They stepped into Stew's arena puzzle, and he was already wishing he had created something more dangerous. The room was a boxing ring, minus the ropes. Two golems, Rocky and Chuck, stood on a platform frozen in boxer poses. More golems lined the walls waiting their turn, or, at least, that had been the idea.
He had wanted to paint one combatant red and one blue, but didn't have any paint, so he had Cecil mark a big line on Rocky's back and and two big lines on Chuck's back with a copper coin. The "mat" was really Sluice who was there to keep them properly lubricated and to collect any debris for cleanup. The golem named Don was standing in the center of the ring to start the fight.
There was a table between the ring and the door with two buckets, each marked in the same way as the golems. A single coin lay between them. The idea was for delvers to "bet" on which golem would win. Only if they guessed correctly would the next doors open.
If there had been enough time, Stew had planned for this to be the place golems trained and leveled-up. It had seemed like a good idea at the time, but now it felt like a joke in bad taste. This was nearly his last line of defense.
Lithel raised his bow and rapidly shattered both fighting golems with one shot each, delivered Legolas-style.
Sella took down Don with some sort of plant grenade that exploded then wrapped the golem in vines that did the same thing to the golem that they had done to Stew's wall earlier.
Stew sent the other golems charging across the room to attack the delvers, but, being stone golems, they weren't charging very quickly. "Can you do anything Cecil?"
Cecil reached up and tugged on the arrows in his skull. He pulled one free, but struggled with both hands at the second. "It seems not, but I will keep trying."
"Aren't you a mage?"
"All I can do is make it dark."
"Then do that!"
Cecil waved and both rooms plunged into absolute darkness.
Stew moved his attention to a Golem named Pound. Through the golem's eyes, the bandits were flickering ghosts of pale light in the dark. He could barely make out the shape of some, others burned more brightly. Some of them seemed hampered by the darkness, standing still or walking with a hand out. The two fae glowed with a pale white flame from every inch of their skin, Sella's glow was brighter than Lithel's. Eira was illuminated as if she stood in a deep violet spotlight. Hers was the only light that seemed to illuminate the room around her. She seemed to be able to see the others.
The fae also didn't seem to be bothered by the darkness. Lithel continued to knock and pull arrow after arrow. With each arrow, another golem fell. Lithel turned his attention to Pound, and Stew tried to throw the golem out of the way, but there was no chance of avoiding the arrow. The last thing he saw through Pound's eyes was the glowing outline of Sluice moving around the floor with a galloping, scooting motion, gathering mana cores.
So much for taking out Garrik. I can't even keep one golem alive. At least the slime, simple creature that he was, seemed to be enjoying himself. Maybe Sluice would get to eat one of the bandits before they brought him down too.
As he thought of Sluice, the slime reached out to him with its mind, excited as a puppy with its first chewed pair of slippers.
"What is it? What do you have there?"
The slime sent an image to Stew's mind of a stack of mana cores and an image of the Lunar Forge.
"Sure, I guess?" If the little slime wanted to spend their last moments playing on the equipment, Stew couldn't argue. Nothing else they were doing made any difference.
The "battle" wound down, with not a single golem even making it across the floor to land a punch. Cecil finally pulled the other arrow from his skull and slipped through the hidden door to join Sluice in the Lunar Forge.
"Oh, isn't that interesting," Cecil said. Stew moved his attention to the skeleton, noting a couple of arrows through the eyes hadn't affected his vision, or done much damage at all. The skeleton's hand was on the Lunar Forge. As Stew changed his focus, the Lunar Forge menu appeared. Only this time it had options.
Lunar Forge
The light of the Moon has kindled a subtle fire. Use the forge to shape and improve magical implements, gear, and weapons.
Items:
Living Stone - (5 Stone, 5 Mana Core Levels)
Mana Core Level 2 - (3 Mana Core Levels)
Mana Core Level 5 - (6 Mana Core Levels)
Mana Core Level 10 - (11 Mana Core Levels)
"Sluice, how did you find this?"
The slime burbled happily and shared images of mana cores and the menu, also, for some reason, a floors-eye view of the bottom of a golem's foot. Stew took from this that Sluice had stumbled on the menu because Smittee stepped on it. Maybe Sluice touched the forge while flinching away? The menu must have appeared because Sluice had mana cores in its inventory. Stew could see it now because he had the three cores he had picked-up from the 3Ms stored away in his core room.
Stew switched to Sluice's perspective and used an action to turn eleven, level 1 mana cores into one level 10 mana core. Then he sent the mana core to storage and switched back to his own perspective to create a False Dungeon Core. He had hoped it would ask him for a color, but it seemed he could only make it the same as his own. It was more information than he thought he should reveal, but he was out of options. He turned the room at the bottom of the stairs into a second core room and placed the false core on a pedestal. The golems had been busy meanwhile and had just finished another room on the second floor. He swapped his real core room again to put more stone between him and Sella's vines.
He used a golem to take a quick peek at the false core.
The gray crystal glowed faintly. It was smaller than the level 10 core he had spent to create it. He wondered which was worth more. He checked its stats.
Unnamed Dungeon Core (Gray)
Dungeon cores control and oversee a dungeon which they typically have created. They coordinate the movements and actions of all spawned minions, monsters, traps, and puzzles within their domain. Destroying this core will cause the dungeon to die.
This core is of an unknown type, and its qualities are mysterious.
So this is what I look like to everyone else.
There was no time to send someone into the core room to compare the decoy with the original. He had to hope it was convincing and do his best to sell the ruse. He gathered the remaining golems to defend the false core. He set Big John to guard the top of the stairwell, right behind the door.
Back in the arena, Stew couldn't tell if Cecil's darkness had faded. There were no golems left to see, but he felt a few more mana cores on the ground and snatched them before anyone found them, storing them away in his core room with the others. He let Sluice keep the one he still had.
The delvers were gathered at the doors to the Boss room. They used some attack too fast for him to sense to bash them open.
"Look at that." Garrik said, as he walked out on the dungeon grass under the false sky. "Tell me this isn't a dungeon now."
"Simple illusion," Sella said, but she sounded uncertain.
Raek tapped on the wall. "Not one I've heard of. It's perfectly clear, and positioned exactly as if the hillside didn't exist at all."
Eira held up the necklace in her hand and showed it to Ba'Rush, apparently not wanting to antagonize Sella any more than she had to.
Ba'Rush took a look and nodded, then pointed. "It's through that door." He turned toward the entrance to the stairwell and readied his cleaver.
Stew flinched. Couldn't they have just brought out the bronze sword and let him do his "Open Sesame" trick? Did everything have to be a smash and grab with these people? He realized he had never unlocked the Boss Room door, so he unlocked the door to the stairwell, just in case.
Raek was the first to step forward, using his rod to check for traps. He held up one hand and reached out with the other. He carefully grabbed the door pull, holding it between his thumb and first finger. The door opened easily.
Big John's huge pickaxe filled the open space, swinging for Raek's head, but he dodged it with no sign of effort.
Ba'Rush was the first to respond to the attack. He smashed the big golem in one stroke with his cleaver, then stepped back with Raek to let the archers clear the rest of the golems at the bottom of the stairs.
Stew watched in quiet horror. It took only seconds, and it was done.
The delvers all gathered at the top of the stairs, staring at the core.
"It's true," one of the bandits muttered.
"Never doubted it," Raek said. "But–"
He was interrupted by the need to dodge a sword thrust aimed at the back of his neck by Lithel.
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With that signal, the bandits attacked. Garrik, Raek, Ba'Rush, and Eira were immediately surrounded and fighting for their lives.
Garrik blocked an overhand attack and another from the right, Raek swayed like a reed and deflected an arrow with a well timed dagger parry. Ba'Rush just took a blow across the shoulders of his armor and knocked back his attacker with a metal-reinforced elbow to the face.
Only Eira ignored the bandits, her eyes never turned from the core. Her heartbeat finally accelerated for the first time since she entered the dungeon. The muscles in her legs tensed and she leapt down the stairs.
"Eira, No!" Garrik shouted.
Ba'Rush made a grab for her, but she was out of reach. Raek materialized a dagger that seemed meant for her back, but seemed to think better of it.
In three reckless strides she was down the stone stairwell. Her hand touched the false core.
Stew's world shredded into fragments of searing pain as Stew literally lost his mind.
Nothing remained but the dungeon. The dungeon did not feel fear or anger toward the delvers, only hunger.
The dungeon recognized that the delver touching the false core had unleashed a titanic pulse of raw death magic focused through the false core itself.
The delver stood on the second level so the dungeon could not create any monsters or summon any minions to devour the delver. With no opening to attack, it ignored her.
On the first level. all of the golems were already gone. Bossy, Lassie, Rin Tin Tin, Fluff, Socks, and Boo evaporated. Only their mana cores remained. The dungeon gathered them. Of the dungeon's defenders, only Cecil and Sluice in the Lunar Forge remained untouched.
Most of the bandits lay dead. The dungeon was about to loot them and gather their cores and biomass when the delver, Eira, started up the stairway carrying the false core. It chose to wait to see if this offered more opportunities to feed.
The high-level delvers survived, but even they were badly injured and stunned. Eira might finish them off, or they might recover and finish her. Either result might provide high value cores and useful loot.
As she stepped onto the stairway, the second floor unlocked and the dungeon immediately generated two slimes. The delver was too fast for them, sprinting up the steps and slamming the door. The dungeon let the door shut, satisfied with the success of the false core bait.
The dungeon ordered Cecil and Sluice to the Boss Room to help finish the stunned delvers and held the other slimes in reserve for the right moment.
With growing hunger, it turned its attention back to the bandit corpses and their cores.
Sluice advanced, but Cecil cried out, "I can't control my body!"
As he did so, the dead bandits began rising from the floor with unnatural vitality. The dungeon saw that they were mostly low-level revenants now, but with limited resources it couldn't create any more defenders to attack them.
Weighing the choices, it ordered the new slimes and Sluice back down the stairs and through the vents to the real core room to form a last line of defense, and ignored the defective skeleton.
Sluice changed course and moved toward the stairwell, nearly knocking Eira down as it flowed under the door. Sluice followed the example of its suddenly decisive creator, and paid no attention to the necromancer otherwise.
Eira, for her part, was fixated on the core in her hand as she moved to stand behind the revenants.
Cecil also joined ranks with the revenants, complaining as he went.
The stunned delvers began to recover. The living and the undead divided themselves into three new parties. Each faced off against the other two.
Named Party: House Briar, First Cohort - 14 Members 14:08
Delver parties, essential for dungeon exploration, consist of diverse adventurers with unique skills and roles, combining their strengths in numbers to strategically navigate traps, defeat monsters, manage resources, and engage in social interactions, ensuring a well-balanced and specialized approach to overcome the multifaceted challenges presented in the depths of dungeons.
💀 ENEMIES BEYOND YOUR ABILITIES💀
Members of this party include:
💀💀💀 Commanding: Lady Briar (Eira Wainmender)
Paragon Of House Briar
Necromancer - Level 25 / Wizard Apprentice - Level 4
Archers Level 3 (revenant) - 4
Light Infantry Units Level 2 (revenant) - 5
Heavy Infantry Units Level 3 (revenant) - 2
Rogue Units Level 2 (revenant) - 2
Mage Level 1 (skeleton) - 1
Unnamed Delver Party - 2 Members 14:09
💀 ENEMIES BEYOND YOUR ABILITIES💀
Members of this party include:
💀 Ranged Damage: Lithel
Level 12 Silvan Ranger
💀 Healer / Multi-role Damage (Magic)
Sella - Level 11 Nature Mage
Unnamed Delver Party - 3 Members 14:09
💀 ENEMIES BEYOND YOUR ABILITIES💀
Members of this party include:
💀 Point / Traps: Raek
Level 15 Rogue Shadowmaster
💀 Front Guard / Tank: Garrik
Level 10 Blademaster
💀 Rear Guard / Tank
Ba'Rush - Multiclass (Level 6 Gourmand, Level 13 Shieldbreaker)
Deep inside the dungeon's core. The fragile overlay of thoughts and emotions that was Stew began to stir, but only barely. The core's base functions were still in charge, but he began to be aware again. What happened? He tried to piece together the last few moments. Whatever attack Eira had unleashed immediately killed the bandits, Bossy, the wolves and the cats, it had stunned everyone else and even affected him. But it had not affected the dungeon core itself, or, apparently, Sluice or Cecil. It seemed like important information, but he didn't know what to do with it just then. He was still in danger.
"You're outnumbered now. Surrender!" Garrick called out to Lithel and Sella. He, Ba'Rush and Raek held a position against the wall to the right of the stairwell.
"You think she plans to let you live?" Sella snarled. Holding a defensive spell covering herself and Lithel against the undead bandit archers.
Garrick's eyes turned to where Eira stood a little apart from them all with her revenants. Two of her archers were also covering him and his allies of necessity. Eira herself seemed to be in a kind of daze, her eyes fixed on the core in her hands. Garrik's face hardened. "Eira, tell these two it's not worth more bloodshed."
Eira blinked. She looked around as if awakening from a dream, but when she spoke her voice was firm. "I can't let them live." She didn't make eye contact with anyone. She seemed to speak only to herself.
"Sella, I'm sure we could defeat this rabble eventually, but don't we have better places to be?" Lithel's expression was calm and his voice was light. His heart rate told a different story to Stew. He was worried.
Then, so was Garrik, and Ba'Rush tightened his grip on his cleaver. He couldn't read Raek at all.
Eira seemed to snap out of it and looked at Garrik as if hearing him for the first time. "No. No you're right." She waved her hand at Lithel and Sella. "Go, just go. No one is going to listen to a couple of bandits anyway."
The two backed out of the room without responding, and made a quick retreat out of the dungeon.
But no one in the boss room lowered their weapons.
"We're keeping this." Eira raised the core. "I know you youngsters had other plans, but Eira needs this. You can't understand how important it is to her future."
"You don't know what you're doing. That's not–." Garrik started, but Raek interrupted.
"What do you mean her future?" Raek's expression said he already knew the answer.
"Small minds stripped this child's legacy from her. I had to act to give her a chance to restore our family honor."
Understanding dawned on Garrik's face. "She's no child. You lived your life and paid the price for your choices, let her make her own."
"You think some prefect is going to give her a choice? She's always been one wrong word or gesture away from the headsman's block, just for her family name. The only thing that will give her a choice is power." Lady Briar raised the core in her hand. "Power like this. I've never heard of a core like this. It has a subtle pliability, and yet…" She looked up. "I'll let you live, handsome boy, because she cares for you, though she doesn't admit it even to herself. And you other two haven't earned my wrath.." She turned and headed for the door. "Yet."
The undead bandits fell in behind her, covering her exit with wary looks and weapons still drawn, Cecil among them though he was unarmed and only held his hands out in a threatening gesture.
"Help me!" Cecil called out again to Stew.
This time, Stew was aware enough to respond. "What can I do? How is she controlling you?"
"My bones respond to her power. I don't know how to break free. She holds me as firmly as she's holding your core."
"That's not my core." Stew almost said, realizing Cecil never saw him create the false core, but wasn't sure how much he could trust the skeleton. Maybe the necromancer would take control of his mind next. With everything depending on the decoy, he couldn't take any chances. "I may not be able to speak if she takes me from the dungeon. If you break free, try to return me here."
Cecil was silent all the way to the cave exit, then replied. "I will find a way. I promise."
He sounded so sincere that Stew almost told him anyway, Then Cecil was gone and the chance was gone too.
The three remaining delvers stood in the boss room, silent and unmoving with weapons drawn.
Eventually Ba'Rush said. "Are they gone?"
Raek nodded, straightening his vest.
Ba'Rush sighed and sheathed his cleaver. "You know those two will be planning an ambush, for her, for us. For all I know, they have another twenty arms off in the woods we never saw."
Raek nodded again. "She will likely welcome the extra recruits. That's not our problem right now." To Garrik he said, "I hope you're right about this."
Garrik's face was grim, but he sheathed his sword. "I am." He turned around in a small circle looking up at the false sky. "Dungeon, I know you're still here. If you were watching, you saw that we never meant you any harm. We were betrayed."
Stew wished he had at least one Golem so that he could smack himself in the face. The walls and ceiling, the torches in the other rooms, he should have doused them all as soon as Eira picked up that false core. He had been too stunned by Eira's attack, but still, he could have shut them off as soon as the core was out of the dungeon if he hadn't been so focused on Cecil. If he did it now it would just prove Garrik's point.
What he could have done didn't matter now, these three had seen through his trick, and they were each powerful enough to defeat anything he could have thrown at them even at his best. Now they were only a few feet from his core and his one and only finished level was wiped out.
"She'll be back when that false core dissipates. We should be prepared," Raek said.
"If her elder keeps control inside that head she will only grow more powerful," Ba'Rush looked at Garrik, "We may want to try to make for the city, then find passage south."
"Eira won't accept being controlled." Garrik's voice was confident. "When the false core dissipates, she'll get control again. When she comes back here, we can reason with her."
"Maybe," Raek shrugged. "Either way, she's had a taste of power. We may have to offer her something more valuable than our own flesh and bones, or there may not be any talking at all. We've only cleared the first level. There's no telling how deep this dungeon goes. Maybe it has more treasures to trade with her."
"The dungeon's going to be preoccupied with repairs right now, as long we're enemies and still on this level." Garrik looked to the ceiling again and spoke louder. "We formally withdraw from combat and offer a truce. We know a few things about managing a successful dungeon. If you let me advise you, I can help you grow stronger, and help keep you safe, but we need some sort of real treasure to trade with the Briars first. Do you have anything to offer?"