Now that I’ve made my level 20 selections and learned about [Quest]s it’s time to begin working on the 3rd floor. Depending how long Mulan and the staircases hold them off higher tier adventurers may be ready to explore it in under a month. It’s a little stressful to be creative on a time limit but nothing inspires hard work like a deadline.
Pushing the core room off to the side I paved a smooth stone hallway at the back of Camp Core behind a large red gateway. It’s a straight shot about 150 feet long. Where adventurers will merge onto the 3rd floor I carved out a rocky outcropping overlooking a steep incline. Said incline is over half a mile long at a 45 degree angle. Jutting out of the stone I sculpted hundreds of stone spikes and platforms.
Once at the bottom of the incline the floor opens out into a large plain of smoothed gray stones. In the middle of this plain I began [Terraforming] hundreds of feet downward. The opening of the hole was topped with a giant triangle outline of white marble. Inside the sinkhole itself it was a large cylinder but this couldn’t be seen from the platform. Into the walls of the hole I chiseled out large stairs circling down to the bottom. The purpose of the triangle, besides added flair, is to keep this staircase hidden from view. Only when the 3 trials are completed will the path down the stairs be revealed.
The plan is for each of the triangle’s points to lead towards one of 3 trials. In those areas adventurers will need to perform a different task. Once all have been completed they must complete the puzzle awaiting at the platform. If successful the stairs will reveal themselves. If not they could still attempt diving into the hole but will be made more dangerous. Thankfully [Micromanaging] exists to track which parties the stairs appear for.
Turning upwards to the ceiling of the floor I spent a healthy chunk of my mana budget embedding water and electric affinity stones dropped by my Ethereal Elk. The water stones leak water as their mana supply overspills, something that happens often due to the ambient mana in my dungeon. Electric affinity stones function similarly but release bursts of electricity into their surroundings.
Using these stones I’ve created an everlasting rainstorm with occasional lightning strikes. This is a cheaper solution in the long run than having [Micromanaging] constantly create rainwater. Soon the smooth rocks will become slippery and the water will flow downwards into the sinkhole. I don’t want the sinkhole to fill with water though so I need to act fast!
Moving quickly I generated several thousand pounds of mud and dirt that will flood down the slope at the floor’s entrance. At the bottom of the mudslide I placed a quarter mile of small hidden grated wherein [Micromanaging] will relocate the mud back to the top to flow down again. The mud would be pumped back out directly on the edge of the rocky outcrop above.
I did something similar with the magic stone produced rainwater by creating an enormous reservoir at the bottom of the sinkhole. From a 2d perspective the reservoir was really another room, albeit a very deep one. At the end of this room is where I’ll be placing the boss and core room. [Micromanaging] was of course put in charge of periodically absorbing the water when it raises too high up. Inspiration struck and I told the skill to recreate tides down in the reservoir. With my artificial tide not all of the sinkhole could be explored at all times. It would fluctuate but the tide would be lowered from around 9pm-6am. Since the ending of the floor will only be accessible during that time it should halt the progress of adventurers coming through.
The last step in designing the sinkhole is building 2 invisible structures from the [Construction] tab. A “Faucet” and a “Drain”.
Faucet’s will constantly spew water out from wherever they are placed for free once built. This may seem somewhat broken when looking at the usually expensive cost of producing water, but the Faucet water will only exist for 30 minutes before disappearing. For this floor though it would work perfectly fine. I attached the Faucet to the opening of the marble triangle, making it appear as if the entire sinkhole was filled with water.
The Drain was attached just above the reservoir below the sinkhole. As should be obvious the Drain will remove any water summoned by Faucets before the 3o minutes expire. The caveat for this being it only worked on Faucet water, not the rainwater, thus the need for [Micromanaging] and the tide system.
Together these 2 [Constructs] work in harmony to make an enormous pillar of ever flowing water cascading down the shaft in a cylinder of water. Since the Faucet and Drain are invisible it appears as though all the water is coming from the thunderstorm raging above. They would also serve to make the entire sink hole appear flooded.
Finally I slowed the flow of water inside of the pillar to manageable levels for aquatic life. This way anything I decided to put inside of the pillar can attack adventurers coming down the slippery stairs, but now all be thrown downwards into the reservoir. Something else will be calling that place home.
Mudslide and sinkhole completed I got to work on the rocky plain itself. The entire floor was sloped down slightly towards the sinkhole so all the rainwater would flow there, but I still added some bumps and trenches along the way to make it appear more organically constructed. Perfect funnels aren’t exactly common in nature after all. For the still developing “lore” of the floor I also placed some “Stone Ruins” from the [Construction] tab. This place needs to look like someone other than my monsters lived here. Outside of the “city limits” I began placing Crystal Trees periodically.
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I found myself able to alter the tree’s colors and material to that of any jewel I currently have a template for. To match the gray color scheme of the floor I went for a stainless steel metallic look. Given their susceptibility to magical influence I granted the trees a small affinity to Lightning. This resulted in an effect where the water near the trees would be electrified when the trees mana reserves topped off. Also as a consequence of my tampering lightning strikes would strike the trees regularly creating a much more severe version of the AOE shock.
Heading west from the leftmost point of the triangle I began constructing a dark forest of gangly dark oak trees. This would be my haunted forest of spiders so I granted the oak’s the same magic weakening effects of the Superlunary Mangroves. Not being able to use magic with ease should only enhance the creepy atmosphere I’m aiming for.
Up from the northern most point of the triangle I lifted several hills covered with the remnants of an ancient battlefield covered in rusty iron weapons still held by skeletal hands. These bones and weapons were taken from many of the young adventurers who had fallen to the Mangle Bog in the early days. Given that they were real weapons, some of them may still be salvageable and worth something to adventurers.
Atop the highest hill I placed a torn but still waving green and blue flag with the fictional country of Burza’s emblem sewn into it. This flag was set to respawn every day at noon, as claiming it was one of the 3 tasks. If my evolution experiments are successful stealing the flag from the remnants of Burza’s military will prove a difficult task.
Finally, to the triangle’s rightmost point I dug out a large watering hole surrounded by reeds possessing a slight paralytic agent. As I left the hole to fill up with rainwater I was reminded of a skatepark’s appearance. Not much else to be done here before my creature [Quests] are fulfilled.
With the beginnings of my 3 trials completed I began summoning the first generation of creatures onto the floor. A rather cheap endeavor since all of these creatures are left fundamentally unchanged from their templates. Perfectly manageable amount for the remaining third of my mana.
Beginning on the mudslide I summoned about 20 goats. For alterations I gave them a small affinity to Earth magic focused around their horns. Hopefully that would help them survive the rather harsh environment. Knowing the ridiculous scenarios Earth’s mountain goats could get themselves into though I’m not terribly worried.
Next I created a colony of about 1,000 common and wolf spiders in the western forest. My hope is that they will spread throughout the entire forest, as one of the 3 tasks will be retrieving a mini boss spider’s silk. When altering the spiders I enlarged them to the size of a small dog, granted the spiders small electric affinity stone pads on their legs, and made their threads conductive. It should be obvious what I’m hoping for in their evolutions.
Across the northern battlefield I summoned a new breed of Clay Golems. Using what I know now I molded the golems into human skeletons. Selling the effect of a dead army I ordered them to play dead until noon when the flag is raised. Every time a party attempts to steal the country’s flag its fallen citizens will rise from the grave to defend it.
As I mentioned earlier the eastern waterfall is on hold until my [Quests] are fulfilled. For now I only created a small, buoyant, waterproof, and anchored chest in the middle of the water. Inside would be a knitting needle and several different colored dyes. Obtaining the dyes would be the last of the 3 trials adventurers need to finish before returning to the sinkhole. The final hint would be a metal pole standing at the triangle’s base.
It’s was the first real puzzle of my dungeon and I’m excited to see how long it takes adventurers to solve. The goal wasn’t for it to be extremely difficult to solve but difficult to gather the needed materials required.
During the concept phase the voice had chimed in with puzzle requirements. To cut the ceremonial speech short a puzzle could be anything as long as it’s feasible. Obviously a puzzle required to progress through the dungeon needed to possible, but it couldn’t be absurd. For example I couldn’t make the puzzle “Sit in this room for 50 years.”. But I could make the puzzle “Wait in this room for 5 minutes.”.
Once the puzzle is solved adventurers will head down the revealed staircase around the pillar of water towards the reservoir. They won’t have time to relax just yet though. I plan to summon and evolve a variety of creatures within the pillar itself.
The first created was an older template of mine, a few dozen Caiman. It may seem weird I didn’t opt for the Alligators, but I want them to evolve a different way. At the very least into Salt Water Crocodiles since the Faucet and Drain combo only pumps out salt water. To make sure they survive I granted the Caiman a much stronger affinity to water magic manifesting in both claws and teeth made of whitish blue crystal. Using their magic the Caiman are perfectly comfortable breathing water over air.
Next I summoned 150 of my selected stingrays to form a few schools inside the pillar. These were granted an affinity to darkness and a sizable increase in width. Manta Rays are called devils of the deep after all! Down inside the reservoir I created another 500 light and air affinity stingrays. To help me differentiate them I gave this second group luminary organs on the tips of their fins.
The final offensive monster I created were several enormous sea snakes. Moving all the way down to their paddlelike tails the serpents repeat a pattern of blue, black, and white rings. I had only had 1 person donate these to the dungeon so far and what a find they’d been! Large, venomous, aquatic, and beautiful. For fun I gave the 15-18 feet long reptiles small affinities to light.
For all these predators to feed on I summoned prey fish like tuna, bass, and tang. The larger fish will be eaten by the Caiman while the others will be consumed by those waiting down in the reservoir. Of course these fish were granted breeding tunnels so I wouldn’t waste mana producing on my newest mana farm.
Taking a glance at my mana supply I will sadly need to take a break. Hopefully by the time my mana comes back I’ll have some new templates and evolutions.