Chapter Twelve

John, Camille, and Sam were all walking back to the camp. They were all a bit worse for the wear, but that didn’t dampen their spirits. They explored two whole floors of the dungeon, got information about what the dungeon was doing, and managed to harvest a valuable flower. That might not be considered much for one of the dungeons back on the old continent, but here exploring with almost zero information their results are a huge win. They talked excitedly the entire way back and stopped at the healers as soon as they got back to camp. From there they went to Olivia’s and reported what they found. Sam started saying “ We had a lot of success. We managed to explore multiple floors, confirm there are both dangerous and valuable plants in the dungeon, and didn’t suffer any major injuries. Unfortunately, there were a lot of weird things about the dungeon. It had two entrances, its later floors went up, and it has already added traps since we last went there. If it keeps changing at this speed I’m not sure any of our information will be valuable for more than a week or two.”

Olivia nodded and said “ Ok. In that case I’ll free up some more time for you three. If the dungeon is adapting this quickly I want you all to explore as much as possible before it gets even tougher defenses. For now your only job will be raiding the dungeon. I’ll also make sure that the crafters will prioritize making your gear. Do you all have any problem with that?” All three shook their heads, so Olivia continued “Now show me that valuable flower you talked about. I’ve got to keep track of all this so I can send a report back with the supply ship. Sam handed over the flower, told Olivia what she thought it was, and then waited for Olivia to finish examining it. When she was done she looked up and said “Ah. Sorry to make you wait. You all can go put in orders for whatever you need from the craftsmen and then get some rest. I want you raiding the dungeon as soon as the craftsmen finish making what you need.” Once she was done the three of them followed her advice to put in orders with the craftsmen, and then went to sleep.

They all recovered for a day and then left for the dungeon refreshed and with new gear. They all received knee pads, elbow pads, and shields to help them deal with the fish. John also got a thick leather overcoat he could wear over his existing gear. They arrived just before noon and immediately started their raid on the dungeon. As was now usual for them they ran right past the fish guarding the entrance and made it to the relative safety of behind the waterfall. From there they ignored the plants growing there and started to move towards the alcove with the holes leading up. They were surprised to see that the spike traps had been entirely removed and soon got onto the second floor. The second floor appeared unchanged, so they quickly passed through and climbed up to the third floor. As soon as they entered fish started flying at them. John blocked the fish with his shield while Sam and Camille went up and then they all started to crawl forwards. It took a while, but they were able to find the way up with almost no danger since the fish could only shoot themselves above their head.

They dashed up to the next floor while being pelted by the fish and saw that it was full of plants just like the second floor. They kept moving upwards and found that the floors were just alternating between fish and plant floors. After enough crawling that their elbows were starting to chafe under the pads, they eventually got up to a floor that had sunlight shining down through the opening. They climbed up and looked around to find themselves on an island with a truly astonishing amount of mana infused flowers. If they managed to bring them back they wouldn’t have to worry about money for the rest of their lives. They immediately tried to harvest them, but before they could get a single one they heard a bone rumbling roar.

They looked up from the flowers and realized that they had been so distracted that they didn’t see a massive bear that was on a rock at the edge of the island. Sam pulled out her bow and shot at it, but the arrow just got caught in its fur without even drawing blood. They started to back away from the bear and soon realized they had backed up all the way to the edge of the island. They looked at the bear, and saw that bees the size of a clenched fist were starting to come out of hives hidden in the boughs of the tree. John looked at the bear and the bees before turning to Sam and Camille and saying “Can either of you guys channel an air rune? Because if not then we might be in some trouble.” Camille responded “ I can” and John said “Alright, let's get ready to jump then.” Sam was about to start protesting, but the bear roared again and started advancing on them. She shot it again, but despite hitting its head the arrow was still stopped without drawing blood. She looked at the bear running towards them and said “I guess we have to go” before stepping to the side and grabbing onto Camille. John stepped back and grabbed on as well and then the group of three jumped off the island over the waterfall. Camille used her air rune to slow their fall while John strengthened his body as much as possible using his earth rune.

They plummeted down and sent up a plume of water as they landed in the pool below the waterfall. All three of them had to drop their new shields, John had to drop his sword, and Sam dropped her bow as they swam towards the surface. They were battered by fish as they went up, but none of the blows were strong enough to stop them. They climbed out of the pool and crawled towards the tree line where they laid on their backs breathing heavily. Once they all caught their breath John looked around and said “Well, that could have been worse.”

Gem

The gem was berating itself for its carelessness. Its fish had stopped the invaders so easily before that it let them explore without worrying to test out the other changes it had made. Unfortunately nearly everything went terribly. The stone it had covered the spike pits in was thin, but it hadn’t broken even when all three of the invaders walked directly over it. They ignored all of its poisonous plants without even slowing down and they brought new gear that let them get past its fish easily. Worst of all they had made it all the way to its main body. If it wasn’t for the fact that its bear was able to scare them off it would have been in real danger.

While unhappy that it had failed so badly, the gem shifted its focus to what it had gained from their incursion. It now knew that it needed to cover the spike pits with an even thinner layer of stone, its plants needed to be able to defend against intruders more actively, and it needed other defenders to partner with its fish so invaders can’t just go under them. Making the stone thinner was an easy fix, so the gem did that first. Next it started looking into the plants. The plants it could grow in its territory under the mountain had been heavily influenced by the lack of light, but the invaders had shown it a possible solution for that. The entire time they had been in its territory one of the invaders was using mana to create light. Once it managed to replicate that it could grow all kinds of plants throughout its entire domain.

Imitating the release of mana the intruder used to make light was easy, but making it a self sustaining effect so the gem could focus on other things was more difficult. It played around with its mana trying to make various sustained effects and managed to learn that sustained effects require the mana release to be linked to something. Once it learned this the gem tried to make the ceiling release light, but instead of actually releasing light the stone just warmed up. Since that didn’t work the gem kept trying to make different objects emit light and realized that only clear objects are able to. Once it figured this out, making its entire territory suitable for plant growth was easy. Throughout its entire territory small gems already dotted the walls and ceilings. These gems were clear, so the gem used them as its light sources. Soon its entire territory was filled with light and it started to grow new plants everywhere.

The first thing it grew was spiny vines and poisonous plants along the path the invaders crawled to avoid its plants. It still wanted to add creatures that could actively attack them if they managed to dodge the fish, but that was a good enough countermeasure for now. After that the gem started looking at all its plants that could move on their own. It placed them on the jungle floor and started to flood them with more mana than it was giving its other plants and creatures. They weren’t too dangerous for now, but the gem believed it would be able to make them a force to be reckoned with.

After that the gem started to look at its last prizes. The invaders had been forced to leave behind some of their gear in its pond, and the gem planned on using them as reference for its own creatures. The gem did not recognize the material that the invaders' items were made of, so it recreated them out of wood instead. Every drybold warrior was given one of the shields, and the dungeon gave out swords to a few of the drybolds before realizing that they could not use them very well. It left a few of the drybolds to keep using swords in case they could figure out how to get good with them, but it left most of the drybolds with spears.

The last item that it tried to replicate was the bow. The wooden portion was easy enough to replicate, that was its specialty afterall, but the gem did not know how to replicate the string. It tried using different types of vines, grasses grown unnaturally long, and even a snake, but none of those worked as well as the string on the invaders bow. The gem wanted its defenders to have good bows, but couldn’t figure it out, so it did what any good leader did and delegated. It called for Snud and informed him that the drybolds new priority was to figure out how to create the strings.