The Lucky Goat and the special Units that it had been paired with were sent into the Dungeon on the dawn 2 days after their last delve. As usual, the Units stumbled as the membrane of the Dungeon cut them partially off from the rest of the Swarm. But their Fragments had grown accustomed to their experience and they immediately latched together to form a minute pseudo-collective to keep themselves sane.
When walking into the Dungeon their minds did not pick up much of a difference from what it normally looked like. They did notice a slight vibration almost rhythmically passing through the ground, but beyond that, only the infant could see the slight color differences in the sky and along parts of the Dungeon floor. But the little group cared not and their Fragments whispered comfortingly to one another as they moved onto the first floor.
It went like it should have, rabid chickens ran out from the bushes to swarm at the Units. But this time unlike all the others there were no exploding balloons, hidden crossbows, or any other kind of trap that were meant to disrupt the group. Nor were there any special monsters, just the standard-sized rampaging chickens who were easy enough for the Units to slaughter.
Had they been Subjects, then the group might have thought this deviation odd. Their Fragments had grown to the point that they did notice it, but they were not yet there that they gave it much thought. "Now the Dungeon sometimes does not deploy traps or advanced monsters, noted", would be the closest to a conventional thought that the group would have shared. However, they did not notice the look of terror in the eyes of the chickens nor how they seemed to be just as focused on getting past the group as attacking them.
They just continued wandering deeper into the county fair, until something rose up from among the haystacks and the group suddenly was in a wholly different sort of battle.
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Mariam was eating minute bits of food along with her group and the newest Subject to arrive at the camp when it happened. The Lucky Goat stumbled out of the Dungeon entrance and collapsed to the soil with a pathetic bleat. Pure panic radiated out from his fragment and washed out into Collective like a tidal wave.
She was stunned as she felt the sheer horror that the Unit radiated out, none of the other Subjects had been aware that they had that level of emotion left in them. But the goat was clearly displaying it now as it bleated and stamped on the ground while trying to pull itself away from the entrance, and Mariam could sense how the other Fungal zombies were starting to panic.
"Has he become a Swarm Champion?"
Zilla asked from where she was eating soup, the only serene presence in the camp, in spite of the panic flourishing through the bonds. Her question was a relevant one as it would explain how it could influence so many other Units, but it looked identical to how it had been before and it didn't feel different beyond the fear it radiated.
The presence of the Adventurer-Collective grew agitated in their minds as it rushed around trying to keep the Units in line while also trying to draw the memories out of the goat's Fragment. It was a young Collective and a small one, so it was sloppy in the attempt and the memories leaked unbidden out to everyone within it rather than the singular mind of the Collective itself.
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The group stepped forward into the fair and suddenly they saw a new monster entirely rise up from among the haystacks. It looked almost like a regular haystack golem at first, except that it was oozing with orange and purple puss out from between the hay. Which made it seems almost like a grassy hill of slime and mud, rather than a construct of hay.
Next, came a gaggle of chickens with multiple sets of wings growing out of them. Most of them fluctuated between having 5 to 27 wings sticking out of their bodies, flapping, and flailing around like a fly caught in a web. Shrieks came out of them as they rushed at the group and while their appearances were strange, the Units attacked like they would any enemy.
Horror began to rise when they noticed that these confused abominations were unperturbed by the protective ward of innocence, they rushed as readily at the little infant as they did at the rest. But they fell non the less, to the might of the Swarm.
The group then began to launch ranged attacks at the lumbering "golem", hardened shards, toxic spit, and webbing hit it but they seemingly had little effect on it. It began to slither across the ground, dragging itself across with multiple fleshy tendrils that used bundled clumps of hay almost as anchoring spikes.
Flying balloons came out of the air and descended down on the group, but rather than the malevolent balloon creatures that the Units had killed before. These were floating collections of mouths and beaks that were roughly shaped into a ball, hundreds of mouths covering every surface of the floating object to the point that it could not be seen. Mouths shrieking, cawing, yelling and roaring as they descended down and began engaging the group.
Battle was joined and it was immediately clear that things were very different from before. The floating collections of conjoined mouths bit every attack launched against them and breathed out fire in response along with their cacophony of sounds. One of the Soldiers died moments into the battle as a strange flying...color hit from above. It clashed even against the "sensibilities" of the Fragments as the indescribable color began to spread out across the chitin of the Soldier.
It rotted away on the spot and fell apart into chunks of primordial ooze that began to smoke after it had been fully engulfed. Next was the infant whose powers of protective innocence were utterly ineffective against these new monsters. One of the conjoined mouths swallowed it whole and the ball suddenly inverted as all of the beaks and mouths turned inward to eat what was among them.
New horrors, seemed to spawn out at every passing moment as new creatures climbed out of rifts in the air, dug out from the ground, or simply ran at them from the nearest rooms. Luck was finally overcome as the Lucky Goat felt its aura shatter against the onslaught and it fled, not because of the programming of the Fragment, but because these horrors had done the impossible. They had shattered the morale of a Fungal Zombie.
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Mar felt the horror of the memories that the Adventurer-Collective transmitted accidentally and they were not pleased. Something had changed in the Dungeon and they did not like it. Especially, because they felt like the power within the Dungeon had become...familiar, so rather than letting a potential chance ruin their schemes, Mar relayed their orders down the chain.
"Nasi, you will travel to the Dungeon. Bring 30 Warrior Subjects, Ysandra, 10 of the newly converted Mages, and 3 Elysian Flesh Mistresses. You are in command of this mission and Adventurer-Collective will submit to your directives, I will give you a large allotment of energy to work with. Confer with Logistics-Collective, Antmite General, and Adventurer-Collective for your briefing. I want the Dungeon destroyed or suborned within the week."
They felt the assent, but even if Mar had sent their strongest combat Avatar they would not rest easy and let him handle the work without some supervision. First, they would have to handle the emissaries waiting at the border of their divine realm, but once that had been settled they would pay close attention to the matter of the Dungeon.