“Well, that was interesting,” I said to absolutely no one. The first people in my dungeon get ambushed by a single rabbit—I thought they were playing, not training to fight people! Not that I have a problem with it, I guess the adventurers will just have to work a bit harder for a [Lucky Rabbit's Foot].
Okay, what should I work on next? The next floor? Wait! I need to fix the borders on the first floor first. Looking over at them, they’re just big stone walls. While that’s not the worst thing ever, I’m going for more of an ‘entered another world’ vibe, and the stone walls don’t exactly fit the aesthetic.
After some thought, I decided to cast a large-scale illusion on the edge of the first floor, making it look like the floor continues into the horizon. Instead of a solid wall, I change it to a super-stretchy, thin, but resilient film so that people don’t just crash into an invisible wall hidden by the illusion.
With that minor tweak out of the way, I turn my attention to creating the second floor. I can’t think of much else to improve on the first floor, other than maybe making my illusions more realistic—but that’s easy. Besides, no one’s even properly challenged it yet, except for those two adventurers who just left. With those thoughts bouncing around in my head (core?), I begin excavating the space for the second floor, using a bit of manual digging and a lot of space magic.
How big should I make this one? The first floor is about 10 square miles, which sounds like a lot until you realize that someone who’s fit could walk that in just a few hours. And in a world full of monsters, I doubt there are many unfit adventurers, especially ones brave enough to delve into my dungeon.
I think I’ll go big for this next one—really big. Let’s say around 100 square miles. Adventurers will start in the center, so they’ll need to walk about 50 miles in any direction to reach the edge, which would take about a day and a half if someone walked in a straight line from edge to edge if you include breaks. This way, they’ll have to camp inside my dungeon to explore it properly. Plus, I can make each floor progressively larger.
I mean, I’m trying to prepare them for big threats, right? What better way than to create an entire world for them to explore, complete with disasters of my own making? It’s a win-win. I get to design cool monsters and mini-worlds, and adventurers get to fight giant creatures without the risk of permanent death—while also collecting tons of treasure!
Now, what should the theme of the second floor be? The first is a forest, but I don’t have many blueprints to work with yet. Sure, my [Cave Widows] have been out gathering new designs, but they can only cover so much ground.
I could create some birds to travel farther, but I’d have to make them bigger to carry more back, which would make it harder for them to return unnoticed. Until I figure something better out, I’ll have to work with what I’ve got.
As I sift through my list of blueprints, I find a few new animals and many more plants, but what catches my eye are the numerous fungi blueprints. Maybe I could go for a magical mushroom forest? With some mushroom people? I don’t have any better ideas, so let’s do it!
Creating the second floor starts out much like the first: a thick layer of dirt, along with tons of plants and trees. But instead of adding animals or monsters right away, I speed up time, letting only the trees and plants grow. Instead of a typical forest like the first floor or the one outside the dungeon, I aim for a dark and damp woodland, shaded by a large canopy of trees, because from what I remember, that's the best environment for mushrooms.
After accelerating time for a bit, I stop powering my magic and examine the forest. After about a day of manually making it darker and more humid, it’s complete. Nice! Now I just have to add some regular animals and decide which mushrooms I want to populate my new dark forest.
As I look at the different options, I realize something: almost everything I’ve made so far is incredibly flammable. Sure, I doubt people would purposely set fire to the forest, but it only takes one idiot to ruin the fun for everyone. And while it wouldn’t affect me too much—everything would just respawn once they all died or left—there’s still the potential for chaos. So, I go back over my two very flammable floors and place some enchantments on them to make them a bit harder to burn down.
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After that, I return to the second floor and start looking at my options again. Going down my list, I select a variety of mushrooms to place around my second floor. Here are just a few I plan to add:
Lifebloom
- Description: A vibrant green mushroom that thrives in nutrient-rich soil, resembling a flower.
- Uses: Known for its healing properties, it can be used to brew restorative potions.
Dreamspore
- Description: A small, iridescent mushroom that releases spores when disturbed, inducing vivid dreams.
- Uses: Often used in dream-based magic or for peaceful sleep aids.
Wispwhistle
- Description: A tall, slender mushroom that produces a soft, melodic sound when the wind passes through it.
- Uses: Utilized in enchantments for sound-based magic or to soothe restless spirits.
Embercap
- Description: A fiery orange mushroom that seems to glow as if it’s on fire.
- Uses: Can be harvested for ingredients in fire-related potions or charms.
The last mushroom allows adventurers to easily set everything ablaze for a quick victory. Who knew I could find so many different mushrooms in one forest? And I plan to add many more. Do I know what a [Soulshroom] is? No, I don’t! Will I add it anyway? Of course!
For the next few hours, I spread a variety of mushrooms throughout the entire second floor. Midway through, I feel someone enter my dungeon—or rather, it feels like multiple people have entered at the same time, so it’s like one group.
Deciding it’s time for a break from working on the second floor, I turn my attention to the new group that just entered my dungeon. It’s a party of five, and from the get-go, I can tell they’re more experienced than the last two adventurers who came through.
All of them are lightly armored, wearing green cloaks. Each carries a bow, quiver, and short sword. One of them, probably the leader—judging by the red armband on his right arm—is holding a palm-sized stone and speaking into it continuously.
I move closer to listen in on the guy talking to the rock.
“This is Fred. I’ve confirmed that a dungeon has manifested in the woods south of town. From now on, I will be recording my progress and observations about the dungeon using the standard issue recording stone provided to me. My squad and I will now begin our scouting mission under orders from Guild Master Dorin.” (Fred)
He then tucks the stone away in a hidden pocket beneath his cloak.
Man, talk about professionals. Are these guys guild agents or something?
I take a step back, watching as they make their way through the forest cautiously, bows drawn, constantly on alert for enemies.
A few minutes pass without any signs of monsters, but with my dungeon senses, I spot two rabbit archers silently sneaking up behind them, drawing their makeshift bows. Meanwhile, a lone rabbit spearman approaches from the front, making no effort at stealth.
The squad immediately notices the spearman. One member of the group quickly turns to spot the hidden archers among the bushes. A warning is shouted, and the battle begins. The two rabbit archers get ready to fire from behind while the spearman charges head-on.
Fred, the leader, barks a few orders, quickly drops his bow, and draws his short sword to meet the spearman’s charge. Two of his squadmates closest to the rabbit archers do the same, drawing their swords, while the remaining two guild members keep their bows aimed at the archers.
The rabbit archers release their arrows, but the guild members in green cloaks effortlessly bat the shoddy projectiles out of the air. The two remaining guild members fire their own arrows, scoring direct hits on the archers.
Meanwhile, I’m just standing here, watching it all unfold. Man, I could really use some popcorn right about now.
Fred engages the spear-wielding rabbit in combat, deflecting its spear to the ground, where it gets stuck in the dirt. With one swift swing, Fred cuts the rabbit in half, its body dissolving into light particles.
The rest of the squad makes short work of the archer rabbits, cutting them down with their swords and arrows. Once the fight ends, they collect their loot and regroup in a small clearing nearby.
Time passes as they continue exploring the first floor, fighting off trained rabbits and the occasional regular monster—wolves, boars, and wildcats. All the while, they’re making reports and cataloging their findings.
After an hour or two, the group heads back to the entrance. They pause to review their loot: no [Lucky Rabbit’s Foot] this time, but they managed to gather a bunch of primitive weapons, arrows, and animal skins.
And with that, they exit my dungeon.