120 Titanium ingots
300 Steel ingots
500 Iron ingots
1,000 ingots of various other metals (Copper, Tin, Nickel, Lead, Bronze, Silver, Gold)
Her treasury represented millions of Mana and Raw Materials-worth of Monster Seeds and crafting materials, and it filled her treasury room up. She was now confident that – in case of another emergency – she had the “funds” available to bail her out; it would most likely hurt her again to dig into her reserve, but she also knew that it might be the only thing that could save her.
Even with all of that filling her treasury room, Sandra still had an overflow of Mana – both from the deaths of the deadly creatures and through her continuous ambient Mana generation from her AMANS. As a result, she was able to unlock some of the materials she hadn’t been able to before in her Organic/Inorganic Elemental Transmutation Menu.
Organic/Inorganic Material Elemental Transmutation Menu
Transmutation Options
Elemental Orb Required (Size/Qty)
Mana Required
Additional Seed Material (Size/Qty)
Unlocked (Y/N)
Precious Gemstones
Citrine
N/A
N/A
N/A
Y
Hematite
N/A
N/A
N/A
Y
Onyx
N/A
N/A
N/A
Y
Sapphire
N/A
N/A
N/A
Y
Topaz
N/A
N/A
N/A
Y
Ruby
Fire (Large/6)
268000/500000
Copper (Large/5)
N
Emerald
Natural (Large/6)
0/1000000
Bronze (Large/5)
N
Diamond
Holy (Large/6)
0/10000000
Steel (Large/5)
N
Moonstone
?????
0/20000000
?????
N
Dragon’s Eye
?????
0/50000000
?????
N
Magistone
?????
0/100000000
?????
N
Fruit-producing Tree Seeds
Apple
N/A
N/A
N/A
Y
Pear
N/A
N/A
N/A
Y
Peach
N/A
N/A
N/A
Y
Plum
N/A
N/A
N/A
Y
Apricot
N/A
N/A
N/A
Y
Orange
N/A
N/A
N/A
Y
Lemon
Air (Large/5)
50000/50000
Redwood (Large/4)
N
Lime
Natural (Large/5)
60000/60000
Yew (Large/4)
N
Coconut
?????
0/100000
?????
N
Elderfruit
?????
0/1000000
?????
N
Ambrosia
?????
0/25000000
?????
N
Sandra was able to unlock Citrine, Hematite, Onyx, and Topaz gemstones; the others on the list she was working on but hadn’t had the Mana for quite yet. She was also able to grow Ash and Pine trees for their wood, which also provided the Seed Material for Plum and Apricot fruit-producing trees – which she then unlocked. She currently had Redwood and Yew maturing in her growing room along with her new acquisitions, which would contribute to unlocking Lemon and Lime tree Seeds; she had already paid the Mana for them, so all she was missing was the materials.
She had previously unlocked all that she could from the other categories in her Menu, so all she had left to work on were the remaining fruits and gemstones, but she still needed to figure out the requirements for several of them. Experimenting with the mystery materials and Elemental Orbs for her locked transmutations was definitely something that she wanted to pursue, because the potential of having rare and superb materials to use with her crafting was a huge draw. However, there were a few things that she wanted to do before that, including looking at what she could use her Advancement Points to purchase – which turned out to be quite a few Points.
Advancement Points (AP)
Source
Criteria
Point Value
Lifetime Earned Points
Lifetime Spent Points
Core Size
Receive AP upon Core Size upgrade (does not count for Core Size 1 nor upgrade stages)
1 per Core Size upgrade
19 AP
(19X Core Size Upgrades)
19/19 AP
Number of Rooms
Receive AP for each distinct dungeon room at least 4,000 cubic feet in size (20ftx20ftx10ft minimum)
1 AP per qualified room
45 AP
(45X Qualifying Rooms)
33/45 AP
Unique Dungeon Fixtures
Receive AP for each never-before-seen fixture in your dungeon
2 AP per fixture
26 AP
(13X Crafting Stations)
26/26 AP
Creature Eradication
Eradicate sources of nearby creatures (i.e. lairs and spawning areas)
3 AP per eradication
72 AP
(5X Territory Ant Colonies, 6X Bearling Lairs, 4X Desolate Spider Clutches, 4X Crag Hound Packs, 5X Solitary Broat Spawn)
6/72 AP
Sentient Race Elimination
Eliminate members of sentient races
1 AP per 10 eliminations
8 AP (12X Orc, 71X Gnome)
8/8 AP
Sentient Race Bonding
Form a new Dungeon Visitor Bond with a member of a sentient race
1 AP per 2 Bonds
8 AP (1X Orc/Dwarf, 6X Elf, 9X Gnome)
8/8 AP
Dungeon Core Destruction
Receive AP for eliminating another Dungeon Core
30 AP per Core
30 AP (1X Reptile Classification Core)
30/30 AP
?????
N/A
N/A
N/A
N/A
(?????) Denotes an unknown, unique Source of Advancement Points. Perform this unknown action to unlock more information.
Total Advancement Points Earned and Spent
208 AP
130 AP
Total Advancement Points Available
78 AP
Advancement Options
Current Advancement Points
78
Advancement:
Cost:
Choose 1 Dungeon Monster from another available Classification (Repeatable)
5
Give your Dungeon Monsters the option of having a chosen accessible elemental attribute in addition to their base element – Cost increases with each purchase (only works on Monsters capable of using/applying their element) (Repeatable)
10
Reduce the Mana cost of Monster Seeds by 15% – Cost increases with each purchase (Advancement 0/4)
15
Reduce the Mana cost of Dungeon Monsters by 15% – Cost increases with each purchase (Advancement 2/4)
60
Reduce the Raw Material cost of Monster Seeds by 15% – Cost increases with each purchase (Advancement 0/4)
15
Reduce the Mana cost o
f Dungeon Traps by 15% – Cost increases with each purchase (Advancement 0/4)
15
Extend your Area of Influence by 10% – Cost increases with each purchase (Advancement 0/10)
50
Advance a current Classification 1 level to acquire access to stronger and larger Dungeon Monsters – this also includes any “Advancement Unlocked” Monsters – Cost increases with each purchase (Advancement 1/3)
150
Select a second available Classification to hybridize your Core (This option is only available once)
150
Sandra had received quite a few AP for eliminating all of the creatures inside the wastelands; when she added it to the 20 additional rooms she had created at the end of her dungeon, she had a total of 78 AP to spend. There were a few that she could rule out as unneeded or too expensive at that time, such as adding additional usable elements to her Dungeon Monsters (which wouldn’t really work for her constructs), reducing the Mana cost of traps in her dungeon (most of them were easily replaceable and she saw no need to spend more on them at the moment), extending her Area of Influence (it was quite extensive already and covered everywhere important), advancing her Classification (it was too expensive and she was still trying to afford all of her constructs from the last advancement), and choosing another Classification (it was plainly just too expensive, nor was it really needed yet).
The remaining options, though, were all things that could be beneficial in different ways. Purchasing the third reduction of Mana cost for her Dungeon Monsters would allow her access to the Titanium Anaconda, as well as making the rest less expensive – but Mana right now wasn’t that much of a problem, especially with her AMANS at full strength. The same went with the reduction of Mana cost and Raw Materials needed for Monster Seeds; in the long run it would save a lot of each resource as she created them, but she was currently sitting fairly pretty with both of those things. Still, they were definitely a possibility.
She decided to hold off on that for now, and instead looked at what Dungeon Monsters were available from the other Classifications. The benefits of having access to other Monsters from different Classifications was already being shown with her Unstable Shapeshifter – if not the Goblin Worker she had first purchased. It was entirely possible that having other choices of things to create might work in her favor, though she didn’t really have a goal in mind.
When she was searching through the hundreds (or possibly thousands) of choices before, she had been looking for something that could be used by Violet to help enchant; now, though, she was covered fairly well in that department. Nevertheless, she started to peruse the possible choices while her six Unstable Shapeshifters – she had expanded her crafting crew as well – were busy alternatingly creating Energy Orbs. As a side note, she had found out that she was correct about the sample transference; it would only work with the original one that had obtained them in the first place. Therefore, the subsequent Shifters she created had to obtain the forms for the Elite Elves from that specific one, though she made sure to grab samples from Violet, Felbar, and Echo directly.
By the time Echo came back to the dungeon a little later in the morning, there were over 200 of the Orbs there for her to bring back to the village and her people. It would’ve been even more, but 400 Energy Orbs (50 of each element) had been added to the Gnomes’ wagon to bring back to their own people, along with all of the other materials.
The Elf appeared to have fully recovered from her forced coma, though she didn’t look as happy as Sandra thought she would’ve been being outside of her dungeon. It was probably because her people still hadn’t shown the same “warmth” towards her as they had before, though at least none of them had been outright rude like Wyrlin; however, the village Elder was becoming more and more insistent that Echo get more of the Energy Orbs from Sandra – or “your dungeon”, as she liked to say to the young Elf. It was getting to the point where it was bordering on unfair harassment, but fortunately the Elder hadn’t risen to drastic lengths quite yet – and was likely to be mollified with the latest shipment.
“Thanks, Sandra – this will get Elder Herrlot off my back for a while…at least, I hope so. As much as I appreciate these for my people, sometimes I wish you had never created them,” Echo said as she picked up the two large – and slightly heavy – bags full of Orbs and slung them over her shoulder.
* Why is that? Don’t these help your people? *
Echo sighed heavily as she settled the two cloth bags so that they sat along her back more comfortably. “Oh, absolutely – there’s no denying that they are literally miraculous,” she said dully, which contrasted completely with the words she was saying. “But I’m worried that my people will see them in a light different from what you expect; I don’t even think the original ones I brought to the village have even reached the capital yet, but I have a feeling they will engender…unhealthy…competition between the Elite Elves to get one – or more – for themselves. I can already see the desire and – dare I say it – greed in Elder Herrlot’s eyes as she keeps asking for more.”
* Are you sure it’s not because she just has her people’s best interests at heart? Now that they found a viable way to fight back against the Dungeon Monsters and dungeons, I would think that would be normal. *
“Yes, I can see that – and I’m sure some of it is exactly what you say. However, I suspect that the Elder has taken a portion of the Orbs I’ve brought to her for herself, before sending the rest on to the capital. Whether it’s for her own use – and I’m well aware that having more than one in contact with your skin will speed up the restoration of elemental energy – or for some other purpose, I couldn’t tell you. It wouldn’t surprise me to know that she’s hoarding them as a bargaining chip to have her transferred from the village, which I’ve heard rumored was a punishment of some kind – though no one seems to know what that punishment was for. Regardless, the scarcity of the Orbs, which she is contributing to, could be bad for…you.”
That didn’t make any sense to Sandra at first, but as she thought about it from her own experiences as a merchant…horror overcame confusion as she thought she understood. Scarcity of a demanded product caused the price of it to rise, which was one of the first things she had learned while she was a very young girl. That wouldn’t normally be a factor in the current situation, because she was giving everything away – not charging for it; not only that, but it was doubtful that the leaders in charge of the Elven nation would charge for it either, negating “price” as a factor altogether.
However, when it came to objects that “enhanced” someone’s power, those kinds of things were considered priceless anyways. Sandra remembered a tale about an Enchanter that had spent 40 years researching and experimenting with various enchantments he had learned over the years, before finally creating one of his own inside the facets of a precious gemstone; rumor was that the enchantment somehow increased someone’s available elemental energy by a significant amount when they held the stone. The story went that he made a total of eight gemstones – one for each element – before it was somehow discovered what he had done.
The gemstones were stolen from his workshop by a group of powerful Heroes working for someone even more powerful and the Enchanter was forced to flee. The nameless Enchanter was inevitably found and held captive, where he was told to create more of what he had made; for some reason the man had refused and asked to be released, stating that he couldn’t make any more. Rather than risk letting him go and potentially finding a way to make more, the Enchanter was killed, his identity lost to the ages – along with any knowledge of the enchanted gemstones’ whereabouts.
Most thought it was a myth; even if it was, the story held an important lesson to anyone who really dug into it. Power (whether politically, physically, socially, or economically) was attracted to power, and the already-powerful want nothing other than the chance to be even more powerful. Even the Elves, who needed the Energy Orbs to protect their people, were
obviously not immune to this lesson – if what Echo said was true about the Elder.
The same thing was likely to happen even in the capital, though Sandra hoped it was on a lesser scale – but now she didn’t think it would be. She was originally banking on the fact that their people were in danger of extinction to curb most of those greedy impulses, but she was wrong; once the people who wanted the Orbs – and couldn’t get them from those in charge – found out about their existence, then (as Echo had said) the “unhealthy competition” between the Elites could end up with them trying to steal or even kill to possess them. What was even worse, objectively, was if they found out the source of the Orbs: Sandra.
The Dungeon Core could only imagine large groups of Elves coming to her dungeon to demand more Orbs; even if she gave them hundreds of the enchanted creations, it would never be enough. There would be every possibility that they would try to invade her dungeon and try to force her into being some sort of Energy Orb-making factory, where they would control the distribution of whatever she produced. They would also likely cut off all Sandra’s access to the other races, and her plans to help the Gnomes, Orcs, and Dwarves would be denied.
Of course, there was no way she would ever allow something like that to happen – but then Sandra would ultimately have to kill more people, which was something that she would prefer to avoid.
What have I done?
All of that was conjecture, though, unless Echo was proven right about the Elder. Sandra hadn’t really been paying attention because she had other stuff she was trying to take care of – like eradicating her deadly creature problem in the wastelands – so she had no clue whether the Elf was correct; confirming those suspicions would be difficult and probably dangerous for Echo, so there wasn’t a need for the bonded Elf to risk herself. The truth will come out eventually.
The Crafter's Dilemma: A Dungeon Core Novel (Dungeon Crafting Book 3) Page 11
