Kazue shoved aside the still unfolding plethora of information from Satsuki's 'trinkets', both those gifted to them in their aspect as a faerie court and the ones she later gifted to them in their aspect as a dungeon. That second set had hardly seemed needed, given how much the necklaces had given them.
She also resolutely blocked out her avatar's thoughts and emotions. She couldn't afford any distractions right now, this was going to be the first time they'd claimed a new zone since they'd also become a faerie court.
The past couple of months of constant delving by the Trionean soldiers, the less constant delving and foraging of the Kuiccihan troops had supplied, and the hunting and delving by groups of kitsune had supplied them with plenty of mana, though speeding up their domain's growth had consumed a portion of it. Their biggest delay had simply been getting both sides to balance.
Now she scanned over the wetlands zone to make sure no one was near the edge. Things were about to get messy, and possibly dangerous.
Once she was satisfied with that, Kazue sealed this entrance to their rooms, which left only the entrance from the sewers to the arena as an open path. There was a bit of resistance, but this was just a temporary measure to avoid any problems.
Kazue spread her awareness past the final section of the dungeon and to the very borders of their territory, including the side edges of this section. Through her consciousness, their mana flowed to claim more territory for the dungeon.
Deeper, farther, and wider, all at once. It was their biggest territory growth so far and even with that, she was handling another flow of mana designed to expand the internal space of this new territory.
Expanding their space internally also redistributed much of the solid earth she was claiming. Mordecai showed her how a dimensionally manipulated space could have a firm border without any physical barrier, but that sort of non-space bothered even her core to look at, let alone what it might do to brains not designed to handle this sort of information. It was much better to let that earth be redistributed as part of their border, the rest was going to need to be absorbed anyway.
Once she had spent most of their reserves on claiming their next zone, Kazue shifted toward preparing it properly.
Within the limits of maintaining a roughly oblong shape and keeping a thick enough 'edge' for their warrens and sewers, she absorbed almost all the stone that had not already been redistributed to their borders. With this giant hollow space readied for further work, it was time to wrap their core chambers with her power and carefully move the entire complex to the very bottom and end of their new zone.
This was only inexpensive relative to the massive amount of mana she'd just expended claiming the zone.
It was also the first time that the movement of the complex could be seen by anyone but the cores, and the way this massive section of stone slid noiselessly along and down the newly opened space was eerie.
After Kazue had settled the complex into place, complete with having simultaneously created a straight tunnel for the sewer connection, she reformed some of the earth she'd absorbed before into a giant cone of earth reminiscent of a small mountain. Which is what it was sort of supposed to be. When Kazue was satisfied with its shape it was time to connect the chambers to a wide plateau that ringed the mountain relatively near the top.
While she'd been doing this, the normal reclamation of excess water from their various waterways was stopped.
They'd always been as efficient as they could be, but the wetlands and the sewers could only hold so much. But now there was this vast, hollow basin to be filled, and the briny water of their wetlands began draining into it.
It was insufficient on any reasonable time scale, but Kazue had a low-energy way of speeding up the process. While creating matter was always one of the more expensive things they could do, absorbing and redistributing matter cost very little energy in comparison. Almost all of the accumulated snow inside of their territory abruptly disappeared, only to reappear at the bottom of the basin. Kazue then 'cheated' and grabbed a second mass of snow from Faerie to create another layer of snow inside their basin.
Oddly enough, bringing the snow across did not rid it of its eerie 'too real' appearance and sparkle. Mordecai had warned her that bringing in this much substance from faerie was going to affect how the 'ocean' they were creating would work, but in this case, Kazue felt there was little to worry about. A strange ocean was perfect, and there was illusionary work to be done on the zone still.
Work on their new zone was far from complete, but she'd deliberately pushed as far as she could while retaining a stable structure. Major work would have to wait until they had more mana again, but she did still have enough to reshape the edge of their wetlands zone.
The brine lake at the end of their zone was now part of an extensive shallows area that was also riddled with deeper trenches and the occasional tunnel to connect otherwise isolated areas. For those here to fight, the terrain for combating the masima dragon bosses had become a lot more treacherous. Their final destination, should they win their way through, was a wide circular island that jutted out into the deeper ocean. The island itself was simply a bare disc at the moment, the proper setup for their challenges would come later.
If you spot this story on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.
As for those who had made their way past Carmilla's challenges, the hedged-in path now led to an underground tunnel that passed beneath the enlarged combat area and resurfaced on the island. The path for combatants was not so clear as there was only one unbroken path of shallow water and sand that led through the boss area and when they had the mana to spare, the sandbars and trenches would shift after every battle against Nezha and Ysi.
Kazue examined her work and was satisfied for now.
While the dungeon might not have much mana left for direct work, Mordecai's avatar was making his way to the island to begin some of the manual work he had planned. What he had in mind was tricky and she appreciated that he was going to put in the extra work to make sure that the path would be safe for their delvers.
While her husband went to work there, Kazue took the opportunity to shift her attention to the Other Side. She wanted to see how Faerie had reflected the changes to their dungeon territory. It had been hard to ignore the portion of their mana that had been siphoned off to keep their domain matching their territory.
Like the rest of their domain, this new area was sparsely inhabited.
Sarcomaag was the only entity other than themselves that could simultaneously exist on both sides of the border between realms, and like the cores, his main body was entirely on the mortal side. But his tendrils were still able to grow along with the matrix of living crystal that had become an automatic part of building new borders for the dungeon. These tendrils had sprouted into a sprinkle of glowing mushrooms and other fungi inside of the cavern on the faerie side, which gave soft illumination to the dark waters of the underground lake there.
Overall, this cavern was a lot smaller than the ocean planned for the dungeon. This left a lot of the new territory left in stone and earth, but that should be fine. After all, some of the fey that they had accepted as immigrants to their realm included beings that preferred an underground life. The blue caps in particular would be happy to be able to create mines this deep under the surface.
Really, it was more of an underground sea. Though oddly enough, Kazue found it hard to determine exactly how deep the waters went. The far end of the sea was strangely indistinct.
An eerie, underground faerie sea that was located far beneath mountains.
One with waters far too dark and deep for the space they occupied.
Oh no.
"Mordecai," Kazue sent, "Um, how far from normal living lands do you have to be to no longer find Faerie on the Other Side?"
Her question grabbed his attention quickly and she could feel him shift his focus to the new section of their faerie domain.
While he was examining the space, Mordecai replied to her question, "To my knowledge, Faerie should be connected to almost all of our world, outside of a few dangerous confluences. But those areas are usually extremely dangerous environments on the mortal side as well, with only meager life scraping by."
He sounded frustrated to her, and Kazue couldn't blame him. If her feeling was right, they were touching on dangerous realms.
Mordecai continued his musings as he probed the area. "This is still part of Faerie. It has to be, no Court has a domain that extends past the borders of Faerie, the idea is contradictory. If it is part of a faerie court, it is part of Faerie. Though not all of Faerie is claimed by a court, there's always the Faerie Wilds."
Kazue felt a new presence approaching their domain and shifted her focus toward it. The presence was coming across the underground sea and that painfully indistinct border.
It wasn't the most powerful being that had been inside of their domain or territory, but direct power was not the only way to be passively terrifying.
The pale, ethereal woman walked serenely across the surface of the dark waters as her hair streamed behind her on non-existent winds. She wore a white dress that looked fit for either a wedding or a funeral, and her bare feet made no noise when she stepped on the water's surface.
Behind her trailed a pair of hounds who glowed softly and padded across the sea with the same silent ease that their mistress did.
The woman's soft humming was beautiful, but it did not set Kazue at ease. At least she wasn't singing.
Mordecai sighed and said, "Yet, despite all that, we have this visitor. If we were a winter court I could understand the connection existing, but we have not declared an allegiance. Well, the three of us are going to need to talk with her, but we'll need a representative first. Carmilla is closest, other than my avatar, and I think the three of us should arrive together, so I will send her ahead."
Kazue's avatar had already realized that something was wrong, even with the delay in the information flow between them. Moriko had started listening in as soon as Kazue had spoken up, and both of them were scrambling to get ready.
Carmilla was distinctly unhappy with the idea of being sent to speak with a Pale Lady accompanied by a pair of spectral hounds. "Lord Mordecai," she said in a tight voice, "while I have been happy to become your adopted daughter, I am currently wondering if I should be reconsidering that opinion. If I understand you correctly, you and Lady Kazue have managed to connect our realm to an Underworld lake‽ Now, if I thought this was deliberate, I could at least claim you were being extremely bold, but I am fairly certain that Lady Kazue and Lady Moriko would have put a stop to it if this had been part of a plan."
As she spoke, Carmilla used her magic to hastily change out of her normal outfit for a dress more befitting of a princess. A dark faerie princess, to be sure, but a princess nonetheless.
"Very well," she said when she was done, "I am as ready as I can be on such short notice."
Kazue watched nervously as Carmilla crossed into their domain and strode toward the edge of the dark sea. Carmilla managed to use Kazue's information to time her arrival to coincide with the Pale Lady stepping onto the shore.
With a welcoming smile and perfect poise, Carmilla curtsied to the unexpected visitor. "Greetings visitor. I am Lady Carmilla, Princess of the Azeria Court. On behalf of Queen Kazue, Queen Moriko, and King Mordecai, I should like to welcome you into our realm as a guest. My parents will be arriving shortly to meet you in person."
The woman's humming stopped for the moment as she considered Carmilla, then she smiled in return and said, "I accept your invitation, and look forward to meeting your Lord and Ladies. My name is Cliodhna, and I am here as a servitor of Lady Kikoi Muerte and Lord Yamaraja. They are very curious as to why a faerie realm has come into contact with the realm of the dead."