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Cara and I had a long talk about what to do about the impending flood of adventurers while I regenerated mana.
In the end we agreed that we would share resources and patterns so that neither of us would be missing anything that we'd need in order to be as prepared as possible. On top of that I learned that when a sapient creature dies within the dungeon, some of its skill related memories are imprinted on the dungeon.
To that end we agreed to share the skill set memories, and to split the mana gained from a kill between the two of us. That second part was a little annoying to me at first until I considered how she must feel about the fact they'd all have to traverse through my forest to get to her mine.
Anyway, I didn’t intend to be overly hostile to the adventurers anyways, at least not in any fashion that would overtly scream dungeon to them.
Cara also shared with me the knowledge of currency she had and taught me how she seeded the ores into the cavern walls. Apparently one of the dungeon abilities allows us to 'seed' of a resource. Depending on how mana intensive the resource would be able to create directly, the 'seed' grows at different rates. It feeds on the ambient mana in that area and slowly replaces the rock. Whereas this was not as efficient as moving the naturally found resource from one place to another, it was still far more efficient than creating the raw copper veins from mana directly.
Taking this knowledge, I decided to try and seed some metals into my most abundant resource. After the wild growth spurt yesterday, my sparse forest floor was covered in new nuts and seeds ready to grow.
I watched as my little hedgehog helpers busied themselves from area to area planting the seeds 7 to 8 feet from each other.
I decided to start small with the cheapest metal seed pattern I had at my disposal. Near the Ash hill I had the hedgehogs plant 4 walnuts, North south east and west of the hill about 15 feet. I seeded the seed with the copper pattern and watched as it took hold.
I couldn't be sure if it was a success yet because it was growing far slower than any other seeds I had planted, but it seemed to be absorbing the ambient mana at a fast rate.
I pushed a few more Squirrels that were close to an evolution over the cusp and evolved them much like the first and contemplated my next move. Given how much faster things were evolving and growing than they had last week, I thought that I just might be ready within the month of time I had left.
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Echil volunteered to stay behind at the ratty little travel outpost of a town while Gladil ran his message back to the city on horseback.
The original plan had been to send their report via messenger bird or with a merchant, but with what they had discovered Gladil wanted to personally assure the delivery. The two had decided that two horses would ride faster than one.
Echil preferred to stay behind anyways, if there is one thing he liked as much as having coin, it was drinking it away.
The moody elf found himself in a semi crowded tavern, glowering into his third drink of the night. Humans may be short lived, but they lived their lives at least. You couldn't find cheap alcohol or most other vices in his homeland.
He smacked two more copper Deci down table and beckoned to the tavern worker to bring him another round. If only Gladil hadn't been such a worry wort, Echil could have had enough money to stay drunk until the Adventurers Guild showed up. He probably could have had a woman to warm his bed every night as well.
Two drinks later Echil realized there was no reason that he couldn't make a little money before the unavoidable taxes got implemented. Scanning the common room Echil decided that he just may have spotted the perfect drinking companions for the night.
Ignoring the glares, with the aid of the liquid courage he'd been nursing so far tonight, Echil sundered up to the group of 4 burley looking humans.
"Good evening gents, I have a proposition for you."
"Fuck off elf, just cause ya look like a woman don't mean we want to take ya for a spin."
Not one to be discouraged by the brash attitudes of humans after years of exposure, Echil kept right along.
"Oh no my fine fellow, you've got me all wrong. I mean to say that I have a mutually profitable business opportunity. You must have seen my companion and I passing through town two nights ago. We happen to have found a new dungeon in the area."
He had their attention now. Echil prided himself on his ability to read reactions, not only did it help with card games, but it was even helpful in applicable like this. It was a very minute change in facial expressions, but the men went from glaring to starting intently, hanging on each of his words.
"That’s right. There is a dungeon in your own backyard, not manned and tax free. I figure a few men like you might be up for making a bit of cash before the influx in strangers arrives."
The bald human on the left made a show of cracking his neck, and then his knuckles.
"What is to stop us from beating the location out of you and heading out ourselves?"
Typical humans.
"The dungeon is in the center of a vast enchanted forest. It doesn't seem to me that any of your motley crew have any tracking or woodsman skills, and you don’t strike me as a mage who can track mana currents."
He decided it wouldn't hurt to talk up how large the forest was, after all the larger they thought it was the more likely they'd have to take him along. Maybe he could even charge a guiding fee along with his finder’s fee.
"Alright pretty boy, give us a few days to get things together. I figure we got about a month 'til your fancy friend returns from the city so you shouldn't mind waiting three days for us to get gear together."
"It's a date."