Dungeon Annihilation 2 - 7

Hey everyone. It doesn't look like I'll have a chance to work on Dungeon robotics today, so I'm posting a DA chapter. 

Regan

I checked the time to make sure I wasn’t running late. I had my appointment as Earle to keep but my project had taken over and I’d worked on it all morning. I moved back to take in the beautiful piece of technology on the roof my dungeon. You didn’t study robotics without dabbling in a little of everything. 

Especially since I had focused on military applications for my creations. Rockets were something I knew well. This would have terrified people back on Earth if they knew what it was capable of achieving. It sparkled in my eyes thanks to the sunlight hitting it through a few breaks in the clouds.

“Master. It is about time for us to go. Raven is already waiting for us.”

Turning, I found Set in her illusioned form. Two objects on her chest made me wonder what she’d been studying during her trips into the town. “If you make them much bigger, they’ll start to get in the way. Make them the way they were the first time you made that body.”

Set bowed her head instantly as her chest shrank before my eyes. “I apologize, master!” I had very little perferance to the size of a woman’s chest as long as it suited them. There was usually someone that could appreciate it no matter what the size was. I nodded once she was done. 

“Mortals do notice that sort of thing. While most probably wouldn’t say anything since they had those massive melons to look at, we are on the little lord’s watch list.”

“Yes. I understand. I had thought master might like them, but since that is the case I will refrain from making such chances in the future.” I wasn’t sure but I thought she was almost sad.

I grinned and grabbed her chin forcing her to look up at me. “Don’t worry. I like this form very much. It was close to perfection in my eyes the first time.”

She squirmed a little, with her hands moving at her sides but not doing anything. “I understand! Thank you, master!” she said with a small squeak in her voice.

“Good.” I slid my thumb along her jawline, the skin feeling amazing. She had gotten better at creation the illusion by adding shadow magic to give it a stronger sense of feel. No matter how you checked, it would appear a real body was here.

“Master?” Set asked with a quiver in her voice.

“Ah. My bad.” I released her and stood back. I might need to explore the extent of her power later on. I hadn’t enjoyed a woman for several years thanks to being locked in that damn tower for the last decade.

“No. I didn’t mind,” she said looking away quickly.

I snapped my fingers and moved us to where Raven waited for us. We were in a small clearing on the edge of my dungeon aura. A corpse of trees blocked the view, and Raven had checked it out to be sure. She kneeled when I appeared. “Master. The parties we talked to last night are waiting just down the road.”

“Good work. Let’s go make some friends.”

We moved out of the woods and followed the road until we reached a decent sized group of people that were milling about. Four parties had agreed to pay us to take them to the mine after we talked about it last night. 

Three were your common parties that were hoping that the floor would be easier than the previous one. Apparently, there were dungeons that had strange cases of this happening naturally, but the main cause was the floor being a mismatch for the party. This was the case when it was easier for them to deal with certain types of monster or whatnot. Pride on his bridge was tough roadblock for most parties from what I understood.

The fourth party was much more interested in the mine than anything else I’d talked about. A party of fifteen dwarves, amazingly all brothers, had shown up in the town a few days ago when they were kicked out of the last town they were in by the lord. It was some sort of dwarven feud or something.

Either way, they were a prospecting party from a dwarven clan. If I played them right, I could get them to uproot their entire clan and move them here. I hadn’t even considered doing anything along those lines until one of the drunken dwarves dropped that clans moved when they catch wind of mithril. If I could get an entire clan to start frequenting my dungeon, that was a lot of mana to gain, plus they would be inclined to protect me if something were to happen since I could create mithril.

“Sir Earle! We were beginning to worry!” High Prospector Jacob shouted when he saw me.

“My apologies. The ladies just wouldn’t let me go,” I replied cheerfully as I grabbed Set’s and Raven’s waists.

“OH Ho! Yer making me jealous here!” Jacob shouted with a laugh.

“If I see a good dwarf woman, I’ll be sure to send her in your direction.”

“After being outside the clan, I prefer me a good human woman. Not as bony as those elves, and not as tough as the dwarves. Hard to find em short, but them being tall isn’t too bad.”

I patted his shoulder. “That certainly widens the target range. I’ll see what I can do.”

“Sir Earle. If we could proceed.” I turned my gaze onto an elven woman that managed to be taller than me and I’d set my avatar’s height pretty up there. She had long silver hair with sharp features common of the elven races and carried a bow on her back. The wind mana practically rolled off her. 

“Lady Ioa. Forgive me. We can not all be as strict as you,” I said without dropping my grin. She looked like she was about to say something, but I stopped her by addressing the rest of the gathered parties. “If everyone is ready, please make your way to the teleport matrix. I would like to take this chance to warn everyone here that the mine has strong defenders. Please be careful.” 

Lady Ioa scoffed at me then moved into the dungeon with the rest of her party. The other parties filed along after her with the dwarves moving in last. I moved next to Jacob. “Got a strong attitude that one,” he whispered to me. Well… whispered was mislabeling what he did. Not yelled it was close enough.

“The fierce ones are the ones worth breaking,” I replied earning a glare from Ioa. I whistled but I had intentionally said it loud enough for it to reach her. I love that elves had superior hearing. It made them worth messing with.

“I’d be careful with that one. She came at that Commander Yin’s request. They are top of the line from where they came from.”

“A challenge then.” The words had barely left my mouth when an arrow flashed past my head faster than I could keep track. It collided with the wall and blew a small chunk from it. I narrowed my eyes when I realized that the strength of her tier was much higher than I initially thought. I’d placed her close to tier two level one or two, from the aura she was putting off, it was more in the range of six or seven. Other than that marquis, she was the strongest person to enter my dungeon.

“Another word earns you another arrow,” Ioa said using wind magic that allowed only me to hear it.

“As you wish, lady Ioa,” I replied copying her technique only using darkness to pass the words through the shadow realm. I grinned when she widened her eyes in surprise. 

~~~

A few minutes later found us on the eleventh floor. The cubed room with all floors being visible at once caused the party to, well, freak out. Some stared around in awe, while others, were frankly terrified by the strangeness. The dwarves were drooling from what they saw.

Jacob wasted no time in running over to me. “Can I buy that token, Sir Earle!?” 

“I had planned to sell it once we acquired another one. How much are you offering?” To be honest it sucked being about to create gold from nothing. Money practically had no value to me, but it was just about the only thing mortals could offer up to me in this form. My host form had more options to choose from. Like a slave or something to be thrown in the dungeon.

“Jacob!” one of the dwarf’s friends shouted.

“Ah. I got ahead of myself. We need to check what ores are available. Please allow me to get back to you about that request.”

I waved him off not wanting to press the issue. All these games were just to pull more people into my dungeon. It was a good thing Destruction didn’t give me a time limit, but I’m sure if I dilly dallied too much, she would find a way to lite a fire under my ass. 

The three parties that came with the dwarves spread out as they each went for a different Rakshasa. I noticed that being able to see their target gave them more confidence. Now that I thought about it, my goblins and Pride had actually killed more people than the Hunters. Their surprises attacks were hard to counter even knowing about them. 

While I watched, Ioa’s party drew the attention of one of the Rakshasa. It enraged when one of the members stepped near an outcropping of ore and it charged them. Ioa leveled her bow as her team moved with practice ease to block its charge. I blinked and the next thing I knew there were three arrows buried in the creature.

It slammed to the ground, breathing heavily from the wounds. Checking with my dungeon senses, I found that both lungs and heart had accurately been punctuated. That was some scary marksmanship. I almost wanted to see how good she would be with a rifle, but that would be risking creating an extremely dangerous enemy.

I leaned back as I watched the parties work. All I had to do today was take them here and back. Easy work that would help get Earle more connected for future plans. 

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