Keeper
Fenrir's Wolf Den, Loki's Mimic Mystery Mansion, Asmodeus's Roper Den, Satan's Dark Fire and Muerta's Arena of blood have all been decored and Graves just got back with the bags of holding containing Lucifer's Surrounding dungeons the latest of which I just converted into Dungeon Jellyfish, that leaves Pluto hole full of Dragons, He who makes everyone forget, hypnos governing sloth, and envious Phthonus. Hypnos and Pthonus were total wipes, why we can compile later.
Okay everyone You know the drill by now. Hel if you would?
"Thanks to Frost Fang Muerta's 'Arena of Blood' has already been taken out of the picture." Hel explained as she attempted to breach for the two headed duo, and nothing happened. Hel made a sigh as she looked frustrated.
You can have some of my power, trust me I've got way to much of it.
"Thank you." Hel's pride looked like it had taken a hit as she facilitated the Breach for one. Are you okay? "As you've said before, my resources are dreadfully poor." Which now led to the next topic. "Frost, Fang, I've already spoken with Genmu and secured their cooperation. You will be spat out near another dungeon that has already contracted with me, Marrowind, in the far North. You two will cooperate with the Keeper for guaranteeing trade through my realm. I've already prepared your boon for you." Thus Hel waved her hand, Text appeared in front of Frost Fang's faces.
[Trust-Produce contracts made with the blessing of the Goddess of the Dishonored Dead's magic, creating a curse that punishes those who violate the letter of the contract as decided by the contractees]
Ooh! This is a good one for the Merchant route!
"Really?" Frost looked doubtful.
"I like it." Fang did not.
The two shot each other a dirty look before they started wrestling with each other, all the way off the edge of the arena.
"Should we stop them?" The Vampire Shark asked looking down at the falling duo as they looped around from up top.
"They're used to it." Solarus on the other hand just gave off a dead pan expression at their misfortune.
Moving on. Graves you go back to the Dragon's den and send your Pluto Blessed boss to see if that big lizard is feeling cooperative yet. Graves zombie nodded his head in the affirmative.
"Check on the Library too. Merlin has been gone for too long for a respawn, even if he is a B-rank." Hel stated and the Zombie nodded again, this time more respectfully. Assuming that the Dragon's Den and the Library can be crossed off, admittedly a rather large assumption on my part, what do we do about the two remaining dungeons that we have to deal with? Flood them with numbers again?
"Numbers will backfire against Phthonus." Hel warned seriously.
"Weak as he might be but he is an expert at turning allies against one another. Just by flooding them with his power of Envy he can transform life long friends into bitter enemies who would rather fail together than let the other succeed."
Okay so clearly what we need is a singular overwhelmingly powerful that can wipe out anything that stands in their way to deal with Phthonus. What about Hypnos.
"Numbers." Hel replied bluntly. "Hypnos has all kinds of blessings that involves putting people to sleep and making them fight inside of their own minds. That self propelled cloak of yours will be a especially potent terror."
Which made it all the more important that we get him back. So in layman's terms Hypnos has a wide diversity of tricks that he could have given a dungeon that makes him difficult to deal with but not impossible. Conversely Phthonus is a one trick pony that will make us argue and bicker among ourselves until we have torn each other apart. By the sounds of things Hypnos is the easier of the two to deal with, so we'll save him for last. First two announcements, we'll be deploying our highest fire power Solarus to deal with Pthonus, secondly I also intend to save dealing with Hypnos until after I've respawned the Fire Frost Fiend.
"So you can claim the dungeon yourself?" The giant spider ape snapped glaring.
So that I can kill it again and put it out of commission. It's simple guys, as soon as the last dungeon is dealt with I'm going to be spat back out into the mortal plane, and then my next floor is going to be spawned and my body's evolution is going to be triggered. Personally, I'd really like it if I didn't make any decisions while stuck in the mentality of a psychopath, so I would really like to find a way to remove the blessing of Satan before the situation arises. Soon as Graves gets back with the Dragon's Den and Library cores we can talk strategy for the last two cores.
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Graves
I flew to the Library first, it being the closer of the two dungeons that I had to visit, I deployed my zombie Grappler to play diplomat to both areas, though if this situation was to become common place I should consider getting a real diplomat. For now though upon entering the library I was greeted by the boss of the floor, The sphinx looked vaguely familiar, similar to Apas in terms of appearance and proportions, but unlike her she was wearing various jewellery most notable a collar necklace cross called a Wesehk and a striped head cloth known as a Nemes. Interestingly enough I did not know that until now, as if the dungeon itself was conveying information to me. interesting.
"You I take it are the ally to the cloak?" The Sphinx woman asked raising an immaculately mascara'd brow.
"Gaahh?" 'Yes. Did he do something to offend you?' Interesting. It seems that my zombie's intentions were conveyed too, as if this entire place is meant to relay information to one another.
"Follow me." The Sphinx turned around and started to walk away naturally we followed. "This place was created for peaceful purposes, to convey information here. Your cloak got distracted on the way inside, so we do not know it's intentions in coming here, and for that matter we do not know yours."
"Gaah." 'We are here to removed this dungeon from this realm and return it to the mortal plane thereby severing it from Lucifer's grasp.' We soon spotted the area that the Sphinx had been leading us to, someone had managed to build a fort out of countless books that were being read.
"Lucifer's relationship with my master was built on mutual interest, or so we thought at first. He spoke of bringing enlightenment to the masses, but Lucifer's enlightenment is a form of ignorance of itself, paranoid and mad. Still it was worth viewing for a time. In all honesty the master would like to leave but Lucifer has called them to violence and violence is not something that he enjoys. That said he will not be separated from this wing of the library and what it keeps beforehand." The Sphinx used her paw to knock over the 'wall' of the book fort and revealed Merlin inside with a book in what passes for his hands. "You can start with those."
More Muryan armours were released into the library, each of them working to transport books out of one wing of the library and into another, I left them to it, they'll let me know when they are done for now we had to return to the Dragon's den to deal with the last dungeon. The Keeper's boss monster had some unfinished business here, so he was sent out to the Dragon's den alongside my own Pluto Representative, a Crystalised Skeleton.
The chambers of the boss room opened and I saw the unfinished business that the boss had spoken of, one of the Keeper's Thunderwheels flew out of the boss room and quickly hid behind Leonaidas. The seven headed monstrosity transformed, shrunk down and assumed the form of a scaled humanoid, not a lizard man or even a dragon-newt but rather a human being covered in a rainbow of scales that glittered like jewels. The Hydragon ignored us, instead opening a portal into which the vast wealth inside of the boss room began to vanish into, it seems that the task of transporting the dungeon core had fallen to us.
The Artefact legion's thunder wheel proved to be just the thing we needed in order to transport the core, after slicing through the base of the core's pedestal we had something that was perfectly flat that we could put on top of the floating wheel.
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Keeper
A few hours later I felt Hel's realm tremble, Graves dropping two more of my bags of holding bombs onto Cocytus who was no doubt bringing them back to bring the count up to six. Hey Hel what are you going to do with these things anyway?
"I am not sure." Was Hel's honest answer. "If I was a normal goddess I would feed these to another dungeon like yourself for the power produced in the process." But it goes against your personal principles. "So it does." Hel stated letting out a sigh. "If you have a better idea on what we should do with them I'm all for hearing it." Well right now these things aren't 'Dungeons' but rather 'Creature's with dungeon cores lodged inside of them.' It reminds me of something that I saw before, a creature that had pieces of mana lodged in it's flesh. "I'm given to understand that they're widely considered to be abominations, especially by dungeons. Imagine if you will all of your power of creation, manipulation and duplication in the body of a living creature. Imagine the destruction and devastation that such an individual could reek, as far as I know there was only one human with a core implanted in their body in recent memory."
As far as you know?
"They were betrayed." Hel shrugged her shoulders as if her statement was obvious. "They grew too powerful and so they were killed."
So other's could have gotten better treatment and thus still be around? Hel nodded by way of reply. Right well, what can you tell me about the one who got betrayed?
"You're not going to like what you see." Hel warned as a mana crystal formed in her hand. "Eat this if you wanna find out."
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I used my mana to pick up the crystal Hel gave me and examined it. Near as I could tell it was a mass of pure mana, like the crystals inside of the Squid Levi brought me once. I shrugged my imaginary shoulders and ate the crystal, and suddenly I was treated to the familiar feeling of being pulled into memories.
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The pack of monsters as the locals call them was pushed away again, drowning them inside of the waters and then making their bodies break down, wolves this time around. So be it. I delved into the new schema, water being drawn to form a familiar shape as a monstrous creature formed at my finger tips. In a few hours it would be dead with no soul to sustain it, but until then I would let it rampage against the enemy army, there's no shortage of bastards in the world to be feasted upon by the monsters after all.
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I snapped back to reality breathing quickly, been a while since I got sucked into a memory like that.
"You need to remember that none of them are 'Your' memories, they're all fragments from what you've consumed."
So people tell me. I thought through the memory some more 'No shortage of bastards' eh? Hel if my memory serves humans on the Mortal plane are relatively rare right?
"Relatively yes. So much of the world is highly unstable from the Dungeons, what is stable has largely been taken over by monsters with Humanity having to hunker down into cities to survive. There are exceptions like the Giant Slayer that you met before that can kill them but he is an exception, not the rule."
But this wasn't always the case was it?
"No it wasn't." Hel stated letting out a sigh. "Put the power to manufacture monsters in a human's hands but don't act surprise when they use that power to make something they can no longer control."
The dungeons can make monsters but the monsters they make can't leave the dungeons...
"A fail-safe, to ensure that they cannot endanger the world anymore than what it is each monster a dungeon creates lacks a soul of their own." But Humans make souls all the time through good old fashion reproduction. "Yes they do. So if you combine the ability to make life with the power to twist it as much as you please..." Hel held up a icy globe, a recreation of the world.
Oh damn! Is that why dungeons like Lithilas protect humans?
"It's part of the reason yes. We gain power by accumulating worshippers, dungeons get rewarded by fulfilling tasks for us."
So you pay dungeons to protect your worshippers for you? Is that the reason why dungeon cities keep popping up?
"Yes and no." Hel answered with a shrug of her shoulders. "Humans build their cities where they find resources, dungeons just so happen to be the most convenient way of getting those resources without having to deal with their cattle spontaneously mutating, the forest spirits trying to eat them, or the mines spontaneously shifting around. Mind you they are still monsters that produce other monsters, but just like any other beast they're making efforts to domesticate them, and more importantly in many cases have succeeded. It is a matter full of trial and error though. Many do not survive the attempt, and when they are consumed their thoughts and feelings get absorbed into the core alongside their bodies and mana."
So 'throw bodies at it until it starts to think like us' is a completely viable method of dungeon taming?
"People die every day." Hel stated bluntly. "Believe me I would know. Setting up a ward for the dying in a relatively safe place inside of a dungeon is one of the nicer methods I've seen. At least your city lord didn't resort to dragging his slaves inside and slashing their throats so that you could eat them." The Goddess of Betrayal stated as she ran her thumb along her throat. "Nor are you that pirate bastard who only had thieves and sea monsters to eat." I'm surprised you guys let humans near dungeons at this point. "They have the common sense to limit the production of weapons of mass destruction. Now. And if the day comes that they don't, we have fail-safes installed into cores to keep it from happening again."
Fail-safes?
"You may have noticed that you have no human Schema?"
Well that is true, I have a lot of things that look a little bit like humans, Apas for instance, but no actual humans.
"This is because humans are anathema to the core system itself, if one attempts to place a core into their bodies then the core will be able to eat them from the inside out."
I made a contract with Jack before though? Shouldn't that have been impossible by your logic.
"Jack was human, now he is a Goliath."
Because of Evolution right? A pause as I reached an epiphany. Monsters are attacking every human settlement in the world, either wiping them out or the humans manage to kill enough of them that they trigger a evolution, in the mean time the dungeons are being used to mass produce human compatible creatures like Sphinx's or Centaurs but the newborn is always the monster, even Charles was only a human hybrid. There are even all female monster species like Lamia and Harpies that deliberately have to seek out mates from other races and for this reason usually prey upon humans.
"Figured it out did you?" Hel sounded rather smug with her assertion.
Are you saying that you're... phasing out humans?
"Don't make it sound worse than it is now." Hel's tone took on a negative tone of voice. "Half of this happened because of their own actions, we're just doing our best to salvage this mess that they created. If you insist on sheltering unevolved humans please be my guess. From what I hear they need all the help they can get."
Why then are human evolutions like Goliath's and Dwarfs have lower fertility than regular humans.
"That is a side effect we're trying to fix." Hel admitted while letting out a sigh. "Higher performance bodies require sacrifices." Hel used her thumb to point down the hall leading to my main dungeon body. "You have visitors. We can finish this discussion at a more convenient time."
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The familiar click clack of hooves echoed throughout the halls of the dungeon, as representative of the Mustang trading company I, Chiron Mustang, was naturally called forth when the rumbling of another breach had been reported. The City Lord Charles was naturally leading the way into this cold and bitter place, he at least has utility as a torch, I'll give him that much. The area inside of the dungeon was still bitter cold, the Keeper will have to invest in fire type monsters in the future. I walked into the room where the dungeon doors were being kept, globes of ice by the Bellfast door indicating where it would lead, a second globe by the gate associated with the Skunk Ape's gate, and finally the third glowing gate of the most recent dungeon. Personally I wasn't interested in the Skunk's Dungeon, it apparently opens up into some place full of greenery, too far away from civilisation to be of use to us.
"You don't look like one of us."
I turned my head to face one of the abominations born of this place, particularly abominable at that, a two headed creature that was standing guard by the door.
"I'm not creature, I am Chiron Mustang of the Mustang company. Do you speak for the dungeon making the breach?" I honestly didn't care about what head this creature used to speak through, my only concern was business.
"Presently yes." A bright light appeared in the home, Charles starting a fire for warmth perhaps? "Looks like Bellfast's representative is here too."
I turned my head to face the existing breach, and watched as a bird's skeleton wreathed in flame came flying out.
"A fire monster on that flooded floor?" I snorted in derision.
"The water's drained to the floor below you stupid horse." The Phoenix like skeleton snapped by way of reply. "Without the shackles of this realm my floors are able to thrive now, I will be returning to my former glory soon enough, stronger now that I will have the resources to beat back that pirate bastard this time." The Skeleton boasted.
"You still lost last time need I remind you, or are you hoping that this dungeon would be inclined to protect a thing like you?" The bird brain was a pathway, not a particularly safe one nor was it too far away at that and thus lacking in value, in my opinion it shouldn't over estimate its own value. The bird snapped its talons and produced a scroll from thin air. "Lady Hel is quite talented at making contracts it would seem. See for yourself."
[The Signatories of this Document Dungeon Keeper and Bellfast agree to a mutual defence and restoration treaty, in the event of either signatories death or damage the other party agrees to pay an appropriate amount of mana, resources and power to heal the damage done and return the offended party back to the mortal plane]
A contract like this for a nobody dungeon? Ludicrous!
"I intend to dedicate the area around my territory to agriculture, I am more than happy to mooch off the population and mana of the Keeper in exchange for supplies." The bird boasted cockily.
"Luckily for me then I have no intention of posting two trade posts so close together." I turned my attention to the turtle snake. "And what of you?" I watched the Undead fire breathing bird fly up the tower itself, no doubt off to conspire with the other dungeons, or perhaps to farm for points. Either way the focus of my attention was on this two headed creature here. "What do you have to offer?"
"Reap it and weep horse meat." The snake head spat out another contract, so that means that Hel had given the turtle the same blessing as she had the bird skeletons. Cute.
"Words are meaningless without substance. What do you actually have to trade, or failing that, where do you open up that the people I work for would want to have anything to do with you?" I was getting tired of being out here waiting to drown when the blasted Pirate or it's ships finally get here.
"Marrowind." The cocky turtle stated as if spitting out names above it's station held some kind of relevance. "I'm opening up right near him, even if you have to deal with the snow and sleet I'm the shortest path from there to here."
"Finally you actually speak of something that's worth coming all the way out here." I examined my nails as I looked at the creature out the corner of my eyes. "But what do you want?"
"A toll. A portion of whatever you and Marrowind bring through my dungeon." The Turtle snake stated making his opinion known.
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Keeper
For now I let the Horse man and the Genmu continue their negotiations. I had to go get Apas so that she could talk to Charles for me and I can explain to him my current plans for the future. As I was thinking this Archie finally respawned, and he was much closer too, okay so that'll work.
"City Lord!" My Walpurgis's voice echoed out into the chamber that would soon be set up to be a spaghetti junction. "My master requests an audience!"
"Great, the loud mouth is back." Charles quietly muttered to himself before he went to talk with Archie. Through Archie I explained my plans concerning my body and what state it is in. "It's good to hope for the best but it's wise to err on the side of caution. With luck we can expel the negative influence with the right expertise." Charles explained while he rubbed his chin. "If you want I can post a notice at the adventurers guild."
"The last time you brought adventurers here my master was almost destroyed!" Archie snapped shoving his staff forward. Charles pushed the staff out of his face.
"Adventurers is a collective term used to describe people from a wide variety of locations and job descriptions that have been lumped together under the banner of 'will kill monsters for money.' Not to be confused with Assassins who 'will kill humans for money.'" When you're on the receiving end of the knife it's honestly pretty hard to give a damn about the differences. "Jack came here to eliminate a threat, your passage way to Lucifer's domain the easiest way to do that being killing you, lets not even touch upon the fact that you're so bloody abnormal."
"We're off topic. Who would we employ if we do hire out to the adventurer's guild?" Archie spoke my question.
"Someone who can counter the specific element that is plaguing you, say for example Satan..." I didn't tell Charles whose stick is shoved up my rear but he's a smart cookie, and he knows whose dungeons I've been raiding. "... according to the elemental laws of consumption, water suppresses fire, and earth consumes fire." Oh I didn't like where this was going at all. "If there's nothing else, I should return to dealing with the horse."
"Begone, and not a word of this leaves this dungeon, or it's not my master's wrath you need fear."
It's not yours that he needs to be afraid of either.
Charles walked away while I explained my suspicions to Archie.
"Pluto and Oceanus?"
I'll need to use Levi and her water affinity to suppress my power and you to try to yank out Satan's power and give it to Pluto.
"Why not ask Pluto directly for help?" My clay skeleton was understandably confused.
You see every time I go talk to that guy it feels like he feels like he owns my stony butt, and I have to pay out an arm and a leg just for the privilege of getting his help. Well no more high ranking gods for me for now on. Give me a thousand bargain bin deities like Castor & Pollux any day.