I had only had this body a few days, but I had adapted to it surprisingly quick. I mean the core itself didn’t do much, just float there surrounded by a skill generated shield. No bobbing or flying around, just perfectly stationary as if held in place with a vice. But when that thing started drooling with evident hunger in its eyes, I shivered. My floating little core visibly vibrated in place. A feeling a pure dread rose up in me. And watching how it acted I knew why they were called invaders. It had come into my home, into my World, and all it saw me as was food. As a way to gain power and grow to new heights. I knew it wouldn’t back down.
It was about 2 ft. long from head to tip of the nub that used to be a tail. It opened its mouth to lick its chops, showing not one, but 2 rows of needle like teeth. The strangest part though was the color of its saliva. Instead of being relatively clear it was a light blue in color. As it dripped onto the floor I noticed what looked like ice forming. In fact, using Mana Integration I could confidently say it was ice forming. So not only was this thing a strange coagulation of creatures, it had some kind of elemental effect.
Tundra Ice Skink
A creature found in the northern regions, this skink has evolved to survive in the cold. Still cold-blooded, it uses the clear hollow fur and feathers to reflect its body heat to stay warm. Using its internal Mana it has also attuned its bodily fluids with Ice, allowing it to survive in colder climates. It uses this to its advantage to inflict ice Mana into its prey, or freeze the mouths of would be predators. A favorite tactic is to fill its tail with Ice attuned blood and let a predator remove it. Once removed it can detonate the blood inside like a bomb to freeze and possibly kill its attacker.
Average – Uncommon
Chances to Evolve – Very Low
It felt a little overpowered to get so much information about something when I scanned it, but I figure it’s due to dungeon core magic. It made sense that a core would need information on creatures so as to be able to defend themselves and create new creatures. Or maybe this was a perk of my Formless skill, allowing me to get insight for my own templates. Not like there was anyone I could ask though so I put the stray panic induced thought aside.
This thing was strong, at least compared to any of my creatures. Just its rating was a match for my bats, but I felt that even if they were in the same bracket, my bats were there more due to their higher intelligence and less their threat level. Sure they could use sound based skills, but this thing was attuned to Ice. So attuned, that it was capitalized and in its name. There was some other information I could disseminate from its status but it was at that moment the skink started moving.
Once again fear spiked through me, as the lizard slowly made its way, as if nothing would bother it as it made its way toward me. Luckily, even though I had frozen up mentally due to the fear, my creations had not. The lizard jerked its head to look at a foot long centipede attached to its back leg, trying to pump venom into its bloodstream. But even as it tried, I watched as the centipedes head popped in a burst of ice, causing it to just fall off. The lizard looked at the dead insect before turning back around to continue its journey.
When a second centipede bit down on its right side, it didn’t even stop this time as its head also popped moments after latching on. Watching what amounted to my second strongest creatures just dying off like that was somewhat terrifying. Now I know why the less sapient dungeons dig in deep as soon as they are able. I had just been content to watch my one little room, focusing on my levels without even considering the possibility to create more rooms.
That’s when my bats attacked. The first to go in was the male, diving down and screeching at the skink. Unlike the centipedes who only seemed to annoy it, the screech actually caused it pain. Stunning it momentarily, my bat dove down and tilted so that it was perpendicular to the floor. I then watched as a small glow lit on the wing talon closest to the floor and it raked it along the back of the skink. This caused a gash to appear on its back, though shallow, was able to draw blood. As it flew away I noticed a small film of ice on said wing talon. Flying back up and shaking the ice off it turned around to do another run.
The skink shook off the stun and turned towards the bat, aiming to grab it out of the air. That’s when the female came in silently, and raked its wing talon along the back of the skink’s neck. My female bat was still only level 2 but was a tad bit bigger than my male. It also aimed for the stretched out part of the neck, allowing for a slightly deeper cut. This time the lizard hissed in pain, the first sound it had made since entering. It turned its head back, trying to lunge for my female bat, but she was long out of the way. Not quite stupid enough to forget, it turned back towards the male, only to see that it too was no longer there. That’s when a mouse, covered in scars came and took a toe.
Even I had not noticed my little battle worn mouse sneak up, as it bit right at the joint in the toe, ripping it off. Immediately it spat the chunk of toe out, and booked it. The skink whipped its back end at the mouse, but I guess it forgot it no longer had a tail as it missed completely. I quickly checked the mouth of my little mouse, seeing damage cause by the frozen blood. Not enough to be dangerous, but it was obviously painful as the mouse grimaced as it shook it head.
Looking back I noticed that, once again, the male bat had come dive-bombing in to screech at the lizard, slightly stunning it. I noticed though, it didn’t seem to have as much an effect this time. My bat noticed as well, since instead of trying to claw at it again, it flew off instead. The skink watched it balefully, keeping its head on a swivel so that my other bat couldn’t come in for a sneak attack. Fortunately since it was keeping eyes to the sky it didn’t see the monstrous centipede that had snuck up on it.
Now even though it hadn’t gained a level from killing the mice, I hadn’t realized that it had grown much longer. The centipedes in general averaged to about a foot in length, but the one who cleaned out the mice was nearly as large as the skink. At about 18 inches in length it was a terrifying sight. Not only was its body longer, but the “fangs” were longer too. I say “fangs”, because I had assumed that like most creatures, centipedes use its mouth to inject venom. Even the smaller ones that had died looked like they were biting to inject the venom. Now though, due to the increase in size, I could see the difference. Its front two “fangs” were actually just its front legs, with a smaller mouth on its head.
The centipede slowly scuttled forward, getting within a foot of the skink. As the skink turned its head, finally noticing something on the ground in front of it, my centipede dashed forward. In barely even a second my centipede had not only reached the skink, but had climbed onto its back. Using those front legs it continuously struck out, injecting its venom as it kept moving. The skink once again hissed in pain, the venom from this centipede causing much more pain then the smaller ones. Unfortunately it wasn’t enough to stop it as it reached around and grabbed the back portion of the centipede. Once in its mouth it bit down and whipped its head back and forth. I could only watch in horror as ice formed where the centipede was bitten. With one more aggressive shake, the centipede’s body was torn, losing almost 5 inches of its back. My centipede hadn’t given up, continuously stabbing into the skink when it got the chance. But ice had also formed on its front legs and when it flew off it didn’t get back up.
My bats didn’t sit still either, taking the chance to tear a few more gashes into the skink body. But due to the thrashing around they were only able to do a few dive-bombs. My male bat was even clipped by the skinks head at one point, causing it to screech out as it flapped out of reach. It didn’t seem like anything was broken, but bat bodies are relatively light so as to allow flight, so even just the clip to it could cause some bad damage. In fact looking at its status showed me how much damage it had taken.
Name
No name
Species
Foxen Bat
Level
1/10
Family
Bat
Life Points(LP)
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4/8
Mana
2/5
Skills
Echolocation, Ringing Blast, Enhanced strength
Since it was at level one, its stats were slightly lower than my female, though not by much. Still to lose half its health by just being clipped showed that my bats were glass cannons. They could obviously do some damage, seeing on how wary the skink had been of them, but they could not take a hit.
I watched as the skink once again turned its eyes on me, the hunger still there, but now tempered by a wariness. It must have finally caught on that this was not some normal place. Especially seeing how so many different species were fighting together. It sucked that I couldn’t see how much health it had left, but it had some decent damage from what I could tell. Multiple lacerations from the bats covered it, with puncture wounds interspersed by the centipede. I also noticed it was missing a few more toes, so it would seem my little mouse got in as well. None of the other creatures in my dungeon were attacking, leaving it to just the current 4.
Even still I wasn’t sure what else could be done. Not only had I slacked off on developing my dungeon, but I hadn’t tried making any new monsters. Hell, I hadn’t even though to lay any traps. The thought about traps gave me a sudden idea, one that could change the tides. I wasn’t sure if it would work, but I felt no restrictions on me when the skink had entered, meaning I had just as much a chance to attack as my creatures. I couldn’t do anything with my skills directly, but maybe I could do something indirectly.
A quick test showed me my idea was viable, so I began to set up. Reaching out mentally I asked my 3 remaining creatures to just run distraction. Without meaning to I had also reached out to my centipede, to find that it was actually still alive. Obviously wounded, but it wasn’t ready to bow out yet. I was hoping to keep it out, but for the first time I felt a connection to it. I also felt a connection form between me and my mouse, but for now I focused on the centipede. From it I felt a defiant will, not at me, but at the invader of its home. I tried speaking, but could feel that the connection couldn’t support that quite yet. Instead I sent over worry that this centipede would throw away its life if it moved. In return I got the vague feeling that not only would it not die from that, but eventually my centipede will regrow.
Deciding to trust the centipede I relayed my plan and thoughts to my 4 creatures. Distract the skink and lead it toward me. I could feel the worry from all of my creatures of letting it get so close to my core, but then came the faith. Faith that I knew what I was doing and could handle it. It felt amazing, the trust and loyalty from these creatures. I had never really explored it, just instinctually knew, but even if I were to die these creatures wouldn’t. They weren’t mana constructs feeding off me. They were literally just beings I had brought forth, using Mana to give them form and life. But even then, they were more than willing to live and die for me. So now it was time to show I was worthy of it.
Harassing the skink, they slowly led it over, drifting a little to the right of the room. The bats screeched when they had the Mana, causing it to stumble every so often. My mouse went and harassed its feet, making it constantly have to whip its head not only around its body, but from the floor to the ceiling. My centipede waited till it was slightly out of sight before getting back up, stalking forward to get into position. Even though a portion of its body had been torn off, it was still the largest of my creatures. Finally the skink was just where I wanted it.
My little cave room was a bit more clustered than a normal cave entrance should be. The floor was covered with ferns and moss, interspersed with the random stalagmite rising into the air. None were very high, at most a foot, but for the creatures here they plenty large enough to hide behind and use as cover. Not only the floor, but the ceiling was also dispersed with multiple stalactites. The biggest was the center piece, hanging just over my Core. Almost like the sword of Damocles, its tip only 6 inches away. But even though that was the largest at almost 2 ft. in length, there were other stalactites with a decent size as well. And much like the sword over my Core, there now hung an 8 inch sword of stone over the skink. I had been whittling away at its base connected to the ceiling and could feel the pull of gravity on it due to my Mana Integration. It had taken a nice chunk of my Mana to do this, nearly 20 Mana altogether, but with the skink in place, it was now or never.
I gave my centipede the signal, watching as it raced out from its hiding spot to sink its venom legs into the back of the skink. At the same time both bats used their Ringing Blast skill, causing the stun to be more effective. My mouse did nothing, staying to the side so it didn’t get hurt. Finally, I whittled the last bit of stone away and held my metaphorical breath.
With the effects of gravity a crack rang out as the stalactite broke off and fell. I watched as the skinks eyes grew wider, as it turned its head up to watch the 8 inch point come racing down. It tried to move but the mix of stun from my bats, and the strength of the centipede holding its back legs, stopped it from more than a slight twist. The point came down just to the right of its spine, and ripped through it. I heard as stone once again met stone and watched the life vanish in the skinks eyes. A small cloud of dust blew out, covering my centipede and mouse.
And just like that, the threat was gone. I watched as the dust settled, as the 4 kept themselves ready to continue in case it didn’t work. Realizing that they didn’t know it was dead, I sent out the mental all clear. All 4 looked my way, before focusing in on the body of the skink. Then as if in sync, they all descended on its body to eat.
In a somewhat gruesome display they tore off parts and chunks, the blood no longer infused with the internal mana, leaving it as just an odd color of light blue. I realized they were all digging to the center of the body, not just eating it. I watched in morbid curiosity, until my centipede hissed in joy. Holding in its front venom legs, a core near as big around as myself, a neon blue in color. The other 3 stared at the centipede and I could see them planning on how they could possibly steal it. Laughing I sent out the command to stop, before a new fight could start. All 4 stopped, my centipede holding the core in front of its mouth like a child caught stealing candy. Looking at my 2 bats, I informed them that due to already having cores, this core would not help much except to slightly increase their Mana. In fact I could feel that by ingesting it, it would interfere with my future plans, changing their evolutionary paths. Though sad, I could also feel joy as they realized I already had some plans for what they may become. I looked over at the other 2, my mouse and centipede.
I looked at the 2, knowing that the ice affinity wasn’t really related to their mythologies either. But out of the three only the centipede did not have a core. Of course, the Mana core in the mouse was small, so eating this would actually boost it as well. I focused in on the core, receiving no table but instead just the feeling of possible growth. Finally I made a choice, figuring I could possibly help both. The mouse did not need the whole core, just a portion of it to grow its core to the next level. Thinking this I sent the mental image of the centipede eating 3/4ths of the core, leaving the last bit for the mouse. It looked split on its decision for a moment before carving a quarter chunk off. It tossed said chunk toward the mouse, before devouring the rest. My mouse grabbed the portion thrown and ate it. Immediately I could feel the change inside. And scanning them showed me those changes.
Name
No name
Species
Amazonian Giant Centipede
Level
5/5
Family
Scolopendridae
Life Points(LP)
8/15
Mana
2/2
Skills
Paralyzing sting, Regeneration
Name
No name
Species
Fanged Field Mouse
Level
4/5
Family
Rodent
Life Points(LP)
5/5
Mana
2/3
Skills
Enhanced Night Vision, Resist Poison
I could finally pull up their status pages. My status had also changed, now showing 4 Monsters instead of 2. I guess by ingesting the core and fighting for my dungeon, these 2 had finally joined the official dungeon monster list.
But now the fight was done, and the dungeon core equivalent of adrenaline left me, I realized something. I had been relaxing, treating this almost like a game to just kind of sit back and let develop on its own. But this was my wake up call, and I wasn’t going to let it go to waste.