The Goddess was upset. The minion known as “Rocky” by Her and “priestymost” by the minions knew why... It was the fact that Her Favorite, the only one to call Her by name, had taken an extended absence from Her presence.

Since the Favorite had accepted the Chief's task, he'd spent nearly all of his time at his worksite in the depths. A place beyond the Goddess's direct influence, although not for lack of trying. Her Domain was expanding as swiftly as it could, yet that was not the same thing as Her presence... Which some unknown force was resisting. The Priestymost could not for a moment believe it was merely the maximum extent of Her power.

Rocky didn't understand the whims of his Goddess. The Favorite went so far as to rebuke Her, yet was still subserviant to Her geas. She had sent him away as punishment, yet clearly She longed for his return. This sort of relationship was unfathomable by one who thought of loyalty as an absolute thing.

The Goddess dealt with Her malaise through the use of a surrogate, a role which Rocky could trust to none other lest they lead Her astray through either malice or incompetence. Mostly he was simply regaled with tales and images of prior events in the dungeon, but it wasn't long before he realized why the one known as “Arc” was meant for this role.

{Rocky, none of the minions are using the clay pit Kat ordered. Why not?}

{Look at the silly minion with the boot on its head! It can't see anything! Isn't that funny?}

{Why doesn't Rocky try to make something new? Maybe... Um... A banner for Kat?}

{Rocky, help! The mobs aren't listening to Kat anymore.}

Rocky wasn't actually a very creative minion. Even if his name came from the rune-stone he was carving when the Goddess found him, he himself wasn't sure how he did that. The favorite had already surpassed him in that regard. All he did was follow the voices in his head. Maybe they were just his imagination, maybe they were low-level forms of the spirits the Goddess once spoke of; whatever the case, they had served Her ends well so far.

{Rocky? What should Kat do?}

Rocky meagerly attempted to satisfy Her desires, but rarely met up to the standard. However, this time it sounded like a more serious issue: Rocky would have to go all-out to serve her as well as Arc could.

{Maybe Rocky should go call Arc back...}

No! ...He wanted to say, but couldn't; not to Her. “Master... Master can do it!” Rocky believed She relied too much on her Favorite, and was certain Arc would agree with him. Even if he was here, he'd probably try to get Her to stand on Her own.

“Master... What would Arc do?”

Yes, that was the question. Though Rocky wasn't sure himself, he believed Arc merely wanted the Goddess to think as well as he could. That was how he served Her.

Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

{...Kat lacks enough power to coalesce that information from decoherence.}

What? Rocky didn't understand the works the Goddess was using.

“Er... See what Arc do before, apply to now.”

{Okay. Simulating... Arc would, probably try to find out the cause of this and fix it.}

Find the cause? Rocky looked at the image the Goddess cast in her shrine's basin. It was clearer than it used to be, according to Arc who suspected it had to do with the small crystals from the mine that had been seeded into it. Currently displayed was the image of several rats furiously devouring a minion. They were one of the smaller breeds, yet seemed to possess an unnatural strength for something so emancipated...

Hunger...

“Master, maybe they hungry? You feed enough?” {Wha... Mobs need food? Kat has to feed the mobs?} She sounded dejected. She probably never even thought about what the rats would eat, not having the need to eat anything herself.

“Yes, Master. Most things need to eat food or, they die. If, they die then, they cannot serve Master. So, they must ignore now else, cannot obey later.”

{Aww... So, Kat has to give food? Um... What do mobs eat?} Unfortunately, Rocky didn't know either. From his observations, the rats mostly ate other rats; in retrospect that should have been the first sign something was amiss.

Prey...

Right now, that was the minions. “We need, another mob.”

If Arc had been in the upper dungeon, he would have been able to assess the situation and see that the rat population had been heading for a disaster ever since it fell under the dungeon's influence. While the smaller rats could forage on the surface at night, the larger rats would quickly deplete any natural prey once their population started expanding.

And what was their natural prey? The answer was a large roach-like insect that ate the slime mold that grew on the sewer walls. The mold had flourished under the dungeon's influence, but the bugs were killed off before they could be integrated. The survivors instinctively avoided the dungeon, but since only a fraction of the sewer system's breadth had been assimilated, Rocky was able to find one in the unexplored zone without too much difficulty.

The voices urged him to wave his relic staff, and the herd was enchanted. They followed him willingly, although some of the starving rats attacked on the way back. Another wave of the staff, and the rats began convulsing: some died, others recovered to their normal state and fled, and a few remained living but paralyzed. Rocky had some minions carry those back as well.

Both were presented at the Shrine.

{Lifeform identified as “Lesser Sewer Crawler”. Mutations: none. Classifications: creature, monster, mob, passive. Attempting to contract... Contract successful.}

{Lifeform identified as “Rat”. Mutations: Aspect of Famine. Classifications: creature, monster, mob, swarm. Reinforcing contract... Reinforcement successful.}

The Sewer Crawlers were thus integrated into the dungeon, and would multiply quickly under its influence. With the promise of food, the new variety of rat, or “Famine Rat”, came under control as well.

But if Arc was there, he would have realized that this wasn't a stable solution. The crawlers' food source was plentiful now, but would probably decrease over time now that the crawlers had been reintroduced. Additionally, it would still be a while before the crawler population was large enough to support the current number of large rats.

They needed a predator to balance the equation.

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{Intruders have entered the dungeon.}