by Drew Jager
"Yes, t-thank you. What will you do now?" He nervously asked.
"I have come here to identify the Dungeon and have been ordered to go only to the first room." Brian stated.
Both looked surprised at this, "You won't complete the Dungeon? Why only one room?" The elf asked incredulously.
"It is the Adventuring Guild's belief that if we send in a group to scout out the Dungeon that is too strong for the Monsters present, it may unhinge the Dungeon. I am sure you are both aware of the disaster that occurred with the Lightning Dungeon in the Andel Mountains. A team of Experts was sent in to examine and evaluate the fledgling Dungeon. Except, because that was the first encounter the Dungeon had ever had, it assumed all Adventurers were as strong as those ones were. Many lives were lost over the next few months before we had to destroy the Crawl." Brian recited, the disaster of the Andel Mountains was a mark of shame on the Adventuring Guild. He would not let that happen to this Dungeon as well.
It was a little known fact, but most Dungeons were actually Sentient beings in their own right. Which means they were rational and capable of intelligent thought.
The elf bowed his head, "I understand. If you will follow me I will lead you to the Dungeons entrance. You can stay here, toadstool." He said that last part to the Gnome. The Gnome, to his credit, merely winked at them both before taking his leave.
"I look forward to working with you down the road, Mr.Aldritch." He said as a way of goodbye.
Brian inclined his head towards him, then followed the Elf.
Only a few minutes later they came upon what looked more like the epicenter of an explosion than an actual cave. The plants around the area were both flattened, and overgrown all at once. It was a strange sight, but it was a Dungeon after all.
Brian turned toward the Elf and bowed, "Thank you Master Elf, I can take over from here. Please inform your comrades the Adventuring Guild thanks them for their vigilance. We have already sent a representative to your people's city within the forest to discuss the future of the town. We sent one to the Gnomish city of Tenver as well. Please continue your hard work until the caravan arrives with the adventurers and craftsmen."
He bowed to the elf, then stepped into the entrance of the Dungeon without looking back.
* * *
Back in the Crawl room of our Dungeon.
It had been four days after he opened up his Dungeon, and still, nobody had come to visit.
"Is it me? I feel like it's me." He said for the fifth time to Bel. She just rolled her eyes and continued to ride on Grizzly's back, yelling for him to go faster. The Bear was surprisingly quick for something so large.
He was busy carving statues for his Alcove room, of which he had four done by now. He decided to pay homage to his dream and was trying to carve the likeness of a Deer for the statues. He pictured a hallway filled with the terrifying beasts staring down at Adventurers as they passed. He was starting to get better at carving different things out of stone, but only marginally so. All of his Deer statues he had right now were horrifying amalgamations of what he really wanted to make.
He was busy adding an extra long fang to one of the Deer when he felt a jolt run through the entire Dungeon.
Bel froze, and Grizzly whipped his head up toward the entrance.
Finally.
She rushed back to the Crawl room, she had prepared him for this soon after they opened the entrance.
She had said, "When a Sentient enters your Dungeon, you lose all Dungeon abilities besides that of viewing the people who come in. If necessary we can communicate with Adventurers, but few know the secrets of Dungeon Cores and even fewer know that they can actually speak. So no chatting with your favorite Adventurer!"
He mentally smiled at how cute she was when she was serious, but agreed all the same. Being told what would happen was one thing though, it was another entirely to not be able to interact with any part of your Dungeon anymore. He turned his focus to the entrance and gagged.
"That thing is disgusting!" He was looking at what he could only assume was a deformed human.
Smack!
"Don't be rude! That human just has a lot of extra muscle, most likely he is a scout for the Adventuring Guild." She said in a whisper, why she was whispering he didn't know.
The man walked with his back straight and a critical eye. Will could tell none of his Monsters were going to have an easy time sneaking up on him. A Crawl could hope, though.
The walking bag of muscles skirted around the first Fake Floor trap he had placed right before the entrance.
Damn.
After a short walk, he reached the Ore room. The man took a long look around, noting, to Wils immense frustration, the Dungeon Serpent stalking towards him from the cave in the wall. The snake looked frightened, but gathered its courage and leaped at the man anyways.
He didn't even flinch, just grabbed the snake by the throat and thrashed it once against the wall.
What the fuck, who does that?!
As the snake dispersed into his signature golden green Mana, a few pieces of the Snakes scales dropped as loot. Will had assigned loot to all of his new Monsters, most dropping Common crafting items. Grizzly already came with loot established, so Will hadn't had to mess around with that too much.
"Bel, please tell me all Humans aren't like this." To her credit, she seemed a fair bit calmer than he was.
She smiled sadly, and spoke, "I told you, he is a scout. The Guild sent him to evaluate our Dungeon, I wouldn't be surprised if he could kill Grizzly like that." Will's Crawl went down a few shades in color. That just isn't fair.
What happened next definitely caught Bel by surprise though. The man finished examining the room, noting his Copper Ore with a small smile. Then spoke.
"Dungeon. I know you can hear me. I wish to speak, then I will leave in peace. I have come to talk about both of our futures going forward from now."
Bel's tiny mouth dropped a lot farther than what should have been physically possible.
"A little known secret, huh?" Will said sarcastically towards her.
"Will this is a big deal! There aren't more than a hundred people in all of Bermin who know the secrets of a Crawl. To know this means this man is either exceptionally well connected, or exceptionally powerful. Or both." She said now, with genuine fear in her eyes.
Will felt his non-existent blood run cold. "Is he a Hero?"
She just shook her tiny head, to Will's immense relief. "No, if he was a Hero we would have known instantly. This is just a very high ranked Human. Most likely he is an Expert or A rank. I don't think it would be in our best interests to ignore him..."
Will got the message, this guy was too important to blow off. At least for now.
"How the hell am I going to talk to him though? I don't have a mouth you know." Bel just smiled at him and winked.
"I have to go talk to him."
"Absolutely not." He said instinctively. He was being irrational, but he didn't care.
"Will, listen closely. When Mr.Blue created us Guides, he made us invisible to the many Sentient races of the world. Honestly, I think we are immortal, as we only die when our Dungeon Crawl dies." Will was taken aback, this was not something he had been aware of.
"How will he talk to you if you are invisible...?" He had many other questions, but this one was the most glaring.
"I will always be invisible to Sentients eyes, but if he knows this much about Cores then it is most likely he knows this as well. If I want to, I can make my voice heard by anyone I want. I will go talk to him, but he will not be able to see me, or even tell where my voice is coming from. To him, it will sound as if the very Dungeon is speaking to him." She said, looking regal and childish at the same time.
"Don't let him touch you, he looks really filthy." He didn't know what to say, so he settled on insulting the Two-legs.
She just rolled her eyes, "No Sentient can touch me, especially if they can't even see me." With that, she flew off towards the Ore room.
<
br /> * * *
In the first room of the Dungeon.
Brian would wait here all day if necessary, he knew the Herald would find it difficult to convince the Dungeon to speak to him. Few knew the secrets of the Cores, and the fact he did most likely scared the poor thing.
Brian felt a small bit of pity at what most likely a terrifying scene. Of somebody like him coming into the newborn Dungeon, and dominating one of its Monsters with ease.
Then he remembered how many would soon die in these tunnels, and felt less guilty.
After a few more minutes of sitting in pure silence, he felt the very walls begin to vibrate, and a tiny voice sounded out from all around him. "Speak, Human. Why have you called?"
Cute.
Brian knew who he was speaking to was actually the Herald of the Dungeon, not the Crawl. It was trying to put on a brave face. So he would let her.
"I have come on behalf of the Adventuring Guild. We seek to build a haven for the many different races above your Dungeon. " He said automatically.
"What use have we for the other races? You come seeking only wealth and blood." The small voice replied.
"We offer what we offer to all Dungeons. Our lives. When we build the town you will have Adventurers coming in every day, Sunrise to Sunset. Those that prove themselves feeble will perish, and you will grow, and we will thank you for weeding out the weak." He knew he was being overly cold, but it was the reality. He had plenty of time during his life to get used to this harsh truth.
There was a long pause, and Brian assumed the Herald was speaking to her Crawl.
"How long until you and your kind begin braving our Dungeon?" She asks.
Brian smiled inside, it seemed like he wasn't going to be blown off right from the start. "I arrived ahead of our caravan, over the course of the next few weeks we will set up the beginnings of the town. After an outpost for the Adventuring Guild is built we will begin sending in teams. I expect this to take no more than one month."
"If you will offer us your blessing by allowing us to build a town over your Dungeon, I will offer the blessing of the Adventuring Guild. We will protect your Crawl from any who may seek to harm it, as well as provide a steady stream of Adventurers to test themselves against your Dungeon as you grow." It was a good deal, they both knew it. It just hinged on if the Dungeon was prideful enough to turn him down or not.
After what seemed an eternity to the A ranked Adventurer, the Herald responded.
"We accept. See you in a month, Human." Before the voice finished sounding out in his head, he could swear he heard a small laugh accompany the final word she had said.
Brian breathed a sigh of relief, he really did not want to have to deal with a Dungeon who refused to cooperate.
"Thank you. See you in a month."
As he turned around to walk out, he placed three coins on the ground. He knew Dungeons did not have initial access to the currencies of the Sentient races, so he hoped by doing this the Dungeon would understand what to do with it.
He reached the entrance, took one last look behind him into the Dungeon, and walked out.
The elf from earlier appeared in front of him almost immediately. "Well? What happened?" He queried.
"It appears to be an Earth-based Dungeon, with either a specialization in Reptiles or Beasts. From what we know of Dungeons, it seems to have a Nature affinity."
"A Nature affinity? Great! That just means more hassle from the other races. I shudder to think of what the Dryads will have to say in regards to this information." The Elf spat.
Brian agreed, but he would handle that problem as it came.
"Over the next Month, we will build the foundation of what will become the town. Please guard the entrance until we can find a suitable replacement." He knew he was asking much of the Elves, but he also knew they would guard it whether or not he asked. They were far too greedy to let anyone else in but themselves.
* * *
Back in the Crawl room.
"You should talk down to people more often, it's very cute." He said to Bel when she returned from the Ore room.
She just shrugged and settled atop his Crawl, "I only talk this way to people I like."
Will gasped. "You like me?!"
She smacked the top of his Crawl playfully, "Only a little."
He laughed, "So we have one month, what do we do until then? My Mana is already maxed out and I can only make statues so fast."
"Not much, sadly. We could always force evolve some of our Monsters with Resources, but if we make the Dungeon too hard it may lead to issues. For now, we should wait and see how the first group of F rank Adventurers do before we mess with anything. For now, you should work on fixing that entrance to the Dungeon, it looks like an explosion happened up there." She admonished.
"An explosion did happen up there, Bel" He retorted.
"You have a month, do your best!" She said with a tone that would brook no argument.
Will just grumbled and turned his focus away from his Herald to the new entrance. If he looked hard enough he could swear he saw some pale looking mutant with two legs and unnaturally long ears peeking down into his Dungeon.
Gross.
"Oh, Will! It looks like that Adventurer left us a present." She called towards him.
"What did he leave?"
"He gave you...one of each of the coins the Sentients use as currencies. Typical."
"What the hell am I supposed to do with those?" He asked angrily.
Bel just raised her hands and said, "Most likely it was so you can set them as loot for your Dungeon Monsters. A little heavy-handed of him, but in reality, this is for the best. If they didn't drop any coins, then the growth rate of the Town above us would be abysmally slow. By adding the coins to your Monsters loot, they will grow a lot faster. If they grow fast then we will as well. Just grit your teeth and do it."
He hated that he had been manipulated by the Human, but he also knew it was necessary. So he added the copper coins as a potential drop for all of his Monsters.
He was ready to take his frustrations out on a Two-legs. Only one month to go.
Chapter 9 - Greatest Adversary
* * *
One month later, Brian goes back to the Dungeon one day before the Guild will begin to send in Adventurers.
Bel was playing with Grizzly again. They had created a game where she hides a small gem somewhere in his room and he has to find it. She called it 'fetch'. Will was worried Grizzly would take offense at being treated like a dumb animal, but when he saw the slobbering bear crashing into trees and hillsides looking for the gem he knew how the Boss really felt.
Grizzly had just found the small yellow stone, and was stampeding back towards Bel, who was cheering in the air at his success, when Will felt another Sunrise come. His Mana had long since been capped out at 30/30, but Bel had informed him that any excess Mana was converted into experience that went towards helping him level.
Will had given her the silent treatment for a couple days over that missing piece of information, but he eventually got over it and asked her what she had meant. According to her, when Sentients die in his Dungeon, they release the Mana in their bodies, and a portion of that Mana is converted to experience for the Crawl.
Since he wasn't spending any Mana his experience had risen significantly. He personally felt he was close to level 4, but Bel told him it would be much faster to gain experience through the Mana of Two-legs instead of just waiting around doing nothing. He was about to ask to join their game of 'fetch', which was now looking more and more interesting, when a shiver ran throughout his Dungeon.
Will's focus snapped to the entrance, and he tried to bite back the mean comment he was going to say. Instead of calling the Two-legs a mutant, he settled for saying, "Bel, the walking bag of meat is back."
Not his best insult, but he felt it got the message across. Bel just rolled her eyes and flew off to meet the Human. They had both decided, since they had spoken once before, no harm
would come to speaking to him again. At least if he was alone.
Thankfully, it seemed he was. As he came into the Dungeon and reached the first room, he sat down in the position he had taken during his last visit. Will couldn't help himself though, and he sent a mental signal to attack when the opportunity presents itself towards his hidden Dungeon Serpent in the room.
"Dungeon, I wish to speak. It has been one month, and true to my word the Dungeon Town has begun to be constructed. I have come to tell you that starting tomorrow morning, I will begin sending in groups of Adventurers into your Dungeon." He said all of this without a hint of emotion in his voice.
