Chapter 16: New Monster Friends
DM collapsed onto his throne. “I’m so tired…” Although he was never personally in danger, the battle was exhausting, mostly because he needed to deplete the grand majority of his MP.
Sasha and Ardreth seemed fine, although their other party members got roughed up pretty good. They’d survive, but he wasn’t sure if they’d be fit enough for adventuring anymore. The other party of adventurers was wiped out, as was the head merchant.
DM monitored the other merchants and drivers return to the caravan and assess the situation. They were discussing plans to lift the wyvern into a wagon. Apparently, the wyvern’s body was more valuable than one wagon’s worth of supplies and wares. Also, they weren’t far from the nearest town.
“I do wonder how Sasha and Ardreth will explain the dead wyvern to the Guild and everyone else. It seemed like that opponent was too strong for either adventuring party to have a hope of defeating at their levels.” He doubted they would credit him for his aid using tentacle and other abilities, but they couldn’t very well claim they were strong enough to defeat the wyvern themselves.
“That damn wyvern was resisting almost everything I threw at it, too.” From the beginning, DM was trying to apply just about every negative status effect he could think of. It seemed that wyverns resist charm particularly well. Perhaps that was a racial trait of dragons and their kin. His other abilities were mostly blocked too.
DM was successful at stealing fireball T3 from the wyvern, at least. Given that the wyvern was launching T3 fireballs like they were no big deal, DM suspected that he’d need at least T3 touch abilities in order to successfully apply negative status effects, charm aside.
Other than ability touch, the big winners in the battle where pain touch and pleasure touch. By adding pain touch to projectile attacks and tentacle slaps, DM was able to distract the wyvern and disrupt its flight. Pleasure touch had been surprisingly effective at delaying the wyvern at a time when seconds were precious.
Health touch was how DM ultimately finished off the wyvern, but the effect was too slow to accomplish much earlier in the battle. In other circumstances, he might have waited for the wyvern to fall asleep and then try to quietly apply affection via a gentle touch from a tentacle, but that obviously wasn’t an option today.
“Oh, that’s right! Ardreth discovered that the infection doesn’t get removed if he heals while considering the infect status a benefit to the target. That also explains why I’m still able to monitor the girls even after they healed some minor injuries over the past few days. I wonder if I can use similar logic to apply multiple negative status effects to enemies.”
DM’s theory was that he could apply a status effect like paralysis to an enemy, mentally consider paralysis to be a beneficial status for the enemy, then apply a second effect like poison. If applying poison didn’t remove beneficial statuses from the target, then perhaps the paralysis wouldn’t get removed. This exploit would probably be rendered moot once DM leveled up the tier of his touch abilities, but it was worth testing at the next opportunity. He figured testing it on his minions was too risky since they might react differently than real enemies.
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Sasha’s party and the rest of their caravan elected to continue their journey towards the capital of the Empire, minus one wagon. The merchants insisted that as long as they made it to Gulukkhath, the rest of the journey would be safe enough to proceed with their remaining fighting force.
The girls were finishing up their activities in the Narrow Cliff Woodland, aptly named since the small forest stretched between two opposing cliff faces for kilometer after kilometer. DM expected them to return to the dungeon the next day, but that was just an educated guess.
He continued scouting the forest from the air using infected bats, but he wasn’t finding evidence of intruders from the city. He decided to try sending a bat into the Twin Cities after dark. He wasn’t sure if the city had countermeasures in place. If not, he could spy on the humans without relying on allies like the beast girls or Sasha’s party.
“Okay, I should be safe for a while, so let’s review the notifications I received from defeating the wyvern. The dungeon and I both gained two levels, which is a first.”
>Dungeon has reached LVL 6.
>Dungeon Master has reached LVL 8.
>Dungeon Floors 5 and 6 now available.
>Additional creatures now available.
“Me first, then the dungeon.”
Name Dungeon Master Species Tentacle Monster (Tier 2) LVL 8 HP 625 MP 1625 STR 74 DEF 61 MAG 57 MDEF 49 AGI 37 LUCK 1 Abilities
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Offense Touch (Poison T1, Slow T1, Berserk T1, Mana T1, Charm T6, Pain T1, Pleasure T1, Health T1, Ability, Paralysis T1, Experience T1), Projectile (T1), Ice Shot (T1), Affection (T1), Tentacle Slap (T2), Ice Spear (T1), Lightning Bolt (T1), Air Blast (T1), Earth Spike (T1), Fireball (T3)
Defense Guard (Poison T1, Fire T1, Ice T1, Charm T1), Reduced Damage from Monsters (T1) Utility Bonus Damage to Monsters (T1), Infect, Heal (T1), Sense (T2), Antidote, Regenerate (T2), Absorb Equipment (T3), Disguise, Float, Spawn Tentacle (T2)
“I must have missed it before, but spawn tentacle seems to have increased to T2 through usage. What does it do exactly?”
>Spawn Tentacle (T2): Summons up to two tentacles to desired locations. Targeted spot must be in view of caster. Tentacle persists until destroyed, dismissed, or replaced by using Spawn Tentacle.
“Two tentacles instead of one will be a big boost to my firepower so long as I have the MP to support it. What minions can I summon now?”
The dungeon system answered DM’s question with a tremendous wall of text. Apparently, the answer to that question was no longer simple. For example, T1 kobolds could be summoned at levels ranging from 1 to 4, whereas T2 kobolds would be summoned at level 5 or above, and they could use the second tier of their steal ability. In contrast, goblins could still be summoned at T1 up to at least LVL 6. T2 slimes used a T2 version of their acid attack, and T2 spiders used a T2 version of their web ability, for whatever that was worth.
Setting aside which tier was available at LVL 6, the following new creatures were available: Tentacle Monster, Wolf, Lesser Demon, Lizardman, Chameleon, Ogre, Dryad, Basilisk, and Elemental. DM inquired about the abilities of each monster type.
Tentacle monsters could use the same abilities as DM had learned naturally, except the abilities were learned at higher levels as compared to the dungeon master. At LVL 6, a tentacle monster could use tentacle slap T1, regenerate T1, and absorb equipment T1. Charm, infect, spawn tentacle, affection, and paralysis touch were not available at this time. Some of those, DM could provide if he wanted to with the ability touch skill anyway.
The other interesting thing he found about LVL 6 tentacle monsters was that they were a tier lower than DM, meaning they were smaller. DM was 3 meters tall and purple, whereas the new tentacle monster he summoned appeared 2 meters tall and gray. Again, he noted being the dungeon master seemed to result in him achieving higher tiers earlier than normal monsters.
Wolves could howl, reducing the attack of nearby enemies. Chameleons could hide, making them invisible so long as they didn’t attack. DM was quite interested in that ability. Dryads possessed a utility skill, Reduced Damage from Males. DM wouldn’t mind that skill either. Basilisks could turn enemies it repeatedly struck to stone with stone strike. Elementals could cast one of fireball, ice spear, lightning bolt, air blast, and earth spike.
“Become food for me!”
DM summoned and used his ability touch skill on the relevant creatures one at a time.
>Learned ability, Howl (T1).
>Learned ability, Hide.
>Learned ability, Reduced Damage from Males (T1).
>Learned ability, Stone Touch (T1).
DM wasn’t able to improve his elemental spells since he already knew them all at T1 or above. He dismissed the creatures and summoned a lesser demon, a lizardman, and an ogre.
The lesser demon carried a sword bearing confusion strike. The lizardman, a spear bearing sleep strike. The ogre’s mace didn’t have any abilities attached to it. DM absorbed one each.
>Absorbed sword (T1).
>Learned ability, Confusion Touch (T1).
>Gained 3 STR.
>Absorbed spear (T1).
>Learned ability, Sleep Touch (T1).
>Gained 3 STR.
>Absorbed mace (T2).
>Gained 4 STR.
DM felt like he could use every negative status effect under the sun now. The system report of monsters available also shared one other unsolicited piece of information with him:
>At dungeon LVL 7, water-themed floor features and water-based creatures will become available.
DM wasn’t sure why he was warned about this, but water levels seemed interesting enough. He already had six floors to work with, after all.
Dungeon LVL 6 allowed DM to summon and control up to 18 LVL 6 minions at once, or as many as 108 LVL 1 minions. Any adventurer beyond the novice stage could defeat one or two LVL 1 monsters, but how would a small adventuring party hold up against a swarm of 108 dogs running circles around them or 108 imps launching T1 fireballs at them repeatedly?
“What’s this?” DM noticed a caravan, separate from the one Sasha guarded, approaching the Lower Gordu Forest from the southwest, thanks to a roving bat. Most likely, the caravan would stick to the road and proceed directly to the Twin Cities without entering the forest. Since merchant convoys didn’t pass by too often, he did his best to keep an eye on them. He was also interested to see what type of guards the group had walking alongside.
The convoy stopped on the portion of road closest to the southern tip of the forest. A group of apparent adventurers waved and then marched north. The convoy continued east, presumably traveling to the city under reduced guard.
“Let’s see. This party is around LVL 3. What are they doing entering the forest instead of continuing on to the city?”
DM wasn’t certain, but he had a theory. Perhaps they departed from the capital or somewhere else quite a distance to the west bearing outdated information of a LVL 1 or LVL 2 dungeon in the Lower Gordu Forest. Perhaps they made arrangements with the head merchant that they could peel off at the end of the journey and proceed directly to the ripe dungeon.
If DM was correct, this group would have no way of knowing about the current restrictions on entering the forest, or that the dungeon had leveled all the way up to LVL 6. DM suspected such rates of leveling were uncommon if not unprecedented for dungeons.
“There’s something I’ve been wondering…” Now that DM could summon tentacle monsters at will, he’d have a chance to see how normal tentacle monsters behave. He’d step in if things got too dangerous for the beginner adventurers, but this was a golden opportunity.
He rushed to restructure the first floor of the dungeon and set a trap. The adventurers would get lured in by a single LVL 1 spider and a treasure chest bearing the same loot as DM first encountered a few weeks ago, back on his first day as a dungeon master. Surely they’d think this dungeon is perfect for them.
They’d proceed into the next room, only to find it’s a dead end. They’d return through a now one-way door and encounter a LVL 5 tentacle monster, with 19 more hiding just out of sight. DM would not provide the tentacle monsters instructions. He would just let the creatures act according to their default behavior until it was time to step in.
Once the adventurers were subdued, he would rescue them and figure out what to do with them from there. He hadn’t decided whether or not he would eat their gear… he felt a little bad about it, and they probably didn’t have anything that good anyway. At a minimum, he planned to ask the female elf if she knew Ardreth.