《The Realm Beneath: A Dungeon Story (Edited)》 Prologue At first glance, it appeared that nothing was happening, nothing at all. In fact, whenever it tried to look, nothing did happen. As if everything had paused, as if trying to hide away. Angry. It didn¡¯t understand! Why? It questioned. It was when it glazed over, giving up and watching without watching, that things seemed to happen. Movement, shadows, light; swirling patterns in the endless grey that surrounded it. But the patterns of light twisted away, falling out of view. Panicking, it tried to look. Pause. Anger. Boredom. Why? What? Confusion. The twisting shadows and lights returned slowly, as time began to play once again. Happy. Content. Interesting. Over time it began to become more interested and then¡­ Pause. Again? Frustration. Slowly it began to try to remember things. What¡¯s things? It questioned. But even those questions faded away in the mists of time. Everything faded away in the grey! What were questions? Confusion. Anger. The grey mists billowed up around it again erasing those metaphysical thoughts as the patterns danced and swam. Not angry? So, it went back to watching, everything paused. Angry. It looked away and the dancing started again. Not angry? Happy. Pause. Dancing, happy. Pause. Odd. Slowly, it peered back at the things happening, passively absorbing all that was going on. It still looked too often, and the pause happened. That made it angry, and then¡­ resigned. If you come across this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it. So, it watched, peacefully, loving the dancing of the grey, letting the endless time pass quickly, rushing by. Mirrored in those passively blank eyes, the grey began to stick around, not just floating free and away, lackadaisically. Happy. Pause. Sigh. From the grey that stuck around, patterns began to form, first a circle, vast and yet also small at the same time. The circle slowly expanded, filling out in multiple directions. Happy. Pause. Sigh. The circle of grey seemed lonely, and it felt compassion, it was lonely too. Sad. Confusion? The circle broke apart and it felt sad, the fragments spreading apart, as if running away. Sad. But as the circle faded, another formed, and then another and another and then they filled out just as the first had. And then they moved! They moved!!!! Happy!!!! Pause. Sad. Movement. Dancing spheres. Happy. Slowly, as time passed, the spheres dancing began to coalesce, into more regular patterns, circling around each other. And as it watched it began to see more, hundreds, nay thousands, of dancing spheres all circling around something. Something more. The dancing spheres seemed to pull in streams of grey, light grey and then, in one moment, the grey expanded, blooming and then it happened. Happy happy. Pause. Pain. Blinding pain as the light that had just blossomed from the endless grey emerged. Darkness. Movement. Happy. It moved towards the light, as close as it dared. And then it watched. Pauses happened occasionally, when things happened but it watched through them, learning to observe everything and nothing. One particular sphere drew its interest and it spent most of the time watching the pretty patterns within the sphere dance and swim, much like the endless grey had done and yet somehow more. More frantic, more elegant. More. Great rifts and pillars formed and collapsed to dust, sundering and reforming in vast fractions of time. Uncountable. Uncontrollable. Wonderous. Eventually the stuff found a pattern that it liked, and it stayed still, moving only gently. Much like how the sphere had formed initially. As the being observed the sphere over the passage of time, it grew interested in what was being formed. What is it? It wondered. And slowly, over the many eons that it watched, it saw something forming, a tiny mote of existence that drew the endless grey in. The grey swirled and swirled. Faster. Faster. Faster and faster. Faster and faster and faster. And faster still, until something broke. And the grey was gone. In its place was something new, not grey, not light, or dark. Something more, something special. Happy, happy happy. Pause. Colour. Movement. Happy. As if responding to this, the sphere decided that colours were good, and it started producing the colours. More and more and more and more until the whole sphere had flourished with the colours. It looked at the other spheres, no colour. Sad. It looked at the sphere with the colours. Happy. It went back to watching, happier now than ever before and, just as it had watched the grey form the spheres, and the spheres gain patterns, the colours made little moving patterns. It tried to get closer still to see these new patterns. Patterns that never sat still, moving in constant vibration, faster than anything before. Eons passed and the colour never settled down, never slowed, always moved and it was happy, happy for the movement. It was afraid of boredom more than anything. As it watched without watching, it saw the colours come together as clusters, rising, falling, and dying. Sad. But as the colours died, more still were born and they lived and died in the moments between seconds of the clock of time. With each new generation of colours, they grew brighter and bigger until¡­ ¡°Ahhhhhhhhhh!!!¡± It jumped, as from the ever-silent grey, a scream broke out. Shattering everything it had known, for it had only lived in silence prior. Sad. Afraid. Confusion? For eons, the being looked away ¨C scared. But the boredom got to it, and it turned back to stare at the world. Wondering where the sound had come from. What sound was and why it hurt. Afraid. At least the colours and patterns danced onwards. Happy. ¡­ ¡­ ¡­ ¡°Ahhhhhhhhhh!!!¡± Another scream ripped open the silence. It cringed, fearful, and confused. ¡­ ¡­ ¡­ Over time, the being came to realise it was normal, though what was happening again and again still eluded it and it was ever so scared. But the grey mists of time rose again and again and stripped it all away. The screaming faded into the background again and again and again, until¡­ It felt a tug, and a scream broke out all around the ever quiet. Reverberating and echoing until even the echoes died and silence once more reigned supreme. Chapter 1 Chapter 1 Blackness, all encompassing¡­ Silence, forever accompanying¡­ Solitude, unrelenting¡­ Sadness, unpolluted¡­ Awareness, overwhelming¡­ The grey¡­ comforting, safe, and longed for¡­ Pain? My companion¡­ It came in short sharp bursts, shattering my mind, leaving me wallowing in an inky blackness without end. The after-image scarring my mind with the expectation of more, a phantom pain from which there was no escape, no distraction, only the silence that listened to my pain with a deaf ear. But with each shattering blow, my awareness increased. Gradually, the darkness retreated to the recesses of my mind, occurring only in the moments after my companion had taken hold again. And then¡­ with one final burst, it left entirely. My aching mind the only sign of the pain that had run rampant through me. More time passed and even the scars and phantom pain faded, leaving me wallowing in the implacable solitude of my isolation. Pain, previously my constant companion had left my side, leaving to ply her tender mercies to someone else¡­ somewhere else. Sadness, raw sadness flooded in. A pain-free mind held room for something else; an unpolluted sadness that captured me in a pain of its own. I missed the grey. What grey? Grey? What? Confusion. Endless confusion. I stopped, paused. Holding my fractured mind together with my will. Fragments of myself seemed to float away, as a feather on the wind. Memories emerged, bobbing up and down on the surface before dipping under again and leaving me as lost and confused as a stranded sailor on the wreckage of his ship, surrounded by debris that dipped and dived away from him, just out of reach, taunting and whispering, goading him. I paused, stopping for a moment to catch myself. No. I couldn¡¯t slip. Death lingered close. Death? What? NO!!! I caught myself again, no distractions. I paused, thinking without thinking and watching without watching and I saw something. Something that wasn¡¯t the absolute blackness. Colour. Blue. It filled me with a longing, nostalgic feeling that soothed me, like a lover¡¯s caress. I focused on it, and it bloomed: the world was awash in blue, patterns of light and dark that permeated my vision, swirling around, moving as eddies and ripples upon the water do. Infusing the patterns of the world so that the patterns glowed with a faint light. A light moving in an endless stream, past me and off into the distance. To where? I couldn''t even comprehend. Off, and off it went, leaving me far behind, feeling cold, like soldiers marching off to war. I blinked, and upon blinking, the world was washed in greens, not blue. This new green seemed to get more intense the farther above me it got. Above? Where did that thought come from? I stopped again; I couldn¡¯t be distracted. Like layers, the green blossomed away and out of my vision, pulsing with colour, and then fading away to the background, before flaring in vivid colour seconds later. Like a heartbeat, it thump thumped along to its own rhythm, ignoring all that was not it. The green seemed calming, and I relaxed, blinking again. This time, the world was washed in reds, and oranges. Unlike the green, this time they darkened and became more intense the further down it went. The reds filled me with a sense of warmth; the colours seeming rich and happy. They didn¡¯t pulse like the green or march ever onwards like the blues. Rather, they seemed to waft up and suffuse the world. Each and every time I blinked, the world changed colour, but still, the underlying patterns were evident. Blue, green, red, purple, brown, black, white, yellow and silver with countless shades in between, a near endless spectrum of colour that was overwhelming. Yet still the patterns of the world were clear to see. Eventually, the colours began to merge together. Their bright spots remaining separate, still standing out in the tapestry of my vision. Down below the world was still more red, whilst up above was more green. Blue swirled and flowed through my vision and small specs of the other colours shone out, like stars in the night sky. As the colours merged, the pattens became more and more clear. Almost as if I were seeing in two types. The world of the colours and the world of the patterns. Focusing on the patterns, the colours faded away until they almost disappeared. I could distinguish my surroundings: a small space, earthen walls surrounding me barely twice as big as my body. I felt constrained, as if the space were far, far too small. I wanted to expand it, to improve it. Odd I thought to myself. Where was that feeling coming from? I dismissed the thought for the moment, still focused on getting my bearings and went back to observing. Stretching my vision, I could see signs of life above me. Small bugs and critters, crawling around and exploring the earth of the walls, carrying out their lives oblivious to me. It was comforting to find them, to find life around me, I felt less alone, with them, less isolated. Happy. I felt the pieces of my mind draw a bit closer, less fragmented. I was obviously doing something good and so I continued my observation, focusing on the mundane, on the lives of the insects and the warmth of the earth. Watching as they carried on with their lives, finding food and water and building their colony. They moved with a sense of purpose that I found remarkable. So far, I wasn¡¯t driven to do anything. Well, anything, except expand my small hollow, but that could easily be set aside for the moment. I don''t know for how long I observed their lives but, after a while, a new generation was born, and all the time, information was filtering in. Soon, I realised that the water that the bugs kept finding, corresponded to the bright blue glow I had first seen. I¡¯d been focusing on the patterns so much that the colours had faded enough that I had forgotten them for a moment. But now that I saw both, I could see the creatures more completely. They glowed with a faint red and green light as they went about their business. Rushing off to find the blue dots and the green ones too. Blue was obviously water but what was green? It came to me in a moment. Life. The green was life. The discovery felt good, and I once again felt the pieces of my mind draw closer. Back to the bugs¡­ I watched them for a few more generations, fascinated by their lives, the drive that they experienced, the rush. For myself, slowly watching and observing it seemed frantic, strange, completely alien to my own desires. For now, all I wanted was to watch them. Three generations later I felt a disturbance, it came from above and I watched with interest. I couldn¡¯t see it yet, but I could feel it, and I waited, anxious to see what it was. It didn¡¯t take long before a head poked out of the side of the earthen walls that surrounded me, antenna waving around and claws scrabbling at the dirt, dislodging clumps, and widening the hole, letting the rest of the larger insect slip into my hollow. It wandered from side to side, exploring the new space it found itself in, and searching. For what? I didn¡¯t know, but I awaited finding out eagerly. Nothing this exciting had happened since I had found the bugs, and I was beginning to grow bored of watching them. The new, larger insect eventually wandered into the bugs. They avoided it and continued on their way. But, as the creature explored, it got closer and closer to the colony until it couldn¡¯t be ignored. The bugs came out in force and an intense battle started. Support the author by searching for the original publication of this novel. The bugs fought with numeric superiority and with a fierceness that bellied their smaller size whereas the new insect fought with a viciousness and skill that was far superior. But numbers beat skill, and the bugs eliminated the threat. Many soldiers had been lost and I felt sad for the bugs. Yet something strange happened, something that I was not expecting at all. From the bodies of the bugs and from the larger insect arose a wispy vapour that shined with a familiar grey light. Why it was familiar I didn¡¯t know, but it was. I wanted it, something called it to me, stronger than any desire I had thus far felt and I reached for it, not with my body, that it seemed was too rigid to move but with my mind, fractured and all. With a rush the grey wisp entered me, filling up a hole I had no idea I had and making me ecstatic. Wow it felt good. ~~Congratulations! You, ______, New Dungeon have reached level 1. Having found the skill of mana absorption you can now feed yourself, survive and thrive. You need only to think Menu to open up a world of opportunity~~ I freaked out at the *ding* that sounded out, piercing the silence that had enveloped me from the beginning. It was loud and scary and wrong, very wrong. My mind started to drift apart again with my worry, but I clamped down on it, steadying myself. Idiot I thought to myself, annoyed that I had lost progress. My mind had been healing, the fragments getting closer together, but now they were far apart again. I sighed. I stilled my thoughts, and then read through the text that now hovered in front of me. Odd, very odd. Menu!!!
Menu
Crystal Dungeon Store Close
Name: ??? Level: 0
Race: Dungeon Health: 1/10
Titles: / Mana: 1 of 2
Renown: Undiscovered Dungeon Points: 100
Rating: 1E Attunement: /
When the menu popped up, I managed to stay calm, and reading through the table was interesting. Though what most of it meant was confusing and I didn¡¯t understand. Though I had discovered two interesting things. One, was that I was a dungeon, though what that meant was beyond me and two was that I was damaged. One out of ten health seemed bad, potentially very bad. I also suspected that the vapour I had absorbed from the remains, was something that the menu called mana and the table indicated I could have another one, that seemed enjoyable. I mentally clicked the close button on the page, and it disappeared from view. Focusing on another of the small bugs bodies I absorbed another of the grey vapours. ~~Congratulations: you have absorbed two mana and reached your maximum capacity, should you wish it you may now level up which will allow you to hold more total mana as well as to select one prize for the first step on your journey. However you may also choose to save your mana and use it.~~ ~~Would you like to level up? YES NO~~ I selected yes and felt a force rush through me before the emptiness filled me again, acting quickly I drew in the largest of the grey vapours that hung over the dead bodies of the insects, the one from the invader and felt the emptiness disappear. Happy. Menu
Menu
Crystal Dungeon Store Close
Name: ??? Level: 1
Race: Dungeon Health: 1/11
Titles: / Mana: 5 of 10
Renown: Undiscovered Dungeon Points: 110
Rating: 1E Attunement: /
Interesting, I thought looking over the menu again. As I had expected, level had increased to one. Health had increased its maximum by one to 11, which wasn¡¯t comforting, I would much rather have healed up. Mana had increased to five with a maximum of ten and I had gained ten dungeon points. I now knew what the Crystal and Close tabs were, but Dungeon and Store were still a mystery and so I thought Dungeon to myself. The Menu flipped over a tab, and I was presented with a new screen.
Menu
Crystal Dungeon Store Close
Rooms: 1 Traps 0
Floors: 0 Items: 0
Bosses: 0 Perks: 1
Monsters: 0 Dungeon Points: 110
Unplaced Creatures^ 0 Material types: 0^
This page was mostly confusing, though it seemed my hollow counted as a room and I had one perk, the message earlier had mentioned that. What was a perk? What were bosses, monsters, creatures, and traps for that matter? I wondered. I had an inkling, but I wasn¡¯t certain. Odd, everything was odd. I clicked over to Store to see what that was and was taken aback.
Menu
Crystal Dungeon Store Close
Monsters: Bosses: Items: Materials:
Points to spend: 110
Slime: Danger level: 0.1 Points: 10
Brittle Skeleton: Danger level: 0.4 Points 35
Wounded Goblin: Danger level 0.5 Points 50
Expand to see more¡­
Interesting, it seemed I could buy monsters and flicking through the other tabs it seemed I could also buy bosses, items, and materials, though since I didn¡¯t know what to do yet, I thought it best not to experiment with such a finite resource as dungeon points. For now, I closed the store down. ~~Congratulations: You have reached the milestone: Level 1 and as such have been granted a perk. The following perks are available: Heal 23 dungeon points 1000kg of soil/stone/wood/¡­ Item: The Dungeon Guide for Dummies. Mana boost: 20% 1% off next store purchase Free monster/trap within ultra-basic tier. Choose wisely, your next perk is available at level 10~~ The heal option stuck out to me, and I chose it, knowing it was the right choice. I didn¡¯t like being broken, it felt dangerous and holding myself together with my will was tiring, no, I was sure it as the right choice. Heal I thought confidently. The pleasure that rushed through me was extraordinary and I felt my mind draw close, the fragments slotting together neatly before sealing up. I relaxed my hold and when my mind didn¡¯t fracture again, I knew it was true. I pulled up the menu again to check and sure enough it said full health. Fantastic. Feeling pleased with myself, I looked around, feeling more confident in moving my mind, exploring my ¡®room¡¯ as the menu called it. It was with this exploration that I discovered something, my body to be precise, it was a weird feeling looking down on myself, but it was right somehow. I was some sort of crystal, white and shiny. The colours of the world flowed through me, and I felt at peace watching it. Remarkable. I¡¯m beautiful, majestic. I don¡¯t know how long I watched myself for, but I didn¡¯t regret it for a moment. Time well spent. What to do now? I thought to myself. I didn¡¯t feel hungry, my mana levels at a good level, nor did I feel the desire to fix myself, I was at full health after all. Hmm. I had the desire to increase my space I still felt cramped, and my beautiful core needed something more, more than just a small hollow in the ground. Vaguely, I remembered one of the options from the perk list, something about a dungeon guide. I tried to bring the perk list back up, but I couldn¡¯t work it out, probably impossible. What has been has been, and I couldn¡¯t go back anyway. With nothing else to do, I began absorbing the rest of the vapours from the battle, though despite the number of dead bugs, the mana barely managed to get me to the ten required to level up. ~~Level up: 2~~ With no more mana from the bugs left to absorb I was stumped. What to do? What to do? Watching myself, I had noticed that the coloured mana seemed to pass right through me, whereas the grey swirled around and around inside, stuck. What if I could make the coloured mana stick around, would it be mine to use, could I keep it, use it? With that thought in mind I set about my task. I had to interact with the mana somehow and since my body was a crystal, it couldn¡¯t move, that left my mind. I could move my presence and I was sure I could manage this; it was just a matter of will. At first, I tried throwing myself at the streams that passed. Unfortunately, they just bent around me, continuing on their path unhindered. Then I tried grabbing it with my mind, holding it in place, much like I had with the fragments of my mind. That too failed, it just leaked out through the gaps, like trying to hold water in your hand. Sure, it stilled for a moment, but a moment was not long enough, and the effort left me aching. When I recovered, I thought about the issue for a while. Imagining ways that I could direct it. In the end, the bugs helped solve it. They built their colony, and I watched as the bugs had to move around the walls they put up. It was this very idea that allowed me to direct the mana. To reflect it until it bounced around restrained within me. I kept close watch on that first stream, making sure it didn¡¯t slip from my grasp. Eventually, it slowed, in fact the whole world slowed down, grey mist rising up and surrounding me until all I could see was myself and the mana stream, paused. It felt exceedingly familiar and yet I still couldn¡¯t remember from where, what about the misty grey was familiar I wondered. ~~Congratulations: you have learnt the basis of elemental absorption. Would you like to become water attuned? YES NO~~ I thought about it for a while before selecting no, the water had made me feel cold, and I didn¡¯t like that. ~~As you have selected NO, the absorbed water mana will be lost and the residual grey mana will be absorbed~~ The world sped back up and the grey faded away again, the blue stream now gradually fading away as it bounced around me. Great! I thought to myself, nothing to it but to wait. Menu
Menu
Crystal Dungeon Store Close
Name: ??? Level: 2
Race: Dungeon Health: 13/13
Titles: / Mana: 2 of 50
Renown: Undiscovered Dungeon Points: 130
Rating: 1E Attunement: /
The menu didn¡¯t say I had more or less mana, but I felt empty. As if the effort I had expended had used up more that I had gained. In this manner I continued in my quest to level up and get another perk. It took a while, absorbing the ambient mana, but eventually I got there. ~~Level up: 3~~ ~~Level up: 4~~ ~~Level up: 5~~ ~~Level up: 6~~ ~~Level up: 7~~ ~~Level up: 8~~ ~~Level up: 9~~ ~~Level up: 10~~ ~~Congratulations: You have reached the milestone: Level 10 and as such have been granted a perk. The following perks are available: Heal 230 dungeon points 5000kg of soil/stone/wood/¡­ Item: The Dungeon Guide for Dummies. Mana boost: 20% 1% off next store purchase Free monster/trap within basic tier. Choose wisely, your next perk is available at level 20~~ This time I chose the Item: The Dungeon Guide for Dummies. Settling down for an interesting read. Or at least trying to, I felt far more constrained, more cramped. I didn¡¯t like it, but the lure of the book was too strong, and I focused. Finally, some answers¡­ Chapter 2 ~~Hello New Dungeon, and welcome to the world. Your first question, I imagine, is what is a dungeon? What are you? To put it simply, a dungeon is a creature whose soul is housed within a crystal, whilst their mind is free to move around their domain ¨C land under their control. They feed off of mana and without it a dungeon will die. But how does a dungeon get mana? Death. Though more specifically, the grey mana that is released upon sudden death. Initially a dungeon can survive off of the animal deaths within its domain, however they quickly surpass this ability, and must move onto more complex life. As the native elemental mana flows through a dungeon core, it is altered slightly, purified, as any grey mana is extracted. This pure mana is a potent draw to the shorter-lived races, as it allows them to grow far stronger and it is also the reason why dungeon cores are exceptionally valuable. Dungeons, in response to this danger and in order to facilitate their feeding, create defences and floors of danger, in order to both protect their crystal and to draw in more complex life, in hopes of feeding upon it.~~ The rest of the book was fairly useless, just giving a few examples of what other dungeons had done and it felt wrong. Cramped, not at all what I wanted for myself. Ughh, no. But that first bit, it answered exactly what I had wanted to know. What I was. And it explained the insects and the blue mana mystery. Though it had scared me; people wanted my crystal. Well, it is beautiful; I am exquisite after all. I thought smugly. Who wouldn¡¯t want me? Nonetheless, the idea that I would have to start small, weak, and vulnerable did not sound good. The requirements to reach the next level were greater each time, and each time my mana reset to zero. How could I possibly build a decent dungeon with that restriction. Ridiculous. I also needed to use mana to build it. As far as I could see there was no possible way to build up enough defences before I surpassed the ability to feed upon animals. It was something to ponder, for sure. I had plenty of time before that happened, time to figure out what to do. For now, though? I decided I needed a room to start with it was awfully cramped, more so than I remembered. Looking around myself, I saw it, no longer did my length from tip to tip fill up a quarter of the room, no, it was more like half now. I had grown, and with it my domain must have grown, so much so I felt cramped, pressed up against the walls. Like being stuffed in a too small box. I needed space¡­ But how to go about it. I tried to absorb the stone in the walls, much as I had the mana, a spectacular failure. Nothing happened at all, not a slight wobble, or a crack. Nothing, just a slightly more tired dungeon. Hmmm. Perhaps there was some sort of limit to how much I could absorb. Focusing on the walls in smaller amounts yielded nothing either. On a whim I focused on the small dirt clumps that the big invading insect had dislodged. It worked! I shouted to myself, surprised at that. Yes, success. ~~Congratulations: You have absorbed your first material. You can mentally choose if you would like the material to be voided or stored. You can store material up to your mana maximum where each 1 point of mana is equal to 100g of material.~~ I mentally voided the soil. Now about those walls¡­ Over the next, however long ¨C I still wasn¡¯t sure how to measure time, especially as it kept slowing down and speeding up depending on my focus ¨C I tried many methods. Almost all of which failed. Two worked, one was using my mind as a pickaxe, to widen the cracks in the walls, applying pressure and force until it broke. Then I could absorb it. The other was to mentally pick up a stone and hurl it at the wall. I chose the first method and set to work, carving out a large sphere with a central column to support my crystal. Just how big that was, I had no idea, but it was many, many times my own size, and the pressure I had felt had lessened significantly. I was a lot happier now, feeling far less squeezed, though it still wasn¡¯t comfortable, I wanted lots and lots more space. I kept working, expanding the bottom of the sphere, flattening it until I had a kind of dome. I paused for a moment bringing up my menu.
Menu
Crystal Dungeon Store Close
Name: ??? Level: 10
Race: Dungeon Health: 65/65
Titles: / Mana: 280 of 4354
Renown: Undiscovered Dungeon Points: 650
Rating: 1E Attunement: / Enjoying the story? Show your support by reading it on the official site.
Only 280 mana left! Oh God, this wasn¡¯t good, there was no way in hell I was opening up my dungeon anytime soon, how on earth would I protect myself. Just making this room had spent almost all of my mana. I pondered this issue for a long time. Unfortunately, thinking on it hadn¡¯t helped much and I was still stumped. How could I possibly remain safe, with such limited defences. Perhaps it was down to luck, perhaps others of my kind just got lucky and didn¡¯t get killed. Perhaps there were only a few dungeons out there that survived. There was no way I was allowing luck to dictate my life. There must be some sort of solution, and I would find it. The problem was, I had no idea where I was. I might be in the middle of nowhere, but I might be just outside wherever those shorter-lived races lived. So, what to do? I questioned. Menu, I thought flicking over to the store page and then to items. Perhaps there was something that would help.
Menu
Crystal Dungeon Store Close
Monsters: Bosses: Items: Materials:
Points to spend: 650
Pitfall trap blueprint: Danger level: N/A Points: 100
Pitfall trap Danger level: 0.3 Points: 25
Rockfall trap: Danger Level: 0.3 Points 25
Expand to see more¡­
The traps were interesting, but they didn¡¯t help me. I expanded the page and set about searching for something, something that would help. It took me a while, but eventually I found it.
Menu
Crystal Dungeon Store Close
Points to spend: 650
Above Ground Map:
Description: Danger level: N/A Points: 3210
The Above Ground Map provides a detailed account of what lies upon the surface, including the topography, natural features and any settlements that are nearby. The map comes with several scale options and can only be used once.
Expand to see more¡­
The map seemed like the answer to my desires, it could tell me where I was and if I was in any danger. But it cost a huge 3000 dungeon points. I only had 650, it would be a while before I could afford it, but I didn¡¯t see any way around it, I would just have to level up. A quick calculation found that without any additional points, only the ones from levelling up, I would need to reach level 25 to be able to afford the map. At level 20 I would get my next perk, but I wasn¡¯t sure if I should use it for dungeon points, it felt a bit wrong, surely it should be used for more important things. Right? I decided that I didn¡¯t know, and that there were many things I didn¡¯t know. For now, though, I knew I needed to grow and so I set about doing so. ~~Level up: 11~~ ~~Level up: 12~~ ~~Level up: 13~~ ~~Level up: 14~~ I had to stop, once again I felt confined, the room was too small and I just couldn¡¯t stand it, it needed to be bigger, much, much bigger. Excavating the room again took far longer than I would have liked and far more mana than I would have liked; draining me several times as I worked to expand it. ~~Level up: 15~~ ~~Level up: 16~~ I stopped, taking time to expand the room again. I was reaching the limit on what I could absorb from the elemental mana that flowed through me, and each refill took me weeks. All told, these six levels had taken me 42 weeks of work and only the ability to speed up the time I perceived had kept me sane during my struggle. Sometime around week five, I had grown annoyed with my inability to measure the amount of time that had passed. It kept me feeling disconnected and lost. Fixing the problem had kept me thinking for a while and eventually the answer came to me. Bugs! Though I had found out they were called ants, having seen them one day while looking through the animal options in the store. Seemingly at random an ant would stop. Why? I hadn¡¯t a clue, but they continued on a moment later none the worse for wear. Careful observation had shown that each time they stopped they paused for exactly the same amount of time. I called this a minute. But it was far too small a period of time to use. I could accomplish almost nothing in a minute and so I used 10,000 of them to be a week, which was further subdivided into days and hours. A useful system, and once I had it figured out, I no longer needed to observe the ants, I just knew exactly how much time had passed. I was very pleased with myself for that one and it seemed the system was too, because shortly after I had finished refining my system it popped up. ~~Congratulation: you have successfully completed a hidden achievement, developing time. For developing time and not buying a clock you have been awarded 1,234 dungeon points.~~ The reward had made everything feel far more achievable and I was proud of myself. Now I only needed to reach level 19 to get the map, and I wouldn¡¯t even have to use my perk, I would be able to get the map, make a plan, and then make the most out of the perk. Things were looking good. But now I had another problem, having reached level 16 I had just about surpassed the ability to grow passively. Needing more complex life to give me the mana necessary. Yet without buying traps or creatures from the store, I had no way of killing anything. I continued the grind, slowly expanding my room and pushing up through the levels absorbing and refining the ambient mana and continually declining the elemental affinity prompts that kept popping up. ~~Level up: 17~~ ~~Level up: 18~~ ~~Level up: 19~~ Menu!!! I thought excitedly.
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Name: ??? Level: 19
Race: Dungeon Health: 200/200
Titles: / Mana: 308 of 12849
Renown: Undiscovered Dungeon Points: 3234
Rating: 1E Attunement: /
Yes!!! I celebrated. I had done it. I had garnered 3234 dungeon points; 24 points more than I needed. Without too much delay, I bought the map. Navigating through the menu to it. It was under my list of items, in the dungeon tab, which now numbered two, the unused map, and the dungeon guide for dummies. Opening it up, I got a request for the scale of the map. ~~Please select a scale option for the map to use: 1:10 1:100 1:1,000 1:10,000 1:50,000 1:100,000 1:500,000 Would you like to use the map: YES NO~~ I was confused, what did it mean? Stupid I cursed at myself, annoyed at not being able to understand it. What did it want from me? I sighed, hoping I wasn¡¯t making a big mistake and picking the middle option, before selecting yes. Please, please, please don¡¯t have wasted over three thousand dungeon points I pleaded with myself. The map filled in, the large canvas blossoming into rich colour. A huge mountain range sprawled across the centre of the map. Towards the peak, a small white diamond sat. Myself. That¡¯s good, I thought. I wasn¡¯t too close to any settlements. The nearest one being a small village called Littlebrook. Still several kilometres away. Though how far that was, I still wasn¡¯t sure. Following around the mountain to the west was a town, Oar¡¯s Rest. It was situated on the edge of a small lake, at the foothills of my mountain and I was glad to see there were no other villages nearby. The only city on the map was near the very edges. Barkamsted. So, I dismissed it. I wasn¡¯t threatened at the moment, and that shouldn¡¯t change anytime soon. It looked to be a difficult path to the peaks, and I couldn¡¯t imagine why anyone would bother. To the north was a small forest, dense trees shutting off exploration to my northern side, and beyond that, great plains of flowing grass. To the north-west, bordering the plains, was a great forest. Many times, the size of the one to my immediate north and on the edge of it was another small town. In the north-east, a lake took up a significant chunk of the map, with two towns located on its banks. To the south, at the edge of the map, were more trees, though I couldn¡¯t see their extent, perhaps it was only a small copse, or perhaps an unending forest. I couldn¡¯t know. Similarly, to the east, the potential for a desert seemed likely. With sandy dunes marked on the map, bounded by a flowing river that ran from the lake in the north. A small campground was south of the dunes, and there was no name marked. I dismissed it. Overall, I felt fairly comfortable, with my position. There were towns nearby, sources of food. And if the book were right, once the thieving bastards found out I was here, I could expect more people to trickle in. Plenty of deaths to fuel my growth. I smiled to myself imagining it. Yes, it would be great. But first. Perk two. Getting just one more level took me a week of absorbing mana. And in that time, I had worked out how far one kilometre was. Ten thousand of my body lengths. ~~Level up: 20~~ ~~Congratulations: You have reached the milestone: Level 20 and as such have been granted a perk. The following perks are available: Heal 800 dungeon points 1000kg of soil/stone/wood/¡­ Item: Treasure Blueprint Set 1 Mana boost: 25% 2% off next store purchase Two Free monster/trap within basic tier. BONUS: For making it to level 20 without killing anything, you have been offered a special one-time deal: 1 passive mobs pack, Treasure Blueprint set 0.5, 500kg of surface foliage materials and 600 dungeon points. Try not to remain so passive. Choose wisely, your next perk is available at level 30~~ Chapter 3 It was obvious to me, that the bonus was the right choice. Not only was it nearly the same number of dungeon points as the other perk, but it also had a treasure blueprint set, and a half ton of materials with which I could start building my floors. It was the best option by far, despite the vaguely mocking nature of the text. Bonus! I thought strongly selecting the perk I wanted. Instantly, I felt knowledge flood into me, streaming in from some unknown source. I tried to follow the source, tracing the mana back with my sight. Pain!! I stopped, pain raking across my mind like a hot poker. I felt a slight crack in my soul. Fuck, that was bad! I thought, moving my vision back over to my crystal. It seemed okay, still white, and shiny and beautiful. Dazzling. Though, looking closer at my illustrious self, I noticed something. A slight defect. A flaw that hadn¡¯t been there before. Just looking at it hurt. It was a scar that marred the perfection that was me. Oh dear. I thought a sinking feeling washing through me. Menu!
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Name: ??? Level: 20
Race: Dungeon Health: 199/220
Titles: / Mana: 7308 of 12998
Renown: Undiscovered Dungeon Points: 624
Rating: 1E Attunement: /
I was right, I had hurt myself. Note to self, do not trace the system, it leads to pain. That was something I wouldn¡¯t be doing again; it was not worth it. I sighed. No matter how vain I was, and I realised it was a lot. I wasn¡¯t foolish enough to waste another perk point on healing myself. Although, I had proven that my initial decision was correct; my foolish actions would have killed me if I hadn¡¯t healed myself with the first perk, I no longer had such low health that I had to worry about it. Mostly satisfied with my decision, I tried my best to forget the blight on my perfect crystal. Dungeon, oh yeah that was what I was supposed to be doing. Whoops! Many ideas had rifled through my mind over the last few weeks, and with the materials that the perk had given me, it had confirmed a thought I¡¯d had. A nature floor, it seemed perfect. Not only was it a continuation of the outside world, but it was cheap. Having used all my points on the map I didn¡¯t have much to spend. And all the material I¡¯d just received had solidified my choice. The map had told me how far away the nearest settlements were, and I felt confident in my ability to go unnoticed while I built myself up. It would be slow going, having to survive on the animals that inhabited the forest to my north, but it was the safest. And I was all about that. Safe was good, safe was safe and safe was life. While I had been grinding out the levels, I had just kept expanding my chamber, on and on, wider and wider and taller and taller. Until now, it stood at 100 metres across at its widest, with the ceiling stretching up to thirty metres. I was proud of my achievement. Although, at first, I had planned for lots of tunnels, where the thieves would be hemmed in, forced into confrontations. Now I was considering a huge cavern, Not only had I already built it, but it was different, different from all the examples the guide had had. Surely something as majestic as I deserved to be unique, special. I was ever so special after all! While pondering the landscape, I grew more and more confident that I would be able to make it work, with enough time, it took a long time to carve out such huge chambers, and I had lots of ideas, ways to make each floor special, and challenging, ways to subdivide the huge chambers. I made sure to file them away for later use, happy with my idea. Caverns would work, I¡¯d make sure of it. I could be patient. I could see it now, a huge expansive dungeon, glistening with treasure and littered with bodies, the bodies of those too stupid to turn back, or too eager to see my beauty. Foolish. I laughed to myself, imagining their death. Happy. But first, I had to build it. Natural caverns weren¡¯t perfectly smooth and so I had to texture the rock. Throwing smaller rocks at the walls did a good job, and the technique that I had since abandoned in favour of chipping away at the cracks with mana, came in useful once again. All told, texturing took me one thousand mana, leaving me with six thousand left to work with. Accessing my materials space, I looked over what I had available.
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Materials: 5000kg
Compact soil: 2000kg Soil: 2000kg
Grass (short): 50kg Grass (medium): 50kg
Grass (long): 50kg Gravel/Pebbles: 550kg
Shrubbery 100kg Trees (short): 50kg
Tree (tall): 50kg Seeds/Life starter: 100kg
It was a good mix, and something I could work with. First, I covered the floor with a thick layer of earth, about a metre deep, with the compact soil and then soil in layers. I then spread the gravel and pebbles across the soil. I was pleasantly surprised at how easy it was to work with. I had expected the magic to work by just dumping it all on the floor and forcing me to use telekinesis to move it all around. But instead, the magic seemed to work in accordance with my wishes, letting me brush my presence over the land, distributing the gravel and soil with ease, almost as if I were painting. The short grass I used to make the paths, a maze of intertwining trails that led across the cavern, avoiding the exit of the floor, for obvious reasons. Along the trails, the longer grass grew thick, hiding the ground and the other paths with ease and making movement much more challenging, and hopefully, more intimidating. Who knew what lurked in the grasses? I imagined they would think. Bushes and underbrush grew sporadically, blocking the paths and hiding amongst the grasses, there were a few berry bushes amongst the bundle, and these I used as a food source for the insects and bugs that had come in the life starter. Surprisingly, only the short trees fitted in my room, the larger ones were just too tall. Way too tall. With all the foliage in place, it was time to think of the danger. Since I wasn¡¯t planning on confronting the various intelligent races, only the local animals, it didn¡¯t need to be particularly vicious. Just enough to draw them in, and to kill them once they wandered too close. It was time to look at the passive mobs I had got from the perk.
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Unplaced Creatures: Type Danger Level
Blood Sucking Brambles x10 Passive 0.01+
These Blood Sucking Brambles are armed with sharp barbs that can cut exposed, unstrengthened skin. When in contact with blood, they absorb it and use it to grow stronger. Although they start out incredibly weak, they have the capability for considerable growth
Iron Spine Hedgehogs x15 Passive 0.04
What it says on the tin! Hedgehogs that have lived around concentrated magical metal veins and have absorbed their strength. Growing iron spines from their backs.
Healing Herb Patch x2 Passive N/A
A fascinating, regrowing patch of herbs that have healing qualities. No matter how many are picked, they shall always regrow.
The Weeping Willows of Garotte x 5 Passive 0.2
The Weeping Willows of Garotte were grown by the mage Garotte as a defence for his tower, toughened wood with a thirst for blood, the sharp, draping tendrils have the ability to move around and favour throttling as their method of killing.
The Mad Magpie Semi-Passive 0.2?
The Mad Magpie is a bird with razor sharp talons, that strives for gold and riches beyond anything else. It will dive in a frenzy at any treasure left exposed with reckless abandon.
As I read through the list of creatures, I was more and more pleased with the perk. It seemed that not killing anything until level twenty had really paid dividends. I started with the blood sucking brambles, selecting all ten to place around my floor. Unfortunately, it seemed that they came as seeds, and that seeding and growing it required mana. It took a while, as I had to regen my mana, but it wasn¡¯t too long until I had them placed in and amongst the berry bushes and paths. Hopefully, they would grow strong soon, though I had little hope it would be a quick process. The iron spine hedgehogs were little babies that I spawned near the bushes. They looked around briefly, before burrowing under the bushes, and grasses, trying to hide. They were ever so cute, and I instantly fell in love with them. I doubted they would ever net me a kill, but perhaps an injury or two as something stumbled onto them. As hidden as they were, they had relatively little to fear from the thieves who would be wandering through one day, and as long as I made sure to maintain a healthy population, they would always be a part of my dungeon. The weeping willows were easy to implement, and I simply replaced some of the trees with them. They were almost identical to the couple I had got in the foliage material, with only a slightly unnatural waving to the branches and a darker trunk. Between two of the willows, I placed both Healing Herb patches, hoping that some unconcerned animals might wander too close while grazing, and the willows would snap them up. In the ceiling, I cut away a small space for a nest and the magpie seemed happy enough. It was quite a large bird, large enough that I had had to increase the size of the space to make room for it. But, once it got settled, it seemed right at home. I paused for a few minutes, contemplating the floors¡¯ design, and picturing what I wanted it to become. Something my future self could be proud of, something distinctive, illustrious. A place where people would come, from all over the world, an endless source of fuel for my majesty. I revelled in it for a moment, a beautiful idea. I sighed, snapping back to the present. I wanted the floor to feel alive, and for that I needed an ecosystem, something where it needed very little management. Then I would be free to expand, to use all my resources on improvement not maintenance. The floor needed to balance the producers and consumers all the way up the food chain. More insects! I added more of the insects from the life starter and watched for a week, using the time to replenish my mana. Not enough, more insects. After I had created a good stock of insects, I needed the things that would eat them, birds. Smaller than the magpie, they flapped through the sky, wings beating hard as they swooped down, scooping up beakfuls of the flying insects. Buying the birds from the store had cost me only a few points, but it was well worth it. A few more tweaks and additions and another week of watching and I had done it. My first floor was complete. All that was left was the stairs to the second floor. On the opposite side to where I wanted the entrance, I cut a small arched tunnel that descended 15 metres, before turning back on itself, and descending another ten. I was sure 25 metres of solid stone was enough to support the cavern I had just made. Taking the roots of the nearest tree, I encouraged their growth, feeding them mana until they stretched down the tunnel, forming an intertwined lattice of root stairs that would allow access to the second floor. I took one last look at my menu before committing to opening up to the surface. Menu!
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Name: ??? Level: 20
Race: Dungeon Health: 199/220
Titles: / Mana: 3200 of 12998
Renown: Undiscovered Dungeon Points: 597
Rating: 1D Attunement: /
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Rooms: 1 Traps 0
Floors: 1 Items: 0
Bosses: 0 Perks: 0
Monsters: 31 Dungeon Points: 597
Unplaced Creatures^ 0 Material types: 10^
Chapter 4 Tunnelling to the surface took far less time than I imagined. The map had made it seem like I was buried in the middle of the mountain, but in actuality, I was just a few dozen metres from the surface. Barely an hour or two after starting, I broached the surface. It was far more underwhelming than I had anticipated. A momentous occasion marked by the flowing breeze that swept from the surface, rustling the leaves on the trees, and blowing through the grasses, making them wave in hypnotic harmony. There was no fanfare, no congratulation message from the system, just a bright white light that I couldn¡¯t peer through. It blotted out my vision whenever I looked at it. Some kind of barrier, perhaps a limitation of the system that ruled me, I pondered. I¡¯d already felt the pain of the system and I wasn¡¯t keen to test it again anytime soon. Turning away from the entrance, I went back to watching the hedgehogs. So cute! It was perhaps a few days later that I got my first visitor, a small rodent. It scurried in, hiding from a rainstorm, and wandered into the grasses, hiding amongst them, and nestling down. I could tell it was raining, by the water flowing down my tunnel, but no sound or feeling penetrated this deep into the mountain. It seemed the mouse also, couldn¡¯t tell it was raining, and didn¡¯t leave again. I watched it for a while, tracking its progress as it pushed through the grass, searching for food. Later that day, it stumbled upon one of my berry bushes, and had itself a feast, gorging on the sweet flesh of the fruits. It seemed it had no desire to leave, and I had found myself another creature to house. Rent free. It was another week before something slightly more impressive than a mouse wandered in, and by the time it did, I had a few more colonies of insects and a small family of field mice, my original one having found a partner. A day later, a couple of bats had flown in while I was waiting, and then immediately flown out again. I had been curious as to what those strange creatures were and had scoured the store for them. Bats! How strange! I thought. Nocturnal. Day and night didn¡¯t exist for me, and so the concept was strange, a period of time each day where one couldn¡¯t see properly. Sounded horrible. The bats had seemed freaked out by the dungeon and they scarpered as quickly as they arrived. When the antelope wandered in, I was ecstatic. Finally! Something to kill! I watched, enrapt as the deer began to graze on my grass and explore the floor. Come on, come on, come on! I chanted, mentally coaxing it closer. Find the herbs¡­ find the herbs, and then wander too close to the trees. It seemed that my wishes were being granted, as the deer worked its way over to the herbs, as if it were drawn to it. I felt like I was going to burst as I watched it begin to nibble at the green herbs, munching on them with tantalising slowness. Just a little more, come on you silly deer¡­ just one more step, one more. You can do it¡­ please¡­ YES! I whooped in joy, as it took that last step, bringing it into range. Like a whip, the branches of the willow snapped out, wrapping around the deer¡¯s antlers, drawing it closer. More branches slipped around its throat, squeezing, and slowly tightening, constricting the deer. Soon the deer passed out, blood not reaching its brain, and only a minute later I saw its mana start to fade, the colour leaching out of it, just like its life. Grey mana, blossomed from the corpse of the deer, and I hurried to absorb it. Like a hearty meal I chowed down filling me with mana. ~~Congratulations: Having killed your first complex animal, you have been awarded a 1000% mana bonus for it, make good use of it.~~ Yes! Nice! I thought happily, reading the message. This would be able to fuel my growth for a while. It was time to start building again. *** 2 weeks later*** It had taken me far less time to carve out my second cavern than the first; I had got far better at the process of breaking down the rock. With more mana, I could do so much more. It was astounding really; in barely two weeks, I had carved out a cavern almost twice the size of the first floor, stretching nearly 200 metres across, with height enough to accommodate the tall trees that I hadn¡¯t been able to use in floor one. Due to the sheer height of the trees, I had had to dig down significantly farther than I had originally intended, almost eighty metres, and as a result, the stairs that I had previously cut out ended just a short distance from the ceiling of my new cavern. I had been contemplating what to do about this issue for a while, and a part of me rebelled against continuing the stairs down through the walls, until they extended to the bottom of the floor. Instead, I planned for the stairs to end in the canopy of the largest tree. But first, I had to build the floor. As with the first floor, I built up the floor in layers, with the compacted soil first and then the rest of the soil. Unfortunately, I didn¡¯t have enough materials left over from the first floor and so I had to buy some.
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Monsters: Bosses: Items: Materials:
Points to spend: 597
Stone: 1000kg Points 10
Wood: 1000kg Points: 10
Soil: 1000kg Points: 10
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I ended up buying 5000 kilograms of compacted soil and another 5000 of regular soil for a 100 dungeon points. Spending so much had set me back a little bit, but I wouldn¡¯t have to buy any for the next few floors, and it was easier to buy it in bulk. It took me the rest of the day to fill up the floor with the soil, making sure there was enough depth for the trees to be supported before I could move on. Moving on involved creating a small babbling brook that wound itself through the ground, in wide meandering loops, like a snake. The stream had a few tributaries that fed it, springing from underground pools. The main branch of my stream started life in an undercutting in the cavern¡¯s wall. Swimming up the stream underwater took you past the wall to a small secret cave. It was here that a source provided the water to the stream, whilst at the other end, the water was removed with a banishing enchantment. These, I picked up on special offer for forty-two dungeon points. Once I had the stream done, it was time for the trees. Their huge size meant that encouraging their growth from seeds took me a few days of work. But as I stopped to observe my work, I knew it was worth it. All along the stream, slightly smaller trees traced the banks, their roots extending into the stream, making little shelters for the animals I planned to introduce. Farther away from the stream, the trees grew denser, though still sparse in nature, this was supposed to be woodland after all, not jungle. The trees were a good few metres around, with dry cracked bark and thick branches that interwove to form a tough layer of matted branches and wood. A proper canopy. One that blocked all view of the ground from the stairs. Between the trees, there were paths, or at least there would be after I was done implementing them. Animal trails. The first floor was designed to kill animals, to fuel my growth, it was a cheap and because of the passive mobs I had been given, perfect for clueless animals. For more intelligent prey though, it was definitely not sufficient. This floor was sure to be my first line of defence, and I wanted something dangerous to inhabit it. The first few monsters that the store had shown me had cost between ten and forty points and they seemed little better than the natural predators of the woodland. It seemed foolish to buy them for ten points apiece, when I could simply encourage a natural pack of wolves, or a forest cat, to live within myself and have something just as dangerous for no cost at all. With little risk of exposure, I felt no reason to rush, to waste my points on far more expensive monsters than I needed. When I became famous, and people from across the world would travel hundreds of leagues just to challenge me, I would need all the points I could scrounge up. Until then, I was determined not to waste any. So, I waited¡­ And waited¡­ And waited some more¡­ Until finally, finally I felt a disturbance above me. Something entering the dungeon¡­ With hope, I moved my presence upwards, phasing through the stone to reach the entrance. A female wolf and her cub stalked forwards, claws clinking on the rock of the tunnel as she shuffled forwards nervously, eyes wide, observing everything, for the slightest sign of danger, or¡­ maybe prey? I hadn¡¯t much practice at observing wolves yet, none really so I couldn¡¯t tell what the she-wolf was thinking. Perhaps she was seeking safety, or maybe food, or a mate¡­ or something beyond my ken. Either way, she had entered the dungeon and soon she would be mine. Bah, buying monsters is for the foolish! With a little bit of encouragement, I guided the wolf down the stairs at the end of the first floor. However, I soon encountered a problem I had not foreseen. How to get them from the canopy, to the floor 80 metres below. I focused intently, slowing down the time that I perceived and began to think. I didn¡¯t want to just build a stone staircase, or anything else I would have to take down afterwards. It would be a complete waste of time and resources. If only I could grip animals with my mind, then I could just pick them up and put them on the floor! In the end, I decided to modify my largest tree. Growing more branches from the trunk. In spirals, they ran around the tree ¨C a makeshift staircase that allowed access to the floor ¨C before spreading out and intertwining with the branches of is neighbours. Making a sort of sky-path. I felt my mind open as I considered it. If the ground was to be a dangerous hunting grounds for my wolves, then the trees could be for more hidden hunters. A sky path on the interwoven branches with ambush predators. All I had to do was help the off the branches, sideways, for them to tumble to the floor. Dead. Happy With multiple routes, routes favouring different types of people, my dungeon would provide more intrigue and diversity, drawing more people to me. More fools and more death. I thought to myself, savouring the image. Oh yes, I liked this. From the stairs, the wolves had to step down into the canopy, the thick branches of the tree that grew up to meet it, wound seamlessly to blend into the wood of the stairs, providing a path to the tree that would let them down. Needless to say, the wolves weren¡¯t exactly keen to do so, but they were fairly easy to steer with mana. Manipulating animals seemed to come naturally to me, their instincts easy to guide and soon I had the wolves descending the tree. Along the way, several larger branches acted as exits, allowing access to various sky paths, though I hadn¡¯t yet built them. There was no need to after all, not until I decided to announce my presence to the town at the foot of the mountain. With the wolves down on the floor, I realised that before I could make them my monsters, I had to make sure they survived. And the lovely foliage I had placed down was not a particularly good food for them. To this end, I once again started by seeding the bugs, beetles, insects, and other bottom feeders into the floor. I still had loads left from the perk and if I had to guess, I would say would still have loads left after this floor. Instead of buying all the small animals that inhabited the first floor, I waited. I waited until they gave birth and then I forced them down to the second floor. I populated the floor with the small birds, the mice, and also the hedgehogs from the first floor, and set about breeding them up. With only two wolves - a mother and daughter - I couldn¡¯t expand the pack to make them into a suitable defence, a threat, and I still felt a bit naked. However, I decided to brave it out and wait, I was confident I was safe enough at the moment, and hopeful that more wolves would enter. *** 4 weeks later*** ~~Congratulations: two wolves have lived within your dungeon for 1 month, and as they are above the minimum danger level, they can be made into your dungeon monsters, with the ability to respawn for the simple cost of mana. Would you like to make the wolves into your dungeon monsters? YES NO~~ Yes! I thought firmly. The instant after I selected yes, I felt a strumming vibration in my mind, as if a cord had just snapped out and bound us together, vibrating at the suddenness. Slowly, the bond faded away, until it matched the gentle humming of all the others. Though just as with all the others, I could focus on it, bringing my presence to them, checking in. They were ok, though they seemed lonely, as if they wanted a pack. It was a different feeling than I got from any of the other creatures. The trees felt nothing, obviously, the hedgehogs were happy and content with sleeping the days away, buried in the plants and the mice just went about their business. The wolves though, they were far more complex creatures and they seemed to want company. Feeling guilty, I opened my menu and browsed the store, looking for more wolves to buy. To my surprise, it seemed that capturing these two wolves had given me a discount on buying more of them. Perhaps it worked this way if you bought regular monsters too, it would make sense in a way, that it got cheaper, less draining on resources. Either way, it seemed to be a good deal.
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Monsters: Bosses: Items: Materials:
Points to spend: 457
Grey Wolf* Danger level: 0.6 Points:65 *35
Avalt Python: Danger level: 0.6 Points 70
Goblin: Danger level 0.8 Points 100
Crash Birds x4: Danger level 0.2 Points: 40
Expand to see more¡­
Nearly half price for more wolves, why not! I thought buying four. Two more creatures caught my eye, the Avalt python and crash birds. If I was going to have a sky path, then a snake that lived in the trees and would ambush people seemed like a very good idea. Unfortunately, it was quite expensive. I bought two, a male and a female, with the hope to get a nest going in the future. I also liked the idea of small birds ramming adventurers and knocking them off the sky paths to their deaths. They came in groups of four and I bought three of them. Curious about both creatures, I pulled up their description prior to placing them.
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Unplaced Creatures: Type Danger Level
Grey Wolf x4 Active 0.6
Grey wolves live in cold woodland and hunt in packs, with sharp claws and fangs and a devious mind they can always be a challenge. With good night vision and stealthy movement, they can navigate and hunt in dark environments well.
Avalt Python x2 Active 0.6
A very large species of python that like curling up in a tree, with a mottled brown colouration they often pretend to be branches and strike with lightning quick precision that is often deadly. Although they have no natural venom, they can still kill large prey by crushing the breath out of it.
Crash Birds x 12 Territorial 0.2
Crash Birds are birds with a ruffle in their feathers. With toughened heads and sharp beaks these birds defend their nests by diving towards any intruder and slamming their heads into them to deter predators.
Chapter 5 ========== [Marrok] A guttural screaming split the night once again, countless times it had come, and countless more times it would come. Until, at last the foetid creature would expire. Marrok hated humans¡­ and elves¡­ and dwarves¡­ and beast-men and gnomes and pixies and giants and merfolk and every other creature under the sun, save his own goblins and the mighty orcs. He respected the orcs. But there was only one thing he hated more than the filthy humans. A stinking, lying, traitorous goblin. Goblins were proud folk, they had ethics and morals, and to betray one¡¯s own, to betray the rightness of the goblins, to think of others before the goblins was a crime that Marrok hated beyond belief. It was so wrong, so very wrong and Marrok was proud to be punishing the traitor. Traitor to the goblins and traitor to the one God. With a joyous smile, Marrok picked up the poker, removing it from the goblin and pushing it back into the coals. With a spitting sizzle, the flesh that had burnt off and glued itself to the poker crackled as the searing hot flames licked up and around it. Cooking and charring the flesh. Marrok watched, impassionate, as the fat dripped into the fire, smoking and eventually combusting before disintegrating in the heat of the cleansing fire. Traitor wasn¡¯t screaming any longer. At first, after the poker was removed, he kept screaming, the constant agony too much. Now though, he had got used to it, and only when the poker was applied, did he scream again. He had tried to brave it, but Marrok knew how to exact the most. One didn¡¯t get to the position Marrok had achieved without tenacity in abundance. Marrok smiled as he pulled the poker from the fire, the cherry red glow lingering on the metal an indication it had reached the perfect temperature, any hotter - a yellow or white glow - and the poker would burn through the traitors nerves, less painful that way. With a savage grin and a growling stomach ¨C courtesy of the burning meat smell - he laid the poker across the traitors¡¯ belly, watching as it burnt its way deeper, until it exposed the guts again. Goblins were tough creatures, and though they didn¡¯t heal like the orcs did, their tough flesh remained active and mobile even while carrying horrific, debilitating injuries. A broken leg, nothing, holes in the stomach, arrow-riddled bodies and the goblin would still charge forwards, seeking one final kill. One more to the tally before it expired. Marrok had a lot more torturing to go before the traitor expired, and he was looking forward to each and every scream that he could elicit before the goblin in front of him passed away. He licked his lips and set to work¡­ ***6 hours later*** Marrok shoved forwards, putting his whole body into the effort, driving with all the force he could muster. A snapping sizzling sound arose, as the red-hot poker was driven deep into the goblin body ¨C now dead. The pops of the boiling liquids slowly got more spread out, slower, as the poker cooled. Once the flesh had cooled slightly, Marrok stood up tall and grabbed the flaps of skin that ringed the injuries and pulled, flaying the goblin in front of the crowd. Pulling down his tally and throwing it on the fire below, the sizzling euphoric to him. Once the tally was fully flayed, leaving no mark of honour for the traitor, Marrok spat on him one final time, before calling out to his friends¡­ ¡°Let us go forth my friends, let us abandon this decrepit dump and traitorous mound. This filthy traitor has broken our creed and he shall not be given his rights. His great tally shall be withheld and so too his passage to the one God. Here he shall moulder for all eternity, his soul decaying just like his bones. Let us go forth my brethren and spread terror. Our tally thirsts for more victims and we shall go and prove that the goblins of the Wier are the most feared in the land¡­¡± ========== [Dungeon] The grey wolves and the pythons adapted to their new homes easily enough, and soon the pack was happily running around the lands. I found it odd that they were so accepting of the limited space, after all, on the surface they had thousands of hectares of space, far more than my limited cavern, and yet they seemed to be exceedingly happy. Perhaps it was something to do with the dungeon magic. I didn¡¯t know. Oh well, I thought. Questioning the system had proved fruitless so far, painfully so. And so, I put it behind me and continued my work. Through the weeks used to balance the ecosystem and perfect the level, more creatures had wandered in and the floor was now the proud home of bugs, beetles, rodents, rabbits, foxes, wolves, and a few smaller reptiles. Along the water¡¯s edge, a small family of otters were nested in the roots of a particularly large tree that overhung the stream. The otters had made it to the floor as a result of my carving the floor below it. It turned out that a natural spring lay below me. It made sense, when I had first awoken and seen the mana of the world, I had wondered where the blue was running off to. My vision was limited then, and so I couldn¡¯t tell it was the spring. When breaking down the rock, I had accidentally let in far too much water, and down from the surface swept a couple of otters. Unable to swim up the stream and back to the surface, they had lived in the cavern until I had helped to scoop them up. Now they lived in my second floor. Unfortunately, this meant I had had to buy an aquatic life pack, but the store only took thirty dungeon points for it and so I had sacrificed my precious points for it, certain I would find more use for the pack in the next floor. The natural spring was too useful to not include in the next floor after all. A free source of water was hard to ignore. Especially for one so conscious of my expenditures as myself. Part of the aquatic life pack was a small family of water elementals which I placed by the water source, in the hidden cave. Now both the first and second floor had a hidden section, the water elementals, and the magpie nest. Unfortunately, the water elementals were designated passive and did not count as monsters. When the time came to reveal myself, I would make sure these areas held the best loot of the floor. It just seemed cool that each floor held a mystery area, and perhaps if my dungeon were simply the best, the thieves would be more reluctant to kill me. Any advantage I could get¡­ With the second floor complete, for now. I pondered the third floor. How should I get down? Roots had been used for the first to second floor stairs, and a tree to get down to the bottom of the second floor itself. Hmm¡­ I thought to myself. Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on the original website. Got it. At the end of the stream I started digging down, about twenty-five metres into a little basin. I now had a waterfall that would lead people down, they just needed a way back up. A path up through the stone led into one of the trees. Where a timed entrance would let them out of the trunk. It wouldn¡¯t allow anyone back down though. Quickly checking I had a decent supply of mana left, I carried on working. Like before, I created the cavern by carving out the stone and then banishing it, and when I was finished, I had completely run out of mana. This floor was nowhere near as tall as the previous one, but it was much wider, stretching over 500 metres across. I felt weak and drained, a state I hadn¡¯t been in for weeks. I settled down to rest for a little while. Trying to recoup my mana and to browse the store. I had taken to doing so fairly frequently, and the store often gave me ideas for what I wanted to accomplish. Menu
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Name: ??? Level: 20
Race: Dungeon Health: 199/220
Titles: / Mana: 128 of 12998
Renown: Undiscovered Dungeon Points: 27
Rating: 1A Attunement: /
As I could plainly see, I was running out of mana, and soon, dungeon points. Without levelling up again, I would soon run out of both. Carving such massive caverns was mana intensive, and though I wasn¡¯t giving up on it, I recognised that I was running out of room for growth. What I really wanted, was a small, isolated group to stumble in and die. They would provide a good influx of mana and more importantly, points. Having a large buffer of mana was good but levelling up just slashed straight through all the work I¡¯d done gathering it. The only reason to level was to be able to do more at any one time and of course, the points that levelling gave. Without a way to gain mana as fast as deaths gave me, I was never going to reach my goal. I relaxed, looking up into the ceiling in frustration. What to do? What should I do? I thought, anger seeping into my thoughts. It wasn¡¯t fair, I just wanted to be safe. To grow my dungeon in peace until I was ready. Then¡­ then I would kill them, bleed them out and suck up their mana. With my mind back to normal, I set about working on my plan for floor three, a swamp. The waterfall fell down from floor two and dropped into a crystal-clear pool of water. The natural spring, keeping the water topped up. This wouldn¡¯t do, I wanted a sticky marshland. By filling the water with the soil and gravel that I had in my materials, I was able to make a thick mud that coated the room in a thick layer. Mana had so many uses, and by exerting my will and a basic telekinetic wall I was able to squeeze enough water from patches of the mud to make dryer ground and pools of water. However, when I relaxed the two started to intermingle again. Oh, for fuck¡¯s sake!! I thought angrily, sowing the aquatic grass seeds that I had purchased. Hopefully, the roots of the plants would be able to hold everything together. It took another week of work, and an overwhelming amount of mental control to make the fenland that I wanted. But I had succeeded, and the anger that had been leeching into my thoughts drained away as I stared out at my work. In the week that I had been working, another deer had died to my trees, and the mana burst and euphoria that came with snuffing its life out gave me the will and the way to complete the plant life. The water that fell was a pleasant clear blue, but this was soon tainted by the muddy green colour that filled the water of my swamp. A murky, thick, green that could hold significant dangers, they would never know what I had. The vegetation was even more abundant here than the previous two floors. I imagined many groups of people could be here without any of them knowing so. The thick vegetation would block out the views, and the sounds of all the insects and life I had planned was going to drown out any sound remarkably well. With so little mana left, any polishing and maintenance would have to wait for later. For now, I was focusing on the life that would fill my swamp. Whereas my previous floors had been filled with bugs and insects, the living creatures this time would be many orders of magnitude higher. I kept adding them in, until an ever-present hum and buzz filled the room, giving no reprieve. The endless flittering wings of large insects and the sharp buzz of bees and wasps were joined by the croaking of frogs and the harsh cries of birds. The constant gush of running water and the rustling of leaves were an ever-present sound that would hopefully hide the occasional splash of fish and predators. Reeds, algae, lily pads, floating soldiers, swamp grasses like sedge, ferns, flowers, shrubs, mangroves, and trees all suited for swampland were in the aquatic life pack and they gave hollows and shelter to all the small fish that swum through the interconnected pools and streams and feasted upon the water bugs. Swooping through the sky, birds divebombed into swarms of insects, scooping up hundreds of the creatures yet not making a dent in their populations. Flying back to feed their young, they made tricky prey for the snakes and lizards that climbed the trees. Yet despite all this wonderful life, there was no top tier predators yet, nothing dangerous, and I was for sure going to change that. The aquatic pack held a few monsters and I gave them a quick look over.
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Unplaced Creatures: Type Danger Level
Assorted Piranha Shoal x20 Active 0.4
An assortment of piranha shoals (shoals contain 5-10 piranhas) including red-bellied and black piranha that hunt small fish and dead prey. Capable of stripping animals to the bone in seconds these creatures when so stimulated can prove to be quite dangerous. So voracious is the piranha feeding that the water is said to look as if it is boiling. Razor sharp teeth that take chunks of flesh and bone, without the prey feeling pain are this fish¡¯s primary weapon.
Goliath Tiger Fish x8 Active 0.4
Weighing in at fifty kilograms, with inch long teeth that rip and shred flesh, this massive beast hides in the eddies and calm waters waiting for something to enter its feeding range.
Arapaima x6 Semi-Passive 0.2
A passive fish that glides gracefully through the waters. However, when startled, it leaps out of the waters at tremendous speed, its bony snout, and armoured scales capable of crushing a man¡¯s chest by accident.
Green Anaconda (Giant)x3 Active 0.8
A huge snake, growing up to five metres in length that loves to swim through the water. No normal predators take on this snake willingly as its strong muscles are easily capable of constricting an armoured man to death.
Placing in all the animals took me a while, and my mana had regenerated enough that I no longer felt like I had a hole in my crystal. Though I still felt like something was lacking. The floor didn¡¯t feel quite dangerous enough. Browsing the store took me a while but I found it soon.
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Monsters: Bosses: Items: Materials:
Points to spend: 27
Alligator Danger level: 1.2 Points: 128
This top tier predator has an armoured hide that even the strongest man will find hard to penetrate. Crushing jaws and a malicious temperament result in a hunter that has little to fear, as it rips and tears limbs off its victims. Lying invisible beneath the waters and charging quickly across the boggy ground, most prey find it hard to run from an alligator.
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Perfect, just as death hungry as myself. I felt a sort of kinship with the beast, and the image in the store only further cemented that fact. I had to have this¡­ I wanted¡­ five? Yes, five would do me well. Three levels and I would be able to afford it. I had some work to do it seemed¡­ Chapter 6 ========== [Marrok] Marrok led his band of goblins out of the Wier woods, and up through the foothills of the mountain. He knew the filthy races had names for the mountain, but he didn¡¯t care for their names. What use was naming things to a goblin. All that mattered was the tally and the one God. Marrok¡¯s tally stood at 135, 40 more than his nearest warrior. That was why Marrok was chieftain, and though he wasn¡¯t the biggest goblin, he made up for it in cunning and ferocity that none had yet matched. As a young goblin, he had brawled with his brothers on a day-to-day basis, killing five of them, as they slumbered. Some had thought it was cowardice, but he had dispatched them in a similar way and his tally now sat higher than any other goblin he had heard of. His first non-goblin tally mark occurred in his fifth winter, an injured human. It had wandered into the Wier wood in search of food and tripped on something. Marrok didn¡¯t know what, nor did he care. All he knew was that he could start his tally off well. Cutting the human¡¯s throat had been one of the best things Marrok could remember. Feeling the grating resistance on his blade as he sawed it back and forth and the hot blood rushing down his hands and forearms had been euphoric, and he had taken full advantage of the death, mutilating the corpse before roasting it over his fire. Marrok had fed well that night, and as he sat around his fire now, 15 winters later, he revelled in the memory, mouth salivating at the thought. Soon, he promised himself, soon¡­ The band had left the Wier wood, the traitors¡¯ behaviour having tainted the land. He wouldn¡¯t stay there now; nothing would prevent his glory from reaching the one God. He had a momentous tally and a pure life. He deserved a place by the God and traitorous scum would not stop him now. Abandoning the Wier wood was a big step for a goblin that had lived his entire life within it, stepping out for a quick raid every now and then. Now though, he was abandoning it, and the choice between the great plains or the mountain was an easy choice. Goblins didn¡¯t like the plains, too open, too vulnerable. The mountain was his destination, and he would drag the band with him. He was chieftain after all, and his word was law. The mountain was steep on the side of the Wier wood and traipsing up its slopes had led to the deaths of a few of his brethren. Marrok didn¡¯t care though. Other goblins were not his concern, only his tally. They followed him because they knew his tally was so good, just as he had done with the previous chieftain. But he was in charge now, and he would ascend the mountain to new land, he wanted to get their before breeding season, and when the new influx of goblins grew up, he would go on a huge raid. Perhaps getting his tally into the two hundreds. Surely that would merit a place by the God¡¯s side. Two hundred! The fact that he was even considering it was possible was amazing. He knew that he would have been astounded to meet a goblin with such a tally as a child. And now he was that goblin. He revelled in the thought for a few moments. ¡°Pick it up, let¡¯s keep going¡­ onwards Wier goblins, to the flatland over the crest.¡± He screamed. His warbling voice, bloodcurdling to the filthy races, but encouraging to his brethren. They joined his cry with their own and they forged on, making good progress. ***2 weeks later*** Just yesterday, the ground had begun to flatten out and the crest seemed far closer. Today, Marrok had led his band over the crest and down towards the gentle slopes of the southern side. Sparse trees and cold blowing winds were not what Marrok had hoped for, in truth he hadn¡¯t expected it, and he was annoyed at that. The prevailing wind was always to the north. Why hadn¡¯t he considered that? He wondered, frustration scratching at his mind. Why? One of the breeders had frozen that first night, and Marrok had reluctantly ordered the band to huddle closer around their fire. The band was not content, and resentment was beginning to build. Marrok hoped it wouldn¡¯t get much worse, he didn¡¯t want to be challenged. He had no fear though, he knew all the members of his band in serious detail, knew how to take them down and keep them down. But he wasn¡¯t looking forwards to killing them. Though it counted for his tally, he felt it was a tainted mark and he didn¡¯t like accumulating them. He would do it without a thought though. He was chieftain, and he was proud to be chieftain. Perhaps they needed a reminder of how skilled he was, that would prevent a challenge. But he didn¡¯t know how to prove it to them up here, he was a goblin of the Wier wood, not one of the gentle mountain slopes, and it would take a while to learn what needed to be learnt. Perhaps he would stumble across an opportunity sometime soon. Either way, ruminating on his issues did nothing to solve them, so he focused on the walk, night was drawing near once again, and he needed to look for somewhere to camp. ========== [Dungeon] ~~Level up: 21~~ ~~Level up: 22~~ ~~Level up: 23~~ ~~Level up: 24~~ ~~Level up: 25~~ I had gone a bit overboard with levelling, getting to 25 and not to the 23 I had originally intended. If I had only got to level 23, then I wouldn¡¯t have had many dungeon points left over for building my next floor. And the one after that, I wanted to be a boss floor and I was sure I would need a lot of points to buy a suitable creature. The first three floors had made use of the cheap, normal animals. But I would need to move onto mana-attuned monsters soon, not just animals. They just weren¡¯t dangerous enough. Getting to level 25 had taken me a couple of weeks, though another deer¡¯s death had fuelled a decent chunk of that. Smaller animals wandered in fairly regularly, seeking the warmth and shelter of a hideaway underground. Their constant deaths had increased my mana absorption by double. Double what it had been before opening up to the surface. It was still extremely slow going though, and I recognised that soon even the deer that wandered in occasionally would be of limited use. The author''s narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon. Menu!
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Name: ??? Level: 25
Race: Dungeon Health: 287/335
Titles: / Mana: 20,000 of 27,905
Renown: Undiscovered Dungeon Points: 1297
Rating: 2D Attunement: /
Levelling had increased my health to 335, however, I still wasn¡¯t at full health. The damage that I had done to my crystal had compounded with my growth so that I now only had 287. Higher than before, yet a larger gap to full health than it had ever been. My mana was fuller than ever, and with 1297 dungeon points I was sure I would be able to finish off floors four and five, even after buying the alligators. I had gained 120 extra points from somewhere, but I wasn¡¯t sure where, either way I wasn¡¯t complaining as it would only do me good. Spending 640 dungeon points for the alligators was a large chunk of my points and I reconsidered whether or not I truly needed five. Perhaps only two? A male and a female? Then I could breed them. But I wanted a good insurance now though. Just in case. Deliberating over whether or not to buy them, I felt paralysed. It was a strange feeling, I never felt paralysed: I made a decision and stuck with it. For better or worse. Making up my mind, I spent the points, buying the five alligators for their exorbitant price, and quickly distributing them through the floor. Now it felt complete, and I was happy with my choice. I was going to make it to at least level 30 before announcing myself anyway, and I could pick my next perk then too. Carving out the caverns took an enormous amount of time and mana, and I wasn¡¯t willing to invest so much in my next floor, making it a similar size to the first floor; about 100 metres across. However, unlike the first floor, which contained small sparse trees and plentiful grasses, floor four was going to be an extremely dense packed jungle with brambles and foliage blocking everything. I was going to be weaving the plants into a barrier that the thieves would have serious trouble getting through. Thick, nutrient-dense soil and plenty of water were needed to grow such a huge amount of plants and so I implemented an underground network of water channels that would ensure the trees had enough water to grow. That, in conjunction with my mana feeding, allowed me to fill up the floor in no time. Well¡­ some¡­ About a week. But it felt like good quick progress. Far faster than any of the other floors had been. Unlike the previous floors, I didn¡¯t want this one to hum with life. No, I wanted it to be quiet and eerie, of course some life was still important. I needed enough for my monsters to live off. I sure as hell wasn¡¯t going to be feeding them all mana for the rest of my life. That was my mana, they could make do with the animals. Far more efficient of me, I thought. The animals on the first two floors had been living there for a while now, and several generations of the shorter-lived species had occurred. Siphoning off some of the population wasn¡¯t too difficult and they soon adapted to life in the jungle. Determined not to go overboard, I stopped working on it, an overgrown wilderness didn¡¯t need much micromanaging and design, nature did a good enough job, and arranging things just so, was a waste of mana. With the floor design done, it was time to move onto the monsters. In one of my store scans I had stumbled across a creature that I thought was a good fit for my level. Kobolds.
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Monsters: Bosses: Items: Materials:
Points to spend: 657
Kobold Young: ^ Danger level: 0.4 Points: 40
Kobold Warrior: ^ Danger level: 0.9 Points: 80
Kobold Berserker: ^ Danger level: 1.0 Points: 50
Kobold Shaman: ^ Danger Level: 1.5 Points: 100
Kobold Chieftain: ^ Danger Level: 1.0 Points: 200
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When reading the store entries, I had been confused what the little up arrow next to the creature name meant, but I had eventually realised it was a selectable option that brought up a page of information. It turned out that kobolds were a societal species, and that buying one or two wouldn¡¯t work. They needed to live together to be happy and they needed to work together to be lethal. Kobold young needed adult supervision to get stronger and they were paralysed in fights without it. Kobold warriors were fantastic fighters, but they were lazy and disorganised without leadership. Leadership that the chieftain would provide which is why he was the most expensive kobold despite having an average danger level. Kobold berserkers were so cheap, because without the kobold shaman providing regular magic during downtime, they would go crazy and kill everything in sight. And the kobold shaman needed the warriors to protect it whilst it cast spells, it was otherwise a very weak physical fighter and of almost no use on its own. Frustrated by the high cost for getting the kobolds I had looked harder, until I had discovered an offer. One that had held my attention for a while.
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Points to spend: 657
Kobold Village: Danger Level: 2.2 Points: 1,000
The Kobold Village pack comes with a Village Chieftain, a Shaman, two Berserkers, five Warriors and fifteen young kobolds. Kobolds are a secretive species, and though they are not of higher intelligence they live in a community, Most happy in thick jungles with plenty of shade, they stalk through the shadows ambushing prey with sudden overwhelming force. On their own they are weak disorganised fighters, but when working in a full unit they are frightfully strong. The village kobold pack contains everything needed to build and maintain a working society of kobolds.
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The kobold village was exactly what I wanted, it contained everything I thought I needed to make the floor perfect. But, damn, one thousand points! I had thought it was less. Still, it was only two levels worth of points. It was sacrificing so much mana that I had trouble with. It has to be done. But first floor five. Having regenerated my mana properly and being in a creative mood, I wanted to finish of the chamber for my boss. Since it was only one monster, the room didn¡¯t need to be too big, and I had a vague idea of what I wanted. Carving out a room only 30 metres across, but 50 high was easy, the room was quite small! In the centre, a large open grassy space filled up most of the room, whilst round the edges, thick trees towered up above, their canopies intermingling, yet leaving a small hole in the centre through which the ceiling could be seen. To prevent the thieves walking around the grassy space, through the woodlands, I filled up the space between the trees with thick hedging, tough branches, and sharp ends. Hopefully, preventing quick access to the trees. I was determined they wouldn¡¯t have anywhere to hide from my boss. With both floors ready, it was time to level up again. Hopefully, a few more deer or something better would wander in. That would cut short my process by weeks at least. It was an unlikely hope, but one I desired a lot. Chapter 7 ========== [Marrok] The cold woodlands as they descended the upper slopes were barren of everything a roving goblin band wanted. Fresh meat being the most important. Discontent had continued to grow as the band made their way and Marrok was beginning to get worried. He dreamt about being challenged, of course he would kill them, but the very thought of being challenged was worrisome enough. He still pressed them on, descending quickly, eager for the fertile lowlands that he knew were there. Once they made it, they could breed and in the summer, he would rain hell upon the settlements in the foothills. Nobody climbed the northern face, and Marrok hoped the surprise attack would take them unawares. There were many villages in the foothills, and plenty of targets ripe for the taking. If he were lucky, he could push his tally into the two hundreds. But that was a ways off. And now, the most important task was to keep everyone alive, even the ones who were plotting his downfall. There were always goblins plotting his downfall; that was their way. The goblin band marched onwards, and several hours later, the sparse cold tree-land gave way to a boulder field. Marrok would have been disheartened at such an obstacle, weren¡¯t it for the bright green forest that loomed upon the other side. The choice now, go through it, or go around it. If he chose to go through, there was no telling how many would trip and fall, never to get through the rest of the way. There was no-way a goblin could carry another over such bad terrain and, tough though they may be, they were small and if injured they might remain trapped within, starving to death. But if he went around, he didn¡¯t know where he would end up. They were running out of food, and to leave sight of salvation was a blow many of his band might not be able to take. Perhaps it would be a short detour around the field. Perhaps it would lead to a cliff, a dead end. In the event, the choice was simple. Goblins were self-centred creatures, and going through the field would fill more of Marrok¡¯s desires, he didn¡¯t really care if a few of their number died, in the process. ¡°Forward, through the boulder field!¡± he called out, in a strong commanding tone. ¡°Let¡¯s pick a careful route through, watch your feet, tell anyone if you discover a loose one. And look to the horizon my brothers. Salvation beckons us.¡± It was slow going, as Marrok had expected, but he hadn¡¯t dared to imagine how slow. By nightfall, the band had scarcely made it a fifth of the way through the field, and he was concerned. Already, three of their number had fallen, and it looked like the easy part had been first. Pitching the camps had been difficult, the rock ground making finding a place to rest disastrous. Still, they had managed, finding a spot where the rocks were small and could be shifted away. They had had to make do without a fire; no wood to be found, and that meant a hungry night. As Marrok stared out towards the forest, he knew they would have at least one more night between the rocks. A night without food and short on sleep. Sighing in frustration, he rolled onto his side, shuffling around to find the most comfortable spot and closed his eyes. Sleep was long in coming, but eventually the lady claimed him, and he got some rest. When morning broke, its pale rays scattering between the cold grey rocks, and bringing with it a measure of warmth, Marrok felt chilled down to his bones. Waking up seemed as if it was down to luck, and it was a long time before he felt right. His blood seemed slow, as if it had thickened with the cold, and his muscles protested any movement. Breaking down camp took several times longer than usual, but at least no-one had perished in the night. Without breakfast, the goblins continued onwards, carefully picking their way through, and by noon they could begin to see individual trees. With excitement speeding their actions they continued pressing forwards, and as if by some unspoken decision, everyone knew they wouldn¡¯t be stopping to make camp until they had reached the tree line and their future. The Wier woods had been tainted, but a new home summoned them. Dusk took hold in the final stretch, and it seemed as if the one God had truly kept an eye on them, for throughout the day and into the night, not a single goblin, tripped, stumbled or otherwise injured themselves. With joyous hearts, the goblins made camp beneath the shelter of vibrant trees and slept well on the soft loamy earth. Marrok felt relieved and proud. He had made the right decision. It was truly coming together. He couldn¡¯t wait for summer. If you come across this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it. Lying down on the comfy earth, he knew he would sleep well tonight. If only he had had some dinner¡­ Even a chieftain sometimes had to go without. Dawn bloomed and the goblins rose early, keen to get started. Sleeping on the warm earth had rekindled their spirits and Marrok didn¡¯t hear a single disparaging comment. He felt good about that. Still, the growling of his empty stomach tempered his mood. Food! Food was definitely the first order of business. ¡°Everyone¡­ gather!¡± he bellowed. They ran to follow his command. Grouping up into sub-bands. ¡°Goblin scout bands one, two and three. Do your jobs, I want to know everything about this land, and our recommended borders by nightfall. If you see any food, grab it, we¡¯re short.¡± He pointed at each one in turn and they scurried off. Once they had departed, he continued. ¡°War bands one through five, food duty. Warbands six through ten, get that earth broken down.¡± They too scurried off, about their business. ¡°I need the women, to start setting up a permanent camp, and children, we need firewood. Don¡¯t stray too far, the dry ground wood will be good for now, we¡¯ll work on cutting down some trees later. Let¡¯s go everyone¡­¡± Once all the bands had dispersed, going about their jobs, Marrok was free to do what he wanted, which in this case, was hunting. Unlike the bands, he wasn¡¯t after food, he was after a challenge, and he hoped to find one nearby. Getting food would only be a bonus. He grabbed his hatchet and crossbow, slinging both across his back, before belting on his small skinning knife; the leather sheath, stained black with blood. His recent activities only adding to it. Trekking through the frosty morning grasses, soaked Marrok¡¯s skin boots and he felt his toes numbing with the cold. He forged onwards, pushing through the trees, and across the mountainside, in search of prey. Marrok lost count of the number of rises and falls he crossed, but soon the camp was far away, out of sight and then some. But he knew he wouldn¡¯t get lost. Goblins had an excellent sense of smell, and he would be able to track down the camp with ease. A few deer crossed his path, but he left them alone, it wasn¡¯t a challenge to kill a deer, and without any brothers to help carry it back it would be a waste. He needed something that would put up a bit of a fight, a deer wouldn¡¯t do. He was hoping for some wolves or a bear or something. A predator! Not a prey! The trees started to thin again, giving way to rocky outcroppings and small boulder fields. Marrok was contemplating giving up on this route and turning back. Perhaps towards the foothills? He sniffed, something catching his attention. What was it? There was something here. The faintest scent, he couldn¡¯t place it. He needed more. He paused in place, nostrils flaring, trying to capture more. He was confused. Was there something? Marrok had never known his nose to be mistaken. But the scent eluded him. Not even a single small iota graced his powerful olfactory. No, he trusted it. There was something better than him around. Elves? No, the stuck-up bastards would never venture from the great forest. Dwarves, Humans and Beast men stunk to high heaven, there was no way it could be one of them. He thought to himself, puzzling through the options. What could it be? Eventually, he decided to move on, making sure to keep aware, something was lurking, tracking him down. He felt his heart racing, adrenaline pumping. He lived for this. As he wandered, he felt the tension rising, like a bow string being pulled back. More and more, further, and further. Eventually it would release¡­ There¡­ Like an arrow, shooting down the mountainside towards him. Silent and deadly. Marrok caught it in his periphery, a white blur. Like a cloud, it floated over the terrain, seemingly unaffected. Though it had to be said it was a fast cloud, storming towards him. Marrok managed to turn towards it in time. It barrelled into his chest, knocking him flying. Not a cloud! He thought, grunting as he slammed into a tree. He pushed the cloud that was not a cloud away, slashing out with his hatchet. Blinking, he saw that it was some sort of cat. He raised his arm, blocking the cat¡¯s attack and made to punch at it. He heard his arm crack, turning his head and watching as the arm bent backwards, hatchet flying free. Pain washed up into him and he smiled, thoroughly enjoying it. He grabbed his small knife, diving forwards and slashing madly. Burying the blade in the creature¡¯s gut. Not used to its prey fighting back, nor it being so injured, the cat fled, parting with a pained hiss, leaving him panting, and thoroughly unsatisfied. Marrok grabbed his arm, wrenching it around until it sat back in place, picked up his hatchet and followed along. Now that he had its scent, he could trail it, although he was surprised at how hard it was. Tracking the cat was a challenge, and Marrok loved it. It was only a few rises later that he found it again, hunkered down in a cave on an outcropping that overlooked the path he had been walking. It was a mottled white cat, with a long bushy tail. Large and peaceful-looking. Deadly, and it blended in absolutely perfectly with the rocks. If it weren¡¯t for the blood and the scent buried in his nose, Marrok wouldn¡¯t have been able to spot it again. He crept forwards, jumping as he watched the cat¡¯s ears turn towards him. As it was, he barely caught the cat, slicing through the shoulder muscle. He doubted he would have caught it with his blade if the cat had been healthy. It batted at him, claws extended, and Marrok felt the sharp points dig into his chest. He slammed into it, cutting deep with his hatchet, as he felt his side tear open. He laughed, pain racing through him, making him feel alive. The mad scramble that ensued pushed the two over the edge and they tumbled down the mountainside. Although Marrok was a fleetfooted goblin, far more than his peers, he was a far cry from the cat, even injured. And he watched the cat catch itself as he continued to roll away. He came to a stop, between two rocks, breathing heavily. Fixing his arm again, he wrapped bandages around his wounds to stem the bleeding and ran off smiling. Marrok made it up to where the cat had caught itself, eyes scanning for any trace of where it had gone. A blood trail revealed itself, and Marrok followed, nose and eyes guiding his path. He was fast, but the cat was faster and soon he reached the end of the path. A gaping hole in the mountain, black as night. No hint of sun graced the depths. The blood trail led right inside, and Marrok wondered what in the one God he had stumbled across. Chapter 8 ========== [Dungeon] I had been looking through the store for a while now, searching for the perfect boss whilst regaining my mana. I had yet to level up again, but I was close. Playing around with search terms and filters had given me an appreciation for how much the store had to offer. There were hundreds of thousands of monsters within my price range, and presumably millions more outside of it. A seemingly unending catalogue of options to help customise my dungeon. At the moment I had filtered by natural monsters and mana enhanced ones, thus excluding all the pure magic monsters and mechanical and countless other ones. Then I had filtered down for nature-attuned monsters, cutting the list down to somewhere in the ninety thousand range. I needed more refinement. So, what do I want in a boss monster, I thought to myself? Big, it needs to be big. Big¡­ and intimidating. That grandiose feeling of staring up at a giant. That¡¯s what I want them to feel. I was about to instruct the menu to narrow down to that choice when I felt a disturbance, something had entered the dungeon. Happy Yes, another deer, I thought, moving my presence upwards, through the floor, until I reached the entrance. It wasn¡¯t a deer, nor a mouse, or any other small critter. It wasn¡¯t a wolf or anything else I recognised. Certainly, nothing I had encountered so far. It was big, bigger than the wolves or the alligators. Bigger than most of the kobolds for sure. It stood on four legs like the wolves and looked quite similar, save for the glossy white coat and long fluffy tail. Well, a formerly white coat, the bloody gashes had painted it in a rather macabre crimson. It had a softness to it, unlike the wolves that seemed more aggressive, yet I knew without a shadow of a doubt it was a more fearsome predator that the wolves. What injured it though? I found out moments later, when a short stocky green creature ran through the entrance on its short stumpy legs, screaming out a war cry. ¡°Hyaaaaaa¡­¡± it screamed, a short stubby blade in its hands held high as it charged forwards. The cat, I now knew what it was called from the store, caught sight of the creature, and ran, limping badly on an injured leg. The creature followed, ignoring my beautiful floor, and majestic work, intent only on the cat. I felt offended. How dare he! How dare he besmirch my illustrious work, my precious dungeon. That was it, I had decided. He will DIE!!! Since the cat was a simple creature, I knew I could control it somewhat. Guiding it, I managed to get it to weave through the trees. Hopefully¡­ Yes, he¡¯s falling into my trap. Guiding the cat around the trees, had meant that the creature decided to take a short cut between them. With a whip like crack the branches shot out, lashing at the little green guy, wrapping around him and threatening to tear him apart. I felt the sweet kiss of victory hovering over me. Unauthorized use: this story is on Amazon without permission from the author. Report any sightings. No¡­no, no, no, no, no¡­ you can¡¯t do that, you¡­ The creature calmly slashed through the tree branches with his knife, cutting himself free. Landing deftly on his feet, he raced to catch up to the cat. I guided it down the stairs and onto the ground of floor two. If the trees didn¡¯t work, then I would have to hope that the wolves of the second floor would do more. The cat seemed to relax in the rocky woodland, and although there was no snow, unlike its natural habitat, it seemed like a good fit. Perhaps, if it survived, I would make it into the biggest threat on this floor. But for now, I had a little green monster to slaughter. ========== [Marrok] The stinging pain of the branch cutting through his flesh brought a smile to his face. Marrok breathed it in, loving it. He cut himself free, landing lightly on his feet. More cautious now, Marrok recognised that he had entered a dungeon. He had read about them before, in the books from the filthy races, perhaps it would solve all of his problems. If he and his band could raid the dungeon, train themselves on the monsters within, then perhaps, come summer, they would be the strongest band around. Able to add plenty more to his tally, securing his place as the most formidable Goblin ever. He shook his head, driving the distracting thoughts away. It wouldn¡¯t do to get careless. Many, many things wanted to kill him in here, and he would have to defy them. The cat continued to run, limping badly. Marrok smiled, he was close, it was only a matter of time before the cat succumbed and he would be there to finish it off. Dungeon or not, nothing would get in the way of his hunt. He pushed through the grasses, following the cat by sound and smell, the tall grass blocked his vision. But that wasn¡¯t a problem for a goblin, and Marrok was the best. He emerged from the grasses on a set of stairs. Wooden and carved, they descended a few metres, before turning back on themselves. Marrok took careful steps, padding down with light feet, careful and observant, traps could be anywhere after all. With only one working arm he knew a pitfall could be the end of him, climbing out would be nigh on impossible. The second floor of the dungeon was much more interesting, emerging onto the canopy of a woodland. With such dense foliage, Marrok had no idea how high up he was, the ground was completely obscured. A few metres ahead of him a tree from the emergent layer, stood out, its top gracing the ceiling, brushing against it like a tender caress. He made for it, certain that that was the intended path. He was right, stairs circling the trunk led to the floor, which he could now see was a very long way down. Fear was weakness though, and Marrok had no weakness, he wasn¡¯t afraid. Quickly making his way down to the ground, he set after the cat, following the blood trail and scent through the level. ========== [Dungeon] With unerring accuracy, the creature followed the cat through the grasses. Grasses that were taller than it! How it could do so, without being able to see, I hadn¡¯t a clue, but it could, and there was seemingly nothing I could make the cat do to hide its trail. The creature seemed more cautious now, taking his time and observing everything. Paying me the attention I deserved. I will still kill him. Reaching the second floor, it became apparent I wouldn¡¯t be able to shake him. Giving up, I directed the cat towards the wolves. Surely the green guy wouldn¡¯t be able to defeat a whole pack of wolves. Right? They encountered each other in a small clearing, next to the stream. He kept the stream to his back, thus preventing the wolves from surrounding him. With them all in his vision he waited, patiently. At some unseen signal he charged forwards, stabbing into one of their necks and using its body to shield one side of himself. The rest of the fight was a flurry, blood flying, fur and skin being rend from the flesh and the howls and cries of the participants. I watched, agog. Come on, come on¡­ I thought to myself, mentally coaxing the wolves to win. It turned out he was too tough for the wolves. Despite having been bitten and clawed and battered down by the wolves, he hadn¡¯t collapsed and died. It shocked me really, the ground was stained with blood and yet he was still standing, still fighting. He had one working arm, one working leg and probably half his blood left and he was fighting with only a small knife and leaving my wolves in piles on the floor. How tough was he? When the fight ended, he was breathing heavily, he made to take after the cat, but his legs failed him and he stumbled, falling to the floor. Seemingly thinking better of it, he turned to go, marching back through the floor towards the exit. What¡­no, how dare you¡­ right, I¡¯ll block you in. But it seemed that I couldn¡¯t block him in, something connected him to the surface, and no matter what I tried I couldn¡¯t manipulate anything between him and the surface, I could change the deeper floors, I could do everything except modify anything between him and the exit. Arghhhh, I growled, stewing in my frustration. That blasted, disrespectful¡­ God damn¡­ mark my words little green man, I will kill you, and I will enjoy it. You had better come back, or I will find a way to tear myself out of the ground, fly my mountain across the world and sit it atop of you. Arghhhh I went off to sulk. Chapter 9 ========== [Marrok] The wolves were down, but Marrok was too injured to continue his hunt. The damned cat had escaped. He, for sure, would be coming back. But now, Marrok had the arduous task of dragging himself back to the goblin camp. He knew he would be able to get there, but the question was if he would make it before night fell. He crawled back, ignoring the sharp stones and twigs that seemed determined to catch in the various gashes that marred his skin. Pain was a constant companion for Marrok, it made him feel alive and he relished it, but dragging himself back was going to be a long process, if he could just get to his feet! Alas it was hopeless, both legs were broken and battered. If he could get back to camp, they would be able to set them, and he would heal in no time. He crawled through the black fog that marked the entrance to the dungeon, and emerged into the cold air, shivering as the wind bit into his exposed flesh. He was tougher than this though! Marrok thought to himself, determined to make it back. ========== [Dungeon] With the little green man gone, I was free to examine my new dungeon member. The cat. It was beautiful, even though covered in blood. Its soft white coat glistening in the few areas untainted by blood splotches. This would be another powerful addition to my dungeon, though it certainly couldn¡¯t be the boss. If one goblin could injure it so, then it wasn¡¯t what I was looking for. Floor two would probably be a good place for it. I just had to wait one month for it to become a dungeon monster. I went back to browsing the store while I absorbed the leftover mana from my dead wolves. Depending on how expensive my boss would be, I would need anywhere from five to ten levels. I needed two levels to afford the kobold village and making my way to level thirty would give me just over one thousand dungeon points to spend on my boss monster, and a perk. The perks had been instrumental in how I developed my dungeon, and I was sure they would continue to be so. With nothing else to do, I started to compile my list of potential boss monsters and began to level up. ~~Level up: 26~~ ~~Level up: 27~~ Without further consideration, I bought the kobold village, leaving me with only 115 dungeon points. But I didn¡¯t want to give myself any chance to reconsider, I had made my mind up a long time ago. The kobold village came with everything I would need for the entire floor and was perfectly adapted for the dense trees that filled the fourth floor. I placed the village in the back corner in the deepest, harshest section of the forest and watched as the trees slowly bent around the small wooden huts. From within the huts emerged my kobolds, shrouded in darkness they stalked out, sniffing the air with their large noses. The kobolds were taller than the goblin that had wandered in, at about one metre in height, though with the plumage on their heads they stood more like one metre thirty. They had elongated snouts, with large eyes and a mouth that split all the way back towards the neck. It reminded me vaguely of the alligators. Their teeth were significantly smaller than the alligator though. With a single row of pointed teeth about one centimetre long. Perfect for tearing flesh. They hunted with weapons, ambushes, and traps not with their teeth. The chieftain had a long, gnarled staff made of knotted wood, black in colour. On top was an elegantly carved symbol. It surely meant something to the village, but I had no idea. The kobolds all carried crossbows and a variety of melee weapons including hatchets, swords, spears and even kpinga, though the last one I had had to look for in the store, a very odd weapon it seemed to have knives sticking out at random and even more absurd was that it was supposed to be thrown. Well, I couldn¡¯t wait for that. The shaman was dressed slightly differently, wearing more cloak-like armour than this mismatched leather and fur combo of the others, and he carried only a staff with a blood red crystal on top. Watching the crystal, I saw flashes of light sparking within it, I was interested in what kind of magic he would be performing. While waiting for everything to settle in I started collecting mana again, my target was level thirty after all, that was a lot of time to dedicate to collecting mana. The kobolds began to spread out, scoping out all the land that was there. Interestingly, in addition to the kobolds I knew the village came with, it seemed there were a couple of older kobolds to act as elders as well as some females. It was even better than advertised, though I suspected that they wouldn¡¯t be fighting members. Perhaps other dungeons thought this was a problem, but I liked it. ~~Level up: 28~~ ~~Level up: 29~~ ~~Level up: 30~~ ~~Congratulations: You have reached the milestone: Level 30 and as such have been granted a perk. The following perks are available: Heal 6000 dungeon points 150 tones of soil/stone/wood, 5 tonnes of rare materials Item: Treasure Blueprint Set 1 & 2, trap set 1 & 2 Mana boost: 138% total, 61% bonus mana gain for 4 months 12.5% off next store purchase 30% off boss price and mana respawn x6 BONUS: For making it to level 30 without killing anything sapient, you have been offered a special one-time deal: 2 greater mana atmosphere regulators, Treasure Blueprint set 1, 15000kg of random material (including 360kg of rare materials and 10kg of super rare materials), 1x 75% discount on elemental based mobs pack and 1600 dungeon points. The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement. Choose wisely, your next perk is available at level 40~~ The 6000 dungeon points were tempting, it would let me make huge progress, but it didn¡¯t help me design anything and it didn¡¯t discount any of the little things that designing a floor required. The boss price was interesting, but it wasn¡¯t worth it in the slightest. The bonus perk was yet again too good to pass up. Though I didn¡¯t know what atmospheric regulators did, I was sure they were useful, and the rest of the items just made it all the better. Bonus!! I thought to myself, mentally selecting the perk I knew I wanted. My dungeon points shot up to 2650, more than enough for almost all of the bosses I had considered. Menu!
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Monsters: Bosses: Items: Materials:
Points to spend: 2,585
Fenris: Danger Level: 2.5 Points: 1,160
A giant variety of wolf that stalks around the forest floor swallowing all who cross its path whole. Its thick fur coat a substantial armour to most blades. The wolf relies more on speed to dodge weapons.
Juvenile Titanoboa: Danger Level: 2.7 Points: 1,312
This young snake grows up to six metres in length with weak paralytic venom. It relies on constriction to kill its prey, crushing and suffocating them simultaneously. Thick scales are resistant to slashing damage but don¡¯t hold up for too long.
Gigantopithecus: Danger Level: 2.6 Points: 1,250
A heavily muscled relative of the gorilla. Thick matted fur and deep skin help to blunt and capture weapons, while its hammer like fists crash down breaking anything that comes in contact with them. Sharp nails, help this beast climb trees where it drags prey to consume out of danger, gouging deep furrows into even toughened bark.
Drake Hatchling: Danger Level: 2.1 Points: 3,000
A drake hatchling, prior to awakening, heavily armoured with vicious intelligence and a temperament to match.
Flame Burst Tortoise: Danger Level: 2.9 Points: 1,875
A slow-moving goliath, immune to most attacks, the tortoise can shrug off all but the most extensive damage, relying on its superheated breath to capture prey that wanders to close.
Expand to see more¡­
There was plenty to unpack here, I couldn¡¯t afford the drake, and I didn¡¯t like the sound of it being unawakened. Perhaps I would be able to ¡®awaken¡¯ it and it would become more powerful, perhaps I wouldn¡¯t, perhaps I wouldn¡¯t even be able to control it. No, that one I would give a pass. Similarly, I didn¡¯t want a slow-moving goliath, it just wouldn¡¯t be too fun to watch, and the flames seemed like a poor idea in a wooded environment. That took my choice down to just three. The giant wolf, the giant snake, or the giant gorilla. The giant snake was also out, from the description, it seemed that when it constricted someone it would be vulnerable to being attacked by others, and I knew the adventurers would challenge me in teams. Wolf or gorilla. Gorilla, there was something about it that called to me, and the idea of it falling down through the hole in the foliage to crash down next to the adventurers seemed cool as hell. Yes, gorilla for sure. I placed it in the floor, and it immediately jumped over to the trees, climbing up with ease, as if it knew what I wanted. I laughed gently. Nice!!
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Name: ??? Level: 30
Race: Dungeon Health: 458/475
Titles: / Mana: 6,300 of 40,000
Renown: Undiscovered Dungeon Points: 1,335
Rating: 2A Attunement: /
Playing around with the mana regulators took me a while, but eventually I figured it out. They were exactly what I wanted, and I knew I would need lots more in the future. By feeding them mana, they actively cooled or heated. It would allow me to make floors for ice levels or scorching hot rooms. They held so much promise, I couldn¡¯t wait to start playing around with them. Ideas fluttered through my mind, ways to use this, ways to make my dungeon even more magical and awe inspiring than before. I laughed to myself as I considered it, yes things were looking good, but I needed more mana. It was time! I couldn¡¯t go on much longer without attracting more prey, there was just no way to manage it. It took me months and months of work just to recoup my mana. Not fast enough. It just wasn¡¯t. No choice. But before I did so, I had a few last-minute tasks to do. Using the treasure blueprint sets 0.5 and 1 that I had got from the level 20 and level 30 perks, I distributed the treasure around the floors, making sure there was enough to loot around. Of course, I would be moving the chests and treasure around each and every time, I couldn¡¯t have my floors becoming predictable and easy to blast through. If you wanted the loot, you would have to stay around and look for it or move onto harder floors and waste less time. The final thing I wanted to do, was to institute the secret areas in the fourth floor and the boss floor. It was the one thing I wanted to keep throughout my entire dungeon, a hidden area, perhaps protected by traps or more powerful monsters that contained lots of loot. Most races were greedy beyond belief and there was nothing that motivated them more than really shiny things. Fools, greedy fools. I thought laughing. Both floors had easy options for this. On the fourth floor, my secret area would be the kobold village itself: the adventurers would have to battle through the densest jungle to find the camp and kill all the kobolds guarding it, before being able to access the loot. The boss floor was just as easy: on top of the trees. If the boss jumped down from up there, it would be perfectly logical to assume there was something up there. The trees that all grew around the edge of the room made for tricky obstacles and a long fall if adventurers misjudged it. Ending a scant few metres from the ceiling, the trees were thick enough that it was a perfectly usable space without any modification, and the few, sparser areas could function as traps, catching unaware clumsy adventurers. I moved my vision back, surveying my dungeon as a whole for a few moments. It started with a serene floor, full of beautiful trees that wafted in the wind gently, holding no trace of the potential danger that existed. The second floor was an open woodland, bathed in golden light that filtered down through the foliage, colouring the woodland floor in rich hues of reds, oranges, and greens. Wolves and big cats stalked the ground, hoping to sneak up on the unaware. Floor three was a mucky, overwhelming swamp with murky pools of water hiding dangers and the incessant buzzing of insects wearing away even the most patient, stoic of adventurers ¨C hopefully. The fourth floor was a thick jungle, where the roguish kobolds stalked amongst the thick boughs, and dense bushes, working in sophisticated teams trying to besiege and wear down the adventuring parties. And lastly was my Gigantopithecus gorilla boss, huge and tough, ready to jump down and wreak havoc. I was proud of all that I had built, and the ideas for the future, held visions in my eyes. I could hardly hold my excitement at the prospect, but for that to work I would need mana, so, so, so much more mana. My life was long, and I had plenty of time to work and progress. Patiently waiting for months for my mana to refill had been troublesome but I had done it. It wouldn¡¯t be long before my dungeon was an expansive labyrinth holding all manner of dangers and rewards. Moving my vision up to the start of floor one, I carved out some elegant patterns in the walls of the small tunnel, enlarging it as I went. It curved around a quarter circle before leading out to the small entrance I had made earlier. It was time to make it look better. Widening it extensively I created a beautiful archway with dark marble blocks contrasting against the red clay in between. Extending back the pattern, I drew the colours together in a swirling pattern that curved down the walls and along the floor, slowly narrowing and combining until it slowly faded away, revealing the lush green paradise of my first floor. Yes!!! With one last hurrah I blew away a chunk of rock that sat next to the entrance, creating a thunderous clap that echoed around the valleys and a vicious roar as the huge boulders tumbled down the mountainside, wiping out a number of trees. Dust and dirt kicked up into a large cloud that hailed down on the forest. I smiled, if that didn¡¯t draw attention, then I was out of luck. Soon, someone from Littlebrook would come investigate, of that, I was sure. For now, though, it was time to prepare and plan. Chapter 10 ========== [Sigurd] An explosion rattled the air, it burst from the peaceful atmosphere like the crash of a cymbal at a high-class opera ¨C unexpected and most certainly unwanted. It seemed to linger in the air, humming and reverberating as it slowly died down. As well as hearing the thunderous roar, Sigurd could feel it, a vibration running though him like a slap on the back from a mighty drunk dwarf. From his skin to his bones, it rattled around, making the air thrum with the power and violence it held as near and dear. Following the explosion, there was a brief moment of complete silence, as if the world itself had stopped, putting everything on hold for just one moment. And yet, like the eye of a storm, when peace settled in, you knew that in naught but a moment it would be gone again. And sure enough, a few moments later, the world started again, time resumed, the storm took hold, and Sigurd found himself cringing as the roof rattled, vibrating, as if on this perfect day it had begun raining, heavy rain. The sound was sharper though, tinnier and dryer than the wet slapping drum of rain pounding down. Amongst the hail like storm a few softer hits thumped down, like an elderly inn keeper beating the dust from her carpets or a particularly vicious parent disciplining his naughty child. The soft thumps that rang out around the place ended this subdued firework show with one final, large thump that smashed down just outside, pelting the windows of the shack with gravel and debris. When the cacophony of noise stopped, Sigurd relaxed rolling his shoulders and jaw around to work out the kinks that had developed as he was wincing and tensing up at the impacts to his poor garden shed. Half expecting the bombardment to continue any second now, Sigurd busied himself tidying up the shed, half of the tools had fallen from the walls, they were held up by a few thin nails that had been punched into the wall years earlier. Over time, the weight of the resting tools had slowly bent them towards the ground until it was a daily battle to rack them up again after use. ¡®I just have to find the time to fix them and solve my problem¡¯ Sigurd thought to himself, but between the odd jobs for the village and his retirement he hadn¡¯t found the time yet. Sigurd¡¯s father, God rest his soul, had always said that he was busier in retirement than he ever had been while working and, God, it seemed to be true, or at least Sigurd thought so. It took him a good few minutes to hang up the tools properly, time that only increased the apprehension at what he would find outside. Would his garden be ruined? Oh, please no! he begged to whatever Gods were up there, I¡¯ve spent ages and ages on the horticulture. ¡°Please don¡¯t be ruined¡± he said aloud instead. Chanting it to himself like a mantra as he went to open the door. He quickly discovered another problem though, when he tried to push the door open, it wouldn¡¯t budge. Well, that was a lie, it did budge ¨C just a little ¨C but, like a spring it just pushed back. Sigurd sighed in frustration, tilting his head back out of irritation, as he stared up at the ceiling. While doing so he noticed the large, buckled dent in the doorframe. ¡°Great! Just Great!¡± he ranted half-heartedly. Calming down, Sigurd looked around the shed. There was nothing really useful for fixing this, all the big tools were outside, the shed was for the detail work and so the tools were all fairly dainty little things, certainly nothing he could use here. Since Sigurd was just eager to get out, he picked up a hammer. The largest one of course, and just started whacking away on the lump until it was out of the way. Perhaps a touch too far, but it felt good to vent his frustration- having already been in a bad mood before the explosion. Sigurd had just ruined the metalwork piece he had been working on, wasting metal, time and money. Setting down the hammer with a wooden thump, he pushed open the door. It moved with a rattling creak and groan as the metal shifted, then it stopped. He tried again. It stopped. It was still stuck. Raising his eyes to the ceiling he checked there was nothing still blocking it. With nothing for it, he took a step back then in anger just shoulder barged it out the way. The door slid open. Stepping out of the shed, Sigurd looked around in dismay. There was only one way to put it. His lawn was fucked. Not just fucked; absolutely fucking ruined. It looked like a bomb had gone off and considering the explosion, it wasn¡¯t all that unlikely. The lawn was covered in dirt and stone. From the layer of dust to the large chunks that lay strewn around the place, it was not quite how he remembered it. No, Sigurd remembered a crisp, pristine garden full of lush green grass and flowers. He sighed. The grass was barely visible beneath a thick, uneven layer of mud and rock dust. A large clump of mud had been blocking the door from opening and now it was spread across the last step. Just more work for him to do, Yay! he thought half-heartedly to myself. With a final huge sigh, he stepped back into the shed, found some of his gardening tools and got to work. *** Four days later*** Sigurd had finally got his garden shipshape. And when he said ¡®shipshape¡¯ what he really meant was ¡®barely passable¡¯. He had cleaned off the roof and repaired a couple of leaks in the house as a first priority, couldn¡¯t have water leaking through to the beams and struts, a fine way to have an accident that! Similarly, he repaired the shed, properly this time, instead of just assaulting it with a hammer. Just digging out the muck from the lawn and tipping it away took the majority of the four days of work. The grass was finally back to a shade of green, though it was more of a faded, tired grass colour, plastered grey by the dust, it would all clear up again when the rains fell. The pond was the only major problem left to deal with, but Sigurd decided to leave that for a while. He¡¯d have to drain it and redo it as it was currently full of dirt. It had formed a thick layer of mud at the bottom that would need to be dug out before the pond could be refilled. The dust and rocks and general rubble that had landed in the pond had killed everything bar the bugs, and Sigurd didn¡¯t fancy trying to restore the ecosystem at the moment. After finished some last bits of clearing, Sigurd stood back and looking at all the work he¡¯d done, despite it still being worse than before, he was proud of himself. Washing his hands, Sigurd stepped back into the house, closing the back door with a loud slam. He slipped out of his boots and was just about to sit down with a nice drink when he heard a loud knock at the door. Placing his mug down, he got up and went to answer it. The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement. ¡°Hey Sig¡± a jovial loud voice called out to him. ¡®Sig¡¯ was a nickname, one he didn¡¯t mind ¨C he was actually quite fond of it, and had found himself referring to himself as such on occasion. Sigurd Vasagen was his full name though no-one in the town called him that anymore. He had retired from the life of an adventurer, a life many dreamt of, but few understood, it was a tough life, but the rewards were well worth it if you were careful. The small quaint town of Littlebrook was home now, and though relaxing in the peaceful village where time passed so slowly was lovely, Sigurd did find himself missing the rush and the experience of the adventure. At this point though he was committed, and couldn¡¯t bear to abandon the house anymore. He was happy living off savings and doing odd jobs in the village, selling off some of the metalwork creations he made as a hobby whenever the traders came by. Littlebrook rarely received traders. It was as much of an embodiment of a name as anything else. It was literally in every sense of the word, small, with a brook, hence the name. Sigurd laughed lightly at the thought. Whoever named the town clearly wasn¡¯t too creative. Unlike the big cities, life here was predominantly about helping people. There was no mayor or town leader, and no real use for money. It was used as everywhere else, but it couldn¡¯t buy anyone privileges in town, or a bigger house ¨C because the townsfolk all pitched in to build the houses and if a family had another kid and needed an extension, the town would get together and build it for them. Sigurd liked that about Littlebrook. Littlebrook consisted of about forty people, with four streets in the village proper with five houses on each side, a market place and a few logging cabins and woodland huts for the hunters and gatherers. Beyond the town itself, a few scattered farmhouses filled the endless country scenery, the small road leading to it trailing off over the horizon. The side with the hunters¡¯ woodland was towards the mountain and on the other side was a couple of small fields that the farmers used. The mountain was called the Avaltjarn or ¡°The Avalt¡± for short, it sat at the border between several different lands and extended up to the skies beyond even the birds could see. A magnificent sight, the untamed reaches fraught with dangerous terrain and peculiar life. ¡°Hey yourself¡± Sigurd said opening up the door. On the other side was a young lad, 14 years of age. John was his name. He was almost hopping up and down with excitement. Absent-mindedly Sigurd wondered why. ¡°Have you heard?¡± John said, before continuing without giving any time to respond. ¡°The explosion, it was caused by a dungeon we think. Up in the mountains, Rayver said he saw it when hunting. A cave, in the peaks, it just like blew open and it¡¯s a pitch-black opening. He said it had an odd look to it, we thought you might know, being an adventurer and all.¡± He rattled out not even taking the time for breathing. ¡°Slow down lad, a former adventurer mind you¡± Sigurd replied with a chuckle placing a hand on his shoulder. ¡°Come in, come in. Let¡¯s discuss it over a drink.¡± It took almost a quarter of an hour to get anything from him. He was too giddy about it to explain properly. John was one of those boys who wished with all their heart to be an adventurer, he played swords all day till his mother shouted at him to do his chores, and he was always pestering people for advice and stories. Sigurd had hesitated to tell him what it was really like, but John was fascinated by it and he didn¡¯t have the heart to tell the boy the truth. But with a possible dungeon up on the slopes it was quite likely that John would get that chance. At least he wasn¡¯t so rash and stupid as to delve inside alone. Sigurd¡¯s few cautionary tales enough to discourage him of that much. The story had Rayver climbing up farther than his normal hunting haunts, following a particularly fleetfooted deer when he had reached a cave that hadn¡¯t been there before. Rayver claimed to have felt an ominous, overwhelming feeling crawling up his spine and had turned right around, the deer having vanished in his moment of distraction. Rayver had returned to town and from there the news had spread. By all accounts, it sounded similar to what Sigurd had experienced during his dives and it only further confirmed his suspicion that it wasn¡¯t all smoke and no fire and that they were in fact dealing with a real dungeon, and a new one at that. It was both good and bad news for the town. Dungeons were extremely profitable, and this was sure to be great for the town, but it could be bad as well because dungeons meant change and the town might well lose its lovely quaint charm, as adventurers and all the businesses and followers they brought with them converged on the village. Luckily, at least from the sound of things, it seemed that the dungeon was quite far away and so it was at least plausible that the guilds would start construction much further up the slope. A nice-sized dungeon town would be a great little place to go for a day. Though that was an expensive project, and the dungeon would have to be worth it: something that was definitely not guaranteed. Sigurd hoped that the town could remain smallish and keep its quiet atmosphere. Something he so cherished. Though he wouldn¡¯t be averse to a few more dungeon dives, you know, to liven up the life a little. John had ended by saying that he knew the townsfolk were wondering if Sigurd could go explore it, since he was the former adventurer and all, to confirm that it was a dungeon. It would be dangerous but the accolade ¡®First to conquer a new dungeon¡¯ was something every adventurer yearned for, himself included. Quite often a new dungeon would offer new rewards and unheard-of prizes that got moved down to later levels once they developed further. It was why guilds paid so much for information on new dungeons, that and the new challenge and place for adventurers to go. Dungeons were quite rare after all and with the current rate of shutdowns there was a growing need for big dungeons to entertain all the adventurers and train soldiers. ***8 hours later*** Sigurd was nearly to the entrance now, five hours after leaving the town, he had made it, sweat poured down his brow soaking his eyebrows and beard, the way up was fucking horrible, stupid dungeon making it inaccessible. He was less fit than he should have been for a solo adventurer, but he wouldn¡¯t be able to contact his old team for a while and he had doubts they would even want to get back into the life. As far as he knew they were all happily retired just like him. Besides, all he had to do right now was get in, confirm it was a dungeon look around a bit to get as much information to give the guild and then get out. Giving his pits a sniff Sigurd realised his clothes were getting a bit too ripe, the journey to the cave was a tough slog and he was sweating profusely. He felt sticky and was looking forward to changing out of them. Hopefully the dungeon would soon realise how badly it needed steps or a path to its entrance. Sigurd realised that his mind was wandering and pulled it back on track. ¡®A wandering mind meant a straight path. Straight to the grave for an adventurer¡¯. That¡¯s what his old teacher had said, the man¡¯s advice had kept Sigurd alive on numerous occasions, so he always repeated the line to himself before a delve. It was nearing mid-afternoon now; John had caught him in the morning, getting in some early gardening and Sigurd had set off shortly after the talk, stopping only to let some of the villagers know what he was doing, they had expressed a multitude of opinions but it seemed that the dungeon was just being accepted and the change that came with it as a ¡®come what may¡¯ sentiment. Setting his pack down, Sigurd lay on a smooth section of rock, enjoying the feeling of his spine straightening out hunching over whilst carrying the pack had started his back aching and he needed to rid himself of that distraction before he began the delve. Yawning a bit, Sigurd took a good long rest. ¡°Forty I may be, but I wasn¡¯t that out of shape¡± he mumbled to himself. After his nap he got to work, since poor planning provides piss-poor performance, then preparation provides perfect performance. Right? Sometimes. Yawning and stretching once more, he got up and started a basic stretching regime. Just to limber up a bit you understand, not because he was old. The next task, equipment. Getting out of his sweat-soaked clothes he dug into his pack and pulled out a fresh set of underclothes and some soft leather gear. Warming it between his hands with a touch of magic made it especially supple and it helped in pulling it on. Sigurd pulled out a belt with lots of pouches, repacking the few that had come loose in his pack. The belt rested on his hips, the left side filled with healing supplies and the right with dangerous things. From healing potions, bandages and gels on the left, to poisons, bombs, and elemental attack runes on the right. He was alchemically prepared. Sigurd pulled out his battle axe and whetstone and began the long process of preparing it for battle, pulling the cutting edge into the block towards him then pushing it back away until the edge was just sharp enough. You don¡¯t want a really sharp blade in battle, because the edge chips away, fractures, and begins to seriously degrade the weapon. From the pack, Sigurd grabbed some metal vambraces and clipped them onto his forearms, a rerebrace and pauldron went onto his upper lead arm and shoulder ¨C left in Sigurds case, though he occasionally switched to right if he had taken damage to his lead - while his rear arm ¨C right ¨C just had leather protection on the shoulder. He required less protection on his rear side as it held his weapon and was positioned away from the enemy, allowing him more freedom of movement for his weapon. A simple leather and steel band breastplate protected the rest of his torso, Sigurd had both greaves and sabatons on both legs with a poleyn and cuisse on the lead leg ¨C left - and simple leather on the rear leg - right. He slipped on his gauntlets, grasped his axe, hefting it familiarly as if it was an old friend, and in a way it was. Made of fairly thin steel and leather, the armour was of medium build, it wouldn¡¯t stop very large powerful mobs like full knight armour would, but it was heavy enough to take a decent bit of damage. He favoured the mobility it gave to dodge the usually slow and powerful types, whilst giving the protection to face the slashing, or piercing style mobs head on. Because it was weighted significantly towards his left side, Sigurd had to be especially aware to keep foes from circling around him, but in the small confines of a tunnel it hadn¡¯t been too difficult in the past. Sigurd took a couple of practice swings, a few more stretches to settle the armour in place, and he was ready to explore. He collected his old clothes and stuffed them in his pack, slinging the pack down beside the entrance as he stepped into the black. Chapter 11 ========== [Dungeon] Once I¡¯d blown open the entrance to my dungeon, the ambient mana had begun to pour into the entrance spilling down into the dungeon, I hadn¡¯t realised it, but I had sucked out a lot of the mana in the mountain surrounding my dungeon, depleting the whole area. The mana in the air rushed into my domain to equalise the densities. I felt alive again and charged with energy. Mana carried on the air far easier than through the ground and it didn¡¯t take too long before I had regained all my mana. Since I was eager to get to work, I decided not to level up and instead I set about building the next floor. I had planned for a rest area; hoping to encourage adventurers to rest up and challenge the harder floors that followed, hopefully with false confidence. The first five levels would challenge adventurers at a decent level, but I had no illusions that the top tier ones wouldn¡¯t just breeze through it. First, I carved out the room. Much smaller this time, I might as well make minimal work for myself, right? About 200 metres wide, it was a circular room with a 15-metre ceiling. The stairs from the fifth floor led into a hallway that extended half-way into the room. On either side of the hallway was a two-layer building of sorts. There were a number of rooms, three metres in all dimensions, with a wooden bed frame, a chest and a locking door. At the end of the ten room rows, a toilet was placed for a total of 44 rooms, toilets included. It was just a small room with a raised box. Like an outhouse; it had a hole that led to a banishment enchantment. Whilst I didn¡¯t care about how dirty the adventurers were, I did care about my dungeon, it just wouldn¡¯t do for something as high class as myself to have faeces all over the floor. I wasn¡¯t some sort of sleazy lowbrow whorehouse, filled with crass philistines after all. I was a dungeon! A dignified existence for sure. Opposite to the exit onto the safe floor, was the entrance to the sixth floor, though I hadn¡¯t built it yet. The sixth floor I had decided, would not carry on the woodland theme. No, I would change it up, five levels and then a break sounded good to me. The plan was to use the atmospheric regulators that I had got from the level 30 perk to change it up. I had never planned on being just a nature dungeon, it was too simple, too easy and not different enough, I wouldn¡¯t be just another dungeon, one mark upon millions, just a star in the sky. No! I would be the sun to their stars, unique and respected. The woodlands were the easy levels, to ease people in. An organised party would have no trouble passing by the obstacles, they would have to get to know it first though, it still held dangers. What should the theme for the next five be? Ice? Fire? Water? Air? Or¡­or¡­or¡­ My ideas were endless, and I could sit here pondering it until the dwarves passed out. But, I digress, I had work to do, and that was what I should be thinking of, rather than cheap idioms about the ever-drunk dwarven folk. The remainder of the rest area housed an empty bar and merchant section. The merchants would be able to set up tents or gazebos with a little stall in it to sell their items. Any life within my territory would grant 5% of its mana regeneration to me at all times, so the longer I could keep them in the dungeon the better. The amount of mana it took to build this place and maintain it would hopefully be recouped from the overnight rests and merchants. At the end of the day, even if I was losing monsters and life to the adventurers, I wasn¡¯t really losing, I would almost always end up gaining, either from the items they dropped, the experience of fighting or the occasional death. The mana tax was just another thing to help my growth. If this wasn¡¯t the case, then there would never be Dungeons as they would slowly die. A dungeon that had adventurers and wasn¡¯t killed would grow to be prosperous and big. I built several stone tables and chairs to cover the empty expanse of floor. They were for people to socialise at and hopefully to prolong the time they spent resting. There was no need to give them a whole lot of comfort, after all, I was trying to kill them. As a last thought before I moved on, it occurred to me to continue the woodland trend here too. I quickly covered the floor with a layer of dirt and cut in some paths and a nice winding stream. The natural spring in the corner flooded through the channels, the stream ended up cutting through the middle, separating the housing from the social area and a series of small footbridges were the only dry way over. I managed to grow a few fruit bushes, it took another couple of hours, and a small investment in mana but I thought it was worth it. There were a range of currents; red, black, white and a few other berries as well. In a few spots there were some overhanging trees, in small groves that provided a much-needed texture to the room. Along the water¡¯s edge were some bamboo shoots and a few reeds; small fish wove in and out using them as cover. Unlike the monsters though these wouldn¡¯t respawn readily. After one month any that were killed would respawn and I thought I might have to change that. Too small to eat they shouldn¡¯t be killed by the adventurers; but you never knew. I finally looked back on the room and decided it only needed one change. The stone buildings had to be turned into wooden cabins, it fit the aesthetic more. I tore down the buildings and instead built a series of small log cabins throughout the resting side of the room. This would be a safe zone and I decided to mark the boundary of the stairs with a short pulse of golden light to signify such. When entering the safe zone, it would flash gold and when exiting the second half of the staircase would flash red. I took a second to add a black mist to the entrance of floor six. It would obscure the adventurer¡¯s vision and it was just there so that no-one would be able to plot and plan from outside. They would have no idea what the inside state would be, and they wouldn¡¯t be able to gain anything that they hadn¡¯t already found out before entering. I also thought that it gave off an ominous feeling. I liked that. I had finally finished the safe zone! It was time to move on to floor six, but what should I do? I was definitely planning on using the atmosphere regulators, so my main choice was between fire or ice themed floors, cold or hot. I could also do a maze, labyrinth or puzzle type floor but I thought I would save that for later. Straight forward floors would be more accessible and would let the dumb ones challenge me just the same as the clever ones. Thus, I didn¡¯t feel like a puzzle fit properly so I would save that, they also required a lot more planning and I was wanting a few more levels before the adventurers came. Labyrinths had such versatility too, they could be really cool, but I couldn¡¯t make them at floor six, that would be a waste of something that could be extremely dangerous. Hmmm what to do? What to do? Ideas trickled through my mind like leaves in a wind, yet none seemed to stick. I had visions, but they seemed to just stay out of reach in the fuzziness on the edge of my mind. Concepts not ideas. As I pondered, time passed quite quickly, too much time in fact, by the time I had grasped the basic concept of what I wanted almost six hours had elapsed. I once again started the rather tedious process of excavating a chamber to begin. All in all, it took a good four hours to open up the cavern to a sufficient size; about 700 metres long and 300 wide with a height of almost 100 metres. However, this time the ceiling was not a picture of uniformity. It went up to a 100 metres only once and in several places the ceiling was only five metres high. On average though, I estimated that it was about 40 metres. With the base done I set down the environmental regulators and poured my mana into them. They looked like they were made of crystal, but rather than being angular, they were smooth sided and rectangular in shape, like small pillars. I embedded one in the ground and struggled to figure out how to get the desired effect. The mana rushed into it, and seemed to get absorbed by the object, doing nothing. How does this work? There has to be some trick to it, how to get it to put out ice mana. It took me a very long time, but eventually I figured out the input criteria for it to begin outputting what I wanted, the trick was in rotating the mana input. Now I just had to wait for the room to cool down. Once it was freezing cold, I started conjuring water until it settled to a depth of about half a metre above the floor. Freezing it was next and that took a significantly greater proportion of my available mana, but once it was frozen the regulator would be able to keep it so. I had used about 5000 mana just excavating and covering the floor in ice. And I felt that I would just have enough mana left to complete the floor, it was touch and go but I reckoned I was going to manage. The next task was to cover the walls and ceiling in ice, it wouldn¡¯t look right if it was only the floor. This was much harder as I would need to hold the water against the walls while it froze, otherwise it would all flow away. In the end, I got around this issue by raising some stone walls and filling the intervening space with water. After it had frozen solid, I had a nice thick wall of ice and a thin ceiling that slowly dripped water. The atmospheric regulator coped reasonably well and with just a small trickle of my mana it was capable of keeping the room chilly enough that the ice wouldn¡¯t melt. The smooth walls also weren¡¯t right and so I had to texture it. I found out quite quickly that throwing rocks at the walls chipped them and it gave me a fairly natural look. I was pleased with this and felt pride at my discovery suffuse my core. I didn¡¯t even have to be precise, in fact the sloppier I was with my mana the better, as the rocks hit almost randomly, avoiding the trap of creating a pattern by mistake. A good while later, the texturing was done, small shards of ice and powdery snow formed small piles on the floor where I had been smashing the floor. Looking at it, I decided that the floor also needed the same treatment, as it was just a touch too smooth, even if I would be covering much of it up later with snow. This time I used smaller rocks so that the divots and cracks were small enough to provide enough grip so that it was feasible to walk across without too much trouble. The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings. I of course left some super smooth sections as well ¨C I wanted to see adventurers dance around on the slippery surface ¨C but in general it was possible to walk around. Now it was time to fill the room. The piles of ice and snow from the texturing provided enough inspiration and I found that with a minor water summon enchant I could produce an effect of perpetual snow falling as it froze mid-air: perfect. It was just what I was looking for. After playing around with it, I got it to the point that over the course of a day a good four to six inches of pristine snow would settle on the floor and a light dusting that would settle on the shoulders of anyone walking through. Enough that by exploring the floor you would end up sodden and cold as the snow melted with body heat. I would have to remove the snow periodically to keep the floor useable, but that wasn¡¯t that hard. Hopefully the room was cold enough to chill adventurers but not to kill them, otherwise I imagine they would all go and buy heat enchants which would be rather beside the point. My goal, as always, was to make people take risks and compromise on their safety; be a bit cold and slow or spend lots of money on an expensive enchantment. I hoped many adventurers would risk it and get caught out as their muscles and reactions slowed in the cold; perfect. Although if it did kill a few, I wouldn¡¯t be complaining. Though I¡¯d save that level of cold for later. Stalactites hung tight from the ceiling, looming like the sword of Damocles, whilst the stalagmites protruded like buttresses from the floor, ready to impale any adventurer that took a fall on the ice. Unlike the traditional cone shaped ones, these had a triangular profile with razor sharp edges and wicked points. My first traps were the stalactites or the ¡®stalac-not-so-tites¡¯ as I called them fondly. Some of them were loose enough to be dislodged either by spells or impacts with the walls, hopefully resulting in some being knocked down during a fight. They would come crashing down with no warning either shattering into deadly flechettes or impaling the floor and anyone ¨C monster or adventurer ¨C that came between. The room still felt incomplete, however, and I decided that I needed a centrepiece. Thus, in all my wisdom, I spent several hours painstakingly carving it out of a giant block of ice, using my mana as a chisel, but at the end of the process I was very proud of my accomplishment. In the very centre of the room, where the ceiling climbed to the monstrous height of 100 metres, I built a huge ice arch, 40 metres wide and 30 high with the ice a couple of metres thick. Into the ice I etched decorative runic designs. The actual ice was frosted whilst the runes were clear enough to peer through. It was the minor details that brought my floors to life and that was what I spent a lot of my time on. Within this wonderous arch, I placed my centrepiece; a beautiful, majestic statue, illustrious. An ice dragon. It had a slender body and large wings that arced up into the arch over it, coming to rest at the centre. The dragon was depicted as if it was landing, mid-roar. Such a beautiful piece though would be wasted if it had no function and so I spent even longer debating with myself on how to incorporate it into my floor. In the end it was a quick scouring of the store that provided my answer and for a positively cheap 35 points I picked up an enchantment that I sunk into the dragons head. Periodically, it would allow the dragon to spray the entire room with its frost breath, a timed attack and my second trap. The breath was frigid and piercing, much colder and damaging than the room itself. It was a very dangerous attack for those that felt this room was a challenge, and I thought it might catch lots of people unaware of the danger. Next, I needed monsters, and huge lumbering Yetis were my choice, they had shaggy white fur and ice blue eyes that glowed when they awoke, curved horns protruded from their foreheads and followed the line of their jaws ending in sickled points by the hooked mouth that looked mighty dangerous, filled with large sharp teeth as it was. Their horns and teeth were aided by the sharp claws on their hands and feet. A tough package for the adventurers.
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Points to spend: 1,300
Yeti: Danger Level: 1.6 Points: 150
The Yeti is a hulking monster perfectly suited to icy environments on account of its thick fur and tough skin. Solitary creatures, these do not play well with others and are highly territorial, although they do not wander far when inside a dungeon. Sharp claws, and teeth as well as high strength make these monsters perfect for a one-on-one environment. Their shaggy white coat can help them blend into snowy environments and allow them to often surprise their foes.
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I planned to incorporate these monsters on my ice floors as they seemed perfectly suited. They would be disguised as huge snow drifts and beneath each sleeping form would be a treasure chest to reward those that managed to kill them.
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Points to spend: 1,300
Ice Phantasm x4: Danger Level: 0.8 Points: 75
The Ice Phantasm is a creature that strides the line between the physical and the ethereal with its small icy body and surrounding cloud of its super cold ice mana forming a snake like creature that floats and glides along. These creatures are white in colour though also translucent and are best at dealing elemental damage and harrying their foes.
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Another creature I had found whilst browsing the store was the ice phantasm. They sounded like perfect harassment mobs to distract adventurers whilst the yetis took them down. They came in groups of four and I planned to buy one group for each yeti, hoping I would be able to get them to work together. They were fast, nippy little creatures, made of crystalline ice infused with mana. Ice phantasms were often made by mages or summoned from the frozen wasteland to the south where the crystallising mana allowed them to form. They moved by floating around and lashing out with small bites and frost damage, unlike their more powerful counterparts; the elementals, they were restricted to small serpentine forms that posed little danger to the adventurers on their own. But in combination with the yetis, I was hopeful this would be a powerful paring. Some more loot was in order, but I couldn¡¯t make it too easy. A few minutes browsing the store got me to an entry I thought was interesting.
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Points to spend: 1,300
Ice Dragonfly x20: Danger Level: 0.0 Points: 15
The Ice Dragonflies flit and fly around the place spreading joy to all who see them, whether it is the sheer beauty they possess or the incredible value they hold as the crystallised mana makes up their body, your adventurers are sure to love them. A tricky challenge to capture and not too expensive it could be well worth a purchase to spice up your dungeon leaving a cool atmosphere
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One purchase gave me 20, and that seemed like a perfect number for the room. Perhaps people would chase them and accidentally tread on a yeti, enraging it. By this point I had used up three quarters of my mana and I had finished, there wasn¡¯t enough to start the next room. So, I sat back and pondered where to put the hidden treasure this time. It was obvious really. On top of the arch! A small chest with the customary prizes, done. A few small tweaks finished off the level. The ice was colder, much colder enough to begin freezing the adventurer¡¯s hands if they touched it with exposed skin for any length of time. Small patches of spikes were spread over the surface. Only five millimetres in length and fairly fragile, they would be painful but not even useful to help climb. The rest of it I made smoother, and more difficult to scale, and hid the chest behind a well frosted ice. In fact, there was no way to see the prize until you had already climbed the arch. Mages with flying familiars would be the ones to discover this. Hopefully, once this one was discovered it would lead to people trying to find the rest of the hidden secrets, though I expected it would take a few people finding them in multiple levels before people caught on. I sat back and admired my work, five levels of nature-based floors, a safe-room and an icy dragon lair. All was going well. I decided that now was time to purchase the monsters and with 1300 points I could choose five of my yetis and ice phantasm groups to populate the floor. It was just about enough to fill the floor, but it wouldn¡¯t allow me to buy anything for the subsequent floors. I truly needed more points, but how on earth did I get them? In the end I bought them all and placed them around the room, giving strong instructions to work together. It didn¡¯t work and almost instantly the yeti lashed out, crushing the ice phantasms with a single blow. I sighed mentally and began working. It took several hundred attempts and I think the yeti eventually grew weary of destroying my ice phantasms every time they respawned, but they eventually seemed to get used to their presence. Now they just needed to work together. For that I needed a challenge, but that was something I was sorely lacking. Having spent several hours coaxing the yetis into not pulverising my cute little ice phantasms I had expended all of my mana and I decided to browse the store to give myself ideas. To my surprise, I found something amazing. It was insanely expensive, but wouldn¡¯t it be brilliant to have?
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Points to spend: 160
Empower Creation (Natural Instinct +)
Description: skill Danger level: N/A Points: 5,320
Using the power of mana, imbue life to a creature of your creation by charging the mana heart in its chest with all the mana types and imposing your will upon it. This skill also requires dungeon points to use in order to lock a creations power. WARNING! Needs the item to function
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It sounded like a skill that would allow me to create my own monsters and although there would be other costs involved in doing so, namely mana and dungeon points it could be invaluable as a skill. Something I would have to aim to get.
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Points to spend: 160
Mana Heart (Blue)
Description: Danger level: N/A Points: 650
This one time use item allows mana to be stored and converted into life energy, it allows the user to impose a series of axioms to which the mana must follow. This is most often used in conjunction with life giving skills to create Automatons and Golems.
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The mana heart seemed cool even if it cost several times more points than my other monsters, but it might just allow me to make monsters far stronger and more unique than could be found using the dungeon store. I sighed, making the dragon even more functional would take a lot of my points, but I felt it would be worth it. I just needed an insane 5,970 points to do it. Something I definitely couldn¡¯t achieve at the moment. The last task was of course, to carve out the stairs. Curving around three times, these were some the longest stairs I had done yet, and obviously they were still covered in ice. Just as I finished carving out the ice banister to go along with it, I felt a small electric shock. It ran straight through my mind and then a huge thump, thump. A monotonous beat that demanded I focus on it. Almost like a heart.
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Name: ??? Level: 30
Race: Dungeon Health: 458/475
Titles: / Mana: 2,509 of 40,000
Renown: Discovered Dungeon Points: 160
Rating: 3E Attunement: /
Chapter 12 ========== [Sigurd] His first thought was wow! The darkness that blotted out the entrance went on for a long while. He was ten steps in and he still wasn¡¯t out of it. However, after another few, slow, deliberate steps, thumping the floor with his axe handle to determine where it was, the darkness faded away. One would think that spending two minutes advancing the 15 steps to get through the darkness was slow going, but since the dungeon was completely unknown, not just to Sigurd, but to everyone, he wasn¡¯t going to be taking any chances. He¡¯d heard rumours that new dungeons often tried to throw everything they had at adventurers straight away in a frenzied effort to kill them, once they had matured and become stable, then they could be farmed easily, but at the start it could be very dangerous in their frenzy. Sigurd didn¡¯t want to have that happen to him here. It was often said that a new dungeon was the most dangerous one and he felt that it may well be true, Sigurd was nervous, normally he would be both physically and mentally prepared to face the dangers having been given the information from those who came before. Now he was one of those and when the dangers hadn¡¯t been catalogued yet anything could take him by surprise and being surprised often meant death. Emerging from the darkness, he stumbled around like a baby deer, new to the new world as he was bombarded by the sights and smells, and the overwhelming intimidating aura that was always present with a dungeon as everything blossomed around him. Instead of the small, cramped tunnel he was expecting, a large open woodland greeted him. The sounds of life exploded over him as he stepped from the darkness of the entrance tunnel and into the first floor. Some of the first things that drew his attention were the sounds, his keen ears picking up the rustle of the grasses and the leaves in the wind, the humming buzz of flying creatures and the occasional tweet-tweet of various birds that called out at him, adding to the serenity of the place. The sweet smell of sap and wood mixed with the earthiness of the ground, giving a fresh scent that Sigurd felt could almost convince him that he was outside, under the summer sun, instead of in a dungeon in the tail end of winter. It was a feeling carried forth with his each and every breath. A thick layer of grasses obscured the ground in the huge cavern. Waist high. They could be hiding all manner of creatures, or traps. Luckily, nothing had charged at him thus far as some dungeons were wont to do. Emerging from the grasses, thick wall like hedges grew tall, working to divide the floor into more enclosed sections, almost like the rooms within a normal dungeon, and within each of these rooms he could see large droopy trees emerging, only the top few branches visible over the hedges. Thin vine like branches extended downwards, wafting gently in the breeze. Breeze? The thought stops him for a moment, why is there a breeze here? He asked himself. Dungeons don¡¯t have a breeze, they are stale and imposing. It¡¯s unsettling. Across the woodland, on the opposite side of the cavern, he spied what looked like a simple staircase, presumably descending to the next floor. It looks almost like a cave, blending into the walls around it quite well. But his experience is enough to spot it. The exit is partially obscured by the branches of one of the trees, positioned underneath, the branches acting like a curtain, a trap perhaps. He took a few more steps forwards without thinking, and when he caught himself at it, focus returning, he chastised himself. ¡°That was bad Sig, very bad¡± he muttered, annoyed with his distraction. Clearly, he was rusty, having been distracted at the beauty of this dungeon, forgetting the danger it held so easily. Whilst staring around, his mouth dropped open, looking like a gormless idiot, he could easily have been taken unawares by the dungeon. It¡¯s not a woodland, but a dungeon, he thinks hoping it will keep him focused. With his senses sharp, he carefully observed the surroundings, this time looking specifically for any kind of threat, rather than the appreciative gazing he was doing previously. Nothing stands out. He was lucky, the mistake had gone unpunished. Though, it wasn¡¯t likely it would have killed him, it was the first floor after all. The thought is slightly mollifying. Nonetheless, it was something he couldn¡¯t afford to do again, especially seeing as he was alone. As Sigurd set off exploring the floor, he pushed through the grasses, avoiding the thicker patches as best he could, and stopping every so often to listen. Mobs would have just as much trouble moving quietly through the grasses as he did, and he hoped this fact would allow him to catch onto their presence before they caught onto his. Ten minutes later he was still pushing forward, having not encountered anything yet. It was odd, nothing that he had seen so far would pose any threat, there were no large animals or even predatory ones that he could find, no traps for the careless to blunder into, nothing at all. It seemed to be just a small cavern filled with life. Is this really a dungeon. Sigurd continued to explore the floor for about a quarter of an hour before he spotted it. Under one of the trees, a treasure chest, it was a similar colour to the wood and hidden in the roots of the tree. As he got closer, something felt off, Sigurd wasn¡¯t sure what it was, but something about this was unsettling, the tree, the treasure. He paused, looking around. Nothing, no grasses shaking as of some predator preparing to leap, no suspicious patches of ground to fall through nor cracks in the rock above his head. Sighing, he moved forwards, pausing with each step. Nothing. With nothing else to do, he pushed aside some of the dangling branches with the axe head as he prepared to step finally step within the layer of branches. This was a mistake! The branches reeled back and the whole tree seemed to come alive. It whipped out, sending him sprawling, back to the floor. Thankfully out of its reach, Sigurd scrambled up, looking around quickly, nothing. Standing up, he looked at the tree, now just as still as before. This was something new! he had never heard of trees like this. Sure there were plant mobs, but they were more like animals when the dungeon was finished with them, giant plants that could swallow a man whole roaming around and blending in, mushrooms that hopped around, but a tree that came alive, odd! He was smiling as he thought about it, this was new, and he couldn¡¯t help the excitement welling up within him. He was excited to delve further, this was great, new things to explore, he had originally given up delving because his team and he were weary of doing the same things day in day out, the deeper dungeons that had things they hadn¡¯t seen were far too dangerous for such an average team and so they had given up, retired whilst still ahead. Returning his mind to the tree, he pondered the best way to approach it, eventually deciding to give it an early pruning. He stood, just out of reach, calmly hacking at the tree until it couldn¡¯t get at him anymore. As expected, the chest was a little meagre, containing only a few low value coins that Sigurd quickly funnelled into a belt pouch. But he was happy with the loot nonetheless. It was loot after all. As he continued around the floor, he noticed a few more trees with treasure chests beneath them. Approaching the closest, he stopped just out of range, stepping forward to get it to try and attack, before stepping out of range and swinging his axe. Or that is what he would have been doing if it had responded and tried to attack. Alas it didn¡¯t. He took another step forwards and then another. Another. Another, and now he was close enough to touch the tree, he gave it a quick slashing stroke before dancing back out of range. No response. A bit more probing with no response and Sigurd eventually concluded it was just a tree. He collected similarly meagre loot and moved on. Spying the exit for the floor he continued pushing though the undergrowth, pulling the plants out of the way, and forcing though the brush. He felt a few snags here and there as the foliage pulled at his clothes and body, but it didn¡¯t stop him and soon he exited the grasses to stand just before the tree that loomed above the exit, surely this one was alive. This story is posted elsewhere by the author. Help them out by reading the authentic version. Idly Sigurd noticed he was bleeding in a fair few spots, on the exposed skin of his right arm and leg and around the joins between the greaves and leather cuisse which were left loose to aid in mobility. Wiping it up with a cloth from his bag, Sigurd focused and in much the same way as before dismantled the tree that tried to throttle him, before ducking beneath the shortened branches, taking the treasure and exiting upon the far side. Time for floor two, perhaps there would be danger there, floor one had been remarkably easy, and he suspected the dungeon wouldn¡¯t give out another free shot, it had to recoup the mana lost at some point. Though is suspected the trees would catch a fair few beginners out once the dungeon became more well known. The stairs going down were made from the roots of the tree that he had just defeated. It was a nice touch he had to admit, clever. It fit the aesthetic of the room perfectly. Sigurd was significantly reticent of stepping onto the stairs, especially considering the trees were capable of moving, he was nervous that they would disappear from beneath him. Luckily Sigurd could look through the roots and see the rock that they were resting on. Sigurd already liked this dungeon, and he suspected that learning its depths would be a great deal of fun. As long as it got harder and more profitable, then he imagined that this could become a major part of the world¡¯s economy. Because the one thing adventurers liked more than money, was adventure, hence the name, and this so far, was unique. Sigurd walked down and around, spiralling down about 15 metres before emerging from the side of the wall of the next floor. Floor two was similarly themed. The steps emerged from the side of a cavern even bigger than the last, and high up, like really high up. Below was a floor of foliage, the canopy of the tree tops, He took the next few steps down carefully, he really didn¡¯t want to fall through the canopy to the floor below, not knowing how far that drop was, was playing with his mind. On one hand, he didn¡¯t know how far the drop was and couldn¡¯t see it, on the other he didn¡¯t know if he would survive the fall. If he was betting, it would be that he wouldn¡¯t. In front of him was a tree trunk that almost brushed the ceiling, the tree was several metres around and cut into its trunk was a small opening. When he got closer, he could see that it was a staircase, original. The stairs in the tree coiled down a long, long way, and at several points along the winding staircase there were paths that led out into the different layers of foliage. Sigurd peered out trying to follow the route, but he struggled to pick the path from amongst the greenery. No, he decided, he preferred the stability of the ground and so he continued down the tree in hopes of reaching the bottom. Give me firm ground under my boots any day he thought to himself. The staircase continued for a few more loops before it exited onto the floor. It was a bit darker than before, like a late afternoon summer as the sun begins to set and the shadows lengthen, distorting the shapes which cast them. The trees block out enough of the light from above the canopy that the floor looks as if it is laced in a mottled golden blanket. The ground itself was coated in a layer of dead leaves and twigs that had been compressed into a woody surface. It was an odd detail that stood out to Sigurd but one that did, for if he had been designing a dungeon, he would not have thought of the dead leaves from many past cycles and the ground would have been bare. Sigurd considered the many oddities with this dungeon and got the sinking feeling that perhaps there was a measure more intelligence to this one than the others he had been in. Stepping out onto the soft ground he whipped out his axe, expecting an attack, nothing came. It was quiet once again, as if the world had but for a moment forgotten him. It was an almost uneasy silence, unsettling and eerie. Nay it couldn¡¯t last and as he looked around trying to get his bearings the sounds and sights and smells filtered in. Unlike the first floor, where he had entered from one side with the goal to get to the other, this time he had been dropped off in the centre of the floor with no idea in which direction to head first. Looking up he felt small, the trees themselves were huge towering monoliths that climbed up and out of view as their branches and leaves spread out to form the canopies he had walked upon. Their trunks several metres around, he struggled to take in their form in their entirety. Sigurd hoped the exit was on the ground, but had not discounted the possibility it was on one of the many canopy layers he had seen earlier. He dreaded that possibility. A half-dwarf had no place dancing among the tree-tops. On first examination, he couldn¡¯t see any immediate life, though the signs were there. He could hear birds fluttering around, their wingbeats resounding in the quiet, the occasional snorting grunt echoed from somewhere off to his right and on the floor to his left, the ground had been disturbed. Sigurd thought it might have been a wolf paw print, but he wasn¡¯t an expert, nonetheless he could see the distinct signs of the toes and claws. He would be going into this floor with the expectations of fighting wolves, something he had done many times though less frequently in dungeons themselves as opposed to the forests of the continent. The dungeon it seemed had finally introduced a predator, at last. Sigurd was looking forward to a fight, nothing got the heart racing quite like it. Further to the left, the soft tinkle of flowing water caught his ear, it was a slow, trickling stream. He made his way over to the stream figuring it was as good as any other point to start from. It was a small stream, perhaps a metre wide and fairly shallow as well, the water was completely clear, the surface appearing glasslike as it trickled over the light grey pebbles that made up the bottom. It was unusual to find such a clear stream in the outside world and it was yet another fact that made this dungeon so unusual, not that it had clear water but that it was set up in an almost idyllic way, as if in creating each floor an almost utopian aesthetic had been developed. Other dungeons Sigurd had delved in were always much more rough and ready, with narrow roughly hewn tunnels connecting into larger rooms and caverns. The woodland was peaceful, the breeze gentle, the trickling water and the sounds of the birds pleasant, the temperature and light levels perfect. It was a dungeon for fuck¡¯s sake. Sigurd sighed, an illusionary paradise that would catch you unawares if you relaxed in its enchanting clutches. Since the stream itself held no clues, he decided to abandon it and set off exploring the woods on the upstream side. He encountered nothing much beside some small pawprints in the soft ground, smaller than before, perhaps a fox or a large rodent. Nothing threatening. Continuing to explore, he found a treasure chest with some more coins and a couple of ingots of iron. He thought it was iron and would have to test it back in Littlebrook but he was confident of his guess. Still no wolves though. He had been wandering for almost 30 minutes before he came across them. Enough time for his shoulders and eyes to begin to tire from being on guard so much. He had just rounded an especially large tree when he encountered them. At first only one attacked, jumping upon him from where it had hidden behind the great tree. Catching him in the front as he turned to face it. It scratched Sigurd lightly, the claws of its paws catching behind a strip of metal on the side of his breastplate and yanking it off, the impact knocked him off balance. The armour had taken most of the blow and though it was a bit mauled, nothing serious had broken. Recovering his balance Sigurd threw one nice looping swing from his axe, which bit into the wolfs¡¯ neck and dispatched it. Seeing this, its packmates decided to jump into the fray, though too late to save the initial attacker. As he brought the axe up from the death dealing blow, a wolf managed to catch a bite on his forearm, the teeth closing around him, clamping around the metal of his gauntlet, and squeezing the arm tight, one of its canines skated off the steel surface and slipped into the leather, punching into his arm, drawing blood. He managed to shake off the wolf, wincing as he felt the fang lacerate his skin before disengaging. One swinging attack from his axe upon high, cleaved into its flesh, shearing through muscle and bone alike and taking off the attacker¡¯s hind leg. Sigurd grinned like a madman, revelling in the battle as he heard it yelp from the pain. That was before he buried his axe in the poor monster¡¯s head, dispatching it with ruthless efficiency before rolling over its now dead body to avoid a swipe from its packmate. Four left. It took a good ten minutes of careful, solid, fighting before Sigurd managed to kill them all. By the end of the fight, he wasn¡¯t too bad off, having used up one health potion and received enough damage that his armour would need some minor repairs. All in all, it wasn¡¯t too bad for his first fight in a while, and he felt he was doing pretty good. The wolves hadn¡¯t proven too much of a challenge, just enough to get back in the saddle so to speak. And he¡¯d earned enough from the pelts and the coins he had looted to cover replenish everything he had used so far and some. Wandering round the rest of the level, yielded nothing new except for a few more treasure chests with only slightly better loot than that of the first floor. He did spot what looked like some healing herbs on his wandering, he pocketed a few on his way. The oddest thing he had found so far had been the half-buried campsite, it looked like there had been other people here at some point, or at least that was what the dungeon wanted him to think, he struggled to imagine anyone having made it to the dungeon before him though. In the end he assumed they were just there for decoration, perhaps to aid adventurers in setting up a temporary camp for further explorations. Though why anyone would want to camp inside an active level, such a short distance inside was beyond him. With the floor pretty much explored, it was just about time to find the exit. He returned to the stream, locating it by sound as he could hear it from where he was, and this time followed it downstream. As he walked along the waterway, following it on its journey he was taken unawares by a big predator. It leaped down from one of the sky paths in the trees that overlooked the stream and landed on him, sending him crashing to the ground and rolling away, falling into the stream. Sigurd felt a deep gouge spring open in his arm and a crack from within, what he assumed to be a broken rib. Struggling to his feet in the water, he splashed around managing to gain his balance before it lunged at him again. Sigurd swung his axe upwards as it pounced, trying to twist sideways and step out of the way at the same time. His definitely broken rib sent a lance of pain through his chest, and he stumbled. Despite this the axe struck true, slicing through the jaw of the animal, a cat he could now see, and embedding itself in the skull, ending its life. The weight of the animal landed on Sigurd knocking him back into the water and muffling his face in its fur. Groaning, he sat up spluttering and spitting the wet fur from his mouth as he pushed the cat off him. However, just as he tried getting to his feet, a huge rush of water came crashing down the stream picking him up and sending him tumbling along and down. He was swept along, his focus only on holding onto his axe and trying not to breath in the water and before he knew it, he felt the ground disappear from beneath him and then he plummeted. Sigurd screamed, much to his embarrassment should anyone have heard him, and managed to rotate in mid-air enough, and just in time too, to see himself face plant into solid ground a good 30 metres below where he had fallen. His vision flickered as he tried to raise his head and then went black. Chapter 13 ========== [Dungeon] When I looked for the source of the thumping beat, that echoed around my dungeon I found it at the entrance, or more specifically I found him. It was a man. Covered in shiny metal and holding a large axe in one hand. He entered the dungeon cautiously, stepping into the black mist that covered my entrance with slow deliberate steps, checking the ground with his axe handle each time. There was nothing there beyond a straight tunnel. It took him about two minutes to exit the darkness that clouded my entrance cutting off his vision, before he emerged into my first floor. As I observed his methodical, slow steps it occurred to me that it would be funny to put stairs going down to the first floor instead of the flat ramp currently there. Back to the man, he had dusty blonde hair edging towards white, and a pair of deep blue eyes whose lustre had faded with the years. A square jaw bristled with a thick brown beard half of which was going grey, in places. The grey hairs and the few wrinkles that I could see, gave away his age. He had broad shoulders, currently covered in leather and steel armour, and around his waist, a belt with several potions and pouches. On the whole I thought he seemed rather well equipped for my first adventurer but then he was alone. As the man exited into the floor and gazed upon my splendid creation, his mouth dropped and his arm relaxed, letting the axe hang loose in his fingers until the axe head hit the floor with a soft ¡®tink¡¯ distracted as he was. His vacant look lasted only briefly before he snapped back to himself. Pausing briefly, he pulled a face that made me think he was annoyed with himself, and then glanced around with a more direct, pointed look. He observed the dungeon in an almost analytical sense. He moved forwards slowly and carefully and proceeded to examine the plants, grasses, bushes, walls and all the other interesting features I had incorporated into this floor from the safety of the open ground. Retreating back, away from the grass he stood for a few moments observing all that lay before him. I frowned as I stood, this was not what the guide had suggested the first delver would be like, he was too prepared, to careful, as if the temptations of the treasure I could give held no sway with him. ¡®Perhaps he is an oddity¡¯, I thought to myself. Seemingly having satisfied something he needed, the man moved forwards with purpose, pushing open the grasses that blocked his way, stepping through with¡­ well, not grace¡­ but fortitude and strength. He circled around the floor keeping his back close to the wall like hedges as he skirted the first room and turned to his left. It wasn¡¯t long before he would find a chest, and I watched with mounting anticipation as he neared one of my willows. Spotting it he marched forward and cautiously pushed open the branches using his axe. Fool. I thought fiendishly as I waited. I almost winced as he was sent falling back. Whipped by the branches, with a deep gouge taken out of his chest plate. By this point it was clear to me he was at least a bit more experienced with dungeons and I took it as excellent news that my plants could catch someone with at least a little experience out. Unfortunately, that only lasted until the man, stood just out of range calmly chopping his way through the branches that lashed out at him. I sighed, that was the drawback with a tree, it couldn¡¯t move. Unless¡­ No, not now! I thought to myself feeling the flicker of an idea forming. I banished it for the moment intent to focus upon this man. He pocketed the loot, looking a little disheartened at my meagre offerings and continued on. Tough, I thought, there were no active predators here, no good treasure for that. Derision bubbled up within me at the idea of rewarding someone more than I had for such a simple task. It took him another 45 minutes to fully explore the floor, having missed the iron spine hedgehogs and mad magpie both. He despatched another couple of my weeping willows of garotte, taking the loot and looking surprised when some of the trees did nothing. Hopefully he would be confused when the trees all changed places before his next entrance. Assuming he survived to try again. Unfortunately, I expected he would as the man was a bit too careful. Walking down to the second floor, he stared at the steps apprehensively. He paused again at the entrance to the second floor, before spotting the staircase in the tree and making his way over to it. The man took far too long, and if all the adventurers were going to be like this, then I¡¯d never get anything done, the incessant pounding that followed along with him delving seemed to demand my attention and prevented me from working. Thankfully, it was at least interesting to watch him explore and it wasn¡¯t long before he was on the floor and examining something I hadn¡¯t noticed, a wolf print. If you find this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the infringement. I helped guide the wolves too him, interested in how he would deal with a wolf. It jumped out from behind a large tree and though it seemed to get him good, he recovered from the ambush quickly and slew it with no hesitation. How about the rest I thought. Go I commanded to the other wolves, watching as they advanced as a pack. The rest of the pack followed shortly, although he did receive enough damage to warrant using a potion. I stared at the vial, watching him consume it and following the mana as it worked to heal his injuries, filling in missing flesh and quenching bleeding. It was almost a shame, I was half rooting for his death. He grimaced, distaste evident on his face as he chucked the empty vial away. Curious, I looked at it in greater detail, zooming my vision in until¡­ ~~ You have discovered a middling healing potion, because it is mostly empty the amount you learn from it is insufficient to recreate this item. Find and collect another four empty potions or one full potion to learn more about this item. ~~ Like a sneaky rogue, he worked his way through the rest of the level with ease. Having defeated the wolfpack the only threats remaining on the floor was the cat, but it hadn¡¯t yet become mine, very soon though and the family of elementals. If he ascended into the trees he would find my avalt pythons and crash birds but for the moment the floor was clear. Surprising me as well as the man, he was tackled hard by the cat which ended up knocking him in the stream. It chuffed in what looked like amusement and darted away. He struggled to his feet in time to watch the cat launch from a different angle. With surprising dexterity, he swung his axe from down low catching the cat in the jaw with as much serendipitous luck as skill, killing it. No! I thought, angry with myself, how did I let myself lose the cat. Trapped under its furry corpse the man struggled to sit up. Oh no boyo, not going to happen. I said to myself commanding the water elementals to send a wave of water down the stream, washing away the intruder. The water carried the man downstream and out over the waterfall. He fell And he fell fast, and landed hard. I almost winced for him again, I didn¡¯t I was a dungeon after all, but almost. A 30m fall onto his face was bound to hurt. He tried to raise his head, but it fell to the floor limply after but a moment, and with a wet slap he blacked out. Sighing I looked at the body of the cat, might as well make use of the mana I thought beginning to suck it up. ~~ Warning: by consuming the mana of this snow leopard you will be unable to respawn it. This animal has completed 93% of the required attunement for dungeon integration and as such is eligible to be respawned with additional mana cost. Do you wish to consume this mana or respawn the cat for 1679 mana? Respawn Consume ~~ Oh, you lucky man Now I wouldn¡¯t have to kill him for sure. RESPAWN! With a slight blurring the corpse faded from view, and I felt that above me in the woodland floor the cat spring into life, bouncing around with obvious glee, glee I imagined at not being dead. I knew, as well, that it was now a dungeon creature and the link felt just as strong as to my wolves. I wondered what the dungeon attunement threshold was. Looking at the store I found the entry for the cat and sure enough it was available at a discount.
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Monsters: Bosses: Items: Materials:
Points to spend: 160
Snow Leopard Danger level: 1.0 Points: 120* 85
The Snow Leopard is an agile foe at home in the mountains, its white coat blends well into the snow but a mottled grey patchiness also allows it to blend into the ground equally well. An ambush predator, the snow leopard likes to jump from on high with extreme speed and knock its foe to the ground with its claws before crushing the neck as a killing blow. Snow leopards are solitary creatures preferring to be alone or in the company of their mate if at all.
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With obvious delight I bought another one, designating this one as female and hoping they were happy together. Both cats would do well on my floor and were a great addition to the woodland. I decided that I would make them a small cave and plateau out of rock in the walls that they could call home, it would also prevent adventurers from skirting the walls to try and avoid fights if the leopards could get behind them and dive from above. Trying to dig into the rock though resulted in a splitting headache as the mana refused to work. ~~ Dungeons are unable to perform terrain modification work behind the path of the lead delver. ~~ I sighed, it would have to wait, Sorry cats. Strangely, nothing major came along to kill the man. Having recovered my cats, I returned to a non-interference policy. It would have been easy to direct an alligator over for an easy meal, but I resisted. The man was lucky, in fact only the insects investigated him. He received a few stings and bites that mollified my thirst for violence, if left untreated they could become infected, but I suspected one of the potions things on his belt would deal with the stings and bites handily. He was lying on a semi-hard section of ground in the swamp floor. It was a section of grasses that kind of floated on top of the water but were still anchored in place, so they didn¡¯t end up drifting around. He was luck he had landed with his head out of the water. As he ¡®slept¡¯, water lapped around his waist and soaked into his clothes. I predicted that it would be pretty uncomfortable for him. Not that it wasn¡¯t already with all the insects biting him. All to soon he started to wake up, but he appeared groggy and out of it. I guessed he would continue working his way through the dungeon once he had perked up a little. Since the thundering heartbeat wasn¡¯t lessening, I sighed and settled down to watch him bumble his way through until he either died or decided to walk out. Chapter 14 ========== [Marrok] Marrok crawled over the rise, eager to see the camp, it was the second day since leaving for his hunt and he came back wounded but victorious. Not with any sort of prey but with the knowledge of a dungeon. A dungeon that would do exceptional things for the goblins of the weir wood. They would hone their skills and weapons on the easier monsters, recuperate and hunt, breed prepare for in the late summer he would attack, whichever town was nearest. Hopefully accruing enough marks on his tally to take his from legend to myth. Perhaps not. Marrok was a realist and he knew that it would be many more attacks until he reached 200. But he was close. He snarled at the pain in his body, more annoyed at its lack of function than at the pain itself. The goblins would have to rebreak his bones, having begun to heal all on their own. As he crawled forward, he reached the top of the hillock, watching the gently waving grass as he looked down at the camp. There were several fire pits going, with plenty of meat cooking and goblins relaxing. It sounded like a perfect evening. Summoning his energy, he wobbled onto his feet and marched back into camp, a vicious smile painted on his face. The first goblin to greet him was Forroll; she was shorter than average, with pretty eyes and small drop tusks, that peaked out of her lips, gleaming and sharp. She had light brown hair that complemented her pale green skin and of course, most importantly for Marrok, she was a scout commander, a damn good one at that, with no thoughts to try for his position ¨C as far as he knew anyway. She was a pretty sort and if he didn¡¯t value her head so much, he¡¯d have bedded her by now. ¡°Chieftain¡± she said, bowing. Marrok smiled slightly, and continued past, hiding the extent of his injuries as he made his way through to his tent. Forroll followed him, catching onto the pain in his eyes. He nodded to the other goblins, relieved when they didn¡¯t raise a toast to him. What he needed most was to recover first, in secret and prevent the other goblins knowing how injured he was and then he would present them with the dungeon idea, well, present only in the meaning of telling them what to do. It was not open to discussion. ¡°Forroll¡± he said as the tent flaps closed behind them, ¡°I need food rest and healing.¡± ¡°Got it¡± She replied heading out. Marrok shuffled over to the bed, a low timber structure packed with moss and leaves for cushioning, perched on the edge and levered himself onto the bed. It wasn¡¯t too long before Forroll returned, carrying a bowl of food. Bread, cold meat ¨C Marrok thought it smelled of venison ¨C and some foraged greens, his stomach grumbled at the smell, and he tucked in with pleasure. She was followed by another female, Lethin. She was an old goblin, specialising in healing, and she came to stand by the bed frame, casting a critical eye over his injuries. Healing was one of the few non-combat professions that the goblins accepted. She earned her marks by proxy: any goblin that she saved would owe the next mark gained to her, thus allowing her to gain a suitable tally to greet the one God but also furthering goblin kind. Still, it was looked down upon despite the obvious value. Marrok himself had gifted ten marks to healers over his life and they had earned his respect. ¡°The legs will need re-breaking, Chief,¡± she said, confirming his thoughts. ¡°I¡¯ll bind the ribs, and set the legs and then you can take a potion.¡± ¡°No, save the potions; they¡¯ll be needed in the future. I found something, something that will make us strong, strong enough to challenge them all.¡± He replied, coughing slightly. ¡°Don¡¯t be an idiot Marrok, we need you, we need your leadership here, already there¡¯ve been a few fights, nothing serious, but with you off for a few days some of the young¡¯uns have thought about challenging you. If we are to make use of this discovery of yours, we must spare one of the potions.¡± ¡°No, I¡¯ll be healed in a couple weeks, we can manage till then.¡± ¡°You won¡¯t have a couple of weeks, there¡¯s no way we can hide your injuries while you have braces and bindings on. You are taking that potion.¡± ¡°Save it¡± This story has been unlawfully obtained without the author''s consent. Report any appearances on Amazon. ¡°No¡± ¡°Lethin¡­¡± ¡°No, Marrok, you haven¡¯t been here, it¡¯s not good, we need you back now, take control and you can tell us all about the discovery you have once we¡¯re stable again. Ok?¡± she said glaring at him. Marrok sighed, nodding slightly. ¡°OK, I¡¯ll break your bones now¡± she replied with obvious pleasure, hefting a hammer. He grimaced. *** 1hr later *** Marrok winced, letting out a low moan as he held in the scream. Having your bones broken again and again as a healer tried to align them was incredibly painful, and Lethin had not tried to make it more comfortable for him. He must have really annoyed her by refusing the potion, even though she won in the end. As the last brace went on, stabilising his legs he felt a glass bottle being shoved into his face. Sitting up, he reached over grabbed the flask and quaffed the potion in three big gulps. Healing energy flowed through his body. He itched, feeling muscle regrow and fill in the lacerations made by the vine-like tree branches and the cat. Watching as the skin knit itself together like a blanket. Bones popped and shifted as the broken ends merged together, fusing once again. Marrok felt increasingly exhausted as the potion used up his energy in addition to its own. As his injuries slowly faded, leaving behind scars he fell into a deep sleep. ========== [Forroll] Forroll watched as Chieftain Marrok fell into a deep sleep. He was damn stubborn, but he was incredible. It was why the Weir goblins had done so well. Goblins were not well liked by the other races. Though that might have been a kind way of putting it. Goblins were despised by the other races. Forroll thought it was for good reason, though she didn¡¯t care. The tall ones only existed to be added to the tally. Their heretical belief systems confounded goblins and their extermination raids meant that goblins didn¡¯t tend to live long lives. Goblins added them to the tally in order to meet the true God. It wasn¡¯t their fault that the tall ones were wrong. But Chieftain Marrok had changed the way goblins approached things. He was on the smaller side, but it was his ferocity and intellect that had allowed the Wier goblins to survive. Forroll thought back on her past, she had been just a goblin tot when Marrok had first appeared. Janke had found him wandering in the woods, butchered but still alive. He had had a tally to be envious of even then, now though¡­ she thought wistfully. It had taken many moons for Marrok to heal sufficiently but he was welcomed into the tribe. Despite his small stature, the tally that adorned his skin had ingratiated him with the Weir warriors quickly and before long he was leading the goblins out on hunts. It was in the brittle winter that trouble had first emerged. Frost trolls appeared in the woods and prey was driven far from the goblins home ground. Trade caravans had stopped coming and the goblins of the Weir were beginning to starve. Forroll absently tightened her arms around her belly as the memories of the aching cramps of hunger grew fresh in her mind. The lashing sleet and pounding snow that settled in thick blankets, burying the ground to a goblin¡¯s chest height, had been deadly. Lankrik the chieftain at the time had told them to weather the storm and that they would last the winter before growing fat on the renewed trade. Marrok had disagreed, believing, and rightly so, that the winter would continue on far too long for it to have been manageable. Forroll thanked the true God for him, otherwise the goblins would have perished with many not achieving the tally necessary. The worst fate a goblin could imagine. He had slit Lankriks¡¯ throat in battle for the next chieftain and pushed the goblins hard through the snow to the nearest human village. It was on the edge of the Weir Forest and the goblins had always left it alone because it was always host to numerous caravans with extremely dangerous guards. A challenge too mighty for the goblins. With the brittle winter¡¯s hold on the land though, it was a target ripe for the taking. Forroll remembered the crunch of snow under her cloth-wrapped feet and the smell of ash and wood from the warming fires in the hearths of the villagers homes. Homes that, soon after, belonged to them. The slaughter had been glorious and many a goblin had added to their tally that night. She herself had added three. A young boy was first, taller than her, but that wasn¡¯t a feat hard for the tall ones, he came up a head above an adult¡¯s waist. Forroll was not sure what age that made him, but he was certainly not grown. He had frozen, cried and fallen silent with an axe in the head. A smile graced Forroll¡¯s lips as she stood in the tent, hidden in the darkness of the extinguished lantern. She savoured the memory of the kill. The next one had been a woman, she had charged with a knife, protecting the boy, but it was too late, and she was dispatched just as easily. A few houses later, Forroll came across the most important mark on her tally. A large male human, tanned and scarred by a tough life. She remembered the scent of his blood and the huge bushy beard that adorned his face. He had held off many a goblin with his spear, killing Janke and a few others, until she had slipped in behind him, sliced through his ankles and buried her axe in his head as he toppled to the ground. The goblins had occupied the village for the remainder of the winter, eating up all the supplies and razing the rest to the ground before leaving in the spring. Marrok had saved them and, as chieftain, he led them on a array of ambushes that left the humans floundering. Now with the Wier woods tainted on account of that traitor - Forroll paused her thoughts to spit at the memory of that coward - they had breached the mountains and descended into new woodland. Woodland that could be their home to recover and recuperate before launching a raid of their own. Forroll hadn¡¯t forgotten Marroks¡¯ words. He had found something, something that could make them even stronger. The Wier goblins were no more, they would be forged anew in the coming months, into something different. Forroll was sure of it. She gazed down at her Chieftain, considering everything, before buckling up the tent flap and sliding into the bed with him. Soon she too slipped into the black. Chapter 15 ========== [Sigurd] Sigurd came to, dazed and confused. He groaned, pressing his hand to his head. He blinked twice before realising the hand was wet, in fact, more than just the hand was wet; he was soaking. What was going on? Where was he? In a flash, it all came back and he tried to scramble to his feet. He was in a dungeon, and a dangerous one at that. Memories of the wolves surfaced and the cat that knocked him into the stream followed soon after. He had been washed down stream and dumped off here, in this¡­ swamp? Predictably, as Sigurd tried to get to his feet in a hurry, the floor moved, and he fell over, face first, in a puddle, swallowing a load of the dirty water. Coughing and spluttering, he rose to his feet, wiped the water and dirt from his eyes and brow, and drew his axe. Taking a few seconds, he observed his surroundings. Sigurd was standing in a steamy, smelly, stagnant swamp. The ground shifted dramatically as he moved, and as a result Sigurd sort of waddled around as he took a few steps forward. Damp was the prevailing smell. Though you wouldn¡¯t normally describe damp as being a smell, it was the only description that Sigurd could think of that fit. Everything was wet, and the over-ripe smell pervaded the air almost as if it was thick enough to form clouds. The moisture in the air, - humidity he¡¯d heard it called by the artificers ¨C filled his lungs, cloying and with the heat of the swamp. The whole atmosphere was oppressive, and Sigurd felt it. It was much more like a dungeon usually felt. Though dungeons normally had that intimidating effect because of the density of the mana they exuded and the knowledge of the countless fallen adventurers in whose steps you traced. Sigurd certainly could not recall ever feeling that way due to the physical atmosphere alone. Though the atmosphere was stifling, what was really the most unsettling was the sonorous humming buzz from the thousands of insects that called this place home. A vociferous outcry, protesting at the intrusion. Sigurd swatted at a cloud of midges buzzing around his face as he looked further afield. Marshy trees grew off in the distance, their creeping vines and mangrove roots intertwining with each other, latticing boundaries on the water¡¯s edge, a perfect hiding spot for all manner of creatures. He gave it a cautionary nod. Marching over to the edge of his wobbly little island, Sigurd peered into the water beyond. It had a crystal-clear surface layer that faded very quickly as the algal bloom and silt increased dramatically. He took a step off, yelping as his foot plunged far deeper than expected, the water which was up to mid-calf originally, flooded up to mid-chest making him gasp at its cold embrace as it engulfed him. As he stood, slowly sinking into the silt, he felt something. A fluttering brush against his calf and then a rush of water moving against him as whatever it was circled back for a big hit. Sigurd dodged, jumping out and back onto the safe, albeit wobbly, island. Staring into the depths, he saw a flash of green scales and a powerful tail flick before it disappeared into the murky depths. The brown-green water obscuring all traces. From the glimpse that Sigurd caught, he thought that the scales looked big, and it gave him the sense that this was a significantly more dangerous floor. Off behind some of the thick vegetation, a cacophony of noise echoed out; birds rapidly taking flight and honking and tweeting in fury. There was a loud snap and squawk followed by a large splash. Sigurd imagined that some unfortunate bird had lost its life. The branches rustled a few moments later as the birds that had alighted at the danger all landed in the trees, out of reach of whatever lurked bellow. Sigurd slapped at a biting bug that had decided to make him its next meal, squashing it against his arm and smearing its blood, blood that burned, on his hands and arm. Sigurd quickly bent down to wash it off and the pleasure of the cooling water removing its acidic remnants took him by surprise. There was an important decision to make right now. Press on and take some risks in the unknown, or retreat and get a significantly reduced price for giving information on an unmapped dungeon. The adventuring guilds paid out a substantial amount of money for info on new dungeons, but fully mapped ones even more so: though woe-betide anyone who sold incorrect information. You didn¡¯t want to get on the wrong side of the guild. If the dungeon was mapped out initially, by its discoverer, then the guild paid a lot more as they wouldn¡¯t have to send in a team of surveyors to help catalogue the dungeon. The surveyors ¨C terrible name by the way ¨C were groups of strong adventurers that often-explored new dungeons, mapped them and rated them for the guild. This was done so that newbies didn¡¯t go too far or try a challenge that was far beyond them, only to die in unexceptional fashion. The guild wasn¡¯t about protecting people from stupidity, but they didn¡¯t want people to die based on incorrect knowledge. Taking stock, Sigurd realised that he was sporting a lot of cuts and bruises. Few serious ones though, which was good. He had an injury to a rib, cracked, fractured or just bruised he couldn¡¯t say. Additionally, his shoulder had seized up and it was painful to move, Sigurd figured he must have landed on it. His weapons and armour were damaged slightly, and he was just very uncomfortable. Overall, not great, but not too bad either. But, he had to admit he was in pretty shabby condition ¨C and despite wanting to continue ¨C he hadn¡¯t got to middle age by being reckless and stupid. Retreating was a sound decision. If he had known the dungeon and wasn¡¯t alone, it might have been another story, but that wasn¡¯t the case here. Looking up, Sigurd saw the stream that had carried him down. It tipped over the cliff in a beautiful cascade of crystal-clear water that crashed down into the swamp. The waterfall that formed was a majestic but unnatural pale-blue and behind it, a dark shadow. Investigating further revealed a cave, and within, a short path led to a spiral staircase that wound its way up and up and then narrowed significantly. At the end, there was a lever. Pulling it opened up an exit and as soon as he passed through, it slammed closed. Looking around, Sigurd recognised the second floor, and if he wanted to leave he had to climb back up. He sighed. Sigurd was hoping for a shortcut to the surface, but it wasn¡¯t to be. The trip back was uneventful, he felt more watched than at anytime in any other dungeon and Sigurd knew that if he had tried to loot anything the temporary protection for his retreat would be rescinded quite violently. Walking back to the entrance, he found no black fog to blind him, and Sigurd emerged into the fresh open air just as dusk was beginning to descend. Breathing deeply, he set about collecting all his stuff, changing, and packing for the hike back to town. Sigurd set off what was probably an hour later, ready to bring news to the village, though it would have to wait till the morrow. Right about now, a nice, relaxing bath was in order and a hearty dinner too. Sigurd sighed, relaxing at the thought. Yes, it was definitely in order. The journey passed quickly and as the day was nearing its close he could see the village in greater detail. The narrow, drystone wall, wooden houses with slate or straw roofs and plentiful fields revealed the signs of a village obscured in a haze of the setting sun. In a few windows, Sigurd spotted the flickering of a fire or the dull glow of a mage-light illuminating the house for the families as they began to settle down for the evening. Smoke rose from a couple of chimneys and silence reigned. Perfect. It took only a couple of minutes to reach home and a few more to settle down into a bath. For a long time, Sigurd contemplated going to sleep, but for that he got out of his bath and slid into bed, his stuff could wait for tomorrow. With a sigh, he pulled the covers up and closed his eyes as darkness flooded in. ========== [Dungeon] The horrid pounding abated fairly quickly ¨C as soon as the short man left in fact. He had made it to the swamp, after getting ambushed, knocked out and swept down the stream. I laughed gently remembering that. Upon gaining consciousness, he decided to jump into the water, a mistake he quickly rectified. Baffling. Perhaps it spooked him, because soon after he looked around and decided to leave. A shame, I was looking forward to digesting him. On the other hand, I suspected that he would be coming back soon enough, perhaps with a bunch more friends for me. I watched him leave, instructing the creatures to leave him alone. Could I ambush him on the way back? YES Should I ambush him on the way back? YES, probably. Did I? NO It felt wrong to go after someone who was retreating. After all he had admitted defeat, that I was better than him, and it would be far more likely that people would dive deeper and see more of my magnificence if they knew getting back would be safe. After he exited the first floor, I polished off a few of the changes I had wanted to make while watching him. First, the stairs at the start. I smiled again imagining him tripping down them. Carving into the stone took so little mana now that I had perfected my art, that I barely noticed the small drain. Then the small cave for the snow leopards. I placed it at the opposite end to the cave for the water elementals, spreading my creatures over the whole level. It was about 15 metres high, with a few small ledges to allow the cats to jump up to get to it. Introducing them to it went well and they settled down together almost immediately. Perfect. Shifting around details, hiding others and just generally smoothing issues that had become apparent whilst he was working his way through my dungeon took me a while to implement. Things like moving the trees slightly, adding a few branches here and there and a few cosmetic changes to the levels such as deepening the greens on the leaves in level two. Mostly however it was balancing work. Once the changes were made, the next issue was my limited mana, it was really halting any work I wanted to do. It seemed that adventurers helped as they naturally exuded mana, or at least that man did. I could leech it away and if they died, I expected that I¡¯d get all of it. Unauthorized usage: this tale is on Amazon without the author''s consent. Report any sightings. Perhaps I should have finished him off, I thought absently, but then I wouldn¡¯t get an influx of adventurers. Hmm¡­ what to do? What to do? Well it¡¯s a bit late now, I suppose it doesn¡¯t really matter anymore. Having fixed my dungeon as best I could, I began to work on the seventh floor. It would be a continuation of the ice theme from the previous floor. Even though the room was smaller I would need more ice for what I had planned. This room was one that was going to be a pure physical challenge. It required a rectangular shape to be cut out of the mountain. When I was done, I had a room 50 metres wide and tall but 200 metres long. The floor was inclined down from close to the ceiling at one end, to near to the floor at the other end of the room, thus creating a 200 metre long ramp. I made the walls have an undulating wave like shape to them. They ran the length of the room and certainly didn¡¯t appear to be natural, though for this room they didn¡¯t have to appear natural. I wasn¡¯t going for the cavern aesthetic here. Adventurers would complete the previous floor and walk out onto a two-metre-wide platform that spanned the width of the room. The floor of the platform was sloped gently down to the beginning of the ramp and so if they weren¡¯t careful, they could slide right into the ramp with no time to prepare. From there the remaining 198 metres was a downhill slope coated in ice that they would have to navigate, with traps, walls, stop-off platforms where there were treasure chests containing loot; the amount depending on how hard to get to they were. Some of the prizes had monsters suitable for defending them and others were just free. But they wouldn¡¯t know which was which, so it wasn¡¯t really free. I hoped they would get surprised or cocky and Bam! Dead! Time would tell, but for sure I couldn¡¯t give them everything free. As before, I created several walls up the stone ramp to contain the water. Filling it up took me several hours of conjuring the water, and freezing it took just as much time and mana. By the time I had frozen all the ice, removed the walls, and got the atmosphere cold enough to support my plans, I had burned through half of my mana. Taking in the glistening white ramp was a beautiful sight that made it all worth it. I marvelled at it for a few minutes before gliding over and using my force magic almost like a big spoon that I could wield to carve channels and ridges into the ramp. Resulting in, hopefully, a great many twisting paths that adventurers could choose to follow. I made sure there were places where the ramp just ended and I carved big holes in the ice and the stone ramp, filling the pit with spikes: adventurers choosing the wrong path, or not nimble enough to dodge them would fall into the pits, hopefully killing them. If they somehow survived, I carved small notches into the walls of my pit to allow them to climb out, but it would be a long and tricky climb. It took me days to carve what I needed, but once the slope was done, with its ridges, banked curves, berms and waves that would make painful jumps to land from, I moved onto some of the more unique elements. I filled the paths with obstacles such as weak ice walls that could be barrelled through and sharp ice spikes that stuck out of the walls at odd angles, hoping to catch the adventurers. Big globs of snow covered some parts of the paths, hiding the next turns. On a whim, I added tunnels that went down steeper and, like a huge waterslide, emerged again, hopefully flinging them through the air. For a particularly painful landing. Some of these tunnels would shoot adventurers probably about ten metres high only to land them in a snowbank. Or of course, a yeti pretending to be a snowbank, how could I not do that! Some even shot them out onto other paths or straight into walls for a tooth-shaking impact. Just an average ice slide you know. I spied two banked turns that veered towards each other and then away separated by only a small half metre thick wall of ice. I cut this intervening wall away so that transferring between the paths was possible and where the walls began again, I narrowed the division point into a deadly spike. Uncontrolled sliding into it would prove to be a very costly mistake. My next task was to polish the whole floor so that it was absolutely impossible to stand on and especially to stop on, I couldn¡¯t have them just slowly shuffling around the slides. The point was, that adventurers would have to slide down on their backsides and use whatever they could to change direction and whatnot, a puzzle of physicality and memory. At various points through the ice slide, the slope levelled out into a platform. If my thinking was correct, it should be possible to slide to a stop before tumbling off the edge, especially with the big snow banks around the platform that would stop someone for sure. On these platforms I roughed up the ice to provide enough friction to be able to fight. As with the previous floor I figured some yeti would be a good challenge, making two per platform guarding a treasure chest. Unfortunately, I did not have enough points to buy any. Each yeti cost 160 points and I had only 75 left. I figured with six platforms, at two yeti apiece I would need 12, not counting the secret area for which I wanted four. I would need a total of 2560 points to buy what I needed. I had made good on discounts, perks and achievements to save my points so far, but it was getting untenable. I received my level multiplied by ten in dungeon points each time I levelled up. So, at my next level up to level 31 I would get 310 dungeon points. Taking that calculation into account, I would need to get to level 38 before I could buy what I needed, giving me 2835 dungeon points. Was that achievable? Could I really get eight levels just to populate this floor? I would be just two levels from my next perk. No, it wasn¡¯t sustainable, there had to be something I was missing. I had got discounts in the store with the creatures that had wandered into my dungeon and lived within me for one month. Why was that? Was it some arbitrary rule that gave a permanent enhancement to using one type of creature? No, I thought to myself. Probably not. The system seems to work on maths and logic. I got an increase in my health the same as my level, I got an increase in my dungeon points at ten times my level. Mana, well I still hadn¡¯t worked out how it determined the requirements for each new level yet, but I would get it eventually. So why did these creatures get a discount? Well, I suppose, what were dungeon points? A tricky question to be fair, and something I wouldn¡¯t crack today, but when I used them, I felt it in my soul, a similar feeling to what I felt in the system use. I remembered the pain of trying to follow that feeling to its source. It had damaged me significantly. So perhaps they were related to the soul: whatever intangible thing that made me, me? Either way, probably irrelevant. I used them to buy things, things which I didn¡¯t have, like a physical object, a creature or knowledge. Knowledge. I felt, when using them, the knowledge filter into my mind. Dungeon points didn¡¯t just conjure an object from some external source they gave me the knowledge, the familiarity to use whatever I had just bought. So, when I bought creatures from the store, it just shoved the basic template knowledge into my head, I used my mana and bam, creature forms and the pre-attuned core exists and the dungeon creature exists. Then, I just filled the template with mana and the creature could be respawned if it had died. Simple and easy. With the ones that wandered in, I had had to take care of them, keep them living, observe them. I knew them and cared for them far more than the generic store-bought ones. They were unique. That was what set them apart. After attuning, though, they felt the same, I knew they were mine. But I also knew them far more. I knew that one of the original wolves was more dominant, bigger, with a few scars. Whilst one of the others was more timid. I knew they bled red, I knew the depth of their fur, I knew¡­ So much! I knew so much more about them. So, if I could find out more about the yeti, I would be more familiar and then the knowledge required by the system would be less. Hopefully, with less knowledge required, the price would drop as the system was doing less work. Work requires energy, and so the system charged for its input. I knew that. I had found ways around using the system before. I had found shortcuts, even just stealing the wolves and cats from the surface had been a shortcut. So therefore, if I could make the system do less work for me the price should hopefully go down. Maybe. It was worth investigating. But if it required a month of observation, there would be no way I could do it for every one of my creatures. Perhaps only for the expensive ones I needed to use lots of, like the yeti. Still, that only gave me a slight reduction in price. Maybe dropping from 2560 required for my yeti to What? Like, maybe 1500? 1250? Still requiring four or five levels. Something which was still not sustainable. It was a start but there must be another way forward. I figured I was doing better than most dungeons with my Bonus perk options. Surely, they wouldn¡¯t be there unless a dungeon did something outside of normal? Right? So how did the other dungeons do it? Smaller rooms maybe? The guide I had bought seemed to suggest that was normal. Less monsters, more traps, because you didn¡¯t need to buy traps if you could figure it out on your own. Adventurers? Everything always came down to adventurers. Everything! It was the main difference between me and others, I thought. I had had only one adventurer, I was just beginning my journey. I NEED ADVENTURERS! Now I was doubly glad I had let the short man go. Still, there was nothing for it right now but to continue on. I set one part of my mind to observing the yeti on the previous floor and continued working on the current one. I still had the secret area to do after all. On the opposite wall to the entrance, at the top, I dropped down a stone frame, a 10 by 10 by 5 metre cage. Filling in the floor and with the stone back wall, I had an open faced room that could be seen from the start. Filling up the wasted space in the floor, I placed five chests filled with good loot. There would be space to add some traps or monsters later, when I had the dungeon points. I knew already that one of the traps would be dropping the adventurers back into the sloping floor, on a path that led to spike pits. This room would be this level¡¯s hidden secret, though it wouldn¡¯t be secret exactly, but how you got there would be. Additionally, I placed a sign that read: ¡°Congratulations adventurer for making it to the ice run¡¯s hidden secret. Here is your prize. Did you find the other levels¡¯ hidden secrets I wonder?¡± Just another clue, I wanted them to search for the secrets. Then I could change them around and make interesting traps. Mentally I began laughing, evilly I assure you, there¡¯s no other kind of laugh that¡¯s appropriate with the thoughts filtering through my mind. With the room complete, I knew I just needed to figure out a way for an adventurer to get up there. It occurred to me, after some pondering, that I had a perfectly good system with the tunnels. If I could alter one to get enough speed up that the adventurers would fly high enough to land on the platform. It needed to be a very hard route that they would need to go down without slowing at all, otherwise it would be too easy. Oh, and I could change the entry point after one team managed to find it, that way it could be a challenge that would have people searching out the routes and thus hopefully making more mistakes. A game within a game, though delving within my dungeon certainly wouldn¡¯t be a ¡®game¡¯. And with that I was done. Floor finished.
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Name: ??? Level: 30
Race: Dungeon Health: 458/475
Titles: / Mana: 2,509 of 40,000
Renown: Discovered Dungeon Points: 75
Rating: 3C Attunement: /
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Rooms: 59 Traps 45
Floors: 7 (+ 1) Unique Items: 6
Bosses: 1 Perks: 1*
Monsters: 305 Dungeon Points: 75
Unplaced Creatures^ 0 Material types: 200^
Chapter 16 ========== [Sigurd] Sigurd awoke to the sound of knocking at the door. Groaning, hesat up, gasping in pain as his chest tried to kill him. Shooting pain ran around his ribs as his breath froze in his chest, the muscles cramping up due to the intensity. Slowly, with shallow pained breaths he straightened up, stretching out his spine and muscles and relieving the cramp. It took a few seconds before the pain eased enough to continue moving. Guess that¡¯s the rib then he thought to himself. Fractured most likely. It seemed he¡¯d have to visit the healer in Oar¡¯s Rest or perhaps even Barkamstead, if there wasn¡¯t one at Oar¡¯s Rest. That was unless he wished to waste another potion. Sliding his feet over the side of the bed, he completed the sitting manoeuvre. Stretching, he rolled hishead around, rubbed the back of hishead, wiped his eyes and stood up, yawning as he did so. Reaching over, he took a sip of water from the mug he kept beside the bed, wincing at the flares of pain in his ribs before he began hobbling over to the dresser. Sigurd slipped on a pair of trousers and a crude cotton shirt, enough to be decent. He imagined he might be having a rather long conversation this morning. Some sandals went on his feet, he kept them for indoor use only, as a way of limiting the dirt inside and thus the number of times a month he needed to clean. The person at the door couldn¡¯t be kept waiting forever. So, after a quick check in the mirror, Sigurd walked through to the kitchen, put a pot of water on and then went to see who was at the door. Unlike the frantic knocking of young John, desperate to know what was going on with the dungeon, this was the slow measured knock of someone who was not in a hurry, just someone living at their own pace. Sigurd was glad: he didn¡¯t have the energy to deal with that rascal, John, right now. He opened the door wide and blinked at the harsh light that invaded his eyes. He kept the house quite dark, especially the bedroom, he couldn¡¯t sleep well unless it was dark. It seemed likely to be around midday, he must have overslept. Delving a dungeon is exhausting after all so it was entirely understandable. Sigurd shaded his eyes with his handbefore mumbling ¡°come in¡± to the man waiting on his doorstep. It was Dale, the leader of the village. Though calling the man a leader was a bit far, not that he was bad, but just that with a village so small and out of the way he was just another person in the village. At least until the tax man showed up or other important business. Business such as the one that had brought him here. The dungeon. ¡°Thanks¡± he replied in a friendly, chipper tone. ¡°Not worried?¡± Sigurd asked, curious. ¡°Nah¡± he replied, following Sigurdthrough to the kitchen, closing the front door as he went. ¡°I figure, whatever it is, it is, you know? No point in worrying about it.¡± ¡°Good attitude to have, wish I shared it, would have saved me a lot of heartache over my life.¡± Sigurd replied, rooting through his cupboardsuntil he found what he was looking for. Aeldra. It was a root of some kind, Sigurd didn¡¯t know from what, but it was a potent stimulant, tasting both bitter and spicy, while mellowing and warm at the same time. Chopping it up, he scooped the chunks up with the knife, careful not to touch it ¨C like turmeric it stained everything it got near and was a pain in the arse to wash away ¨C and wiped his knife on the edge of the pot, scraping the roots into the boiling water. ¡°Thanks¡± the man responded,awkwardly. Not sure what to say next he fell silent while Sigurd prepared the Aeldra. After a minute or so, the Aeldra had imparted enough colour to the water that Sigurd considered it ready. He quenched the fire, drawing his mana from the flame enchant and poured the liquid into two cups, keeping the root behind with a spoon. Setting it down on the table, he pulled a chair back and sat, off to the side of the man. Opposite enough to see each other without turning his head too much but not enough that it felt like a formal meeting. The two men sat in silence for a few minutes, the only sound the shallow huffs they both used to try to cool their drink. They both seemed content to let the moment stall, as if the first one to speak would be the one to herald the change that was sure to sweep over the village. Dale may have been easy-going, taking whatever it was at face value, but Sigurd knew that he had figured out it was a dungeon, and also that the man was incredibly nervous about it. For good reason, a dungeon was both an incredible boon but a dangerous addition, and with Littlebrook being such a small town it was likely that in a few years, there would be nothing left of the quaint little town. The entire place subsumed by the development of a new economic area. When the drink had cooled sufficiently, they both took a sip. Relaxing as the hot, stimulating, drink went down. At some unspoken signal they both took another, set their mugs down and conversed. ¡°Thanks for the drink, Sigurd, it really hits the spot. I don¡¯t get it often, the wife, doesn¡¯t like the staining, nor the drink, so I get none at home.¡± ¡°You¡¯re welcome, Aeldra is a pain with the staining but it¡¯s addictive stuff. I find I need a cup most mornings now.¡± He replied, laughing. ¡°Dungeon?¡± He asked, that one word enough. Sigurd nodded back, confirming what Dale already knew. ¡°Hmmm¡± he murmured, pondering on his thoughts. ¡°Ok¡± ¡°Well, we¡¯re in for a change around here then.¡± ¡°I¡¯d expect so,¡± Sigurd responded. ¡°A good one?¡± he asked. ¡°Yeah, I¡¯d say so¡­ , weird though.¡± ¡°Oh, how so?¡± ¡°Well, like, you know how normal dungeon delving requires you to slink around narrow passages, watching the ceiling, walls and floor for traps or ambush monsters until you reach a room. You have a fight, pick another passage if it¡¯s a non-linear one and continue on?¡± ¡°Yeah¡± ¡°And that some dungeons have wide open passages like ten metres across instead of narrow passage and room, narrow passage and room etc., that you can move around it with monsters along the way.¡± ¡°Right¡± ¡°Basically, just long floors with pretty much one-linear route, extendingfrom the entrance of the floor to the exit on the other side with a few dead ends or challenges.¡± ¡°Yep, gotcha¡± Dale replied nodding along with his explanation. ¡°So¡­ this one. It¡¯s not like that. When I first entered the dungeon, I was greeted with an idyllic meadow filled with lush greenery, woody scents, a gentle breeze, trees, bushes¡­ not the barren rocky¡­ness I was expecting.¡± ¡°What?¡± Dale questioned, not really believing it¡­ ¡°You having me on?¡± ¡°No, no. I mean, I was baffled, and thank God the dungeon didn¡¯t throw anything at me right away otherwise it could have had a free meal I was so shocked. Standing there like a gormless idiot.¡± Dale and Sigurd both shared a laugh at that. ¡°Then what?¡± he asked captivated. Everybody, literally everybody,gets fascinated by dungeons, Sigurd thought to himself. You could be an angsty teenage boy and be fascinated, or a 45 year-old former farmer like Dale; both would be equally enthralled when Sigurd started talking about his experiences. Women were harder to figure out, many of the women Sigurd had been around were the barmaids and whores in the taverns in dungeon towns, who acted interested in the hope of earning some more coin, as well as the other adventurers. They were obviously interested as their profession indicated. Then he¡¯d retired to Littlebrook,where there were no single women, just married mothers and girls; girls a touch young for the aged half dwarf he was. ¡°Well, when I snapped back to myself, I was rightfully ashamed at my lack of composure, so I set about observing everything to try and spot anything. Found nothing, except the stairs going down. With the floor being just one big cavern, I could see everything, you know. The elevated position at the entrance was enough to see over the hedges but I still couldn¡¯t spot any threats.¡± Sigurd took a sip of Aeldra, before continuing, ¡°So I assumed it must be hiding in the grass, snakes or pitfalls or whatever. The next hour or so I spent walking like a mouse, tiptoeing here and there. Nothing.¡± ¡°Really? So, no threats then?¡± ¡°No. Definitely threats¡­ you didn¡¯t think I got this injured falling down the mountain did you?¡± Sigurd asked back. ¡°Well, now you mention it, it does sound like you: was it falling down the mountain then?¡± Dale teased. ¡°No!¡± Sigurd retorted with fake anger. ¡°Dick!¡± he hissed as an after-thought. The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement. Dale laughed. ¡°You are a clumsy dwarf, how was I to know if it was the dungeon or the mountain that hurt you?¡± ¡°Dungeon, definitely dungeon.¡± Another sip of Aeldra went down and Sigurd continued. ¡°Eventually I got the picture, so I started moving a bit quicker, found a chest under a tree and kept my caution about me, I think many a newbie could have gotover excited about that and been caught unawares as when I got closer, the tree came alive, whipping its branches at me and trying to ensnare me. I simply collected myself and gave it an early pruning.¡± Sigurd said, mildly boasting. They both huffed in amusement. ¡°Sounds easy enough though,¡± Dale replied after a moment. ¡°I suppose, with a bit of experience for sure, I didn¡¯t test it, but I imagine the branches could be quite dangerous for the unprepared, especially those of low rank who haven¡¯t got the durability increase.¡± ¡°Could be troublesome, but it sounds like they are static enemies, given a bit of practice they could be dismantled from range in complete safety?¡± ¡°I¡¯d expect so, yeah. Unless the dungeon changes things up, which it could well do if it realises the trees aren¡¯t working.¡± ¡°They do that?¡± Dale asked. ¡°Yeah. It¡¯s the best and most infuriating things about dungeons. Just when the perfect strategy has been developed to beat the dungeon, it goes and changes it up. Like how annoying is that? At least it keeps it fresh and exciting though.¡± ¡°So why did you retire then if it was always fresh and exciting.¡± ¡°Well, fresh and exciting with regard to the tiniest details, like the angle of the walls. You wouldn¡¯t think it, but it can make a huge difference: enough to completely change the approach needed. But at the end of the day, it doesn¡¯t rework the stale air, bland tunnels and fights into something more interesting. It is still the same dungeon, the same fight. There¡¯s only so many differences a rock tunnel and room can have, you know. I guess that and the fact that losing friends made me grow a bit weary of it, I set off to experience something new, and here I am in Littlebrook.¡± ¡°Makes sense I suppose. You gonna pick it up again now that there¡¯s one nearby, and a unique one from the sounds of it?¡± ¡°Maybe. Haven¡¯t decided yet, but you¡¯re right, it is unique. Not only has it just been discovered, but it has multiple floors. I don¡¯t need to tell you that that just doesn¡¯t happen.¡± ¡°What!¡± Dale exclaimed in shock. Everyone knew that dungeons were found with only one floor, sometimes two. They would then expand over time until they could have over a hundred floors, but the guild was so good at finding new dungeon that it was incredibly rare to find one with more than two floors. The guild would then catalogue it and keep track of its expansion, but from the way Sigurd had phrased it, it seemed like this one had more than two. It was unheard of¡­ ¡°How many floors?¡± Dale asked after recovering. ¡°I didn¡¯t get to the bottom, at least four floors though. Floor two was another huge cavern, far larger than before. Actually, it was honestly astonishing in scale. I emerged into the canopy of trees so tall I could scarcely believe, certain death if you were to fall. Crossing it leads to a wooden staircase that descendsthrough a tree to the floor with various stopping off points. I ignored them, I belong on the ground.¡± Sigurd said, picking upthe story. ¡°Too right you dwarven bastard.¡± Dale interrupted. Snorting in laughter. Sigurd glared back. ¡°Continue.¡± He sighed, ¡°Right, so crossing the woodland I got ambushed by wolves, dangerous but nothing I couldn¡¯t handle, before a snow leopard got me, that¡¯s what the damage is from, that and the fall.¡± ¡°Fall?¡± Dale picked up on. ¡°So, I was right, you did get injured falling.¡± Sigurd sighed. ¡°Yes, the cat jumped at me, I killed it, but got knocked back into a small stream and then, I¡¯m not sure, but I guess I triggered a trap, got swept downstream,went over a waterfall and landed in the next floor, a swamp by the way.¡± Dale cackled at that, and Sigurd sighed in response. After a few moments. Dale spoke up. ¡°So¡­ what does this mean for us then? The fact its unique?¡± ¡°It¡¯s hard to say, I would imagine the dungeon has lots of potential:it¡¯s unique which will be a draw,and once word gets out of the serene beauty inside, that will also be a big draw to the adventurers. I would have travelled across the kingdoms if I¡¯d heard word of such a unique dungeon. So, there¡¯s that.¡± ¡°Great. You know, Sigurd, I was prepared for it to be just a cave, to be a dungeon, and even to be a good dungeon. But this? If you¡¯re right, even though we are out of the way here in Littlebrook, we could be in the middle of insane change.¡± ¡°I know Dale, but it is what it is, as you said earlier.¡± ¡°Don¡¯t throw my words back at me¡± he replied jokingly as he tipped his cup back and downed the Aeldra. ¡°I¡¯ll write down what I know of the dungeon, so that we don¡¯t forget, and then we can decide what to do about it. But, Dale, tell the villagers, that they can¡¯t keep it secret, no chance of that with the bloody noise it made. Might as well get the gold for the discovery you know.¡± ¡°I hear ya, buddy. I¡¯ll pass it on, with the change we imagine I doubt that the villagers won¡¯t revel in having the gold. Sounds like things will be getting more expensive around here. We¡¯ll be needing it. ¡°It¡¯s the way of the world, my friend.¡± Sigurd responded. The two men, sat for a long time chatting about the change that was to come, Dale was a close friend of Sigurd and it had been a while since they had sat down to chat. *** 4 hours later *** ¡°So, to sum up the Adventurers¡¯ Guild will want control of the area for sure and it¡¯s hard to dissuade them. This new dungeon is unique and most likely highly profitable so it¡¯s sure to attract attention. They¡¯ll build an outpost and small town at the entrance, but since it is high in the mountains, anything further would be a massive undertaking, so thereforethey will need a centre of trade. And since it¡¯s easier to convert Littlerootthan it is to build from scratch, we will become that centre of trade. It is both a boon to our town and the end of its quiet little feel. We need to prepare for it,¡± Dale said, summing up quite concisely with measured words, what was to come. It was a town meeting, and most of the adults had made it. Sigurd had talked a bit about what he had found, without really saying much. A unique dungeon and more coins than the kids had seen before would be more than enough to tempt them into trying to delve it. He didn¡¯t want to tell the parents of their deaths. Then Dale had taken over to explain what it meant for the town. ¡°Sigurd. Will you head off tomorrow then, if you take the T-pads it¡¯ll only take two or three days.¡± Dale asked. ¡°Yeah, I¡¯ll head off once I¡¯ve healed up enough, should be tomorrow or the day after when I¡¯m well enough to ride, it¡¯s a hard ride to Oar¡¯s Rest but once I¡¯m there I¡¯ll find a healer, and continue on.¡± Sigurd replied. ¡°Good.¡± He spoke. ¡°Now Sigurd will be going to the capital to collect the money for the dungeon information. We¡¯ve no idea what it will be worth, but it should be enough for a few gold coins for each family. He¡¯s kindly offered to invest that money into banks, businesses or purchasing land deeds for each of you if you will let him know what you want to do with it. Of course you can just ask him to bring it back, but I figure investing in the land surrounding this village will be a good move since it will most likely shoot up in value once the guild starts farming the dungeon. People will need inns, food, drink and many businesses, so if you¡¯ve dreamt of opening one then this could be a choice. Either way, owning the land will give you a lot more power in whatever Littlebrook becomes than if you just collected the coins. That¡¯s my thoughts, any questions?¡± Dale asked, expecting a barrage. Sigurd tuned out the rest of the conversations, focused on the people that came to find him. He needed their names, ages, authorisation marks, and what they wanted to do with the gold for a range of amounts. Some people wanted to purchase land worth three gold if and only if the amount they were getting was in excess of five gold and so on, different for each person. By the end of it, he was starting to regret offering, but he had grown attached to the village and the people in it, and he didn¡¯t want to see them swept away by the scheming nobles who would undoubtedly do exactly as they were planning, once news broke. So, although it pained him, and would most likely extend his stay in the capital for another week it was worth it. Probably. ¡°So, what was it like?¡± they all asked him. To which Sigurd always replied with the same answer. ¡°A dungeon, more unique than most, but just as dangerous.¡± They always came back with a variant of ¡°Whatever do you mean?¡± or ¡°Tell me more?¡± or ¡°what was the first floor like?¡± Sigurd danced around the topic redirecting and evading questions about the dungeon until they moved on. He didn¡¯t wasn¡¯t to give anything away that would make it more likely someone would get it into their head to try the dungeon. Eventually the tide of people ran out and Sigurd had several pages of notes on what each person wanted to do. Luckily it seemed like a good proportion wanted to either have him bring the gold back or invest it into a bank. Something that would take him no time at all. A good half of the requests were for more land. Luckily Dale had had the good sense to get out one of the chartered land division maps for the area and they had placed it on a board in the meeting. So Sigurd had a list of people wanting land and the slots that they wished to purchase. Thus, there were no people that would be unhappy with what they got, as they had asked for that exact piece of land. Assuming that it was available of course. Sigurd doubted any had been bought by outsiders, Littlebrook was a village on the very outskirts of the kingdom after all. The last few had odd requests, but all in all, he expected that about four days would be added to his tasks in the capital. Much less than he had feared. Hopefully the guild thought his information was worthwhile. Standing up, he took a few secondsto stretch before he ambled back home. The pain in his ribs had eased from a sharp stabbing pain to an intense but dull ache that only flared when doing certain tasks like washingup the mugs and pans he had used to make Aeldra for Dale. It was late afternoon once Sigurd made it back to his house. He wanted nothing more than to crawl into bed and rest, but he knew he had to force himself to take care of his equipment. Only an idiot would let it stay damaged and degraded. Dragging his pack through to his workshop, he emptied it onto the floor, letting armour, clothes and supplies tumble out. He set three tubs of water on to heat (one full, one half and one almost empty) and in another smaller one heplaced a block of soap. Whilst that was heating up, Sigurd placed the armour on the stand and then set about separating the other bits and bobs into two piles: ruined and fine. All the herbs, bandages and a few potions as well as the food went to the ruined pile as well. Straight to the bin. Lying unconscious in a swamp tends to ruin lots of things. After he had finished sorting that, the soap had melted and Sigurd poured itinto the full water tub. A quick stir made some bubbles form on the surface. He smiled. Sigurd threw all the clothes into the soapy tub and walked over to the armour. Unclipping the plates, he set them aside before dumping the leather into the soapy water to soak. Taking a break, Sigurd breathed deeply, the pain making him wince. Take it slower, he thought to himself while waiting for the grime to begin loosening in the hot soapy water. Once the water turned a vaguely yellow brown colour he walked over to the cupboard and pulled down the scrubbing rack. Placing it into the soapy water he took the clothes and started scrubbing them thoroughlyagainst the rack. The rack was made of wood that had been carved to have wave like crests and falls along it. By scrubbing against the wood, the dirt was knocked loose thus cleaning the clothes. Taking the tub half filled with water, Sigurd placed it on the right side of the mangle. The empty one went underneath the frame and the soapy one went on the left. Sigurd grabbed his shirt from the soapy water, wringing it in his hands to get it as dry as possible before feeding it into the mangle and turning the handle. The rollers pulled the shirt through, pressing the water from it as it passed. Once complete it tumbled into the clean water on the other side which he used to wash out the soap. Once clean Sigurd passed it back through the mangle and set it on the wooden racks in his house to drip dry. He repeated the process with the other clothes. Packing stuff away, he figured the leather had had enough time to soak and began scrubbing it with his hands, rubbing away the grime from the seams. Once done, he dried it as best he could with a towel before getting some oil out. Applying the oil was a straight-forward task but it was part of his regular maintenance as it kept the leather supple, and if it was supple it wouldn¡¯t crack. He used the oil on the metal plates from the armour, discarding the cracked one that had broken at the impact from the cat as well as on his axe, blade and handle alike. Chapter 17 ========== [Sigurd] The journey to the capital was a long one, and Sigurd was not exactly keen to get started on it. It would be boring, painful, expensive, and painful. Did he mention painful? Especially so with his battered body. Still, like normal, he woke early, just as the sun was kissing the horizon, as a mother to her child stepping into the wide world, a fitting image for him to start his own journey. A quick breakfast, with a cup of Aeldra was enough to perk him up, ¡°up and at them¡± as his mother used to say. Sigurd didn¡¯t remember much about his mother, but he did remember that. He smiled at the fond memory, busying himself with preparations. He had packed a bag of food, a sleeping mat and a couple of water pouches as well as a small tent, the night before and they completely filled up the saddlebags on Dexter, his horse. His armour had dried over the last two days, and he had fixed it up enough, once dry, that it fit him correctly again. Sewing up the slashes with wax thread had taken time, but it was worth it. After a quick run around the house to check he hadn¡¯t forgotten anything, Sigurd stepped across the threshold and into the morning air. He emerged into the fresh air and, breathing in a cold lungful, he smiled. There was nothing quite like the eerie quiet of the early morning, the peace and serenity lingering as the world began to wake. A private moment while everything was still and calm. He loved it. Sigurd¡¯s cheery outlook and smile soon faded at the pain of riding his horse, shortening his breath and making him gasp with each jolting step as it trotted along, excited to leave the stable for once. Fucking horse! What was it doing, dancing a fucking jig? He thought, bitterly. ¡°What do you want? I give you a nice stable and food!¡± Predictably it didn¡¯t respond. Fucking horse! As he travelled, he said farewell to the few people up at such an hour, farmers and the like, and though he tried to keep the swearing to a minimum, it crept out a little. Wincing with each prancing step Dexter took, he headed down the road at a trot, bracing every time the horse shifted or jolted around on the uneven path. As time went by, the sun started to crawl slowly across the sky, rising properly as the land came to life. The early birdsong faded away, and the wind picked up from the dead calm to a cooling gentle breeze that pressed him forwards, giving a nice shove as if to say ¡°get on your way.¡± The leaves rustled, disturbed by said breeze, a breeze which carried the smells of the country across Sigurd¡¯s nose, from the woody earthy smells of the woods to the smell of freshly cut grass and hay, he took it all in. Off to his right, a small brook babbled and bobbled along, cutting through the terrain on its way to the sea. It took a few meandering turns, passing under bridges and across fields and copses. Sigurd watched it as he travelled, the constant glass-like flowing ridges in the water and the wavering, flickering reflections pleasant to look at. He watched odd bits of debris float along, at times seeming to dance around as the water currents pulled it this way and that. Speeding up and slowing down, pausing for breaks amongst the rocks that jutted out of the water like mountains as it raced downstream. For a time, he watched the same small stick, before the twisting trail edged too far from the water and he lost it. He felt a momentary pang of disappointment that his companion had vanished. It couldn¡¯t be helped though, he would have to cross the brook several times before reaching Oar¡¯s Rest, and his trail led round fields and thickets of trees on a much longer journey than that which the water took. The sky was a nice, rich, blue, with nary a cloud in sight: just a few wispy vapours that marbled the blue canvas. Sigurd sighed, relaxing, it was beautiful. He felt at peace. As one with nature. And he whistled merrily as his joyous mood returned, the pain banished in the depth of such a serene scene. As he travelled, Sigurd found himself thinking back to his recent delve. Not on the failures and mistakes that he had made, and there had been plenty. No, he had already had ample time to think of those, but rather of the dungeon itself. Whatever the truth of dungeons, it was clear to Sigurd that there had to be some sort of intelligence behind them. Whether there was any conscious thought or just intelligent reactions he didn¡¯t know, but what he was sure of was that whatever was controlling this dungeon was far more unusual than any he had sought before. Perhaps unique among dungeons. He supposed it was possible that the caverns had existed there before, as part of some old mages¡¯ grand experiment or of some old order of peoples. A purpose he couldn¡¯t imagine for such a work, but it was worth considering. At this point, it was all worth considering. In such a circumstance, perhaps the dungeon¡¯s guiding intelligence had stumbled across it and had decided to use it, after all taking the time to remove that much stone had to have been time consuming. In fact, he wondered truly how old this dungeon was. He had heard of some of the deeper dungeons having far larger twisting paths and rooms that perhaps rivalled the first floor on this one, but that was on floor 100 of some of them, like The Great Tomb and Parivalio. Dungeons like them had been around for around at least a hundred years, with thousands of people putting in thousands of hours before they managed to get down low enough to see these floors. Even now, The Great Tomb was only 132 floors deep, adding a new floor every two to three years, whilst Parivalio was unknown. It was much trickier and had got away from the guild at floor 115 when they had failed to reach the end of the last floor. The guild had managed to keep up with the dungeon for decades, but it was a very risky dungeon to delve due to the incredibly deadly traps and monsters that ambushed adventurers seemingly at random. That and the wandering boss, the Parivalio Reaver, that had wiped several high-level teams, meant it wasn¡¯t delved as much as needed to keep up with its growth. It was still delved and last he had heard it had been delved down to floor 137. Still they predicted that it was 146 to 152 floors deep from its rate of growth before losing track. One of the deepest dungeons known, and Sigurd had heard reported that floor 109 was a few huge rooms. He had never seen those rooms though. The Great Tomb had stopped him at floor 58 and Parivalio at floor 32, so a long way off. Sigurd smiled as he remembered the good times he had had with his team in those dungeons, with everything new they discovered. It was so good, but soon they had got as far as they would get in those, as their progress stalled out. Then they moved on, to the next one and the next. As he reminisced, he felt tired and so slumped down in his saddle, letting his torso rest on the saddle bags. He liked this position, slumped over as he was, he could look behind them and watch the last remnants of the little wispy clouds of dust that were kicked up by Dexter¡¯s hooves settle back down on the loose gravel of the trail. It settled down quickly after, leaving little evidence they had passed through, but the swirls were a good idle distraction and watching it helped to pass the time as the leagues went under foot. Being half-dwarf allowed Sigurd this position without falling off or burdening Dexter overly, which was a major benefit as far as he was concerned. The sun rose higher in the sky as the hours blended together, and Dexter marched on under the heat of day, a tireless soldier carrying his friend to safety. Soon it was time for lunch and a rest, Dexter had done well and despite dancing a painful jig at the start, he had carried him safely all day. Sigurd pulled up in the shade of a tree, near the bank of the stream. Picketing the horse so that he could graze on the lush grasses that fed off the stream and take a nice refreshing drink at leisure. Sigurd washed his hands and face in the cold water, feeling refreshed as the heat of the day was banished and the droplets of cold water dripped from his hair. Slicking it back, he went rooting through the pack for food. A deer stew was easy to heat up using a mage fire powder and it was delicious. Meanwhile, Dexter got several handfuls of oats, a carrot and an apple as well as a brush down. After eating Sigurd pulled his straw hat over his eyes and drifted off to sleep for a quick nap in the shade of the tree, the breeze caressing his face. Dexter snorted a few times at his lazy owner, before taking a drink, and settling down to graze while he waited. ========== [Dungeon] The construction of floor seven had gone very smoothly and I hadn¡¯t run into any problems doing it, well¡­ except for the lack of dungeon points but that wasn¡¯t so much a problem with floor seven specifically, as it was a problem with all floors right now. I could only hope that when I had adventurers continually delving me, I would end up getting dungeon points for something, because it was not particularly sustainable to only get them from level ups. Progress on floor eight had gone much slower, though just as smoothly. It was to be a huge room. After sliding down the seventh floor ¨C assuming they made it through the icy maze of routes and didn¡¯t die ¨C they would either end up slamming into the wall causing icicles to fall from the ceiling which they would then dodge: something I had added when I began to plot out floor eight, or they would end up sliding down the slope and through the entrance to the eighth floor, I thought it was fitting, seeing as they had already descended quite far. No stairs this time, though having said that, I would need to add stairs at some point to allow them to backtrack. Asking them to climb back up those routes was a bit much, it might push adventurers away from delving me, and I couldn¡¯t have that, no, nothing that would prevent them from continuing to delve time and time again and thus dying, could be allowed. If they didn¡¯t slow themselves down enough, they would just slide straight off the platform at the beginning of floor eight and plunge into the icy cold water I was planning to put there; a very likely death followed that. If they managed to stop in time, or avoid the icicles, then they had two options, they could walk up the stairs that I had yet to put in or they could press onwards, exploring floor eight and those beyond. If they decided to press on, they would have to navigate across floating blocks of ice and flat sheet ice platforms that bobbed and shifted on the ocean I was creating in order to get to the other side and the entrance to floor nine. The giant blocks would roll around in the water and the adventurers would have to be quick, nimble, and careful to avoid such a fate. Scrambling across them one at a time should be fine though. The sheet platforms wouldn¡¯t roll but they would contain fights and treasure. This level was the most linear in regard to how it was explored, since the water was pretty much impassable other than via the platforms and blocks. They would then be faced with an accessible path straight across the cavern, although there would be several different routes across the icy obstacles that could let adventurers risk more with jumps between platforms and slippery rolling blocks, or take more fights. It was fairly straight forward. It took me about four days to dig out the cavern, in part due to my increased skill, but also due to the fact that there was a large cavern already in place, that took up about a third of the space I needed to excavate. It extended a touch too far down, so when I finished excavating the rest of the room I used some of the stone to seal up the natural split in the rock and then I began filling the place with water. It took another four days to fill, and I had no clue how long it would take to get to the right temperature, I was expecting to have to play around with the balance of temperatures but it would come in time. When last I looked at my status, I had noticed something odd, it seemed as though I still had a perk or something.
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Rooms: 59 Traps 45
Floors: 7 (+ 1) Unique Items: 6
Bosses: 1 Perks: 1*
Monsters: 305 Dungeon Points: 75
Unplaced Creatures^ 0 Material types: 290^
Focusing on the weird symbol it came up with a notification telling me I had not finished accessing all parts of the perk. Love this novel? Read it on Royal Road to ensure the author gets credit. What had I missed? Thinking back, I realised, and I felt incredibly stupid for doing so. The notification had said: ~~For making it to level 30 without killing anything sapient, you have been offered a special one-time deal: 2 greater mana atmosphere regulators, Treasure Blueprint set 1, 15000kg of random material (including 360kg of rare materials and 10kg of super rare materials), 1x 75% discount on elemental based mobs pack and 1600 dungeon points.~~ The elemental based mobs pack! I had used the mana atmosphere regulator to create these icy floors, I had used the treasure blueprint to create some of the treasure I offered, and as soon as I knew how to replicate the potion that the adventurer had dropped I would be including those too. I had examined the super rare materials, mithril and orichalcum were useful for sure, but I hadn¡¯t done anything with them, but the discount on the elemental mobs pack. I hadn¡¯t used it. 50% off could be amazing. Quickly navigating to the store, I brought up the options:
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Monsters: Bosses: Items: Materials:
Points to spend: 75
Elemental Mobs Pack Danger level: Variable Points: Variable
Like all Mob Packs, the Elemental Mobs Pack contains various mobs grouped together for their similarity. In this case by elemental type. Several customisable options for this pack exist, if you would like to purchase it please select one of the options below: BASIC: 900 points* Elemental Earth Mobs ¨C Danger level ¡Ö 1.8, Elemental Fire Mobs ¨C Danger level ¡Ö 1.8 Elemental Wind Mobs ¨C Danger level ¡Ö 1.8 Elemental Water Mobs ¨C Danger level ¡Ö 1.8 BASIC + : 1000 points* Elemental Ice Mobs ¨C Danger level ¡Ö 1.8 Elemental Lava Mobs ¨C Danger Level ¡Ö 1.8 Elemental Electricity Mobs ¨C Danger level ¡Ö 1.8 Elemental Darkness Mobs ¨C Danger level ¡Ö 1.8 Elemental Light Mobs ¨C Danger level ¡Ö 1.8 BASIC ++ : 1200 points* Elemental Life Mobs ¨C Danger level ¡Ö 1.8 Elemental Death Mobs ¨C Danger level ¡Ö 1.8 Elemental Holy Mobs ¨C Danger level ¡Ö 1.8 Elemental Unholy Mobs ¨C Danger level ¡Ö 1.8 Elemental Spirit Mobs ¨C Danger level ¡Ö 1.8 Elemental Spectral Mobs ¨C Danger level ¡Ö 1.8 ADVANCED: 1600 points* Elemental Earth Mobs ¨C Danger level ¡Ö 2.8 Elemental Fire Mobs ¨C Danger level ¡Ö 2.8 Elemental Wind Mobs ¨C Danger level ¡Ö 2.8 Elemental Water Mobs ¨C Danger level ¡Ö 2.8 ADVANCED+ : 1800 points* Elemental Ice Mobs ¨C Danger level ¡Ö 2.8 Elemental Lava Mobs ¨C Danger Level ¡Ö 2.8 Elemental Electricity Mobs ¨C Danger level ¡Ö 2.8 Elemental Darkness Mobs ¨C Danger level ¡Ö 2.8 Elemental Light Mobs ¨C Danger level ¡Ö 2.8 ADVANCED ++ : 2000 points* Elemental Life Mobs ¨C Danger level ¡Ö 2.8 Elemental Death Mobs ¨C Danger level ¡Ö 2.8 Elemental Holy Mobs ¨C Danger level ¡Ö 2.8 Elemental Unholy Mobs ¨C Danger level ¡Ö 2.8 Elemental Spirit Mobs ¨C Danger level ¡Ö 2.8 Elemental Spectral Mobs ¨C Danger level ¡Ö 2.8 COMBINATIONS: Elemental Four ¨C Danger Level ¡Ö 1.8 ¨C 1000 points* Elemental Four ¨C Danger Level ¡Ö 2.8 ¨C 1700 points* Elemental Fire and Ice ¨C Danger level ¡Ö 1.8 ¨C 1100 points* Elemental Fire and Ice ¨C Danger level ¡Ö 2.8 ¨C 1900 points* Elemental Light and Dark ¨C Danger level ¡Ö 1.8 ¨C 1100 points* Elemental Light and Dark ¨C Danger level ¡Ö 2.8 ¨C 1900 points* Elemental Life and Death ¨C Danger level ¡Ö 1.8 ¨C 1300 points* Elemental Life and Death ¨C Danger level ¡Ö 2.8 ¨C 2100 points* Elemental Holy and Unholy ¨C Danger level ¡Ö 1.8 ¨C 1300 points* Elemental Holy and Unholy ¨C Danger level ¡Ö 2.8 ¨C 2100 points* Elemental Spirit and Spectral ¨C Danger level ¡Ö 1.8 ¨C 1300 points* Elemental Spirit and Spectral ¨C Danger level ¡Ö 2.8 ¨C 2100 points* *75% Discount already applied.
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Reading the entry initially I was excited as the 75% discount would reduce one of those packs from 2100 points to 525 points, only two levels worth. But it was a question of which one I should get. I knew I was going to need to get the advanced options, the kobold village had a danger rating of 2.2 and my Yeti had a danger rating of 1.6 so I couldn¡¯t very well make the future levels easier. I was also nearly at the end of my ice floors so it might be a waste to get an ice pack. I scanned the list once more before, stopping as I read the last sentence. What? How had I missed that before. The discount was already applied meaning I would need many more levels. Since it was already applied. That would mean that the Combination pack worth 2100 points was originally worth 8400 points! It better have a lot of good mobs I thought to myself, as I mentally committed to buying one. The Fire and Ice pack, worth 1900 points, I decided, enough to finish off my ice floors and get started on the fire ones. Doing a few calculations, I realised I would just need to get to level 36, to get the required points. Great. At least it would set me up for a long enough time that I would hopefully be good on points until the adventurers came back. Then I would figure out what I needed to do to gain points from them. It was time to begin absorbing mana once again. Yay! However, after having blown open the entrance of the dungeon, ambient mana had poured into my awareness, and I had had a much easier time of it. While pondering this fact I had a realisation. All life gave off mana, mana with its own unique properties. That same life absorbed other, different mana and used it to fuel their growth, spells, whatever¡­ and by doing so it stripped away some of those unique properties and made the mana into their own. Which then ended up back into the environment. Dungeons were no different and I had absorbed all of the ambient mana in my domain, thus reducing the mana density of mana that was not my own and making it more difficult for me to gain mana and level up. When I had broken through to the surface, I had opened up the floodgates and ambient mana had spilled back in. A fact which should help me complete my next set of level ups in a similar time to the previous ones, despite needing much more mana. This theory explained why I gained mana for all the creatures that were inside my dungeon, as well as explaining why adventurers delved dungeons, apart from all the treasure; because living within my environment meant that they could absorb my mana - which was foreign to them - and use it to grow stronger, especially since dungeons represented some of the most high mana density places accessible. The joy of growing stronger, mixed with the challenge and difficulty of a dungeon as well as the rewarding treasure meant that there was a perfect combination of factors to provide for adventurers, and dungeons in turn had learned to feed off of them, a symbiotic relationship. I was missing that vital component, and without it I had been struggling, but I was willing to bet that killing adventurers would give me dungeon points, though how whatever entity that created the store for us, benefited from this was unknown. *** 3 weeks later*** ~~Level up: 31~~ ~~Level up: 32~~ ~~Level up: 33~~ ~~Level up: 34~~ ~~Level up: 35~~ ~~Level up: 36~~ Yes! Finally, success. I had done it. Level 36 and enough points to buy the advanced Elemental Fire and Ice Mobs Pack. Getting to level 36 had given me 2085 points. I spent 1900 of which on the pack giving me 185 left over. It was time to see what I had got in the pack. First the Ice ones.
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Unplaced Creatures: Type Danger Level
Yeti x 10 Active 1.6
Icy Polar Bear x 5 Active 1.8
The Icy Polar Bear is one of the best predators of frozen biomes, Weighing more than 400kg, they are excellent at blending in from a distance and capable of incredibly speedy charges over short distances. They are a tough customer for many adventurers to deal with. As dungeon monsters they gain the ability to absorb ice mana to toughen their skin and fur, turning all but the sharpest of blades.
Icy Crash Birds x 12 Territorial 0.6
Just like normal crash birds except cold!. These birds have adapted to the cold environment with thicker feathers, tougher, larger bodies and the ability to drill into the ice with their beaks, they slam into the ice, breaking off chunks to create their nests.
Orcas x 4 Semi - Active 2.5
Orcas are one of the kings of the ocean, weighing over 3500kg, these marine mammals are vicious hunters, that cruise the waters of the cold oceans looking for prey. Orcas can jump out of the water up to fifteen feet to stun prey as they come crashing back down. As dungeon monsters they gain the ability to shoot jets of water from their mouths.
Greenland Shark x6 Passive 0.2
A predatory animal, useful for providing a number of ingredients for adventurers.
White Sturgeon x 6 N/A N/A
A normal animal, useful for a number of ingredients for adventurers.
Wallowing Walrus (Boss) x1 Active 3.2
The Wallowing Walrus is a Boss monster of goliath proportions. Weighing a staggering 4 tonnes, this brute lounges on the ice ready to greet adventurers to its home. With a skin six centimetres thick and a significant fat layer underneath the walrus is protected from most sharp and blunt weapon blows. Huge tusks protrude from its jaw, pointed at the ground that the walrus can use to impale adventurers too slow to get out of its way, if they don¡¯t get battered around by its huge weight. Slow but powerful, a disaster for a team without any heavy hitters.
Synth Cat (Ice) x 5 Active 2.3
The Synth Cat is a creature that, unlike most animals that use food to survive, requires mana. One of the easiest sources of food are materials that naturally absorb mana. As a result of its diet, the Synth Cat slowly takes on the properties of the materials it eats becoming no longer just an organic being. It may also pick up some faint magical abilities associated with the mana that infuses its body. This variant has been attuned to icesteel, becoming completely white and incredibly cold to touch. It has a hard outer shell made from this icy crystal and favours ambushes with its incredible speed and stealth.
Wow! There was a lot to take in with that, I had gained 28 monsters and another 12 animals which I could use to populate my waters, and that was just in the Ice Part of the Pack. It was certainly enough to finish off my ice floors. I wanted to place them all immediately, but I also knew I wanted to look at the fire ones. If the fire pack was equally good, I thought that I would end up with at least double the number of monsters I could have bought with the points required to buy the pack alone, even without the discount from my perk. A deal, though you didn¡¯t get to choose, so maybe it was more risky, and I had been lucky so far that all the ice monsters were a perfect fit for my dungeon. Oh well, the fire ones now, I couldn¡¯t wait, it was bound to be excellent.
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Unplaced Creatures: Type Danger Level
Baked Sand Lizard x 4 Ambush 1.3
Baked Sand Lizards are ambush predators that bury themselves in the baking hot sand of the fire wastes, taking creatures that wander too close by mistake. Razor sharp teeth and powerful jaws have meant these creatures have liberated many a limb from its prey. Weighing around 100kg with thick scaled hide and strong muscles adventurers should be wary where these creatures lurk.
Flaming Driller Mole x 3 Semi ¨C Active 1.4
Flaming Driller Moles use their sharpened claws and superheated fire breath to drill and burn through the rock of their homes, creating a web of tunnels to move beneath the ground. Highly sensitive to light, these creatures cannot see but are sensitive to the vibrations of the earth which they use to locate prey. Once found, they drill up through the ground, bursting forth in a flurry of slashing attacks before dragging the prey into the ground to finish off. Weighing in at 50kg these should be more than enough for low tier adventurers.
Noxious Komodo Dragonling x 2 Ambush 1.7
Noxious Komodo Dragonlings are slow moving lizards, capable of short bursts of speed, and have tough skin and sharp claws. They lie low to the ground, watching for prey to stumble past before springing upon them, slashing and biting. Their bite has vicious poison and destructive bacterial toxins that begin to break down and destroy the flesh of their victims. The dragonling then waits for its prey to expire before feasting on the disintegrating meal.
Living Flame x 20 Passive 0.2
Small balls of living flame that waft around with seemingly no purpose. They burn extremely hot and adventurers should be careful not to wander through them. Most often used as lights.
Lava Scoria x 3 Active 2.4
One of the more advanced versions of the golem, the Laval scoria is a diverted upgrade of the Stone Scoria, gaining heat and speed as its body melts into lava from stone. It shoots sharp rock shards and balls of lava to disable prey before slowly encasing the victim in its molten body, ramping up the heat so that it can feed on the gasses produced as the body begins to pyrolyze. Weighing in at around 125kg, a Lava scoria can digest a human in 40 minutes.
Lesser Manticore x 1 Active 2.9
The manticore is unique amongst beasts, being an amalgam of various beasts with humans. Like the sphinx, the manticore has a vaguely human head distorted by its other features. However, it has no sapience. The Manticore has the powerful body and jaws of a lion, with the intelligent hunting of a human coming from its oversized head. Wings allow the beast to fly, and its scorpion tail can inflict vicious venom to paralyze its foes. Barbed spines adorn its back, tipped with sufficient poison to kill. The manticore is a powerful hunter with little to fear. The lesser manticore variant is significantly smaller and, as such, less dangerous, but it is still a force to be reckoned with, weighing in at 300kg of furious beast.
Flame Riddled Wheel x6 Active 0.6
The flame riddled wheel is a mimic variant. Resembling a giant wheel that rolls around whilst bursting with little off shoots of flame. It gains great speed in a straight line but suffers from a lack of mobility, only capable of slight turns whilst travelling at high speed. Each wheel is 8 feet tall and capable of battering and crushing those not careful enough to avoid its scorching spokes.
Another excellent plethora of monsters that I couldn¡¯t wait to implement. Though I doubted it was enough to get through all the fire levels. For sure it was enough to start. Though I couldn¡¯t see myself using all these different creatures in one floor. I would also have to buy some more of them as there were definitely not enough to fill up the floors on the scale that I was creating. The scoria stood out to me, despite its description not doing a great job at explaining it, I thought this could be one of my most dangerous monsters. Perhaps too the noxious komodo dragonling would fill that role, depending on the extent of its toxins. I was excited and intrigued to play around with them, but it would have to wait. For now, I had to finish up the ice floors placing monsters on floor seven and eight before creating floor nine and the boss room. Placing the ten yeti throughout the Ice Run I tweaked a few bits here and there, making it more difficult in places and less in others, trying to balance out the visuals of each run down the slope, to try to give no clue away. For the battles on the platforms in the Ocean floor, I went with the Icy Polar Bears. From a distance it was hard to figure out which platforms had one on and as such I hoped adventurers wouldn¡¯t be able to try and plot a path that avoided most of them, still the treasure was in the same place, so it seemed rather pointless to avoid the fights. They wanted treasure the most. The Polar Bears were the main threat to the adventurers on this floor, with the Icy Crash Birds perhaps capable of knocking an unwary few into the waters or dealing small bits of damage, there were a few of them and they would dive at random so it would be a distraction at least. I thought I would get a couple of kills with them over time. But my dungeon was untested at this point so only time would tell. Up in the roof, 50 metres above the perilous waters, I made the nests for the crash birds, it wouldn¡¯t be a special area this time, there was no need as I had plenty of other options. The Greenland sharks and White sturgeon went into the waters, as it was the only place to put them, and I filled the water with lots of krill, small fish and other normal animals that could be picked up in the store for an exchange of materials. That was one of the great features of the store, that I could pick up lots of the decorative elements and key parts of the food chain in exchange for stone, iron and coal, and since I was more efficient than a quarry at mining it, it meant that I never ran short of the things needed to give my monsters food and exercise. Yes, I knew that they could just lie around waiting, feeding on my mana, but I liked the feel of the ecosystem, and watching them hunt and eat. It kept them sharp, especially without regular dives from adventurers. Hopefully that would change soon though. Unfortunately for me, the orcas required a lot of space, so much so that I had had to expand the cavern to 1800m across and 700m wide with a depth of 200m. But once it was done and they were happy enough I placed them I and gave them a few mental commands, watching them soar out of the water and come crashing down on to the empty platforms. That¡­ That was brutal, I loved it. They would definitely be killing a lot of adventurers. Any that fell in the water would fall prey to them. If I added a freezing fog to the floor too it would prevent adventurers from seeing and planning out the route and hopefully would surprise them the first few times. Trading some of the iron I had mined, I picked up a few rare creatures; crabs in the depths and various crustaceans which could be fished for, their carapaces and claws or eyes were valuable. The bony spurs along the side of the sturgeon and the heart of the Greenland sharks were worth a lot of money and considering that the creatures held so much value, there were few treasure chests on the ice course. They would have to use their ingenuity here to eke out a profit. Lastly, as it always was, would be the secret area. I had included one in every level so far and I was planning to continue that here. I could have done the roof nests for the crash birds, but instead I made a small cave in one of the far corners that they had to boat to. It was hidden behind a sheet of ice that in addition to the fog helped to obscure it. Inside, I needed a challenge, I wanted it to be unique but I had not got anything in the pack that I felt was fitting here, I wanted something else. I was determined to get it now, confident I could find something within the store that fit the bill, it didn¡¯t need to be ultra strong, close to a danger level of 2 would be fine, but just unique, something that was hard to figure out and tricky to fight. I was well and truly stumped on this one though, there wasn¡¯t much available for 185 points. But in the end, it came to me as it always does.
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Monsters: Bosses: Items: Materials:
Points to spend: 185
Winter Soldier Danger level: 1.0+ Points: 145
The winter soldier is a semi-humanoid ice golem capable of wielding the freezing cold ice it inhabits as it guards its charge. These mobs are passive until attacked but capable of skilful combat. They have reasonable durability, but their danger comes from their ability to use weapons and armour to the best of their ability. Capable of matching many an adventurer in single combat and dealing with groups if given appropriate equipment, the winter soldier scales in difficulty with the equipment provided. Note: The winter soldier comes with no equipment and each dungeon is required to provide its equipment.
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It was a perfect sentinel to guard a big supply of treasure, I would outfit it to be around a danger level of 2.5 and it would be accompanied with 2 Ice Phantasms, which I picked up for the last 40 points I had available. It was perfect. All points used, and all my floors (for now) were fully complete. Watching the Orcas, I noticed that as they came crashing down, they would create a wave that would make all the platforms unstable as they rose over the crest and fell down the trough of the wave, potentially a game changer. I loved it. The difficulty was starting to ramp up now towards what I imagined to be the serious adventurer rating. I wasn¡¯t sure but I imagined that my dungeon would be enough for most adventurers to have a few month¡¯s worth of delving before they grew familiar enough to reach my current floor. And by then I would be far ahead. There was one more level to do before the boss level. After all woodland had four levels then boss. Starter, forest, swamp, rainforest and boss. Ice would have, Tundra with the dragon, Ice Run, Frozen Sea ¨C I was calling it frozen sea now rather than ocean, something else and then boss. The question was, what would that something else be? A Frozen forest maybe. Or a frigid ice maze, getting them lost and slowly freezing to death, I liked the idea, but it was too similar to the ice run which was kind of a maze with the many different paths. No, I needed something else. But what to do for an ice floor. What to do? What to do? I pondered to myself.