It was day 56, the final day of the second month. It was also the day that rankings would be posted. Mark did not expect much. They would probably be near the bottom in the low 20’s. There were now only 24 contenders remaining. One more had been eliminated over the last week. It was probably too soon for it to be due to other dungeons reaching level 2, but perhaps it could be due to the sponsorship rewards dungeons were receiving. Mark and Amelia still had no clue what they could look like.
Regardless of the cause, Mark anticipated for another round of dungeon eliminations to occur in the near future. As dungeons reached level 2 they would gain a significant boost over their competition. Mark and Amelia were not far from taking that step themselves. They were currently sitting at 86,523 MP. Within the next week they would have enough, after taking into account their planned expenditures over the next few days. Mark’s intention was to unlock it immediately upon reaching 100,000 MP provided nothing changed.
It would be a bit of risk, leaving themselves with so little MP to build units to fight if they had to, but it did not seem like they needed to worry about the other dungeons currently. It seemed that both Nehemiah and Mareth were saving up their MP, probably for the same thing. Neither had completely rebuilt their forces. As for Gale, well as far as they knew she had yet to leave the swamp. They were not even sure if Gale knew where their dungeon was. She seemed to be content with continuing to turtle down and build her strength.
Perhaps it should be a bit worrisome that she was seemingly growing unabated, but Mark could hardly worry about her for now. Gale was the only dungeon in their area that was from a major faction after all, and she was seemingly putting down deep roots. In the future it might be all but impossible to dislodge her, but they did not have the luxury of even hitting the easier targets that Mareth and Nehemiah provided.
In the next few days they would complete the tech tree for dungeon level 1. The war party had left early this morning. They would fight the beast plaguing the kobolds, and in return they would receive the mining tech. For the last tech, Contender capabilities, they were already at 15 of the 20 RP required. Mark did not know what it would give, but they had favored other things for too long.
Hopefully, the war party would bring back their next floor guardian. They currently had only 38 DP toward unlocking the third floor, but Mark would convert the rest today. According to Amelia, Nick Holt was one of the richest contenders in the battle, and he had already found one of their entrances. He had not even touched their second floor during his last exploratory raid, but Mark would not count on only having one new floor to keep the guy at bay.
Nick Holt was surely one of the first to hit level 2 and even if he was not; he would likely be receiving sponsorship rewards on a weekly basis. Since the rewards were based on level 2 dungeons, Mark felt he had adequate reason to be worried. Mark might have already built the third floor, if he had not been waiting on finding a floor guardian. A third floor without a guardian would not be much of an addition.
Of course there were other things that Mark had been waiting for. It was important to make defenders as strong as possible. Theoretically they should be stronger as the floors progressed. Unfortunately, unlocking higher classes was too expensive, and they most definitely were not going to start unlocking beast bloodlines although Mark had considered it. Eventually, he decided against it. It would be cool to have a beast floor, but they could not delay reaching dungeon level 2 and techs that it would bring.
So Mark needed to improve the defender's strengths in other ways. Luckily, the barracks were now completed, so now Mark would never again deal with the 10% experience penalty. His units would forever start as recruits instead of conscripts. The finished building would not give any boon due to being shoddily constructed by goblins, but Mark could hardly worry about that for now.
The other way Mark could improve the defenders was with their equipment. Several more attribute enchantments had finished, strength and agility. Which meant Mark had five enchantments in which to increase their strength. He would give their weapons the piercing enchantment. They would have the standard necklaces for vitality.
For agility, Mark had initially wanted to add it on their footwear, but the goblins did not wear anything on their feet and according to Nasal they would be less than receptive to doing so. The soles of their feet were as tough as boots, so they did not really need it for protection. Instead Mark decided on shin guards. Technically they filled the grieves slot, but they looked more like soccer shin guards than a piece of armor. Similarly, Mark made arm guards out of bamboo to fill the vambrace slot.
The inscriptions had been a bit different since he had to incorporate them across two pieces of separate equipment that acted as one, but they had not proved to be overly difficult like the defensive enchantment had. He made it from bamboo since it was readily available and would fit over their thin arms and legs. It sprouted like crazy around the fishery, and it actually held inscriptions quite well. They would not provide much defense if hit, but they were flexible and light. They might stop a casual strike, but the defender might then lose the attribute boost from the inscription.
There would be two sets of defensive equipment available for the defenders. They would all get the defensive vests that Mark had made more than a week ago, but he had also designed another inscription for their shields. The main difference was that the shield’s defensive enchantment was weaker, but it was also a constant defensive boost. The unit did not have to expend MP to perform a temporary boost like the vests did.
All of the enchantments would be good quality, and would effectively raise the unit's power rating by about 20% by Mark’s estimate. It was a modest boost, but still Mark would want far more for their next floor.
Unfortunately, there were no other enchantments or other research projects that could help, and Amelia had seemed to run into the wall with the enchantments. Good quality seemed to be the best that she could manage. Mark did not know if it was materials or something else. Perhaps they needed a future tech. Regardless, their forces would be fighting at a slightly higher tier than would normally be possible.
Other research projects were progressing. Of note the previously undefined life essence based class was now labeled as the spiritualist class. Mark still did not know what it could do, but it sounded cool. The three closest projects to completion were the duplicate projectiles at 98%, the vitality bomb at 82%, and a new fast riser, the war drum class at 87%. Each category also had new undefined projects underway, including 4 projects for the new pharmacology focus. Several were even combination projects including another essence focus with the specialized class.
The essence focus seemed to be the most popular focus to combine with, which made sense to Mark. Essence by its very nature was an enhancer. There were only three essence-only projects that were not combinations, and one of them, the rock skin pill, would have likely been a combination project with pharmacology if they were able to. Instead the rock skin pill was progressing at a seemingly snail pace in comparison to the vitality bomb that had started at around the same time.
It was all pretty exciting, and soon they could have even more focuses. The gnome builders had only needed a week to complete the crafting house add-on, the apothecary. Mark had retasked them to work on building the research lab’s final add-on, the basement. It would take them at least two months of work, but it would be worth it to get two more focuses. They had two other unit types after all for the research lab to work on. Perhaps they could get specialized bloodlines or germination routes, or he could just pick something else. There were not really any bad options, just better and worse ones.
Fortunately, they received a special feature for the apothecary and it was a good one.
[Notice: Due to the nature of your apothecary, all finished products will receive a boost based on their quality level: poor 0%, below average 5%, average 10%, good 25%, exceptional 50%, masterwork 100%, and artifact 200%]
It was a great special feature. Probably far better than their crafting house special feature since they had not made any use of it. They were not infusing two inscriptions on a piece of equipment yet, so did not need to worry about interference. Even if they were only able to reach the same quality they could for enchantments, they would still get a 25% boost. Still they could not make much use of it till some pharmacology projects finished.
It did raise the question why they had not received a special feature for the research lab pagoda add-on. Mark had thought add-ons might not get one. He had speculated whether they could have the goblins just make the add-ons from then on, but had decided not to chance it since it might weaken or even lose the special feature for the main building. Perhaps, the apothecary got one since it actually added a new function unlike the research pagoda which basically just added more of the same. Oh well, it was certainly welcome to receive such unexpected benefits.
The light in the corner of Mark’s vision flickered. “Oh, I guess it's time,” Mark said to himself. He took one last look at the archer tower being constructed. Perhaps it could be completed in another month. They were currently working on flooring for the first floor, so it would be somewhat usable if they were suddenly attacked.
It was not the only project the goblins were working on. They were already working on a barracks add-on. Just having the barracks allowed units to start at the recruit experience level, but they could also have their units train there. Currently, they could have 25 units assigned to the barracks. In a week of training they would become regulars and get a 10% boost. Really the only downside was losing the ability of using the units as a workforce, which was not really a detriment. Mark had immediately assigned 25 legionnaires to the barracks. In a week he would rotate 25 new units, since training units into veterans was currently locked.
The add-on would allow them to train units, so that they developed classes naturally. Normally, Mark would rather just pay the MP, but they had plenty of weak units that could benefit from this add-on. After all, Mark was not ever going to spend MP to give green goblins classes. They did not add much of a boost, 10% of 0.3 was not significant. However, there was a new class that it would be very useful for, the mount class. It would be very beneficial if his future roach calvary goblins could earn the class. Luckily, the add-on would not take too terribly long by goblin building standards. They mainly needed to clear a bunch of land.
Mark had summoned one of each the fire ant and spider units. Like the cockroach unit they were hidden away deep in the forest. Mark did not want to spend extra MP to make the forces yet. For one, they would not want to build a force till they had unlocked aspects of the beast bloodline. Well at least for the spiders. At 600 MP per a unit they were worth getting a boost. But Mark still wanted to get a good idea of their capabilities. He wanted to see if they had any special abilities like the roaches' couple hundred foot glide. Unfortunately, Mark was disappointed in that respect.
Fire Ant 1 (1/66) (conscript) Power lvl: 1.5 Morale: 50 (content) Strength 18 Attack: 4 Defense: 2 Endurance 14 Abilities/Skills Agility 11 Vitality 12 Intelligence 1 Wisdom 1
The fire ant was bigger than the cockroaches, but not by much. Their blackish red bodies would rest about 3 feet in the air on top of their six legs. They had far more formidable mandibles than the cockroaches. They were basically like curved spears that would easily lop off an appendage if one was caught between them. On top of that, they were incredibly strong. They could easily carry the bigger goblin units without being slowed. Mark could also see using them to pull things like a workhorse. He could see them being able to work in conjunction with each other quite well. Fire ant chariots…?
Wolf Spider (1/55) (conscript) Power lvl: 1.8 Morale: 50 (content) Strength 15 Attack: 5 Defense: 2 Endurance 14 Abilities/Skills Agility 14 Webbing Vitality 13 Intelligence 2 Wisdom 3
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The spider on the other hand was an utter terror. Amelia hated them. The spider’s body rested nearly five feet in the air. Its brown body was covered in coarse black hair that made the spider take on an ominous speckled look from a distance. The fangs were about the same size as the fire ants, but since if you were in them you would be closer to the 8 black orb-like eyed monstrocity, Mark would prefer to be caught by the ant. The spider did not have a stinger, but did have spinnerets. The web would not be useful in active battle. It would be too slow to catch moving prey, but it definitely had other applications for them to explore including crafting projects.
Unfortunately, unlike the cockroaches or ants the spider needed to eat meat. It was easy to provide hunted animals or animals from the goblin’s pig pen for now. It only needed to eat like once a week, but in the future a force of these would go through a lot of food.
The goblins were less than enthused to have another potential claimant on their fresh meat stock. The harpies were still bringing in information, but the goblins were still stingy on what they deemed was theirs. Luckily, Nasal was back to help deal with them. He was not really smarter than the red hobgoblins, but as a named unit he was much more loyal to dungeon interests over his own. Mark could not let the other goblins hinder their information gathering because they decided to stiff a couple harpies to save a couple chickens. However, the information was nothing essential, although he was receiving daily reports on the surrounding dungeons.
The tactical screen at the corner vision started blinking even faster. “Okay!” Mark said exhaustingly. It was time to watch tonight’s entertainment. A horde of goblins versus future floor guardian number three… hopefully.
“Gee… you're going to end up missing it,” Amelia said flatly as Mark approached the couch.
Mark glanced at the screen. Nothing had really changed from the last time he had flipped to the link patrol. A lone kobold led 80 odd goblins through a twisting tunnel. The tunnel was illuminated by the dozens of torches carried by the goblins. Mark looked annoyingly at Amelia, “Doesn’t look like I missed anything. Just more of the same,” Mark said pointedly.
“They passed a pile of bones a few minutes ago,” Amelia responded. ‘Oooooo,’ Mark mouthed. “What? they were fresh,” Amelia said, elbowing Mark in the side.
Mark brushed his side. The girl was getting notably more violent. Perhaps it was because he was a bad conversationalist?
“The kobold said they were close to the creature’s lair,” Amelia said with a huff.
“Hmmmm, well then I’m going to eat while we wait.” Mark said bringing up the interface store. A hamburger sounded good.
“You are pretty cold blooded. Our goblins are soon to be fighting for their lives and you're going to eat a burger like you're watching a football game,” Amelia said. She tried to sound like she was serious, but Mark could pick out the playfulness in her tone. In a few minutes, she joined him, choosing an elegant looking curry dish. Despite what she had said, it seemed there would still be some time before the entertainment.
Mark dwelt for a moment on the similarities between the earth and the higher realm due to the football reference. It turned out mankind was a lot less creative than one would expect. People named things simply. If it was not for different languages and their constant evolving everything would be rather simple.
The football she was talking about was closer remarkably similar to soccer than the American sport. Figures, even the higher realm agreed that the name for the sport should be football. Just like the imperial measuring system America was one of the lone holdouts from doing what the rest of the world did. Even the Arcadian realm used something similar to the metric system using 10 as the base for everything. Mark did not know whether the measurements actually were equivalent, but they had the same idea. Mark of course kept converting things into the imperial measurements he was familiar with. Why… just cause.
They did not have to wait for long. About fifteen minutes after Mark had joined Amelia on the couch, the war party entered what was most definitely the lair. Bones scattered across the floor, some 20 feet lower than where it adjoined to the tunnel. A sloping ramp led down to the bottom of the hangar sized room. If the war party went in, it was unlikely they would be able to leave during battle. The floor was slick and the air looked humid. Almost like it was covered in a layer of condensation. There was a pool of water to the left, although Mark could not tell how deep the pool was.
Mark was about to ask where the monster was, when a large shape detached from the floor. “A snake!” Amelia gasped. “No, a dragon,” she corrected, noting that the creature had legs. The only problem was that there were about six pairs of legs.
“Just look at the thing’s status,” Mark said.
Amelia pulled it up. The creature was called an albino Behir although the term snake or dragon fit the creature’s look. The snake-like creature was a good 25 feet long. The bulk of its body was supported by five pairs of legs. The sixth pair were more like arms, but instead of fingers it had sharp bird talon-like claws. The head looked like that of a monitor lizard. The lower jaw hung unhinged revealing a horde of sharp teeth. The creature’s skin was slick and white.
“I don’t suppose we can keep them from entering,” Amelia said, her eyes as wide as saucers.
“Not unless Nasal felt he could make the decision,” Mark said. But it was too late the goblins were already inelegantly sliding down the ramp. “Great, I’m going to lose Nasal again. I really need to stop sending him on these expeditions,” Mark said, running his fingers through his hair. They had sent two full patrols along with 10 legionnaires and 5 reds from their entrance guard.
It was quite possible Mark had misjudged only sending this many goblins to deal with the Behir. He had been picturing a giant salamander. Something in league with the bear or wasp drone, but this thing was twice as big. To think, this morning he had been excited because they had been able to sponge up about 12 measures of life essence. Finally, they would not lose any of the beast’s efficacy, but this beast would likely need more than 12 measures of the stuff.
Crap, they would lose their essence if the goblins were wiped out. Well probably, it looked like Nasal had chosen to hang back in the tunnel with the kobold scout, but even if he hid out, it would be difficult for the goblin leader to carry the essence back by himself. Nasal pulled out a spare bow, It looked like he planned to contribute from where he was at.
The creature that seemingly had been content to wait, started toward the war party as soon as the last of the goblins had slid down the ramp. Probably wanted to make sure none of the units could retreat. The beast was at least more intelligent than a normal beast.
Still hope was not completely lost. Eighteen bows twanged, sending their payload toward the fast approaching creature. Magic bolts were already forming from the 8 mages. At least half of the arrows hit their target. Instead of sticking into the creature however, they all sank in deeply. Some all the way up to the feathers. Not that they could tell now, with how fast the beast was moving. Mark could only grimace at the fact that half of the arrow had missed, but the green goblins did not have the scout class and the creature head bobbed back and forth as it approached, making it a difficult target.
The one volley would be the only organized part of the fight, as the beast slammed into the goblins a second later. Mage bolts sizzled into the beast around the same time, but Mark could not see how effective they were. It became utter mayhem. At least a half dozen goblins were instantly crushed underfoot by the Behir. A couple others were cut down by the creature’s arms. Simultaneously the mouth bit into one of the green goblins. It did not eat it, but released the unfortunate goblin into the air a second later. The green goblin’s body flew through the air, an arm and leg short.
However, it would also be the only time during the battle that the creature could kill so many all at once. Goblins scattered in every direction, most having given up fighting the creature for the moment. A few who did not, were cut down along with the unlucky ones that caught Behir's attention. In seconds a dozen goblins were gone. Unfortunately, the majority of them were legionnaires. They were the biggest targets after all.
The behir finished catching the goblins close to it. Next it spent a few seconds swiveling its head back and forth to locate where all the prey had gone. The goblins had scattered to all corners of the room. The brief indecision showed Mark and Amelia that the battle was not completely one-sided. Black blood was already draining down from the arrow wounds. If arrows continued to puncture that deep into the creature they would definitely hit something critical?
Eventually the behir decided on its next target. It wheeled around on a clump of three legionnaires. They jabbed with their spears, but it had little effect. They were cut down in seconds. It was clear that if they were going to beat the beast it would be due to piercing arrows and the mages. The melee fighters with stone weapons were far out matched. Luckily, Mark had not seen any of the archers or mages go down yet, but unfortunately, the next target the behir chose was one of the mages.
The mage was only part of the way through a fireball spell. The orangish yellow glow had likely been what had drawn the beasts attention. The mage was snatched up and quickly chomped into pieces. “Good thing, we both had time to finish eating,” Mark remarked, earning him an elbow.
But two other fireballs were able to come to fruition while the behir targeted others. The first struck, but glanced off of the rocking head causing little to no damage. The creature had likely shifted its head having caught sight of the flaming ball of fire, but the second fireball slammed home into the main body between the first and second pair of legs. The flames licked at the creature for a couple seconds before winking out leaving only topical damage. It would take a bunch of fireballs to cook this beast. The behir responded by targeting one of the mages, finishing the red goblin a second later.
However, enough time had passed for all of the goblins to reach all corners of the room. Arrows and magic bolts soon started to pepper the behir with impunity from all directions. The goblins felt a semblance of safety since the behir could only focus on one area at a time, a pair of legionnaires even charged in and jabbed at the creature. Their semblance of safety was proven to be false since the behir quickly snapped the front of its body to face any goblin that approached, cutting them down in seconds.
The goblins got the picture. None would approach from thereafter and the behir once again froze in indecision. It was being peppered with ranged attacks but was seemingly having difficulty determining from where they came. The goblins would fire then scamper away. A dozen torches flickered away from where they had been littered. No goblin dared to carry one and draw the creature's attention, but it was hardly enough to make the chamber well lit. Shadows flickered along the walls and floor, and the goblins danced in and out of the light.
Only about half of the arrows fired were actually enchanted. It was easy for Mark to see which arrows had the piercing enchantment and which ones did not. The enchanted arrows seemed to have a faint arora that Mark could make out in the dark cave. He had not noticed in the battle above ground. Then there was the fact that the unenchanted arrows stuck ineffectually into the creature, their heads barely piercing through the slick hide.
The behir eventually just decided to methodically hunt down one goblin after another. There was no set pattern. The creature was just focused on speed, killing each goblin or group as quickly as possible. Goblins started using all sorts of methods to keep from drawing the creatures ire. They cast items, bones, or rocks into the walls making sharp sounds. Others waded into the pool of water. Some even laid down and pretended to be dead. The latter method was eventually discovered by the behir when one of the mages shot the creature in the side with a magic bolt.
Soon the behir was also checking bodies as it passed. A flip of its talloned arms either cut up a corpse or killed a goblin attempting to play possum. In a couple minutes, more than half of the war party had been eliminated, but it had not gone unanswered. The behir had dozens, maybe even a hundred small wounds with black blood pulsing out, and its movements had slowed down substantially.
Partially, because the room looked like a slaughterhouse, and it was having difficulty picking out the living goblins, but also because of its wounds. The piercing arrows were carrying the day. Surely, some had pierced organs and arteries. It was likely the goblins could have shot the beast with several thousand unenchanted arrows and not done near the amount of damage that a hundred piercing arrows, and to a lesser extent magic bolts, had accomplished.
Arrows and the far more occasional magic bolt still zipped out of the darkness to strike the beast. Unfortunately, only half the arrows were actually enchanted. The archer’s quivers contained half regular arrows and half enchanted arrows. Only for the first volley had the goblins made sure to fire a piercing arrow. Now they just pulled one from their quivers at random. It was a bit frustrating since each arrow they fired might grab the beast’s attention. They should be making sure that it would at least matter, but it was dark and they were likely in a panicked state.
Another five minutes passed, and another dozen goblins were silenced. Arrows were now few and far between. Several minutes had passed since the last mage had been brutally killed. Mark did not know exactly how many archers were left. Since they were all unclassed. There was no distinction between them and the other green goblins. However, it was easy to see that all the reds had all been wiped out. Their magic was too eye-catching.
The chamber was deathly silent up until when the beast located another one of the living goblins. Then there would be only a short scream, followed by a crunch. The situation would have seemed hopeless, if not for the creature wobbling as it moved. The beast’s white hide was covered in blood, and it was not all the goblins. It might be kind of anticlimactic, but given enough time the beast might die from blood loss. There just had to be at least a few survivors among the war party. Luckily, the beast seemed to be highly territorial, giving no indication to flee.
Ten minutes later the beast settled down on its haunches. Several minutes had passed since the last arrow had struck the beast. Perhaps it needed to try and rest and recover some strength.
It was at this point that Nasal stepped out from behind the wall. At some point he had stopped firing arrows. Probably to keep from drawing the creature out of the room, but now he confidently nocked arrow after arrow and shot them at the beast’s head. The goblin leader had a handful of piercing arrows left. It was not until the third arrow that Nasal was able to hit the small target. It was enough. The head jerked and the beast collapsed to the floor after spasming for a few seconds. They had succeeded.