The Dungeon Fairy: Two Choices: A Dungeon Core Escapade (The Hapless Dungeon Fairy Book 2)

by Jonathan Brooks

  Against her personal feelings against them, she had to acknowledge their impressive perseverance; up until the end, they all worked together to try to break out of their stone cage with a single-minded persistence. The two swords that the Fighters wielded were passed off to different people as they got tired, and although they were constructed and enchanted to withstand a lot of abuse, the weapons eventually became chipped, bent, and even broken towards the end. The damage they did to her Rotating Stone Bridge was quite significant as well, with huge portions of it chipped and sliced away by the enchanted blades.

  As much as she didn’t want to admit any type of admiration towards the leader who had seemed so intent on destroying her, she couldn’t help but watch with amazement as he lay slumped against the Stone Bridge trap, continuing to slam his bent and broken sword against it with the last of his strength while the others were all passed out unconscious and appearing ready to die at any time. With a final strike, his sword managed to break enough of the Rotating Stone Trap to shatter the entire thing, which quickly disappeared like her creatures did when they were destroyed.

  With the stone trap he was slumped against gone, the leader collapsed into the void it left when it disappeared and Tacca could see a hint of a smile on his face…which quickly disappeared when he saw the additional stone wall keeping him sealed inside. That was apparently too much for him because the Fighter closed his eyes and died less than a minute later from the lack of air. The other Raiders trapped with him followed soon after, and Tacca saw her CIPs rise by 5 Points after each death.

  While she was glad that they had died and that the threat they represented was gone, the Dungeon Core couldn’t help but feel bad about the way they had died. It was one thing to kill Raiders who delved through her dungeon with her traps and creatures; it was technically their choice to venture through dangerous obstacles looking to increase their strength and acquire rewards, so if they died…well…that was a direct result of that choice. This, though…this felt different; these Raiders had died due to what Tacca deliberately did, singling them out for death and not as a result of the dungeon.

  “You had no choice, Tacca,” Shale said softly to her after she reported that they had all died. “If you hadn’t done that, there is every possibility that they would’ve survived anything else you could’ve thrown at them, or even come back later if you forced them to leave. It’s…a horrible way to go, but they deserved it for what they were planning on doing to you; I doubt any at the DPRC would see it differently, either.”

  I know that, Shale, I do. I just wish there had been another way.

  “Well, there might have been if you’d had more time to plan and with more resources at your disposal,” he said matter-of-factly. “Sadly, that wasn’t the case, and it doesn’t appear – at least, so far – that anyone is missing these 5 yet.” Shale paused for a moment before asking, “Speaking of resources, what are you going to do with everything?”

  That confused her for a moment. What do you mean? I’ll just absorb all of them like I did with the others who died inside my dungeon— Wait…I don’t have to do that, do I?

  It was a rule that Dungeon Cores needed to “clean” up after themselves when a Raider died inside their dungeon. For reasons she could completely understand, having a corpse stick around to be potentially seen by the next group of Raiders to delve through was bad practice – and could cause some difficulties if, say, the new Raider group knew the person before they had perished. A need for vengeance was always a potential reaction by the Raiders from any death inside the dungeon, of course, so there was no need to exacerbate the feelings by leaving corpses scattered around.

  The gear with them was usually also absorbed because it couldn’t really be used by the Core. Most armor wouldn’t fit their creatures and was therefore unusable; weapons were sometimes useful depending on what a Core had as far as creatures that could use them, but they were generally absorbed because reusing a dead Raider’s identifiable weapon might engender that same need of vengeance that leaving a dead body around could ignite. The bottomless bags they frequently carried with them – at least among more experienced, higher-Level Raiders – could potentially be a treasure trove of items, but they were also keyed specifically to a Raider so that they could mentally retrieve whatever they were looking for easily.

  Without any way to re-key them, there was no way to access them; without being able to access the contents, they were basically just plain, unusable pouches. From what she had been told and had learned herself at DAPS, trying to access them through applications of Dungeon Force usually ended badly: If they didn’t explode and cause major damage to the dungeon, then some of the magical spells that created the bags were released and somehow warped in unpredictable ways – at least temporarily. The range of the explosions or warping was difficult to determine beforehand, so accidentally rupturing one could damage a corner of a room – or wipe out half of a dungeon, including a Core in the process. The same didn’t happen when these bags were destroyed by other means – physical or magical damage, for example – only if Dungeon Force were applied to it.

  As a result, Dungeon Cores usually just absorbed such bottomless bags if they were left behind, which was a rarity unless there was a full-group wipe of Raiders and no one was there to retrieve their gear before they left. In fact, most Raiders who delved typically didn’t leave their dead behind to be absorbed by the dungeon, unless they were forced to flee for their lives.

  Could the gear be saved and given out as rewards, then? Well – theoretically – yes, the items could be left in a pile that Raiders could pick up and acquire that way. They couldn’t be assigned as a “Reward” when a creature was killed or stashed in a treasure chest, however; if they weren’t part of the Reward Tiers, then there wasn’t much a Core could do with them otherwise. Hoarding them inside of a room was also not that great of an idea, especially not in a Core Room, as had been demonstrated by the unfortunate demise of Darlene – one of Tacca’s first Cores to whom she had bonded.

  But these Raiders were quite different. Not their bodies, necessarily, which Tacca took the slightest pleasure in absorbing to get rid of them; no, their gear was what was quite different. For one, it was thoroughly enchanted and mostly intact (nearly destroyed swords notwithstanding), which was a rarity – and therefore probably highly identifiable for anyone who came across it. This meant that she wouldn’t put it out for rewards to be picked up, not that she would with such valuable gear – it would set a precedent of her dungeon having extremely expensive gear, and could lead to angry Raiders in the future who didn’t find any of it later on.

  Secondly, Tacca’s unique situation meant that she had the ability to actually make use of the armor and remaining weapons. No other dungeon – that she knew of – had access to creatures in the form of Humans, Elves, and Gnomes.

  I think I see what you’re getting at, Shale. Very clever; I knew I kept you around for a reason.

  Her teasing tone made him blush a little and look away from her Core. “Yes, well, it just makes the most sense not to waste what practically wandered into your dungeon.”

  Over the next day, as more groups of Raiders delved through her dungeon without any problems – with constant surveillance by both Tacca and Shale – she finally rearmed all of the current traps in her Core Room. She then spent some time and DF to create some of her “unique” creatures down below, as well as slightly reducing the count of her creatures up above, in order to free up some of her Control Limit. By mid-afternoon of the next day, she had 2 Human Fighters, 1 Elven Caster, 1 Elven Healer, and a Gnome Scout; in addition, she also spent extra DF to equip them all with every Ability they had access to for their Variants. When they were all complete, she unsealed the tunnel where the Raiders had been slain and instructed her creatures to exchange their current Ragged and Basic armor and clothing for the enchanted sets left behind when she absorbed their bodies.

  Thankfully, it worked; she was momentarily concerned that
they wouldn’t be able to wield such powerful tools because they weren’t created by her, but she needn’t have worried so much. The Caster and the Healer picked up the intricately carved staff and mundane-looking steel mace left behind; the Healer’s weapon was the only object with minimal enchantments on it, which Tacca determined to be durability bonuses. The gorgeous bow that the Scout had been using was a little large for the Gnome, but it could still be used well enough – especially with the Accuracy enchantments on the weapon.

  The swords were pretty much trash by that point, after having broken in half and being banged up quite a bit. Instead of trying to salvage them, since she had no way to fix them back to the way they were before, Tacca just absorbed them and brought up her Reward Tiers to see what else she could arm them with. During her last increase in her Core Improvement Level, she had spent some Points to unlock Tier 2; she hadn’t needed to access it quite yet, since those Rewards would generally be too much for a dungeon of her difficulty.

  Reward Tier 2

  Reward

  Cost

  Gold Coin

  500 DF

  Refined Iron Dagger

  40 DF

  Refined Iron Shortsword

  40 DF

  Refined Iron Mace

  40 DF

  Refined Iron Axe

  40 DF

  Crafted Pine Bow

  40 DF

  Sturdy Maple Staff

  40 DF

  Iron-banded Oak Shield

  30 DF

  Again, nothing there that she would want to include in her current dungeon, but she could make use of the Refined Iron Shortsword available to her. Anything better than that would have to wait until another dying Raider dropped something usable, or until Reward Tier 4 was unlocked. Tier 2 gave an upgrade to weapons and the ability to produce Gold Coins; Tier 3 had upgrades to armor, and they went back and forth with each Tier from then on. Other rewards were added as well, including gemstones of different kinds, as well as enchanting scrolls of different rarities, potions, and other specialized Rewards dependent on dungeon composition.

  Therefore, Tacca created and armed her Fighters with Refined Iron Shortswords; it wasn’t much of an upgrade, and they paled in comparison to what the Raiders had used and destroyed in their efforts to escape, but they were better than nothing. She also added an Iron-banded Oak Shield to their off-hands, to utilize the Shield Slam Abilities that they possessed – since protecting themselves wasn’t really a priority with the quality of gear they were wearing.

  Once they were all equipped and as ready as possible, Tacca had them move two empty rooms up from where her Core was still located (at the very bottom of her dungeon) and stationed them there to prevent anyone—hopefully—from progressing any deeper. She was planning on placing some additional traps in the room as well, a mix of intense Enchantment-based ones and deadlier Projectile or Explosive traps; it was something she was planning to work on over the next few weeks as her DF allowed. As much as she would love to just shut her dungeon down for a day or two to fully fund her defenses, doing so might cause a stir with those still delving through her rooms on an amazingly consistent basis. If she absolutely had to, she would certainly do it, but for now she was trying to keep things as “normal” as possible.

  The next few days passed slowly – or so it seemed to Tacca – because she was paranoid about anyone coming into her dungeon before she had it fully defended; almost all of her concentration was fully focused on watching every single move the Raiders made and she was hung up on every word they said. The only time she wasn’t watching them, even as they walked up the exit staircase, was when she was placing additional traps down below to protect her Core. She wasn’t necessarily going overboard with it like Jeff the “Prepper” had, by filling up every inch of his dungeon with traps, but she was planning for the room containing her superbly armored creatures to have a very similar feel to it.

  She found that, although she was limited in the amount of DF she could pump into an Enchantment Trap, she could play with the dimensions and focus the intensity of the trap to produce some interesting results. The resulting creation was limited in area as a result, but quite a bit more powerful.

  Confusion Enchantment Trap

  The Confusion Enchantment Trap can be placed on any surface and is triggered by proximity. Any living being passing through the activation range will experience a level of confusion – determined by the strength of the trap – for a limited duration of time. Victims afflicted with confusion cannot retrigger additional Confusion Enchantment Traps until the duration has expired. All traps can be disabled with high enough Disarm Trap skills.

  Cost: 1200 DF (-60% Enchantment Specialization)

  Replacement Cost: 300 (-75% off current cost/Enchantment Specialization)

  Creation Time: 6 Hours

  Disarm Trap Resistance: 20

  Activation Range: 1.0ft X 1.0ft X 1.0ft

  Trigger Proximity: 0.2 ft

  Strength: 70.0

  Duration: 10.0 seconds

  Resistance Category: Mental

  Special Effects: Causes the mind of a victim passing through the Activation Range to become confused and they may attack allies

  Something like that was very similar in size to the tiny Confusion Enchantment Traps she had created to boost her CIPs over the threshold at the end of her countdown periods, but they were much more powerful. The Strength score of 70.0 was enough to overcome all but the strongest Mental Resistances – including the enchantments on her creatures’ armor. It also had an impressive Disarm Trap Resistance, meaning that someone would have had to train that Ability up quite a bit in order to bypass it safely. The trap also normally cost 3,000 DF to create, but since it was her Specialization it only cost 1,200 DF instead.

  The biggest downside to a trap like this, other than the expensive Dungeon Force cost – and the reason she wouldn’t normally use something like this up above in her normal dungeon rooms – was that the Activation Range and Trigger Proximity were quite small in comparison to her other traps. What that essentially meant was that someone would have to step on a very small, very defined area, just barely big enough to place a foot inside, in order to be affected by the Enchantment – and it would likely only affect one person at a time.

  That was why she was planning on placing dozens, or perhaps hundreds, of them along the ground, so that they would be difficult to avoid. Not just Enchantment traps that caused Confusion, but also ones that caused Fear, Rage, Despair, and even Phantom Pain; that last one was unusual in the fact that it created a sense of pain throughout the body, but the victims weren’t actually subjected to any injury. It was a bit severe, and its use was frowned upon by the DPRC – because it was akin to torture, which was something with which a dungeon wanted to avoid being associated. Sure, a Core could do all numbers of things to injure, maim, and kill Raiders all day long; torturing them for any length of time before either letting them go or killing them, however, was another no-no.

  It was shaping up to be an ongoing process of putting those all in, as well as some Explosive and Projectile traps that were nearby (which were not quite as intense, given that they cost a lot more) to help hasten the confused, afraid, and despairing victim’s death. Nevertheless, even with a few of them already there and her Human, Elven, and Gnome creatures armed and armored to help with the defense, Tacca already felt like her Core was better protected than nearly any other Core at her stage of existence.

  Just as she thought she could relax her extreme vigilance – even just a little – a group of Raiders walked inside her dungeon that appeared almost identical to those who had come to destroy her Core.

  Chapter 12

  Tacca nearly started to absorb all of her creatures and traps for their DF when she saw the group walk into her dungeon, but Shale fortunately stopped her.

  “Wait! I don’t think these are the same as the others.”

  What? How can you tell? She was still poised to start the absorption p
rocess but held off while she listened to her Dungeon Fairy.

  “I can’t sense or see any enchantments on their gear, and I can visually see that it isn’t quite as high of quality, either. Hold off for a moment, if you will; you’ll still have plenty of time to prepare if I’m wrong.”

  Tacca put her sudden preparations on hold while she looked at them closer, trusting for the moment that what Shale said was correct. She relaxed the tiniest bit when she observed the plate armor of the two Fighters out front, which was a well-used, dented, and thoroughly scratched-up lower-quality steel. The chainmail underneath the plates was visibly rusted in places, as if it wasn’t properly cared for in between delves. None of it had the slight, barely visible glow that indicated to her that it was enchanted, either.

  Looking at the others, she saw basically the same sort of thing in their attire. While the Healer’s and Caster’s robes were clearly embroidered silk, they were frayed in spots and worn nearly through in a couple of locations. The superb leather armor worn by the Scout – which Tacca suddenly realized was a Gnome this time, instead of a Human like the last group dressed like this – was tooled in delicate designs around the chest area, but there were also obvious places where the original armor had been mended multiple times; it was very well done, but it was plain that the armor had seen some action.