The Trash Tier Dungeon

by Kaye Fairburn

  The cattens had acquired some problems of their own during their fight. Arden lacked the necessary focus to see exactly what was ailing them. Based on their high-pitched whines, they were in need of a Monster Lounge.

  “You did it! I’m not sick anymore,” Minette said, her voice way too cheery for the mood Arden was in. “You’re looking rather…” she struggled to come up with something nice. “You look like you’ve seen better days. Do you need a nap?”

  “I’m dying.”

  “I’m going to have everyone else go to the Recreation Center until we get the Monster Lounge finished.”

  A catten stomped on Arden on its way out of the room.

  “No,” she choked out.

  The 12 points from earlier became a 1. Yes, 1 out of 300 HP remaining.

  [CONGRATULATIONS! -ADVANCEMENT UNLOCKED-

  You have discovered the “Last Chance” Advancement! Units with this special trait can regain 50% of their maximum health and mana when they hit 1 HP. View the Advancement on its appropriate screen for more information.

  You may now research this Advancement.]

  “Good job!” Minette cheered. “We should—”

  Whatever else her dungeon had to say, Arden didn’t hear it. She took her final breath.

  RIP Arden the Endless Terror, Dungeon Pixie to Minette Ashes Max Felixia the Trash Tier Dungeon.

  Chapter 8

  But of course, Arden came back to life because that was how she functioned as a Dungeon Pixie. It wouldn’t do for a pixie to permanently die.

  “You sure slept for ages,” Minette greeted her. “I almost thought you’d never wake up.”

  Arden stretched, raising her arms towards the ceiling. “Dying’s awful. Zero out of 10; would not recommend.”

  “I’ve got a surprise for you.”

  “If it’s a dozen farms, I’m going to the underside of the dungeon and…” Arden’s words drained from her.

  Déjà vu pounded her forehead.

  Ouch.

  “The Monster Lounge is finished,” Minette carried on like nothing was out of the ordinary.

  “You’re not still sick, are you?”

  “Nope. I’m cured, thanks,” she said. “Would you like to see the information screen for the Monster Lounge? Blaize and Mickey-Scotia are in there now, resting.”

  “Yeah, show it to me.” Arden scratched her shoulder. Respawning fixed all of her previous injuries. Her mana was back up to its maximum 200 points.

  [BUILDINGS -SELECTED-

  Name: Monster Lounge

  Type: Room

  Health: 500/500

  Usage:

  - Regenerates monsters’ health points.

  Description: A place where the creatures can go to be healed.

  Current Occupants: 4 (Blaize, Mickey-Scotia, Joseph “Eagle,” Drasko)]

  “Why are there two peons in the Lounge?” she asked, doing her best not to let her fury seep into her question.

  “They wanted to see what it was like and I didn’t see a problem with them seeing it,” Minette said.

  “What about the whole ‘they’re not doing their job’ part?” She couldn’t believe that she had to go over this for Minette yet again.

  “Oh, they’re out of work. The shiny deposit room dried up.”

  “So have them search for one. We can’t afford any downtime. How many shinies do we have left?”

  “20.”

  There wasn’t anything that they could do with that low amount, besides continue to save it up. Until they found a new shiny source, they were at a standstill.

  “Let me access the Overview mode. I want to see how their search efforts have been going.”

  Arden almost wished she hadn’t asked. Had Minette forgotten that time was a valuable resource? It may not have been listed with the shinies and glowyrms, but it was equally as important. The Demon Lord Oiseau’s review would happen in a handful of weeks. If the Trash Tier Dungeon didn’t reach his standards, Arden the Endless Terror would be no more.

  That deadline was never more big, bold, and redlined apparent as it was when she saw the workercats’ blatant lack of effort. It looked like they’d barely done anything in the time Arden was respawning.

  Sure, they defeated Minette’s source of sickness, but that didn’t mean that everyone could slack off. More tricks needed to be added to the maze around the Warp Gate room. As for the search efforts specifically, they needed to spread the tunnels they were building. Currently, they were bunching the corridors around the first shiny deposit.

  “I’m going to let you guess what I’m going to say,” Arden said.

  “All play and no work makes Jill an unfocused girl?”

  “Something like that. You need to work on your sprawl. Spread the search radius. It doesn’t help anything if they’re going in circles around the spot they already know about. And it really doesn’t help things for them to literally walk in each other’s footsteps. What are they playing, follow the leader?”

  “Cats do what cats will do,” Minette said.

  “Don’t keep hiding behind phrases like that. That’s no excuse. Use your Influence and put them to work the way they should be. Have some go left, have some go right, have a couple go diagonally. C’mon, I shouldn’t be telling you this.”

  “Okay,” she replied, sounding like a reprimanded child.

  Arden was thankful that Minette wasn’t a stubborn child on top of that. She put the workercats to a more proper and improved version of Work™. They searched the area, creating halls that fanned out from the ground they’d already covered. Soon after that, they found the deposit they needed.

  Resource gathering resumed.

  She turned down Minette’s attempts at conversation. Neither of them needed the distraction that chatting would bring. Arden kept Minette to the task of encouraging their units to explore, construct, and patrol. Breaks were only allowed when necessary. They couldn’t afford any slip-ups. Arden, especially, didn’t want to get involved in another round of combat that she wasn’t meant for.

  Minette still thanked her for what she did. Arden brushed her off because she had to. Dungeon and pixie fraternization sounded good on paper, but it came with unintended consequences. Friendship softened focus. Friends went easy on things that they shouldn’t. They cared about each other’s feelings when they should be caring about the bottom line.

  The bottom line being: will this make us better? Is this a worthy use of our time? Everything was about progression. Stagnation was not to be tolerated.

  Some dungeons liked to run themselves like they were terrariums. They set things up to a certain point and then let their creatures run amok without any interference. Arden hated that style. Creatures needed to be pushed. They needed to get better.

  It appeared that Minette sat somewhere in that camp of minimal interference. Disciplining her and converting her to the other side was proving to be an uphill battle. If Arden wasn’t constantly nagging her, she wasn’t doing much of anything. Minette was too content to watch her monsters “do their thing. Aren’t they so adorable?”

  Her words, not Arden’s.

  Over the next few days of working together, they only talked whenever Arden needed to direct her to do something. Minette withdrew. She seemed to have finally learned Arden’s preferences.

  You’ll understand that this is for your own good, Arden thought and didn’t say out loud. I can’t make the same mistakes all over again.

  Too much was on the line for that.

  “The Trap Workshop is almost complete,” Minette said, her spirit tempered. She’d learned to speak at an appropriate volume rather than the excited shouting she’d been doing before.

  “Excellent.”

  They’d delayed building it in order to round out their armies. The catten forces stood 12 strong, their numbers spread throughout the dungeon. They boosted the number of workers cats from four to six, allowing for faster gains in shinies. All in all, Arden was confident that if Minette got sick
or surface creatures wandered in again, they’d have no problem fighting them off.

  “Once Workercat 5 is finished—”

  “Hugh,” Minette interrupted.

  “Right, Hugh. Once Hugh is finished, we’ll have him get started on building us some traps.”

  Traps were one of her favorite parts of her last dungeon. No dungeon was complete without its fair share of traps. The look of horror in an adventurer’s eyes over triggering a trap was positively delectable. Be it saw blades or sudden floor drops, Arden couldn’t get enough of traps.

  [ALERT:

  The Trap Workshop is complete. Select the building to see the Traps menu.]

  “Let’s have at it, then,” Arden said. “The last time I checked, we were at 225 shinies. Has that changed?”

  The glowyrms were still terribly elusive. They temporarily halted their efforts to find them, instead focusing on shiny collection, troop creation, and room construction.

  “300 now,” Minette answered.

  “Great. That gives us a lot to work with. Show us the menu.”

  “Before I do that, I was wondering something. Why is it that they call you the Endless Terror?” Minette asked. “I know we haven’t been talking much lately, but maybe we should? I mean, cohesion is important. We’re supposed to be collaborating here.”

  “Us talking drags everything down. No one cares.”

  “You don’t care.”

  “And this is why we shouldn’t talk. It opens the door to petty arguments.”

  “That’s only because you slam the door closed with a sledgehammer,” Minette huffed. “Pixies and dungeons are supposed to get along. I didn’t fight with any of my other pixies.”

  “We wouldn’t be fighting if you didn’t keep missing the point of everything. What, you want me to be all cutesy and nice to you?”

  “It’d be a massive improvement.”

  “How about this then? We try a little experiment. We’ll swap places.”

  “Ew,” Minette said. “I don’t want to be a pixie!”

  “You’ll still be a dungeon and I’ll still be the pixie and, hey! What’s wrong with being a pixie?”

  “Pixies are always pent-up and full of complexes and things like that. I’m sorry to say it but you’re not proving the stereotype wrong,” Minette answered.

  “And dungeons are always jerks, so how about that?”

  “Really? Because so far you’ve been the more jerk-ish one. You could’ve fooled me.”

  “Hey, listen! Do you want to try this experiment or not? All we’re going to do is act like each other. I’ll show you what you’re like and you’ll show me what I’m like. It’ll be a win-win because we’ll be what the other one wants. Just a bunch of idealistic clones.”

  “Are you sure you’ll be able to resist being a bitch for more than an hour?”

  Arden gasped.

  “Sorry, I was just being you. Too much, too soon?” Minette asked.

  “No, not at all.” Arden forced out a high-pitched giggle. She got into character. “Oh, my sweet, beloved dungeon, would you please show me the Trap Workshop screen?”

  “Only if you shut up.” It appeared that Minette had gotten into character, too.

  “Ouchies! Why don’t we up the ante? Whoever breaks character first before the end of the day must do whatever the other one says for the next day.” Having to maintain a higher pitch than she was used to strained her throat. Arden wasn’t looking forward to the rest of the day.

  Minette spoke with a flat affect. “Great. Let’s do it. Now can I show you the menu or what?”

  “I love the way you’re exaggerating me.”

  “Likewise. Here’s the menu.”

  [TRAPS MENU:

  Pits

  Offensive Spikes

  Blades

  Bludgeons

  Projectiles

  Snares

  Magical

  Other]

  “This is like the Research Center in the sense that we’ll have to research the blueprints first,” Minette explained. “After that, we’ll be able to build the trap for a fee.”

  Arden hummed in thought. “The category names are rather straightforward. Pits are classic. The adventurer steps on the wrong thing and falls into a hole. The Offensive category involves things like blades swinging from the ceiling, random rocks falling onto people’s heads, and spikes coming out of the floor.

  “Snares are for entrapment. Magical seems like a broad category. I imagine that’s where we can develop things like mirages and any traps that involve spellcasting,” Arden said. “What’s in the Other category?”

  “It seems to have more mischief-making traps. Think spring-loaded tiles, flashing lights, and other things that are meant to be tricky and less damage dealing.”

  “Sounds fun,” Arden said, cringing at the way the F-word sounded coming out of her mouth.

  “Definitely. And every trap comes with a default placement. You have to do more research if you want to place it somewhere unusual. It won’t cost us extra shinies or glowyrms, but it will cost us time.”

  Arden pulled a funny voice. “We should place pits on the wall! I bet the cattens would love having hidey holes.”

  “That’s not a bad idea, but since I’m a curmudgeon that hates everything, I’m going to say that it’s terrible. You should be ashamed of yourself. I’m also going to say that we should develop some pits without consulting you about it.”

  “What Magical traps can we make?”

  “None, as far as you are concerned. Here’s the menu for the pit.”

  [Name: Basic Pit

  Category: Pits

  Type: Mechanical

  Placement: Floor (Default)

  Health: n/a

  Armor: None (0)

  Cost: 30 shinies

  Requirement: Basic Pit Blueprints (100 shinies)

  Description: The Basic Pit lives up to its namesake. It is a six-foot hole in the ground with a camouflaged tarp covering it. The fall may hurt an unsuspecting adventurer.]

  Minette added, “We don’t meet the requirements for any intermediate or advanced traps. Basic traps will be easier for the adventurers to detect, but they’ll do the job for now. These blueprints are available to purchase.”

  “And how many pits are you planning on putting in? We should focus on our defense outside of the Warp Gate room.”

  “I’ll put in as many as I want to, wherever I want to. Our units aren’t affected by them so they can go anywhere.”

  If their monsters ran over any of the pit traps’ tarps, it would appear as though they were running over regular flooring.

  “But you have to be strategic when it comes to pits,” Arden said. “They’re good for slowing the adventurers down, but you have to have a plan in mind on how to deal with them while they’re trapped. And you can’t put all your hopes into a series of pit traps. What if no one falls for it?”

  “I hear what you’re saying. What you’re saying sounds like a legitimate concern, but I’m going to ignore everything you’re saying because I’m not Minette right now,” she said. “All I want are pits.”

  Arden groaned. She transitioned her groan into a bout of throat clearing, remembering to stick to her role. “Point taken.”

  “Aren’t you going to suggest something for me to turn down?”

  “Well, I’ll be entirely in character and ask about getting a bunch of anvils. We should place them on the floor because everyone knows an anvil is best when it’s sitting on the floor.” Arden threw in a giggle.

  Really, though, a snare or two would serve them well. They had the cat power to support it. Anyone caught in one of their snares would meet their end at the fast-moving claws of a catten.

  Pits weren’t a bad pairing for the snares. The problem with them lay in the quantity. All of their eggs in one trap basket when they had 300 shinies and counting to work with didn’t sound wise. In fact, it was foolish.

  Convincing Minette of that was like talking to a bric
k wall. She didn’t even let her have a peek into the Magical trap screen. What if there were mimic-type spells for them to purchase, like fake treasure chests, the larger the more lovable?

  Arden sighed.

  Am I really this bad and impossible to work with?

  Just as fast as that question arose, came her sharp retort.

  Then again, I have to be. One of us has to be the sane, rational, and focused one. If being incorrigible keeps us alive, then I’ll do it. I’ll be the incorrigiblest pixie of all time!

  Minette purchased the blueprints for 100 shinies, then started buying pits. Arden only knew this because she saw Hugh the workercat sit on the workshop bench. A golden swirl of energy hovered in front of him. He passed his hands over it, causing it to spin faster.

  Once it was finished, the workercat would be able to drop the golden ball wherever the pit needed to be placed. Then, it would instantly become the pit that Minette ordered. Trap creation was a bit of a relay in that sense. One workercat created the trap, the next one would carry it to its placement point, and so on.

  Had she been herself, she would’ve instructed Minette to look into speed upgrades for the workercats. But, because she was the Minette version of Arden, she didn’t think she could ask about anything other than increased fluffiness levels.

  Arden switched off of the Overview mode. There was no use in watching things that she wasn’t a part of. It kind of reminded her of the exact thing that she had gotten away from. Her memories of her previous dungeon gave her a lancing headache.

  She leaned against the dirt wall. The hallway she stood in was a few bends away from the Dungeon Heart room. The distance gave her the necessary space in which she could breathe.

  A couple of the new cattens passed by, heeding her no mind. Based on their fur patterns, she suspected them to be Basily and Lerona, or, on second thought, perhaps they were Haunter and Brode. Every time she thought she came up with a reliable system of tracking them down, their menu screens proved her wrong.