Rather than explain and get scolded for bad visuals, I opted to just show them using Visualization. The middle door straight ahead is a spacious room with no other exits in sight, inside is ten Druidants that seems to be of another different variant, a little plumpier than Druidant Sprinklers and less armored. They seem to be busy gobbling up fruits, herbs, and mushrooms and various plant materials, before kinda sitting still in a meditative-like state. Their most notable feature being a scorpion-like stinger that has an injection-like point. And to the left is another corridor that spans fifteen meters, to the left are three doors, while furthest and to the left is another door, one that is much more ornate.
I requested we eliminate all denizens of the dungeon just to be safe before facing the Druidant boss. The notion was agreed upon, so we entered the middle door. All ten heads turn to regard us the moment we come through, staring silently in the creepy undead way. I cast VLoS, aiming at a spot inside the room, approximately seven meters from the door. Hopefully this will aggro all of them, which would make them gather while Roy and I stand guard by the door. They did aggro, all ten simultaneously charging for us only to be frozen and struck by at least two lightning each. The four unlucky enough to get struck by three bolts were eliminated, while the rest are left charred and barely functioning, allowing us to safely make short work of them. I wonder why there seems to be no item drops from kills, even after all these.
Moving on to the last unexplored exit, we find ourselves in a corridor. Three doors in a line on the wall to our left, and one ornate door on the furthest right wall. Checking out the left doors, we discovered a Druidant Sentinel each in two of the further rooms, by having unlucky volunteer Roy and eager volunteer Agus go invisible to take a peek. They reported that the Sentinels just stand there and stare at the walls, with the occasional postural sway, as Henry-ctionary calls it.
We decided to make our stand at the corridor back towards the long cavern, just in case attacking one aggroed the other. I will cast VLoS on the one in the middle room, and quickly run back to the team that will be ready in their combat positions behind several SmartMines.exe. My spell was successfully cast—as feared, while I made my run to join the formation, the other Sentinel very audibly rushed out of its room and, very predictably, charged at me.
I made sure to keep to the walls during my escape, finally making a Dodge Roll to evade the lunging Sentinel. The creature, on account of its larger physique, ended up triggering one of two traps we placed on the ceiling. An electrocuted net falls and engulfs its ant body, though missing the Druidants humanoid torso due to the speed of its charge, unfortunately, it is too large, physically, for the stun to take effect.
Though the half a second delay was enough for Roy to position himself between the creature and us, soon after, only its corpse is left to partially block our way. Checking the middle room shows the charred corpse of another. I guess the way VLoS is designed makes it more effective against fewer opponents as opposed to many, in the way its bolts only target one enemy at a time. A design flaw that needs to be fixed.
"Nice job!" Henry praised us, then said to me with a glint in his eyes. "I would love to own that spell you used. Will have to look for it after this."
"Yea you should! Umm, so what now? Think that's the boss room?" I ask him, pointing at the last door. "It's the only decorated one so far."
He grins at me. "Possible."
"Let's be careful." Agus says, failing to hide his enthusiasm. "Can I open the door?"
"Might as well," I allow him, making eye contact with Henry and seeing him nod. There is probably only a little more than 1.5 hours left till midnight, so there is no sense delaying. I positioned myself as a vanguard, right beside Roy "Agus, open then run back, Roy please be ready."
"Why do you use mister with Herman, but call me by my name only?" Roy inquired me while preparing his shield for contact.
"Wha..?" That came out of the left-- no, the behind-field. "Uh, look! Agus opened the door! Focus!"
Successfully making him turn his head forward. Agus is rushing towards us as if a Sentinel is charging at him. Must. Not. Bully… "Agus! Behi--"
A smack on the back of my head cut my words short. "Don't!" Came Henry's warning. "Geez, we're risking our lives here. Zen, this is real life, remember, not one of the games we play?!"
"Sorry." Am I losing track of reality?
Agus stopped behind Roy panting, "what were," he took several breaths, "you saying… Mr. Zane?"
"Nah, it's nothing." I tell him while my eyes observe the ornate door. Nothing is happening, nothing charging out of the open door and rushing at us. "Just a bad joke... Say, how about you call me Zen like everyone else."
He stares at me, "yes! Zen?.. sir."
"Drop the sir, man~."
"Alright, we should take a look through that door." Henry looks at me, "can you send one of your disks?"
I gave him an okay gesture and sent one over, followed soon after by Visualization. The room, because it is a room past the door, is large, we could probably hold a moderate sized ball in there, complete with live music and a buffet. Unfortunately, along the walls are instead, lines of what looks to be white colored egg sacs, semi-transparent and with something dark moving inside, the sacs are almost perfectly spherical and at least 1.5 diameters in size. The center room is clear of anything, besides the one massive Druidant lady that is looking at u– my disk, with a sinister smile.
"How big is tha– she?" Roy muttered the question present in our minds.
At a glance, the Druidant Queen's humanoid half has what I would describe as the kawaii teenage princess vibe from anime with neck length hair; cheeky, playful and confident in her authority and good looks, not to mention dangerous. With smile as bright as the stars, innocent enough to draw on the hearts of many men, that is until they lay their eyes on her lower half. An ant body approximately the size of a small house, the back-most abdomen itself maybe four by five meters in size and about 2.5 meters tall, the front adding another three to its length. Slowly after, it would dawn on them that the cute lady above that monst– the cute lady that is the monster, is at least upwards of two meters tall.
As we stare at it in awe, the creature raises its right palm upwards and beckons at us by curling and uncurling its index finger with a dominant smile.
"Is it just me or does she look intelligent?" Agus chimed.
"I think you meant sapient." Henry corrected him, "capable of self-awareness."
"Yeah that!"
The Druidant Queen is still looking at us with a smirk on her face. "Well, what are we waiting for?" Not waiting for an answer, I step forward and through the door, I can hear the others following me.
As we make our way through the door, I thicken and slightly enlarge the armor on my left forearm to act as a makeshift shield. Roy too steped forward while the others step back, his shield ready to intercept.
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"Oh my, welcome intruders. What brings you into our humble abode, oh, so early?" The Druidant Queen speaks in a melodious soprano voice.
"Hi," I decided to humor the conversation. "Well, we're here to see the Dungeon Core, can you show us the way?"
"To meet with master?" Her humanoid form makes a thinking pose. "On what business? If I may ask."
"I'm afraid your master is fired," I continued, unsure of what exactly we should do. "Someone from up high sent us here to straighten that out with it and provide a replacement. If you'd be so kind as to step aside, we'll be out of here in the blink of an eye."
She is quiet for a moment, as if conversing with another… "I'm afraid I do not have a choice on that matter, please, the exit is that way." She points to a portal on the right wall, perfectly situated in the center. While nothing but egg sacs are on the left wall. Another corridor lies on the far wall straight ahead from our entrance.
"Attack!" Came Henry's command in the form of a whisper. Everyone instantly distanced themselves, Roy stood his ground, Agus, Henry and the ladies jumped back as their armor turned them barely visible and I rushed left in a circular route away from our tank while still maintaining distance with the Queen.
She has an amused expression on her face for just an instant, before her smile becomes a thousand percent more sinister. Her sturdy ant legs stabs onto the ground, causing a slight tremor to travel through the floor before she stood up, barely audible among the sound of her booming steps is a girly giggle, before it develops into a screech.
The largest among the eggs hatched at the, now, shrill sound of her scream. Plain looking Druidants stumble out, still covered in fluid, their exoskeletons drying up at an accelerated pace.
"Druidant Young, level five!" Somebody shouts.
"I count ten of them!" Someone else answered.
They are positioned all over the room, so casting VLoS seems moot, not to mention the risk of friendly fire. "Roy, can you tank the Queen's attacks? Draw her attention?" I hear Henry yell and sneaked a few glances.
It seems to be shooting out several variety of elemental spells. I can see crescent shaped winds, toothpick shaped lights, jets of murky water and spikes of earth that erupt from the ground. But fortunately for us, she is only capable of rotating its massive body instead of actually walking. "Ye!" Roy grunts his reply.
"Zen!" Henry called, "clean off the hatched ants."
"On it!" Two disks float out of their sheath to blitz at the nearest Druidant Young. Piercing into its neck and out the other side leaving behind a cross shaped wound on both sides. I kept moving even while manipulating the disks, eventually I began relying on Mana Sense to aim even whilst I evaded and rolled out of danger, eventually managing to raise the amount of manipulated disks from two up to four disks. A little more than a minute later, all ten Druidant Youngs are taken care of.
The Queen stood strong against the combined effort of the others, as it is now surrounded by tentacle-like vines that sprout out of the floor. But soon succumbed when my Animus Incision started assaulting her soul. Rather anticlimactic I must say, why does everyone in the Multiverse not become soul mages or something.
** DING **
Remember. Your journey into the Multiverse has barely begun, do not let it blind you. This is but the beginning, more so regarding Dungeons and everything within
"Good job guys!" Roy cheered.
'That… makes sense. Thank you.'
The end is near
Make haste
I did not reply, opting instead to set my sights on the others. "So what now?" Henry askes from beside me.
"Now I have business with the core, can I count on you to keep watch. Make sure nothing unexpected disturbs me." I told him as we all made our way through the obvious exit.
"If by that you meant Agus, sure." He chuckled. The Dungeon Core floats before us on a flora decorated pedestal.
"Hey! What about me?" The target of our jest asked from his position a little further away, guess they're listening in.
"Nothing~," I tell him, laughing at the confused look on his face. Very soon, everyone followed suit, Agus included. "Anyways, I'll be trying to defeat this core without destroying it, please keep me safe guys—and girls. Wish me luck."
Dianti and Kirana each cheered for me in their own way, one elder sisterly and the other cool as ice, Roy in the way he booms, Agus with enthusiasm, and Henry, "stop looking like your kid's on his first day at school!" I chidded him, which got them LOL-ing, even as I approached the core. Sigh, the nerves!
Shifting focus. I can feel the soul residing within the floating Core very clearly, it feels stronger than the Sentries, or any of the others, maybe besides the Queen. Maybe at a stage above a Soul Seed.
** DING **
The Queen, true, an Infant Soul. This little one is merely a Soul Seed on the cusps of a breakthrough.
'I see, how come the Core has a weaker soul than its subordinate?"
None can say. Perchance it is simply fortune, perchance a treasure, a divine intervention. May be it is a talented soul, or it has experienced great emotions. There are a plethora of possibilities and combination that may cause its soul to undergo an expeditious evolution
'I see.' That is an interesting subject, evolving a soul, maybe my soul too if I found a way.
Make haste
Right, the quest. I once again focus on the Core's soul, now, what can I use to pull it into the outer reaches of my Mindscape. Essence Duel, as I recall, seems to have used my mana to reach past their physical existence, into their Mindscape and engulfed its target, before pulling back. Hard… Or, there is also the web-thingy spell from the store, hmm~.
A way to connect from a-far, like the cup and string phone earlier… which I managed to make work by giving the string tendons, before changing it again into just a string. That flexixility is good.
Inspired. I form an arm-like design out of mana, at its core is a line of identicals segments of rigid bones, each connected by ball joints. And attached to the bones, a simple muscle structure that can pull or release tension following command. Then, I tightly wrap the construct with a thin layer of rubbery skin-like-mana to keep it all together. At its tip, I add five similar but much smaller constructions of the exact design, this one to resemble fingers, though perfectly optional. Last but not least, I influence the mana that is the spell to exist in two planes of existence, and be capable of phasing between both reality and the Mindscape. For now, it would function following the users arm movement and thought commands. While the spell stays connected to the arm controlling it, so more mana may be infused to create more extending segments or finger segments to modify the construct as necessitated.
All in all, the construct costs me 65 mana for an android, arm, construct, like thingy that is made of two big segments and five fingers. It is protruding out of my right arm like an illusion, and clenching my fingers also clenches the constructs fingers. I can feel each segment is, when outside of the Mindscape, about ten centimeters long each, and is designed to be capable of extending by another twenty. The fingers, instead, are dextrous but unextendable.
** DING **
I unceremoniously shoved it at the Core, shifting it to phase through into its Mindscape… the length falls short, very short! Which is how I figured out that every twenty mana extends the construct by one extendable segment. Seven additional segments did nothing later and the soul is nowhere clos—the newly constructed eight segment, instead, end up extending beyond it—distance in the Mindscape is surreal, I made one more for better mobility. Then maneuvered the construct and snatched the soul and pulled.
I followed into my Mindscape, landing us on the outer parts of it before letting the spell end. Hmm, maybe it's possible to construct an area that would give me combat advantages—the Core manifests as is, albeit much smaller, and hovers in place, inanimate..
it slowly hovers away at my approach… lets, just get this over with.
Casting Animus Incision does not summon a dagger into my hand, rather, the spell manifests beside me already in its wyvern-like form in all its aerodynamic-ity. "Attack!" I point at the Core, giving me a live show of how the creature attacks. As a result, the Core's is now chipped and fragmented into several fading pieces, only the largest-center-most piece still registers on SoulSense as a soul.
** DING **
Well done, allow me
The fragment experiences intense tremor for a moment before disappearing out of my Mindscape.
Time is short, please evacuate this instant
When the one most-omnipresent entity in the Multiverse politely says, go away. One gets the hell away. So I exit the Mindscape with a thought, ignore the prompt asking me to roll for rewards and ushered everyone out the portal.