It’s been many hours since Tarra left. I have no idea where to. But, I am guessing since she had trouble with the goblins to the West, she would not go back there. That means probably going to the river and then maybe heading over to that white-walled castle. It seems like the biggest fortress around. Must be a local center of power. Maybe she’ll go there to report to the authorities what is going on with the goblins. Or with me?

Sure hope she does not do that.

I hop into LightsOut, and we go for a flight.

Figuring she was walking downhill, she could have already gone fifteen miles away. So, that became my circle. Instead of trying to see through the trees, I concentrate on following the trails and the road, looking for that red cape of her and her uniform of Wonder Woman. Among the gray clothes of the poor peasants, I know that has to stick out.

It takes me half an hour, but I find her on a large cargo boat going downstream.

She sees me as I start making circles, approaching the boat slowly, and moving to the back of the boat where there is nobody.

I think if I should land and say ‘hi’, but at the last second, the way I notice how dismissive she is of me even though she can clearly see me, I decide to just drop the scroll over her head and fly out. It’s all in there anyway.

Thinking I do not want to leave yet, I climb up and see her open it. Watch as she reads it. Looks up at me frowning. Then… she drops it in the river. Why? That… was a very incriminating document. Why would she want to get rid of it?

I do not know. I let the boat and the river take her.

Suddenly, I again feel very lonely. And understand how very vulnerable I am.

And I hurry home.

There are no more delay tactics. No more ‘need to save all the energy to help him’ or her or whatever. Now I need the energy to save and protect myself.

Not wanting to spend coins on new designs, I go and pick through the scroll inventory I have.

While I’m doing that, I tell LightsOut to go and check the land to the West, to see if the Goblins are still there. I tell him to bring all the dead he finds. I doubt they took care of the ones we killed. And they would serve good fertilizing the dungeon and feeding us energy.

Going through the scrolls, there are three that stand above anything else.

The first ones that appear very promising are black spiders with heads as big as a basketball. I have the option to make them poisonous. And not just through a bite. They have the option to spray venom targeting the victims’ eyes, just as some species of cobra snakes do. But these ones have a larger distance. Maximum of eight meters. Yeah. That’s awesome. I get five of them.

Two will be my guards inside the Core and attack automatically if under some eventuality a thief or an enemy breaks in.

Other three I will keep at the Grand Entrance, patrolling the area inside and out. Just to greet anyone who dares to come in uninvited and tell them that this dungeon is off-limits.

I instruct them not to attack anyone without my permission. And when they do, to roll them up in a cocoon and take them to jail. No killings unless previously instructed.

Another option is this huge serpent, a whole meter thick. It looks menacing with fangs five inches big. I bet it can withstand attacks from pitchforks all day long without breaking a sweat. I bet it would take more than a dozen swordsmen fighting abreast to kill it. Which would make it impossible to do in the tight tunnels. That serpent would be a formidable defense weapon if my dungeon's outer defense ever gets breached.

But… I realize I want something else. I want something I can take outside.

I also need to create a monster that can help Oollie with all the heavy lifting. It’s about time he gets some help and I get me some muscle. And I have an excellent option for a muscle. It’s labeled as Giant Neanderthal. The original license came for the construction of ten of them, but… there is one left unused. And that one will be mine.

It takes fifty Energy units to build this monstrosity, but as he comes out of the cocoon, I don’t regret it! Not one bit. Not one spill of that good beer that went into producing the needed energy.

The huge goblin I killed when saving Tarra would be judged as skinny compared to this fella. It’s two and a half meters tall, wider than a two-door fridge I had at home. Yeah. I’m just hoping the Core gate is wide enough for him to get out.

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

He is completely absent of any hair, not even eyebrows, and even in the dim light of the Core, I can clearly see his skin pigment is on the greenish side. And... his pupils are red as if they are begging to see blood.

“Yes, Master,” he growls out of his throat even before I get a chance to stop admiring him.

He even sounds evil.

This is going to be my gatekeeper. Most people care about the size, and when they see him, I know they’ll care plenty.

And not just the looks. His muscles seem real, veins bursting out as he flexes them. I bet a mountain rock is not stronger than this guy. Yes, Rocky is a good name for this dude.

The thing comes out naked. It will take me, I mean Oollie, to skin two cows to get him enough hide just to rope around the waist. I have no desire to waste all that, so I get the Constructor to make him a giant tunic. The thing can cover easily a whole pickup truck, but I don’t care. He puts it on, and this way, he is not scaring little children and insecure men no more. If I did not name him Rocky already, it might have just been ElephantTrunk.

“No raping cows, bears, elephants, or any other kind of animals,” is the first thing I find I need to tell him. But I still card him and decide to go in options and, just to make sure, I knock down his sex drive to zero. If I ever get him a wife, I can always change that, and then I can have a tribe of Rockies. I imagine his wife would have boobs big enough to kill someone. Wouldn't that be something worth talking about while sitting around a campfire, "Yeah, Tonie was a good lad, too bad he got killed by a booby."

Yeah, when I get him a wife, she'll be called BoobyTrap.

Well, having a beast for a guard, I can hardly wait to take him for a test run.

Oh, yeah. We are at the front gate, and I see he can pick a boulder without a hitch. The biggest one, he can move, but I don't make him try and lift it. No need to damage his muscle tissue on the first day on the job.

But I let him try to lift a fallen tree trunk inside the forest. Not only can he pick it up, but he can raise it all the way over his head and put it over his shoulder.

I realize I need to give him a proper weapon. Just a big club that came as a default will not do. It's just plain stupid and a waste of potential for him to swing half a tree. He would not be fighting giants with it. No. I have to be smarter. Use his power the best I can.

Yes. I have an awesome idea. If I put some good armor on him, and due to his strength, I could put a lot of protective metal on him, the only way they could kill him is by giving him the death of a thousand cuts. Close combat. So, yeah, a long cleaver and two swords as a backup. And… why not something for a distance? Like a giant bow and arrow. That would be like a scorpion weapon. Arrows that are like two meters long, all iron, could fly out and nail a dragon if needs be.

The sad part is… I cannot procure all those weapons. Even armor that big is just not available for this planet. I will need… probably the help of those stubborn dwarfs after all.

By the time I’m finished, I am informed I have leveled up again.

And that’s when the fun can really start.

This time I have options to customize the dungeon. About time.

And surprise, surprise. The higher level brings a customization option. It seems the dungeon can build its own gate. I don’t need dwarfs after all. I select the basic model with the heavy iron door opening to the inside, thinking Rocky could hold it on the other side of it.

I also have the option to set up a trap pit. One in front of where the tunnel starts would be great. One down by the jail is even better. The best would be to have the fake floor built in front of the Core. And to connect it with the tunnel that would take the perpetrators straight down into one of the jail cells. That would be awesome. But it’s expensive. All that work would require energy. Like two thousand units. And after finishing with the gate and my new monsters, I’m down to a meager handful left.

While I do all of that, in the back of my mind is the context of the scroll. Keep wondering what exactly is going on.

Some King Eri is making a deal with the Master of Goblins about Ertirnia, to split it all the way to the river. One would take the mountains, one would take the forests and the land. Those peasants who get captured would be split evenly

Of course I am guessing that this here is Ertirnia. They would not be talking about someplace that is on the other side of the continent.

So, my dungeon would become under the control of someone else. Nice. Don’t I have a say in it?

A monstrous shriek in the air punches me out of my thoughts. I look up to see a goblin dropping down, screaming his guts out, eyes and mouth wide open. He smashes not five meters away from me.

I look at LightsOut flying above and wiggle my finger to call him over.

“Are you trying to be funny? You targeting me now?"

He does not answer me, just stares at me, and moves nervously from one foot to another. I bet he saw Oollie and wanted to be funny. "I’ll get into Rocky and plug your feathers if you hurt little Oollie.”

“He hurts me, he hurts me,” LighthsOut starts complaining, nudging his beak forward.

I step out of Oollie just to face him and look at him. He lowers his head down, ashamed even to look me in the eyes.

“You hurting my eagle?” I ask him.

His eyes don't move off the ground.

“Tried to burn me, tried to burn me. Burned my feet,” LIghtsOut cracks out behind me.

“That’s it,” I say. “You kids both get a time-out. Don’t even care who did what. To the corners, both of you. Dark ones. And if you keep on fighting, I’ll have you go after Manka and Zanka, our cows, and pick their crap after them. Yes. That will be your punishment if you don’t stop fighting. We’re on the same team here. Just can’t afford this. So, shape up! Or a dung duty for you both!"

I figure ten minutes in the dark corner, then I'll call them over, give them another talk, offer some nice treats, and make them do a job they need to do together as a team. Rocky can be in the middle as a mediator. I don't think they would want to argue with him.

While they do that, I have something else I really would like to research.

Tarra… If she is over two hundred years old, I bet there are quite a few scrolls about her on the Galactic Network. And, I bet, for a few coins, it could be available for me to read through. Yeah. That sounds interesting. She said she came from a planet… What the hell was it called?