Runitos' PoV:
"Hmph. Cowards." - Runitos
I watched my troops enter the portal leading to the demon child's Dungeon from my humble lair. What caught my attention first was the lack of any opposition. My first thought was that it was a trap, not that it would stop my liege of creatures. I had them move onward, yet nothing sprung upon them.
That made me think the demon child was giving up on the first floor, enhancing her defense on one of the lower stages. Either that, or she might have had the same idea I had when creating my plan of defense, but seeing the pathetic excuse of an attack squad making its way through my Ruby Coffer's 1st floor, I could only sigh with disappointment.
Most of her monsters are F-ranks, maybe with a few E-ranks mixed in. I am not sure, weaklings look alike to me.
Losing my interest in the feeble "Damavand" forces, I redirected my line of view to the screens showing my forces traveling through a flooded area of the...hmm? Flooded?
Aha. It seems the monsters have reached an area where a set of fountains had been placed. Maybe they were a decoration facility used to attract people from the desert with the allure of running water? Now, however, the formerly pristine fountains have been smashed to pieces. Rubble is spread across the path in what I think is an attempt to stall my great force of monstrosities...
No, that cannot be it. That demon child didn't look so naive. If they could amass that much of a fortune like what they were transporting on their floatship, then their strategic plans would not be something so simple.
I had my moves wade through the flooded Dungeon "room", as they're technically called despite being an open area while reminding them to be aware of any potential hostiles hiding in the shadows of the buildings or the rubble. Unlike me, that demon child does not seem to have planned a strong enough home defense to allow her to set her best monsters on the invasion front. The group of weaklings is proof of that.
*BZZZT!!*
Hmm? The screen just went black. Is the signal bad..., no, what am I even saying?
"Troops, come in. What is going on over there? Troops? HELLOOOOOOO!!" - Runitos
No answer from the communication device I gave to one of the smarter Goblin Knights. What is going on over there?
---
Garami's PoV:
"Nice shot, Noire! That's 200 to 0 in our favor!" - Garami
[Did you ever doubt my excellent archery abilities? By the way, what should I do when there are no more 'sparky boxes'?] - Noire
"You mean 'electricity generators'. As for the question, just stay low and on standby. We might need you for more than executing operation 'Zap Trap'." - Garami
[Ah, yes. As if it were any doubts.] - Noire
And that's all I needed to keep the needy Noire on her toes. I love it when they make it simple for me.
"Master, do you mind if I call you evil?" - Bloom
"Sadistic, sure. Vile, your choice. Mad, why not? Completely coconut crazy, my pleasure. But I think 'evil' is stretching the limit a little there, Bloomy." - Garami
"Creating a flooded area only to have someone destroy a generator to electrify the whole soup with all the monsters inside is qualifying enough to call someone 'evil'. At least in my book." - Bloom
"Interesting. Too bad I'm waiting for the movie, so I haven't read that one yet." - Garami
This trick cost us 2 facilities, the "Fountain Plaza" and the "Electro Urban Generator I". The latter was a hasty inclusion to the 1st floor and one I will remove after this event. All it does is allow "Electro Urban"-type facilities to be placed on the same floor and I'm not planning on making a "theme floor"..., just yet, at least. Hmm, maybe I should just settle for saving that generator in the Facility Storage instead of deleting it for 10% of the DP I used on it.
"Anyway, if we're lucky, the 3 remaining generator boxes might score us 800 baddies on floor 1 alone! That's gotta be over half the enemy forces!" - Garami
"We will see. Oh, and the decoy group just reached the end of the floor." - Bloom
"Brilliant! ...Wait, hold on. Already?!" - Garami
Switching screens, I saw what the decoy group was doing. They're standing in front of a massive gate, blocking their path, while participating in the largest game of rock-paper-scissors I've ever seen. How are the Cave Rabbits or the Monster Dog doing that? Not to mention the Demonic Elementals! The Monster Bats, I can sort of see it.
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"And what's exactly this whatever-I'm-looking-at?" - Garami
"A boss room." - Bloom
"Right, a boss-!? A boss room?! I thought they were restricted to only every 5th floor! ...Along with the one that you can place on the final one!" - Garami
"Wow, Master. How knowledgable of you." - Bloom
"Of course, I'm in the know. Bosses equal dragons. It's pure science, baby!" - Garami
"Still wanting that Dracolich in your roster?" - Bloom
"It's not like Santa Claus will bring one to me for Christmas." - Garami
"Who is Sandy Flaws?" - Bloom
Oh boy...
"But regarding this boss, it seems to be a special option you can put on any floor. You take a super spiced-up version of a monster from any monster line and place it there. The downside is-." - Bloom
"Wait, hold on. It's coming back to me now. That's the room that prevents the slotted monster from EVER appearing again in the Dungeon, even if you remove the facility later, right?" - Garami
"The one and only. Though you could pay a steep fine to 're-recruit' the monster back into your bestiary." - Bloom
Still not my cup of tea. It's probably why I decided to forget about it. That, and we won't be getting any dragons from using it.
"Well, boss or no boss, that's not a good excuse for slacking on the job." - Garami
"They are not slacking. This boss room seems to have an additional rule added to it, preventing no more than 6 adventurers from entering the room at the same time." - Bloom
"Those guys aren't adventurers. They barely qualify as meat shields!" - Garami
"And you are sure calling you evil is incorrect?" - Bloom
Blast! This is going to be troublesome. Though while Bloom and I were busy blabbering, the monster crew finally finished their game and got 6 representatives to try and challenge the boss room.
Without much fanfare, the door opened, letting only the 6 monsters, 2 High Goblins and 1 of each from the Demonic Elementals, Monster Dogs, Monster Bats, and Cave Rabbits, enter the inner sanctum of the Ruby Coffer's 1st floor.
The room is...not that impressive. It's circular with many pillars by the walls, a typical Dungeon arena, you could say. The only funny thing here is the giant treasure chest located in the middle of the room. The monsters are running toward it with greed in their stupid little eyes! Abort! Abort the mission-!
*YUM!*
Aaaaand the screen turned black. Let's hope they at least give that giant Mimic-like some bad digestion.
"*Sigh*. Bloom, who do we have for Mimic control?" - Garami
"Might I suggest Mira and her Team A?" - Bloom
"What are you, crazy? Mimics are her natural predators! Send in Iron and Team B instead and make some random excuse as to why we're shuffling the deployment order." - Garami
"Okay. Then, what about team C?" - Bloom
"We're not that desperate...yet." - Garami
Releasing that bunch is a true late-game move. Doing it too early would make things catastrophic! Hence why they're the C Team.
"The only problem now is whether there'll be traps that react based on the target's strength level. The decoy squad could have gone past them without trouble, but Iron's group's a different story." - Garami
"Oh, there are no worries for that." - Bloom
"How come?" - Garami
"On the way, the decoy squad was distracted by several Treasure Chests, Fountains of Recovery, and Rest Area facilities. The floor's facility limit is reached when you include the boss room." - Bloom
So that's the case. That's one big sigh of relief for Iron's sake, but those decoys better not expect me to be lenient on slackers. Now I don't feel bad for the guys who got eaten. Let's keep them as guinea pigs for the following floors.
---
Okay then, Iron and his crew of monsters came to the boss room quite easily, mostly thanks to Bloom's navigation. The decoy squad's mapping didn't end up being for nothing after all.
After they arrived, Iron selected some of the D-rank monsters in his group, 2 Vorpal Rabbits (from the Cave Rabbit evolution line) and 3 Vampiric Giant Bats (evolved from Monster Bats), and wasted no time assaulting the boss room.
The moment the doors closed, the giant treasure chest, aka the Mimic, opened its massive mouth again, showing a set of teeth that easily outclassed those of a shark, plus a tongue that's way freakier than even a penguin's. Trust me, you don't want details.
Iron gestured to his "party members" to stand back as he moved forward holding his new shield up high. It's supposedly made from an alloy that includes part of the meteorite from Grey Park. Polaris had some pebbles left in his fur, enough for Flint to smelt it down to add to the long-awaited metal slab. Too bad. I wanted a meteor weapon myself. Hmph, we better consider making a rerun at that park.
Back to the battle, the Mimic looks at Iron with nasty (yet non-existent) stink eyes. Our reliable ghost knight banged his shield using his sword, an action related to the [Tauning] skill. And boy did it work. The Mimic's attention was turned solely around Iron before it, and half a second later, it jumped at him with its gigantic mouth wide open.
Looking undisturbed as ever, Iron swung his shield, enveloped in a dark grey aura, and smashed it into the giant Mimic's nasty fangs. Ouch, that gotta hurt. For the Mimic, I mean. All its front-row teeth need to be checked by a dentist now.
Jumping back in pain over its now-missing fangs, the Mimic was now in perfect range for Iron to drop a [Lava Bomb] into its open, agonized mouth, burning it from the inside out. That's some hot sauce even I wouldn't stomach.
And after that, it was a beatdown. Iron did most of the job, laying on Magma attacks thanks to [Magma Touch] added to his Combat Arts, but the other two monsters did their part.
The Vampiric Giant Bats, gigantic (duh) bats with bloodred claws, fangs, and talons that shined in contrast to their pitch-black bodies, flapped with their wings to generate slash-like waves that cut apart the Mimic's wooden shell. You know, in retrospect, maybe going for a small metal chest would be better than splurging on the large one in wood? Even stone would be a better option...
As for the Vorpal Rabbits, cute little critters armed with sword-like sharp talons on the back of their fluffy feet, they were running around and throwing-, err, correction, kicking rocks at the Mimic with incredible force. And I added them to make the Damavand not look so threatening...
It didn't take long for the Mimic to say its final prayers. Iron's sword struck the monster's "head" with enough force to slice open its "brain". Damn, Mimic anatomy is a difficult subject.
Anyway, after the Mimic started disappearing in a puff of black dust, the doors, both the entrance to the boss room and the exit, opened up, allowing everyone to pass through this first gauntlet of the Ruby Coffer.
"Great. One down, four floors to go. We're in the lead!" - Garami
"Hmm, I am not sure if it will be that easy to keep that position." - Bloom
"Why do you say-, whoa!? Now THAT'S nasty!" - Garami
Something new came out from our main entrance. The Ruby Coffer's new forces had arrived, and they sure knew how to throw you for a loop. So that guy also has added a main attribute to his Dungeon. This is getting interesting.