Tacca had to turn away as Marvus quickly stabbed the horrifically bleeding man through the heart, which was made easier from the shredded leather caused by Panther claws. She wasn’t the bit least squeamish when dungeon creatures killed Raiders but seeing them kill each other was…wrong, somehow.
“I don’t have any Dungeon Force left to create any more Panthers! Do you think he’ll leave now rather than risk dying the further he goes in?” Darlene asked in her panicked state again. The defense had been close, but unfortunately was just short of complete success, and Tacca had no more ideas of what to do in such a short time; the fight had lasted less than a minute, though another minute was used up as the Raider healed himself and killed his groupmate.
“I don’t know, it’s possible—” She was proven wrong as Marvus continued moving through the room and down into the next tunnel, where he eventually came to the Core Room.
“I knew it! Look at all of this treasure…but why is there still a Dungeon Core here?” he asked as soon as he walked into the room. Looking around with his greedy eyes, his mouth fell as he took it all in. “There’s no way I’m going to be able to carry even a fraction of this in just a single trip and I don’t particularly want to hire anyone to help me haul it away…it looks like I’m going to have to destroy the Core, because I don’t want to have to fight my way back into here when I come back,” he mumbled, talking to himself.
“NOOO! Fairy – help me! You’re supposed to be my Assistant, so Assist me!” Darlene shouted through their bond.
Tacca couldn’t even respond as tears ran down her face and she retreated to the previous room, knowing that there wasn’t anything she could do. Not only did she not have any offensive capabilities but Marvus was already slowly pulling his dagger from his belt, turning it around so that he was holding it by the blade; as she settled down in one of the alcoves the Panthers had dropped down from – safe from searching eyes – she heard the Core shatter as the dagger was likely expertly thrown, and she felt the unbelievable pain of her Bond being forcibly broken.
As she writhed in agony, she somehow had enough of her mind to wonder why she didn’t ask for Darlene to break the Bond – because it was obviously easy for the Core to dissolve it. The only explanation her pain-wracked mind could come up with was that Tacca didn’t want to abandon the Core in her time of need, even if there was nothing she could do to save her. The torture she was currently enduring was a minor price to pay, and it was the only way she could think of to honor that connection.
It was silly, of course, but that was just who she was; she wasn’t one to give up even in the darkest moments, and she just couldn’t be like the other Dungeon Assistants that forced the Bond to be dissolved because it wasn’t working out the way they wanted it to. She felt a strange connection between herself and these misfit Cores and staying with them to the end not only seemed right but was the only thing that made sense.
She just hoped there weren’t any more of these Cores, because the pain was incredible…
Chapter 7
Tacca waited until the Raider was gone with his first haul before she Translocated back to the DPRC; it wasn’t long to wait, in fact, because when the agony of her broken Bond finally faded to a dull ache, Marvus was already getting ready to leave. She barely registered it, however, because she was basically just numb throughout her mind and body from the ordeal she had gone through – though she couldn’t really complain because she was still alive. While it sounded callous to dismiss the destruction of another Dungeon Core that she was Bonded to, there was nothing she could do. She tortured herself with more “What ifs” afterward, but by the time she was ready to go she couldn’t seem to justify her self-persecution.
The only thing that really stuck in her mind was how sudden everything had happened. Every dungeon she has thus far visited had been destroyed a short time later; the incident with her Mentor may have been devastating and horrible, but it may have also been coincidence. When Jeremy had been destroyed within an hour or so of her appearance there, that could also be put down to unfortunate circumstances. But when Darlene, who had been safely hiding out inside her Core Room for months was invaded so soon after Tacca arrived, something didn’t quite add up.
She wasn’t at all superstitious – unlike almost every other Fairy in the world, apparently – but the newly “available” Dungeon Assistant was starting to wonder. Am I really bad luck? Are they all correct about my birth being a bad omen? Nothing had really happened while I was growing up or during my schooling, but what if I’m not bad luck to Fairies…but to Dungeon Cores? She had no answer to that, mainly because it was impossible to be sure; Tacca decided to consider everything that had happened a complete coincidence and move on.
It seemed as though Lily, her contact at the DPRC agreed with her. “It’s unfortunate, but we’re required to try to help them however we can. That’s what we do, you know; Assisting Dungeon Cores is our duty, and one that we don’t take lightly. We try to give them every advantage we can provide so that they succeed, and sometimes it just doesn’t work out. I appreciate you trying, and I know the others on the Council are thankful for your dedication and determination,” the much older Fairy told her with an extremely fake smile on her face. Tacca didn’t know how she knew it was fake, but it screamed falsehood even if her words weren’t untrue; she really believed that Lily was telling the truth: the Council really was appreciative of what she was doing…for some reason the young Dungeon Assistant didn’t understand.
“You’re not…disappointed—?”
“Of course not, I can’t fault you for doing as much or more than any other Assistant would’ve done considering the circumstances.” Now that is hard to believe – I didn’t really do anything! “Anyway, I have your next Placement all lined up…”
* * *
As she had done before Translocating to Darlene’s dungeon, Tacca took some time to herself before she went to her new assignment. Lily hadn’t said anything about her previous delay, which the young Assistant had definitely informed her of, so she figured that it was fine; besides, the exhausted Fairy found that she needed another long nap, because the horrific events of the last few days were catching up with her. She slept another night away down in the Giant Lilies below the DPRC mountain entrance, before waking up the next morning and Translocating to her new dungeon with the hope that things would be different.
Unfortunately, from the moment she arrived – to approximately six months later – her life was a constant blur of hopefulness, despair, pain, and disappointment.
First was Larry, a lethargic Dungeon Core that complained incessantly about his existence, his dungeon, the Poisonous Giant Sloths that he chose for his initial creature because they looked “cool”, the fact that there were Raiders in the first place trying to invade him, and – for some reason – the presence of his new Dungeon Assistant. Larry didn’t want to do anything, though Tacca convinced him to at least put a trap in his first room – which took hours of pleading just for him to do it – and the next invader that came in was dissuaded by the stone-spiked pitfall trap that was cleverly hidden near the entrance. No one died, but the Elf Archer narrowly escaped being impaled by the sharp stone protrusions on the bottom by a deftly timed leap, and then she left without venturing further.
Tacca couldn’t help but be excited by that development, since it meant that Larry wouldn’t die right away – and that maybe she wasn’t bad luck after all. Of course, seeing that his trap had worked, and deciding that nothing else was needed, the lazy Dungeon Core retreated into himself and refused to do anything else, stating that he was tired and needed to sleep. Unlike Dungeon Assistants, Cores like Larry didn’t need to actually rest as they could continue operating without “sleep” for centuries if they wanted to, so that was a complete lie.
The lazy, uncooperative, disgruntled, and lying Core lasted all of 12 hours, as the Elf Archer came back with an entire group of Raiders, and after easily avoiding the pit trap that hadn’
t been moved and killing the two Poisonous Giant Sloths that were guarding the first room, they made their way through the rest of the dungeon. Larry hadn’t bothered to give rewards for killing the two Sloths, and as the rest of the ten rooms in the dungeon were empty and therefore a waste of time, the party of Raiders was rightfully annoyed…so they inevitably destroyed the Dungeon Core, who couldn’t even bother to care.
The next was a former woman, Betty, who was both a perfectionist and an aesthetic fanatic; she built perfectly cubic rooms and straight tunnels, without any type of curving or misdirection. Tacca had to admit that it was very unnerving to fly around in because it was so uniform – and also for the fact that if you had good enough eyes, you could walk into the entrance and look all the way down to the Core Room. The only thing that broke up the uniformity were a series of creative art pieces made out of stone that were attached to some of the walls, looking for all intents and purposes like three-dimensional chessboards.
Betty had chosen Kobolds for her initial creature, which was actually a great choice (she was told that the former Dungeon Assistant helped with that selection), but after creating a single Kobold she refused to bring forth any more. They were apparently not very pleasing to look at and ruined the bright “aesthetic” of her dungeon; by “bright” Tacca meant bright – the ambient light was turned up so high that it appeared like the brilliant sunlight of a summer day.
The only thing that she had agreed to create – and what had kept her alive for so long – was the introduction of traps that she could hide cleverly inside her rooms. Most Cores – she was taught – installed traps and did what they could to hide them, hoping they wouldn’t be found and be effective; Betty, on the other hand, was a perfectionist and had apparently spent hours upon hours looking at each one and hiding them so well that even Tacca had trouble finding them – even in the increased ambient illumination.
Of course, eight hours after the new Dungeon Assistant arrived, another Raider group came looking for rewards when they invaded Betty’s dungeon. They were eight strong, and didn’t look particularly powerful – but they were not amused when there were no creatures to slay, no rewards to acquire (again, the Core thought it went against the minimalist approach she had adopted for her dungeon to put in reward chests for those who got through her traps), and half of them had died traversing through the well-hidden and deadly traps throughout the dungeon. Betty was destroyed while still confused why they didn’t seem to appreciate the perfection that her dungeon was.
Next up was an extremely paranoid Core named Jeff – which was another strange name to Tacca, but she was starting to get used to their unusual names. She was at first hopeful when she arrived because he had brilliantly constructed rooms, deadly traps in each room, and had taken advantage of a rare Dragonling Variant that allowed him to create highly effective flying – and fire-breathing – Dragonlings that were quite deadly. It wasn’t until she introduced herself and took a grand tour that she realized that it was too defended; only the strongest and most powerful of Raiders had a chance to get through even the first room, as every inch of the floor, walls, and even the ceiling was filled with traps, and the dozens of Dragonlings had to stay airborne just to exist without triggering any of them.
As had been the typical attitude lately with all of the Dungeon Cores Tacca had bonded to, Jeff refused listen to her and ease up on the defenses – though at least he had rewards prepared in case someone got through a room or two. He said that he was something called a “Prepper” in his previous life, and that he needed to take appropriate steps to ensure that the apocalypse didn’t reach him – whatever that meant. He lasted a full two days before he was destroyed; the only consolation that the Dungeon Assistant could gather from the whole event was the fact that she was finally able to see a group of super-powerful Raiders.
They came in the entrance at a run, before what appeared to be some sort of variation of a Levitation spell lifted them all off the ground, smashed through the Dragonlings like they were annoying flies, and then did the same with the rest of the dungeon. A few traps, cleverly activated by triggers in the open spaces of a few rooms, managed to go off and hit a few of the Raiders, but other than a miniscule scratch on the lead Warrior-type Raider, no one was hurt – unlike Jeff when he screamed about everything being unfair as he was shattered. The Raiders were so powerful that Tacca was pretty sure that one of them – an older-looking Elf, which meant she was really old – saw the Dungeon Assistant in the corner of the Core Room, despite her Invisibility being activated.
Fortunately, she was left alone as she was incapacitated when the Dungeon Core Bond with Jeff was broken.
One after another, Core after Core, Tacca Bonded and then had that Bond involuntarily broken again and again by the destruction of so many Dungeon Cores. Every single one of them – she lost an accurate count, but she estimated it was at least 50 more after Jeff was destroyed – had some sort of…issue…that prevented them from following the advice of her or their previous Assistants.
It didn’t take a genius to see the pattern evolving from her assignments: a Dungeon Core would get a “normal” Dungeon Assistant, they would do something contrary to the long-term survival of said Dungeon Core, the Dungeon Assistant would go back to the DPRC and have their Bond dissolved, and then Tacca would be sent in to take over for the rest of their existence. On a fundamental level, she understood the importance of ensuring that a Core always had an Assistant available to help them, and it was entirely possible that some of them would suddenly change their minds and do what they needed to survive. For some inexplicable reason, though, it almost seemed like Tacca’s presence hastened their demise.
Apparently, unbeknownst to her, she had acquired a nickname in the Dungeon Assistant community. Tacca only heard about it when she happened to be in the waiting room of the DPRC and another Fairy arrived, supposedly to be placed with another assigned Dungeon Core.
“Well, if it isn’t The Deliverer! How many Cores have you ‘delivered’ to their fate this week?” said another Assistant as he walked in and sat down on the bench – as far away as he could, of course.
Tacca was still a bit unbalanced after her last failed Core and his destruction; Clive was some sort of emotionally bereft killer in his previous incarnation, and he sent his Scorpiders (a unique scorpion and spider hybrid) out of his dungeon to attack the nearby Raider town. If there was one thing that would elicit a swift and permanent response to the actions of a Core, it was allowing – or deliberately sending – your creatures outside to roam free…or to attack the nearby populace. He lasted all of four hours before another powerful Raider strike force came in and destroyed him, and the Dungeon Assistant was still trying to get over his death and Bond breaking – so the other Fairy’s comment didn’t make sense. “What are you talking about?”
The other Assistant laughed shortly before looking at her strangely. “You really don’t know?”
“Know…what? I have no idea what you’re talking about; and what is this ‘Deliverer’ name you called me?”
He looked shocked, as if he couldn’t believe what he was hearing. “How could you not—”
“Tacca, you can come with me now,” Lily’s now all-too-familiar voice interrupted the other Fairy, who immediately shut his mouth when he heard the Lead Placement Council Member speak. When she turned around, the older Fairy was staring with a not-so-nice look at Tacca’s bench-mate.
What was that all about?
“Now, your performance over the last six months has been exemplary,” Lily started as soon as Tacca followed her to her office and sat down. “Honestly, it has been a surprise to us all how well you have…performed…and we really do appreciate what you’ve done. Now, I have a small surprise for you; in light of your recent work and dedication, we’re sending you to a newborn Dungeon Core…of sorts. For once, I’ll tell you a little about this particular one.
“It was first created almost a year ago, and in all of that time we haven’
t had a single Assistant manage to maintain a Bond for more than a few seconds; the Core almost immediately dissolves it after it’s established – for no reason given. In fact, it hasn’t spoken to anyone; the only thing we can tell for sure is that it hasn’t done anything yet. In essence, it’s brand-new – but we can’t seem to get through. With all of your recent experience, we’re hoping you’ll be able to figure out how to get through to them.”
That sounds…pleasant for a change. Tacca was actually looking forward to this assignment, because it meant that the Core likely wouldn’t be destroyed – because it wasn’t anywhere near the surface. All of her other Placements had been with Cores that were either very near or already broken through to the outside world and having that open portal to Raiders meant that there was serious danger from them. But if this Core hadn’t even started the process of being a Core (i.e. choosing creatures and other initial selections), let alone constructing tunnels and rooms, then danger from that direction was unlikely. I might even be able to shape and mold this Core from the beginning!
Then again, she had such terrible luck lately with the other Dungeon Cores – she was slowly starting to believe that something was going on – that she doubted she’d have any more likelihood of connecting with this Core than the others that had tried. But even if I don’t succeed right away, I can keep trying until I feel like giving up. I can maybe treat this as a…vacation of sorts. Tacca felt like she needed a break after the incessant ups and downs of the last six months, and this sounded like the perfect thing.
“Sounds good – I’ll leave right away.” She would, too; if the Core was reluctant to interact with her, she could take a nap in the dungeon just as well as she could in the Giant Lily she usually used after receiving her new assignment. It wouldn’t be as comfortable, but she was too exhausted to care.
The Dungeon Fairy: A Dungeon Core Escapade (The Hapless Dungeon Fairy Book 1) Page 7