The Crafter's Dominion: A Dungeon Core Novel (Dungeon Crafting Book 5)

by Jonathan Brooks

  Now down to 5 Sonic Blademasters and suddenly seeing the downside to so much power, Sandra realized that she hadn’t suddenly found the solution to all her problems. Still, her Blademasters were quite deadly, so she had them move down the tunnel, blasting away everything in their path—or at least she tried. It seemed as though the new Blademasters couldn’t move in a lateral or vertical direction while they were spinning, though they could rotate in place; as soon as she instructed them to move, they stopped their outrageously powerful attack and slowly moved while the rotation was winding down. When she stopped them and started up their attack again, it didn’t quite take 15 seconds to get back up to speed, but the delay was still too long to make them effective “attacking” constructs. They were better suited for defending an area than assaulting one – especially when Sandra found that they had a range of about 20 feet before the sound blades were nothing more than an annoyance.

  But now she had an effective means of preventing more of the Beasts from getting through the tunnel: By creating a few more to bolster their ranks, she used the Behemoth and handful of Roaring Blademasters as shields, blocking any thrown objects meant to destroy her new constructs. It wasn’t a foolproof plan, as a stray rock – or even a thrown boar that got shredded in the air at one point – would hit one every once in a while; by spreading them out so that they covered most of the tunnel and weren’t bunched up, they made a pretty good defensive force.

  Meanwhile, Sandra was already at work with the other tunnels, spending her resources at an alarming rate. The Goblins were next, as they were starting to make some dangerous headway versus her constructs there. Looking at her list of potential Dungeon Monsters, and considering the sudden prevalence of Hobgoblin Mages being used to neutralize her powerful larger constructs, she decided to go small-scale for her defense. If her much-stronger constructs wouldn’t do it because they were fewer in number, she would fight the horde of Goblins with a horde of her own.

  Using 20,000 total Mana to create 800 tiny Monster Seeds and 800 Powered Arachnids, she sent the whole bunch of them down the tunnel. Like the Clockwork Tarantulas, which were faster than their predecessor – the Clockwork Spider – the Powered Arachnids were faster still. Not only that, but they were larger, at about a foot across, and they had a completely sealed body with no sign of any clockwork innards. In fact, they were nearly silent as they swarmed down the relatively tight confines of the tunnel, which wasn’t as wide and tall as the others. (The Goblins weren’t as large as the other Cores’ Monsters, after all).

  To add to the defense of the tunnel, and to come to the aid of the few Jaguar Queens and Dire Wolves before they perished, Sandra spent another 10,000 Mana to create 180 Animated Iron Shears. As soon as the larger, more substantial Shears appeared, she sent them into the tunnel as fast as she could. Unfortunately, the sheer speed that her prior Reinforced Animated Shears possessed was missing from her upgraded construct; instead of zooming through the tunnel at an extremely high speed, they were probably only about half as fast.

  However, what losses they had in speed were made up for by their durability and weight of impact. Whereas her older Shears would normally be destroyed upon impact, when the new Iron Shears hit something, they didn’t crumple and fall apart. With still enough acceleration to do some damage, dozens of her new Shears slammed into the Goblins, impaling them with devastating results. Not only did the metal of the constructs not buckle under the pressure of impact, but they were able to remove themselves from Goblin chests, necks, and eye sockets, leaving their victims to bleed out.

  A dozen of them were caught before they could escape and were crushed or bent by some of the stronger and larger Goblins, but the rest were able to retreat back down the tunnel and make another run at the assembled horde. Another few impalements led to some additional attrition in Sandra’s Shears forces, but they had done their job; not only did they manage to kill 3 of the Goblin Mages, but they had allowed her other, already-present constructs to recover and push the enemy back. By the time her Powered Arachnids arrived, there was a slight lull in the fight as casualties were traded back and forth without too much progress on either side.

  That all changed when the smaller constructs arrived. The upgraded Arachnids weren’t just bigger and faster, but they could jump long distances – which they demonstrated quite well by launching themselves at the Goblins when they were close enough. The enemy Monsters didn’t know what hit them, as sharp, thin spider legs were rapidly stabbed into vulnerable exposed flesh; in no more than 10 seconds, dozens of Goblins were killed as they were impaled by hundreds of arachnoid appendages. They didn’t stop there, either, because as soon as one Goblin fell, the Powered Arachnids would jump off the corpse towards their next target.

  That wasn’t to say that they didn’t encounter any setbacks. While they were fast and could jump at the other Monsters with surprising alacrity, they were rather weak in defense. Even the weakest Goblin Scouts inside the tunnel could grab one of the Arachnids with their hands and crush them – if they could catch them, that was. Not only that, but when the incoming Hobgoblin Mages cast their ice-based spells, they would catch 5 or 6 of the 8-legged constructs at once, leaving them frozen in place and easily dispatched.

  Working together, though – along with a few dozen reinforcements for each of the smaller constructs – they could be extremely effective. While a group of Goblins was distracted by the Arachnids, the Shears would swoop in to strike; when the enemy tried to grab the Shears, then the spider constructs would jump in to prevent them from being destroyed. There were still casualties, but with how inexpensive they were to produce, it was easy enough to maintain the constant defense. Unfortunately, they weren’t really making any headway towards blocking off the tide of Goblins; at the moment, Sandra was satisfied that the immediate danger had passed.

  There was a similar result in the other tunnels. The Golems were probably the easiest to push back because of the simple application of two of her new constructs, as well as one of her Advancement-gained monsters. Previously, her Apes wielding warhammers had done a decent job of shattering the animated hunks of dirt, stone, Iron, and even Steel – but their weapons were nearly destroyed as a result. Instead of having to rely on their rapidly declining quality, Sandra went with her new Champion Totem; creating one of them for a little over 8,000 Mana total, she watched as it sped down the tunnel towards the Golems at a much faster clip than its predecessor, the Martial Totem. The crafty Dungeon Core was a little worried at first, because instead of the multiple pairs of arms the previous incarnation possessed, the new Totem was back to a single pair; not only that, but it was approximately a third smaller in size.

  However, when it arrived at the quickly deteriorating defense near the other dungeon’s entrance, it proved that bigger wasn’t always better. The Champion Totem was fast, agilely dodging devastating attacks by the larger Golems, before swooping in and punching with surprisingly powerful punches. In most cases – for all but the Iron and even Steel Golems that Sandra was now seeing emerge from the other dungeon – a quick combination of punches was all it took to shatter the majority of the enemy forces. For the metallic Golems, repeated strikes in a certain location would start to bend and warp the material the enemy Dungeon Monsters were made of, until finally shearing off from the force enacted upon their limbs.

  But the Totem was only one construct, and eventually it would be overwhelmed. Creating additional Totems was on the agenda; but to aid with the defense, Sandra employed another construct: the Weighted Rolling Force. She had a hunch of what it could do as soon as she saw its name, and she was quickly proven correct. Creating 50 of them, she sent them rolling down the tunnel towards the Golem Monsters, picking up speed as they went; when they arrived, they had accelerated enough that the force of their impact against the Earth-based Golems was significant. Limbs were shattered as the Weighted Forces slammed into them, and already-toppled Golems were broken apart even further as a result. Even the Iron and Steel
Golems received massive dents in their forms, causing some difficulty in the movement of the enemy Dungeon Monsters. When they hit an Iron or Steel Golem, however, the Forces also shattered from the impact; Sandra noted this, and made sure not to target them unless necessary. Fortunately, those powerful Golems were few and far between, as most of the Monsters she faced were dirt or stone; the Totem was able to take care of the metallic enemies, at least, while the Forces could shatter the weaker enemies on their own.

  Of course, without using some sort of elemental effect to stop the Golems’ regeneration, the large Earth Monsters would eventually reform over time. To combat this, Sandra employed the Explosive Phoenix, the larger sibling of the Rising Phoenix to which she’d had access before. Like the majority of the changes she had seen, the Explosive variety of Phoenix was about half again as large as its predecessor – but the changes didn’t stop there. One of the abilities to which the Phoenix had access was to explosively expel the flames over its body in all directions in a matter of a second, creating a flash of super-hot temperatures; better yet, this wasn’t even something that required any of its elemental energy, but was a natural part of its attack. By utilizing this explosive technique, the Phoenixes could melt or char the exposed “wounds” of the broken Golems, effectively cauterizing them so that they couldn’t be regenerated.

  Against the Slimes, the most effective construct in the past had been her Titanium Anacondas, because they could rapidly strike directly into the middle of their gelatinous forms and crush the nucleus inside that acted as their brains. Rather than mess with success, Sandra splurged and spent over 35,000 Mana and a whole lot of resources to create 1 of the new Platinum-banded Wyrms.

  This Wyrm, as opposed to the Titanium Anaconda, was larger, longer, stronger…and winged. It could only lift its front half up off the ground with the pair of sheet-metal wings attached to its back, but that was enough to help propel it forward at even greater speed, as well as reach to the top of the tunnel – and everywhere in between. Its jaws were wide enough to completely engulf 2 or 3 of the smaller Slimes, which it did upon its immediate arrival; the *snap* of its jaws closing on the trio of gelatinous Monsters was reminiscent of a crocodile’s jaws, and the Slimes inside were squished and crushed, killing them instantly.

  The acidic nature of their bodies didn’t seem to do much to the Wyrm as it let the remains of the three Slimes run from its mouth; dripping a slimy substance that soon disappeared, it struck out for even more. *Snap* *snap* *snap* went the construct, killing scores of the smaller Slimes in as many seconds. It was only when it faced the larger, “shaped” Slimes that it started to be slightly affected by the acidity; pits in the metallic jaws of the Wyrm were soon seen as it progressed without stopping, until it was nearly overwhelmed on all sides by dozens of Slimes of different sizes.

  Whipping its tail around the tunnel served both to remove the attackers and to kill a half-dozen Slimes, but Sandra was still forced to make the Wyrm retreat and regroup with some help from the remnants of the remaining constructs she had in defense previously. When she finally had a chance to check out the new Platinum-banded Wyrm, she saw that the damage wasn’t as bad as she had feared, but was still going to eventually be enough to kill it.

  Fortunately, she had a Multi-access Repair Drone deeper in the tunnel that had been doing its best to maintain the fighting shape of the other defenders, but it wasn’t going to be enough. Therefore, she dug down deep into her reserves of Mana and RM and created a new “Unobtrusive” Multi-access Repair Drone – whatever that meant.

  When it finally arrived at the fight, she quickly found out; the same metal “arms” with pads as hands came out of its white cylindrical form, but that was where the similarities ended. The biggest difference was the fact that the Drone didn’t need to physically touch what it was trying to heal; instead, it would send healing energy from a distance of up to 20 feet away. Better yet, the healing Elemental energy didn’t cause the construct being healed to freeze in place while it was being repaired.

  After some observation and experimentation, Sandra discovered the downside – as there inevitably had to be one. The rate of healing/repair at a distance was only about 10% what it would be if there were direct physical contact and a frozen state. Still, this rate – at the moment – was enough to make a difference; the Wyrm was kept in tip-top shape while it fought. Advancing further into the tunnel near the Slime dungeon’s entrance was a little more difficult, as it would get swarmed and take too much damage.

  When all was said and done, she was at a stalemate with the other Cores, and her momentary lapse in judgement hadn’t been a complete disaster. But that stalemate won’t last for long….

  It was only a matter of time before she gained the upper hand. As more and more attacking Dungeon Monsters died, the more Monster Seeds were dropped; about a third of them were picked up or knocked back into their respective dungeons, but the rest were lying about, ready to be obtained by a small force of Mega Automatons she created. While not as fast as the Hyper Automatons from Advancement Level 1, the Mega Automatons were a little larger, could carry more, and were resistant enough not to be destroyed during the melee that was going on in each tunnel by a single stray splotch of slime, an errant punch, or a quick swipe of a claw.

  I will succeed in destroying them! It’s only a matter of time; nothing will stop me now!

  Chapter 4

  Violet stopped pacing throughout the room where she had been confined, before sitting down on the edge of the bed and putting her head in her hands. Try as she might, she couldn’t come up with a solution to her current predicament; pacing back and forth obviously wasn’t working to provide a viable way out of her troubles. Contemplating how she had found herself there in the first place, she supposed that she only had herself to blame.

  “We’re almost there,” she shouted towards Felbar, relief at seeing the outskirts of Gnomilia in the distance. The capital city was like a shining beacon of advanced Enchantment technology at its finest, and even now she could see the hustle and bustle of her people as they went about their day far below. “I am going to be glad to get off of this thing.”

  Truthfully, from the terror she had first experienced after getting on the massive Aerie Roc, Violet had calmed down significantly. She would even go as far as saying that she was enjoying herself, and being able to see the ground from such a height was as extraordinarily beautiful as it was frightening. After the first hour, her muscles had thanked her as she relaxed and stopped holding on to everything with every ounce of her strength; the hour after that, she did her best to ignore the world around her as she concentrated on breathing normally and keeping from freaking out again. It was only then that she opened up her eyes and looked around her with enough presence of mind to actually appreciate the view.

  Felbar…well, Felbar was so relaxed that the gentle-yet-powerful movements of the Roc through the air put him to sleep. His nap was only interrupted later when he suddenly woke up with a start, as if realizing that they were getting closer to their destination.

  “We should probably set down outside of the city—” Felbar suggested, but Violet knew they didn’t have time to waste.

  “No, we need to get our information to the King and the council as soon as possible. I’m going to set this thing down near the palace, so that we don’t have to worry about having to travel another couple of hours on foot through Gnomilia.”

  “For some reason, I don’t think that’s a good idea.” Felbar frowned, but didn’t offer up any explanation as to why he thought that way.

  The young Journeyman Enchanter couldn’t see the harm in it, and arriving on a giant bird would probably only help to communicate their urgency. It didn’t take more than a minute after they passed over the edge of the city to get close to the palace, and she caught her breath at its beauty from such a height. She had been inside half a dozen times when she was younger, due to her parents visiting, but seeing its towering splendor was always eye-catchin
g. Made up of dark-veined white marble, the façade shone in the late afternoon sun as the dozen delicate-looking towers reached 150 feet into the sky, connected by thousands of feet of sturdy enchanted bridges.

  Her people didn’t spend as much time on cosmetic appearance as they did on function, but the palace was definitely an exception. Form played as much a role as function where the King, Queen, and ruling council ruled, as if all of Gnomekind reserved the right to show off their abilities somewhere.

  The palace spanned thousands of feet in every direction, and rumor had it that nearly 300 people worked or lived in the magnificent building. From the times she had been there, Violet thought that this rumor had a ring of truth to it (though she hadn’t really been counting at the time). Regardless, if anyone could assemble her people to work together with Sandra to prevent disaster, this had to be the place to find them.

  Flying over the top of the palace, she could see a few guards stationed along the parapets on the towers, next to the enchanted ballistae that were set up as precaution. She vaguely heard yelling as she and the Roc were spotted – whether in alarm or curiosity, she could not discern. Nothing shot at them, from what she could determine, at least; so she figured they were more curious than anything. Behind the gorgeous building was an impressively large garden and open space, where she verbally directed the Roc to land, hoping that it wouldn’t crush anything important.

  A minute later, after circling once, the Aerie Roc descended quickly, making Violet’s stomach feel like it wanted to eject out of her mouth, the sensation making her doubly glad she hadn’t consumed any food during their long journey. At the last moment before they landed, Felbar shouted, “Don’t forget the War Machine!”