Dungeon Core Academy 1

by Alex Oakchest

  As the night wore on my essence reached 100 again, and I started to get anxious about finishing my dungeon. After all, there was no telling when the overseers might return.

  Then, on cue, there was a knock on a door, way across the dungeon.

  CHAPTER 18

  “If it isn’t my favorite ex-core, miner extraordinaire little girl!” I said, after mentally unlocking the door and having Tomlin carry Vedetta into the dungeon. To her credit, she did a great job pretending the kobold was kidnapping her.

  “I’ll have to be quick,” she said. “Mom needs me later, and my brothers are no help.”

  “Send her my regards.”

  “Ah yeah. Mom? A dungeon core sends his well wishes. I don’t think so. Thank you for the thought, though.”

  “Did you find any iron?”

  “Some. Not a lot, but some. Let me show Tomlin where to dig.”

  “Woah. Hold on a second. Show me.”

  “Oh? You dig things for yourself now, do you?”

  “No, but despite all appearances, my dungeon confirms to a very strict plan. I can't have a kobold digging up holes everywhere.”

  “Hmph. Fine. Do you have a dungeon map?”

  “What core wouldn’t?”

  With a mental command, I made a map appear in front of us. It showed my core root, loot room, worm larder, and the three unassigned rooms. Tiny symbols displayed our current location, as well as the fire beetles who I had station as guards in room 2, which would eventually become the hero entrance. Unfortunately, it was entirely lacking trap and puzzle symbols now, but that would hopefully change soon.

  Vedetta pointed out a section of the third room, in the corner.

  “If you dig a small tunnel a few yards there, and then go up a little, you should find some iron.”

  “That’s much more precise than I expected.”

  “I told you; I’m a pretty good miner.”

  “Then why haven’t you found what you need yet?”

  “The wundaroot? It’s a much rarer substance than iron, and my mining level isn’t high enough yet. I’ll find it eventually, though. Now, I better go.”

  “No problem. Oh, make sure you flee the dungeon screaming and waving your arms. It has to appear like you’re escaping.”

  She nodded. “Will do.”

  She then raised her arms, screamed, and fled the dungeon.

  I felt much happier now. In fact, I was buzzing with excitement. Tomlin turned to me with a grim look on his face.

  “Tomlin has to dig now, I suppose?” he said.

  I grinned. I had planned a surprise for him, and I guessed it was time to let him know.

  “Not so fast. Wait a second.”

  Create kobold.

  Essence left me, and just as before, a figure took shape before my imaginary eyes, and soon I had a second kobold.

  He was a little shorter than Tomlin, and had inherited more of the wolf side than lizard. He had fine, bristle-like hairs all over his head, and his eyes shone with cunning.

  “This is your clanmate,” I said. “You, Tomlin, are his supervisor. Would you like to name him?”

  “Tomlin name him?”

  “I told you, you’re a lieutenant now. He will be under your direct supervision as a miner.”

  “Thanks, Dark Lord!”

  “Don’t mention it. Now, what’s his name?”

  Tomlin pondered on this.

  Then he pondered some more.

  To be honest, I grew a little tired of all the pondering. “Out with it!”

  Tomlin approached the new kobold with a giant smile on his face and put his claw on its shoulder. The new kobold looked at him warily. “Tomlin names you Wylie, new friend.”

  “Wylie? I don’t know what I expected, but not that,” I said.

  “Wylie was a littermate in the academy. Best littermate. But Wylie is now in another core dungeon.”

  “At least you have a friend, now,” I said. Then I turned to Wylie. “Welcome to your new home. A few things you should know. You are a miner, and Tomlin is your boss. There are worms in the larder just over there, and there is a door in room 4 that should stay locked at all times. If a girl enters the dungeon, she is not to be attacked. Oh, and whistling is allowed here.”

  Kobold created: Wylie [Miner Lvl 1]

  “Greetings!” said Wylie, more comfortable now. His voice was much higher than Tomlin’s, and he seemed to have a smile permanently fixed on his face now that he had been properly introduced to his surroundings.

  “Come on, Wylie, Tomlin will show you where to dig.”

  The two kobolds trudged off together, and not long after, I heard the reassuring sound of pickaxes hitting mud.

  It was a full eight hours later when the sounds of mining stopped, and a message appeared in front of me.

  A beautiful, beautiful message.

  You have received: Iron deposits x150!

  Now, my friends, it was time to make some traps.

  CHAPTER 19

  Trap construction and placement is an art form. You might not think so, but you aren’t a dungeon core, so I completely understand. To a gem like myself, it is as fulfilling an activity as I can think of. Almost as fun as some human things I can sorta remember really, really enjoying. I couldn’t wait to get started.

  While Tomlin and Wylie re-built part of the wall they’d excavated to get to the iron, with Wylie doing most of the work now that Tomlin was a kobold of authority, I hopped to room two.

  This was the most northern of my dungeon rooms, and it was here where I had planned to construct an entrance.

  Now, though, floating there, I realized that there wasn’t enough distance between it and the loot room. Seriously, it would have taken a bunch of pathetic heroes twenty minutes to battle their way to their prize.

  That wouldn’t do. No use making it easy for them, was it? In fact, you might say it went against every dungeon core principle to do so.

  Considering that, I had my kobolds friends dig another tunnel going north-west, and they then dug out another room, another tunnel, and yet another room. This expanded the reach of my dungeon greatly.

  But…it still wasn’t enough. It was all too much of a straight path from dungeon entrance to loot room.

  So, I had my kobolds place a door in the furthest room. From here, they dug out a circular tunnel that left the door, looped around for about five minutes’ walk, and then ended up back at the same door!

  Great, huh?

  But it was completely against rules to cut the entrance room off from the rest of my dungeon, so I constructed a separate disguised door. It looked like part of the mud wall, but if a rogue or mage dispelled it they would see it.

  Then, after picking the lock, they would find the real tunnel that led to the rest of the dungeon.

  I hope you have followed this, my friends. It is quite difficult to explain a dungeon layout like this, but I am trying my best for you.

  At any rate, my dungeon had hit its room capacity, and I would have to level again before I could add more. That didn’t matter though, because it was time to create traps.

  So, I thought about this for a while. I remembered all of the things I had learned in Overseer Tarnbuckle’s trap theory class, and the myriad of trap strategies I had read about in the academy library.

  There were thousands of combinations of traps and their placement, but I was a little hampered by being a level 2 core, which meant my trap crafting list was pathetic. I checked it now.

  Traps:

  Beartrap [Cost 50 ]

  Pitfall [Cost 100 ]

  Pressure Switch [Cost 50 ]

  Poisoned darts [Cost 250 ]

  Not too great, huh? Well, it might look that way at first glance, I suppose. But these simple devices are the bread and butter of dungeon traps. It isn’t the trap, but what you do with it!

  Let me just explain each one, in case you were wondering. I mean, I don’t want to insult your intelligence, but some of you reading might enjoy that k
ind of information. I know that I found my trap classes riveting, anyway.

  By the way, you are about to see the more core-like side of me now, and you might not like it. Hey, a core can’t deny his nature, can he? Please, just humor me a little if I begin to sound a little too diabolical.

  Oh, and the word diabolical comes from diabolus, one of the demons in an underworld. I forget which one. Anyway, I met him once, he gave a talk at the academy. Nice guy.

  So, to begin your trap 101 class.

  A bear trap is something you will know about, I’m sure. A beautiful construction of metal teeth that, when stood on, slams shut and bites through the ankle of the poor person or creature. Rather painful, I am told.

  Pitfalls are simpler, but can be quite gruesome. All you need to do is dig a hole in the ground, and then cover it so that it looks like it isn’t there. It sounds rather basic, but you need to be creative.

  For instance, you could place metal spikes at the bottom, creating a delightful impaling trap for would-be looters.

  You could dig the hole fifty feet deep so that the hero falls into the pit and dies when he hits the bottom. Or, if you are especially cruel, you might dig it only thirty feet so that he or she breaks their legs, and then has to lie there and pathetically call for help that won’t come.

  Maybe you fill the pitfall with water and lace it with malicious little piranhas that eat the hero alive.

  See? Lots of things you can do if you let your mind run free! Try it at home! (Please don’t.)

  A pressure switch on its own isn’t a trap. A trap, defined by the overseers in the academy, is ‘a construction designed to trick heroes that is placed in a dungeon with harmful consequences intended.’

  A hidden pressure switch on its own is just a trick, but there are no consequences.

  So, this is where you combine the switch with things like the last trap on my list – poisoned darts. If you’re at all familiar with dungeons, maybe if you have read Tomdarksy’s Dungeon Making for Beginners, you’ll be nodding along now.

  Everyone’s heard of a dungeon where someone stands on a hidden switch and poisoned darts shoot out of the wall. Cliché, right? Sometimes, though, things become cliché for a reason.

  Because they work.

  Now, with 100 essence points, I had some choices to make. I could afford everything except the poisoned darts, which I’d have to level up to get.

  That meant it would just be a matter of buying what I could, letting my essence regenerate, and then deciding where to place stuff.

  And that….well, that took some planning. Oh, yeah, you couldn’t just throw traps around. A core’s setting of his traps could decide his whole evaluation.

  That’s a lot of pressure.

  Another thing to consider was that, as a level 2, I was limited to 8 traps in total in my dungeon. I had to be really, really careful.

  Over the next four days, I spent my time buying a trap or two, and then letting my essence recharge in my core room, while plotting where to place things to ensure maximum carnage.

  In the evenings I tutored Tomlin in whatever subject he chose, though sometimes he picked something I didn’t have a clue about. I didn’t want to be all vain like an overseer, so if I didn’t know something, I admitted it and we moved on. Don’t ever be afraid to admit you don’t know something; it’s much better to admit, than wing it and be wrong.

  Wylie sat with us and listened with a smile on his face, but I’m telling you, there’s not much going on being the eyes with that kobold. Good worker, though. Very pleasant to have around.

  We settled into a routine, and it was strange how much this felt like home for all of us. Many a time I would see Wylie or Tomlin going into the worm larder to get a bunch of worms, like it was a normal, daily thing.

  Here was something else worth noting, by the way. If you remember, the worms came from the walls just outside of my dungeon boundaries. Even though I had bred more of them, I hadn’t created them.

  This meant that when Tomlin and Wylie ate them, they were technically slaying monsters for me.

  Which meant…

  …experience points!

  Yup, when my kobold lieutenant and miner chowed down, they were earning me experience points. Do you want to see how much experience they earned me from eating worms after 5 days?

  Let me quickly grab that statistic for you.

  Experience points [Filter: Worms] – 1.9

  Not even two experience points! It turns out that killing worms isn’t a great way to advance. Makes sense when you think about it.

  You never hear about a famous barbarian getting legendary powers from digging into the soil on a rainy day. There are no tales about the worm-eating pigeons that found themselves leveling up into eagles or something.

  After days of buying traps and recharging my essence, I was left with enough weaponry to turn my dungeon into a place where heroes had a really, really bad time.

  Trap Inventory:

  Bear-Trap x4

  Pitfall x2

  Pressure switch x2

  The first idea I had was to play around with the heroes’ expectations a little. You know, manipulate their emotions, toy with their mental states. Fun stuff like that.

  I crafted another chest in the loot room. I placed this one in the center, exactly where a hero would expect to find one. I also crafted not one, not two, but three locks onto it.

  “Tomlin!” I called.

  There was no answer.

  “Tomlin!”

  Damn it, I was too nice to my underlings if they were ignoring me!

  “The next kobold to ignore me gets mashed up and fed to the beetles!” I shouted.

  Still nothing.

  “Wylie, I think it’s time to promote you. What rank is above lieutenant, anyway?”

  Now I heard scampering, and Tomlin stumbled into the loot room, losing his balance and falling flat on his face. Wylie, his ever-cheerful friend, wasn’t far behind.

  “Tomlin,” I said. “I need you to clean this loot chest. Make it look sparkling if you can. It has to look enticing to a greedy hero.”

  “Got it, Dark Lord,” said Tomlin. Then he turned to Wylie. “Wylie, Tomlin needs you to clean chest. Make it sparkle. Make it look enticing.”

  Kobolds, I sighed. Always shirking work.

  At any rate, whichever of them did it, they made a good job of it. The chest in the middle of the loot room was sealed with three locks, and it was as clean and sparkling as a pair of kobolds could make it. It looked fit for the finest loot. Gems, maybe. A precious emerald.

  I put a bear trap inside it.

  First, I had Tomlin pack two feet of mud onto the base so that the trap was closer to the top of the chest, and then he and Wylie worked together to set it. Neither kobold had the strength to open it by themselves.

  Now the trap was set. It was close enough to the chest lid so that as soon as a hero stuck their hand in it, they’d get a metal toothy surprise.

  After doing this, I practiced my dungeon cackle. This was something every core must develop. I hadn’t felt like I had earned one until now. Unfortunately, my stupid gem core made the cackle sound like a mouse gloating when it found some cheese.

  Moving onto the other areas of my dungeon, it was time to think about what to do in the entrance room.

  I had originally planned to use the 2nd room I created as the entrance, but I had then dug out a further two tunnels and rooms so that heroes had longer to walk.

  I hopped to the new entrance room at the far north side of the dungeon. Floating on my pedestal point, I considered what I should place in here, if anything.

  It was all about messing with hero psychology. Did I hammer them with monsters and traps as soon as they got in my dungeon, thus signaling they had a challenge on their hands, or did I lull them into thinking this would be a breeze?

  I decided on something in-between.

  When I was ready, I would have Tomlin and Wylie dig out a slope from the northern wall of
my northernmost room. This would serve as a way into the dungeon.

  In the room, right where I planned for the slope to end, I placed a pitfall. Under it, I had Tomlin dig a twenty-five-foot drop. Enough to hurt, but probably not kill.

  Then, just two steps away from this, I placed another bear trap, and I had Tomlin hide this under some mud.

  Finally, two paces beyond that…I set a pressure switch on the floor.

  What did it do?

  Nothing!

  But imagine this. You’re a somewhat new hero going into a dungeon. You expect it to be pretty easy.

  Wham! One of your party falls into a pit on his first step into the dungeon.

  Argh! Someone gets their foot chewed by a bear trap.

  Now you’re on edge, you’re looking around, suspicious of everything, and that’s when you step on a pressure switch.

  You don’t dare move. Your heart is pounding as you wait for a trap to spring…but nothing happens. This makes you more paranoid, more suspicious.

  What do you think, would that work? As a core, part of my job is to put myself in the hero’s shoes and try and work out what would make me feel like crap.

  It was worth a try, anyway. I could always change things if it was a dud, but it would mean I need to open my dungeon up soon before the overseers called an end to evaluations.

  See, if heroes made it through my dungeon, it meant they might break some of my traps, kill my monsters. Then, I’d have to create more.

  Since it was likely I’d have to take a loss in my first hero run so I could tweak things, I really needed to get this place open as soon as possible. I needed as much time for alterations as I could get.

  After setting my traps, a message appeared to me.

  Dungeon requirement satisfied!

  Requirement: 1 monster, 1 trap

  Requirements satisfied: 2/4