The Crafter's Dungeon: A Dungeon Core Novel (Dungeon Crafting Book 1)

by Jonathan Brooks

  Monster Seed Schematics:

  2

  And with that, her maximum capacities in Mana and Raw Materials doubled again – as well as her Ambient Mana Absorption. Additionally, like before, Sandra could sense even farther out from her Core…and she got a surprise.

  She wasn’t quite alone down there.

  About 15 feet above and towards what she had been considering the front of her Core – and nearer what she assumed was the surface – was the beginning of a large colony of Territory Ants. They were only about an inch long in length and half as wide, but what they lacked in size they more than made up with their deadliness. Individually, they weren’t much of a threat, but they rarely attacked anyone by themselves; instead, whenever a foreign entity entered their territory, they attacked together as an entire colony and swarmed the enemy with seemingly endless numbers – and their piercing mandibles.

  They were bad enough while she was still alive; during her travels with her father, they had lost three horses over the years when the poor animals had unknowingly stumbled across a few colonies. Sandra and her father only escaped harm themselves because, while the Territory Ants were vicious if they got ahold of you, they were relatively slow in comparison to a running person and didn’t care to venture far from their territory to pursue threats.

  All of which was going to be an issue if Sandra kept expanding upwards. Fortunately, at least for now, the few tunnels she saw on the edge of her Area of Influence were self-contained and didn’t show any signs of digging in her direction. She had to be cautious of what she did now, because if she accidentally opened up a pathway down to her Core, there was very little her dungeon monsters could do to prevent her constructs being overrun and killed.

  Now that she had seen them and determined that she wasn’t in any immediate danger, Sandra looked at what else had come from her Core Size upgrade.

  Constructs Creation Options

  Name:

  Mana Cost:

  Clockwork Spider

  5

  Small Animated Shears

  10

  Tiny Automaton

  20

  Rolling Force

  25

  Segmented Centipede

  100 (Mana and Seed Unavailable)

  She wasn’t sure exactly what a “Rolling Force” monster would be, but it was at least available for her to create. Not so with the Segmented Centipede, which not only cost more than twice the amount of Mana she could now hold, but she didn’t even have a seed capable of inhabiting it. And, unlike the last Core Size increase, she didn’t have access to any new seeds which would make that possible.

  Regardless of those disappointments, Sandra continued to expand – in the opposite direction of the Territory Ant colony. Because she couldn’t see farther than an estimated 16 feet, she didn’t know what was in that direction or even if it would lead aboveground, but she didn’t really have much choice. She had some options to go a little more left or right, but if that didn’t pan out, she’d have to go down – a choice she’d rather not have to make. As much as she enjoyed the security of being inside a relatively safe hole in the ground, she realized she missed the sun and sky, trees and…people.

  She and her father hadn’t stayed in one place for more than a week essentially since she was born, so she was used to being outdoors. She was comfortable in nature; she had spent many a night camped among the forests of the eastern part of Muriel, holed up in a way-cave in the mountainous north, or even spent an evening or two huddling together with him to stay warm during the cold desert nights in the south. To be confined underground in a – granted, it was getting bigger – small underground cave was…unnatural to her.

  Not only that, but not having anyone to talk to – now that Winxa the absentee Dungeon Fairy had abandoned her – was making her a little lonely. Even if she were just able to see and observe someone from afar, she thought that might be enough to scratch the socialization itch that was starting to make itself known.

  With a mental sigh, Sandra got back to work digging out and converting the newly accessible walls into Mana.

  * * *

  It took approximately two weeks of digging out the back, sides, and some of the floor of her cave before she finally reached her limit. While the ceiling was still only about 8 feet tall – because she didn’t want to dig down too far – all but the front wall was extended out to 16 feet. The room was feeling enormous by that time, especially when she considered how small her dungeon monsters were in relation to it now.

  Sandra’s inch-and-a-half tall Clockwork Spiders appeared almost the size of a real-life spider now that she had some height and a better perspective. The Tiny Automaton didn’t look much better at three inches tall, but it still continued to maintain its plodding (and somehow soothing) pace around her core.

  And because she had a plethora of resources now (both Mana and RM), she had experimented with creating the two constructs she hadn’t seen yet.

  The Small Animated Shears were strange, but awesome at the same time. When they formed from a Tiny Copper Orb, they were literally a small pair of razor-sharp-looking shears about 3 inches long from tip to handle. That was interesting enough, but the best part about them was the fact that they moved by flying through the air.

  Soon, Sandra had created an entire flock of flying Shears that swooped through the air and accumulated much of the ambient Mana that she had been missing up to that point. While her Spiders and Automaton had siphoned up the Mana on the floor pretty well, there was as much or more that they couldn’t reach because it was above their heads. With a full dozen of the Small Animated Shears, however, they were easily able to acquire most of it.

  She also discovered what “Rolling Force” meant. It was literally a ball about 5 inches in diameter that rolled; she wasn’t sure exactly what metal it was made of, or if it had some sort of extra weight in the middle of its form, but it was heavy. After discovering that she couldn’t control it directly, Sandra accidentally sent it careening around the room when she told it to move, and it crushed one of her Spiders like it wasn’t even there.

  It was a happy accident, fortunately, because she learned what happened to one of her dungeon monsters when it was destroyed. Even though she wasn’t fully “connected” to her Spider, she nonetheless felt a temporary loss when it ceased moving, but it was gone so quickly that she barely felt it. It was good knowing that she could tell when one of her constructs “died”, as she couldn’t be connected to every single one all the time – especially the flying Shears, as they made her a little uncomfortable in the middle of their flight. That, and they didn’t have eyes, so she wasn’t sure where she was looking at things from.

  Also as a result of her “accident”, the Clockwork Spider that had been destroyed evaporated into nothing, leaving behind the Tiny Copper Orb Seed loot. Since it was near the edge of her Area of Influence at the time and not near her Core, when Sandra tried to use it to create another Spider, it was almost as if whatever governed the operations of a Dungeon Core couldn’t “see” it. It was only when she had her Tiny Automaton walk over, pick it up, and then bring it close to where the other Orbs originated near her Core, was she able to use it again. Good to know that I can reuse them, even if I have to bring them close.

  All in all, she ended up losing 10 Mana from her Spider’s demise (the original 5 and another 5 to bring forth another one), but it was a valuable exchange because of the information she gained from it. She could now see why dungeons sent their monsters out far and wide; the amount of ambient Mana that that one Spider had funneled to her over the last few weeks had to be at least 40 to 50 times what it cost her to create it.

  After that, Sandra made a half-dozen more Rolling Forces because they were able to move around faster, but only after she had learned to control them properly without endangering any of her other constructs. They were now much more efficient in getting around her new Area of Influence, and she thought they would make great defenders if they ever we
re invaded by something.

  Speaking of potential invaders, the nearby Territory Ants had maintained their distance and showed no sign of being aware of her presence – for which she was grateful.

  With her now basically at the limit of what she could excavate within her Area of Influence – as well as having about a dozen extra Small Copper Orbs placed on the floor around her Core – Sandra decided that it was about time she “Sized-up” again. When she was full of Mana, she initiated the upgrade to Size 4 and suffered through the period of inactivity, once again with her sanity maintained by the presence of her nearby constructs. This time she could even sense a few flying Shears as they drifted by in addition to the clomping of her Tiny Automaton.

  When everything came back into focus, Sandra found that her capacities and absorption had doubled again, though she didn’t receive any new constructs. She did receive a new monster “seed” in the shape of a locked Average Copper Orb, which looked like it was going to be a combination of four Small Copper Orbs to unlock it. Seeing everything in order, she looked around her new expanded Area of Influence, but her concentration froze in fright above her.

  The Territory Ants were on the move.

  Chapter 10

  The Core Size upgrade must’ve taken longer than I had thought. Despite it only feeling like a couple of hours had passed, the progress the Territory Ants had made since she last saw them was staggering. They were only about a foot away now and were continuing to extend their tunnels in a downward spiral. The farther they journeyed down, the longer it took them to dispose of the dirt and stone they were dislodging. After watching them work for a minute in horrified stillness, Sandra estimated that she had less than an hour before they punched through her ceiling – and she was far from prepared for that.

  The one good thing she picked up from her observations was that the Ants weren’t digging through the harder rocks in their way; rather, they either utilized a small group of their kind to pick up and move the smaller ones or just bypassed them completely by making a detour. Regardless of the choice they made, it was obvious that they weren’t strong enough to punch through the harder stone – which was something that Sandra thought she could take advantage of.

  Remembering her initial conversation with Winxa, she recalled that the Dungeon Fairy had mentioned using her Raw Materials for shoring up her defenses. Therefore, Sandra figured there must be a way to use what she pulled out from the walls in a different way than just creating monster seeds. She realized that what she needed to do was protect her core from above.

  Almost as if they were homing in on her Dungeon Core, she could see that the Ants’ final destination was going to end up directly above her. If they broke through at that point, there was a possibility that they could drop right on top of her and destroy her Core as they dropped down. Her relative safety floating in the middle of the air wouldn’t help in that situation.

  Winxa! Where are you when I need you?

  Sandra’s plea went unanswered. After about a minute of waiting for the nonexistent help from her Dungeon Fairy, she decided to improvise and try to do it herself. Looking into the ceiling above her, she again observed its composition and saw that if she didn’t do something soon, the primarily dirt and tiny stones in between her and the Territory Ants would be essentially useless.

  Can I turn it into a big slab of stone, maybe?

  She wasn’t sure if she could do all that, but she could certainly try. Reaching out to her Core while concentrating on the space above her, Sandra “grabbed” a few units of Raw Materials she had left over and shoved it toward the ceiling, all the while thinking about turning it to hard stone. Against her not-so-confident expectations, it actually worked!

  A circle of dull grey stone approximately an inch wide and half that deep appeared on the dirt ceiling, directly above her Dungeon Core. Sandra thought it might have been larger if she had more Mana, because as soon as she felt the dirt change to stone, her 2 units of Mana were siphoned off and infused into stone.

  So, apparently, I need both Raw Materials and Mana to create the stone; it actually makes sense, though, because when I make Monster Seeds it takes both as well – though the seeds are certainly smaller.

  Because Copper was a more valuable resource as opposed to stone, it made sense that she could make a larger amount of stone when compared the same amount of material and Mana used in the creation of a Copper Orb. Despite the better conversion ratio, it still meant that she was going to have to race to get a proper overhead shield of stone in place before the Ants arrived.

  Sandra spent the next hour absorbing material from the farther sections of her cave, converting some to Mana, and then using the 2 Mana/minute amount she was gaining from her roaming constructs to extend he stone shield. She could’ve made more of her dungeon monsters earlier – before she “Sized-up” – but what she had constructed previously was more than enough to siphon the ambient Mana in her cave. Now, with it expanding bit-by-bit, she wished she had made at least a couple more to take advantage of the additional space.

  Regrets weren’t going to help her now, and neither was making any additional constructs; she spent all her accumulated Mana on creating a large stone dome above her head, which was costly but not terribly so. At any other time, Sandra thought she could turn her entire cave – and further areas she excavated – to stone within a day or less, but with the advancement of the Territory Ants, she didn’t have that kind of time.

  Why are they heading toward me in the first place? she wondered for the hundredth time while she was creating the overhead stone shield. The only explanation she could come up with – especially when she started looking at the Ant colony itself – was the fact that her Area of Influence had extended up and past the area where the Territory Ant Queen was busy pushing out eggs. Maybe they can sense that I can “see” them now and they felt threatened by it.

  Regardless of the reason, the fact that they were only minutes away from breaching her dungeon cave wall was worrisome. Sandra now had a stone dome that extended approximately 12 feet out from directly above her Core in every direction, which would help to prevent the Ants from dropping straight down onto her. Another few hours would encapsulate the entire room, but at the moment that was the best she could do.

  The Territory Ants reached her stone shield and immediately turned in four different directions, with lines of workers quickly digging and removing the dirt from their explorations. Sandra was half-hoping that they would give up after they couldn’t find an easy access point, but they continued on their excavations with no indication of being frustrated. As a result, within five minutes of first reaching her stone dome, four tunnels were dug by the industrious Ants in four places at the edge of her protection.

  Although her dome was curved slightly according to the shape of her ceiling, they still ended far above the floor; Sandra thought that the insects would just drop in and hit the floor. Unfortunately, she forgot that these Ants were adept at navigating through underground environs.

  Seriously? That’s not fair. As soon as they broke through, the Territory Ants started to crawl along the underside of the dome, as if crawling and hanging off stone upside down was an everyday occurrence. Sandra immediately sent her Animated Shears towards the tenacious insects converging on the center of the stone ceiling. She knew that if she didn’t hurry, they would reach the spot where they could easily drop down and destroy her.

  In just a few seconds, dozens of Ants were already making their way across the underside of the stone dome, but she had a dozen Animated Shears there to prevent them from getting any closer. Fortunately, despite their ability to stick upside down to her dome, Sandra was pleased to see that they weren’t gripping on with much force. With each slice of her Shears, another Ant was knocked off, landing on the floor of the cave with a heavy impact – but failing to do any lasting damage.

  Unlike a typical dungeon core, Sandra wasn’t particularly interested in killing any beasts or sentient races for the
ir Mana. An exception to that, however, were insects; she didn’t really care for them and felt no compunction in eliminating them. Still, she didn’t want to have to – she’d rather find some way to block them from entering her dungeon in the first place.

  Warning!

  While dungeon monsters can still be created from monster seeds, any physical changes to your dungeon while there are invaders inside is prohibited. Please wait until all invaders have been eliminated either through death or voluntary removal.

  Sandra had tried to plug up the tunnels’ exits with more stone, but she received a notification shutting that idea down. It would’ve only been a temporary measure until she could fully seal off her cave, but now there wasn’t a likelihood of that happening at all.

  The Ants that landed unhurt on the floor quickly righted themselves and skittered toward her Dungeon Core. Although she was floating four feet above, she felt a spike of fear go through her when the first dozen Ants stopped directly underneath her. She couldn’t tell exactly what they were doing at first, but it didn’t take long to see that they were climbing on top of each other, creating a rudimentary pyramid.

  A pyramid of incensed Territory Ants that was growing taller by the moment.

  Before it could grow taller than a foot, four of Sandra’s Rolling Forces smashed into the formation in a large explosion of smashed Ant and construct parts. Although they were tiny insects in comparison to her metal balls of destruction, the Territory Ants had a surprisingly tough exterior and their digging mandibles were particularly sharp. As a result, even though her dungeon monsters had squashed or otherwise killed dozens of the invading Ants, her Rolling Forces took quite a bit a damage as well.

  One of her metal balls ended up being split in half, falling apart as some unlucky impacts against the sharp “weapons” of the Ants carved it up. As it fell apart, Sandra could see what appeared to be some clockwork parts inside, though they were centered around a central core of an amorphous substance that glowed a dull blue color. Of course, seconds after it fell apart, the entire construct disappeared, leaving behind the Small Copper Orb seed it was made from.