On every encounter with the goblins, I was getting a closer and closer view at the fragility of my existence, hence my priority to increase my STBC value as soon as possible had multiplied manyfold. Thus came my urgency to open up my next floor despite just finishing with my second floor just a few days prior. I was pretty sure I would not be able to rest easily without increasing my Defense by at least one Rank. Thus I brought up my creation menu to see what I had to work with, to get an idea for my next floor. On completing two floors, a lot more fauna and flora had become available to me than what I had initially started with. I noticed that I now had access to more temperate flora and fauna than in the beginning. My KR supplied me with vague images whenever I read through their names in the creation menu. I grew especially excited when I saw animals like the cloud leopard and new flora like the Banyan tree. My mind started churning with possibilities, and suddenly an idea came to me. What if….? Oh this is going to be exciting. I have to experiment, but if I am right all my intruders are going to be in for a rude awakening. HA.
With my mind set I started a new vent at the end of the second floor, in preparation of mana conservation for my third floor. I made the Mana vent go down around thirty meters and then started spreading out my Mana influence from there. My goal was to convert an area of around two thousand seven hundred meters depth and ten kilometer square area into my next floor. Of course converting all this floor space into mana was going to take much longer than my previous floors. However, if the next floor could give me a better security blanket then it was worth it.
Since converting matter into mana was always a slow and tedious process, I decided to occupy myself with other things while doing all the boring stuff in the background. Hhmmm let me take a look at what the goblins sacrificed to me earlier, maybe I can find some useful things among them. A lot of these herbs seem to have interesting properties. Many of them can be used by both the goblins and my own critters. Although it does go against my conscience to provide my enemies with resources, I should give them at least some things I guess. How does the saying go? Give them a bit of sweetness to keep them obedient. Yeah, let me plant the herbs at random places all over the floors. My creatures can use them if they can protect the herbs against the intruders. That seems fair.
But what to do with these minerals they sacrificed. What use would anybody have with stones? I can’t think of any reason to motivate my creatures to protect them either. Are all sentient races this stupid? Hmmm, since I am in a good mood I will humour them a bit, let me see how important the minerals are to them. With the abilities of resource management and a bit of environmental manipulation I turned one side of my dead zone into a regenerating iron ore deposit. Now let me see whether they will still bother with useless minerals if they have to mine them in a garden of purple sleepers and blood sucking vines. And if they do, then well, free XP for me.
Hmmm now these Clearmind stones seem a bit more useful. Let me put another regenerating deposit in the brook bed, the water should carry it to all of the brook banks eventually. And it will keep motivating goblins to come to the brook, who will become target practice for my trouts. Perfect. Now that I think about it I know what to do with the spear they gave me. He he he. Let me replace some of the spikes in the traps on the second floor with them. Now intruders can dig them out if they survive a fall onto them first. Giggle. Oh, I feel so devious now.
I was busy extending the brook from the first floor through a underground cave water system to make it into a tributary of the brook on the second floor, so as to increase the water volume and reduce mana cost from the mana used at the end of the brook, when I had my next goblin incursion. This time it was a team of seven with the C-ranked Kobold being one of them. Since the contract provided me with a bit of security, I did not order my critters to rush en masse like all my previous fights, rather let them do their own thing, and instructed them they could attack if they felt threatened or challenged when someone stepped into their territory.
I followed the group, curious to see what they were up to this time. Close observation on their journey through my first floor without the distraction, to the question of my continued existence made me realize that I was getting a slight amount of tainted mana from both the group and my critters everytime they used their abilities. Of course, this is nothing compared to all the XP, Mana and KR I get on killing them. But farming intruders long term might be a good alternative solution, in the cases where harvesting them at once is impossible. Especially since I remember, higher ranks give better XP, Mana and KR. I mused.
Following their journey I got prematurely excited to see a goblin succumb to the effects of purple sleepers, only for another of the goblins to take out a contraption from one of the numerous bundles he was carrying to resist the effects of my plant monsters and save him. Will that goblin be a problem? Should I kill him? Though he seems to only have one of those contraptions which can resist my plant monsters. Hmm so I will let him live for now I guess.
When they reached the mineral deposits, I had reluctantly left for them, they got overly excited about them. Do sentient races eat rocks. But no, they do not according to what I saw in my KR. Well, who can understand the poor taste of lower beings? Maybe they like hugging rocks to sleep. I guess, as long as I can use minerals to lure more prey into my Caverns, who cares why they like it?
Once the team reached the second floor, they decided to make their way over the ground rather than use my maze of bridges, which gave me the feeling that my efforts were wasted. I see that I have made the climb down not treacherous enough. I thought even as I heard one of them commenting about mountain goats. Hmmm, thank you for the idea. I will be implementing it as soon as you leave my cavern. I do not believe that nobody will fall down the next time. Hah.
Following the group further, I had to suppress my anger as I saw the small, lithe goblin with the blown up hair, pointing out and circumventing all my pitfall traps somehow. Without the traps, the danger level of the ground was much lower though still the longer route. I knew I should not have let that goblin live. How is he doing it, why does he know exactly where my traps are? Is this one of his skills? And the bigger question is, do many more have the same skill set? Well at least they did not find any of the spears I left for them. No spears for anybody who is not willing to fall into the traps and find them. Huff. One of the reasons they chose the ground seems to be the lack of resources for the bridges. So I have to up, the difficulty of the ground level and include lures onto the air maze level. Now the question is how.
Their further journey proved my fears true, despite taking longer they were waltzing across the floor with almost no hindrances except maybe an occasional Lynx. Close observation on their actions, made me realize that despite them being all of the same species each of their members had a different function. They were basically covering the weaknesses of the other members when they were moving in a group. The goblin with the bow and arrows was scouting out the terrain and my critters beforehand, while the one called Scrap was informing the group of any traps. The one called Thorn helped in the fighting, but mostly healed anybody who got hurt. The Female non-combatant did not seem to have much use except for her variety of potions and knowledge about the resources and how to harvest them. The role of the runed goblin called Pyrok eluded me for a while as well, since his use seems to be setting fire to anything he set his eyes upon. Maybe goblins liked always having fire nearby?
Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.
When I finally hoped for some casualties, during their first big fight with one of my sounders. That damn high-ranked Kobold stepped in again to keep the casualties down. I would have gotten some of their members by now if not for that Kobold. Just wait, one day your everything will be mine. I swore. The real value of Pyrok and the female only became clear to me when a Soul Eater got one of their members. I recognized the value of information the female held, when even the C-Ranked Kobold could not find the cause for the sudden death of one of their party members.Though it is possible to farm them slowly, filling up my KR seems more important. So my resolution to kill if possible, is still correct. If the female had not been there, they would have never suspected my black leafed plant monster. And if the runed mage had not been there, even the Kobold might not have killed the Soul Eater in time to save the burly Goblin. Though he seemed useful, even then Pyrok’s need to set everything else aflame still eluded me.
It seems my Soul Eaters seem to be the most effective ones on this floor for now. Though I should let them hide themselves in between other bushes and be invisible if possible. It would also be great if they could retreat after failing to get their target, though that might be impossible if the group is on high alert from the death of their party. Hmm. Soul Eaters might have a higher potential, I just need to brainstorm a bit.
As I was still analyzing how to improve my floor further and get rid of the weaknesses I had currently witnessed, when the goblin party finally meandered their way into the drop of the first level. I had been starting to get slightly worried about them making their way to my core, despite the reassurance the contract provided me with. However my worries proved to be unnecessary then the group finally fell into the path of my Mandrill Horde.
I have never seen such a short legged creatures run so fast. The Kobold stayed behind for a while to provide the goblins time for their getaway. Despite being two ranks higher than my critters, he was being overwhelmed by the sheer number of them, though he did not seem to be taking as much damage as I would have liked. The other goblins were in full sprint back. I saw the female take out a concoction and spray it on all of the party members. Similarly, once they got somewhat out of sight of my monkeys, Scrap took out a patterned cloth and made everybody huddle together as he covered his party members and himself with it. I saw the Mandrills run past them, seemingly unable to see or smell them. I toyed with the idea of informing my critters about their location, but ultimately decided I would let it be, if they did not come back. Afterall I needed a bait to lure in more sentient beings into my Cavern. And what better way than no fatality rate. I saw the group make their way back to the first floor after a few hours of hiding. The Kobold was also there, having utilized a different path after their separation. The group left the Cavern not long after and my work began.
Obviously the first thing I did was make the hills steeper and add Mountain Goats, which was one of the animals I got access to with the completion of the Second floor. I gave them the Earth elemental variation, so that they could make slight changes to the topography to both displace mountain climbers and make them more adaptable. Analysis of their Blueprint had given me the information that their social structure was to usually form small herds of fifteen to twenty for both males and females separately. Trying to make leaders gave me Dominant male and female goats, who started fighting amongst themselves to decide their leaders. The end result was twelve different herds of mountain goats, which were split up in the ratio of 3:4:5 for each level. The first level contained two female and a male herd, one of which was tasked to make the starter hill with the entrance their territory. The great thing about my newest additions was that they were agile enough to walk the ropebridges if push came to shove, effectively multiplying their area of effect. I really need to thank that goblin for his help. I thought to myself.
The next thing I did was plant a plant called Daphne odora throughout the second floor. This plant had glossy dark green leaves and fragrant, pale pink to white flowers that could have a slightly translucent appearance. The leaves may not be as dark as black, but certain varieties could have dark foliage, and thus would be perfect to lure my intruders into a false sense of security, as well as provide camouflage for my Soul Eaters. I also tried experimenting with the Blueprint of my Soul Eaters. I was not able to add any elements to them, since all plant monsters were already Wood variants from birth. But I found out that I could make slight alteration to their colouration by changing their chlorophyll levels, which I promptly did to make them more similar to the new Daphne odora. I also tried to make an Elite Soul Eater and was pleasantly surprised to get a slightly larger shrub which seemed to have a smidgen more intelligence. Further testing revealed that their capture radius had increased from one meter to one and half meters.
Obviously this made me curious to see what would happen to elite blood sucking vines and purple sleepers. My experimentation helped me find out that Elite Blood-sucking Vines started having branching vines and much higher agility and mobility than their basic brethren. Whereas Elite Purple sleepers had to be renamed to Elite Pink sleepers due to their change in color. They acquired a strong sweet smell which could lure their prey towards their location, where they would make them fall asleep with their knockout pollen. Undoubtedly I added my newest additions to my now much deadlier second floor.
Moving on I gave thought about what lures I could use to motivate my intruders to utilize the tight rope maze. After some thought I decided to go with some plants with magical properties and their favorite-minerals. I had a vast variety of mineral blueprints at my disposal from my excavations, but was unsure which one the sentient creatures preferred. I settled on copper and silver, from my KR knowledge of my previously slain merchant. Gold seemed to be of too high value for my second floor, if my judgment of its value to sentient creatures was correct. I decided to make two small regenerating copper deposits at the top of two of the highest hills on the first and second level, and obviously the silver deposit was similarly placed in the third level.
Next I created my two high elevation magical plants. One was the Dreamveil Moss, which was one of the magical plants I opened up naturally, rather than a sacrifice from the Goblins. Dreamveil Moss has a silvery, ethereal look, with fine strands that seem to shimmer in the light. It grows in areas with strong connections to the dream realm or near portals to other dimensions, and might have become available due to me being a void realm passage and goblins opening up a spirit realm near my entrance. Dreamveil Moss induces vivid dreams and visions when placed under a pillow or brewed into a tea. The dreams it induces can offer prophetic glimpses of the future, communicate messages from distant loved ones, or even allow for astral travel. I planted them in the high reaches of the trees and hills connected by rope bridges.
The second plant was the Skyweaver vine that one of my Owls had brought me during its first excursion. It was thin, with almost translucent tendrils that are a deep blue in color and with flowers that resemble small, delicate clouds that drift on the breeze. I let the plants climb some of my tight bridges.Skyweaver vine was associated with air magic and could be used to create potions that grant temporary flight, levitation, or even control over winds. The flowers could be used as a focus for weather-altering spells, and the vine’s essence was prized by those who practice elemental magic. However, my reason to select this vine was one of its other properties, which was its ability to manipulate air currents, creating sudden gusts of wind that could push intruders off the bridges or lose their balance. The vine’s magic was also unpredictable and might change weather patterns in unexpected and violent ways when harvested in the wrong way.
With all these additions I felt my floors to be more complete and then had nothing to do other than continue excavating the third floor, while watching the goblins send in teams to explore and mine in the first floor. None of them ventured again into the second floor for over a month. From their conversations I understood that they were currently focused on building up their village. Well, more time for me to surprise them with my third floor.