss. Build an undead level for the necromancer and her zombies. Check out all of the upgrade notices for the golems. Replace the view I lost when I applied [Room to Graze] on Bossy''s level. Level-up Big John and send him prospecting again. Level-up all the monsters and minions! Charge admission? The last was a thought that came to him as he was thinking about ways to be too valuable to kill. And before he forgot, he added another item to the list. What''s with this "Merlin" character? Is that for real? That raised a question that was starting to bother him more and more. When am I? It turned into a long list, but just having it all written down made Stew feel like he was finally starting to get things under control for the first time since he drove into a phone pole. Now he could do the most comforting things he knew how to do ¨C categorize, prioritize, and optimize. Since it checked multiple boxes, the first thing he did was review all of the notifications he received when the golems leveled up. It looked like he had missed two important decision points in their evolution by going so fast. [Your Fighting Golem is now level 5. Select a combat specialization.] [1. Unarmed] [2. Shield and One Handed Weapon] [3. Two Handed Weapon] [4. Spear] Still no ranged weapons, unless you counted slimes. [Your Fighting Golem is now level 10. Select a primary and a secondary combat role.] [Must select a specialization before selecting a role.] [A. Unarmed:] [- Primary: [1. Grappler] [2. Striker] [3. Deflector]] [- Secondary: [4. Brawler] [5. Martial Artist] [6. Wrestler]] [B. Shield and One-Handed Weapon:] [- Primary: [1. Swordsman] [2. Axeman] [3. Maceman]] [- Secondary: [4. Defender] [5. Duelist] [6. Shieldbearer]] [C. Two-Handed Weapon:] [- Primary: [1. Greatswordsman] [2. Greataxeman] [3. Polearmsman]] [- Secondary: [4. Cleaver] [5. Crusher] [6. Skullsplitter]] [D. Spear:] [- Primary: [1. Lancer] [2. Pikeman] [3. Halberdier]] [- Secondary: [4. Impaler] [5. Skirmisher] [6. Guard]] That was¡­ a whole lot of options. He was sure that there was a difference between what would work best in a dungeon and what might make a good army. He just didn''t know the first thing about how either kind of fighting actually worked. When in doubt, experiment. He had golems. He had an arena. He pulled group C out and set them all to A.2.5 because there was no way he was missing out on martial arts golems. The golems immediately morphed into glossy obsidian mannequins proportioned exactly like a human instead of a crude, oversized statue. Then he set group A to Shield and One-Handed Weapon divided evenly between mace and axe. He wasn''t sure what the difference was between a Defender and a Shieldbearer, so he split that group again and tried both. These golems changed too. He had wondered if their limbs would change like Big John, but instead they now held weapons and shields made of the same glossy black stone. The Shieldbearers had tall tower shields nearly as tall as they were. The Defenders had rounded shields about half as large. The parts of their skin that resembled armor became smooth and glossy, just like the skin of the martial artists. Their helmets became more ornate with an engraved pattern of repeating shapes that reminded him of his own core. The gem shape was also engraved into their shields as an insignia. The author''s narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon. Group B, he split between Greatsword Skullsplitters and Halberdier Guards. The armor and weapons for these had a similar appearance to group A, but these golems grew until they were half again as large as any of the other golems. They all looked terrifying just standing still. Their base stats were a match for the Delvers now, plus bonuses based on their specializations and roles. The Unarmed, Striker, Martial Artists had +5 to agility and constitution. The GreatSword Skullsplitters had the same bonus to strength and constitution, and the Shieldbearers had a +5 to constitution and something he hadn''t seen before but had seen mentioned. They had 5 points in a category called "Defense." [Defense represents the resilience and durability of the golem''s defensive capabilities. A higher rating signifies enhanced protection against enemy attacks and reduces the likelihood of sustaining damage during combat engagements.] The bulls on Bossy''s level were supposed to provide a percentage bonus to defense for the whole herd, along with a bonus to production. He had seen that several cows had now spawned, but no bulls yet. They were getting more and more interesting, but he needed to finish with golems for now. He tried to think of some way to design a rotation so that every combination fought every other combination. Then he realized he was just making things difficult. He told Don to handle making sure every type of fighter fought every other type of fighter equally. The controller golem didn''t seem to have any problem with the request and the golems began to move into position. He shut down the mana core pit. The spike trap wasn''t much use against the level 10 golems anyway. He brought M.C.P. into the arena, originally planning to have the controller golem keep score, but that turned out to be too much to ask from a level 2 golem. It had no idea what he was telling it, and its big rough hands couldn''t hold a pen. He really needed to upgrade the controllers next. He could probably figure out a way to make it work, but he had a better option. "Cecil. NOW there is a stack of papyrus, a pen, and an ink pot on the first level, bring those down to 5 and keep score in the arena. I want to know each combination that fought and which combatant won." "Coming now." Cecil responded without any quips or complaints. He had been a different skeleton since returning from his adventure in the forest. Stew was looking forward to seeing the results, but he wasn''t sure if this test would tell him much about how they would fight as an army. He was going to need more golems for that, and more room. There was plenty of room on level four, come to think of it. He was just feeling pleased with himself for checking off the golem upgrades when he felt a pair of new minds at the edge of his perception. One was less patient than the other. He could feel Eira pacing around at the edge of his mind, but it was the patient one that creeped him out. She was hunkered down, silent and staring. He hadn''t really thought about what it meant to make a dungeon minion contract with a dead necromancer stuffed in a locket. "It''s called a phylactery." Lady Briar offered. Her mind felt stern, amused. Relieved? "I''ll be right up to get started on your level. Be thinking about what might make the most sense for your zombies." "Revenants," Eira''s mind felt overwhelmed and tired, a little peevish, and embarrassed. The corrections didn''t bother him. They were the experts on dead things after all, but he noticed something interesting. The zombies¡­ revenants, didn''t seem to register for him at all mentally. He could feel them moving around in the small room that was all that he had built on the second floor, but he couldn''t move his mind into them or control them. It wasn''t just because they were undead. He was able to connect to Cecil just fine. Could it be because the Briars raised them? Or was it because zombies were mindless in a way more profound than the simple impulses he saw inside each of the slimes, excepting Sluice, of course. Whatever the reason, it made him even more glad that he had moved the thermal slime floor between the zombie floor and his core. While the fighting golems trained, he sent Drinking Bird to his core room, creating a door just long enough for the controller golem to move in. Using Drinking Bird''s eyes while the golem continued to rack up button presses once per second, he set the core room to use [Natural Light]. This provided him with a panoramic view outside the dungeon in all directions and checked one more thing off of his list. All of the leveling would have to wait until tomorrow when the Big Red Button recharged. He could also finish the slime level on the third floor while everyone slept tonight, so the second floor was next on his list. "What are we building here? A graveyard? A swamp? Maybe a mall?" Stew popped into Eira''s head. It was a little crowded, but he managed. "Maybe a bench to start. I don''t think much else is going to fit in this. This cell," Eira said. He could feel a little panic behind her words and worry. "I thought I wasn''t to be a prisoner." "Hold on. We just haven''t started building this level yet. First, let''s do the honors and make you the level boss, to see what that unlocks." This had worked with Bossy, so he was expecting to get some interesting options. It seemed backward to set the boss, then build the level, but then he kept hearing his System was weird. He opened the monster menu and wasn''t disappointed. [Select a Monster Type] [1. Golem (produces stone)] [2. Slime (produces mucus)] [3. Kitten (Very active!, requires a Cow Minion)] [4. Skeleton (produces loot, requires a Cow Minion)] [5. Giant Rat (produces meat, requires a Goblin Minion)] [6. Shambling Revenant (produces necrotized flesh, requires a Necromancer Minion )] [7. Ghoul (produces grave dust, requires a Necromancer Minion )] What is [grave dust] for? He didn''t even want to think about what use [necrotized flesh] might be. He read the list out to the Briars anyway. Lady Briar''s voice in his mind was measured and slow, she sounded deep in thought. "Shamblers are normally difficult to control and of limited use due to their advanced decay, but perhaps you will be able to summon more advanced creatures later. They will keep the ghouls fed and ghouls are good to have around as general helpers and of course for sanitation." Eira interrupted. "I am a mage not a necromancer. And if we summon ghouls you better never let the goblin know or there will be war." "Dear, I believe the System is referring to me. I''m afraid the bone rattling is all that I''m remembered for now. As for goblins, that''s a vast oversimplification, they do often find themselves in conflict, but it''s only when they are competing for scarce resources like dead rats." What have I gotten myself into? "Hold on. I''ll be right back." He found Femur and stepped into his head for a moment. "What is your opinion of hiring some ghouls to help the necromancers with the zombies?" "Ghouls?" Femur spat. "No one said anything about ghouls. Filthy, mindless, gibbering things. Stab you in the back and eat your liver as soon as look at you. Cunning though. Have to keep an eye on them." That sounded about like what Stew had thought of goblins until he met Femur. Maybe this was the same sort of thing. "Have you ever met a ghoul?" "No, thank the webspinner." Femur gestured vaguely across his cavern. "My great, great grandmother''s clan cleared them out of the Hidden River caves long before I was born." He sighed and gnawed on something, Stew realized it was a roast rat leg. "But if we need them, I won''t argue as long as they stay to their level and keep their greedy claws off my herd." He put the meat down. "Speaking of which. We might talk about adding a few more of my clan here. I''m sure they would be happy to sign-on if you can keep the gold and the fights coming." "I''ll think about it," Stew said and switched back to Eira. "OK we''re good to start. I''ll bring some mining golems up and see what we have available for customization." He opened the customization menu and, not for the first time, decided the System was just making things up as it went. It was also eavesdropping. [Customizations Unlocked] [Sinister Fog] [Grim Graves] [Dismal Swamp] [Empty Marketplace] So he even had the mall, although he had other ideas for how to make use of a ready-made market. He summoned a ghoul and named him Romero. Ghoulfriend Experience Romero was a gaunt, gray creature with a slouching posture and spidery fingers. It had a head like a shaved dog with a short snout and long teeth. As soon as it spawned, it lunged at Eira. Stew had to clamp down on it and take control. The creature''s heart was beating fast with fear and rage. He couldn''t tell if the ghoul only had animal intelligence or if it was so overcome with revulsion and fear for Eira that it was unable to think. It strained at his control, He didn''t dare change his focus to speed up the mining golems on their way across the dark plains of Level 4. He tried speaking through its mouth and found it had the ability, but its voice was thick, and the words were shaped into wet, gnashing noises by the long jaws and teeth. "Hy doesth ith hathe ooo?" Eira visibly calmed and Lady Briar''s voice answered. "Ghouls have a natural fear and hatred of the living. I would have warned you, but I did not realize you planned to summon one in these tight spaces." She gestured and the revenants gathered between Eira and the ghoul ¨C surrounding it and pressing it back against the wall. The revenants smelled delicious. Stew found his ghoul mouth salivating at the smell of rotting flesh. It was like a cross between cheese and pickled sausage and he was HUNGRY. Maybe the Briar''s wouldn''t mind if he just took a small bite. Stew yanked his mind out of the ghoul and wished he could gag or spit the imagined taste out of his mind like he might spit out spoiled food. But it was just a memory, so it lingered. Since the revenants seemed to have Romero under control, he took the chance to check on the mining golems. They were about halfway across Level Four. He sped them up to a fast jog and reconnected with Eira. "So let me get this straight. Ghouls hate the living and crave the undead. How is this going to work out at all?" Eira/Lady Briar pointed. The ghoul was breathing slower now and looking down at the floor. It seemed calmer and leaned up against one of the revenants like an old friend. "They will not eat animated flesh. No one else should either." Stew couldn''t bring himself to peek inside Romero''s head again now that the ghoul was calming down, but he did check the creature''s stats. [Romero] [Lesser Ghoul - Level 1] [Mana Cost - 1 / day] [Necrotized Flesh Cost - 1 / day] [Health 10/10] [Agility 8] [Strength 6] [Constitution 15] [Actions: 1] [Action Recharge: 1/day] [Special Attack: Infectious Bite] [New Structure Unlocked - Portal (Dreamlands)] Dreamlands? Portals sounded like something he could really use. He would love to have portals between levels, but something about "Dreamlands" set off alarms. He couldn''t place where he had heard that word before. "Have you ever heard of the Dreamlands?" Stew asked. He felt the Briars confer before responding. "No, why do you ask?" "It seems like it has something to do with ghouls." He described the menu he saw. "It''s well known that ghouls have a way of appearing in any graveyard or tomb, and disappearing just as mysteriously. Maybe this is related to that." Stew imagined creating a portal only to have a flood of slavering ghouls pour through, and decided to hold off on exploring that option until he was more prepared for surprises. It was another thirty minutes before the mining golems reached the second floor. Now the tiny room was seriously cramped. The briars had to herd the revenants and ghoul back up the stairs a bit to give the golems room to work. Stew set them to digging new rooms in all four directions, then digging four more rooms at each corner to clear out a space three rooms square. Once the simple rooms were complete he used his new knowledge to directly theme them to [Dismal Swamp] without trying to dig out any more space. The walls vanished, replaced with stagnant water, spongy ground and decaying vegetable matter for an acre in each direction. The sky was solid black and sounds of insects and amphibians filled the darkness with creaking calls and whirring susurrations. The darkness wasn''t absolute. Pale lights danced over the still waters in multiple places like dim white flames. [Corpse Orchid] a species of low growing orchid glowed with a dangerous looking, deep violet light. Through Eira''s nose, Stew smelled the scent of rotting vegetation and a sickly sweet, floral scent, possibly from the orchids. The stairwell landing was now inside a low, muddy hillside overgrown with sprawling, thick-knuckled tree roots. Eira stepped off the stair. Her foot squelched an inch deep into the waterlogged mat of woven roots and grass that passed for land. Stew recalled the golems. A level 1 he had named "Earl" promptly fell right through the floating plant raft and vanished with barely a "plop." Stew reached out to the submerged golem, found the slope of the hillside underwater, then sent it trudging back up to the entrance. He set the ceiling to natural light. Bright light from the afternoon sun suddenly filled the swamp, turning pollen dust into golden whirls. The cheery effect only made the matted depths seem more sinister. The insects and frogs stopped their whirring, but something groaned deeply in the distance. "Do I have alligators now?" Stew couldn''t feel anything living in the rooms, so the sound seemed to just be atmosphere. He would have to think of a way to get alligators. In the brighter light, thick drapes of moss hung from the trees. Dense clumps of long grasses and plants with names like [Dead Man''s Sedge] and [Hag''s Hair] formed small islands in the murky, stinking water. He found that he could raise the shallow mud in places to create relatively solid ground. He created a meandering, broken path that eventually reached the eastern edge of the swamp. He sent the golems in that direction. The Briars, the revenants, and the ghoul followed. There was a glistening stone wall there that stretched out of sight above. With his dungeon senses, Stew could feel that the wall actually met the ceiling at four meters and the rest was an illusion. He set Earl to digging the next room to give him more experience. Once it was done he set the theme to [Grim Graves]. A decidedly modern graveyard appeared with worn and broken stone tombstones and a rusted wrought iron fence with a double gate. One half of the gate hung open at an awkward angle. A decrepit mausoleum stood on a low hill. Stew summoned six [Shambling Revenants] for the graveyard and named them Ezekial, Gustav, Frank, Moira, Chauncy, and Gail. He was relieved to see that although these were apparently mindless monsters, they were entirely under his control. The shamblers made Eira''s revenants look like covermodels. No two were alike, but they were all half decayed and missing parts. They wore unidentifiable rags for clothing, and none carried any weapons or seemed aware of their surroundings. They trudged in random directions, and only turned when they met a barrier. Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit. The ghoul seemed encouraged by the development and loped forward on all fours sniffing at the air. "I thought you said ghouls weren''t interested in animated fl¨C" Stew began, but stopped when he saw the forearm drop off of one of the shamblers only to be snatched up by the ghoul who carried it out of sight behind the mausoleum. "Is he going to bury that?" "For a while." Lady Briar answered. Apparently that was the final straw for Eira. "You expect me, us, to live like this?" She waved her hand at the swamp, the graves and the mausoleum. "Bodies rot in this damp, living or dead." "Hold on." Stew answered. "Let me finish out the level, and I''ll show you the accommodations I had in mind. This is all just for the delvers. The boss fight should be here in the mausoleum." They walked through the graveyard to the mausoleum. Stew showed them where the stairs to level three descended from underneath a massive stone sarcophagus that was easy to move aside once you found the right sequence of seemingly decorative carved lilies to press. He couldn''t take credit for the puzzle or any of it really. It was all default decorations for the [Grim Graves] theme. "But as for a place to actually live, I was thinking something over here." Stew led them to a place where the wrought iron fence ran parallel to a towering wall identical to the one that the graves had replaced. He set Earl to digging again, demolishing a section of fence and wall as he went. Once the base room was complete. He restored the wall and gate as a hidden door. Then he sent Earl further in to dig two more rooms. He turned these into a kitchen, general room and bedroom, and furnished them with the best options he had from his menu. Some of the furniture and conveniences were strange to Eira, and after some back and forth, he replaced the table and chairs with lower tables and reclining couches which she seemed to be more familiar with and the bed with another, longer couch covered in cushions. The [Roasting Spit], [Cookpot] and [Baking Oven] were familiar to her, but she pointed out she didn''t know how to use them. Lady Briar chimed in that she could probably work something out with revenants, but Stew showed her that, like the Lunar Forge, these were mostly for show and that there was a menu that would turn various ingredients into food. The options here seemed to recognize Eira''s expectations and he saw that a few options like [Purified Water], [Wine], [Porridge], [Fish and Vegetable Soup], and [Salted Bread and Olive Oil] could be created with only small amounts of mana and no other ingredients. Eira was in a much better mood after seeing the accommodations, so Stew left her to think about ways to improve the level while he took care of a couple of details that he already knew needed attention. He sent all of the mining golems except Earl down to the third floor then sent Earl back to the entrance from the first floor and kept his attention with the golem as it walked. The bright sunlight outside didn''t seem quite right for the atmosphere he was after, so he added [Sinister Fog]. The light immediately dimmed and the blue skies and distant mountains disappeared to be replaced with a sullen haze. Wisps of fog limited the viewing distance in every direction. In places, the mist seemed to clump and cluster like ghosts, even streaming along the ground in low-lying areas. The temperature also dropped just enough to make the air feel clammy. A notice appeared. [New monster unlocked! Rusalka] [The Rusalka is an undead water spirit that haunts the shores and depths of the dungeon''s submerged regions. A Rusalka appears as an attractive person specifically alluring to the viewer from a distance. From closer, the Rusalka is obviously recently drowned and undead. The Rusalka uses its alluring beauty and hypnotic songs to lure unsuspecting victims into the depths where it may drown them and claim their souls.] And, sure enough, there was the Rusalka added to his monster menu. He created one just to see what he had to work with. A few feet in front of Earl, near the shore, a twist of fog bent down and scooped water, pouring it back over itself as if washing its hair. Where the water touched the fog, it washed away revealing green hair and pale skin. [Rusalka - Level 1] [Mana Cost - 1 / day] [Health 10/10] [Agility 5] [Strength 7] [Constitution 6] [Actions: 1] [Action Recharge: 1/day] [Special Attack: Hypnotic Song] [Skills] [Botany - Level 1] [Alchemy - Level 1] Neither Earl nor Stew had capillaries, but he still felt like he was blushing at the Rusalka''s outfit, or lack thereof. She appeared to be an incredibly attractive woman with long flowing hair. He didn''t have a body or hormones to feel the full effect of her appearance, but he did remember being human. He switched his perspective to hers to avoid the distraction and to find out who he was dealing with. "Well, hello there. Are you the dungeon?" She spoke aloud. Her voice was as sultry as one would expect from an ambush predator. "I am. I was building out an undead themed level and thought I would see how you might fit in. Could you tell me what you can offer as a defender?" "You''re quite well-spoken for a dungeon, but you don''t feel ancient," she replied. "How interesting. As for my abilities, I think they should be evident." She chuckled, raising her unusually long-fingered hands and making a wringing motion. "I lure delvers to the water and drown them, usually one at a time. I also enjoy flower arranging, potions, and poisons." "Have you worked with a dungeon before? Where did you last work?" "I have not. Since my death and re-awakening, I''ve been looking for a good hunting area, but it is difficult to find a river or lake near any sizable population that isn''t already thoroughly haunted." "Wait. This may sound strange, but have you always been in this world or did you come from somewhere else?" "I can''t answer that without knowing where I am now." She waved her hand. "This all seems to be dungeon magic, so I don''t have many clues to where I might be." "Where were you before you died?" Her voice changed, becoming coarser but much more lively. "I''m the first mate of the good ship Morvain''s Blessing out of Dylath-Leen, or I was until a fairer smile tempted my captain. We fought, and I found myself run through and cast overboard, tied to a ballast stone, a day off the coast of Oriab." None of those places sound familiar to Stew. "So you were a pirate. Do you have a name?" "Privateer. We had papers." She shrugged. "Neither matter now. I won''t be sailing again in waters this shallow, and I have no name in this life, nor any interest in resurrecting an old one." "Speaking of papers." Stew offered a contract. "How would you like the name Lorelai" The Rusalka accepted the contract. "It''s a name. Any will do. Where''s my assignment?" The talk of potions and plants had Stew thinking. He sent Earl to the wall south of the entrance to dig out another two rooms. He explained to Lorelai that he wanted her to use her song to distract delvers away from the graveyard if she could, but he also also wanted to see what she could do with a [Conservatory] and an [Alchemy lab]. "One thing," Stew asked. "To make an effective distraction, do I need more Rusalka to appeal to different genders and preferences." He thought about Ba''Rush, Femur, and the Fae. "And species. Do I need different species?" "How do I appear to you?" Stew hesitated. "Well, um. A very attractive human female." "That says much more about you than it does about me." Lorelai laughed. "At least I don''t appear as some pretty lump of crystal. You only ever need one Rusalka for an area this size. I''m not some puny Siren who needs a chorus." Stew left Lorelei to settle in and went to work on the [Conservatory]. The moment he set the room type, the swamp extended for another acre, in the middle of which suddenly appeared a round glass greenhouse with milky panes framed in ornate black iron. It was overgrown with runners and creeping vines. He wondered if it would have looked the same on the first floor, or if this was an adaptation to the swamp level. Inside, the center of the room was taken up by troughs filled with soil. Tables with empty pots ringed the wall. One small table with gardening tools, gloves and stacked pots stood just opposite the door against the far wall. He tried activating one of the troughs but nothing happened, so he stepped over to the table and tried it. [Conservatory - Level 1] [From the mystical to the mundane, nearly anything can grow in this all-purpose greenhouse. Planting the right species in close proximity can unlock new synergies that promote growth, reveal special qualities and even enable evolutions to create entirely new varieties. Careful though. Invasive species can destroy neighboring plants and take over the greenhouse, requiring expensive treatments to clear.] [There is nothing planted here. Plant something? Y/N] There were no options, so he assumed he would have to gather plants to start. He had some ideas but they would have to wait for now. He created the [Alchemy Lab] The lab also seemed to take a cue from the surroundings and become a ramshackle shack just behind the conservatory. Inside, arcane glassware bubbled over a low flame and empty jars and bottles lined one wall. Another wall was devoted to tiny drawers, all empty. Activating the equipment prompted for a reagent, 1-4 ingredients, a temperature, and a time, but there were no other instructions. Maybe Lorelei would know what to do. He took one more look around and decided he was finished for now. He named the new level "Shamblers'' Swamp" and walked Earl down to the third floor. Fire And Ice The Slime level was a mess. The slimes had dutifully filled the shallow channels he had cut in the floor, but some had filled them with lamp oil and others had filled them with liquid nitrogen. Likewise the slimes had followed his instructions to battle like the golems on the fifth floor, but with no controller and no detailed directions, the free for all combatants had just been competing to see which slime could overpower the thermal power of the other. This had led to a patchwork of red hot stone and slicks of ice. The slimes were immune to heat or cold, but the dungeon walls and ceiling were cracked and flaking from the constant heating and cooling. Just looking at it made Stew realize he had been feeling the ache for some time, but had been too distracted to do anything about it. One more thing to find a way to automate. There was no mana moss and no stone weevils on this floor. They didn''t seem to like the extreme temperatures, good to know. He called a time out and separated the hot and the cold slimes. Three of the former and two of the latter. The other three mining golems had been standing at the foot of the stairs. He sent them to the sides and far wall and along with Earl had them expand things as he had on the swamp level until he had a three by three square, then he sent all but Earl back down to Level 5 and the [Stone Quarry] to work. Flamer #1 was one of the cold slimes, which just emphasized how poorly named they were. He renamed them all Thermal 1-5 and set Thermal 1 to be the level boss. [You have unlocked a new theme - Fire And Ice] Stew set the new theme and immediately had to scramble Earl back up on the steps to Level 2. The floor was literally lava. The room had grown as large as the swamp with each room now taking up an acre of space, only, instead of stagnant water, the floor was one large pool of bubbling lava. There was a new lighting theme available, [Arctic Volcano]. He set it. A huge volcano loomed over him, drooling lava down in a thick ribbon. The exit to level four was clearly visible in what looked like the bottom-most slope. The lava stream split to frame an open cave before draining into the pool. Past the shore of the lava pool in all directions, he saw an endless plain of ice. As he watched, in the middle of the lava lake, a winding path of black stone cooled, then cooled further until it was coated in thick, blue white ice. The ice sloped to make for treacherous and slippery footing. One of the thermal slimes, number 3, flopped across a point in the middle and melted a gap, then replaced the missing stone and ice with itself, freezing to match the appearance of the rest of the path. Across the way, at the end of the path, Thermal #1 crawled out of the lava. Now that it was a boss, the slime had grown to be almost four meters across. It gathered itself across the exit to Level 4 and shaped itself into a rough cube completely blocking the door. It froze there until it appeared to be a nearly opaque, dark blue block of ice, coated in flowing mist as the air froze and pooled around it. He looked closer and saw its description had changed also. [Thermal #1] [Lesser Thermal Ooze - Level 4] But even though it was now described as an ooze, its stats were only a few points higher than the other slimes. He looked around for the rest and eventually found them lurking in the lava pool. He directed Thermal #2 to replace the path just before the small ledge near Thermal #1. With the wide open spaces in this level, he was going to need more slimes. He looked through the customizations menu and found that two new options appeared there to match the theme, a steam geyser and a fire whirl. He raised a few small islands out in the lava away from the path. He spaced them just close enough to jump from one to the next, so that they made an alternate route to the exit, then planted the steam geysers in three of the islands. They appeared as small, still pools of brightly colored mineral water. He built a ledge out from the entrance where Earl stood, and added another geyser just beside the last step. This would go off thirty seconds after the last delver in a party stepped onto the ledge, encouraging them to move fast and find safer ground. For the fire whirl, he set the spawn near the middle of the pool and the path to cross just before the false path where Thermal #3 was lurking. Hopefully this would drive delvers to continue running forward to avoid the super heated tornado only to be surprised by the slime''s trap. I really am starting to think like a dungeon. But do I really want to roast every delver that comes through here? This book''s true home is on another platform. Check it out there for the real experience. He changed Thermal #3''s instructions, instead of trapping delvers, the slime would offer them a cooling sanctuary if they could reach it before the fire whirl hit. He had Thermal #3 freeze a roughly circular patch of stone and ice around itself to make a small island. Then the slime grew the ice up into a small jagged-topped castle with an enclosed area inside. That would give the delvers a target to run toward. To balance things out, he added another fire whirl further down that would wander off into the distance rather than toward the path. It would launch as soon as delvers entered the level to give them still another hint at the dangers here. So they now had a set of challenges to overcome, enemies along the way and a boss to fight, but for what? He still hadn''t figured out what to do about loot. The things he had been able to spawn so far had been pretty pathetic. More things to add to the to do list. Maybe Eira or Cecil could figure out a way to make some fire or ice magic themed weapons or armor. That reminded him. He had completely forgotten to give Eira her welcome gift. He sent an order down to Smittee. He checked things over again, then named the new level "Inferno Springs." He was enjoying having a body, although Earl would probably level better in the [Stone Quarry]. He marched the golem back up the stairs. Closed back the sarcophagus, then he cut across the swamp to take the stairs back to the first level. As he walked, he checked in on Drinking Bird and the [Big Red Button]. He still had several hours left until it was ready to trigger again. Back on the first floor, the wide open temple entrance was still in place with just a single bench for decoration. The office supplies he had spawned were down with Cecil on the fifth. The entrance to Femur''s cave opened off to the right. He had decided he wanted the first level to become a goblin level, but he couldn''t afford any more goblins just yet. He could, at least, take a step in that direction. Thinking about how the other rooms had adapted to the level themes, he pulled up the unused theme from the undead floor and set the entrance to [Empty Marketplace]. The room expanded back into the hillside and a dozen wooden stalls of all shapes and sizes appeared behind the stone pillars. In keeping with the name, they seemed to have been abandoned and only worthless odds and ends remained. The stalls themselves looked sturdy and well maintained. He suspected they wouldn''t have looked as nice on the swamp level. Assuming he could get enough traffic from delvers, and from Raek and Garrik''s talk it sounded like that wouldn''t be much of a problem, he could fill the market stalls with goods, or maybe even rent them out to others and just charge rent. The money could go to hire more goblins. Once he had enough goblins, he had an even better idea for how to make money, but that would have to wait until he had more delvers. It was weird to think about actually wanting people to come attack his home, but now that he''d had time to make some preparations, he could see a clear way to mark off the second biggest thing on his to do list. Make myself more valuable alive than dead. But all of that could wait because the [Big Red Button] was almost fully charged, and he was finally ready to make some real progress on both items number one and two on his list. Learn. Build. Grow. And, Make myself too tough to kill, even if they try. [The Big Red Button Is Fully Charged] Drinking Bird, dutifully stopped this time. It wouldn''t press the button again unless it dipped below full charge. Stew swapped his attention to the fighting golems on Level 5. He gathered them into a double line and marched them up the stairs along with the slimes, the controller golems, and Cecil. They looked pretty awesome marching out of the temple on Level 4. Bossy and the kittens watched them pass. He saw that there were now six cows in the herd, still no bulls. There was something strange about the sky on Level 4, and at first he couldn''t place it. It was always night here, but that wasn''t it. The moon was still there, glowing bright and low to the horizon. The stars were also unusually bright above, but that wasn''t different. He let his vision unfocus slightly as he looked through M.C.P.''s eyes as the golem marched. It was like looking at a hidden-image stereogram. The new detail leapt out at him immediately. All the stars in the sky formed the body and face of a woman who arched above with her hands on one horizon and her feet on another. The whole sky was one big constellation. A sense of profound awe filled him. Somehow he could sense that this was more than just an illusion painted across the ceiling. He felt like he was looking at a being larger than galaxies. He realized the stars moved. The figure was breathing. He was definitely going to have to ask Bossy who that was. One more thing for his to do list. It seemed like it was growing as fast as he knocked things off, but that was nothing new. He marched his tiny golem army out onto the plains. The spectral cats appeared and vanished around the edges, curious and watching. His plan was to hit the [Big Red Button] and start spawning golems as fast as he could, using the higher level golems to smash them so that he could respawn them quickly to level them all up to match the golems he had been testing. The individual combat numbers were already interesting, but he needed many more trials. And after those were through he wanted to move on to testing some formation tactics for massed assaults and defense. He gave the order and the golems of all types fell into a mixed skirmish line and snapped to attention, at the ready to start some power leveling. He would only have five minutes, so he double checked his mana reserves, crossed imaginary fingers and pressed the button. [Big Red Button Pressed - Berserker Rage Bonus, all minions and monsters engaged in combat will receive 50% less damage and deal 25% more damage until all action points are consumed. Once all action points are consumed, all minions and monsters will receive damage equal to half their remaining health.] Not cool, Button, not cool. So much for easy power leveling. [Button Bonus 0.001%] Step Right Up Pressing the [Big Red Button] had been a disaster. This [Berserker Rage Bonus] came with a steep cost ¨C if he ever ran out of action points, that is. With six more cows in Bossy''s herd he had over two hundred action points right now, but he would have to watch his action levels carefully. Maybe at some point he could brace everyone and take the hit, but today was definitely not that day with Eira and her crowd just moving in. If he held off on any more big projects he could continue to build up his reserve, maybe another one hundred action points and just treat that as his new floor. Kind of like he used to do with his bank account. He had twenty bucks he never touched, except for that time his paycheck was late and he went all the way into overdraft. He moved his perspective back to his core room and looked out of Drinking Bird''s eyes while it built the button''s charge back to full. He wasn''t sure if he could ever bring himself to press it again. It would have to be a serious emergency before he was likely to risk it. With [Natural Light] it felt like he was standing outside in an open meadow next to his core with the delver camp halfway between himself and the treeline. That''s when he made his real mistake. He found himself thinking, "what else could go wrong today?" Ten minutes later an army stepped through the trees. There were well over one hundred people, horses and wagons. No one was wearing armor. The wagons were loaded with what looked like building materials, and rather than swords, people were carrying tools and shovels over their shoulders. They filed out of trees in a single-file line. A man dressed like Socrates walked at the head of the newcomers. He raised an arm to Raek and Garrik who went to meet him. Stew re-prioritized his to do list and put this new development at the top. He reached out to Femur. "Grab the false core, then go see who these people are who just showed up outside." "Are we going to set them on fire?" Femur grabbed the old sack and slung it over his shoulder, already on his way through the [Empty Marketplace] room. "I''m not sure yet. The delvers seem to know them, so go ask for an introduction." Femur was now on the steps down from the temple entrance. "It looks like they plan to dig. Do you think they''re miners?" Stew joined him and looked through Femur''s eyes as they walked past the Delver camp to where the others were talking. The group was mostly workers but there were a few guards. Some of them looked startled, surprised to see a goblin. They stared at Femur as he approached. Some of the guards covered their weapons, but didn''t draw them. Raek held up his hands palms out and patted the air as if pushing everyone back. "Hold! This is a representative from our host. Show him some respect!" Then he turned to Femur and added, "Allow me to introduce Theus of Macedonia, Garrik and Eira''s mentor." He turned back to Theus. "This is Femur, a representative of the dungeon." "Greetings and well met." Theus was a muscular, older man with curly gray hair, tan skin, and smile wrinkles around his eyes. He looked like Hemingway if Hemingway had been a mixed martial arts instructor on the weekends. Femur started to say something, but Stew nudged him and took over. Something about the look in Theus'' eyes reminded him of Raek, easy going, but dangerous to cross. "Pleased to meet you. I see that you''ve brought quite a few friends with tools. What did you have in mind?" Raek spoke before Theus could open his mouth. "As you will recall, we had talked about building a town here. I sent to Theus to help arrange for builders to come prepare the ground. We will start by laying out the buildings and streets. If you will walk with me, I can show you¨C" "I thought I might also check on my charges." Theus interrupted. "Garrik here seems to be none the worse for wear from his adventures, but he tells me that Eira is within the dungeon?" Theus'' tone was light, but there was that hint of threat that Stew had noticed from the first glance. Stat-o-Vision? didn''t work outside with just the false core, so he couldn''t tell his level or class, but he had to be at least as advanced as Raek, so maybe level 15. What was he, a fighter? "Eira needed a place to go, so I offered her a job and a place to live in return for her help running a level. We made a deal." Stew said through Femur''s mouth. He could feel Femur''s heart accelerating as the goblin felt the tension building in Theus. That was unusual enough for Femur that it made Stew nervous too. "This deal." Theus'' voice was tight although his expression remained pleasant. Stew could feel something coming off of him. Mana? "May I see it? Her family will be very interested in knowing what terms she has made with a dungeon." Stew had the feeling that he was being tested. If he rolled-over too easily, it would call his bluff and they would all know he was weaker than he pretended. If he tried to make a show of force and marched out a bunch of fighting golems, things could get ugly fast. He had no real idea what he was dealing with with this guy, but showing weakness seemed like a very bad idea. Support the creativity of authors by visiting Royal Road for this novel and more. Maybe he just needed to bluff bigger. "She''s a promising hire. I''m looking for someone to head up level five, maybe you would be interested? Here''s the same contract I offered her." He shared the contract with Theus, word for word the same as the ones he had offered Eira and Lady Briar. Theus'' eyebrows drew slightly together, but otherwise his expression remained the same. He said nothing for a long while, seemingly reading over the contract several times. "Such a short term for dungeon service," was the first thing he said. "As I told Eira, I would rather have someone stay because they want to than because they have to." "Hmm." Theus said. "May I speak with her?" He obviously knew what he was asking. Would Stew let him into the dungeon without signing a contract? Fortunately, Stew already had an answer for that, straight off of his to do list. He smiled wide with Femur''s mouth, then thought better of it. Goblin teeth are sharp. "I''d be happy to have you visit, and you can help me try something out, speaking of short term contracts." He sent Theus the other new contract he had been working on. If he was right, this was going to make more money than mana cores. Theus'' expression barely changed, but there might have been some surprise, then interest, then a question in the subtle movement of his eyebrows. "One hour?" "What is it?" Raek must have caught Theus'' almost expression. Maybe that was an emotional outburst for this guy. "The dungeon has offered me a contract as a minion for one hour, during which time I can delve, fight, loot, and, if killed, be resurrected to train again." Theus looked over at the temple-shaped entrance to the dungeon. "Resurrected?" Garrik looked from Theus to Raek then down to Femur. "What is he talking about?" Now was when he had to really lay on the bluff. "I noticed that very few of you on the surface had much experience or training. The Nec¡­ The mage was the most interesting, but the rest of you have potential. I thought I might offer my domain as a training ground. I can let my representative here negotiate fees. If you accept, you can safely visit Eira and ask her opinion of the deal." "Remember, no demanding their first born!" Stew sent to Femur mind-to-mind before letting him speak for himself. The goblin grinned again. "We''ll call it two denarii for an hour''s visit, or an aureus for the day." He managed to make it sound lewd. Raek looked thoughtful. I could see the profits adding up in his mind as he thought about his Inn and taxes. Garrik was the first to ask the obvious question. "But won''t that mean you''ll have to serve the dungeon?" Theus gestured and a scroll appeared in his hand. "Apparently not." He handed it to Garrik. "It just requires an agreement not to go below the fourth level and no attempt to bring harm to the dungeon itself, though I may fight and even kill any denizen." "We respawn too." Femur shrugged. "Or so I hear." That scroll printing trick was something Stew had to learn. Maybe he could get Theus to trade it for some golem boxing? Garrik handed the scroll to Raek who read it over too. "This." Raek looked up at Femur and his face was positively glowing. "This is something special." He rubbed his chin. "I''ve only seen lower level defenders. Are there limits on the power level of delvers you will accept?" Stew took over from Femur again. "That contract is just an example. For now, let''s see how well this works up to level ten, just the first four floors of my dungeon." Stew had to keep in his bluff, so no reason to tell Theus he was going to have to level up himself and spend some time to get any defenders higher than that level to fight. It occurred to Stew that he hadn''t even asked Eira what she thought about sending Papa Pit Fighter down to see her. "Hey. A guy named Theus is here to see you. Is it alright with you if I send him down?" "Theus! He''s here?" Eira sounded worried. "Is he a problem?" He was glad he asked. He started rethinking things. Maybe he could take out Theus with ALL of the golems right now before he was expecting anything. Maybe. Or maybe a freezing slime attack. Stew called up a thermal slime from the third floor. "No! He''s my teacher. I just wasn''t expecting him." She sounded much less confident, and much younger than she had earlier. "What is he going to think? What will he tell my parents?" Stew felt Lady Briar on the edge of the conversation. "I am not pleased to see him, but he''s no threat to Eira. I''m more worried that this means we''ll be drawing attention from the outside faster than we might be ready." Stew shared the image of what Femur was seeing. "Not just attention. He''s brought workers. They''re building a town around the entrance." "Oh," Eira gave off a sense of shock, embarrassment. "I thought I''d be able to hide here for a little while at least. I''m not ready¡­" "Nonsense, girl. You can take ten of those louts," her grandmother said. "That''s not what I mean. I''m not ready for anyone to know that I''m, well, a dungeon monster now." "Minion," Stew corrected. "Monsters are made by the dungeon. Minions are summoned from elsewhere or contracted." "Great. Minion." Eira sighed mentally. "Mom and Dad will be so proud." "They better be," her grandmother said. "You''ve already accomplished more than they have. Your mother''s wasted her talent. Wasted!" Stew withdrew. This sounded like a private, family discussion now. At least he knew it was alright sending Theus down, if awkward. He sent the thermal slime back to the lava pit. A notification appeared. Theus had accepted the contract. Raek and Garrik were asking if they could get contracts of their own. Femur had already collected the fee from all of them. He sent them each a copy. This had been a productive day, despite the damned button. Stew checked off another item from his to do list with some satisfaction. Charge admission. Boomtown Before starting down the steps, Raek asked Femur to add one more to the contract, a guard named Rufus, seemingly picked at random as they walked. Stew sent the contract. Rufus signed, then Rufus, Theus, Raek, and Garrik started down the steps. While the delvers descended, Ba''Rush and Femur walked back to the boundary of the soon-to-be town with the architect Raek had hired, a man named "Quintus." Stew had a few minutes, so he followed in Femur''s head. The false dungeon core was slowly degrading in Femur''s sack, but it was working well enough for the moment. "The hill blocks the best light from the north, but we can make-do with a forum there and the basilica and guild halls here on the southern end. They will face the dungeon entrance. Hopefully that won''t be too ominous." Quintus glanced nervously at Femur. Stew and Femur pretended they didn''t notice, their attention was on the ground preparation and digging. Survey teams were stretching long cords and marking the ground into squares with stakes and flags. To Stew, it looked surprisingly similar to things he''d seen crews do in his previous life. Quintus continued. "Our problem right now is finding enough water for the baths and public fountain." He stopped walking and faced Ba''Rush. "You said you believe there''s a strong stream to the west?" "Yes. It starts high enough up the mountainside, about there. You could divert it pretty easily." He pointed to where the mountains rose higher toward the pass. "Or you could build an aqueduct, eventually." "Aqueducts take an extraordinary amount of time unless we can hire an extra stone mage. Ours will be busy enough with the roads and walls here." Ba''Rush shrugged. "For money matters we will have to talk to Raek. He''s watching the purse strings for this." Stew was looking forward to seeing an earth mage at work. He would be willing to throw in an extra mana crystal or two to get the additional mage if it meant he could see an actual aqueduct. Fresh water seemed like something that would bring more delvers to the dungeon, so it might be a good investment. It wouldn''t be a terrible thing if delvers had a place to bathe before adventuring too. He still had to smell them when they entered the dungeon and some of those bandits had been ripe. While he was distracted with his own thoughts, Femur spoke up, apparently he was also thinking about smells. "Speaking of west, you say the livestock pens will be here to the west? Won''t the wind be in the wrong direction?" Femur held up a moistened finger. Quintus started. "No!" He seemed surprised to hear a goblin speak, or maybe to speak in such perfect Latin? "I mean, no, Dominus, quite the contrary, The wind here tends toward the west, as you, no doubt, can feel just now." Femur scowled. "So you think it''s fine for the stench of a whole town full of flesh eaters to blow over the pens. Every animal there will be in a constant state of panic. They will be so stressed it will sour the meat." Femur shook his head. "I''d never raise rats downwind. What do you plan to pen here? Owls? Pigs in nose clamps?" Ba''Rush chuckled. "This lot won''t even eat a horse unless it''s lame. They''ll have some geese, lambs, goats, pigs, and a few cattle for special occasions." "Then at least let me bring in some goblin ranchers to manage this mess. This fool will poison us all." "Is that¡­" Quintus was turning paler and paler as the conversation between the big orc and the spindly goblin continued. "Is that the will of the dungeon then? I can move the pens. We will just need to re-route the road to the east gate a bit and¡ª " Stew interrupted, taking using Femur''s vocal cords. "Pens will be fine on the west side. The residents of the town won''t appreciate the smell of livestock, I would think." "That''s the dungeon talking. You can hear the difference." Ba''Rush said. Femur grimaced, but nodded. "Boss says panicked goose meat is good for business." "Besides." Stew added, just for Femur. "I do want to talk about adding some goblin ranches, we just need to talk privately first." That perked Femur right back up. He and Ba''Rush started quizzing Quintus about drainage and sewage management. They all seemed surprisingly knowledgeable about it. Stew was interested but he needed to keep an eye on the delvers. He left a few instructions with Ba''Rush and Femur to avoid any major mixups and switched his attention to the second floor, to quickly warn Lorelei to let the party pass that was just arriving in the swamp. "Can I just have one? They look like a tasty bunch." "Not this time, but I''m sure they will be back to delve another time, then you should be able to have a go at them." "Fine. I''ll just tend to my flowers then." She was transplanting a weird looking, dark-petaled flower that appeared as a [Phantom Orchid] in Stat-o-Vistion?. [The Phantom Orchid is a rare and ethereal flower with a transparent stem that causes it to seem to hover above the ground. Its translucent petals are tinted with deep purple and soft blue. The central stamen emits a faint, pulsating light that can only be seen by lost souls. Found in haunted swamps where the barrier between worlds is thin, the Phantom Orchid exudes a fragrance that''s detectable only when the swamp''s breeze shifts just right. Legends say it holds potent magical properties, bridging the gap between the living and the spirit world. Adventurers should beware, where Phantom Orchids grow, restless spirits walk, their mystical allure draws adventurers and the undead alike.] Stew wondered what it meant that he could see the stamen flicker faintly. He didn''t have time to ask Lorelei about it. He needed to check on Cecil and the golems where they were training in the darkness on the fourth floor under that eerie breathing constellation. It occurred to Stew that, as a dungeon, his vibe was definitely trending toward "creepy." The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation. "How''s the training going?" "Sir! It''s going quite well, although the sudden enhancements may have invalidated the most recent trial. May we have your permission to run it again?" Cecil sat on a low mound of grass, a roll of papyrus across his bony knee. A sharpened reed stood in a pot of ink beside him. "Sounds like a good idea. I''ll have the controllers reset." Stew reached out to Don and M.C.P. They reset their golems to rerun the last test. A group of halberdiers stood in a line facing a line of grapplers. It seemed wildly mismatched, but they were all level 10, so Stew imagined they were all pretty good at what they did. He hadn''t had a chance to really watch a fight since the upgrades. At a silent signal from the controllers, the grapplers charged, barehanded. They were sleek looking and ran like Olympic sprinters. The Halberdiers swung their massive polearms as if they weighed nothing, and didn''t so much charge as dance into the battle whirling around to add more power to their swing. The first grappler rolled over in mid air to dodge a low swinging axehead only to take the butt of the weapon straight to the head when the halberdier reversed grips and thrust it forward without hesitation. The blow didn''t seriously damage the grappler, but it tumbled to the ground, its momentum changed. Another grappler arriving a half second later faced two halberds swinging toward it from opposite directions and chose to block and deflect them rather than dodging. The grappler''s arms windmilled and swept up the rapidly moving weapons driving them first up where they lost most of their momentum then back down to where the grappler could trap them, one under each arm. Another grappler leapt its comrade''s shoulders and ran straight up the shaft of one of the halberds as if it was as wide as a road. With one, well timed kick, it beheaded one halberdier then used the impact as a springboard to land on top of the next, knocking it to the ground. The rest of the grapplers and polearm fighters met now. The battle, despite the early win by the grapplers, seemed even at first. One grappler would bind up a halberdier and take it down, or a halberdier would catch a grappler in mid charge and cleave it halfway through or smash the butt of the weapon completely through the other golem''s chest. Eventually the awkwardness of the long weapons and slow recovery from an attack, even when using a reverse and thrust with the butt, made all of the difference. The last of the halberdiers was down and three of the grapplers still remained. "A very similar result." Cecil made a mark as the golems began to respawn in place and the slimes collected mana cores. "So far, halberd beats sword or ax with shield, one-hand with shield beats unarmed. "And unarmed beats halberd. Rock, paper, scissors." "Pardon, sir?" "Nevermind. What matters is that it looks like we can''t just churn out one speciality. Good to know." Stew wondered how they would do against mounted attacks. It seemed like the long reach of the halberds would be especially useful there. He wondered about adding some of those spear carriers to the mix. For now, the next step would be to train his controllers. He could pit them against each other with not dozens, but hundreds of golems and let them fight it out until they leveled up and became better at tactics. Before he could do that, he was going to need much more mana and even more action points. He left Cecil to rerunning all of the match-ups again, just to make sure they had a good sample. After that they could try some mixed units and see if the controllers could get creative. He moved his attention to Bossy. "How''s the herd?" "We now have six additional members and are about to add our seventh once we accumulate enough milk." Bossy, placid as ever, munched away at grass under the moon and stars. She was a perfect picture from a block of cheese or a milk carton, a black and white Holstein cow, just as Stew had imagined when he summoned her. The cattle of her herd, on the other hand, were huge, standing taller than an average human with weirdly powerful shoulders and slim rumps. Apparently all those prehistoric paintings hadn''t been exaggerated, these were giant, bodybuilder cattle straight off of a cave wall, ready to chase around a bunch of stick figures. Despite all of that, they seemed just as content as Bossy to crop grass at the moment. Stew checked his stats and felt some satisfaction watching the numbers go up. Actions were increasing at six times the rate they had before, even with Bossy''s production dedicated to unlocking more cows. He decided he would let the action points accumulate to 1000, then take a break from action production and use all the milk to grow the herd for a day. That should get him to 100 head in a very short time, and give him enough room to seriously consider growing that golem army. A titanic black bull suddenly appeared, facing Bossy. He stood over two meters tall and his horns, pointed straight ahead, were massive even though they looked small compared to the rest of his body. "Oh, now I am very pleased to meet you." Bossy said. [Auroch Bull: Level 1] [An Indomitable protector charged with the defense of the herd, this colossus among cattle stands, implacable, against any threat. Gentle and calm among his kin, this beast is nevertheless a deadly foe when challenged.] [Mana Cost - 1 / day] [Health 30/30] [Agility 5] [Strength 18] [Constitution 9] [Actions: 1/1] [Action Recharge: 1/day] [Special attacks] [Charge] [Gore] [Sweep] [Special Abilities] [(passive) +20% to milk production for all cows in the herd] [(passive) +1 to defense to the herd] Stew checked Bossy and one of the other cows and didn''t see any changes to explain how the point of defense worked, but from the sound of it, it was some combined stat for the herd? As he was looking, Stew realized he hadn''t named any of these new cattle. Names like "Daisy" and "Buttercup" just didn''t seem to fit these stone age brutes, and he was expecting to need to name quite a few, so he went with Auroch Cow 1-6. He was tempted to name the bull "Ferdinand" but that didn''t seem fair after giving the milk cows numbers, so he just named him "Auroch Bull 1." With the milk multiplier, he should be able to start really growing his herd in just a few more hours. Then he could start exploring these cow upgrade options. It looked like he could just spend mana to upgrade a cow or bull, would that also upgrade the bull''s production buff? What about the cow''s production? A thunderous explosion filled with mana rocked the dungeon. Stew could feel it like a blow to his body. Even though the fourth floor was technically its own pocket dimension and no sound or vibration could be felt here, the herd and the cats all stiffened and sniffed at the air, sensing something had happened. "I better check on that." Stew said. "Yes, please let me know what that was." Bossy also had her head up, sniffing the breeze and using whatever other senses she might have. Contractual Obligations The boom came from the second floor, so Stew swapped his mind into Eira, just in time to duck a fireball. "What is this?" Stew was having trouble getting his bearings as Eira rolled to the right and returned fire with a bolt of energy so deeply violet it looked black. "Training." Eira spat out between clenched teeth as she dodged another fireball. He couldn''t see anything through her eyes but the back of a gravestone. He reached out for the shamblers and found them all gone. Lorelei was all the way across the swamp. The contract technically gave him the ability to jump to Raek, or Garrik, or even Theus'' perspective, but that might lead to some difficult conversations, so he instead hopped into Romero''s mind. Yet again, he immediately regretted it. Romero seemed completely unperturbed by the mage battle on the other side of the mausoleum. The hungry ghoul was much more interested in a juicy chunk of freshly dug up shambler leavings. It was one of the most difficult things Stew had ever done, letting Romero swallow the mouthful it was chewing before pulling the ghoul away to peek around the edge of the stone building. If Stew had any illusions about how his monsters would fare against higher level delvers they were firmly dispelled by this "sparring match." All of the shamblers were down already. It seemed they had never landed a scratch on the delvers. Eira was, wisely, it seemed, keeping her own revenants out of the fight. Stew could sense them wandering around in the living quarters. The delvers were having some sort of live fire exercise in the graveyard with actual fire. As Romero watched, Theus gathered a ball of flame between his hands then lobbed it toward Garrik. Unlike a physical ball, the fireball accelerated as it went, moving more like a missile than a bullet. The comparison was even more apt when the fireball swerved left at the last moment, making a tight loop to speed toward Garrik''s exposed back. Garrik, his sword ready, whirled. Stew expected him to try to block it but Garrik cut the fireball in half, his blade seeming to drink the magic glowing briefly as did his armor. Stew peeked at his stats. There was no change to his mana, so he had either just refilled it by absorbing the fireball, or whatever enchantment his armor and sword shared hadn''t required any of his own mana. Stew was hoping to watch another couple of passes to make sure, but that didn''t turn out to be an option. As Garrik recovered from his two-handed slice, Raek appeared, right behind him, daggers flashing. He managed two slicing strikes before Garrik could turn or react, then Raek was gone. Stew could feel every air molecule in the dungeon, but he couldn''t track Raek when he vanished again. Eira, several beats too late, cast a sort of instant beam spell that ended up splashing off of Garrik''s armor with little effect. "A little more help?" Garrik called out. "I''m trying!" Eira called back, but suddenly she was taking two quick dagger cuts from Raek herself. "Focus!" Raek whispered in her ear before vanishing again. Stew rubbed Romero''s chin with his yellow clawed hand. He had never really thought about how disturbing rogues could be. He was going to have to find a way to counter this stealth ability and fast. It couldn''t be an accident that they were demonstrating all of these skills to him right now. Maybe they wanted to see how he would react? As he thought, Rufus stepped out from cover and charged Theus from behind, his shoulder into his shield for a bash. Theus either didn''t see him or ignored him as he lobbed another fireball toward Eira, forcing her to duck behind the gravestone again as the flames exploded with the same heavy detonation Stew had felt earlier. At the very last moment, Theus side-stepped the charging fighter, spinning gracefully on one foot, then continuing to spin across the attacker''s back, hooking one arm around the guard''s helmeted head and snapping his neck without apparent effort. One of Eira''s beams splashed across Theus'' bare shoulder staggering him as he finished his turn. Theus nodded as the guard slumped to the ground, dead. "Much better!" he called out to his pupils as if Rufus had raised a useful point in a classroom. "By distracting me, Rufus gave you an opening." The teacher brushed charred flesh off his shoulder, healing the wound beneath with the same motion. Stew was surprised, though he had a hunch this guy, Rufus, a level 5 fighter with mediocre gear, was a redshirt from the moment they called him over to sign the contract. Eira took it much harder. She rose and stood staring in open shock. "You killed him? Why?" She shook her head slowly. "Do you want me to¨C" "No!" Garrik stood straighter and raised a hand, "wait." Raek reappeared also, standing next to Theus, watching the dead guard''s body. Oh right this is my part. Stew reached out to his temporary minion and respawned the guard. It was his first time respawning a human, so he wasn''t sure what to expect. But what happened made the most sense really. The guard respawned next to his body, stark naked and visibly shaken. "That was¡­" He looked over at Theus and cringed a little. "I remember. I felt it." He bent down and looked at his own face. "How long." "Not long." Raek sheathed his daggers. "Get your things before the dungeon absorbs them." This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it. Theus and Raek exchanged a look. Stew was even more sure this had all been a test of him rather than the two pupils. What exactly Raek and Theus had learned other than that he would keep his promise to respawn delvers, he wasn''t sure. In the contract, he had given himself a time limit of one hour for respawns, thinking ahead to busier days, but he was glad he hadn''t waited. "I think we''ve had a good session. We''ll be heading back up to the surface, but I am close by, should you need me." Theus looked Eira in the eye. "And your parents will be glad to know that you are helping to establish a new trading outpost." He turned to Garrik, "and Brutus sends his regards. He''s pleased to see his son putting his attention to the security of the Republic. He''s asked Gaius to personally bring a garrison for the defense of this new border town." "Gaius must have more debt than I thought. I expected him to just come visit, not lead a legion here on common guard duty." "Nothing common about guard duty in this place," Rufus muttered, but Stew thought he might be the only one who heard. Eira and Garrik both looked relieved, so apparently they were happy with whatever story Theus had shared with their parents. But he thought he might check with Eira anyway. He had more than a few questions. He thought she might be more comfortable giving straight answers once Theus left. "I need to talk to you about the level when you''re finished here," He sent to her. She sent back a wordless confirmation, apparently lost in her own thoughts. While he waited, he checked with Lorelei. She was irritated. "Is it always so loud around here? It was like we took a broadside at close range." Stew started to explain the training battle, then interrupted himself. "You know what a canon is?" "Aye, I know which end to point toward trouble and where to set the match." She laughed. Her external voice was nothing like her salty internal tone. She continued mind-to-mind "I doubt I could stack shot all day with this back. And if you''re planning an excursion, I''ll tell you I don''t know the local waters." She splashed a bare foot in a swamp puddle. Now he had even more questions, but they would have to wait. "I want to introduce you to the level boss. She''ll be your captain, I guess, for this level. You''ll be her first mate." "Or last if you like." Lorelei primped her hair. "No randomly killing your colleagues." Stew hoped he sounded stern. "We will do some planned sparring though, so that you can level-up." "Oh don''t worry. You saw I left that skulker alone, just as I promised. I won''t go draggin anyone down to meet Captain Jones unless you give me the nod." "Skulker?" Then thinking better, Stew added. "You could see him?" "Sure, that throat slicer that came sneaking around. He was good, but to this spider every wasp is just another fly in my web. The plants could sense him, even if I couldn''t see him myself." "How well did you follow him? Where did he go?" "He followed a searching course, moving fast as a feather in a gale. All the way out to my shack and down the stairs to the next level." "That''s." Stew thought about it. "That''s good. Thank you. Keep an eye out for those kinds of delvers. We''ll likely have more of them, and, unless I tell you differently, any that come in unannounced are fair game, even this one, if he comes back without signing a contract." He swapped his attention back and forth between this conversation and where Romero was tracking the delvers as they returned to the stairs and the surface. Raek stayed with the others and stayed visible, but Stew kept Romero close until they started up the stairs, and followed them with his dungeon senses until they left the dungeon altogether. That was when he realized he had forgotten to use Stat-o-Vision? on Theus. How could he forget something like that? It seemed like there had been more than one stealthy skill in play. Even that "training session" had been as much to distract him as to test him. How far had Raek gone in his explorations? Stew checked the slimes and didn''t see any evidence that the traps there had been triggered. The slimes didn''t seem to have any memory of a battle. He was about to breathe a sigh of relief when the ooze recalled smelling a tasty treat that had, unfortunately, gotten away. It had been away from its post blocking the door to level four for several minutes chasing after what sounded like a rabbit. Had Raek just happened to smuggle a rabbit with him? Was that just standard rogue gear in this world? How had he known he would need to distract the ooze? Maybe it was some sort of illusion or summoning? Stew moved to level four. Here things were different. The Auroch Bull was standing guard at the bottom of the stairs flanked by two of the spectral Panthers. "We didn''t want to disturb you while you entertained your guests, but we had a visitor of our own." Bossy shared from where she stood near her temple at the far end of the level. "You could see him?" Stew asked. "Nothing can hide from the cats." She chuckled in his mind. "And nothing can pass our bull without defeating him." Stew could feel the unbending will in the giant bull, and the playful ferocity of Socks and Boo, and he felt a little bit better about how things had turned out. The delvers might have made it past his slimes, but he had hopefully maintained a little mystery. He didn''t blame them for keeping their own secrets and trying to find out his, and it didn''t seem like they had violated any of the terms of their contracts, but he would still have to keep an eye on them. Just because he understood their motivations didn''t mean he had to let them do what they wanted. He had his own priorities and one of those was keeping his bluff in with what were obviously much more powerful neighbors. "I think it''s time to shake things up just a little bit. I''m moving Socks and Boo to Level 2. I''ll replace them with some new kittens here." He really wanted alligators and giant mosquitos for his haunted swamp, but he would settle for ghost panthers for now. Besides, a few kills would make them stronger. While they started up, he spawned two more kittens, one silvery gray and one black like boo. He named them Twilight and Midnight and sent them to meet Bossy and Fluff, so they could get to work turning milk into actions and grow up big and strong. And speaking of secrets, he was going to have to get Theus back in the dungeon, not just to get a look at his stats, but to get him to fight the grappler golems. Maybe he would even train them for a price? Everything went on the todo list, because the biggest revelation today had been very deliberate, and strangely done. Theus could have told Garrik all about his dad''s friend and the legion somewhere out of Stew''s earshot. And Theus and Raek could have just told Stew directly. Should have really. What game were they playing? He had his own game in mind. If he could get his mana and action production high enough he could offer training for the soldiers 100 at a time, and maybe he could get this Gaius to help train his golems if he needed money so badly. The thought scared the hell out of him, but if he hadn''t been currently residing in a solemn-minded bull, he would still be grinning ear to ear. This timing couldn''t be a coincidence. All the pieces had finally slotted into place. He was no history buff, but he had taken a half semester of Latin in Middle School. He knew where, or at least, when, he was. Rome was a republic. Garrick''s dad was a Senator named "Brutus." The Helvetians were acting up to the north, and a Roman Consul named Gaius with money troubles was headed north leading what would probably turn out to be more than one legion. Brutus'' old buddy, Gaius. That had to be Gaius Julius Caesar. If Caesar didn''t sack the dungeon and kill everyone, maybe he''d sign an autograph. Got Milk? Socks and Boo bounded up the stairs to get acquainted with the swamp while Stew caught Bossy up on what he had learned. "I know you said a contract can''t be broken, but how does that work? What if Raek or one of the other delvers harmed the dungeon involuntarily? What if I ran out of mana and wasn''t able to respawn someone within the hour?" Bossy thought for a moment. "While those may seem like two very different things. Intent, for the most part, doesn''t matter. That''s one of the things that makes these kinds of contracts so dangerous. There is very little room for interpretation." "So accidentally breaking the contract is the same as doing it intentionally? What happens exactly? Demons come and punish you or something?" Bossy snorted. "Demons must be very different where you come from. It''s not about punishment. If there''s any punishment that''s something added to the contract and carried out by one or the other of the parties. If you ran out of mana and were not able to resurrect a delver whom you had contracted to resurrect, they would still be resurrected without using mana." "Wait, then I don''t have to spend mana, it just happens? How can that be? Where does the power come from to make that happen?" Was this another loophole? "Dungeon contracts are powered by the souls of those whom the agreement binds. Soul magic is extremely powerful and extremely dangerous." She raised her head and looked toward the stairs to level three, although they were too far across the plains to see with normal vision. "That is why the delvers were so shocked you made the offer to let them train and resurrect using your mana, and, not only agreed, but made it a formal dungeon contract. If you were to run out of mana with a delver left to respawn, your soul would pay the price." "A life for a life." "Depending on the size of the soul, yes. As a dungeon core, yours would normally be too small to even enter into a contract of this sort. The fact that you were able to create multiple resurrection contracts of this sort tells an astute observer that you are not just a dungeon core, but an Incarnate bound to a dungeon." She lowered her head and went back to grazing. "I had suspected as much, but this confirms it." "Is that a bad thing, that someone might think I''m one of these ''Incarnate''?" "It makes your core doubly valuable to those who might want to take it, and it tells them that you are a sapient being with all of the strengths and weaknesses that suggests." She chewed for a moment, considering. "It also means that they are unlikely to believe you are ancient. According to legend, most Incarnate either become extremely powerful or are destroyed in a short time." "Legend? So there aren''t any more around now?" "There are none remaining from ancient times, but there is certainly at least one other out there right now. There are always two, or two factions if there are more." "Why is that?" "The purpose of an Incarnate is to either conquer the world or defend it." "Just that simple. Some big battle between good and evil? Which am I then?" "I would think that would be obvious. You''re a magical entity building a citadel full of monsters and minions. Does that sound like a hero to you?" I''m the bad guy? Bossy chewed for a moment before answering. "That remains to be seen." More to worry about, but it didn''t change anything. It just meant he would have to grow stronger. His [Action] store was finally at 1000, so it was time to turn all of his milk production to building the herd. He had a theory about the milk. Every milk bottle Bossy produced generated a duplicate bottle for each cow in the herd. Since Bossy could generate two at a time, that meant the herd output was fourteen bottles per second with six cows. Normally a panther would turn every two milk into five mana, but he stopped that process and started spending every one hundred milk to buy a new cow. It didn''t take long for fourteen to become sixteen, eighteen, and twenty. At twenty bottles per second, things really started to accelerate. Cows popped into existence all around him like some sort of reverse alien abduction. He worried, at first, when the second bull appeared. He thought there might be some sort of rivalry between the two, but the second bull seemed as placid as the first. It had taken hours to bring milk output up to twenty bottles per second, borrowing just a few hundred from action production here and there. It took less than two minutes to grow the herd to one hundred head of cows, counting Bossy, plus the two bulls. That put the base production at two hundred bottles per second, but each bull added a 20% bonus on top of that. The bonus turned out to be additive, not compounded, but he couldn''t complain at 40% for a total of 280 bottles per second. That was a massive amount of actions if Fluff and the kittens could keep up, but he wasn''t worried about that right now. They could only generate 7 actions per second combined. If he had kept Socks and Boo on the fourth floor he might have sustained 17 actions per second, but only while they were awake and focused on just creating actions. The second bottleneck was at mana creation. He could create mana as quickly as he wanted, delegating actions to controller golems, but, again, he had to dedicate an entire golem to what was essentially a single click, then he could only store mana in bulky cabinets. He could make more store rooms, or put them out on the plain with Bossy and the herd, but it just didn''t seem efficient. Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings. It was the only method he had for the moment, so he asked Bossy to hold off on adding any more cows for now and set the kittens, panther and golems to action and mana production again. He watched a few minutes to make sure he hadn''t screwed up the flow. The only thing different was that the bottles of milk were accumulating at a hilarious rate. He had never let them accumulate before, so it was the first time he saw how the logic of the system dealt with large amounts of milk. They didn''t turn into old-fashioned milk cans or drums the way he hoped. Although, considering where he was, maybe he should have expected amphoras. What they did was almost as much fun. For each six bottles a crate would appear. As multiple crates accumulated they stacked themselves in a pyramid. He waited a few minutes to see if the pyramid would just keep growing, but it stopped at 10 high, then started another. He counted the crates and found each pyramid held 385 crates. With six bottles in each crate that was 1320 milk in each pyramid. He already had two and the third was starting. Time to go see Smittee. He had some contractual obligations to fulfill and some ideas about mana and milk. Smittee had finished the new mana crystal, so Stew turned it into a false core for Eira''s staff and generated a new golem he called "Courier 1" to take it to Eira on the second floor. That seemed more appropriate than having it just appear in her hand. Things might go differently the next time she sparred with Theus. Now to do some experimentation. Sluice had unlocked new options by having mana crystals in his possession while accessing the forge. In all the time Stew had been making mana glass, he had never thought to try the same thing. The glass had always appeared on the smelter''s shelf, then gone right to storage. He had been using it right away just like the milk. Now he pulled a sheet of mana glass from storage and gave it to Smittee, then opened the menu for the forge. [Lunar Forge] [The light of the Moon has kindled a subtle fire. Use the forge to shape and improve magical implements, gear, and weapons.] [Items:] [ Living Stone - (5 Stone, 5 Mana Core Levels) Mana Core Level 2 - (3 Mana Core Levels) Mana Core Level 5 - (6 Mana Core Levels) Mana Core Level 10 - (11 Mana Core Levels) Mana Cube - (100 mana glass) ] There it was. He was starting to get a sense for the logic behind these things. Everything was a building block for something else. He spent one entire mana cabinet to create a single mana cube. A half-meter tall, translucent green cube appeared on the forge. [Mana Cube] [An aetherial precipitate capable of capturing vast amounts of mana energy. When charged, the wise wizard will handle the mana cube carefully. Energies within are contained under enormous magical pressure. Mana Stored: 0 / 100 Mana Recharge: 1 / hr Affinity: None ] Stew felt a little prickle of awe. One hundred stone, one thousand mana all to create this single block of mana glass, but this one cube would replace an entire mana glass cabinet, and it actually generated mana. It was a slow process. He could fill one of these blocks in seconds with his milk production, but this was the first entirely passive generator he had discovered. He moved the block to storage, next to the now empty mana glass cabinet. He sent Exterminator 1 to keep an eye out for stone weevils while he cleared out another mana storage cabinet to create another cube, then another. The cubes began to glow as he stacked them. They glowed brighter and brighter the more he added with six glowing twice as brightly as three, at least to Exterminator 1''s eyes. He looked again at that first mana block. [Mana Cube] [An aetherial precipitate capable of capturing vast amounts of mana energy. When charged, the wise wizard will handle the mana cube carefully. Energies within are contained under enormous magical pressure. Reaction Efficiency: 0.06 Mana Stored: 9 / 600 Mana Recharge: 56 / hr Affinity: none ] That little prickle of awe from earlier turned into a full blown chill. If creating the cube had felt like discovering fire, then this was like inventing the steam engine. He had enough mana glass to create ten cubes, but he decided to keep the stack of six and make another of four. He thought he understood what would happen at 10 cubes, but he was going to have to find a safe place to test how closely he could pack the cubes safely. If finding a safe way to do that was even possible. Maybe he could send Big John out with a false core to dig a test bunker. With 10 cubes in two stacks he had 5,300 storage and was passively generating 90 mana per hour. The new reserves gave him enough to safely double the number of slimes in the lava pool and add a dozen new shamblers to the swamp. Action generation was still his biggest limitation. He already had five cats. He wasn''t sure why that felt like a large number. He had more slimes. He had shamblers, and golems, and a whole herd of cattle, but cats seemed to take up more attention and mental space somehow. He barely had to think about the wolves. In fact, I should probably check in on the wolves Maybe he just didn''t feel comfortable becoming "that cat dungeon." What mattered was that turning milk into actions was a bottle-neck with real bottles. It was the only thing holding him back now. And what he had just seen with the mana glass confirmed a hunch he''d had for some time about the way this System worked. Unfortunately, it also supported Bossy''s theory. He had been underestimating the System. The reason he was able to exploit the rules wasn''t because he was somehow smarter than some World or even Multiverse spanning super intelligence that could rewrite the laws of physics. He was an Incarnate grabbed from another reality to fill a role. He hadn''t been what it was looking for at first, but the System had found a use for him. The reason he could bend the rules was because this was his role in the larger game the System was playing. He had gone out of his way to be peaceful, merciful. He was building a market, a town, a nice training dungeon. But he was also building an unstoppable army of stone soldiers that could march right out into the world, if only for a short time before his false cores degraded. Using his slime''s eye he considered the glowing cubes of what could be the literal building blocks of a super weapon. Maybe I am the big bad. That raised a disturbing question. Who''s the hero? Squaring The Circle A hero was just one more thing to worry about later. Right now, he was drowning in milk, 720 thousand bottles an hour, and nothing to do with it really. Not for long though. If collecting enough mana glass allowed him to make mana cubes, then collecting enough milk should unlock something. He gave Forge and Smelter a break and passed a bottle of milk to Smittee. With Smittee''s eyes, he looked at the forge menu. [Lunar Forge] [The light of the Moon has kindled a subtle fire. Use the forge to shape and improve magical implements, gear, and weapons.] [Items:] [ Living Stone - (5 Stone, 5 Mana Core Levels) Mana Core Level 2 - (3 Mana Core Levels) Mana Core Level 5 - (6 Mana Core Levels) Mana Core Level 10 - (11 Mana Core Levels) Mana Cube - (100 mana glass) ] Nothing. He had been sure the milk would unlock something awesome. Then he mentally smacked his forehead. Mana had to be refined in the smelter to make mana glass. If Divine Milk worked the same way, he was looking in the wrong place. He walked Smitee over to the smelter and had a look there. [Lunar Smelter] [Use the purifying glow of the Moon to extract the essential essence of materials.] [ Refine Tempered Stone (10 stone, 1 mana) Refine Mana Glass (1 stone, 10 mana) ] Stat-o-Vision? gave him a flowery description for the smelter, but that was all. Maybe it was weird to expect to refine milk in a smelter anyway. You would just get burnt milk, right? No one wants to smell that. He had been so sure. Now he had milk crates stacking across the plains and nothing to spend them on. He would just have to hire more cats. He was about to call Boo and Socks back from the swamp, when he had an idea. Eira''s kitchen had a [Roasting Spit], [Cookpot], and [Baking Oven] that seemed to work very much like the stations in the Lunar Forge. Courier 1 had just arrived outside the door of Eira''s residence, so Stew let Smittee get back to creating mana glass. He wanted to have at least one cabinet full for future experiments. When he swapped to the golem, he could feel Romero watching him from around the corner of the mausoleum. He didn''t even want to know what the ghoul had been up to while he was away. He knocked on the hidden door to be polite, but also sent a message to Eira''s mind to make sure she knew it was him. "Enter" Eira called from inside. He walked into the residence and found Eira sitting in the kitchen with a glass of wine and loaf of bread. A revenant wandered around the kitchen with a broom, not really sweeping, but staying busy. It creeped Stew out, but he decided not to say anything. He handed Eira the false dungeon core. "I''ve brought something for you, just as we agreed." It glittered in his hand and pulsed with a purple glow when Eira touched it. Her eyes widened. "This." She looked up at the golem. "I know we agreed, but I didn''t really expect you to give me something this powerful." She trailed off looking at it. "My magic destroyed the last one. I thought that I had¡­" "This won''t degrade like the one you had before as long as you keep it here in the dungeon." Stew didn''t mind revealing more details now that she was under contract, but he still didn''t want to tell her too much, like how easily he could replace these. "I''d be interested in learning more about how you use this to amplify your magic, but right now I need to use your kitchen for a moment if you don''t mind?" Eira''s brow furrowed but her lip curled in a smile. "Why would you need¡­ Nevermind, it''s yours anyway. I''m just a tenant." "Thank you." Great, Stew thought, now I''m the kind of landlord that drops in to borrow the oven. He realized belatedly he could have just created another kitchen next to the forge on the fifth floor. Maybe he would later, but right now it made more sense to just use the one he had until he was sure this worked. He passed a bottle of milk to Courier 1 and took a look at the menu for the [Baking Oven]. There was a new option, but probably not the one he was looking for. [Baking Oven] [The smell of fresh baked bread can brighten any day. Provided you have the right ingredients, this oven can create breads, pies, and pastries.] [ Loaf Of Braided Bread [1 Mana] Flatbread - Unleavened [1 Mana] Salted Bread And Olive Oil [1 Mana, 1 Flatbread - Unleavened] Small Cake [1 Mana, 1 Milk, 2 Eggs] ] That wasn''t how cake worked, but it made a sort of sense if the logic was that mana replaced flour, water, and sugar. He had no idea where to get eggs, maybe he could trade for them with the town once it was up and running. This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there. The [Roasting Spit] didn''t seem likely to be much help, so he looked at the [Cookpot]. [Cookpot] [A bubbling pot of hearty stew can be deeply satisfying. Provided you have the right ingredients, create soups, stews, and other cooked items] [ Porridge - (1 Mana) Fish And Vegetable Stew - (1 Mana) Purified Water - (1 Mana) Wine - (1 Mana) Cheese Wheel - (10 milk) ] Really. Cheese? Like the cake, it made a sort of sense, but not from a pot bubbling over a fire. He shrugged the golem''s shoulders and gathered two crates of milk, creating two cheese wheels with two bottles left over. He set one of the cheese wheels and the two extra bottles on the table for Eira. The cheese wheel was about twenty centimeters across, dark yellow, almost brown on the sides and lighter on the top and bottom. It looked delicious. Using Stat-o-Vision? he found it was probably better than delicious. [Divine Cheese Wheel] [1024 servings] [One of the great culinary achievements of the gods, best served with Ambrosia and a side of Mana] [One serving of Divine Cheese heals all injuries, restores all mana, and cures all diseases.] "For me?" She asked. "Um. Yes, sure, enjoy." Stew decided it didn''t make much difference since he could do all of those things for her as part of the minion contract, but that was probably some ridiculously tasty cheese. He checked the [Cookpot] and [Baking Oven] menus to see if the cheese wheel unlocked anything. He wasn''t surprised to see the [Baking Oven] now offered three kinds of pizza for one bread and one cheese. Ironically, he''d have to explain what pizza was to Eira and the Romans, but it gave him ideas for his market. "I was just thinking it would be nice to have something more for lunch. Thank you again." Eira sat back down with her staff and the false core. She pulled a cord from a satchel and began winding it around the crystal and the end of her staff. When she finished she raised the staff in one hand and the crystal thrummed with power, seeming to draw the light out of the room with its deep, deep, violet glow. "Sweep," she commanded the revenant. It straightened and looked at Eira, then at the broom in its hands. It nodded and began to sweep the floor gracefully and efficiently. The nod gave Stew some concerns. Were these revenants empty shells, machines like his golems, or did they still have some awareness? They might have been bandits here to kill him, but that didn''t justify keeping them bound and alive if they were still aware. He was going to have to talk to Eira and her grandmother about that, but he could tell he would have to approach the subject carefully to get a straight answer. At the same time, Stew wondered if the forge might be able to make her a staff with a better mounting than the cord. He realized he hadn''t even tried bringing any weapons to the forge, despite its description mentioning weapons specifically. He should try some armor too. For right now though, he was going to see if he could forge¡­ Some cheese? He swapped back to Smittee who had already finished 52 mana glass. He gave Smittee the cheese wheel and checked the smelter. Nothing. And it was the same for the forge. He found it both disappointing and comforting that neither the forge or the smelter had anything to do with cheese. But it still left him back at square one. Was it possible to still turn cheese into actions? Maybe? He swapped to Johnny Five and tried feeding the cheese wheel to Fluff, but Fluff wasn''t interested. He looked at what was quickly turning into a vast field of milk crate pyramids, like the ruins of some weird civilization with a thing for calcium. He could make a boatload of pizza. Possibly divine pizza. Cake too, if he found some eggs. Not terrible, he decided, but still not solving any actual problems. He swapped back to Courier 1 and brought the cheese with him. Thinking that there might be a new build option like a holy cheese cave that produced [Divine Cheese] on its own or something, he poked around in his own menus. There was no cave, but there was something more mysterious. [Font Of Divine Encouragement - (10,000 Divine Cheese Wheels)] That seemed promising. He set Courier 1 to work making cheese until he had enough. He decided to create the font down on Level 5 in the old arena to avoid cluttering Eira''s kitchen. At 100,000 milk, it made a significant dent in the accumulated crates. The font was a small white pedestal, topped with a basin full of milk. The milk glowed with a warm light that felt like concentrated nostalgia. [Font Of Divine Encouragement] [Sometimes it just takes a little motivation, a kind word, a smile, or an endless stream of divine energy.] [Generates 10 Action Points Per hour] A serious magical artifact made from cheese. He didn''t know whether to praise Bossy or Sheogorath. This was nothing like a [Mana Cube] but it seemed to be exactly what he was looking for. It was expensive, but each font would be a passive source of actions, and that was just what he had hoped he would find. Thinking of cubes he decided to see what happened if he put multiple fonts in close proximity. He quickly generated four more, placing them close together. It didn''t seem to make any difference. The fonts were small, but his current milk production was 720 thousand per hour, so he could make 7.2 fonts per hour. He didn''t really want to put them on the plains with Bossy and her herd, but that seemed like the only option for now. It turned out a golem could only work with items on the same level, and he wanted to automate the process. He moved the fonts he had already created to Level 4 on the far side from the entrance, tucked away in a corner. Then, he tinkered with Johnny Five for a few minutes before finding the right cadence to keep the new kittens fed as fast as they could go as long as they were awake, and generate a font every time the milk surplus hit 100,000. There was no need to keep Fluff on milk duty, so he sent the panther up to the swamp to join the others, to Fluff''s delight. Each of the Panthers was eager for a chance to pounce on a delver, and they seemed to be fine with being on a different level from Bossy as long as they were between her and the entrance. While he was automating things, he updated Smittee''s instructions to have Forge and Smelter create mana cubes and stack them in the six and four pattern. It was obvious he was going to quickly run out of room in storage, so he expanded the room using some of the tricks he had learned with the other floors and made a one acre warehouse. He took a moment to settle back in his own core to rest his mind and look at his stats. [Unnamed Core] - Category 1 Gray Core [Levels: 5] [Minions: 6] [Monsters: 151] [Mana: 1,182 / 10,500] [Average Reaction Efficiency: 0.05] [Cumulative Mana Recharge: 180 / hr] [Actions Remaining: 1,211] [Action Fonts: 7] [Action Recovery: 1,690 / day] [1. Generate Mana] [2. Monsters And Minions] [3. Build] [4. Customization] [5. Inventory] [6. Consume Mana Cores] [7. Press The Button] Maybe he was the villain, maybe not, but this did give him the urge to rub his hands together and cackle. Time to build a town. And an army. Feed The Trolls "Boss?" It was Femur still outside with the work crew. Stew gave Smittee''s instructions a quick tweak then swapped to Femur''s head. The first thing he noticed was that sunset had come outside and the workmen were gathered around cookpots for their evening meals. To the goblin''s eyes, the work area was well illuminated by the fading glow from the sky and torchlight, and the crew had made impressive progress. The second thing he noticed was a hulking figure, nearly as tall as a tree, talking to Raek and Theus at the edge of the torchlight. The newcomer had grayish skin, massive hands, and a face that was all nose. He was dressed in animal skins and carried a huge club. Rather than panicking or drawing weapons and charging, the guards and workers seemed fine with the visitor. "Who is that?" Stew asked. "Nobody I know," Femur scratched an ear. "Little fella, though, not as big as a Mountain King. Cave troll, probably." "Should I send you some golems or wolves for backup?" Stew thought about sending the panthers, but they might be a little too playful to be trusted around so many humans. Maybe he should though, if Raek was about to pull his disappearing trick again. "You have wolves?" Femur''s voice intruded into his train of thought. He was having more and more trouble focusing on the outside world, even his own minions. "I really need to introduce you to everyone." Stew realized it would be a little difficult to introduce Femur around since it was likely Femur couldn''t leave the first floor. Come to think of it, that suggested some interesting implications for how those rules interpreted the domain around a [False Core]. "Boss?" Femur asked again. "Looks like they''re coming here instead." "Oh?" Stew snapped his attention back to what was happening right now. What''s wrong with me? He was going to have to make more effort to focus. He had Femur stand up a bit straighter as Raek, Theus, and the Troll approached. Raek advanced ahead of the others and knelt to meet the goblin at eye level. "May I speak to your patron?" "I''m here." Stew replied. "Ah, good." Raek lowered his voice. "Firstly, I want to explain my behavior earlier. I know you''re aware I had a quick look around. I had to have some sense of what you weren''t telling us. Discovering you were an Incarnate raised some obvious concerns." Bossy was right. The others had also caught his accidental revelation. No reason he couldn''t still play it cool. "You can understand why your behavior raises other questions." "Please remember I am under contract, and was double so. I couldn''t try to harm you if I wanted to, and harming you is the farthest thing from my intentions." He raised his voice again and gestured back at the troll. "We may have desperate need of your help." Well, that didn''t sound good. Those were overtime without pay sorts of words. "How so?" Theus turned to the troll and nodded. "Tell the goblin, he serves as the eyes and ears of the dungeon." Femur chose that moment to try to pick his nose, but Stew stopped him just in time and turned it into a, hopefully thoughtful looking, chin rub. "You''re not getting our first born, goblin." The troll''s voice was a perfect match for Morgan Freeman, if Morgan Freeman had been twelve feet tall and also a cement mixer. "We don''t make those sorts of deals here," Stew said. "Fine then." The troll raised one massive arm above his head. "I am Beryl, and what I can offer is strong arms and stronger backs." Stew felt like he had somehow missed the most important part of this conversation. "In exchange for what?" Should it be obvious to him for some reason? Beryl looked from Theus to Raek with a questioning look, then turned back to Femur and Stew. "What do you think? We seek sanctuary. We want to join your dungeon." Stew looked up and further up from Femur''s vantage to meet Beryl''s gaze. "Who''s we?" A rustle came from the trees and Stew realized the treeline that had seemed so close was actually some distance away. Instead a crowd of trolls of many sizes stood just outside the firelight. Some were as small as humans, and Stew realized these must be children. Some of the adults were half again as tall as Beryl. Beryl mistook his question for a challenge. He spread his arms and roared. "We are the Long-Toed, the Stretch-Armed, the Mighty-Thewed! We are thunder on the clearest of nights! We are the Deep Folk of Tender Rock Abyss!" Most of the workmen and guards who had ignored the troll earlier took notice now, stopping what they were doing and staring. It seems that while they had accepted the single troll''s presence, they hadn''t noticed the other trolls any more than Stew had. Beryl took a deep breath, his face raised to the night sky, then he lowered his arms and looked back down to Femur, ignoring the silent humans'' stares. "We are refugees, tormented and driven from our homes by those foul Helvitian Gauls and their awful new battlemage king, Merlin." Oh, right. He had meant to ask about that name earlier, but now seemed like a bad time to bring it up. Femur might end up smashed to paste before he could ask any other questions. "And what do you want from me?" "Are you so cruel that you would make me beg?" Beryl set his club on the ground in front of Femur and lowered himself to one knee. "Fine then." He said again, lowering his head. "I am Beryl, Production Analyst of the Tender Rock Abyss Deep Folk. According to my calculations we have a twenty percent chance of survival if we remain above ground when the Helvetian Honor Horde arrives. This improves to thirty-five percent if we can find a hiding place and may reach as high as forty-five percent if we find protection from a strong ally." Those were some very low numbers, but Stew couldn''t get past the first part. "Did you say Production Analyst?" Beryl looked up, looking surprisingly sheepish for a giant troll. "Is it so obvious then? I was only First Shift Leader until this year. We lost both our Production Analyst and our Chief Resource Officer to a sneak attack as we crossed the pass. They died bravely that the rest of us might escape. Since, we have found friends here." He looked at Ba''Rush who had come over during the roaring. "But we need stronger allies. I am told that you are the strongest in these soft lands." Unauthorized tale usage: if you spot this story on Amazon, report the violation. Theus stepped forward. "If I may. These are a staunch company of the finest earth mages and builders you will find, and they need to be below ground before Merlin comes, or the Legion for that matter. Neither the Gauls nor the Romans have been kind to the Elder Folk." "Neither have the Phoenicians or Macedonians, to be fair." Raek added. "We all have debts to the gods." Beryl let them talk, staring Femur in the eye and saying nothing. "I can offer you your own level, but I will need a contract from each of you." He shared his updated, standard contract with Beryl. The troll looked into space for a moment then his eyes grew wide. He turned to Theus. "It''s true. You told me, but I thought this was impossible." He turned back to Femur. "An eighteen month renewable contract with a thirty day termination clause? Why are your terms so generous?" "It''s only fair." Stew shrugged Femur''s shoulders. "It''s what I would want." Beryl nodded and Stew sent the contract to all of the other trolls. Doing so gave him a count, one hundred eighty-five. It was a good thing he had unlocked all this mana, because the automatic upkeep looked to be one stone per week per troll and one mana per day. He might have to have Big John scout out another stone quarry or see what it would take to upgrade the one he had. Beryl was the first to accept. As they signed the contract, the trolls formed a line and walked down the dirt path to the dungeon that would someday be the town''s central thoroughfare. The workers and guards all stared silently as they went. He asked Femur and learned that most probably hadn''t seen this many trolls in one place before. No one had, they were usually shy and reclusive. Stew added a stairwell to create a new floor below 5 then shuffled it up to replace 1 as he had before, using the same tricks he had used for the slime level and swamp to turn it into a one acre, bare room ¨C really just a big elevator. As soon as all of the trolls were in, he swapped the floor down to 6 then moved it again, making this the fourth floor. Now Femur had 1; Eira had 2; the slimes were still 3; the Trolls had 4; Bossy was 5; and the floor he thought of as "his" was now 6. He made Beryl the level boss and started looking at options. [Beryl - Level Boss, Unnamed Level] [Cave Troll - Level 15] [Production Analyst, Deep Folk of Tender Rock Abyss] [Mana Cost - 1 / day] [Stone Cost - 1 / week] [Health 50/50] [Agility 4] [Strength 25] [Constitution 8] [Actions: 1/1] [Action Recharge: 1 / day] [Special Attack: Reprimand] [Special Ability: Statistical Modeling and Analysis] The other trolls ranged from level 1 through 18 with varying stats and abilities like [Stone Weaving], and [Crystal Singing], some were fighters with abilities like [Foe Smash], and [Mountain Fist]. One tall, bald troll named Mythril seemed to be their strongest fighter. She carried a spear taller than herself and had a skill called [Skewer Thief] which would allow her to target any enemy even if they used stealth to hide. That seemed like a handy thing to have after seeing Raek''s abilities. Even if he was under contract and couldn''t harm the dungeon. Others were bound to have similar skills. The trolls were looking around at the blank walls and starting to get a little agitated. He doubted anyone called a "Cave Troll" would be claustrophobic, but they were probably worried if this was all the accommodations there were going to get. He swapped into Beryl''s mind, but made sure all of the trolls could hear him. "Let''s get started building out your level. I''m assuming you''d like some caves?" "Yes." "We would, yes." "Yes." Multiple trolls answered, so he tried just asking Beryl, "Who should speak for all of you for how we layout the level? You?" Beryl seemed shocked. At first, Stew thought it was because he heard Stew in his mind, but Beryl said, "No! Of course not. You should talk to Amethyst, our Structural Engineer." "Right, sure." Stew looked around until he found an Amethyst, then head-hopped again. "Hi, I''m the dungeon. I wanted to talk to you about what you would like to see in this level." "You poor thing." Amethyst was a middle-sized troll with short cropped, green hair wearing a sort of bearskin dress with metal loops like barrel hoops for shoulders. "I can see you were nearly destroyed. We''ll have our work cut out rebuilding." Stew was at a loss for words. This was not a reaction he had expected or even understood. "Why do you say I was nearly destroyed?" "Well I can see you''re down to six, tiny levels, and I can feel you generating mana as fast as you can. What was it, a dhole attack?" She straightened, grabbed her shoulder hoops like overalls, and shook her head. "Never you mind, we''ll get you straightened out. I''ll put our best shapers to work getting some levels dug out." "I um." Stew wasn''t even sure how to answer. "Um thank you. It''s really not as bad as it seems. I''m just very. Deliberate. About how I build. Now would you like me to turn this into a cavern?" "How long will that take?" She asked. Feeling a little rankled at the assumption that he was on his last legs, Stew showed-off by turning the room into a [Twilight Cavern], extra large. "Oh!" She spun in place looking around in wonder. "That was fast." She cocked her head. "A little generic, but quite nice for a first attempt, really." He could hear other trolls oohing and ahhing. It made him feel a little better. "I can do quite a few different styles of rooms." He described some of his options. He was a little guarded at first, afraid of more criticism, but soon realized Amethyst didn''t mean it personally and really seemed to know quite a bit about actually building things instead of just poofing them into existence. She pointed out that although the cavern was reinforced by mana it also had some interesting hidden archwork, cleverly concealed by the stalactites. The arches provided tremendous structural strength. "And, of course once you replace this with reinforced stone it will be even stronger," she added. "You think I should?" He didn''t tell her he hadn''t even tried to use the reinforced stone in his menu. "Of course! This is just a prototype, right? I mean, if you stopped here, some delver would just cut right through your walls, and no dungeon would ever allow that." "Right, of course." Stew was really glad dungeons couldn''t blush. They talked through some options and settled on a huge [Hidden Vale] with the sky set to a permanent moonlit night in keeping with the theme of the dungeon and the troll''s sun allergies. The vale appeared as a deep cleft nestled in the mountains with a forest of hearty evergreens and a trickling stream flowing through it. The stairway from level three entered at one end and the stream disappeared into a cave entrance at the other end. The cave system was a winding, unlit maze, so it would seem to a delver that they entered a cave in the slime level and emerged in this hidden valley under the Moon, only to pass through the mountains via another cave to reach the equally dark plains. The trolls would live in their own caves through hidden doors off the main caverns. Stew created the broad strokes with his menu choices, but Amethyst and the trolls with [Stone Weaving] abilities did the amazingly intricate and natural looking finish work. Stew started to see what Amethyst had meant about his first efforts looking generic. The possibilities had Stew''s mind racing. The earth magic was great, sure, and the fighters looked fierce, but trolls like Beryl and Amethyst offered skills he needed even more. He had literally mindless golems to automate repetitive tasks, and he had controllers to help manage those golems, but they couldn''t make decisions, couldn''t help him plan, improve. The number of things he was managing right now was a constant drain on his attention. He was finally starting to see how he might move faster. He had a whole village of trolls that seemed to be experts in middle management. Afterall, he couldn''t watch the horizon with his nose to the grindstone. That belonged on a motivational poster. He should suggest it to Beryl. The Contractor It was a bright, sunny day in Tucson, Arizona and Nestor Banks was on his way to a job interview when he was nearly killed. He wasn''t really interested in the job anyway. He was going mostly to humor his thesis advisor. The address was just off campus so he had decided to walk despite the heat. He ran two marathons a year, so the exertion wasn''t an issue, and he wanted time to read. An acquaintance from his internship over last summer had written an introductory textbook that mostly covered relativistic kinematics, quantization of energy, and atomic and molecular structure. It was surprisingly funny. His attention was deep in the book as he flipped an old butterfly. It was worn and dull and mostly just a fidget toy after years of use. He was so focused he nearly missed some incompetent delivery driver that almost ran him over in a crosswalk. The big black van swerved at the last moment with a squeal of brakes and slammed into some pole halfway down the block. It looked like the driver might have been thrown from the vehicle. Their fault for not wearing a seat belt, it was too hot to be standing around waiting to file some statement, so he just kept walking. Surely someone else would be along in a minute or two and call it in. The address turned out to be one of those nondescript, faux adobe office complexes built sometime in the 2000s. That just confirmed his suspicion that this was going to be some dead-end Defense contractor job. Defense projects could have big budgets, but cash runs out. He needed a job where he could publish his results and build the kind of reputation that brings its own funding. The office suite turned out to be in a single-story building at the back of the complex. It looked like the kind of building where he would expect to find a dentist''s office. Maybe it was a temporary rental just for these interviews. His expectations lowered even further. Worse, it could be some hopeless AI or VR startup that would try to bind him in NDAs and waste his talent solving worthless problems. Through the tinted glass, he could see a small reception area with a few awkward chairs, magazines on a table, and a bored receptionist behind a desk. He almost turned around right then, but he decided to see it through, just so that he could tell Dr. Garza that he had kept the appointment. As he opened the door, he felt a blast of air conditioning, otherwise he didn''t feel anything unusual, but the room where his foot landed looked nothing like the waiting room he had seen through the window. A bald man in a brown suit sat behind a desk with a single empty chair facing him. The rest of the room was a stark white so perfect that Nestor couldn''t see where the walls met the floor or ceiling. He immediately stepped back out and looked again at the glass office front. He saw the same waiting room and now the receptionist, obviously some projection, seemed to be looking at him with a puzzled expression. Nestor sighed. So it was some VR or Augmented Reality startup afterall. Disappointing, although the projection technology seemed impressive, at least. He decided he was going to have to have a frank conversation with Dr. Gaza. He just couldn''t spend his time on these frivolous distractions. He wouldn''t put it in so many words because he knew how it would sound, but he had known since a young age that he had a special destiny, and he wasn''t about to let small minded thesis advisors or anyone else get in his way. He stepped in the room and strode straight to the desk, ignoring how his feet made no sound at all, increasing the illusion of endless space around him. He wasn''t going to give whoever this would-be PT Barnum was, the satisfaction of acknowledging his tricks. The man rose as he approached, extending a hand over the desk to shake. "Mr. Banks, so glad you could meet. I''ll be handling your onboarding." The interviewer''s suit looked overly simplified when viewed more closely. The buttons were just bumps in the same surface as the suit itself. Even the man''s skin was a little too smooth and perfect. Not very convincing and really not that well done, even considering the unusually effective projected 3D. The animation was possibly better than average from the small amount they had shown so far, but still not the best he had seen. "Introductions usually work both ways." Nestor ignored the offered hand, and didn''t sit in the chair. "Isn''t it a little premature to be talking about onboarding? I haven''t accepted a position yet. In fact, you haven''t even offered me one. Just to set expectations appropriately, I''m here on the recommendation of my thesis advisor. He didn''t share any details." The man put his hand away, but his smile didn''t change. "You may call me Bob. I apologize for this makeshift space. As you might expect, this is not our standard approach, so we had to put something ad-hoc together to meet you here." As he had suspected, a temporary rental just for interviews. Maybe he could cut them some slack for the poor VR. He decided to sit down and at least hear the pitch. The man nodded and sat as well. There was a single folder on his desk which he now opened. "Nestor, a propitious name. Were you named for the great warrior and sage Nestor of Gerenia?" "I was named for my great uncle who established our family fortune. He was a smuggler and a drunk." "Pity. Regardless, you have an impressive CV ¨C top of your class, interned at CERN, a special interest in high-energy physics, but well rounded in the Humanities. And you are an endurance athlete which means your body isn''t hopeless for a randomly evolved baseline." He turned a page. "I also see that, after one brutal loss, you decisively won two later schoolyard fights, and managed several acts of petty retribution against classmates and teachers with no consequences to yourself, not even suspicion." That was a much more thorough background check than he had been expecting, even for a Defense position. That implied this was even worse, an Intelligence agency job. There was no way he was going to be bound by all that nonsense. "Dr. Garza didn''t mention¨C" "My apologies again. I should have clarified, you won''t be making the appointment your advisor arranged. Don''t worry, it would have bored you anyway, just a potential breakthrough in nuclear medicine. It might save thousands of lives, but it will never win you the kind of recognition you crave. Hardly anything in this world would. What if I could offer you something new. Something unexpected?" Nestor bristled. He could not tolerate being spoken down to, especially not by whatever government or more likely government contractor flunky was running this pathetic pantomime. "You may think you know me." He waved at the folder to dismiss it. "But I assure you that you do not, and I believe this conversation is finished." He stood, or at least, he tried to, but nothing happened. There was no sense of strain, he wasn''t tied or glued to anything, and he had no sensation of numbness, so it didn''t feel like the man had drugged him somehow. Still he refused to give the man the satisfaction of looking alarmed. "Don''t be ridiculous, let me go now. If you know anything about me you know my family will¨C" "Your family will mourn the loss, but probably not all that much, wouldn''t you agree? You have cost them quite a bit covering up your messes so far. This will be your chance to make up for all of that, serve a higher purpose." Nestor was really coming to dislike this man. He had interrupted him twice, and now it seemed he was actually trying to blackmail him. It was embarrassing. "Bob. I will say this once. Let me leave here now or there will be consequences." "Consequences! Good. Actions. Reactions. Inevitability. That''s what we''re doing here, you, and I, setting the wheels in motion. I''ve kept you here long enough. I had to spend some attention cleaning up some of that mess with your near miss today, but we''re ready now to move on to introducing you to your new world." "That pathetic assassination attempt was you? Did you think you could frighten me into agreeing to your terms?" "Unfortunately we do have to make some allowances for free will. I assure you the intent was not to frighten you." The man stood up and the desk vanished, as did Nestor''s chair. He found himself standing beside the man, facing a glowing blue oval which seemed to hang, unsupported in the middle of the room. It glowed a disturbing blue color like Cherenkov radiation. "This is the exit," the man said. "I can''t make you step through. Know that if you do, there is no going back." The man stepped through himself, disappearing on the other side. Nestor sighed at the theatrics. Maybe Dr. Garza hadn''t realized he was sending him to meet with this Bob, but there had obviously been some sort of leak of his private information. He would accept the blame himself for not vetting this offer more carefully before coming, but, he was going to have to ask for a new Thesis advisor, this was just not acceptable. Love this novel? Read it on Royal Road to ensure the author gets credit. He stepped forward, and found himself standing on the side of a mountain looking down at a beautiful valley where a village of thatched huts surrounded a larger central structure. He could smell the woodsmoke and feel the chill of the air on his skin. Every tuft of moss and blooming flower was clear to the tiniest detail. The man, Bob, was nowhere to be seen. Just as he might expect from a PT Barnum, he had fooled Nestor with an egress. Suddenly a message appeared, green on a black background. [WELCOME ADVENTURER] It tracked his head movement, but when he moved his eyes around it stayed still. The menu was semi transparent, so he could see that two bearded men were hiking toward him from the village. They wore long tunics and carried swords. One carried a short spear. They didn''t look like reenactors. The tips and edges were metal, and from the way they came up the steep path, they were incredibly fit. For the first time today, Nestor felt a deep sense of dread. This was so much worse than he had imagined. He had been prepared to deal with some Defense or tech company or even an intelligence agency, but this was completely unexpected. Dr. Garza had sent him to some boring med-tech meeting, and he had been hijacked by the worst possible sort of predators, a game company with delusions of grandeur. The menu changed. [Nestor Banks, please pick a starting class.] [1. Fighter
  1. Wizard
  2. Rogue
  3. Cleric
  4. Crafter]
He tried to swipe the menu away but it stayed. The approaching men saw him wave. The one with a sword responded by sprinting faster up the path. The one with a spear, planted his feet and threw like an olympic champion. It flew true, straight, and fast. It cut a deep groove out of the right side of Nestor''s stomach. [WARNING: You have taken significant damage. You should rest and heal.] [Please pick a starting class.] [1. Fighter
  1. Wizard
  2. Rogue
  3. Cleric
  4. Crafter]
It hurt more than anything Nestor had ever experienced. He doubled over in pain, gripping his side hard to try to staunch the bleeding. He fell to his knees. His pulse pounded in his face and the wound all at once. He found it hard to raise his head to watch his attackers approach, but forced it up anyway. They had slowed now that he wasn''t getting away. Many things went through his mind. This wasn''t ultrasonic haptics, it wasn''t direct electrical stimulation of nerves. He could feel the ragged edges of the wound beneath his fingers, and he could feel internal damage. He could feel the blood warm on his hand. Given the evidence, he had to assume that this was a real wound. Given that the wound was real, the weapon that had inflicted it had to be real and the two men approaching had to be capable of inflicting even more damage. Maybe this was some kind of over the top combat training simulation, but the technology was a generation or more beyond anything he had encountered. It didn''t really matter. This was a very specific instance of the simulation question. Do we live in a simulation? Was he in a simulation now? When faced with a simulation indistinguishable from reality it made no sense to even ask the question. The only question that mattered right now was what to do next? The two men were nearly to him, and they had drawn their swords. The spear had not traveled far, he could possibly pick it up and try to defend himself, but his opponents were obviously skilled and experienced at this kind of fighting. He had just a few self defense classes he had taken for an elective. Maybe the heads-up display was for some kind of augmentation system that could teach him to use the spear or move his body for him, but there was no way to know without picking something. [Please pick a starting class.] [1. Fighter
  1. Wizard
  2. Rogue
  3. Cleric
  4. Crafter]
"Wizard." If he had to pick something he should pick something with the potential to be useful for more than the next few minutes. [Your new class comes with a new ability, Spellcasting. Would you like to learn how to cast a spell? (Y/N)] "Yes, just get on with it." It looked like it wasn''t going to matter what he chose. He had less than a minute before they reached the small ledge where he was bleeding out. [Gesture in the direction you would like to cast the spell and say the name of the spell. Try "Fireball" to start. Be careful selecting a target!] He raised his left hand and found that it was trembling and weak already from blood loss. His vision was growing dark around the edges. He tried to keep it pointed to a place right at the feet of the two men and equidistant between them. "Fireball." Something pulsed through his body like a second, more powerful heartbeat, only this one felt cool and dense. His hand took on an orange glow. The two men stopped and turned to scramble back down the mountain. The orange glow erupted from his hand forming a flaming orb that blasted away as fast as an arrow. He completely missed his aim. The fireball caught one man in the middle of his back and exploded, blowing the man in two and knocking the other to the ground, burning. [Experience awarded!] [Tutorial ended.] [All damage healed.] [Level Up available.] He felt his strength return and the wound in his side closed and vanished under his hand. Wasting no time, he grabbed the spear and strode down the mountainside to drive it through the throat of the burning man cutting him off in mid-shriek. [Experience awarded!] A loot menu appeared with the sword, some coins, and the man''s burned clothing. There was also something called a "Mana Core." He took the coins and the mana core, assuming it was probably something useful. He didn''t bother looting Eric-The-Half-A-Celt in the interest of time. [Nestor Banks, Level Up available. Please review your stats to Level Up] He looked down at the village where eight more of these fighters were gathering and starting up the mountain toward him, shouting. One was bigger and armored, unlike the rest. The two he had killed on the mountainside hadn''t spoken, but he could just hear these shouts. It sounded like a cross between German and Irish or Welsh. He found he could understand them perfectly. "Surrender you filthy Fae, or face cold Iron!" and "Drop the spear!" He did drop the spear, but only to pick up a large, leather bound book on the ground by his feet, next to an old, rusty knife. The book he had been carrying when he stepped through the portal was gone, possibly this had replaced it. The tome was in no language he recognized, but, again, he found he could read the cover "Basic Grimoire: Level 1." The group of villagers was starting up the path now. Others, mostly unarmed, many of them children, had gathered down by the huts. He looked again at the armed party and wondered what the range was like for this fireball spell. He raised his right hand and gestured "Fireball." His second fireball flew straight and true exactly where he aimed it. Right into the largest thatched hut below. The wall of the hut exploded and burned with a roar he could hear even this far up. Screams and shouts came from the village. The armed party turned back to help fight the fire. [Experience Awarded!] [Experience Awarded!] [Experience Awarded!] He picked the spear back up and tucked the book under his arm. He thought he could see a way to get to the top of the ridge. Hopefully from there he could find a good defensible position to spend the night and do some studying. [Experience Awarded!] He was going to need people to survive, but it wasn''t likely he could reason with this village after such an unfortunate introduction. He would have to learn as much as he could and present himself more carefully to some other village, maybe take on some quests or odd jobs or whatever to begin building a reputation. For now, he would just have to accept that this was what he had to work with. It was surprising, shocking even, but it really didn''t change his plans that much. The fire below had spread to the other huts and trees. He could still hear screaming from where he stood. To be fair to Bob, he had been right about one thing. His old world hadn''t offered any real growth opportunities. This one looked much more promising. [Experience Awarded!] Using the butt of the spear like a staff, he tucked the grimoire under his arm and continued up the path to the ridgeline without looking back. He doubted anyone would be following him for a while at least. [Nestor Banks, Level Up available. Please review your stats to Level Up] "Call me Merlin," he said. Considering his first encounter here, he had almost said "Tim," but the joke would be lost on everyone except himself, and he had to start building a solid personal brand. [Experience Awarded!] Caesars Palace Time to check the todo list again. Stew moved his attention back to the Temple on the Fifth Floor and Bossy. "What can we clear off of the list?" "Since we last discussed it, you have completed, ''Charge admission'', ''Finish the slime level and pick a boss'', ''Build an undead level for the necromancer and her zombies,''" Bossy paused in a way that implied she wanted to say something here, but she continued instead, "''Review upgrade notices for the golems'', ''Replace the lost [Natural Light] view previously available from this level'', and ''Find a way to generate more mana, faster.'' I would add, you have also found a way to generate more actions, though that was not strictly on the list." "And what''s left?" "You placed ''Learn. Grow. Build.'' and ''Make myself too tough to kill, even if they try.'' at the top, followed by ''Make myself more valuable alive than dead.'' I would say that you''ve made progress on each, but you haven''t asked me to remove them." "Yes, leave them for now. What else?" "Level-up Big John and send him prospecting again, Level-up all the monsters and minions, Find out more about the Battlemage King called ''Merlin''. You also mentioned something about ''steam powered siege weapons'' and building an army, but did not elaborate." "That''s it. I knew something was bothering me. It''s Merlin." "Do you know this mage?" "No, but I''ve heard the name before. The only problem is, if it''s the Merlin whose name I''ve heard, he shouldn''t even be born yet." "You say the most interesting things. You will have to tell me more about your past life." "Maybe sometime, but right now I need to make sure of a few things. Garrik might know the most, but Eira works for me. I''ll ask her." "About that." Bossy paused again. "You don''t like her," Stew said. "I don''t know her very well, but she is a necromancer and she did kill me the first time we met." "Right. We haven''t had a chance to talk about that." Stew switched gears. Ancient mysteries could wait. "How did that feel?" "Oh, it wasn''t my worst fatal experience. It was quick and painless. She just withdrew all of the life in this body at once, and I failed to exist for a short time." Stew was still thinking about that when he created a new false core and sent Femur to meet with Quintus to talk about Aqueducts. "With trolls, you say?" Quintus looked up from a stack of large scrolls spread across a makeshift table in the middle of what would eventually be the baths. "And they agreed to this?" "Ready to get started tonight if you let them. But we''ll need some¡­" Femur reached out and picked up a carved stone lion Quintus was using to weigh the plans down in the morning breeze. "lions in payment. Healthy breeding pair, good teeth." Stew was about to interrupt Femur and tell Quintus he didn''t need any such thing, then stopped himself, curious to see what Quintus would say. "Lions? It will take a few months to get them shipped this far north, and you''ll have to talk to Raek about the budget." "Pitiful, in this day and age you can''t get a lion sooner than that." Femur shook his head sadly. "But the boss really wants this aqueduct, so I''ll be willing to let you start if we make it four lions, one male, three female. For the wait, you see." "For the wait." Quintus stared at Femur for a few seconds. "This isn''t just a prank, right. If I go tell the others we''re going to have troll earthmages build an aqueduct by night, and it will cost us four lions, you aren''t going to stand behind me and laugh are you?" Femur put a big knuckled finger to his chin in thought. "I will likely laugh, but it will be about that haircut, not about the lions. Lions are serious business." Quintus hung his head for a moment, and Stew had to admit his hair did look like it was cut under a bowl. "Right. I have to take this to Raek, but assuming he says yes, when could the trolls start? We haven''t properly surveyed the¨C" Just then a shout went up in the camp and people were pointing to the south. Stew tried to look through Femur''s eyes, but the goblin was too short to see over the treeline, so he switched back to Drinking Bird in his core room and used the panopticon provided by [Natural Light] to look out from a higher vantage in the hillside. At first he thought he saw clouds, but then his mind adjusted to the sight and he realized he was seeing a massive blue ship, flying high above the trees. Huge paddle shaped appendages stirred the air on each side beneath massive, square sails marked with SPQR and laurel leaves in gold. There was a faintly glowing ramming beak in front with two giant blue eyes on each side. The eyes looked flat and painted, then they moved to look down at the trees passing below. Dozens of smaller ships of different sizes sailed around it, all with the same general style. Stew switched back to Femur just in time to hear Quintus say, "...finally arrived. They''ll have the lime and ash for our cement." The fleet was just peaking over the treeline now and Stew could see flat, railed platforms were dropping like leaves from all of the ships. Each was full of soldiers in Legion armor. This content has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere. Stew was careful not to take control of Femur''s expression because he would just be gawping. He had known, in a general way, to expect a legion to show up at some point, but he hadn''t expected them so soon, and he hadn''t expected flying troop carriers. The big ship drew slowly forward, then stopped when its shadow covered the site for the new settlement. About half of the smaller ships passed the big one, moving fast and curving around to form a line over the hillside. More troops landed there. As each platform touched the ground the rail in front dropped, and the soldiers marched forward in unison until the last rank stepped off. Then the platform, empty, rose back up to its ship. It took only a few minutes before rank after rank of soldiers stood in perfect lines. Their armor and shields were bright polished steel, and each held multiple spears perfectly straight and vertical. The eeriest part is that none of them made a noise except for the sound of marching feet as they took their position. No one called out any orders or beat any drums. They just kept perfect time and moved to their places. It reminded him of his golems, but these legionnaires were mostly humans with a few orcs. He didn''t see any Fae or trolls, but that made sense with all the iron and daylight. Once every platform had unloaded and returned to the sky, a single, smaller platform lowered from the main ship. Where the other platforms had been plain and white, this one had purple banners and a square formation of soldiers in more ornate armor and longer spears. There were four trumpeters, one at each corner of the platform. It paused halfway between the ship and the ground and the trumpets sounded together in a complex pattern. The legion soldiers below reformed into an open rectangle like a marching band going for a national championship. The platform lowered into the middle of the open space. The guards on the platform separated and one man walked out on the grass. He was dressed in the same armor as the rest of the legionnaires, but his helmet was more ornate and had a purple crest. Behind, followed two columns with a dozen soldiers each. These soldiers looked different from the others. They wore lighter armor and didn''t carry swords or shields. Each carried a staff with a large, glowing gem. The only break in the uniformity was that each gem was a different color and size. Stew wished Stat-o-Vision worked outside the dungeon. Maybe he could find a workaround somehow. Raek seemed to have an [Evaluate] skill, maybe there was something similar for measuring potential opponents. The guards came last but double time marched to bring up each side of the others until they were even with the columns behind their commander. Stew didn''t need Stat-o-Vision to know it had to be him. The entire time, the workers and settlement were as silent as the soldiers. Apparently this wasn''t something they saw every day. The command group marched to the center of the space facing the legion. They were there for several minutes, reviewing the troops in silence. Then the horns sounded again and the soldiers broke ranks and gathered around the platforms which were now lowering again, loaded with cargo and supplies. The silence lifted now and the sound of thousands of voices and even shouts back and forth carried to Femur''s ears. The legionnaires went to work setting up tents and barricades. They used string to arrange streets and space the tents perfectly using almost exactly the same techniques Stew had seen the builders using to layout the town. Theus, Garrik, Raek and Ba''Rush gathered with Femur and Quintus at the drafting table. "They''re good at straight lines." Stew muttered. There had been a feeling of a show about the whole thing and he finally put his finger on it. He kept expecting them to start marching sideways or forming an eagle or something. At first he thought it was just his experiences from a different place and time not matching the reality here, but it was something more. His subconscious was trying to tell him something. This hadn''t been a military exercise, it was a show. That meant it had to be for him. Theus raised an eyebrow. "Not impressed?" Stew shrugged Femur''s shoulders. "I''ll have to get a few hundred golems out here and show you what I mean. It won''t be the same without drums and tubas, but we could maybe form an eagle or a sword or a big Pac-Man. Um, that''s a kind of monster that''s all mouth." Stew had played drums for two seasons in the marching band. His sometimes girlfriend played the clarinet. Badly. He quit when she switched to orchestra and started dating a cello player. It turned out she was much better at violin and rich kids, and he hated marching in a giant que-tip hat in the sun. That made him think that armor had to be hot on a warm day like today, and they were setting up camp without stopping to change. Where do they get enough water? He looked up at the massive ship casting its shadow over the construction of both the town and the camp. Theus noticed his gaze. "Yes, that has to be at least a little impressive. It takes an extraordinary amount of time and money to even build a standard air galley. The Minerva Semper Vigilans took up most of Rome''s military budget for a decade." The Minerva looked as big as a battleship to Stew, but wider, like a container ship, though he had never seen a battleship this close. Garrik stared like a kid at an airshow. "When I was very small, I got to tour the ship while it was under construction. The Minerva is faster than a galloping horse, can carry an entire legion plus their supplies, and her siege weapons can annihilate a force just as large. Or a whole city." Garrik glanced at Theus and Raek then down at Femur. He closed his mouth, and looked down, not meeting anyone''s gaze. "How''s it at digging?" Femur offered without Stew''''s prompting. The goblin chuckled. "Makes a great target up there." Garrik looked irritated, and Theus frowned. Stew was afraid the goblin might be about to start a fight with the whole Roman Empire. well Republic. Caesar. The goblin might pick a fight with Julius Caesar. Stew was going to need more golems. Maybe the trolls had some ideas about better defenses. Raek chuckled, breaking the tension. "You make a valid point. This ship is a fair copy of Carthage''s ships of the line, specifically our Venture class trade ships, though ours are defended by griffin riders for exactly the reason you mentioned, and are more for trade than battle. Then, we have been building them for over one hundred years." He gestured at the ship. "Romans are as nervous in the sky as they are on the waves, they''ll never trust anything but hobnail boots on solid ground." One of the first tents to rise was a large pavilion. Caesar went inside with the officers and battlemages, and part of his retinue crossed the field toward them, his eyes on the group by the drafting table. The elapsed time was less than thirty minutes from when they had first appeared to having the camp well on its way and Caesar''s HQ setup. Stew was even more impressed and worried by that than the big ships in the sky. Suddenly, huge plumes of white vapor jetted from the ship in all directions with a rushing sound Stew could hear from the ground. Raek pointed and smiled. "See they''re venting the steam ballistae as a show of their peaceful intent, and here comes a herald now with a greeting, I''m sure." I knew it! Stew thought. "Bossy, move steam powered siege weapons to the top of the todo list." Dinner Plans The roman officer crossing the field toward them grew less and less impressive as he approached. From a distance, he was just a red plume and shining armor, but as he grew nearer, it was obvious that he was trying to hurry without seeming to jog, and he kept a hand on his breastplate because his armor was apparently slightly too big. "Typical." Garrik muttered under his breath. "Typical how?" Ba''Rush said. "Sending a narrow stripe to greet us." Garrik made a point of turning around and looking busy with some supplies on the other side of the table. "Probably some sort of punishment for the poor kid." "Narrow stripe?" Stew asked, still using Femur''s voice. Raek looked down at Femur. "Noble kid. Young equestrian with his first officer rank." "Leg snapper," Ba''rush added, "kind of green officer you hope steps in a hole early in a campaign, so he doesn''t get you killed." The Legionnaire arrived out of breath and red faced. He looked to be about eighteen and his freckles matched his plume. "Health to you. I am Tribune, Narrow Stripe, Marcus Servilius Iberus of the Second Minerva Legion. I come bearing greetings from Gauius Julius Caesar, Consul of Rome." He looked around, seemingly at a loss for whom to address, then he looked at Ba''Rush and his expression cleared. He spoke, but instead of Latin, the words that came out were in a language that seemed to be made entirely with air through his teeth and sounds in the back of his throat. Stew was surprised to find he understood this too. "Well met, potential opponent. I am tingle over the kettle arrived. Big leader would like to feast with your cave raisin." Ba''Rush leaned down until his tusked face was inches away from the young officer''s. "You may address me as Prefect, Tribunus." He sniffed at the now even paler man as if trying to find a foul odor. "Prefect Ba''Rush, retired. I served the legion longer than you''ve been alive. And I''m not a slave of the dungeon." He looked down at Femur. "But sure, the cave raisin''s all yours." Stew felt Femur reach for his dagger. "Just let me stab the orc a little, and I''ll work for free for six months," Femur''s thoughts were dark, but also a little tired, as if this was an old grudge between orcs and goblins, rather than a specific issue with Ba''Rush. "If he signs up for a dungeon crawl, I''ll let you two have first crack at each other." Stew sent back, then turned his attention back to the tribune, who had been saying something. "...at your earliest convenience to discuss matters of utmost importance." The kid finished and drew himself up to his full height. "May I carry your response to the consul?" Stew wasn''t sure what he missed but thought he had the gist of it. "I will speak to the consul. We can meet at ¨C let me see that." He took the plans from Quintus'' table. There was a plot marked for a "Dungeon Consulate" just outside the actual entrance. Looking at it had given Stew some ideas earlier, but now it he saw an opportunity. He would have to create several false cores to take the strain, but he had the mana cores to spare, and it would be a good chance to show off before negotiations started. It was obvious the Romans had pulled out the stops to impress him. Maybe he could return the favor. He squinted up at the sun. That was going to be a problem though. "We can meet at midnight over there in the Dungeon Consulate." Quintus opened his mouth, then shut it. The tribune looked puzzled, but took his cue from Quintus and didn''t ask. "I will convey your message." He turned around, already looking relieved. Stew relaxed just a few seconds too early. Femur, silently fuming in a hijacked body, exploded as Stew released his grip. "And bring some horsemeat for the stump snuggler." Ba''Rush lunged and Femur drew his bone dagger. Stew was about to retake control and try to smooth things over before it got too far out of control when a voice that felt thunder but was no louder than a whisper knocked both Femur and Ba''Rush back from each other. "Enough!" Theus gave them each a mildly disappointed glance. Behind him the tribune jogged back to camp without looking back. Stew was grateful for that, but he suspected he had just lost some respect in the eyes of Quintus and the delvers gathered there. To Femur he said, "I''m going to need you back in the dungeon. We''ll need to gather some false cores, and I''m going to be sending up some trolls." Femur turned and headed toward the dungeon without argument. Stew waited until they were back through the entrance to add. "If working with Ba''Rush and the others is going to be a problem, I''m going to have to start sending Cecil up to represent me on the surface, or maybe even make one of the others my level 1 boss so they can do it." If you encounter this story on Amazon, note that it''s taken without permission from the author. Report it. "It''s not what he said." Femur spat. "It''s that he''s hanging around with that shadow lurker. Never trust a rogue or any that work with them." "You mean Raek?" "Sure if that''s what he''s calling himself. I had them list out their family lineage and the rogue barely pretended to make his up. At least the big guy told the truth." "You think Raek is hiding something from Ba''Rush too?" "Of course he is. That''s what rogues do." Femur reached his cave and tossed the cracked and flickering false core out of his bag onto the pile of decaying false cores at the back of his hut. "As for the the other bosses, trolls can''t step out in the sun, and I''d like to see how that bunch would take to talking to a skeleton or a necromancer. Or a cow." He snorted, coincidentally sounding very much like Bossy. "Promise me you''ll be more careful, and we''ll give it another try. I need you to contain yourself tonight when we meet with Caesar. If he''s anything like his reputation, we do not want to make an enemy of him." Femur cocked his ears in thought. "How is that one minute you don''t know a nose from a knuckle and the next you''re the Oracle at Delphi?" "It''s a long story." Stew said. "How long?" Stew wondered that himself. Had he really traveled back in time and into the past, or was this just some imitation next door to his own that only seemed to be two thousand years out of sync? "Get some rest. It''s going to be a long night. I''ll send the trolls up with the false cores." Stew switched his attention to Beryl''s mind. For a moment, he forgot all about negotiations with the Roman as he stared in awe. Where he had left the trolls in a network of caverns, connected to the Hidden Vale, he came back to a city straight out of a dream. The trolls had requested a big order of living stone, and a huge order of reinforced stone. Now he saw that Beryl and the others had used it to transform the rocky tunnels into a vast open area with a single stone tree in the middle that spanned the entire space. Trolls strolled along the branches and swung from limbs arm over arm like giant apes. Crystals like leaves formed a glowing canopy in hundreds of colors. But even though they were stunning to see, the colors blended in unexpected harmonies and contrasts, changing constantly as he watched. It was like watching one of those Christmas light displays synced to music, only he couldn''t hear the music. He felt like there was a hidden message or meaning to the progression. It was. Mesmerizing. "Did you want something?" Beryl''s mind was as complex as the canopy, changing and full of hidden patterns, cool and crisp, powerful, a supercomputer mind. It was as distracting as the leaves in its own way. "Romans are here, not the town builders. A legion." "Do you think they will attack?" Beryl''s mind remained just as cool, but it seemed to accelerate. "No, nothing like that." Stew hurried to explain. "At least I don''t think they will unless we provoke them." Beryl considered. "That does seem likely. Romans generally use violence as a tool to achieve their goals, and their goals are usually obvious and monetary, not like the Helvetians." "They''re worse than the Romans? In what way?" "Fanatics. They think we''re animals. Trolls, Orcs, Goblins, even the Fae." "Really?" That didn''t make sense. If what Garrik said was right, he had seen two Fae fighting alongside the Helvetians, and they had seemed to be in charge. "There were some Helvetians here, or at least, I think they were, there were Fae with them." "You are talking about Lithel and Sella. They are outcasts, traitors, and the Helvetians are behaving oddly lately, all because of their new king." "What do you know about him?" "Very little. He calls himself Merlin. He''s a powerful wizard. He appeared suddenly, and he''s not Helvetian himself. Some say he''s Anatolian, but a traveling gnoll told me she heard him speak at a gathering of the clans and he claimed to be from the northernmost of the Atlantean continents across the ocean where only the Phoenicians trade, a place called ''Arethustra.'' At least that''s the way she remembered it. Atlantis. That was new information. Atlantis was real, although it was supposed to be a city, not multiple continents the way he remembered the story. Between the leaves and the sparkling brain and the conversation topic, Stew almost forgot why he came to see Beryl. "I know you''re just getting settled in, but I wonder if I could ask you to work on two projects for me, one, a rush project?" He explained what he needed for the aqueduct and the meeting hall. Beryl thought for a moment and said, "We''ll need more reinforced stone and some of that mana glass." "No problem." He could make all he needed now. Then the troll told him how much. "That''s alot" He waved his hand at the big cavern and the tree. "You did all of this with very little reinforced stone." "We''re going to do some compression techniques to make it many times more durable. I will need to confirm with Amethyst, but some of these load bearing members are going to be under tremendous strain. The mana glass will be for the meeting hall." "In that case I''ll need your help even before that." "What can I do?" "You said you''re a production analyst? Is that just a title for leader?" "We don''t have leaders." "You''re not about to say you''re an ''anarcho-syndicalist collective.''" "I don''t know what that is." "That''s fine." Stew paused. "Do you really know something about improving an industrial process? Do you even know what an industrial process is?" Now it was the troll''s turn to pause, it''s mind churning around Stew. "Why wouldn''t I? Trolls built this world from the creators'' plans, and we were on time and eleven percent under budget." Stew was too stunned to continue. He had learned more brain bending things in twenty minutes talking to this troll than he could handle. And that was saying quite a bit considering what his recent history had been like. He gave it a long, slow think and let out a hypothetical sigh. "Right. OK, let me tell you how the golems work." They talked for over an hour, but by the time they were finished, Stew had a whole new respect for Beryl and trolls in general, and was feeling a little less intimidated by his visitors. On the other hand, he was going to have to meet with Julius Caesar later tonight and talk him out of taking over, even though he brought a legion and flying naval task group with wizards and steam cannons. Table Stakes On the fifth floor, Stew set Big John to prospecting and created nine more stone quarries. Once they were ready, he generated ninety-five more mining golems, naming them "Stone Miner - 6" through "Stone Miner - 100" and set them to work in teams of ten at each face. The first round of stone went to the Lunar Forge to start turning out reinforced stone and living stone. He wasn''t sure how he was going to create enough in time, but he had an idea. He put Beryl in charge of programming the controller golems, and used the first batch of stone and the massive amount of mana he now had to work with to create two more Lunar Forges. It hadn''t even occurred to him before, but then he hadn''t had the raw material to need them. He added Smittee - 2 and 3 as well as Smelter and Forge 2 and 3. Then he drew back and checked in on Cook 1 and Cook 2 in the kitchens turning out divine cheese. Everything was running smoothly, all he could do was watch and wait. After an hour he was cautiously optimistic. After three, he was in awe. Beryl''s careful tweaks had increased overall production by ten percent. As soon as the sun dropped below the mountain tops, the other trolls went to work. Amethyst and a team of five stood in a loose ring around the space cleared two thirds of the way between the tree line and the dungeon entrance. They said nothing for several minutes as Amethyst cradled a false core in the crook of one arm while she looked over a diagram sketched on papyrus. It was an exploded view she had made of the design they had discussed. [Share Storage Access with your minion, Amethyst? Y/N] Stew selected "Y." As soon as he said yes some of the stone, regular and reinforced, vanished from his storage. Blocks appeared in the center of the ring between Amethyst and the others. A tall, thin troll named Chrysolite raised his hands and a rumbling sound started in the ground beneath their feet. The ground collapsed in a big rectangle between the trolls like a massive sinkhole. Simultaneously, all of the dungeon stone melted and flowed, forming into a pool that filled the space. The stone rippled with the ongoing vibrations, until long pale fingers of subtly different shades for the different grades of stone rose up thin and straight and impossibly tall. Once they were twice as tall as the trees in the forest, they began to bow and sway, until they made contact with each other. As soon as they touched they started to weave themselves into shape, merging and hardening. Once the stone solidified, stacks of mana glass appeared and flowed and melted just like the stone had before, creating tall panes supported by a lattice of more of the reinforced stone. The building was round with steps leading up to a massive entrance. The doors were made of big slabs of reinforced stone, balanced to open and close at a touch. Romans knew all about building grand buildings with arches and domes, so Stew had taken a completely different direction. The building was square, all angles and edges, although the sides swooped up like flames frozen in place, the front was made almost entirely of glass. It was much smaller, but it was inspired by the Sydney Opera House and that train station in Cincinnati they used as the model for the Justice League building. He had the trolls place four of his false cores on pedestals out front, like lights. It gave a nice glow, but it also allowed him to manipulate the building as if it were part of his first level. He set a lighting customization inside to provide a sourceless, bright light that made the pale stone blaze white. It made the interior seem larger without using [Natural Light] to make it vanish altogether. Stew didn''t have any sort of logo or flag, so the trolls carved a representation of his crystal core, half as large as the doorway in the center of the wall above the entrance. Inside, they created a big stone meeting table and chairs with low arms and no back that Amethyst insisted were the local favorites. There were several more rooms off to the sides that Stew had ideas for later once the town was up and running. Amethyst had reminded him they would need more doorways in the back and sides to allow the staff to come and go. Decorations and finishing touches would have to wait. That reminded Stew that he didn''t have anything to offer his guests to eat or drink. He could make cheap plates and cups like the "feast hall" he had built before and "dungeon food" bait, but it hadn''t been very high quality and the others had been wary of it, probably with good cause. He decided to send up a dozen [Divine Pizzas] from the kitchens. He could call them samples. While he was at it he sent up some [Divine Milk] and [Divine Cheese]. The Romans could bring their own wine. Quintus, who had watched from some distance away as the trolls worked, walked over to Amethyst as they finished. "Nicely done." Amethyst inclined her head. She was almost half again as tall as Quintus. "It''s based on something the dungeon requested." "I understand you''re going to build an aqueduct?" He pulled a scroll from a satchel and opened it. "Do you already know where you will meet the river?" "We know that area very well. We are gathering materials now. We plan to start tonight." "Do you mind if I come with you?" He nodded at the building. "I don''t think a human has seen troll builders at work in recent memory." Amethyst nodded. "It has been a very long time since we built anything above ground. We were the builders for the Titans, but these new gods prefer to build things themselves." Amethyst and the other trolls took the two remaining dungeon cores and went to the edge of town to start the foundation for this end of the aqueduct before sunrise. Stew transferred his attention to Femur who was on his way from the dungeon entrance with Garrik, Theus, Raek, and Ba''Rush. Love this novel? Read it on Royal Road to ensure the author gets credit. Theus provided a glowing light that surrounded them in the moonless darkness. Across the field, Caesar had also left his headquarters tent and was approaching with six guards, two battlemages, and three officers including Marcus, the tribune from earlier that day. A line of martial arts golems led by M.C.P. passed Femur and the rest carrying pizzas, milk, and cheese on platters he had found in the customization menu for the kitchens. They moved gracefully and balanced the platters perfectly. He just wished he''d had time to put them in tuxedos or something. They went inside to set the table. "I see you''re as careful as the consul," Theus said, nodding toward the golems. "The consul learned to be careful through experience." Garrik said. Raek nodded. "Getting captured by pirates will do that." "Caesar was captured by pirates?" Stew had never heard that before. Was that a difference in this world or something that happened in his old world too? "Briefly." Theus said. "It didn''t go well for the pirates." "He ordered them around and made them listen to his poetry." Garrik chuckled. "And when they released him, he led a flotilla back to their island and crucified them," Raek said. "It''s something the Romans do to make an example." "I''ve heard of it," Stew said. Right. Romans. He tried not to shudder. Both groups arrived at the steps of the new building at the same time. If the Romans were impressed, they hid it well. Stew stepped Femur forward, realizing he hadn''t really thought about how the Romans would see the goblin. He kicked himself for not trying to hire a human minion for this. In fact, he needed to hire an actual ambassador or something that would also know how to do this sort of thing. He was completely out of his depth. All he could do was keep it simple. "My name is Femur. The dungeon speaks through me. Welcome. Please join us inside." One of the tribunes, someone that likely ranked higher than Marcus from his uniform, visibly winced. Uh Oh. Stew thought. One of the guards stepped forward. "You address Gaius Julius Caesar, Pacificator, Consul of Rome and Commander of the Legions!" The other guards and officers stiffened. Caesar''s face was unreadable, but he raised a hand and looked down at Femur. "We will make allowances. Barbarian customs often differ from civilized behavior." Stew tried to think of a response that wouldn''t start a war. "I''ve made some allowances too. I''ve decided not to eat any of you." It was a dumb joke, but one of the officers, the same one that had winced before, had to stifle a laugh. Stew decided he liked this guy, even if his boss was a jackass. Stew made a move to start up the steps, but Caesar took three brisk steps to go in first, his entourage sprinting to keep up. Stew let them get a few steps ahead then started up the steps more slowly. This guy would be ridiculous if he didn''t have a legion and a fleet backing him. Stew caught Theus looking at him with a knowing expression. Maybe it was a difference in customs over two thousand years and thousands of miles, but Caesar was a famous tactician and general. Stew reminded himself not to underestimate him even if he was acting like a twit. Inside the hall, the golems had already finished setting the table and disappeared into a side room. When the Romans reached the table, they didn''t wait for Stew and his group. Caesar, the chuckling tribune and one of the battlemages sat. The rest of his party stood at attention along the wall behind them. When Stew''s group arrived, Femur took the end of the long table opposite Caesar. Garrik and Theus sat to each side. Caesar smiled at Garrik. "It is good to see you are well. Your father sends his regards." "Thank you." Garrik said. "I''m pleased to see you also, Consul." Caesar turned to Femur. "I have come to see this remarkable dungeon of yours and to speak with you about your neighbors, the Gauls." Right to the point. "You can see samples of the unique products of the dungeon here." Stew gestured. "Please feel free to try them." Caesar gestured and one of the guards stepped forward, he picked up one of the bottles of milk. "This is glass." He tilted the bottle slightly. "Perfectly clear." He looked to Femur. "What''s in it?" "Divine Milk," the battlemage at the table said. "A kind of ambrosia. In fact, all of this is ambrosia in one form or another." "This is Caius Magnus, Praefectus Magicae of the Second Minerva Legion," Caesar offered, then continued to Caius. "This is genuine?" "Yes, I''m certain." Caius gestured and the nearest cheese wheel, pizza and milk bottle glowed a bright white. "Your tribute is generous." Caesar smiled, seeming to relax now that the formalities were over. Stew hated to spoil the mood, but maybe that was the point of the smile. "Samples, not tribute. I''m hoping we can agree to trade and mutual benefit. I''m not applying to join your club." Caesar frowned slightly. "I don''t quite follow your words, but I understand your meaning. Generally Rome does not accept incursions on our soil. This dungeon is on land that Rome has claimed for over a century." His expression lightened again. "But neither are we here to demand tribute and oaths of loyalty. I''m here to talk about a mutual threat, and¡­" He waved a hand at the table. "Possibly to discuss mutual benefit as well." "You mentioned Gauls." Stew decided to play dumb. This was Caesar, of course he wanted to talk about Gauls, but Stew had to remind himself that just because this world rhymed with the one he knew, it didn''t mean he really knew what was going on. "Specifically, the Helvetii. I would like to talk about an alliance. My intelligence says they have a great army on the move and are led by an unusual character named Merlin. I hope to encourage you to ally yourself with Rome and help stand against them." "You said mutual threat. Why do you think the Helvetii are a threat to me?" Stew kind of already got that point from the attack earlier, but maybe that was just Lithel and Sella''s grudge, and didn''t really have to do with the Helvetians at all? "They need what you have. The mana cores I''ve heard of, this ambrosia, could make Merlin much more powerful. They must have taken you years, even decades to accumulate, but I''m sure he would not hesitate to strip your dungeon to the walls in a day." Again, right to the point, so Stew returned the favor. "If they are so valuable, what''s to keep you from trying the same thing?" "Let us find out." Caesar smiled wide, and for the first time, it seemed genuine. "That''s why we are talking is it not?" Friends Like These Stew realized he had been trusting the contracts a little too much. Maybe Garrik had agreed to not harm the dungeon, but Garrik had assumed his "father''s friend who owed him money" wouldn''t be a big threat to the dungeon, nevermind that this friend was Julius Caesar. Now Stew was facing down the guy all of the other dictators wanted to be when they grew up. There was an entire Roman legion parked outside with their flying ships and battlemages, and Ceasar had pretty much just asked Stew for one reason they shouldn''t just conquer his tiny dungeon like he was a playground obstacle course. He had mana and actions idling at high speed now, he was pretty sure he could just send infinite waves of low level golems at them, even above ground. It might slow them down. The only problem was they might just like it ¨C free training with low risk. Then again, that''s what he had to offer, wasn''t it? How to get that across to Caesar? It gave him an idea. He sent a new contract to Garrik, and saw the young fighter''s eyebrow raise, but he accepted. "I think a demonstration will help answer the question." He clapped Femur''s hands for effect, calling the martial arts golems back to form-up on the opposite side of the hall from the conference table. None of the Romans seemed concerned, which told Stew that they must have something like [Stat-o-Vision?] working for them, and also that they weren''t concerned about level 10 golems. That confirmed his guess that waves of level-ones probably wouldn''t impress them either. The golems paired off and started fighting. He set M.C.P. to fight them down to the last standing golem. He watched the Romans and caught a few startled looks, quickly suppressed when they saw how the big stone monsters moved. After that, they all kept their expressions under control, so no one even twitched when the last golem used one opponent like a pole to swing around and decapitate another with a spinning kick straight out of a Jackie Chan movie. The battle finished with a fist straight through the chest of its dance partner. Stew was careful not to repair any of the golems until the end to conserve his false core, even though he had made sure to have several in range, just in case. With a bored look, he flicked Femur''s finger and respawned all of the golems where they stood. He had them each pick-up their old mana core and carry it, single-file, to drop them on the table between Femur and Caesar before returning to line-up again. Caesar''s face was still unreadable, but he raised a hand in a gesture that invited Stew to explain the display. "It didn''t take me ten years to create all of those mana cores, and ambrosia, if you want to call it that. It didn''t take me ten days." He nodded toward the perfectly still golems. "I made everything you''re seeing this evening. You saw us raise the building itself." He turned to Garrik. "Ready to join the demonstration?" Garrik hesitated, then rose. "Should I get my sword?" "Why not get some unarmed practice?" Stew said, hoping he sounded confident. "Let''s show our guests just what we have to offer." Garrik looked to Theus who nodded, a thoughtful expression on his face. The golems formed a circle and waited for Garrik to step in the middle. Each attacked in turn, and Garrik, to his credit, did a good job blocking and dodging although it was clear that the stone shins and forearms hurt when he intercepted them. The pace picked-up. The golems just attacked faster, but Garrik seemed to get his second wind and started to fight on an entirely new level, attacking as much as defending. Stew realized Garrik''s experience in battle gave him the edge, even though he was technically outmatched by so many tenth level opponents. Stew let it go long enough to make the point that Garrik was good. He watched Caesar''s face. He signaled M.C.P. to stop holding back. The golems all attacked at once. Two sacrificed themselves to distract Garrik while another grappled him from behind and pinned his arms. The others crunched through the rubble of their fallen comrades to pummel him until he hung limp in his captor''s arms. Stew checked the golems and found the one that had the experience notice for the kill. He gave the command and M.C.P. sent all of the golems remaining to stand in a line again, unmoving. Garrik''s body lay on the ground surrounded by stone rubble, his curly-haired head supported by a dropped mana core. Stew switched back to Femur and continued to watch the Romans. They didn''t move or change expressions, but there was a new tension in the room. Caesar stared at Femur. The only danger sign was that the consul had stopped blinking. Right, Garrik''s a family friend and the son of a guy he owes money. Better move quick, or I''ll send the wrong message. "Garrik signed a temporary contract with me just a few moments ago." He waved Femur''s hand. Garrik appeared, stark naked like the guard before, standing next to his own corpse. He didn''t miss a beat, adding his own sales pitch. "With dungeon contracts, we can train more rapidly than we have ever been able to before. With no fear of death, we can push fighters to their maximum potential." Caius stood and walked over, inspecting the corpse and looking Garrik over, making passes with his hands over the fighter''s chest and eyes. He turned back to Caesar and nodded. This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere. Caesar, who had never broken his stare at Femur, blinked. Then he smiled again. "If what you say about your resources is true, then we have much to discuss." He waved a hand at Garrik, "But Training in a dungeon is nothing new, and even resurrection contracts are not unheard of. It seems to me that someone must have explained to you how I earned my title, ''Pacificator.'' The Palatine Dungeon offers a contract every year to the arena champion. Some make better use of it than others. When Spartacus left that dungeon, certainly he was a force to be reckoned with, and who''s to say, without that training, he and his supporters might still be slaves today." Spartacus? What? Stew had only heard the name Spartacus from the title of an old movie he hadn''t watched. First Merlin, now Spartacus? If Spartacus was real, was he even supposed to be alive right now? He tried to take a lesson from the Romans and not show any of his confusion on Femur''s face, but apparently he did a lousy job. Caesar''s brow creased. "I seem to have overestimated how well-informed you might be. No matter. Do not think because I have made deals before, that I do so from a place of weakness. Rome is stronger for the Spartacus Accord. Rome has magic and ingenuity. We need strong, free citizens, not slaves. And those same strong fighters now form my Second Minerva legion." Caesar leaned forward. "So tell me, goblin. Can you really offer Spartacus," he nodded toward Officer Chuckles from before, "and six thousand legionnaires the same sort of contract you offered young Garrik just now?" Can I? Stew did some quick mental math, and swapped back to his core to pull up his stats for a moment.
01:11 [Unnamed Core] - Category 1 Gray Core [Levels: 5] [Minions: 6] [Monsters: 244] [Mana: 32,123 / 36,100] [Average Reaction Efficiency: 0.065] [Cumulative Mana Recharge: 540 / hr] [Actions Remaining: 5,622] [Action Fonts: 14] [Action Recovery: 3,370 / day] [1. Generate Mana] [2. Monsters And Minions] [3. Build] [4. Customization] [5. Inventory] [6. Consume Mana Cores] [7. Press The Button]
Beryl had convinced him to restack the mana cubes in groups of six and that was already starting to pay off. Stew had to admit things seemed fine. Beryl had wanted to go ahead and go all the way to ten cubes with just one stack as an experiment. Seeing the results of the first change, Stew sent a quick mental message to Beryl to go ahead and give it a try but to wait until the meeting was over. Stew wanted to be able to focus in case something went wrong. Resurrecting a minion cost mana, but looking at these numbers, if they didn''t all die in groups bigger than 500 an hour, he could do this forever, and he could handle thousands once or twice, even an entire legion, and in a day or two, especially with Beryl''s help, power leveling the whole legion would be no problem at all. He swapped back to Femur''s body, hoping his absence hadn''t been too apparent, but he was sitting across the table from a world famous tactician. Caesar waited patiently for him to get back to Femur''s head. "That scale of assault worries you?" The consul asked, mildly. "I just had to check some things, and check my schedule, but I''m sure we could accommodate them this evening, unless you were hoping to wait until morning?" Caesar blinked again. "I believe we would all prefer to resume this discussion in the morning, but no need to plan to host a legion this evening." Caesar made sure his double meaning was clear, then nodded and rose. "Until we speak again." "Until then." Stew stood. He noticed Spartacus''s earlier joviality had vanished. He looked grim, Stew wanted to ask him why, but realized, with the Stoic olympics he had been watching in the room before, the officer''s expression was probably intentional, and probably meant for him to see. It was a message, but what could it mean? They were on the steps outside, when Stew felt a tremendous rumble under his feet. A loud crash came with it from the direction the trolls had gone to look at the origins for the aqueduct. Spartacus nodded as if he had been waiting for the sound and Stew had a terrible feeling. Had this all been a distraction while the Romans sprung some trap? Instead, Caius turned to Caesar and said, "trolls." His tone was like someone looking at a broken floorboard and saying "termites." Caesar glanced up at the meeting hall. "At least this didn''t fall on our heads." Stew looked up at the building and realized he may have made an impression on the Romans, but not in the way he had hoped. The facade of the building was a hollow shell, not solid stone. The shapes weren''t even closed or finished on the inward side. Half the window panes were empty, only a scattering of them contained the mana glass he had supplied. Where was the rest of it? He had just glanced over everything before and taken it for granted that the trolls knew what they were doing. They had claimed to have built this whole world, afterall, "ahead of schedule and 11% under budget." The rumbling subsided, but a rushing sound came from beyond the trees. Caesar nodded at Caius who touched a brooch on his shoulder. Black ropes dropped from a seemingly empty sky and legionnaires slid down. They quickly guided Caesar''s foot into a loop, then yanked the rope. He rose rapidly into the air. The others followed with the new soldiers returning back up in the sky last. It all took only seconds and they seemed to vanish completely. Stew called a golem out at a sprint, and even its eyes saw nothing in the sky. Of course they have stealth, Stew thought. He sent Femur and the golem''s running for the dungeon, then swapped into the mind of Amethyst who was still carrying a false core. "What''s going on!" Stew shouted into the troll''s mind. If the mental shout phased the lumbering architect at all, it didn''t show. Amethyst responded, "It would have taken all night to clear the trees. We''re just letting the river do the job, with a little help from a stone funnel." Stew swapped back to his core room to get a look from a higher vantage. In the forest, in the darkness, trees were toppling in a long curved line that bulged directly toward newly dug foundations of the town, the workers, and the legion. A Common Disaster By morning, the area outside the dungeon was a soggy mess. Fortunately, there had been no deaths and few injuries. The Romans evacuated the workers with some of their smaller flying ships, and the waters didn''t reach their encampment. Meanwhile, Stew hadn''t been able to do anything. He had no flying minions or platforms; even if he did, he wouldn''t have had time to react. The first rays of dawn revealed a wreck. Even the consulate had collapsed, only underlining how misplaced his confidence in the trolls had been. Worse than that, he believed he had been on the verge of an agreement with Caesar. Now, it was hard to see how the Romans could trust him. At least the trolls slinking back with the Roman architect Quintus had helped with some of the clean-up, though it had been little and late. All of them had taken shelter back in the dungeon before sunrise, leaving Stew with the question of what to do next. The first thing he knew he needed to do was find a better ambassador than Femur. It should be someone the Romans would take seriously, preferably someone with some of their own insight into how to negotiate with the Romans. Out of his choices, he would prefer to offer the job to Ba''Rush, who seemed to be a pretty stand-up guy, and he had the experience of having already been a part of the legion, from what Stew had overheard. Then again, that could be a disadvantage. It was obvious that he was proud of having served and may still have some allegiance to Caesar. Likewise, Garrick was a Roman through and through and definitely had connections to Caesar. Theus was an unknown. Stew still didn''t even have a contract with him. Not a current one, anyway. That left Raek. Raek obviously had his own agenda. From the things Garrick had said, he was probably even a spy for the Carthaginians, but he was really the only option Stew had at the moment, and Raek had a vested interest in the dungeon''s success¡ªor so he claimed. What a convenient coincidence that Raek was standing at the entrance to Stew''s dungeon right now, waiting patiently, looking at one of the empty vendor stalls. Since he did have a current contract, Stew decided to speak to him directly. "Did you know the trolls were going to do this?" was the first thing Stew asked. "The timing couldn''t have been worse, or better, depending." "I might ask you the same thing." Raek didn''t seem fazed at all by the new voice in his mind. "No. I didn''t know they were going to do this exactly, but you had to expect something like this. The trolls are as famous for their disasters as they are for their brilliance. Surely you knew that when you chose to have them build the very building where you met with Caesar and set them to work on an aqueduct with no oversight? I thought this was all part of your negotiation, a message for Rome." "If it was, how would you have interpreted that message?" Stew decided to answer the question with a question rather than admit his ignorance. "If I were Caesar. I would be retaining two possibilities equally in mind. The first is that you may be powerful yet capricious and should not be trifled with. That this proves you are merely toying with us mortals. Second, that you might be inexperienced, confused by mortal concerns, and potentially incompetent." Raek shrugged. "Neither of those sound very productive or likely to inspire trust. Never mind Caesar, what do you think?" Raek grinned. "I think you didn''t know very much about trolls." His expression became more serious. "I think you are just learning. I think that, rather than being an ancient dungeon, you are relatively new to this world. This isn''t your first world, though. You''re an incarnate." Well, that didn''t take him long. "So that''s three different interpretations of last night''s events. Out of the three, which one doesn''t end with an army laying siege to my entrance?" "Oh, Caesar''s not well known for sieges. He prefers a direct attack." Raek scratched his chin in thought. "It might be slightly better if he believed you to be an Incarnate. It would explain some of your lapses without implying malice or incompetence, but it would also clearly signal some of your weaknesses and ignorance of this world being one. You would be revealing those weaknesses among people, very likely to find ways to exploit them." "Like yourself, for instance." "Exactly!" Raek smiled. "This is why I was sure you are not some barely sapient young dungeon merely imitating awareness. Yes, I have already exploited your ignorance of the value of your goods to make enough profit to pay for all of this." He waved at the soggy construction site. "If I can keep you alive and favorably inclined, I plan to continue to expand on that agreement to build wealth to make Midas blush." "Thanks for the vote of confidence, but I believe you just called me the Golden Goose?" "This is the mystery with you. You know your Aesop, but you have no familiarity with trolls, or goblins for that matter. How can you be both from another world and seem to know such selective things about our own?" "About goblins. I''ve used Femur to negotiate more out of habit than deliberate choice. He''s done a reasonably good job than some of my other minions might have, or at least it seems like he''s been less shocking to the humans. That''s not good enough now." Stew decided to get right to the point. "I would like to offer you a position as my ambassador, someone to speak for me with the Romans and others." "Ambassador." From Raek''s face and churning mind, he was finally shocked. "Are you sure? You do realize the Romans, Greeks, Gauls, well anyone really have reason to distrust me already?" "Because you''re a spy for Carthage?" "Spy?" Raek laughed. "You''ve been listening to young Garrik. A spy wouldn''t wear the colors of a second fleet commander in the Eastern Trade Flotilla." Stew had noticed that Raek''s clothes were more colorful than anyone else he had seen in this world, but they didn''t look anything like a uniform, not that he would know what a Carthaginian Merchant Marine uniform would look like. "What are you doing leading a band of bandits out here in a forest so far from the sea, then?" Stolen story; please report. Raek stretched his arms out to the sides, and his voice took on a showman''s tone. "Scouting for lucrative trade opportunities! Expanding the goodwill and influence of Carthage in these barbarous lands." He lowered his arms and his voice. "And generally looking for information and ways to limit Roman expansion in the north." "That sounds like spying." "Yes, but it''s just a sideline, hardly a fraction of my day, nothing like a real spy. And most importantly," Raek gestured back in the direction of the Roman camp, "no secret at all." "So, if I offer you the job of ambassador, it''s going to look like I''ve formed an alliance with Carthage?" "It will mean you''ve formed an alliance with Carthage. I couldn''t begin to do something like that without formal permission from the Eastern Fleet Accountancy or even the Trade Practices Board itself." "Well, then, I guess that''s¨C" "Fortunately, since this is such a good opportunity, I''ve already reported it and received approval just this morning to expand negotiations. I''ve been given considerable latitude to make a deal." "That''s good to know, but I don''t see how that helps here. I need a representative, and It wouldn''t make sense to ask you to negotiate with yourself." "No more than it would make sense for me to negotiate for you with the Romans. What you need is someone neutral or aligned with your interests, someone the Romans and Carthage, for that matter, would respect but who would not necessarily be inclined to favor Rome or Carthage." "That sounds great, but where would I find someone like that?" Raek looked around as if worried about eavesdroppers, even though this entire conversation was taking place mind-to-mind. Sensing Stew''s question, he said, "Some things I don''t dare even think this close to Caesar''s Mage Auxiliaries. Can we finish this conversation deeper in your dungeon?" "Step through the door at the back of the vendor''s hall and go down the stairs to Level 2. We can talk there." The last time Raek had been in the dungeon, he had gone skulking around using his rogue stealth skills. He hadn''t tried anything, but Stew had left some pretty strict instructions on Level 2 about what to do if he showed up again. Still, it was probably the best place to meet besides Femur''s cave, and from Raek''s passing comment about goblins, the cave might not be a great idea. Besides, it would give the panthers some practice stalking. They each kept their thoughts to themselves as Raek descended the stairs to the swamp level, and Stew gave him directions to the alchemist''s shack. He reached out to Lorelei and the Panthers as soon as Raek stepped off the stairs. "I''ve asked Raek back for a chat. Keep an eye on him, but don''t let him know you''re watching." He could feel the panthers already converging before he said anything, jumping from shadow to shadow beneath the damp and gnarled trees. He found he couldn''t pinpoint Lorelei''s position at all, which concerned him at first until she responded. "There are advantages to being a ghost. He won''t know I''m here unless I let him, but shouldn''t I just sing him a nice lullaby and be done with it? Why give him another chance? He''s even a sailor, tasty, tasty!" "He has some information he wants to share, and he''s under a dungeon contract, so no harming him unless I say so specifically, and I won''t unless he breaks that contract. Understood?" "Aye." He could hear the pout in her voice but no defiance. Meanwhile, Raek entered the shack and began looking over the shelves and cubbies, obviously appraising the contents. "Who''s the alchemist?" "You wouldn''t want to meet her," Stew replied. "Be careful not to touch any of her things." He could feel Lorelei''s implicit "Harumph" in his mind, but she said nothing. The Panthers were all around the cabin, only revealed, even to each other, by an occasional eye peering through a tiny shadow as if they were peek-holes to their individual lairs, which, in effect, they were. If Raek noticed the increased security, he didn''t mention it, but that didn''t mean anything. "As I said, you will need someone special to represent you properly, and I think I have just the. Well. Person, I suppose. It''s not a simple matter describing the Avatar''s existence, especially now." "Avatar?" He was imagining either a bald kid in robes or a glow-in-the-dark elf, but he was pretty sure that had nothing to do with what Raek was thinking. "How much do you know about the history of this area? What happened here in the years and centuries before you arrived?" "Well, not a lot. As you might have guessed, this world is similar to my earlier world, but not the same. We even had the same mountains and oceans and the same names for cities, but enough things are different for me not to be sure where the history is the same and where it''s different." He wasn''t about to tell him Carthage was utterly destroyed by the Romans in his world. He had no idea how Raek would take that, and it would reveal how little he could possibly know about them since. "Are you aware of the city nearby and the history of these hills in particular?" "There was another dungeon here. Hannibal destroyed it, then Scipio killed Hannibal." "Histories of great battles are lies told by the survivors to bandage their wounds or fill their pockets. Don''t believe all, well most, of that story." Raek leaned down to look closely at a small vial full of tiny, drill-shaped grubs that glowed faintly with the same blue as the mana cubes, [stone weevils] Lorelei had managed to gather from somewhere. Stew made a mental note to ask Lorelei about that later, he may need some exterminator slimes on this floor too. Reak shrugged at the odd creatures and continued. "Hannibal didn''t kill the dungeon, and Scipio didn''t kill Hannibal. Someone like Caesar might have been a challenge for Hannibal Barca, maybe. Scipio, however, was an uninspired general, and he didn''t have that kind of luck. It is true, though, that you are not the first dungeon to spawn in this area." "The Altar Of The Hungry Flame," Stew remembered Bossy describing the ancient dungeon dead rubble and bones were supposed to be somewhere in these hills. He had tried to pretend to be a remnant of it when the first delvers came, but it hadn''t worked very well. He hadn''t thought about it much since. Raek straightened and snapped the fingers of his left hand. "Yes! The Altar Of The Hungry Flame was a powerful dungeon, more powerful than the Palatine dungeon has become even now. In fact, I suspect your soul has implanted in a secret seed left behind by your predecessor, your parent, in a sense." "That''s¡­" Stew tried to wrap his mind around what Raek was telling him. It made sense, in a way, that a dungeon core wasn''t just lying around for him to, what, steal? Possess? Lease with an option to own? It was mind-blowing on the one hand. On the other hand, it just raised more questions. "What does that have to do with negotiating with Caesar?" "You have a sister." Raek beamed. "I would like to introduce you." Field Notes It was well after midnight, but Merlin was still awake. He propped his back against a doeskin cushion stuffed with straw as he made notes on a wax tablet. Beside him, on a low table, an oil lamp flickered. The remains of his evening meal and a stack of books filled the other side of the table, along with a few scrolls, some of which had rolled off onto the intricately knotted rugs that covered the floor. The light of the clay lamp barely illuminated the large open space of his command yurt. The yurt was one of his better designs. It had taken his soldiers and craftsmen a few hours this time, and he probably still had a few more iterations before he worked out all of the bugs. Still, the smoke from the low, banked fire in the center was venting properly while still providing plenty of warmth against the mountain chill. Experimentation, iteration, and careful notes, innovation worked the same in this world as it had in his last, only here it was so much easier. It was like retaking a freshman class, just to pump his GPA. One of his guards opened the door flap and stepped inside. "Merlinorix, my apologies for disturbing you at your studies, but the scout from the south has returned." The guard, Talico, was a burly man. His Helvetian tunic of bright square patches made him look festive, but the bearskin across his shoulders was reportedly from a beast he had slain himself with a knife. Still, his tone was respectful, and there was a guarded look in his eyes, almost fearful, even though Merlin was unarmed, lower level, and had been a little known fugitive just three weeks before. "Send him in." Merlin finished the last few observations in his log to transcribe later. He found the act of diagramming and writing by hand helped him think, even if he could just take notes with a thought with his [inscribe] skill. He wished he''d had something like that skill in his old world. Every test would have been an open book exam. Speaking of books. He reached across the table and picked up one of the thicker codex-style books from the stack. Besides all of the hocus pocus and System prompts, these anachronistic books had been his first clue this world was probably some sort of construct, not a digital simulation, but a poor copy made of regular matter, mostly following the same physical laws and history of his first world, but with a layer of magic and mystery clumsily layered-on. No one used a codex style book like this in ancient Europe, and especially not one with bleached paper that felt like linen. Maybe sheepskin he would have believed, but this was a dead giveaway. Spotting that lazy error had been enough to encourage him to really dig into this System menu that he had acquired, and it had only taken a few old-fashioned fuzzing tricks to find some very, very interesting things. A thin young boy in ragged clothes entered the tent. Unlike the guard, there was no sign of fear in the boy''s vivid green eyes. There was no emotion at all. He stood, unblinking, waiting. "You may release that form and report," Merlin said. The boy''s body and clothing deflated, crinkling and contracting with no sign of bones or internal structure of any kind. The pinkish brown flesh grew more yellow and pale as it shrank until it all vanished beneath the chin of an enormous, warty toad. Only the eyes of the toad remained mostly the same, though the pupils were wider. The toad hopped twice until it was near his feet, then those eyes retracted into its body with the effort of disgorging something. It opened its mouth and dropped a golden glass sphere on the carpet. Merlin picked it up and brought it closer to the lamplight. At first it seemed clear, then the interior began to grow hazy. The haze grew thicker and stirred like silt in water, beginning to form a shape, like a landscape of trees seen from a mountainside. Small figures moved in the distance. Shapes hung in the air above the trees, one much larger than the rest. With a subtle shift, Merlin found himself within the scene as if he stood there himself. It was night, but the details were sharp and the colors were vibrant. There was a small Roman army, possibly just one legion near this "Necromancer''s Dungeon" he had been hearing about. It looked like they were building a more permanent camp or town there. He found the skyships much more interesting. They were ridiculously implausible. Shaped like giant imitations of ancient oared warships, the largest had to weigh twenty or thirty thousand tons, yet there it hung in the sky. There was no sign of gas bags, or propellers, or even any exotic lifting technology he might not be familiar with. To move and navigate, it seemed to use rows of big, fan-shaped oars along with sails, of all things. To his trained eye, the technologies on display didn''t match. This was a Mad Max sort of retrofit like making a landsailer out of a rusted-out truck frame and tires. He didn''t know if the Romans had captured these flying platforms or found them, but it was clear they didn''t understand them. The author''s content has been appropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon. One more thing he could work with. He tossed the ball into a sack by his cushion and dispelled the [Infernal Toad] with a wave of his hand. The toad''s form swirled like the mist in the scrying ball then dissipated into the air, leaving a scent of sulfur and mud. Rule Two in his personal notes of hard-won lessons on summoning, "Never leave an unneeded summon around to get bored and hungry." Rule One was "Never summon anything you can''t dispel." He had learned both the hard way. Some things might be simpler in this world, but it still had its perils. He called for the guard, "Talico!" Talico entered immediately and stood at attention, only his eyes moving as he searched the room, probably looking for the now vanished boy, "Yes, Merlinorix?" "Inform the War Chiefs that we break camp at dawn and head south. It''s time to take that dungeon for ourselves." According to the two Fae who had reported the dungeon, the dungeon could be a strategic advantage, if not for the loot, then for the crystal core at its center. "Yes, Merlinorix!" The guard gave the room one more frantic look then fled through the flap. It was no wonder the man was shocked. From what Merlin had been able to learn through his experimentation, a summoning like [Infernal Toad] should have been impossible for a wizard, and especially not a third level. Wizards were apparently all about elemental attacks and mana powered physical effects. Summoners were some subspeciality or even a different class altogether. They were rare enough that no one had heard of one outside of legends, at least here among the Helvetians. Maybe things were different in Athens or Alexandria. He looked at his wax tablet and the sketch he had made there. It had a few annotations, but it was mostly a map of what he had been able to deduce from abusing the System memory. He should get some sleep, but he couldn''t resist one more experiment.
Merlin (Nestor Banks) - Wizard Level 3 (257/300) Mana: 38/38 Mana Recovery: 10/hr Health: 10/10 Agility: 9 Strength: 6 Constitution: 8 Intelligence: 15 Skills: Spellcasting - Level 1 Equipped Spells: Fireball - Level 1 Rejuvenate - Level 1 Inscribe - Level 1
[Rejuvenate] was the key. He selected it.
Spell: Rejuvenate Rejuvenate allows the caster to transmute mana into health, healing wounds and recovering stamina. Transmute Mana? Enter the amount or "no" to cancel.
Rejuvenate itself seemed to be a common first level spell. The only reason he could imagine that no one had found its weakness before was that ancient number systems didn''t have negative numbers, decimals or exponents. Maybe there was some plan to patch the interface in fifteen hundred years when algebra came along. "9.999 times ten to the negative 128"
E??????????R????????R??????O????R?????:????????? ???????O?????V???????E????????R????????F???????L??????O??????????W?????????? Spell: Summon Floating Horror The floating horror is not one entity, but a hive organism made up of thousands of infernal [Winged Gullets] in the form of an inverted mountain floating in the sky and covered in crawling masses of these deadly creatures. Summon Floating Horror? (Warning this will cost -1,000,000 mana). Y/N
The negative mana cost would roll over at his 38 mana limit, either refilling his mana or casting at zero cost. He wouldn''t cast it, of course. This was a definite Rule One violation. It did confirm his theory that the 1e-128 region was all infernal summons, just as 1e-64 was various woodland creatures and insects, with the exception of the [Lesser Fire Drake] that had nearly consumed him and half of a village before that unfortunate [Shield Breaker/Champion], war chief had sacrificed himself to stop it. Merlin had been trying to summon a large bear just to intimidate the yokels, but he had to admit, a fire-breathing lizard the size of a horse had been more impressive. It had also been the origin of his Rule One. There had been no option to dispel the beast once summoned, which was either some issue with the glitch he was exploiting or a side-effect of the outsize difference in level between himself and the creature. The [Infernal Toad], although probably far beyond his level to summon, was only a fourth-level creature itself. He used [Inscribe] to add the new address and description to his System notepad, then he blew out the lamp and settled in to get some sleep, wondering how well a Roman skyship might fare against a [Floating Horror]. Family Obligations "A sister?" Stew thought it must be some technical dungeon term, like the way they called the snot cap that floated on top of kombucha a "Mother." As if that didn''t just make the stuff even more creepy. "Well, perhaps a cousin, Ignis. She was the avatar of the Temple Of The Hungry Flame." Raek leaned down to look at one of the lower shelves where large jars held ingredients in bulk and also some more lively specimens that were too big for a vial like the one that held the weevils. He peered into a jar that seemed to contain a butterfly at first, but it turned out to be a small terrarium with a plant that mimicked a butterfly. While the rogue peered at it, the plant seemed to sense the man''s presence and changed until it almost perfectly mimicked his nose. He leaned closer and the plant lunged, the "nose" splitting apart to reveal a red maw filled with rows of needle teeth that clinked brightly against the glass as it tried to reach him. Raek did not flinch. "You certainly seem to have no shortage of fine glassware. I don''t think I''ve seen that kind of clarity outside of a royal palace." "Sister. Cousin. This, Avatar." "Ignis." "Ignis. I thought that the dungeon that was here before has been dead for over one hundred years. How is she alive? I mean, she would be really old, but also, it seems like someone like that would be bound to the dungeon somehow so that they might die without it?" Stew didn''t know anything about dungeons or magic or whatever made the rules around here, but Raek was already on to him being new in town, so it didn''t hurt to ask the obvious question. Raek straightened up and nodded. "You would be right there. Normally, an avatar and a dungeon exist together, and their lives are intertwined. It was a surprise when the Romans captured her alive. There has been speculation that some part of the dungeon lived on somehow, deep beneath the surface, but I believe we may have solved that mystery with you, at least, with that dungeon seed you inhabit. I have some old descriptions of the Altar''s core. It might be helpful to let me have a look¨C" "Not going to happen." Stew might let Raek this far, but only with precautions. He wasn''t about to let him go any deeper, and no one was getting near his core, contract or no contract. Stew felt the same dungeon rage and hunger rumble deep inside of him that he felt when the wolves first entered. It only lasted a moment, but it was strong enough through their mental connection that Raek threw up his hands in a placating gesture. "No need to worry, I won''t press the issue. I''ll share the notes with you, and you can make your own comparison." Stew suppressed the feeling with some effort before attempting to reply. "Ok. Good. Yes, I''d like to see it." Raek grinned wide as if nothing had happened. "As I was saying, the survival of Ignis makes much more sense now. She must be linked to you in some way, and not only does that make her someone you can trust, but it also means she knows more about your lineage and dungeons in general than any being short of the gods or another avatar like old Magnus himself, the avatar of the Palatine Dungeon." "And that is how this all helps with Caesar. I can trust this person I''ve never met because you say she''s my sister. Can she be here by sundown? Because, sister or not, I need someone to talk to Caesar today before he comes up with his own explanation for what''s going on." "Oh, I assure you he''s already come up with an account that will highlight his own incredible insight and decisive action in ordering other people to rescue a bunch of muddy laborers. He''s likely dashed off a metered verse and made poor Spartacus listen to five versions by now." "You''re saying he''s not going to be worried about any of this. You were just telling me how important it was to tell him I''m an incarnate so he didn''t jump to conclusions." "Don''t mistake his vanity for weakness. He doesn''t mind making a pact with you any more than he minds crushing you into rouge. That ambivalence makes him seem very patient to some, but don''t test it any longer than you have to." Speaking of patience. The panthers were starting to get restless. Stew had to settle them down with a few soothing words, before he replied. "You still haven''t told me how to contact this Ignis. Where is she, how long will she take to get here?" "That is the interesting part. I''m sure she would be happy to hear from you¡­" Oh, here''s the "but." I knew there was a "but" coming. "But she is currently indisposed. Those flying ships outside? Rome traded her to the Egyptians for ample enchanted levitating materials, if not the actual secrets of levitation. She and a huge fraction of the loot from the Altar were the price." "She''s a prisoner." Stew really missed headaches he realized. They gave weight to feelings like this, tangibility. "A prisoner in Egypt." "Yes, in Alexandria, to be exact, although I would say she''s less of a prisoner than a pet. They feed the prisoners to her, or so I hear." Oh, why did I think she was human? I guess because he used the word "sister," and I still think of myself as human. I''m not human anymore, am I? "Why tell me any of this then? I can''t go to Alexandria, and she can''t come here." "I mentioned that I had considerable latitude to make a trade deal. I''ve been in contact with some colleagues who happen to be loading cargo in Alexandria. If you like, I could ask them to load an extra crate as a special order." "Naturally." Maybe he should have let Femur negotiate with Raek afterall. "And that will cost me what?" "Nothing extravagant. A trade agreement, nothing exclusive, maybe a mutual non aggression clause. Really no more than you''ve already agreed with Ba''Rush, young Garrik and myself already, only on a larger scale." Raek started to say something else then stopped himself and cocked his head as if he was listening. Thinking he was finally sensing the panthers, Stew checked in with Boo and found that the Panther''s earlier unease had grown to laser focused intensity. Something or someone was moving through the swamp using some of the same skills Raek had shown earlier. Stew was just about to ask him what he was trying to pull when Raek said. "There''s someone here. And unless you have creatures I''m not aware of, they aren''t part of your dungeon." Well, actually, Stew thought, before reaching out to Lorelei. "It looks like we have some unwanted visitors. Can you have a look?" To Raek he said. "Grab up some of that moss and shove it in your ears" The author''s tale has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon. Raek looked at the faintly pulsing yellow moss on the workbench and pulled a face. "Is that safe?" "It''s alot safer than what happens next if you don''t." Stew said, then he didn''t have any more time for Raek. He sent Socks to stand guard at the shack door. Sending the rest to go investigate the disturbance, but warning them to keep out of sight. If Raek couldn''t sense them, then maybe these intruders couldn''t either. Socks stepped from a shadow under a leaf and eyed Raek with cold ferocity. Raek hastily shoved the moss in his ears, covered both ears with his hands and crawled under the workbench for good measure. A soft voice whispered across the swamp, barely audible even to the Panthers'' ears. "Aaaaaaah" Then again, louder. "Sweet flesh. Tasteee bones." Then Lorelei began to sing. To Boo, where Stew had currently focused his attention, it was just an interesting prey noise. To Stew hearing the rise and fall of the wordless tune it felt dreamy, wistful, like a whispered secret that he wanted to draw closer to hear better, to understand¡­ He snapped himself out of it. Maybe he was still a little human, enough to be drawn by the Rusalka''s call, but not enough to be ensnared. The intruders were not so lucky. One-by-one, three figures stood up from the brush where they had been crouching. They each wore form fitting fabric and drawstring hoods. The fabric''s color shifted to match whatever was behind them, but whatever stealth skills they had been using, they simply forgot to hide and walked stiff legged and enraptured toward a pond where Lorelei rose. Their faces were slack-jawed in awe as if they were witnessing some sort of transcendent beauty. Boo looked at Lorelei and saw her as a corpse pale woman with water streaming from hair, tangled with swamp plants, her skin coated with muck in patches. Her teeth were sharp as a cats and her nails were like long hooked claws. The latter being the only thing Boo found attractive about her. Boo wasn''t crazy about water or wet things in general. The Panthers gathered behind the trio of intruders, surrounding them and blocking any escape. The first was almost to Lorelie, who reached up both clawed hands, arms outstretched to welcome her victim into a final embrace. "Wait!" Stew shook himself mentally, sending the message out to Lorelei and the panthers at the same time, causing Boo to sneeze in irritation. He had been at least somewhat mesmerized by the song, and had almost let Lorelei eat his best source of information about what, exactly, was going on. "What is going on?" Eira sent to him in a sort of reverse mind reading. "Intruders. Sneaky ones. Keep your eyes peeled." "Nobody peels eyes. They''re full of liquid," the necromancer replied. "I mean, be watchful. There may be more we haven''t sensed." Eira sent back a wordless affirmative thought, like an invisible nod. Lorelie had a disgusted look on her face. She kept singing, but she put her hands down. The three intruders lined up along the bank and stared at her. "Okay, we need to capture these three alive, but we need to make sure they can''t attack anyone or get away." He sent out to the panthers and Lorelei. "Ideas?" Before he could even think "oops" Fluff leapt from a shadow and sliced the achilles tendons in each of the delvers'' heels, with rapid swipes of his paws, right through whatever armor or boots they wore under their camouflage suits. Lorelei surged onto land as they fell and hogtied them with vines that grew from the ground at her touch. She tied another vine through their mouth like a horse''s bit before she stopped singing and settled back into the water up to her shoulders. "How is that?" "That was." Brutal. "Great. That was great." Stew padded Boo over to stand next to Fluff, who had settled down to clean his claws, pretending to ignore the prisoners. "Why did you gag them, though?." Lorelei laughed and it was a disconcerting mix of Maleficent and Tinkerbell. "We won''t want them shouting out any spells, now will we?" Oh, right. "Sure, but I wanted to ask them some questions." The three still seemed stunned, but one of them groaned. Stew called Socks and Raek over to join the rest. "Skilled knots," Raek said. "Good knots make for a smooth voyage," Lorelei replied. Raek looked at her thoughtfully for a moment and something unspoken passed between them, then he turned and looked back at the three on the ground who were beginning to come to their senses. They lay stiff and wary, eyes darting from the Rusalka, to the Spectral Panthers to Raek and back again. Stew felt the rage and hunger rumble inside and realized it was these three that had given him that feeling before; he just hadn''t recognized it. Maybe their stealth skills somehow caused him to discount the feeling as Raek''s had caused him to look the other way when he was skulking about. "Are these Caesar''s?" Raek shrugged. "Not Legion, but they could be auxiliaries or mercenaries." He gave them a look with Stat-o-vision?.
09:18 Unnamed Delver Party - 3 Members Delver parties, essential for dungeon exploration, consist of diverse adventurers with unique skills and roles, combining their strengths in numbers to strategically navigate traps, defeat monsters, manage resources, and engage in social interactions, ensuring a well-balanced and specialized approach to overcome the multifaceted challenges presented in the depths of dungeons. ?? ENEMIES BEYOND YOUR ABILITIES?? Members of this party include: ?? Point / Wayfinder: Forti Level 18 Ranger Tracker ?? Center / Ranged: Bizh Level 16 Rogue Assassin ?? Flank / Traps: Vercig Level 16 Rogue Thief
Stew realized it was a lucky thing they had caught these three by surprise. He was just beginning to wonder if a couple of torn-up ankles and some knots would hold them when the left most, Vercig, slipped his bonds and vanished into a tangle of swampgrass. Fluff vanished at the same time, and there was a faint scream from somewhere in the bushes that cut off ominously.
09:22 Achievement Unlocked: First Blood! Your dungeon has reaped its first soul. Core category limit removed. Nascent core invulnerability removed. You are now a mature core with all of the dangers and opportunities that implies. Congratulations! Your monster, Fluff, has made its first kill! Difficulty Bonus Multiplier - 3 3 Actions Gained! 21 Mana Gained!
Stew felt a sick satisfaction that eased his hunger, and it was almost too much for him. His thoughts reeled. For some reason, with all the fighting and killing that had happened in the forest, it hadn''t struck him the same. The System seemed to feel the same way about it. This person was dead, right here inside his dungeon. Fluff had killed someone without hesitation. They had been up to no good, but the suddenness left him wondering how to feel. He decided it was one more thing he would have to worry about later. Right now the identity of the attackers mattered the most, then the other things in this ominous message. Apparently there was a big pay off for killing delvers, which sort of made sense for a dungeon, not that he needed the mana and actions now that he could generate his own, but the other part felt much more significant. His core had been invulnerable? Now it wasn''t. Fluff, old buddy, what have you done? Priorities While Stew sent the panthers to search the rest of the level and Eira and her revenants to block both entrances, Raek dug through the belongings of the three intruders, starting with the deceased one, Vercig. He held up a copper brooch and an iron dagger. "Helvetian or we''re supposed to believe they are." He spoke mind-to-mind still to avoid eavesdropping, but Stew shared the connection with all of his level bosses and minions. "You think they are flying a false flag?" Lorelei said. Raek shrugged. "Sometimes things are just what they appear to be, but they showed up the day after a Roman legion camped at our door." "Did you send for wolves?" Eira''s thoughts came from where she guarded the level three entrance. Bossy replied. "They thought they might be of some help identifying our guests." "Let them through," Stew said, though he wondered what wolves, however magical, would know about geopolitics. Lassie and her squire, Rin Tin Tin, arrived at the scene of the skirmish at a lope, snuffling at the underbrush and vaulting over standing water. They made a wide detour around the bound prisoners and continued into the underbrush to where Vercig''s body lay. Fluff rose from his lounging, watching the prisoners, and followed them, oozing curiosity. Stew followed. He looked through Fluff''s eyes. He still found it disconcerting to share the minds of the wolves, possibly because of their tight bond with Bossy. The two wolves sniffed at the body with so much interest Stew thought he might call them back in case they started eating it. He reminded himself they were minions in a dungeon. This was one of the perks for them, but he also felt Fluff''s growing irritation. This was his kill, he should get the first bite. Stew could feel Fluff''s hunger as if it were his own, but he found he didn''t have to settle a dispute. The wolves drew back and trotted back to where Raek and Lorelei remained with the prisoners. Lassie shared with him an impression of high mountains, lakes, and the smells of particular plants and herbs. Somehow, he understood what she was saying meant "Helvetian" in wolf. "Well, the wolves agree. This seems to be a group of Helvetian scouts," Stew shared with everyone. "That''s less awkward. We already have enough issues with the Romans." "Less awkward, but it means the Helvetian main force must be getting close," Eira said. Raek shared a feeling of agreement with the group. "This might actually work in our favor. We can hand these over to the Romans as a sign of goodwill, along with explaining the troll flood by hinting that you are an Incarnate unfamiliar with our world. That trade of information may give us some time and protection." Stew noticed the way Raek said "us." He hoped he meant it. "Protection. Do you mean to ask the Legion to protect us?" Eira sounded more than hesitant. "That''s what they are ostensibly here for," Raek replied. But I share your doubts. Let''s gather Theus and see if these three can tell us something about the location of the rest of the force. Search magic works best with a physical affinity." He paused and continued, directing his question to Stew. "Unless you have some methods you would like to try first?" Stew decided he still couldn''t completely trust Raek, not enough to tell him he had know idea what kind of methods the man was talking about. "I would rather see what Theus comes up with. I''ve only seen him in action once, and I was distracted by your skulking around at the time." Raek had the courtesy to be abashed and share that back along the link, slight though the feeling was. "I needed to know more about who I was working with." "Likewise." Stew sent for a squad of martial arts golems to come pick up the two prisoners. He added a half dozen level 10 halberdiers to make a show of some variety in his forces. He decided to leave the body for the panthers, wolves, and Lorelei since they all had some claim on it now. He just asked that they leave the level 16 core the kill would drop for him to experiment with later. He wanted to see what the difference was between a human core and a monster core. While Raek and the golems carried the prisoners and a false core to the surface to meet with Theus and then Caesar, Stew turned his attention back to his to-do list. Everything that had happened above ground in the last few days might count as progress toward Make myself more valuable alive than dead, but with the likelihood of not one but two armies in the neighborhood, he needed to get back to Learn. Grow. Build, and especially, Make myself too tough to kill, even if they try. He had asked Bossy to put steam catapults at the top of his list, but he had to admit he didn''t even know where to start. Maybe he could hand that to the trolls as long as he made sure to check their work very carefully. He might send them to the same bunker he eventually planned to build to test mana cube stacking for safety checks once they came up with something. He made a mental note and put that under "Maybe." Speaking of mana cubes, despite all of the commotion, mana, and action production had continued without interruption. So much had happened that it seemed like weeks since he learned to create a mana cube, but it had only been three days. With a little automation, it had been a very productive three days despite all of the distractions. He had let the process run with Grow turned up to eleven, using every extra bit of the output beyond what he needed for maintenance to build more capacity, but it was time to work back toward Build and Learn. Looking over the numbers gave him a warm glow of satisfaction. The ancient world probably wasn''t ready for what a reasonably solid assembly line could do. Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon. He had been up to 10 new fonts per hour for 72 hours now, and the mana production just built on itself exponentially. He wasn''t using divine milk or even actions to generate mana anymore.
Unnamed Core - Category 1 Gray Core 09:18 Levels: 5 Minions: 192 Monsters: 281 Mana: 3,300 / 5,609,400 Average Reaction Efficiency: 0.05 Cumulative Mana Recharge: 230,220/hr Actions Remaining: 245,640 Action Fonts: 732 Action Recovery: 175,680 / day 1. Generate Mana 2. Monsters And Minions 3. Build 4. Customization 5. Inventory 6. Consume Mana Cores 7. Press The Button
It was time to stop building mana cubes and start accumulating mana. It would take less than half a day to hit his new capacity, then he could start spending the excess upgrading the cows to produce more milk for more divine fonts. He reset instructions for the forges and controllers. Meanwhile he hadn''t had time to even properly name all of his levels. He had a hunch that ten named levels might be a significant number. He sent mining golems down to the sixth floor to start digging more levels and turned his attention back to Femur on the first level. With all of the shuffling, the first level was really just a nameless floor now. "What do you think about calling this level ''The Goblin Market?''" Femur was busy roasting a haunch of rat meat over the fire in his cave. "Not much of a market if it''s just me. Maybe call it ''Femur''s Market?''" "The gold is here. Once they hand it over, we should have enough to bring on more goblins. Do you think your family and friends would be interested?" Femur scratched his chin. "Might be. Not sure how to get a message to them though. I just followed the quest you sent and haven''t seen any others show up, so I''m guessing I was the only one interested." Quest? Stew hadn''t thought about the details of how Femur, Bossy, and Cecil had arrived. The wolves had been following a quest, too. Was that just some effect a dungeon had? Could he deliberately create one? "I think it was just a quest for one." If he brought up the minion menu, would he just get a random goblin? Would that work out? "What if I just invited random goblins? Is that something you would be ok with?" Femur stood quickly and snatched his dagger. "Fine with me. Just let me hide behind something so I can stab them in the back if they''re some of that Moss Hill bunch, or worse, city goblins or some nobody clan. Oh! I know, summon that filthy thief, Long Toe. I''ve been looking for him since last summer." "Forget I asked. You said you''re family calls themselves the Hidden Falls people?" "Hidden River. Hidden Falls would be a stupid name for a clan." "Got it, and how many are there?" "Counting every squealing kid and grumpy elder." Femur thought, counting in his head as Stew watched. "Fifty-five, maybe a few more or less." "I''m going to try something. Don''t stab anyone." Femur grimaced but put his dagger away. Stew concentrated on creating a quest for any Hidden River goblin to bring their family to the dungeon for a guaranteed job. He imagined attaching the contract. Nothing happened. On a hunch, he opened the main menu again and thought at it:
1. Generate Mana 2. Monsters And Minions 3. Build 4. Customization 5. Inventory 6. Consume Mana Cores 7. Press The Button
Create a quest for any Hidden River goblin to become a dungeon minion. Families welcome.
Quest Creation Failed: Insufficient Resources
Even though it failed, he was encouraged. It looked like he was at least moving in the right direction. He thought he might know what resource he needed. He told Femur he would get back to him and switched to Raek''s mind. He was standing in one of the tents the town building crew had raised around the worksite with Theus, Garrik, and two burly builders. The prisoners were no longer bound and gagged, but the way they sat on the ground looked unnaturally stiff. Their eyes were glassy and staring. Stew had questions but stuck to his current task."About that gold you owe me." "It''s here. We can deliver it this afternoon, but Theus has something he wants to tell you." Raek nodded to Theus, who turned and stepped outside through the tent flap. Raek followed. Theus lowered his head and spoke in a low voice to Raek and Stew while Garrik stepped out and stood a little away, pretending to dig through his travel pouch. Stew saw that the young fighter was keeping an eye on the builders nearby. "I''ve found an affinity link back to the main Helvetian force. I was able to get a good look before I had to withdraw to avoid discovery." He glanced up to the mountains in the general direction of the pass. "They are five to seven days away, closer if they make a forced march, but I doubt they will. It''s rough terrain just on the other side of the pass." "Why are we whispering?" Stew whispered with Raek''s lips. "You don''t have any sort of formal alliance with Rome, and, so far, you haven''t made it clear what your thoughts and preferences might be about that." Theus glanced at the tent and the Helvetian prisoners. "Other options." Garrik''s assignment as a lookout suddenly made more sense. He might think he was watching for eavesdroppers, but Theus had sent him away so he wouldn''t hear his mentor talking this way. The question was, who was being played here? Garrik or Stew? Both? He thought about what he knew of the Romans in his world and this one. They were definitely not the good guys by any measure. Then, from what he could tell about the Helvetians, their allies, and especially this Merlin, it was likely they weren''t saints either. Greek Macedonia and Phoenician Carthage were unlikely to be very trustworthy. Though, these two spies representing them had behaved themselves for the most part. Raek said Stew had a "sister" out there somewhere, an Avatar that might have some answers about what he was now. Now, he could see why Raek had dangled that information in front of him. He couldn''t be sure if it were true. It also wasn''t lost on him that this was one more distraction from the one thing he had come here to find out. "Bring me that gold. Then we''ll talk about alliances." Stew switched back the the fifth floor. He needed to see a Troll about a cannon. Checking Boxes "A catapult and a ballista are two completely different things, " Beryl said. "But this is neither." The troll looked down at the crude drawing his own hands had created under Stew''s influence. "This reminds me of some ridiculously dangerous goblin invention. The steam would be under tremendous pressure. I don''t think even reinforced stone would be strong enough to contain it, assuming you had some source of tremendous heat to make the steam in the first place." He drew his arms back as if pulling a bow. "That''s why the Egyptian steam ballista design uses steam power to draw back a cable. The cable can release all of that stored power at once to launch the bolt. It uses far less steam, and it is much safer to operate." Stew remembered something from the Lunar Forge menu. "What do you know about Living Stone?" "It''s delicious." Beryl rubbed one hairy ear thoughtfully. "But, yes, with its ability to heal, it could work for something like this. It''s extremely rare, though. And producing it would take more Mana than even a dungeon is likely to have without a constant stream of delvers to sacrifice." Beryl paused. "I once heard that living stone might be extracted from the shells of Roc eggs. Rocs are one of those ridiculous things the Titans created, so you might ask them unless you have an aviary on some deep level we haven''t seen?" "Something like that. How much stone do you need to make a dozen of these?" Stew could feel the conflict in Beryl''s thoughts, excitement mixed with doubt. "If you have living stone and the mana to feed it, we could build one with about 800 kilos. And. If you have that much, I might have some even more interesting suggestions for training the creature." Now, Stew was the one confused. "Training." "Living stone. These conans." "Cannons." "The cannons, should we be able to build one and feed, assuming we could feed it the mana it requires to survive, it would grow in power like any other dungeon creature. I would also expect creating it would add a schema to your repertoire of monsters." "Alive? And I might be able to spawn these?" Stew took control of Beryl''s hand again and picked up the stylus, scratching more lines onto the drawing. "How much would these add to the cost?'' Beryl shrugged. "Maybe another 50 kilos, maybe less, but you''ll need four for balance, so 100 kilos. And I would add these," Beryl added two more long, clawed legs to match the two Stew had drawn and a pair of bulging eyes near the back of the barrel. "But what kind of projectile are you going to fire, spears, stones?" "Something much better." Stew set the Lunar Forges to work, turning out Living Stone. "I''ll have the materials here in a couple of hours. While we wait, I want to talk about something else I think might be brand new to this world." "Something new?" "Quality control." They talked for another hour. Beryl, despite his doubts, had taken the cannons in stride, but after Stew''s halting description of what he remembered from his three mandatory Six Sigma classes two years ago, the troll Production Analyst nearly fell to his knees with a shouting religious epiphany. "Wonders!" Beryl waved to the other trolls nearby and started excitedly chanting as if it were a spell of its own. "Define! Measure! Analyze! Improve! Control!" Stew couldn''t decide if he was comforted that they seemed to take the idea of quality seriously or if he was creeped out that they took it SO seriously. These were, according to their own claims, the bunch that built this whole world. Now, they were gathered around Beryl, watching him draw a fishbone diagram on the back of the googley-eyed cannon sketch. Stew was halfway between "Look what I did!" and "What have I done?" He wondered if things would have gone better or worse if he had been able to remember what a "sigma" was. Back on the first level, he felt Raek return, this time with Theus, Garrik, and two sturdy laborers carrying a small wooden chest between them. "We have the gold," Raek said. He motioned to the men who set the chest down and left, walking quickly with several glances back over their shoulders at the dungeon and unreadable expressions. Raek opened the chest and let Stew see the loot through his eyes. It was full of small, irregularly shaped golden coins, like a half-melted pirate''s treasure. Stew was afraid to admit he had no idea how many coins they owed or how to count the value, so he sent for Femur, and told the goblin to bring one of the false cores that was still in good shape. To Raek, He covered his ignorance with the actual truth. "I don''t have much use for gold myself. Give it to Femur. It''s all for him anyway." He could feel Raek''s shock and enjoyed seeing the consternation on Theus'' face when Raek repeated what Stew said. Garrik was the first to ask the question in the air. "Why?" Femur arrived and strolled up to the chest with a satisfied grin. "That will do fine." He bent down and ran his fingers through the coins like he was stirring a warm bath. For all Stew knew, he might swim it. Come to think of it, what did goblins need with gold? Stew opened the mental broadcast to include everyone again. Only Theus, lacking a current contract, was excluded. "Now that you''ve kept your end of the bargain. Let''s talk about alliances. I would like to have that conversation we discussed with Caesar. What are your thoughts?" Garrik surprised Stew by stepping forward, looking up at the stone ceiling over the goblin market as if Stew was some god or beast looming over him. "Speak through me. Until you have a better option, I can help negotiate with Rome." Stew moved his attention into Garrik''s mind and found the young fighter deeply uncomfortable with the attention, but his intentions were clear. He saw Stew as a combination treasure trove and potentially powerful ally against the Helvetians. There was a deep distrust there, too, and some confusion over just what Stew was. There was a cautious willingness to find out. There was also a powerful undercurrent of attachment for Eira that seemed both private and complicated, so Stew ignored that as well as he could. He did keep in mind that Garrik''s support might be more because Eira had thrown her lot in with him than for any other reason. If you spot this narrative on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation. Stew thought it over. It made some sense. The Romans were more likely to listen to one of their own. Besides, Garrik had Management Hair. In Stew''s experience that counted more than skill when talking to corporate. But he still had the same reservations he had shared with Raek earlier. Garrik was a Roman and loyal to Rome, and to Caesar. To Garrik only, he said, "If you do this, can you keep your own opinions to yourself and repeat only what I tell you to say, even if you don''t like it?" He felt the current of distrust flare in Garrik, but there was a firmness there, too, a commitment. Garrik spoke aloud so that everyone nearby could hear. "I swear by Hercules and Pollux, that I will faithfully represent your interests and accurately repeat your words or may I be bound and burned and slain by the sword." Romans. I can''t tell if he''s being dramatic or hardcore. From the grim look on Theus and Raek''s faces, they took him seriously. The words echoed in the mind link with the other minions and level bosses, and Stew felt an echo of concern from Eira. So Stew was inclined to believe this was a big deal. "I accept your oath," he said, sharing that back out to everyone. Theus couldn''t hear Stew but watched Garrik''s face and nodded. "That answers our earlier question then." Raek spoke. "Caesar has already indicated he would be willing to meet." Raek glances toward the muddy rubble that had been the consulate. "He offered to meet in his headquarters pavilion this time." "That will be fine," Stew spoke through Garrik to get the hang of it. "I just need to finish something first." He switched to a private conversation with Femur. "Ready to send out that quest?" "We''ll need more rats and a bigger cave," Femur said. "Done." Stew put the trolls to work building out more goblin caves on level 1. He made sure to specify large plantings of the Cauldron Cap mushrooms. He was about to need all of those he could get. Then, using Femur''s voice he said, "The rest of you stand down there, off the steps." Then he brought up the Hidden River Goblin quest again. This time, he was able to submit the quest without any issues. Goblins of all ages began to appear around Femur in ones, twos, and threes. There was some shouting and hissing, but nobody stabbed each other. Theus, Garrik, and Raek stood stiffly in the mud, looking up at the gathering of goblins. They looked concerned, but nobody reached for a weapon or lobbed a fireball. "Sorry, I should have warned you," Stew said through Garrik. "These are the new goblins for the market. We can go now." The three humans looked at each other but said nothing. They turned and headed back down the steps. Behind them, a cacophony of loud goblin voices tried to talk over each other. He had Garrik take the false core from Femur; then they left the newly busy level boss to explain things to the other goblins. The working band of trolls left their level and started up the stairs to build out the new caves. He was going to be too busy to watch them closely, so he hoped they wouldn''t do too much damage while they were at it. He could hear them chanting about quality and standards as they marched up the stairs from their level. It was pretty cringeworthy, but if it kept them from collapsing his first level, he''d take it. Meanwhile, he ordered another false core from his lunar forges and minted a brand new level 1 controller to lead a group of 10 golems out of the dungeon and up the mountain. He loaded each of them with a single Mana Cube and made sure to program the controller to keep them well apart. The route he gave them would take them straight up the mountain, then back down above the pass following some goat paths he had picked out from his panopticon and a discussion with the trolls. The Roman ships would be able to see the golems clearly, but that was the idea. He didn''t want them to think he was trying to pull any tricks. Well, no tricks on the Romans, at least. It only took Raek and the others a few minutes to walk across the field to the headquarters tent. Caesar seemed to be waiting for them, just as Raek had promised. The guards waved them all through. The Consul stood over a map on a low wooden table carved into a relief map. Several other officers stood around him, including Spartacus. I need one of these, Stew thought. He was glad to see the route he had picked for the golems still looked like the best option. Glowing lights like tiny fireflies glowed from several places on the map. Red clumps formed orderly lines in a square near some blue lights. This looked like the Roman camp and the area around the construction. More red lights moved around in the air above, probably the Roman airships. He could see a line of yellow lights moving up the mountain, about where he would expect to see the golems, but his attention was drawn more to an area some distance to the north, in what appeared to be a wide valley, much higher in the mountains. A huge mass of purple lights collected there in long columns. Two moved through the air above. He couldn''t tell their size, but they seemed to move much faster than the Roman airships. Caesar spoke as they drew closer. "Your scrying and a drop of blood from one of your prisoners gave us the affinity we needed to track the Helvetian host." When he looked up, he addressed only Garrik, as if none of the others were in the room. "Good work." "Thank you, Consul, but I had little to do with it. The dungeon gave us these prisoners." Garrik gestured with the false core in his hand. "And the dungeon has asked me to speak for it. If it pleases you, we may continue the discussion regarding an alliance." Caesar gave Garrik a thoughtful frown. "I still have reservations. First, the flood. Now this." He waved at the yellow dots. "That is something the dungeon would like to discuss." Garrik took a breath and gave Stew control. "The expedition to the pass is something I thought might help slow down our visitors," Stew shrugged. "Also, I wanted to test something well away from the dungeon or your camp." "And what should I expect? Another deluge?" "I''ve had a word with the trolls. I believe they will be more careful in the future." Stew gestured back toward the dungeon. "You have probably already noticed that I don''t know very much about this world. I have to admit, I didn''t know that I needed to be so careful with offers of help from trolls. We didn''t have trolls where I come from." The Romans reacted to this, some looking shocked, but Spartacus only looked grim. Caesar''s expression didn''t change at all. "An Incarnate. I did suspect as much. That implies some very grave things." Stew nodded. "That''s what I hear, but I hope it also means I have some advantages that may make this a very good alliance." He pointed to the yellow dots. "For instance, this may turn out to be nothing, but if it does what I hope it will, we may have something useful to hold off the Helvetians." "And if it doesn''t?" There was a loud noise outside as something huge hit the ground. A giant rock unfolded into a golem the size of a tree, painted with legion colors. Three more landed beside it and rose to stand in a line. Then they all turned and marched over to the treeline, where they began ripping up whole trees by the roots and stacking them like firewood. "I plan fortifications, but there is no time to raise anything like what we need to hold off a host like this." I really want some of those, Stew thought. Aloud, he said, "If my test doesn''t do anything useful, I have other options." He was bluffing. He really wasn''t sure his army of barely trained golems would slow down a real army very much, even if his controllers were getting better at formations in their wargames. He was bluffing, that is, right up until the moment he finished the sentence. That''s when someone new joined the mental connection he was keeping open with all of his minions and monsters. A new mind appeared, a very focused, hard mind, a mind looking for a target. Critical Mass Caesar continued to talk, but Stew couldn''t focus on what he was saying. "Raek, Garrik, take notes. I have to go have a look at something. Don''t make any deals while I''m away." "Are you sure?" Raek''s confusion and irritation was thick and palpable. "I would think this negotiation would be your first priority right now." "I''ll be right back." Stew swapped his attention to Beryl, who was tidying up some unidentifiable tools and items. Stew ignored them. He locked Beryl''s eyes on the bizarre new creature that he could feel in his mind waiting for direction. It was like the diagram in general outline, but instead of the goofy muppet cannon he had been afraid he would find, it was a dark, sinister thing with sturdy legs, a bulbous body, and an extremely long barrel snout. It felt like an all-terrain crocodile. Everything, that is, except the eyes. The eyes were brilliant yellow and staring, fixated on Beryl. They were bird-of-prey eyes, far-seeing, dedicated to one purpose. Stew looked at its stats.
10:17 Unnamed Unnamed Hybrid Species - Level 1 This is a living artillery unit that combines organic resilience with mechanical precision. This creature has a symbiotic relationship with a Thermal Slime. A Thermal Slime may reside within the beast''s internal cavity. When the beast is ready to fire, the Thermal Slime rapidly heats up, creating pressurized steam that propels the cannon''s projectiles at blistering speeds. The higher the level of the Thermal Slime, the more powerful the cannon''s blasts become. Mana Cost - 1 / day Water Cost - 1 / day Health 5/5 Agility 3 Strength 4 Constitution 18 Actions: 1/1 Action Recharge: 1 / day Combat Skills: Suppressive Fire - Level 1 Precision Fire - Level 1 Special attack: Cannonade - Fire continuously until all ammunition is spent. Special abilities: Produces Cannon Shot - May produce ten reinforced stone cannonballs per day.
How much is 1 water, and where am I going to get that? I guess I''ll need that aqueduct too. Stew swapped into the creature''s mind and felt directly what he had sensed before. Even though this creature was made of stone, it was no golem. It was more like the panthers or the wolves but colder, more single-minded. He had been considering naming it something punny like "Arty," but there was just no way he could bring himself to do it. Everything he had done up until this point, every creature he had summoned could do different things and could be thought of in different ways. A cow, kittens, Cecil was just a funny skeleton. Even Lorelei was more than just a hungry ghost haunting the swamp and stalking her victims. The revenants, well, they were just for the atmosphere. At least he could tell himself those things. He had crossed a line with this creature. This was a living weapon, and he wasn''t sure if he wanted to be the kind of person who created living weapons. He felt Raek over their mental link. He was concerned, frustrated, even anxious. It was a strange feeling to sense in the seasoned rogue who was seemingly afraid of nothing. "What is it?" Stew swapped back to Garrik''s mind in a tent filled with uncomfortable silence. Ceasar was looking straight into Garrik''s eyes with a look somewhere between disgust and amusement. Garrik was terrified but kept it together. Instead of answering, Garrik said out loud. "The dungeon''s attention is back. Please continue." Caesar spoke slowly and firmly as if he was correcting a child. "I have seen what I came to see. You are an Incarnate, but also a very young dungeon, too weak to defend yourself. If you swear allegiance to Rome I will see that you are protected. Deny me, and my legion will sit behind our fortifications and wait for the five legions that are approaching now to reinforce this position. Meanwhile, I will watch the Helvetii strip you to the walls. Maybe you will put up a better fight than I expect. You claim to have a few surprises. That is all well and good. There will simply be fewer Helvetii for me to defeat. If you somehow win, then I will conquer you instead. Rome has no tolerance for wild dungeons." The other Romans looked grim and sure. It seemed Caesar wasn''t the only one who thought Stew was weak. The only exception was Spartacus, whose expression was as stern as the rest but whose hand rubbed the pommel of his sword. It was a nervous tick from the arena, maybe, but it made Stew think that this hardline approach didn''t fill the seasoned fighter with confidence. Or he was just itching for a fight. Stew had to admit that he was no great judge of character. They were all waiting for an answer, and another delay was only making them more certain he was weak and afraid. Maybe they were right. "It''s an interesting offer." All he could do was bluff and play for time. To do what? He wasn''t sure. Think. Come up with something to convince Caesar to hold off. "I will give you an answer at sunrise." "Sunset." Caesar said. "I won''t have my time wasted while you make whatever preparations you think will change my mind." Feeling like a kid caught cheating on a test. Stew withdrew from Garrik. He could feel the dismay in the young Roman and echos of calculation in Raek''s thoughts. They were worried that they had thrown in with the wrong side. Why shouldn''t they be? He hadn''t broadcast this conversation to the rest of the dungeon this time, and he was glad he hadn''t. But it meant no one else knew how much he had on his mind, so when Ba''Rush reached out, it was with some urgency. "You will want to hear this. Send Raek, too." Ba''Rush was in the tent with the surviving Helvetian assassins. When Stew swapped to his mind he saw the two prisoners staring up from the ground still unbound, with pleading expressions on their faces. "Tell me again. The dungeon is listening," Ba''Rush said. The two assassins lowered their eyes, and the older of the two spoke, "Great, um, Dungeon. We regret our crimes against you, but we had no choice." He glanced up, then back at that ground. "We were compelled, and now we have failed. Our families." There was a catch in his voice. "Our families will pay the price. We ask¡­" He looked at his compatriot, who nodded. "We ask not for forgiveness or mercy. We ask, no beg, for." He looked up. There was a deep and burning rage in his eyes. "We ask for vengeance. We could not stand against this tyrant, but we ask that you make him pay." Stunned, Stew forgot his own concerns for a moment. This wasn''t what he expected to hear. He nodded. "Go on." "There is very little time. Magic hides the main force. They must be at the pass by now. You must warn the Romans and ready yourself. There''s nothing more he can do to us, but don''t let Merlin have his victory." The man shuddered hard like he was shaking off a fever. "He''ll do things that can''t be undone." Stew had seen the Roman surveillance maps. The Helvetian force was far away and camped. Maybe the assassins had been fed false information in case they were caught? "How many¨C" Stew didn''t get the words out with Ba''Rush''s voice before both assassins began to shake violently, foaming at the lips and bending backward until their backs snapped and were still. "Poison," Ba''Rush said to one of the Legion guards. "Didn''t you search them?" The guard rushed forward, by Ba''Rush waved him back. "There''s nothing to do for them now, and if the toxin is meant for assassins, it might make them deadly to touch." Stew''s mind reeled. He felt like the world was closing in on him. Maybe Caesar was right. He was too weak. He didn''t belong here. He left Ba''Rush''s mind, remembering that Ba''Rush wanted Raek but was too overwhelmed to talk to the rogue right now. He heard Bossy''s calm voice in his mind then. "It''s nothing to be ashamed of. You seem to come from a kinder world. This is a harsh place, a broken place. I could tell from the beginning that you were different. Your System is so unusual. The things an Incarnate creates are not random. They are all attuned to you and come from your deepest self. Every name you choose becomes a destiny for your creations. It''s not a bad thing to be different from these people. Though the gladiator rebellion forced Rome to free her gladiators, they still keep slaves in their fields and in their cities under one pretext or another. Carthaginians keep slaves and and sacrifice children to their gods. The Halevetians are no different. You are too gentle for this world. I think I would have liked to have seen the world you come from." This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it. Stew could feel that she meant to comfort him, but it only confirmed his fear that he was just what Caesar suspected. A delivery driver dropped in the middle of a magical war. He needed time to think. The warning from the assassins gnawed at him. He swapped his attention to the controller golem leading the ten other golems up the mountain. The sky was a brilliant blue here, and the golems walked along a snow-dusted ridge, each carrying a glowing blue cube with sure steps, unbothered by the cold and wind. The far end of the pass was just visible past an outcropping. With golem sight, he could see a subtle flickering in a long line along the middle of the pass. It disappeared around the mountain at the bend. It was a little like seeing the bandits through the trees in the forest, but there were no trees here or anything to block the golem''s line of site. This was something else. He turned the golems toward the outcropping. It was a wide wedge of stone that jutted out over empty air. It would give him an unobstructed view of the entire pass. When the golems arrived, there was something already there. A small creature the size of a golem''s fist. As the line of Golem''s drew closer, he could see that it was a massive toad with brilliant green eyes. It shuffled around to face the golems. "This is your plan, Ceasar?" A young man''s voice came from the toad. "Gifts? I was hoping for something a little more entertaining. When I heard you only brought one legion, I thought you might be planning to at least pull some ''300'' stuff or maybe build some fortifications. You Romans, you''re all about fortifications, but here we are marching right through the pass, and my scouts say you''re still sitting down there playing sitter with the baby dungeon." The toad turned back to look out over the pass. "Just drop those and leave." Stew stopped the golems. "Bossy, Merlin is from my world, or one just like it." The casual movie reference wouldn''t have meant anything to Ceasar, or maybe Merlin was toying with him. Bossy snorted. "That sounds just like Bob, the old con. He likes to bring incarnates and their Nemesis from the same world to make things interesting." The scorn ran deep in Bossy''s mind. Stew would have to ask her about "Bob" later. "I need some help on the pass," Stew sent to the panthers. He swapped briefly to Fluff''s mind and was starting to apologize for what he was about to suggest when Fluff, Socks, and Boo attacked each other without hesitation, cutting open their throats with perfectly aimed swipes of razor-sharp claws. They were dead in seconds. Using the false core, he respawned them around the golems. It stung a little, but the core held together. Now, through Fluff''s eyes, he could see a massive army traveling through the pass. Some were walking. Some were on horseback or in wagons. Surrounding the golems on the cliff were more than a hundred more Helvetian fighters that he hadn''t been able to sense at all. Fluff glanced to the sky, and there was a Roman ship. Apparently the stealth ship from before or one like it, watching the pass. He didn''t know if Merlin was aware of the ship or if the ship was aware of the Helvetians. But whatever he did next. He had a big audience. The toad bounded forward as soon as the Spectral Panthers appeared. It began to belch some sort of glowing bile, which singed Fluff slightly before the panther vanished into a shadow under a small rock and reappeared in the midst of the Helveitan''s guarding the pass, catching them by surprise and taking down five before stepping through another shadow to attack others from behind. Meanwhile, Socks and Boo did the same, distracting the fighters, but the surprise only worked once. After that, the cats were dodging attacks as often as making them, and the guards were closing on the golems. The golems, meanwhile, were completely unaffected by the huge gouts of bile the toad unleashed on them. They drew around the controller and began stacking the mana blocks in a two by two square, then another two by two square on top of that. Stew watched the cubes'' mana production climb. The toad stopped spewing acid and started hopping even closer. A Helvetian spear drove through the chest of one of the golems, shattering it. With that one success, more spears began to rain down, and one after another, the golems began to fall. The last two remaining golems, besides the controller, placed their cubes just before falling themselves.
12:10 Mana Reactor Unlocked! Reaction Efficiency: 0.8
And nothing else happened. Boo took a sword through the chest and fell, while Socks was covered in minor wounds but still fighting. Fluff was wrestling with a high-level Helvetian, who seemed impervious to the big cat''s claws and bites. The fighter seemed to have some sort of light-based skill. His armor glowed, and he held Fluff out in the bright sunlight, where Fluff couldn''t find a shadow to escape. "Cecil smash the golems. All of them!" Kicking himself for not using higher-level golems in the first place, Stew swapped to the controller golem and reached out with the false core. He could spawn in dozens of higher-level golems, regardless of the pain and damage that might cause the false core and his own core sustaining it. He could show them what he was capable of. Something long, ropey, and wet wrapped around the false core and yanked it from his hands. The toad''s tongue retracted faster than his eyes could follow. It swallowed the false core. The core wasn''t destroyed. Stew could still see through the golem''s eyes, but he found he couldn''t spawn anything without directly touching the core. He felt Socks and Fluff die. "Hold!" The toad called out, and the Helvetians stopped their charge. They held their weapons ready. A dozen spears targetted the last remaining golem. Stew looked at them, thinking of what the prisoners had said. He looked down at the thousands walking through the pass. The toad looked the golem in the eye. "This is tasty, and these gifts are something special. I''m inclined to show Rome some mercy if you can give me a few more of those." The Toad cocked its head. "Oh." Merlin laughed. "It''s you, isn''t it? You''re the dungeon, here to try to make a deal. I didn''t recognize you at first, but I can feel you through this crystal thing. Sneaky, betraying Ceasar like this." Stew became very aware of the stealth Roman ship above, even if he couldn''t see it now. They were certainly watching and listening. Now, Caesar would think his plan had been to betray Rome all along. Stew looked at the stack of cubes. Like everything else he made, at least everything before the living cannons, it was something that could build, somthing that could do good. He remembered what Bossy said about things being attuned to his deepest self, his memories. In a moment of clarity, he realized the stack of cubes looked just like the stack of 10 standard 1B boxes that had been in the back of his van on the last day of his old life. The ones he had failed to deliver because he swerved to dodge some idiot who couldn''t be bothered to watch where he was going. Almost the same. He nodded. Knowing it would convince Merlin and his toad that he was doing just what was expected. But to Bossy, he sent. "You were wrong." "About what?" She said. "About coming from a kinder place." He reached up to push the two top cubes to the center of the stack, where each of them would touch two other cubes. Where if they had been boxes, he could have secured the whole stack with a single strap, just like they had been secured in his van. The stack of meaningless boxes he had died for. "We had this idea where I come from. It was how we handled people like Caesar and Merlin. A way to balance overwhelming powers."
12:28 Reactor Criticality Unlocked Reaction Efficiency: 1.2
"What was that?" Bossy asked. "We called it ''Mutually Assured Destruction''." Back in Garrik''s mind in the Roman command tent, Stew watched a brilliant light erupt in the mountain pass above them. The light grew brighter, washing out the world in silent emptiness. Then, a massive wind ripped the tent away. Garrik lay on the ground. "What was that?" A jolt and shudder came through the ground a few seconds later. "Get up," was all Stew said. His vision returned slowly. He used Garrik''s eyes to confirm what he suspected: The blast wave had knocked around the Roman fleet above them, but they seemed to be recovering. Back at the pass, the stealth ship was sure to be destroyed, maybe vaporized. Over the pass, superheated air did what superheated air does. It rose and drew moisture along with it, full of vaporized snow, higher and higher until it condensed into a rolling cloud that rose, leaving a central column behind. A mushroom cloud like a banner stood tall over the destruction. Even from here, stew could see avalanches tumbling down the slopes on both sides. There was no telling what damage had happened closer to the ground. Just outside the remains of the tent, he saw one of the giant golems that had been working on fortifications was missing its massive head. It continued working but its head lay behind it with a tree branch through the forehead. The forest around was nothing but bare branches. Every leaf had been blown off. Farther up the slope the trees lay flat. Stew turned Garrik around to face Caesar. Ceasar was just rising from the ground behind his desk. Stew felt cold inside and angry. He was angry at Caesar and Merlin both for forcing him into this position, forcing him to become what he would have to become now. He started spawning golems 100 at a time on the steps of his dungeon, marching them through the town''s wreckage toward the Roman camp. He started with his highest-level fighting golems and controllers. As Caesar calmly gave orders to assemble his Legion, Stew walked Garrik closer until they faced each other across the darkened planning table. Guards rushed to seize Garrik, but Ceasar gestured for them to wait. "Sunrise," Stew said, with Garrik''s voice. "Now we can talk. Ceasar said nothing. He looked up at the rising mushroom cloud. "As equals," Stew said. Caesar looked Garrik in the eye. He nodded. To bossy, Stew said, "We can mark ''Make myself too tough to kill, even if they try.'' off the list." "I underestimated you," Bossy replied. "Tell me more about Bob."