Lemrio was confused when nobody had come by for a few days. Sure, things were going great - He’d already managed a few fantastic improvements and more variations for his treat spiders - but… nobody was there to test them. Nobody to fight. No magic to be gained.

This was bad. Lemrio appreciated that with nobody around, he wasn’t in danger, but some part of him felt disappointed that he wouldn’t be able to show his work to the ones he intended.

Plus, he thought that all of this would attract adventurers, not make them all stay away!

Brushing his thoughts aside, Lemrio decided to continue working. It wouldn’t be hard to continue making more bugs, and he had a few ideas. The white, fluffy things in the treats - which were, apparently, marshmallows - seemed like a good idea to use for covering the feet of his spiders, both for their comfort and to make them quieter. Plus, Lemrio also wanted to start work on the ‘dog’.

He decided to work on that now, considering that it’d been far too quiet lately. How many legs did a ‘dog’ have? Four. Lemrio started with making a spider and removing its’ legs so it only had two legs on each side. Noticing that the spider seemed to struggle standing, Lemrio fixed that by simply making the legs stronger and more muscular. Now we’re getting somewhere!

Lemrio continued thinking about what a ‘dog’ looked like. As long as it moved the same and looked dog-like, the adventurers would love it! Probably! He continued working on the creature, giving it a neck, a tail, a snout, ears, all the things dogs have. At least, the dogs he’d seen.

After finishing the base, Lemrio began work on making it fit in the dungeon. Changing the fur to resemble the lighter yellow-ish muffins, Lemrio worked through another lonely night with no interruptions.

Finishing his work, Lemrio quietly admired it. Hopefully, the adventurers would find it ‘cute!’ Well, if they ignored its’ few extra eyes. He was certain that two eyes was too little, so he allowed it to keep all eight of its’ eyes.

Lemrio was certain that this would not backfire whatsoever. Now to just wait a little longer… Someone’s bound to come in at some point, right? They always did. But it was still quiet. The dog didn’t “bark” like he’d heard others do. How do things make sound, anyways? Lemrio idly pondered this. Once, before he decided to stop killing adventurers, one adventurer had told the other that they were impaled in the lung.

What was a lung? It sounded important to talking, since if one adventurer had it inside their strange, squishy body, then other adventurers did too. Something that all adventurers he’d encountered had in common was talking. Didn’t matter how, Lemrio vividly remembered how much his favorite adventurers would yap and cheer over the smallest things. Like gold!

What did they even use gold for? Lemrio thought it was, frankly, worthless. But, back to lungs. Adventurers had lungs and talked a lot. Dogs bark a lot. Maybe they have something like lungs? Lemrio knew it was a bit of a stretch considering that he’d never heard an adventurer mention a dog having lungs, but… Lemrio didn’t have other ideas.

How to make a lung? Lemrio didn’t know, but he felt like he was on the right track. His bugs didn’t need lungs, they worked just fine. What do lungs do? Do they do other things besides talking? Lemrio was utterly stumped, as he never had to consider this before.

Deciding to drop it for now, Lemrio went back to his musing. He quite liked how the dog turned out - He found it cute, personally - and decided to make a few more. Realizing the damp, somewhat moist environment of the dungeon isn’t as effective when all the residents are snacks and treats, Lemrio made a choice. A good choice.

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A strange choice.

Lemrio decided that if he was going to make the insects of his dungeon into snacks and treats…

Well, why not just… make the dungeon out of food, too? Of course, not all of it - That’d be stupid - but just the parts that are visible? Internally giggling at this idea, Lemrio immediately commanded his subjects to start work, to make things look sweet and yummy.

Idly waiting for his spiders to do as instructed, Lemrio realized he should’ve specified a bit more. Explaining in more detail how to do it, his insects figured it out and began work. It was slow - as was all work in the dungeon - but it was happening.

Lemrio’s favorite part of his day was when he got to watch his little critters work so diligently. He never understood why some people thought his little guys were ‘hideous abominations that should be burned under the glare of a thousand suns’ - a quote he vividly remembered from a skittish adventurer that got crawled on by a dozen roaches - but he liked his bugs. They were efficient, and humans… Humans were not as efficient.

Idly watching his bugs go around, Lemrio felt a little lonely. Some could say he was starting to get rather… bored. Ever since the day he’d gotten a taste of sweetness, he was enamored with it… but also with communication. Interaction. He hadn’t put so much thought over how people think of his beloved bugs until that happened, until the day he put a name to himself.

Lemrio felt lonely. His bugs were adorable - Er, to him, - but they couldn’t exactly talk. Lemrio knew what they were thinking, sure, but it wasn’t the same as finding it out himself. Quietly, he found a bit of humor in that. For years he’d thought that humans were odd for talking and chattering to eachother if they needed to or not, and here he was craving just that.

It was quiet, save for the clicking of the spiders and the scuttling of the roaches and ants. Lemrio was learning that he didn’t quite like the quiet, but the noise filled it well. He found it a little odd that after two long years of being content with his defenses, he suddenly felt the need to do things and experiment all the time.

Boredom… It was a new feeling to Lemrio. It was nighttime by now, and Lemrio was still bored. That was until someone snuck into the dungeon quietly, carrying boxes… Boxes and baking supplies. Lemrio was curious as the adventurer snuck in. Usually they were loud, in order to gather attention from the bugs. Lemrio couldn’t find any ill will - nor could he find something that had the chance to break him, such as a pickaxe - so Lemrio allowed this strange visitor to come in without stopping him.

The man searched around, looking for something. Curious, Lemrio watched him. He seemed fascinated by Lemrio’s newly-made treat spiders, which was good in Lemrio’s eyes! And then Lemrio watched him carefully pick one up, take a green flask out of his belt, and take a bite out of his spider.

Mildly confused by this - as previously, no adventurer would try and bite his spiders - Lemrio witnessed the man chew for a moment, hum in satisfaction, and finish off the spider, legs and all. Lemrio… wasn’t sure how to feel about this. On one hand, the man’s visit gave more magic than losing the treat spider did, but on the other hand, if all adventurers did that from now on, it wouldn’t be in Lemrio’s favor anymore.

Lemrio continued watching the man as he took out a box and collected some of the breading off the wall that Lemrio’s spiders had just finished. This was odd… This was new… And after witnessing that, Lemrio wanted to know how the man would react to a pastry spider.

Sending the pastry spider to the man, Lemrio watched excitedly. The man, however, seemed far more excited than Lemrio was. Lemrio had anticipated his pastry spider to die immediately, so it wasn’t a shock to him when the man promptly threw a blade at the pastry spider and chopped it up. The insides were still mostly spider goop, but some of it was the jelly that Lemrio managed to copy. Lemrio quietly berated himself for being so absentminded - How was he supposed to do this for all of his bugs if he kept forgetting the little details? - but he figured that he could fix that later.

The man didn’t enter the hallway leading up to his core, but he did place down a pink box with a white ribbon before practically skipping out of the dungeon. Lemrio felt like he was doing something right, if the adventurer liked his treats so much that he got a gift!

Lemrio commanded a spider to open the box. Inside was a strawberry shortcake, decorated with a sort of fluffy icing, strawberries, and what seemed to be some kind of twirly chocolate tube. Lemrio couldn’t have asked for a better gift if he tried.

Meanwhile, Fizz was praying that John was asleep.