Three duskgnomes were busily preparing ingredients for healing potions in the alchemy building within their village. Once again, he had relocated his alchemy laboratory, having discovered that duskgnomes were even more passionate about alchemy than he’d expected. Unlike most races who avoided laboratories due to the pungent smells and frequent explosions, duskgnomes eagerly visited and enjoyed watching alchemists at work.
The duskgnomes nodded enthusiastically and continued peeling and dicing mandrake roots and mistletoe while distilling water twice.
Before he could give instructions for the next step, something tickled his dungeon sense. He scanned the area and focused his sight on the underground river used to remove wastewater from the sewers. Just outside his dungeon's claimed territory and barely within his vision range, he saw a swarm of bats—about four dozen—flying in two neat, orderly rows. Instinctively, he switched from his normal dark vision to the vision range of a human, a skill he'd discovered by accident only days ago. As he suspected, the bats' eyes glowed faintly red in the dark. A faint sparkling red, barely visible even in the pitch-black darkness of the underground tunnel. He also realized the formation of the bats was much too orderly. They flew in formation. At every nook or cranny, a single bat would leave the formation to investigate, then return to the waiting swarm. A side tunnel led half the swarm to explore while the rest hovered in place. He was no beast tamer or animal expert, but that wasn’t normal behavior. Someone was controlling these bats. He also sensed active communication magic. Someone was exploring the underground river—likely planning to use it as a secret route into the city, bypassing the wall fortress. That could only mean the Krigesti.
He sighed mentally. An army of desert warriors creeping through the sewers into the city was the last thing he needed. Besides the damage they would cause and the possibility of them discovering his dungeon, the city's authorities would surely investigate every part of the sewer system afterward. He couldn't let that happen.
He summoned every single one of his trusty besps, his bee/wasp chimeras, to gather in a tunnel near the river. He didn’t know if the bats had any magical abilities, but he suspected they might, given their glowing eyes. No one would breed magical animals without also adding combat capabilities. His besps relied on numerical superiority and were relatively weak individually. With more bats coming into range, it would be a tough fight. He needed an edge...
There wasn’t time for regular chimera experiments to graft wings onto one of his monsters. But he did have an open slot to create a new dungeon monster breed. He called up the menu to design a chimera. He needed something that could fly, had dark vision, and—wait. He realized a problem: the river tunnel was dark, and his besps couldn't see in the dark. He needed a new monster that could illuminate the area. Yes, a mobile light source would be perfect. And he could imbue it with the ability to use one of his spells—in this case, silence. That would completely blind the bats. He vaguely recalled that bats also had some regular sight, but it surely paled compared to a sight-based monster.
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What creature could emit light? Fireflies. Perfect. He also added dungeon moss to the mix to give it the ability to use ambient mana to make its light brighter. As a level 7 Dungeon Master, he could mix plants and animals. For the base creature, he chose a dragonfly since it was naturally larger and better suited to being scaled up. He maximized its size to what the system deemed capable of flight and added the ability to cast the stationary zone of silence spell. He critically examined the design. No combat abilities at all.
Do you want to create an auxiliary-type monster?
The dungeon heart paused. Did he? He focused on the prompt, and, for once, he actually received an explanation. Auxiliary monsters lacked direct combat abilities but had increased intelligence and tactical awareness. They could command and coordinate other monsters in the area. They also had better armor and a dodge chance against ranged attacks. He noticed additional options, including the choice to increase the mana cost of the chimera to enable it to make the zone of silence moveable. A no-brainer. He immediately chose to make his new dungeon monster breed auxiliary and completed the design.
He created the summoning circle, and soon, the Glowing Commanderfly took shape. It resembled a dragonfly the length of a human arm, with four translucent wings. Two golden insect eyes scanned their surroundings with almost 360-degree vision in both normal and infrared spectrums. Its glossy black body was covered in intricate golden runes. He ordered it into the middle of a besp formation and instructed them to engage the intruders as soon as they entered the dungeons area of influence.
Guiding them in a slow-moving formation, he positioned the blind insects. The Glowing Commanderfly used its silence zone to make the tunnel area around it invisible to the intruders. With no sound returning, the bats had to assume the tunnel extended without obstacles.
Once the enemies had all crossed into the dungeon’s territory, he ordered the Glowing Commanderfly to illuminate the tunnel. Its golden runes flared brightly, scattering light in brilliant rainbow colors. The bats halted, confused. The Glowing Commanderfly flew forward, right into their formation, blinding their sonar vision with its silence zone and their normal vision with its light. Malvorik’s monster's insect eyes were pretty much immune to being blinded by bright light. As one, the besps attacked, stabbing poisoned stingers into the motionless bats. Once the first bat was hit, the swarm scattered in all directions. Many collided with the walls or ceiling, while others were swept into the underground river and pulled under. Within moments, every enemy was dead. The Glowing Commanderfly and besps scoured the area and checked the water downriver for survivors. None were found.
He recalled his monsters to their usual positions but stationed the Glowing Commanderfly near the river to stand guard. After counting his besps and finding he had only lost one, which he promptly replaced, he surveyed his dungeon once more.
The duskgnomes seemed content for once. There were no enemies in sight. Not even sewer workers conducting maintenance on the upper levels. His main monsters were busy training, especially the lurking stranglers, who were diligently honing their assassin skills. He had already enlarged the shooting range twice. A constant hail of crossbow bolts flew toward the targets as every lurker fired as quickly as they could. Training outside of combat was slow, but at least they were making progress. He was eagerly anticipating the next dungeon delve. But only when his team of defenders was back. Just in case.