The kobolds decided to spend a couple of days getting to know the dungeon as it was now, and then report their findings back to the rest of the tribe. Mordecai had faded far into legend for them, but there was still a sort of faith that he would return. Now the question was if any of them wanted to join what amounted to their ancestral home.
Mordecai’s feelings on the idea were mixed. While he would welcome any who were sincere in wanting to join, he took the time to emphasize that becoming an inhabitant was an incredible commitment. Unlike becoming a contractor, which was about oaths and promises, a sentient who became an inhabitant was agreeing to have their self altered, and were willingly submitting to magic that would reach into their brains and forge high levels of loyalty. It was one thing to offer an evolution to a non-sentient creature that would lead to it becoming a loyal sentient, but Mordecai was more dubious about asking a creature to give up existing free will. He wouldn’t deny them if they were sincere enough, but he was going to at least mildly discourage them.
The kobold’s stay proved to be well-timed as well. Kazue and Mordecai had spent some time discussing their plans with Moriko after she had told them about the encounter with Captain Alain Vitomir, and the group arrived during the kobolds’ visit. Having some of their kobold guests simply be in a tavern when the soldiers entered was a good personality test, as kobolds, goblins, orcs, and similar species were often the most discriminated against by the ‘civilized races’. There was some historical justification, but any people capable of forming a reasonably stable society were capable of peaceful relations with others (with very rare and complicated exceptions). And he’d seen enough to know well that humans, elves, and all the rest were just as capable of brutality. The only real difference was how self-domesticated the average populace was.
The overall results were promising: The captain’s step barely altered when he spotted the kobolds, and he rather casually slapped the back of a soldier’s head who had started to draw a sword. The rest had put their hands on pommels or other weapons, and looked rather abashed as they took their hands back off. Alain took in the rest of the place pretty quickly, and then went to the bar to order a round of drinks for everyone, on him. It was a sort of indirect apology without having to explicitly call out his own people in public.
That did, however, mark two of them as somewhat rash, if in different ways, as Moriko’s description did not match the one who’d started to draw his blade. With the group having arrived late in the day, Mordecai simply took the evening to examine all the magical auras he could, and was satisfied that he could find nothing that resembled the scrying tokens from before, or any similar divination magic.
The next morning, the soldiers found themselves facing a slightly different test. Before they were allowed into the official entrance of the dungeon, they all had to undergo evaluation. Well, except for the captain of course. Kuni evaluated the four martial soldiers with a simple spar using wooden weapons, while Seon had the priestess and the wizard demonstrate their magical prowess, first against stationary targets, and then against launched targets. The official purpose was “To make sure everyone is competent enough to not get themselves immediately killed.” while unofficially it was a time and effort-consuming activity roughly equivalent to proving themselves against a normal first-floor boss fight.
When the soldiers finally advanced to the entrance hall, Captain Vitomir called out a greeting to the dungeon, then headed directly to the offerings table while pulling out two bottles. “We come bearing some treats that I hope you will find suitable to offer to some of your other visitors. First, we have apple icewine, with this particular batch being a family blend of winter-apple cider and fresh apple cider that is frozen during the winter before being fermented.” He placed the first bottle on the table before continuing, “And this is kissel, a sweet dessert drink made from berries and dried fruit.”
Mordecai masked his amusement from Kazue, who whined at him about the inability to actually taste the drinks, despite *knowing* what they taste like from the analysis, and took some time to sympathize before he manifested his avatar down the hallway to one of the shrines and walked out. Most people preferred that sort of entrance if they weren’t used to dungeons. Or even if they were. “We thank you for your gifts,” he said as the two bottles disappeared. “And welcome to the Azeria Mountain Dungeon. I am Mordecai. As you have not come with one of the groups familiar with our rules, do you have any questions?” This had become a routine lately, and one which Kazue intended to automate with her illusion platform. But they weren’t going to test that right now, because that would give the game away. All depictions of Kazue and Moriko had either been hidden or masked with illusions shortly after this group had arrived.
“A pleasure to meet you, Mordecai, I am Alain,” the captain said and then glanced over the plaque on the wall. “This appears to be the same as I was told to expect, so I don’t think so. Mind, this is our first visit to a dungeon, so I did my best to look up etiquette and drill it through the thick skulls of this lot, so I hope you’ll forgive any missteps.”
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He smiled at Alain in response. “I think that everything will be fine. I am a pretty reasonable person.”
“So you are saying I am not?” Kazue said a bit testily into his mind.
“You’re just upset about not being able to taste the drinks still,” Mordecai replied, not giving in to her provocation, then out loud continued, “Though I will note one thing we do not have written down, to avoid contention over exact wording. You are not vouched for, and come well armed. If you wish to try the gentler path, I am going to have to insist that you give up your arms temporarily.”
Alain chuckled. “That makes sense, but you don’t have to worry about that. I want to push my people and see how good they really are. We’ll be taking your combat challenges, thank you.”
“Excellent, I look forward to seeing how you fare. Oh, and as an added incentive, if you clear the bottom floor, I have a treat of my own you might enjoy. Some friends celebrated their wedding here, and the groom made sure to bring a gift that could be shared with the party guests,” Mordecai held up an empty metal bottle with traces of gold around the open rim, “Are you familiar with this maker’s mark?”
Captain Vitomir narrowed his eyes as he examined it closely, then looked back up at Mordecai. “Is that- it is, isn’t it?” He turned towards the six people waiting for them. “Alright you sorry lot, I will haul your corpses through the last floor if I have to, you are not allowed to keep me from getting my first taste of GOME.” Mordecai rather enjoyed the awful acronym and wondered if it was common in the north. He didn’t think that most dwarves would appreciate the name being shortened that way.
The soldiers followed along with wide eyes as Alain led them into the selection circle, and then jabbed the combat path button as soon as everyone was inside. The stone doors started moving, but much slower than normal, slow enough to give Mordecai time to speak as the illusions over the murals were dispelled. “Oh, and Captain Vitomir,” the man spun in place with a suspicious look, as he hadn’t given his full name, “My wives want me to pass on their greetings.” The captain only took a beat more to start laughing loudly, while one of the martial soldiers started looking panicked. Mordecai waved briefly with his left hand, making sure that light glinted to show off the purple and gold crystal before the doors sealed.
Mordecai and Kazue watched as Alain cajoled his subordinate into moving on to the rest of the dungeon. The good captain was quite correct, if they were planning on killing the soldiers, Mordecai wouldn’t have given this sort of warning. But the three of them had agreed that the man who had harassed Kazue and Moriko deserved a little bit of torment.
While Mordecai didn’t adjust the difficulty of the dungeon, he did pay more attention than he did to most groups. Once they got started, they formed up into groups of three, two soldiers with short spear and shield out and a caster in each group, with Captain Vitomir mostly acting as a training instructor. The two groups acted semi-independently but covered for each other, enabling them to each engage an enemy without further communication or chance of confusion while still providing backup if the other group needed it.
Vitomir didn’t get directly involved in any fights until the third-floor fight with Betty. The default was to only have one boss in a fight, so Umbrowl was still in reserves for possibly facing future parties. He engaged with Betty while the teams took out her support, then pulled back to let them figure out how to cope with the skirmishing boxer with sonic-powered punches. And there were still traps to pay attention to as well. They took a little bit of a beating in that fight, though they proved quite capable of patching each other up to minimize the amount of magic that the priestess had to use.
It was still early afternoon when they reached the rest area on the fourth floor, but Alain told them to make camp. One of the pieces of advice Moriko had passed on was to always take provided rest spots, and they had wearied themselves in the fights on the floor above.
The next day the party moved on to tackling the library maze. They adjusted their tactics slightly, with the two groups trying to pincer an enemy wherever possible, and Alain started getting more involved with the actual fighting even before they faced Biblios. And the maze was made slightly harder by the presence of a few ‘helpful’ faeries. The newest rule on the plaque that the captain had read over on the first floor was, “Do NOT attack the faeries. They think they are helping, and sometimes they actually are. They do not present a threat unless provoked.”
Of course, ‘threat’ was very different from ‘distraction’ or ‘annoying’, but there wasn’t much Mordecai could or would do about it at this point. Plus, learning what to filter and what not to filter was good for training situational awareness.
Captain Vitomir led the fight when it came time to face Biblios, and started showing his true capabilities. His boots let him air-walk for short bursts, and his mastery of martial prowess let him strike hard enough to force Biblios to briefly land, letting the others engage directly when not dealing with the spawning bookwyrms and biting words.
While not as formal or stylized as the sort of training Monks received, any sufficiently tempered warrior or soldier found themselves moving into similar capabilities. Biblios hadn’t been forced to land just because of the physical force of the blow, but because of the will and intent powering the strike. The energy that responded to ones spirit and mind flowed everywhere in the world, and strong wills always gathered more of it even if they had no direct training in how to do it.
When the party finally camped on the fifth floor, they were looking a bit wrung out. After the setup was done and the food started cooking, Alain looked over what he could see of the fifth floor thoughtfully, then called out, “Mordecai, can we talk for a little bit?”
Mordecai strolled out from behind a mushroom tree, his hands clasped behind his back and wearing a politely curious expression. “How can I help you, Captain?”