Dungeon Spawned: Dark Dungeon 01

by D. R. Rosier

  On a whim, I left the boss for level four as the succubus and incubus temptation room. And I built a harder final room for level seven. I settled on a large demon warrior decked out with enchanted armor and weapons, with three imps as backup.

  Level five I would leave the extremely high ceiling to provide room for the air elementals to stretch a bit, and more water elementals slightly more powerful than the ones on level four, on the ground with more pools and streams. More elemental stones of the matching types, just with a little higher of a capacity, and I also added a number of the simpler gnomish traps. Level five should still match the current journeyman three designation.

  Level six I’d carve out a little higher than it was now, and increase the difficulty of more powerful air elementals, earth elementals, and finally put in some fire elementals. Between the stronger elementals, and more diverse mobs, it should put the difficulty at Journey five which was the same as the current dungeon final level. I created yet more elemental stones, and other rewards.

  Level seven, since it started a new section, would be journey five as well. I tried to adjust the demon level’s eight and nine to be adept level one and level two respectively, but really, I was just guessing. I’d have to wait for the guild to reassess before I knew for sure.

  Once the day’s adventurers left, I’d block off the entrance and connect the sixth and seventh floors together, move the demons, revamp, summon the elementals, set the rewards, and sink my and Ebony’s homes down to the last room in level nine. If a crypt can be called a home. That shouldn’t take more than a few hours to get it done, the hard part of carving out the new levels would be done before nighttime fell.

  Now, how would I waste time until then? A part of me was still experimenting with elementals to control the more powerful ones, building layers on my crystal, watching the gnomes, experimenting with enchantments and spells, listening to the rumors as I watched the adventurers. Still, I felt the stress of waiting, what if Jennesar attacked before I could finish my expansion tonight?

  Lila said sultrily, “I can think of a way to be… distracting.”

  Now that was a good idea, purely as stress relief. Oh, I wasn’t kidding anyone, was I? I was as much hers, as she was mine.

  Lila laughed throatily…

  Chapter Twenty

  Catalina smiled in contentment. She was so warm, lethargically so in a good way, and Sienna’s warm naked body against hers made her feel decadent. She really didn’t want to get up this morning, but the signs of dawn outside the window disagreed. She felt a surge of affection for the beautiful redhead in her arms, and the way Sienna made her feel.

  How much of that feeling was simply because of the time they spent together and how they spent it? It worried her, that she might be falling in love. She was next in line, she had a duty to marry and have kids. She and Sienna as wonderful as it was, couldn’t possibly last once her adventuring days were over.

  Which she hoped was years from now, long after she reached master status. Her father was still relatively young, and mages lived a very long time, at least master mages did. Still, she hadn’t expected this, they were supposed to be close friends, confidants, with benefits. Not truly lovers, like it appeared they were heading for.

  Sienna sighed breathily in her arms, and made cute wake up sounds that struck her right in the heart. Damn, she was doomed.

  Sienna said softly, “Yesterday was a nightmare. Think we can dive today?”

  She giggled naughtily, “Didn’t we do that last night?”

  Sienna laughed throatily, “Wicked princess,” and pinched her ass.

  She sighed, “I’d love to. To be honest, I’ve been looking forward to beating the dungeon. But… I can’t risk fighting all day and being exhausted if they attack. The southern border is only twenty miles, they could get here and start fighting almost as soon as the scouts got back to report they were moving.”

  She’d even briefly considered letting them try. Wasn’t that the ultimate goal? To figure out how to destroy the stone so it didn’t fall into the wrong hands? The more she thought about it, that sounded like a shitty reason to destroy something that hadn’t done them harm, dark magic or not. More than that, it was benefiting her future duchy no matter what its motivations.

  But even without those second thoughts she’d been having about the stone’s usefulness, the political ramifications of letting another kingdom act in force on her soil made such ideas impossible. Any invading force from Jennesar must be destroyed to the last man, to do anything else would be to show weakness to an overly ambitious neighboring kingdom.

  Jennesar was not a nice place. The church of light there ruled with an iron fist, killed anyone that worshipped outside of their pantheon, and forced worship of all their peasants. It was the kind of thing that happened when there was no balancing power. Even gods could be corrupted by power if they had too much influence on the mortal plane through their clerics.

  Nysten was better in her opinion, where the church was powerful, but ultimately balanced out by the nobility who ruled over matters regarding this world. The church stuck to the soul, and promoting some influence and magic through worship which benefited the gods as well. It was a balanced society, where individuals could go their own way if they wanted. Perhaps not perfectly, perfection was just a myth of the foolish and ignorant, but much better than Jennesar.

  Sienna replied, “Good point, maybe we should stay in bed then, get more… rest.”

  She snorted, “Nope, I have to be seen, and inspect the progress of our hasty fortifications. Moral is important, and I’m a princess.”

  Sienna giggled, which turned into an outright laugh, before she said, “Awesome, now I’ve got you mocking yourself.”

  She bit Sienna’s shoulder, and then kissed it.

  “Breakfast time, peasant.”

  Sienna laughed harder, “I’m a lady you know. One step above a peasant.”

  She teased, “I noticed,” and pinched her lover’s butt as she rolled out of bed, escaping a counter attack.

  When they got down to the common room there were a number of adventurers talking excitedly. They walked over to where Jerrold and Suzy were already seated.

  “What’s going on?”

  Jerrold said, “The dungeon closed up last night, and this morning after a little investigation its different. The undead are still there on top, in the catacombs. But someone with a token went down to level four to peek and come back up, apparently the demons are gone, replaced by elementals. I think the demon floors might have been moved down or something.”

  She grunted, “Why do you think that?”

  Jerrold said, “There’s a new token imprint on the exit door. The old one still says three, but there’s a new one that says six. My guess is there’s nine levels, if the dungeon is still following the same pattern. It’s just a guess though. Either way, conquering the dungeon just got much harder.”

  Shit, she hadn’t thought of that yet. Damn it. Just when they were finally going to reach the end.

  She sighed, “Sorry, I’m dying to check it out, but with things the way they are. You guys can go if you want?”

  Jerrold waved that off, “No way, we’ll wait, and defend the town with you if necessary. Don’t forget cousin, I’m royalty too, and I take my responsibilities as seriously as you do.”

  She nodded, “Of course, I didn’t mean to imply otherwise. Any other rumors this morning?”

  Suzy said, “I heard the guild requested a master level team, but they won’t be here for three days.”

  Sienna asked, “Why?”

  Suzy shrugged, “Bottom line most likely. The guild makes a lot of money assisting and rating adventurers, and making things safer by rating the dangers. I imagine they’d take a dim view of anyone destroying a very stable and money making dungeon. The thing was only found a short time ago, and it’s already expanded again. There’s speculation the new levels must reach into the lower adept rating at least, which would attract a
lot more adventurers once verified.”

  She smiled, Suzy was very shy. She thought that might be the most she’d ever heard the cute cleric say. She also thought her ideas were right, the dungeon was already covering four of the five mortal ratings. There were higher ones of course, but most humans couldn’t get past master, not without assistance from a higher being anyway. The mortal body could only hold so much power before changing from beneficial to harmful.

  Master level mages, clerics, or warriors could live for a very long time, but if they grasped too much power it wouldn’t be good.

  Jerrold said with mock gravity, “I heard a rumor, apparently our princess is shacking up with a wild fire mage.”

  She glared, and was about to reply mock sharply when there was a loud scuffle by the door which drew her attention. A soldier came in out of breath, looked around, and then came right at her. She felt her stomach sink.

  “They’ll be here in less than an hour,” the out of breath scout said without preamble.

  She stood up, “Listen up!” and waited for the conversations to die down. Once everyone was looking at her she said, “If you’re going to defend the outpost, keep, and dungeon, it’s time to get where you should be. Anyone else, it’s time to go. I’d suggest heading for Tenemin and get yourselves behind the walls, for those of you going, please pass the word in the marketplace.”

  She looked at the soldier, “Make sure that happens, the merchants, cooks, and servants have no place here during battle, then report back to your unit.”

  He saluted and followed the stampede out the door.

  She took one more bite of her biscuit, finished off her morning tea, and then followed. She was surprised as she saw a few adventurers going into the dungeon. She looked around and her eyes narrowed, as she realized the four assholes from the crown city were missing. She hadn’t seen them in the tavern as she had every other morning the last week. Just one more thing to worry about, and she wondered what they could be doing. Whatever it was, it probably wasn’t good. She should have arrested them a long time ago, but had no proof of wrongdoing, just stupidity.

  “Let’s get to the fortifications, if you see those two paladins and two clerics from the crown city, let me know.”

  The keep itself was well fortified by walls, and a wagon sized gate that was closed. The outpost itself was now surrounded by stakes, shallowly dug pits, and other obstacles. She had almost two hundred soldiers, including ten paladins and five clerics that Carlton was leading personally. The problem was the perimeter was too large to defend well without real walls. They couldn’t assume the just over a hundred coming were the only ones, and focus everyone at one point.

  Granted, they had more people facing south, but they still had to have a small amount on the eastern, western, and even the Northern approaches which spread them a bit thin.

  It was a short time later when the enemy came into view. She counted ten squads of ten of the Jennesar church soldiers, who were just normal soldiers for the state side of their church. She also counted six paladins, and five clerics toward the back, one of the paladins was older, and she could feel his master aura from here. He was obviously in charge.

  The man walked in front, his sword glowing brightly even in the morning sun. She thought it strange, he should look evil, but he really didn’t. The aura from the sword felt holy, and she knew it was a relic, not just a simple enchantment of light. He was in gleaming full plate steel armor, yet he moved easily and lithely, like he was wearing simple cloth.

  “Princess, I know you are here. I am Light Bishop Commander Salvatore. Surrender and stand aside, none of your soldiers need bleed or die today. We are here to deal with the evil dungeon. You have no idea what you harbor here in ignorance. You have my word, once our mission is complete we will withdraw back across the border. If you resist, we will cut you all down, and burn everything to the ground.”

  Catalina said loud enough to be heard by all, “I am princess Catalina, heir to duchy Tenemin. You have committed an act of war by bringing Jennesar troops onto Nysten soil. Turn around now, and you may leave. Stay, pursue this madness, and you will be shown no mercy and no quarter. If the dungeon is truly evil, present your proof, and we will deal with it as is our right. Only Jennesar would be foolish enough to send an army, if a letter would do.”

  The bastard almost sounded sad as he said, “I but do my god’s bidding, let the results be upon your head. Charge!”

  The soldiers rushed at them, and she stopped herself from casting a spell. She needed to let the soldiers deal with soldiers, and magic deal with magic. She couldn’t see past the dust and destruction, as the first wave of soldiers mindlessly sacrificed themselves to open a hole in the hastily built fortifications. Then it was hand to hand, sword to sword, as her soldiers fought theirs.

  Her eyes narrowed as their clerics didn’t cast any spells, and she didn’t see a paladin. She heard a scream to her right.

  She looked around, and gasped as she saw more soldiers, the clerics, paladins, and the leader coming from the west.

  “Back row, swing right!”

  While the front of her forces continued to fight the soldiers, the ones in the back shifted into a phalanx formation to face the attack from the side. She got ready to start casting as the enemy rushed forward. Their position was between the keep, and the inn and marketplace.

  But the charge on their flank from soldiers, and all the paladins and clerics suddenly stopped.

  Salvatore smirked at her, and then the gates of the keep opened and fifty soldiers, five clerics, and his five paladins rushed in.

  She stared in disbelief at the open gates, and then her eyes narrowed with fury as she recognized the four missing crown assholes. She’d torture them to death for their treason, but later. Their plan had worked and taken her by surprise, but only because it was stupid. Never leave an enemy behind you.

  “Carlton!”

  “Yes Princess.”

  She sighed, “Stay up here and clean up these soldiers with my troops, and secure the area. My party and I, and these twenty soldiers are going after them, do you have anyone that can help?”

  Carlton said, “I’ll give you my best team,” and then he yelled, “Diana, Selwyn, Cory!”

  Two paladins and a cleric came running over. She could feel their strength, and they were very high journeymen, if not adept.

  Carlton said, “Follow the princess’s orders.”

  “Thanks Carlton, good luck. We have to stop him.”

  They followed her at a jog into the keep grounds, and then into the building. There were a lot of guild people dead, and she ran up the stairs to the guild master’s office. Donnell’s head was lying on his desk, and Selwyn ran over to him and checked him with a light spell.

  Selwyn muttered grimly, “Poisoned. He was probably the only one they couldn’t face in a fair fight. Lesser men would be dead by now. Give me a minute.”

  Selwyn cast another couple of spells, one to remove poison, and one to heal.

  Donnell may have been an old man, but he jumped up and went to the corner and grabbed a Warhammer that glowed a disturbing and muddy red. He looked angry, and was all business.

  “What’s the situation?”

  She felt a little relieved, not sure she could have faced a master, not even with their whole group. It was why she felt the delay of checking on him was worth it. Still, she worried Donnell was a little old.

  “Jennesar invaded with a small force, they have sixty some odd people in the dungeon, along with four traitors from the church of light, and they want to destroy the heart.”

  Donnell growled, “Let’s go, no time for dawdling,” and he started out of the room.

  Bemusedly, the rest of them followed, the old man moved fast…

  Chapter Twenty-One

  I have to admit, the way they moved through the first three levels without stopping was daunting. I managed to take out ten soldiers on level three, only because I think the master paladin out front si
mply missed seeing the undead there. Then, there were about fifteen guild people murdered upstairs. They weren’t in the dungeon proper, but they were within my reach.

  Regardless, I summoned a whole bunch of succubae and incubi to hold all the life forces, and expanded my disconnected room to a disconnected cavern filled with beds. If I managed to live through this, I’d add another fifty life forces at the very least, to those twenty-five. Honestly, I wasn’t sure if they could even break my crystal, if it had been flawless with me still asleep I’d say no, but with the imperfection I knew I was no longer invulnerable, not if hit perfectly.

  Plus, even if they couldn’t break the prison part of the crystal, I was sure they could destroy the outer layers which held the power I could use in the outside world. That would be just as bad, even if they had to take me with them on their way out, impotent and helpless. Regardless, I was at a hundred percent capacity right now, with more life forces than I knew what to do with.

  I could use it all to expand the dungeon later, but I didn’t have the crystal power capacity yet to support three more levels, much less fifty.

  But still scared. Did I have anything that could stop even a sole master? I doubted it. My only chance was the group that followed catching up, and I hated feeling helpless. I continued to do all the things I usually do, including building out my crystal, it gave me something to focus on.

  “Hey sexy?”

  Ebony flew over and lay down on her side on top of the crypt, posing sexily, “Yes Nurien?”

  “Umm, why don’t you go visit the gnomes for a while. They’re almost done with the first big room puzzle trap, that’s got to be interesting.”

  Ebony frowned, “I don’t want to leave you.”

  “You’ll still be in me, just not in this room.”

  She sighed and rolled her eyes, “You know what I mean.”