The Crafter's Defense: A Dungeon Core Novel (Dungeon Crafting Book 2)

by Jonathan Brooks

Gravitational Destruction Sphere*

  * This unique construct is limited to being created only 1 time every 60 days. Each Sphere will maintain its existence for 24 hours before dissipating while also consuming whatever Monster Seed it was created from, no matter if it was used or not. Range limit: 300 feet from dungeon entrance. Warning: Use of this construct is not advised inside of a dungeon.

  That was a lot of limitations for something so expensive in terms of resources, which at the moment was almost her entire maximum Mana; in addition, whatever Monster Seed she used for its creation was set to be consumed at the same time, even if she didn’t “use” it within 24 hours. Speaking of that, if it isn’t advised to be “used” within a dungeon for defense, what good is it?

  Winxa answered even if Sandra wasn’t actually asking her. “That sounds extremely dangerous. I can’t give you any specific advice, but I’m sure you can guess what I would say.”

  Yes, and I agree; I won’t use this new construct unless it’s absolutely necessary. Sandra was wary of using anything that had an actual warning attached to it; everything else that she could make – including her deadly traps – were fine, apparently, but she was planning on staying away from something that could potentially harm her as well.

  With the new construct essentially a bust, Sandra turned her attention back to what she could do to increase her defenses. With what appeared to be at least 200 various reptiles (not counting the two Ancient Saurians farther behind them) heading her way, there were a number of ways she could defend herself; first, she could intercept the army with a force of her own before it even got close; second, she could use her AMANS to attack from above, killing many – if not all – of them, but it would end up destroying hundreds or even thousands of her Shears in the process; or third, she could let them come to her dungeon and let the constructs and traps inside do the work for her.

  As for the first choice, it had the benefit of not revealing where her dungeon was located, though she was sure if they looked hard enough they could eventually find it. As it was, Sandra could see that they were following the sporadic blood trail left behind by the bleeding and unconscious form of Felbar, as well as her constructs’ tracks through the wastelands. Therefore, while her own Dungeon Monsters would prevent them from initially finding her entrance, doing it like that would likely end up with many casualties – which couldn’t be as readily replaced to face the Ancient Saurians once they arrived.

  The second option was also tempting, because it also helped protect her location while killing the reptiles from above. The only issue was whether or not she could kill them all; the giant turtles, for example, were essentially impenetrable in their shells, and she had already seen that they could bring their heads inside to protect them from harm. It was entirely possible that she could get lucky and manage to score a direct hit from her Shears bombardment, but it wasn’t probable. Hitting their legs might work, but if they had advanced warning of her attack from above, they could bring those inside their shells as well.

  A combination of the two options would work even better and would be sure to devastate the reptilian force, but there would still potentially be quite a bit of destroyed constructs on her side. While that was potentially fine, with the threat of the two Saurians on the horizon, she wanted to ensure that she had enough constructs left to defend her dungeon and, ultimately, her Dungeon Core from their threat.

  Not only that, but when she thought about it a little more, Sandra needed the Reptiles to find her entrance; the last thing she wanted was to give them a reason to start searching around and potentially find another village of Elves, Dwarves, or Orcs. None of them appeared to be prepared to fend off an assault like the one that befell the Gnomes; in fact, it was a miracle that any of them had survived – though it looked like that was probably due to their walls and preparations they had made as a normal part of their defenses. None of the other villages had anything approaching that level of preparedness.

  Which only made sense; it was only an unfortunate fluke of Dungeon Core rules and abilities that had granted the Reptile Core access to the Gnomes when it shouldn’t have been possible. They had unknowingly paid the price of Sandra’s mere presence, and she’d be darned if she would let any of the others suffer the same fate.

  Decision made, she abandoned any plans to fight outside of her dungeon. Instead, she did what she could to enhance her defenses inside; there wasn’t much she could do that hadn’t already been done, especially when she didn’t have the time (or Mana) to finish trapping the last couple of rooms near her Core. Well, technically, if she wanted to convert some of her treasury into Mana and Raw Materials she’d have enough resources, but she still didn’t have the time – and it wasn’t something she wanted to rush if it wasn’t necessary. Besides, she wasn’t too worried about the reptiles even getting anywhere near her Core; it was their much bigger cousins that were going to be a bit more of a problem.

  Therefore, Sandra used most of her Mana she currently possessed and what she accumulated in the time before their arrival to reset the first two rooms’ traps, though with a lot more Mana than had previously been invested. She ditched the blinding darkness of the Nether-based trap – knowing that it probably wouldn’t affect the other Dungeon Monsters as much as it would a sentient – and instead used the Nether element to create a trap that would be much more useful.

  A dozen flickering bands of pure darkness would extend down from the ceiling like writhing vines, wrapping around any enemy they came in contact with. The Nether energy would solidify and keep them trapped in place, while Sandra’s Basher Totems and Ironclad Apes would take advantage of their immobility; it would honestly probably be a slaughter, and it was entirely possible that none of the reptiles would even get past the first room.

  If some did manage to make it through, they would face the second room which had its trap revamped; not only was the Holy light suffusing the room even brighter and more blinding, but – with a little quick experimentation – she had discovered how to create small little spheres of intense Holy elemental energy. These spheres wouldn’t necessarily do any damage, but anything that touched them would be repelled with great force, flinging them all over the room – and into the spinning blades of the two dozen Singing Blademasters floating around the room. Since the reptiles were all land-bound, she placed 10 spheres near the floor and out of the way of her constructs, so that they would be free to do what they needed to stop the invasion.

  The only downside to the more powerful traps in both rooms, however, was that they only had a limited time that they were active; the boost in Mana pumped into them helped extend the previous time limit from approximately a minute or a minute and a half to about three minutes, but it was well worth it for the extra benefits of them.

  Sandra wanted to enhance her other initial traps, but there wasn’t time nor Mana to do it. With a lack of either resource, all she could do was wait for the lizards, snakes, crocodiles, and giant turtles to arrive.

  Chapter 21

  Echo collapsed behind a rocky outcropping, her legs giving out beneath her from exhaustion. She let the last vestiges of her active camouflage fade as her energy reserves were practically drained; she had held it for as long as she could, but without a bit of rest she wouldn’t be able to sustain it much longer. She dragged herself deeper into the small shadow the rocks afforded her as she attempted to keep herself out of sight of the rapidly approaching army of vicious-looking reptile monsters.

  While Echo had no trouble fighting and killing beasts or even the slime monsters located near the other forest dungeon, she had an unnatural fear of snakes; the larger lizards, crocodiles, and turtles didn’t affect her the same way, nor did the metallic-looking snakes she had seen slither quickly out of the dungeon she had been watching earlier. It was just something about the size and shape of a real snake that made her freeze up; some combination of its scaly skin, forked tongue, and even lack of legs that both creeped her out and made her a bit fearful. Ok
, maybe a little more than a “bit”.

  After following (but staying far back from) the strange white cylinders that trailed the other undead monsters – she had to revise her thought that they were undead, however, after seeing the metallic monkeys and other assorted objects that emerged from the dungeon – she had finally arrived at the Gnome village on the border of the wastelands, just as she had earlier thought they were heading towards. She had already activated her active camouflage a bit earlier as she approached what she was sure was their destination, so she spent some time moving forward cautiously, not wanting to get caught up with whatever was happening.

  She feared the worst for the Gnomes ahead but knew there was nothing she could do to help; even if she had gone to her own village first, gathering up enough to help them out would’ve taken a while because many were out hunting. Even if she had been able to assemble some sort of assistance force – which wasn’t likely, as they had been forbidden contact with the other races because of some longstanding issues -- they would probably arrive too late to help.

  From a distance she had heard what sounded like the sounds of an odd battle, with the gongs of hollow metal being banged around and the heavy footsteps of something walking, but because of the lay of the land she was unable to see what was happening. When she had finally gotten close enough to get a good view, she had seen the devastation of its walls, the small forms of dead Gnomes littering the fields and roofs of their squat houses, and the metal monsters surrounding the village, ready to finish off the remaining survivors.

  At least, that’s what it looked like; in reality, things were confusedly different.

  She remembered seeing one of the metal monkeys jumping up on top of one of the roofs and she thought that was it for the Gnomes; she had nocked an arrow, despite it being at the extreme range of her bow and what would likely be a futile attack. However, she couldn’t have just done nothing and watch them be slaughtered without at least helping a little, even if it was just a token resistance. Instead of killing them all, though, the metal monster gently picked up what appeared to be a wounded Gnome and jumped down with them cradled in its arms.

  She had watched with shock as the other Gnomes jumped down as well and climbed on top of the metal skeleton wolves – and then rode them away! Initially, Echo had thought they were being taken prisoner somehow, though it didn’t make any sense; then she saw all of the Gnomes looking off to the western edge of the forest between her own lands and theirs. From her vantage point, she could see something emerging from the trees but couldn’t quite make it out.

  Rather than follow the metal monsters right away, she stayed to see if she could see what they were looking at. Along with her, Echo saw that one of the metal monkeys and a white cylinder were still there as well, though the larger monkey was missing an arm – at least temporarily. It was too far away to tell for sure, but it almost appeared as though its arm was growing back, albeit slowly; she wasn’t sure if the white cylinder pressed up against it had anything to do with it, but in the end it didn’t matter.

  Echo stayed crouched down on top of a short hill still in the wastelands as a mass of lizards, crocodiles, turtles, and of course snakes swarmed over the two metal monsters left behind. She watched as they began to fight against each other – which was something that she’d never seen before. The white cylinder ended up exploding in a spectacular array of colors, which she could tell surprised the reptiles as well.

  She had no idea what was going on; it almost appeared as though the dungeons nearby were warring against each other, even though she had never heard of that ever happening before – despite her people’s long history and recorded knowledge. What it portended and whether the Gnomes that had been snatched away were to be pawns in some sort of unseen war was yet to be seen. She pondered those questions as she watched the lizards and other monsters swarm over the now-abandoned village, looking for any survivors.

  Her thoughts were elsewhere as she crouched there in her camouflage watching them work – which was why she only realized at the last moment that the reptilian swarm had finished and were on the move.

  Straight towards her hiding place.

  Though, technically, they weren’t heading straight for her, but they had spread out and advanced quickly through the wasteland in a wide line in a sweeping formation. It was another thing that Echo had never seen before, a mass of dungeon monsters traveling together in a silent but determined group towards an objective. She had seen small groups working together in the forest before, but nothing at all like what she was witnessing.

  She took off as quickly as she could while trying to avoid the echoes that were her namesake; they usually only happened when she moved too quickly, so she had to maintain a quick but not too fast of a pace. She knew she could probably outrun them if she wanted to, but since they were all keeping together and regulating their pace to their slowest members, she didn’t want to take the chance that a few of them were much faster. She had seen those metal snakes that came from the strange dungeon move nearly as fast as she could even when she used her Air elemental energy to boost her speed, and she didn’t want to risk a flesh-and-blood one having the same ability.

  So, Echo maintained her constant speed ahead of the army and even managed to put a little distance between them before she arrived near the dungeon in the middle of the wastelands. She had briefly considered running straight back to her village to warn them of all that she had seen but held off for fear that the reptiles following her would somehow be able to track her to her village. The last thing she wanted was to lead them there; it was much better if they attacked the strange dungeon and destroyed it, making the incoming Elites’ job unnecessary. Of course, it would probably result in all the Gnomes that had been taken being killed as well, but it was probably a better fate than whatever plans the dungeon had for them.

  As she watched the lizards and the other reptiles get within 500 feet of the entrance, she watched them break formation and the fastest of them surged forward. The smaller lizards reached there first, with the crocodiles and then the turtles entering next; the snakes were left behind, as they had difficulty slithering up and down the broken hills and valleys of the wastelands.

  From where she was positioned, Echo couldn’t see anything inside the entrance, but she definitely heard the sounds of metal pounding against rock, frantic hisses from struggling reptiles, and the snap of crocodile jaws opening and closing. She even thought she heard the cracking of what she presumed were the shells of the giant turtles, as there were multiple wet-sounding *cracks* echoing out from the tunnel leading in. In a remarkably short time, the sounds stopped just as the snakes reached the dungeon, where they disappeared inside without a sound.

  Silence descended upon the broken valley where she found herself at a loss of what to do. On the one hand, she was exhausted and needed to rest; the best idea for her was to go back to her village and tell everyone what she had seen that day and let them decide what to do with the information. On the other hand, she was curious whether or not the reptile monsters had managed to destroy the heart of the dungeon. Either prospect involved moving, which was not something that she wanted to do at the moment.

  Therefore, she decided to wait for a little bit to see if anything emerged from the entrance. If some of the foreign reptile monsters ended up succeeding and destroying the heart deep down inside, then they would likely try to leave before the dungeon collapsed – or at least that’s what she heard happened when the dungeon heart was destroyed. It usually took a few hours for it to fully collapse – from the stories that she had heard – which was why there were survivors in the first place to pass on the tales.

  After about 30 minutes, nothing seemed to be happening; the reptile monsters’ success was in doubt, as nothing had stirred since the last snakes went inside the entrance. Picking herself up with a weary sigh, Echo got ready to make the trek back to Avensglen; her Holy elemental energy was almost nil, but her Air energy was still relatively ful
l – so she should be able to outrun anything that saw her without her active camouflage. Though, she had to admit that the recent events had been extremely odd, and the verdict was still out – in her mind, at least – on whether or not the dungeon there actually posed a threat or not.

  Elder Herrlot will know what to make of all this. She’s older than dirt and she’s seen just about everything—

  As Echo was thinking that she took a step out of the shadow she was hiding in and felt a piercing pain in her left calf. Looking back, she saw a red/orange-colored snake latched onto her leg, the light and thin clothing she had borrowed providing very little protection against its fangs as they sank deep into her calf.

  She involuntarily screamed louder than she had ever screamed before; whether it was from pain or from the sight of a snake so close to her, she couldn’t tell. She grabbed the knife off her belt while still screaming and started to bend down to try to cut it off – but her vision started to swim, and she almost lost her balance. Two quick whistling sounds followed by a *thunk* *thunk* sharpened her awareness as she looked for the source of the sound while trying not to fall down.

  Two of the metal scissors that she had seen up in the sky had impaled the snake, cutting it in half down below before slicing through the bottom of its neck. All three dissipated after a moment, leaving dungeon loot behind – but by that point, she was nearly incoherent with pain and didn’t even see what they were. Echo finally lost her balance and collapsed onto her side, her prized bow tumbling away from her as she fell; she tried to rise, but she was having trouble even moving. In fact, she was having trouble even breathing, as each breath was getting harder and harder to bring into her lungs.

  The last thing her eyes saw before they closed – for what she feared was the last time – was a large shape emerging from the dungeon entrance.