Charles still remembers the day his fiance died, and his best friend. Amelia Bellfast was the Youngest daughter of the Bellfast family, and he the eldest of the Pentaghast sons, her family was one of the Jeweled city's trading partners, and unlike the Pentaghast's an established noble family that didn't sell themselves to the Bejewelled dungeon like common whores to buy a noble title. Still the first time Charles met her it was like a star had come down before him, she sparkled like the sun. Of course their families didn't attempt anything so crude as to try and force two near adult people together and expect them not to hate each other. Not only was Amelia his fiance but she was also his childhood best friend, mere month's earlier the two had consummated their love for each other.
Charles should've seen the signs, around the same time every year the patriarch of the Bellfast's had this sour look on his features, like something was wrong, and this sour mood usually accompanied a group of ships that arrived in the area. As the years went on the period between these sour moods and the arrival of the ships would shrink, and the number of ships that came would only increase. Then one day, as Charles was arriving for his wedding day, the entire city was simply... gone. Charles found some of the people of the Bellfast territory, the ones that survived that is. Leviathan would sail around, attacking other dungeons to accumulate strength, steal or bully the locals for ships to grow its size and then leave.
It had broken other territories too, and other dungeons, taking enough supplies to propagate it's growth and then leave for relative safety to complete work on it's latest 'floor' before arriving at another dungeon to stuff it full of resources and then pillage it for growth. But this lost it's efficiency, so instead Leviathan did what many mobile dungeons do, and it started hunting other dungeons, ripping them off the ocean floor, off the coast, any where it could reach for the sake of obtaining resources would be ripped out, smashed along the coast floor, and then swallowed whole.
Leviathan was dead now, Amelia and her family's spirits could rest easily now at long last now that the monster that ate them was finally dead, reduced to a beached corpse out in the harbour.
Charles resented dungeons from the day he learned of Amelia's death forward, after all how could he not? One killed the woman he loved, another facilitated that monster's growth. Well, he was able to move past that hatred, but now he reached the point that he was working so hard to save one. Ironic.
Charles held the rest of the Lumber Jacks back as he looked at the creature that was barring their path moving forward. Keeper's second floor had two forms, the Dryad and the Leshen, normally though nature spirits have four forms, one for each season. Dryad's appear in the Spring the Season of Bloom, Leshen's in the Fall the Season of Decay. Summer however belongs to the Carbuncles, the season of Conflict.
"So, you're the local nature spirit are you?" The Creature standing before Charles was a massive wolf like creature, its fur a light brown and embedded in it's chest was a single large chunk of amber bigger then some of the men here.
"You should've come sooner." The creature growled while it talked. "I was in a better mood back in Spring."
If spring was when life came back into the world, summer was when the hunt swings into full gear, animals competing for mates, competing for food, for territory, and no creature in the world better embodies that then this hunter. You could Kill a nature spirit, in much the same way that you can set fire to the forest until nothing was left but a barren wasteland. There was once a noblewoman who saw the fur of a Carbuncle embedded with jewels and so offered her hand to the man who could bring her the jewel encrusted pelt of one, the entire forest, crops, some say the very land itself proceeded to rot from the inside out the moment the last blow was struck. Charles didn't come here to kill this thing, but he needs what it has as well.
"You saw the cyclone from the other day right? The one that had pieces of Leviathan floating around it?" Charles eyes glowed. "My work."
The Carbuncle visibly reacted.
"You destroyed a dungeon, a severe offence among my kind, but that dungeon destroyed many of its own kind and would continue to destroy many more. But so what?" This was his territory, his very life blood flows through this land, and he will defend it to his last. "We both know you won't kill me!"
"Not if I don't have to. It would be highly inconvenient if the timber that we intend to harvest was to rot from the inside out and we have to travel further away in order to get more." Inconvenient, that's what his death and the death of this forest would be, merely 'Inconvenient'. "Still if you refuse to cooperate with me in the harvesting of timber from this forest then so be it, I'll simply present your corpse to the next one over, and the next, and the next after that. I'd rather negotiate with you lot while you still can be reasoned with, meaning the more time that you waste the more likely I will have to use violence to compensate for my apparently subpar negotiation skills."
The wolf like monster snarled, and then pounced. The Summer heat provided Charles with ample ammunition, directly converting the heat flowing through the air into kinetic strikes in order to pummel the wolf each strike aiming to land a crippling blow to the creature until it had been pushed back half dead.
"Make sure it is securely restrained, and heal it. We don't want it dead. Use the druids to identify the trees that are closest to death and cut them down first. Collect cuttings from healthy trees and give them to the druids to prepare new saplings." With any luck, they can get away with only doing the minimal damage possible to these woods, they've already incurred the Carbuncle's anger, and as the old saying goes, a Carbuncle's anger means a Leshen's wrath.
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Apas landed on top of the corpse of Leviathan, still being digested by the trinity, Joining her was Charle's Scribe, a spindly man by name of Leonardo who had taken a unhealthy obsession with trying to paint her. Apas wasn't in the mood to go for a dive, let alone into freezing cold recently ice water, so instead she brought down her paw, gathering all the wind in the air and use it to push aside the water blocking her view of the outside of the dungeon. Not good, the summer heat was rapidly melting away at the ice, by the looks of the ice at least one of the dungeons was trying to use the ice as its main material and providing some support in the process but it wasn't enough, especially when the other major builder of the three preferred to use coral, which does not do well in the sub Zero temperatures that were being propagated here. The only saving grace was the fact that at least one of the three of them prefers good old fashion granite as a building material which was providing some back bone.
"Welp. Down we go." Apas stated turning away from the water, and into the three entrances that the dungeon's had opened to breathe in fresh mana.
"After you my lady." The scribe stepped aside and allowed the much bigger and much stronger woman in front of him to move forward first.
Even though they entered through the coral entrance, it wasn't long until the duo hit granite, and then ice. The trinity are relying on one another to try and pull themselves back together, like people huddling together to try and conserve body heat during the winter cold, but that usually works better when there's a already stable dungeon involved in the process. Luckily Apas was there when Jewel helped to fix her Keeper, she had... an idea of what would be needed to fix the cracked Dungeon cores. Basically the answer was glue, to reassemble the broken pieces mana needs to fill in the gaps, the issue laid in quantity, too much and the core pieces would be pushed apart, too little and the cracks would be left behind, balance slays the demon as they say. So Apas kept an ear out, listened for the moans of pain produced by the cores and then made an effort to cease all mana output. Only when the moaning stopped would Apas resume, and resume their journey as well. This wasn't to say that the Trinity were taking this blatant invasion lying down either, swarms of sea life, ice monsters and animated weapons kept chasing after them and Apas had to smack them away. Leonardo was working too, every time they took a break he would pick a place to paint a complex magic formation onto stone, while they walked he would draw out the map of the maze, as they passed through floors they felt the mana density going up and up. Eventually they arrived at the Trinity Core room, floor ten, still with Leviathan's chains lodged in their cracked pedestals.
"Well aren't you three in a sorry state." Apas commented looking at the three heavily damaged cores. Apas genuinely wondered which one looked worst between the four of them, Leviathan or the Trinity.
STAY BACK! WE'RE WARNING YOU!
"Oh please don't be so melodramatic." Apas made a dramatic put upon sigh as she waved her paw dismissively.
"Hand over Leviathan's core and we'll leave you to stew in your own paranoia." Apas suspected that these three weren't quite stupid enough to try and absorb a chunk of mana that huge, for one thing they were still alive. For another, she wasn't fond of the concept of traces of that greedy pirate winding up inside of these three.
And if we don't?
Apas slammed her paw into the nearby wall of granite hard enough to crack it.
"Did that sound like a question to you three?" They paused, then the three largest chunks of Leviathan's core was dropped out of the Dungeon Storage space.
That is all that you get, the rest is to restore the Trinity! Apas slammed her paw into the wall again. A few dozen marble sized chunks were spat out of the storage space, Leonardo quickly gathered the pieces together in his apron.
That is all that's left, the rest has been absorbed into the Trinity!
You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.
"I thought I saw a bit of the high seas in you three." Apas seriously stared at them, a viscous mocking light in her eyes. "Leviathan is an abomination, you three should know that better than anyone, if he tries to come back through you, I won't hesitate to come back here and smash all three of you. Am I clear?"
The three cores chimed in agreement.
Another benefit of the Core room, after you get around five floors you unlock a function that lets you expel delvers who make it all the way over back outside of the entrance to the dungeon. Once outside Leonardo looked down at the final of his map pieces and kissed it, relieved beyond relief that he had finally finished work on it. The sound of rumbling was let out as the Trinity took the liberty of rearranging their floors. It was Leonardo's own fault, he was the one who painted the temperature regulation formation inside of the dungeon, Charles once used it to kill a man into a work of art, his body split down the middle, half reduced to charred bone and half frozen solid in a block of ice, it was the perfect thing to regulate the coral that needed warm temperature and the ice that needed it to be cold with the Granite in the middle to buffer the two. Leonardo cried as he tore up the map and threw the pieces away into the ocean.
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Originally, my feud with the Dungeon City had been born out of necessity, after all the other dungeon had been in my way, having erected such massive walls to keep the city itself safe from potential invasion by monsters, by bandits and by whatever. If the other party had been accommodating enough to lower its walls and let me pass, then he wouldn't be here trying to break them down to pass. Go around? Of course it thought of that before, but the leyline passed through this place, he's tried to step off of the path before only to be swallowed up with a intensive feeling of not being able to breathe. Whatever, if it hasn't learned it's lesson by the time they come back then I'll just have to break the walls down again. That is what I thought before, but then this pain in the arse cost me an arm, that demanded blood. So here I was once more, smashing at the walls that prevented it from passing, for someone who desired to roam freely I spent a awful lot of time here. Of course since losing an arm I shored up my defences both on said newly restored arm and across the body, Lithilas's associates wouldn't be able to pull anymore dirty tricks this time.
Cue the appearance of more dirty tricks, a massive bone serpent snaking it's way through Lithilas and emerged through it's front gate biting down on Conquerete's arm and wrapping it's body around it's legs before making the entire thing topple over. Conquerete felt a familiar sensation coming from the bony creature's tail, still hidden behind the safety of the other Dungeon's walls. So you'll let this undead dungeon through to harass me, but not I? Okay now I was insulted. The giant serpent slammed down snapping jaws against me, trying to bite through and tear chunks of stony flesh off.
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Conquerete's golems had long since flooded my dungeon, trying to make their way down to my core room, and then another group of monsters appeared and fought them, the undead imbued with holy power, a combination that I recognised.
The newest development had me steaming.
[Ouroboros: Old man you okay?]
[Lithilas: Damn you Graves you reckless fool!]
[Ouroboros: I don't know what you're talking about...]
[Lithilas: Save it!]
[Lithilas: I was wondering who it was that issued that world quest a while ago, to think it was our resident Necromancer]
[Ouroboros: It was the only way I could think of to beat Conquerete]
[Lithilas: By transforming your entire dungeon into a monster, do we need to discuss the perils of turning control over your dungeon to another again?]
[Ouroboros: I haven't turned anything over to anyone, and I have no intention to either, I mean sure I had to rearrange a few of my floors and blessings...]
[Lithilas: And when your monster is ready to proceed with it's evolution? Are you going to still be in a position to talk about still being in control of your dungeon when you're absorbed as material by that monster over there?]
[Ouroboros: ...]
[Lithilas: Do I even need to ask why you're rapidly approaching a hundred right now?]
[Ouroboros: ...]
[Lithilas: It certainly doesn't have anything to do with a certain world quest that has half of my city praying to you for salvation would it?]
[Ouroboros: ...]
[Lithilas: You do realise I'm only asking as a courtesy to you so that you can recognise and admit to your mistake right?]
[Lithilas: Go, finish dealing with Conquerete, but don't land the finishing blow, you're already flushed with so much power that your core is on the verge of shattering]
[Ouroboros: But Conquerete...]
[Lithilas: Already can't go anywhere or do anything with you tying him up like that, I suggest we wait until Babel gets here and then pay the glutton to carry him away for us]
[Lithilas: In the mean time we need to support Keeper, with any luck Leviathan hasn't eaten him already]
[Ouroboros: ...Keeper has already been shattered]
[Lithilas: Keeper recklessly tried to build a floor which broke because he didn't put in enough material to support the over bearing monsters he put inside of it, Jewel put him back together again]
[Lithilas: If we're lucky we can catch them in the middle of the raid]
I checked the chat group's logs, and made a startling discovery in the process.
[Pirate Fleet Leviathan Status: Shattered]
[Dungeon Keeper Status: Evolving]
[Ouroboros: What does this mean?]
[Lithilas: It means that Keeper has been even more reckless then you have been]
[Lithilas: Jewel what about you?]
[Bejeweled Concubine's Mirror Status: Repairing nearby Core]
[Lithilas: I will prepare my Humans to go out and investigate Keeper to see what is happening, if you have any left that you're on good terms with you will do the same]
Lithilas proceeded with the routine of sending the stone masons to work on repairing the damage done to the walls using the materials he provides them, at the same time though he also had a convoy prepared to go to Keeper. Evolving monsters were highly attractive targets, so much rich mana and points all locked inside of a package that couldn't defend itself, prime for a great payout to the one who can kill it. One as large as a dungeon? Every monster in the continent will be after him.
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A convoy had been prepared from Jewel's dungeon, filled with the people taken captive by that horrid manticore. Apas had saved them, this much was known to Jewel, and so she swallowed her own short comings on the matter, many of their families were already dead and others could no longer be trusted. So swallowing her pride she decided to compensate Keeper the best way that she could, his second job from Echidna had been to build a demi-human city, and right now she had a bunch of displaced demi-humans that needed a home. It would be unreasonable to ask the Keeper to look after all of them by itself, certainly not without payment, Jewel had prepared a huge number of different materials that would be helpful for promoting Keeper's growth, including new monster variants and trap designs. The question was getting them to him. The Escort of migrants already had to deal with a few monsters already, monsters that were now being added to the pile for Keeper but still.
Keeper was wrapped in a cocoon of evolution, Jewel didn't know what kinds of sacrifices he had to make to do what he did to Leviathan, but she could offer some guesses. His dungeon was made out of limestone, meaning that it was wholly possible that he turned the entire thing into one massive monster like what Graves did to himself. She had to approach this with the very real possibility that the Dungeon Keeper wasn't a dungeon anymore, so aside from the group in the convoy another of her vassals were in the air. Flying type monsters had the advantage over the continent, the power to fly out of range of enemy attacks and strike at them from afar was a huge boon in combat, and among them a Harpy who has become proficient in the use of wind magic would be able to do some damage, at least in comparison to a ground dwelling monster without the reach to get her. And as she reached the location in question the Harpy was feeling the tingle of familiar mana, but different, mixed with the mana of other dungeons. Someone from Jewel's dungeon, one of the offspring of her monsters, but it had been a long time since he's returned to Jewel's halls, unlike they who bath in Jewel's mana, sometimes literally.
Instead though the unique mana signature he gave off was full of the mana of other dungeons, the complex green pattern of that school that insisted on teaching magic to the people who kept entering it's halls, the fiery red of the volcano further south, most recently the blue of the new born Keeper. Alarmingly however, rather than tending to the mid evolution Keeper, he and his men were working in the forest, one recently cleared of trees. On top of the stumps of newly cut trees slots were being carved out and in their place the specially specially carved branches of the trees they just cut down were being slotted in place, wrapped with freshly stripped bark with saw dust acting as filler, and treated with healing magic and growth acceleration magic in order to do a close approximation of reviving the trees they just cut down. It was a close approximation of appeasing the forest spirit, which would be good if they had only done it one or two times, not the hundreds of times over like they were doing.
"I find myself seriously questioning your sanity." The Harpy was able to further confirm the presence of the one born of Jewel's dungeon after touching down in front of the one who looked to be in charge of the group, he was the one in the best armour as a start, but he also had fiery red hair and red eyes. "You're from the Pentaghast family aren't you?" The Harpy asked as she inched away slowly. And Since the other three Pentaghast boys were still inside of Jewel's city that meant that...
"I was." The Bridge Burner. The Harpy quietly gulped as she moved to back away. "If I wanted to hurt you, you'd be dead already. Why has one of my Families vassals come here?"
"We're delivering the children that were rescued by Apas and the Keeper from the Scorpion." Put the kids up for Adoption? Only to most likely have them scooped up by some blatantly exploitative force in an effort to place Jewel's nascent city under their control? No. Jewel was sending them to someone she trusts, that being her fellow dungeons, Keeper was the closest of the ones she had in mind, and she was banking on a little bit of good will she was building up too. Jewel wasn't sure about how many of the pirate's floors that Keeper tried to consume, all that she knew was that his core was full of cracks and she was working to fill them. Still these kids didn't need a impersonal dungeon raising them, but actual parents and that left this guy. Still better to get a read on the situation. "I presume that glowing mountain of mana cobwebs is the Keeper, but what exactly happened here that allowed a 2 or 3 floor scrub to take down a monster like Leviathan?" The Harpy asked looking over to the glowing mountain in the distance.
"The Dungeon went on a raid." Charles laughed amused.
"Well yes I figured that, but I don't know what it sent on that raid." The Harpy replied simply.
"The entire dungeon, went from that spot right there, into the middle of the Leviathan fleet, then went back to where it originally was." Charles explained but the look on the face of the Harpy implied he explained absolutely nothing. "When it went back it took several of Leviathan's ships with it, then it did it two more times before the system decided he reached the limit and that happened."
"What happened then?" Harpy only looked more confused. "By the sounds of things the Keeper only smashed apart 30 or so of the ships."
"You remember what I called myself when I left the Jeweled city?" Charles asked looking quite smug with himself.
"Ship Breaker..." The Harpy looked even more scared now.
"I got like... 20 of the ships? Set them on fire with the rot from the sea weed, tricked a cyclone into existence and used it to smash the ships against each other, fed the leftovers to the three that the dungeon keelhauled, they took advantaged of that, pulled together their resources to skewer Leviathan through the rear and smash his core to pieces. Right now my associate is trying to stabilise them."
"Four Dungeons?" The Harpy looked shocked. "Oh wow, that's impressive. You really think people are going to let you keep them?" Ah yes. Simple greed. Another thing that Charles will have to beat off with a stick, well maybe Keeper can help with that.