Dungeon Master

by Andrew Bardsley

  Damage/Heal

  Fire shot

  Journeymen

  50

  50

  117.5

  Frost blast

  Journeymen

  50

  50

  117.5

  Light

  Journeymen

  10

  0

  Healing force

  Journeymen

  10

  50

  117.5

  Eye in the sky

  Journeymen

  10

  Staff enchantment

  Journeymen

  -

  Storage spell

  Journeymen

  Immobilization

  Journeymen

  Max MP

  Immobilizes an object

  Cook

  Apprentices

  5

  Cook a meal

  Wash

  Apprentices

  2

  Washes body and clothes

  Tidy/Clean

  Apprentices

  3

  Completes all the house work for you

  Fire/Ice ward

  Journeymen

  50

  50

  Creates a fire or ice ward to damage anybody crossing

  117.5

  Illusion

  Journeymen

  50

  Creates an image that is projected from the mind of the caster

  Force blast

  Journeymen

  50

  50

  Blast of energy that used to move or apply pressure to an object

  Mental heal

  -

  -

  Works to bring people back from the edge of madness

  Magical shield

  Journeymen

  -

  -

  Produces a magical shield over a designated volume

  Ceras was sitting there looking over the few more spell that he had gained, but was disturbed by a loud panicking voice.

  "I need you to get to the top of the dungeon immediately as we have a large problem," said Hidden-Caverns with urgency in his voice that caused Ceras to jump up and immediately run.

  "Moving as fast as I can. What is it?"

  "Just get their as fast as possible!"

  As he ran out of his wooden apartment door, that was now in the lowest level where the dungeon center had been relocated to; he ran past the newly cut tunnels with the magical inscription glowing on the walls. Running as fast as he could, with his heart beating as if it was an erratic Metrodome, he barreled straight into the portal. With a conference that Hidden-Caverns would be used to send him to the castle at the top of the dungeon, that Grikius had been working on with the dungeon's minions' monster.

  This was all to provide a grand entrance with amenities for adventures when they arrived at the dungeon.

  As Ceras exited the portal with a flash of dark light that somehow warped the surrounding space for a brief second, he heard the panicked voice of Hidden-Caverns shouting, "Go up to the battlements just above the gatehouse and you'll see what we are dealing with."

  Ceras was too out of breath to stop and ask any more questions of the dungeons controlling the mind as he exited through the large guarded wooden door into the castles keep. The orc guards with their long spears and armor were looking very nervous, which immediately worried Ceras as it took a lot to get the orc warriors to show any sign of weakness, as they perceived it. Running from the top of the keep where the portal was located the running man took the stone downwards spiraling stairs two at a time past hurrying orc guards that, getting to their defensive position, for an emergency.

  At the bottom of the spiral stairway Ceras ran through the large hall that contained the entrance into the dungeon first level that had been the mine shaft entrance before the castle had been built and out of the fortified doors that were being held open by some of the orc guards that had been instructed to open them for him to exit the central keep of the castles.

  Running across the half-finished courtyard towards the outer building, Ceras ran past all the stone and wooden building under construction, in the courtyard, that would become accommodation and shops for the adventures when they came. The kobold and troll that were busy doing the work of construction had all disappeared as many tools were lying around as if they had just been dropped. It was a quick run up to the large gate tower, that was the main gatehouse to the castle courtyard, and into one of the side entrances that allowed Ceras to start running up another winding spiral stairway to the battlements on the top of the gatehouse with its view of the surrounding mountains.

  At the top, the first thing he noticed was that it was full of orc archers and Grikius, who was patting his dog as it was wining and trying to hide behind his legs. Wondering what could have caused the normally fearless dog to be so fearful Ceras ran to beside them and looked over the wall of the tower gatehouse.

  As he first scanned the ground, he was saw nothing out of place, but then when he looked into the sky, he saw a dot in the distance.

  "It coming around for another pass," said Grikius as he was biting his bottom lip and petting his distressed dog.

  Rather than ask, Ceras just watched as the dot soon became a small dark object with lines that looked like wings flapping in the distance. When the creature in the distance started to come close, Ceras dropped his staff as he saw a creature from the legendary levels that he had only heard about. Instinctive fear flooded his mind as he started to make out the creature's shape with it dark red large wings on its large serpentine body with a long spiky tail.

  "A dragon," said Ceras to nobody in particular as he felt disperse for the dungeon as the massive red dragon landing in front of the gate.

  "You bet," said Grikius.

  Wide ruby eyes sit well within the creature's soft, angular skull, which gives the creature a fierce looking appearance look out on the castles gate tower. Several enormous horn growths sit atop its head, just above its cat-like ears. Fan-like skin and bone structures run down the sides of each of its jawlines. Its nose is long and has two enormous, rounded nostrils, and there's a horn on its chin. Two huge teeth poke out from the side of its mouth and reveal only a fraction of the terror hiding inside as flame flicked out of its mouth in a lazy stream.

  A huge neck runs down from its head and into a body. The top is covered in scale-like skin, and a row of armor plating runs down its spine. Its bottom was covered in massive scales and was a lighter red from differently than the rest of its body. Four thick limbs carry its body and allow the creature to stand arrogantly and poised with each limb has four digits, each of which ends in huge nails seemingly made of bone that crushed into the hard-packed ground. Enormous wings grow to start from its shoulders and end just passed its shoulder blades. The wings were almost angel-like, a specialized layer of skin as all that's visible inside and curved talons grow from each ending like giant scythes. Its narrow tail ends in a sharp barb point and is covered in the same scale-like skin as its body.

  Unconscious, as he was acting by relaxing, Ceras picked up his staff as he looked on with horror, as everybody was quiet on the top of the tower.

  "This is not good," said an agonizing Hidden-Caverns in Ceras mind as he looks on the red flaming dragon in front of him that seemed to be the size the keep with its massive body, "maybe it will not be able to fit inside the dungeon entrance, and we'll be safe."

  "I don't think that we'll be so lucky!"

  As Hidden-Cavern said this, the dragon's body started to glow with a bright red light that seemed to distort space around it as if thousands of lights were drawn inward towards its center. Ceras and the other had to look away as the red light became bright, and their eyes started to hurt. When the light had disappeared, Ceras looked back and saw the large dragon had been replaced by an elegantly dressed woman with long red-black hair that came down to her waist. She was wearing a red and black dress that enhanced her majestic appearances. On he
r face was a frown as if something was making her uncomfortable. With determination, she started to work forward to the closed wooden and iron door of the gatehouse.

  --

  Shoavneon was in a foul mood as she had been flying for age, over the mountains from her normal hunting grounds. She was not only uncomfortable; she was also tried, and now there was a tower full of orc arches pointing loaded cross-bows at her. Amongst the orc she could see with her excellent eyesight two human men, now she thought young men are staring at her with looks of fear. Normally she would have been happy to see abject fear from any other living creature, as was her right as what she was, but this time it just annoyed her as she was just too uncomfortable to be bothered with any showing her destructive ability's, she just wanted somewhere to rest.

  Before she could shout, her commands to the creatures on top of the newly cut stone tower, a single arrow shot towards her. When it was within a few meters it disintegrated in the air and the wooden shaft burnt to a cloud of smoke and the metal tip vaporized with a flashed as the metal burnt in the atmosphere.

  Signing with exasperation as Shoavneon had never been in danger, but this had annoyed her as she was trying to talk, but she managed to keep her temper under control for a few brief seconds until more arrows started to shot toward her. Each of them burnt with the same level of intensity the first arrow had done and started to annoy the dragon more and more as they rained down. At the limit of the patient for a species that are normally waiting for a few seconds before taking action, she now was completely angry with how she has been treated as if she was a common creature.

  She is rising on the elegant waist to pointing her hand toward the top of the tower of the gatehouse, a jet of fire formed in front of her hand, with its flame swirling yellow-red with dark smoke in the twisting flame. The roaring cone of fire moves quickly as if flew the distance toward the parapets the archers were shooting at her from and quickly engulfed the top for several seconds.

  After she had stopped the jet of flames Shoavneon walked forward without bothering to look at the effect of what she had done to the creatures on top of the tower, as the rain of arrows had stopped, she presumed that they were all burnt to ashes.

  Stomping forward now angry with having been interrupted as she was about to talk, Shoavneon saw the large dark wooden door with iron twisted into the wood as if the materials had grown together as if intertwining branch of wood and iron. She admired the lattices work of the material in the door wondering how they had produced the effect, but still raised her arm and blasted the large barrier into smitheries that sprayed all over the castle inner courtyard with a force that throw everything that had been lying on ground on the courtyard into the opposing wall of the wall around the castles.

  In the courtyard, Shoavneon saw the keep with its wooden door that must lead to the entrance of the dungeon into the depth that she wanted to go.

  Walking very slowly as she was still feeling uncomfortable, she made her way to the door of the keep and pointed again, this time limiting her blast strength and just breaking the doors apart providing her entrance into the keep. The sound wave reverberated around the walls of the castles echoing as if it was in the middle of a thunderstorm. After a few seconds, the sound dissipated and was replaced by the loud sound of charging orcs rushing out to meet her from the broken keep's door.

  "This is getting tedious," she said to the air around her as he formed the mental image of a spell in her mind.

  Shoavneon held up her elegant hands in cupping shape, as she blows onto her palms with breath that flows white with plasma energy. Out of her hands, a small fireball raised up, with another one flowing it immediately. Soon around her were hundreds of fireballs twisting and turning as if they were firefly on a dark night.

  When the orcs that had their spears leveled as if they could do any damage were closer to Shoavneon the fireball sped away from her as if they were being guided by an unseen hand, each of them hitting an orc warrior in the chest burning a hole about the size of a fist, that smoldered with smoke as each of the warriors fell to the ground. The balls of fires then returned to their mistress to surround her as they are now orbiting in a sphere of fire.

  Shoavneon smiled to herself as she saw the bodies of the orcs glow with white light as the dungeon absorbed them into the ground, and she thought greedy dungeon, not wasting any energy.

  Still, with the orbiting fireballs, she walked carefully into the keep through the doors that were in pieces and entered a large hall that was in the process of being finished with tool around the place where the creature had been carving into the rock.

  Shoavneon looked around in admiration of what artwork she could see as it had a sense of beauty portraying great skill in the sculpturing of the pieces. She stopped for a while to look at a statue of a man fighting a monster in a forest scene and nearly felt that she was there seeing the battle in all its glory. Sighing with old regrets, in that she had always admired the beauty of art but never had to the temperament of produces any, as her kind were more capable of destruction than creation.

  Getting more and more impressed as she walked around the hall as she studied the art sculptures, she eventually left the hall in a better mood than she had been in for a few days of flying here, sighing as she soon hoped that she would be able to rest in a quiet place. The dungeon entrance archway was still in the process of being finished as it was partially covered by some scaffolding with tools all on the floor as they had been left by creatures carving.

  Entering the first level of the dungeon Shoavneon hummed as she walked down a long cut out corridor that had steel doors at the end that were locked and bolted from this side. Standing at the steel door, she gently placed her hand on the surface and let a bit of her power from the core of raging fire, in her, being flow into the metal of the door. In a few seconds, her hand was surrounded by glowing hot metal as it first turned red and the white radiating pure energy. The whole surface seemed to integrate all at once and seemed to fall down as it melted forming into a pool of glowing metal on the ground that smoldered with metal vapor. Shoavneon stepped through the molten metal as she seemed not to be affected by the intense temperature of the glowing white liquid as she proceeded into the dungeon.

  Looking around with a look of surprise, she had not expected to see the first level of the dungeon so empty as it had just been tunneling out creating an initial large hall that was still under construction.

  "That's surprising," she said in a curious tone as if she was addressing the air, "normally dungeons have the first level sorted out by this time, maybe I've misjudged you. Oh well, we'll see as I proceed."

  Wandering through the first level of the dungeon, to Shoavneon it seemed to be large halls placed after each other in a complicated maze of corridors that were still under construction. Casting a magical spell to find the way, she sent thousands of a small flame swarming like inset down the different corridors mapping out the routes to the next level of the dungeon.

  Sitting down for a few minutes as the flames finished exploring every area of the level producing a fiery map in her mind Shoavneon was able to proceed at a relaxed pace has enjoyed being able to relax, by being off her feet for a few minutes. Walking slowly through the corridors and hall for what seems like an hour Shoavneon was eventually come to a spiral stairway into the depths of the earth. Shoavneon noticed that in the exit hall that a dungeon portal was active.

  Descending the stair slowly at her own pace, that had slowed recently over time the dragon, again enjoyed the quality of the stone caving's decorating the wall of the stairwell from floor to floor covering the ceiling as well. Shoavneon stopped for a few minutes to examine a section that was depicting a forest landscape, and wondered about the level of detail involved in the carving; it was as if little hands and sharp tools had been used to complete the work. Shoavneon knew that the dungeon would have at its services many smaller minions to do the work, but she wanted to meet the person that was the artist directing the
work.

  Moving on with a sigh, she continued until reaching the bottom of the stairs, and into the reception hall that had a dungeon portal glowing with energy. This hall had been decorated in patterns on the wall depicting many mazes with a carved beast at the center of each maze. Shoavneon just had to spend some time looking an admiring the idea behind the carvings she could see. With an improving mood, she set off into the labyrinth with a smile on her face as he loved forward to a good puzzle.

  Chapter 16 Being Observant Helps

  Symania was very nervous as she waited on the third level, with Rhef, Rinaldo and a large group of monsters under Rinaldo command preparing to fight the dragon that was descending into the dungeon.

  "Ceras, Grikius and that annoying dog of his have mostly recovered from the resurrection and will be with you shortly, to try help if they can," said the despondent voice of the dungeon, "she seems to be playing with the labyrinth as if it's just a toy to be solved. I never heard somebody giggle so much over deadly traps. Well at least somebody is enjoying themselves today."

  "Wonderful," muttered Rhef, "am glad she is so amused by it."

  Symania looked around the level and wondered if they were prepared for this battle. Rinaldo had thousands of monsters of all levels arrayed in the open area in front of the entrance door to the level. The third level was under construction as the most of the dungeon and now was just a large empty cavern that the worms had just burrow out of the rock. The magical lights that were positioned around the army seemed to be an island of light in the darkness of the vast cavern.

  Rhef had wonderful plans for this level, but Symania wondered if they would ever be seen as reports from Hidden-Cavern of the power of the dragon, were not good. The dragon lady with easy had completely killed all of the defenders in the castle, and now the dungeon's labyrinth was not presenting any obstacle to her progress. Hidden-Caverns had even said that the dragon lady seems to be enjoying herself and looking at the sculpting of the artwork on the dungeon walls.