Chương 24

-0-0-0-0-0- The Dungeon, Medea Island, Kalenic Sea The Next Day -0-0-0-0-0- The sun rose on yet another day of constant delves. After the Platinum's failure to best the third floor's boss, the rest of the delvers seem to have been reminded that I'm no ordinary dungeon. The Silvers still explored the second floor, though most left after a few hours. The ones who did find the boss rarely committed to the fight. They never pushed their luck.

The Golds pushed past the second easily, but were plenty cautious on the third. They sought out the Mini-bosses, to challenge them and practice. It seems the general consensus is that the Boss is a tougher version of the Kobolds, not incorrectly, and they'll be better prepared with training against the lesser versions. Again, not incorrectly. Parties who had less practice against bipedal enemies quickly became accustomed, and more confident.

None sought the Boss, out of rightful concern that a monster who could turn away two Platinum parties and kill two was beyond their abilities. The twins retreated to their rooms. I'd attempted to listen in on their planning, but they used an enchanted object to mask their words. I was more concerned about the tidbits I'd discovered by listening to Neo and her assistant/friend/party member, Felin. That the twins were explicitly hired to kill me to wipe away some debt was, indeed, concerning.

They're unlikely to give up and leave. And more Guilders on the way, huh? Potentially stronger than the twins, though more likely Golds who were struggling to push their way up to Platinum rank. Segueing into a related topic, my captives woke at some point last night. They were obviously terrified to find themselves stripped to their underthings in a stone cell, but a couple of mandarins pushed into their cells in the morning calmed them slightly, if leaving them more confused.

It's easy to see what they're thinking. I'm alive? Where am I? Am I still in the dungeon? Why am I not dead? Why am I getting food? What's going to happen to me? And so on, and so forth. I began my experiments after they were fed. I kept a careful eye on them as they digested the food, watching as their digestive system siphoned off the mana in the food and fed it into their core.

There wasn't much mana in the fruit to begin with, since these I'd made sure were grown naturally, rather than hastily inflated with mana. If the amount of mana in the fruit equaled a marble in size, then the rough amount it filled their core was about 0. 01%. No wonder they kill monsters, and delve dungeons, I'd thought. Just getting the mana they'd need to improve further from their food would take hundreds of years. And that's if the food wasn't too mana rich.

I left them to their quiet cells and moved my focus up to the fourth floor. The Boss's clan had moved into their new warren, while the other clans spread out amongst the smaller sections inaccessible to humans. They weren't hindered by the water, and even reveled in their new environment. A few clans were already eyeing each other with wariness. I suspect preemptive strikes and rat-on-rat warfare will begin in a few days. The Fifth floor was perfect, ready for anyone who manages to slip past the Ratten.

The Sixth floor was structurally complete. Though making monsters able to survive the intense heat of the floor was tough, it was not impossible. It would probably take a week or two, at most. Construction on the Seventh continued. I decided this floor was going to be much smaller than the previous floors. I mean, both the fifth and six were incredibly open. Another tunnel-filled, maze-like floor was necessary at this point. As I carved the tunnels, I contemplated potential themes.

A few came to mind, but I couldn't quite decide just yet. It was mid-afternoon when the first sails appeared on the horizon. Over the rest of the afternoon, the evening and into the night, ships continued to dock and disembark their passengers. Who? Why, more Guilders of course. Madmen, drawn to Grindstones with the belief they would find their fortune and rocket their way up through the ranks. Oh boy. People gonna die tomorrow.

-0-0-0-0-0- Port Medea, Medea Island, Kalenic Sea The Next Day -0-0-0-0-0- Haythem, Bertram and Flasa had decided to take the day off. They'd made the decision for a number of reasons. The first was that they had been delving as much as they could, recently. Every second day or so. Haythem thought they'd needed a break, and the second reason was just the excuse they'd needed. The second reason being the sudden influx of Guilders to the island.

Yes, they'd emerged from the dungeon yesterday afternoon to discover a couple of new parties in the taverns. More and more had arrived as the day went on, filling the newly constructed bunkhouses to maximum capacity. Yesterday, the day had started with around 16 parties on the island who consistently delved. Today, that number was closer to 35. If they hadn't already been forming raids to push through to the third floor, they would have started out of sheer necessity.

There were only twelve hours in the day, and twelve groups of guilders let in per day, after all. With the current number of parties, if they all tried to delve on their own, it would be three days before they'd once again reach the front of the line. A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation. The third reason was more political than personal.

The merchants who visited their island had ranged far in the month since the establishment of the port, spreading the news of an island-bound dungeon to all and sundry. While all the parties from the initial group of guilders were from the Phenoc Kingdom, a little less than half of this group were from the Bahrain Empire. Where the Phenoc Kingdom sat on the continent of Theona, west of the Kalenic Sea, the Bahrain Empire was situated on the other side of that ocean.

You might think that such distant polities would have little to do with the other, but you would be wrong. The Kingdom had conquered every land of value in their continent. The only places that remained wild were the central portions of the southern desert and the inhospitable lands in the frozen north. Likewise, the Empire had largely removed any opposition in their lands.

However while the Kingdom was content with their lands, focusing on further development, in recent years the Empire had been staring across the ocean with a gimlet eye. The majority of Phenoc lands were fertile and bounteous. Their mines seemingly without end and fields pulling in successful harvests year after year. The Bahrain lands were less so. Their mines were shallow, or running dry. Their land was hardy and tough, ill-suited to farming.

These reasons were the main contributors to their expansionism; fueling their armies and feeding their people. There has been no declaration of war, but all involved know it is inevitable. And so, the newly arrived Bahrain parties were avoided as much as possible. Personally, Haythem thought that treating these guilders differently would cause the very antagonism most Phenocs were so afraid of. The guild loudly professed neutrality in all its dealings, but could not control the actions of independent parties.

If it came to war, spurned groups would likely leave the guild and sign up with the Bahrain military. Haythem picked up the piece of equipment he had been inspecting. It was one of many at the market this morning, refined from the shells of the dungeon's crab monsters. This piece was a saber, formed from the sharp pincer of the Guardian's breed. He glanced back down at the table, observing shields, daggers and various pieces of armor all made from the tough shell of the monsters.

"Five silver for that sword," the man behind the stall bargained. Haythem shook his head and placed the saber back on the table.

"Four silver! Three? Two is my final offer!" The merchant continued to lower his price as Haythem walked away. Obviously, the man hadn't been quite as successful as he had hoped to be. As far as he could tell, the equipment wasn't especially improved from its base form. It would work fine for the weaker guilders or the unempowered humans, but its strength was far below what Haythem and his party required. Yes, Haythem had decided to take a walk through the market this morning. He was window-shopping, mostly.

He didn't need raw ingredients, since the tavern his party stayed at provided two meals a day to all its patrons. The various carved charms and 'magic' items were also useless to him. Such items were generally fakes, used as an explanation for random events. It was the ringing sound of hammer on steel which eventually drew his attention. The smith in question worked out of a shop, where plenty of quality pieces hung from the walls or lay on shelves.

On his entrance the smith paused and looked up, taking his measure, before returning to his hammering.

"Ah don sell magic items." He claimed, his northern accent thick but understandable.

"But ah've been told my work takes enchantments well." Having said his piece, the blacksmith allowed his work to once again take up his full attention. Haythem inspected the various pieces of equipment closely, eventually coming upon a sword noticeably different to the others around it. Its metal gleamed in a way the normal steel of the longsword beside it didn't.

"What's this made of?" He asked, when the blacksmith had stopped hammering and shoved the half-beaten rod of metal back into the forge. The man turned and after a glance at the sword looked Haythem right in the eyes.

"Hell if ah know. It's relatively light, for such a tough metal. The merchant who sold the ore to me said there was a new mine of the stuff, back in the homeland." He narrated as he approached.

"Ah don't think ah caught your name there, friend." He said, sticking out a heavily callused hand.

"Dremlock Mantia."

"Haythem Linus." Haythem answered.

"Now, let's talk price." The answering grin on Dremlock's face was one Haythem had seen often in merchants. This man had a love for haggling. He had a feeling this purchase would take a bite from his coinpouch. -0-0-0-0-0- The Dungeon, Medea Island, Kalenic Sea -0-0-0-0-0- The tension on the beach outside my dungeon was almost palpable. Two distinct groups of guilders waited in line, the second group having drifted into port yesterday evening and overnight.

They feigned nonchalance, but the wary eyes and hands kept close to weapons were rather telling. The groups were also rather distinct. The style of armor sported by the Phenoc guilders was radically different to this new group. If the Phenocs could be considered European in style and manner, these new people boasted armor I would call Middle Eastern. It isn't an exact match to my memories, of course, merely an approximation and comparison.

It was rather easy to tell that the middle-eastern style guilders had done the bare minimum of preparation for their delves today. They knew about the crabs and some general features, but obviously the Phenocs were ill-inclined to share any details of my dungeon. They did seem to be aware that individual parties wouldn't be particularly effective, and the nine parties of them split evenly into three raids groups; two Silver and one Gold.

The first raid of silvers struggled slightly against my diminished crabs, but pushed through fairly easily. Now slightly warier. The Second floor stumped them, leading two to be separated from the raid and fried in the incinerator trap. They had another seven close calls before giving up. These men and women informed their countrymen of their experiences, which meant the second raid of Silvers did decently better. They still failed to discover the exit door, but confirmed the shifting nature of the maze.

The Gold raid managed to find and kill the second floor's boss, the Bloodfish Sovereign. Watching all these people delve for the first time did make me wonder why I was laying out my dungeon the way I was. There didn't seem to be any mental restrictions on how I should create my dungeon, but the now myriad memories I hold informed me my layout was the standard. A 'floor' of rooms, leading to a 'Floor Guardian' they had to beat to continue onto the next floor.

It was mostly seen in conquered dungeons, since it was easy that way to judge exactly how 'strong' you were by how deep you could go. Baby dungeons were little more than tunnels with an enhanced monster or two, like a bear in its cave. Young dungeons began forming 'rooms' or open areas with more confined sections between them. Adult dungeons are where the 'floor' mechanic starts appearing in the wild. I could try to do something weird, but if my layout starts diverging massively the guilders might get concerned.

They might attribute it to my status as a 'lost' dungeon, but that isn't guaranteed. I'd rather wait until I'm confident in my defenses. In the mean time, this works. Actually... I'd assumed it was due to my nature as a dungeon, but the fact that even wild dungeons with no contact between them all develop the same defensive strategy implies we aren't so much consciousness in random gems as much as we are manufactured and planted like seeds. By who? Given they seem to exist in this world, potentially Gods.

Pondering the nature of my own existence, I continued work on the seventh floor. As I dug through the rock, I encounter something different. An ore vein. A search quickly turned up a few other spots the metals seemed to turn up. Hmmm. There was two Silvery and one orange, two ductile.. some light, some not... I have no idea what these are! Let's experiment with them anyway! -0-0-0-0-0- © Max Porteous, 2022