I felt my mind being sucked back down a narrow channel and strange colors flew all around me for some seconds before I knew that I was back in the place I belonged to. My subminds all snapped back to me like a dislocated shoulder and I felt complete again, as it should be.

But then I also got a small shock because I felt the loss of some of my citizens, to be clear most of my guardians were dead, Gillian excluded. What the hell!

They were all gathered in my inner mind where right now a nice shouting contest was going on. For a short moment I thought about just watching the show, but then I sighed and reminded myself that I had a job to do. By my counting it seemed that surprisingly no other citizen had died by any goblin or lizard hand which seemed like a miracle in itself.

It seems that my city spells for protecting and strengthening my people had worked more splendid than I could have hoped for. They sucked mana like a monster but they pay their dues.

My appearance in my inner mind did go completely amiss by the two parties that seperated the room between themselves. On one side there were my two new acquisitions and on the other were all my guardians except Gillian, which made me quite happy because recreating the hearth tree would have sucked. The mana neeeded to get it as large as it was now was already huge but doing the same again would have been a serious kick in not so pleasant parts of my my none existent human body.

“Ehem!” I harrumphed and the room suddenly got silent when all eyes went to me standing a little bit away from the crowd.

“I know that the most here do not know my new two friends here, so some introductions are to happen now, “ I looked at Maria and Sarah with a questioning gaze which they understood at least.

With a little bit of a triumphant look Mariah went first, “My name is Maria Ulvantor and I am or was a first-class wizard who my new employer took the liberty to take with him to this new place. Even if this meant that I would lose some of my power and knowledge I went with him as I've never seen a city core before and am thrilled to see his powers blossom.”

My guardians watched her with some distrust in their gazes and then turned their gazes to the other person here, which I had to admit was a stunningly beautiful human female with golden curls framing a tanned face with high cheek bones, jade green eyes and all in all quite catlike features. She somewhat reminded me a bit of Taylor Swift back from Earth.

Standing almost 175 centimeters tall she was equipped with a model like body which made me somewhat reminiscent of my own quite average one. Maybe I was a little bit conscious suddenly that all of my people seemed to look much better than me. I had to ask Tiria if I could change the way I envisioned myself in my inner mind.

And if not then I still could create an awesome golem for me.

Sarah had a smirk on when she opened her mouth, “Hey there guys and ladies! My name is Sarah and I'm Marcus' new enslaved dungeon core.” All eyes went to me.

“Hey I only bound her to my will by a contract almost like the one you guys signed when you became my guardians.”

Sarah rose a brow, “So they'll get punished by the system if they hurt your rules?”

Horrified looks now hit me from my minions, ehem, I mean my dear guardians.

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“Thanks for this superb introduction, you ungrateful piece of garbage crystal!” I rose my hands in a gesture to excuse my behaviour, “It's somewhat more complicated and and as you all became my guardians before Tiria left the godly realm, your conditions have more leeway than hers as they are controlled by the system itself, which was never my intention, believe me.”

“Sure, I'll believe your bullshit when Tiria herself acknowledges your words. By the way where is my former boss?”

My crew also didn't believe me fully as it seemed. Maybe I should hold some interviews later to clarify some things. Thanks Sarah for this, I will finds ways to get back to you for this.

I turned my questioning gaze to Galen and made a requesting gesture with my right hand.

His expression went sour for a moment and said, “In the last wave she stood in front of the warriors and was hit several times and ultimately died in the onslaught.”

I didn't need to turn my face to Sarah to feel her rage heating the air around her.

Just as I wanted to reason with her there was a sudden eruption of light between my guardians and Sarah. When it stopped the former goddess stood in its place and seemed quite excited and a little bit rugged from the fight.

She stood with her face to me and just opened her lips, “Oh Marc...” and was tackled to the ground by my new dungeon core.

“What the hell! Who?... Sarah!?” Tiria's gaze hit me like a laser, “You've got some explaining to do, mister.”

I would have done that if she wouldn't have been almost smooched down by Sarah which rose some suspicion from me that Sarah wasn't in the normal range of man-female interchanges.

“Damn it, Sarah, get off me now. I'm not some cushion you can use as you please.”

If Tiria wouldn't have been getting angrier every moment I would have been amused about the situation so I just said, “Get off her now, Sarah.”

Even if my command was very softly spoken the dungeon lady sprang up like a spring and threw a very nasty look, followed by a relieved and questioning from Tiria on the ground who slowly stood up again and knocked nonexistant dust from her clothes..

“So Marcus, if I understand the situation here you contracted Sarah to be your minion, right?”

“Minion! I'm not a minion of this guy, even if the system made me his servant.” Sarah exclaimed like a wounded lioness.

I just threw a “Shut up!” at her and like ordered she closed her mouth before more words could escape it.

“Interesting. Shutting her up never worked with me as far as I can remember. But after loosing most of my memories from being a goddess that isn't quite surprising.”

“Just take it with stride and enjoy the benefits. As I see you know Sarah and have been friends some time?” my voice suggested some more information from her and the lady didn't make me wait long for an answer.

“Yes, she's from Earth like you, just some decades older. I think I got her around the fifties?” and her look went to Sarah. I gave the disobedient dungeon core a short nod and she opened her mouth again.

“Yeah, 1952 to be exact. Originally I came from Los Angeles in the USA.”

So she's an original american whirlwind, how nice. Now I just had to gather a russian version of her and I could relight the cold war between their dungeons and enjoy the sight.

Nevermind, stupid idea.

“I don't know why but I get some strange vibrations from you, master,” said Galen.

Tiria watched me with a smirk, “You can be sure that he just had a nasty idea. If you thought about a russian dungeon, just forget it, there is no one around as far as I know. By the way, did you get a look at Thorm?”

I shrugged,” Just at his temple and his high priest seemed quite impressed of my fists. Mariah here left a nice present at his place before we vacated the building. Last words I heard of this sucker was some lamentation about me wrecking his temple.” My smile was more predatory than I had imagined because Chara went behind Galen with a fearful look on her young face.

Tiria looked first at Maria and then back to me with some disbelieve showing, “You destroyed his first temple just like that?”

I signed with my dumb to the wizard-lady, “She was, I just went with the flow.”

“Oh no, I won't take all the blame and glory. I wouldn't have gone all out if you didn't offer me a nice escape by yourself. The meteor spell wouldn't have hit the place without your promise to take me here.”

“A METEOR hit the traitor's place?” and then the former goddess rolled laughing with tears in the eyes on the floor and couldn't stop for quite some time which I took to speak with my guardians and Sarah watching her former boss on the ground.

“So the goblins attacked for some time after my departure and then just suddenly ran away as fast as they could? Any information on why they did?”

In this moment one of my subminds registered the noise of several horns blown some distance away from the town. The surprised and then grinning face of Galen and his ladies made me ask them, “You seem to recognize theses horns, would you enlighten me?”

Kitara said, “Master, the humans seem to have come and began some target practice. The goblin leader has now a whole new problem to solve. Whatever has been left of his forces won't leave the forest anymore. Indeed I think that the trees will get quite some nourishment from the green pests.”