Wrath, page 4
That startled a laugh out of Pierre. "About that gold coin...well, that can wait." he said. "I am relieved to hear you chose that. I didn't want to force it upon you, but I would have been disappointed had you chosen something else. Given the risk that this results from the death of a core, I mean. Ascended cores almost never result in breaches."
Tira was curious about the gold coin mention, but for now laughed with him. "It's fine, anyway. I mean, if I’d chosen mutants... I'd need base animals for that type. With my luck, I'd get a rabbit for my first mob. What am I supposed to do, slap a horn on it and toss unicorn rabbits at Delvers?" Tira scoffed at the idea.
"It's more effective than you might think," Pierre explained, a small smile playing on his lips.
"I'll take your word for that," Tira said. "And the others that are near containment breach... undead would attract a bunch of holier than thou types, and I don't want to deal with that, and who the hell would make a slime dungeon?"
"Once again, you'd be surprised," Pierre said, giving Tira a teasing smile. "Slimes can be very effective if used by someone smart."
There was a definite temptation to take slimes just to prove she was smart, but ultimately Tira discarded it. Containing Acekorah would have to be a top priority. Tira focused on the word.
Acekorah selected. This selection cannot be changed. Confirm: Yes/No
Tira focused on the word yes. Information flooded into her mind, words dancing in her vision.
Acekorah selected!
Mob Unlocked: Scutellosaurus
Mob Unlocked: Velociraptor
Mob Unlocked: Aerodactylus
Upgrade Unlocked: Prehistoric Plants
Upgrade Unlocked: Basic Traps
Rare Achievement Unlocked! The Needs of the Many. Choose a critically uncontained entity. Reward: Random mob from next Tier unlocked. Only one such mob can exist in the dungeon until Copper Tier is obtained.
Mob Unlocked: Gigantspinosaurus
See details? Yes/No
Tira focused on the word yes, unable to contain her excitement. Again, information flooded her vision. This was not just a list. Each of the available mobs had a three-dimensional image associated with it, giving Tira a chance to study them. If she had a jaw, it would have dropped. “Pierre,” Tira said, the word coming out hoarse.
“Creation is an act of will,” Pierre said. “But you need to be able to control them first. You’ll want to absorb some of the stone in this room, so we have more space. Modification will come later, as you upgrade.”
Chapter 5
"You'll need to increase your command limit," Pierre said, buzzing with excitement. Tira pulled up her stats to make sure she remembered correctly.
Name: Tira
Theme: Dinosaurs
Contained Entity: Acekorah
Tier: Tin
Rank: One
Mana: 50 / 50
Regeneration: 10 / Hour
Command: 0 / 0
Area of Influence: [View]
Dungeon Map: [View]
Rooms | Mobs | Upgrades
Pierre nodded. "Each pylon you construct increases your command by five, up to a maximum of fifty. You can make two more pylons - so receive ten more command - each time you rank up. The amount of command each pylon generates increases with your tier. Let's make one so you can see how it works."
Pierre chuckled. "Well, they're obelisks that expand your control, and increase your passive mana regeneration. Grow one near the edge of this room. To start, you'll need to build a heart."
"Well, look at the refined mana floating in here. Really look at it."
Tira did so, focusing her attention as firmly as she could on the refined mana. It took her a few moments to see what Pierre wanted her to notice. What she'd initially thought of as a mist was actually an interwoven web. Tiny, thin lines spider-webbed out, connecting to various points that floated in the strands.
"The points," Pierre said, taking on a tone like a teacher in a classroom, "are called motes. They are actually the smallest unit of mana. Five motes are needed for just one 'point' of mana - that's part of how refined mana is different from elemental mana. What you do is take fifteen of those motes and collect them into a single space. It's a bit tricky. Once you do, just send a tendril of will into it. That will force them to become a heart. Then you just build the obelisk around the heart. It'll cost one more mana point to make such a simple structure. Building is really easy - you just picture the design you want, and you put a bit of will into it. Your mana will do the rest."
Tira said after a moment's consideration.
"Wonderful," Pierre said. "now... I must complete the process that allows me to gain the benefits of the token.”
“I’ll need to sleep while you work." He yawned halfway through the word work, which got a chuckle from Tira. “As an advanced notice, I may be asleep for quite some time. If you decide to expand the open space of your dungeon, you’ll want some pylons in each room. They’ll ensure even mana distribution and keep the walls reinforced against anyone who tries to make their own entrances.”
Pierre gave her a sleepy smile and settled onto the stone floor to sleep. Tira waited a bit to make sure she wouldn't disturb him, then got to work.
Focusing her attention on the motes of free floating mana, Tira realized she had a problem. She didn't know how to make them go together. Pierre had been vague about that. Reluctant to wake up her wisp, Tira tried just willing one mote to move towards another. The glowing ball moved near its target, but as it did, the strings attached to the mote were tugged, and it pulled other motes around. At the same time, the mote it was supposed to move towards moved away. Tira tried to assert her will on the fleeing mote and move it in towards the first one she'd grabbed.
It worked... at first. The individual motes moved closer together, dragging other motes along with them, but when they got too close, they pushed against each other. The harder Tira tried to force them together, the harder they tried to move apart, and soon they were zipping past each other, propelled by their mutual repulsion.
And in doing so, they provided Tira the answer for how to move them together. Other motes were tugged in various directions as the two moving ones were flung apart, and before the change could create a chaotic jumble, Tira grabbed some connecting strands to stop the motes from moving around. This proved much easier to do than trying to move the motes directly.
Inspired by her success, Tira grabbed a single mote and set it to spin. The motion dragged other motes towards it, as the strands wrapped around the spinning mote. Those threads seemed to act as a sort of insulation against the repulsion, and when the new motes hit the spinning one's webbed surface, they stuck to it like glue. The moment a fifth mote touched the spinning section, it flared into a bust of light that would have made Tira squint her eyes, if she'd had them.
When the light was clear, she had a single unit of mana, containing five motes that had merged.
Quickly, Tira merged two more sets, exactly like the first, and forced them together with the one she'd started spinning. These units of mana seemed to want to merge, and when she nudged them closer, they accelerated until they impacted. There was another flash of light, and then a crystal floated in the air. Focusing on it, Tira could see words appear above the crystal, in white lettering.
Basic Heart - Unaligned.
Those words turned into runes that floated down to settle onto the crystal, etching themselves into its surface. The image of the pylon she constructed around it was fairly simple, a stone obelisk about three feet tall. As soon as she dropped a point of mana into it, the stone structure rose from the ground, encompassing the heart in the center. Then it rose a couple more inches, pulling out of the ground, until it was floating in the air and spinning gently.
Tira said, so excited that she forgot Pierre was sleeping. He murmured something and rolled over, but thankfully didn't wake up. Tira waited to ensure he was settled, then got back to work. She’d forgotten to check her mana to keep track of the time, but it didn’t feel like it had taken too long once she’d gotten the hang of manipulating the motes.
Pierre had been sleeping for five hours. How much sleep did a wisp need? Tira wasn’t going to wake him, so set herself to hollowing out more stone. Now that she knew how to absorb it - a simple process of drawing the physical matter in the way she had the mana earlier - doing so was easy. She still had time before Pierre woke up. Knowing him, he’d have a dozen other suggestions before she could start summoning, and Tira was painfully eager for the mobs.
So why not save some time and start the process of building her dungeon? It couldn’t take her too long to figure out.
Chapter 6
Pierre woke up to a core room with a newly constructed hallway to the next room just large enough for him to walk through and a proudly humming Tira. He gave her a sleepy smile and rubbed his eyes. "Wonderful. Then - shall we start the fun part?”
“Ah. Of course. Wisps, like cores, are immortal. Like most immortals, we sleep less frequently, but for far longer. Probably a week.”
Pierre considered for a moment. “No,” he said sheepishly. “Apologies for the delay.”
“I will make certain to avoid that in the future.”
Pierre frowned and looked down at her. "You're still only Tin One, Tira. Even when you build pylons in the rooms outside and reach your ten maximum, that's going to give you fifty command points. Assuming somewhere between ten and fifteen for the boss, you would have to spread your mobs pretty thin if you wanted to fill four rooms. Might make them too easy."
Pierre rocked his hand back and forth. "About fifty million years, give or take fifteen million. Why would you want to give them something like that for free?"
Tira let her smugness radiate through the bond.
"Ah, I see." Pierre nodded slowly as understanding dawned. "Like normal loot, it will tempt them to push deeper. But since it's daily, only the first group to go in will get them. Meaning they'll come in first thing in the morning, rushing, still groggy, and unprepared."
Pierre raised a finger. “Before we go ahead, there is one thing I simply must mention before I forget again. About loot and gold.”
“You must never assemble too much of any metal - save iron, steel, lead, and titanium - in one place.”
“The immediately dangerous amount is one ton. To be safe, I’d keep any quantities of metal below three quarters of that, just to avoid any accidents. Otherwise...the metals will result in a dracogenesis event.” Horror flooded through their bond at the word dracogenesis.
Pierre nodded firmly. “Almost all of dragonkin. Drakes, wyrms, wyverns, hydras...the list of possibilities goes on.”
Tira hesitated. She had to be missing something. When nothing obvious occurred to her, she asked.
“Absolutely. If it worked that way, every dungeon would be full of dragons. However, a dragon spawned via dracogenesis is unstable. It can only survive for a short time period unless it finds a structural core - dungeons, citadels, towers in a pinch - to convert into a Lair core. Doing so anchors the dragon to reality and allows it mastery over the core. Complete and utter control. There is some debate on if the core even remains sentient after such a disaster, or if the core effectively becomes an automation.”
Pierre gave her a weak grin. “Apologies for putting a damper on the mood, but I thought it best to explain that before I see everything you made. I thought that might help counteract the existential dread of dragons.”
Tira laughed.
The antechamber, as far from her core as possible, was the largest space she had and covered with a wide variety of prehistoric plants. She had filled the room with one of everything she had found. Her favorite of them looked like ferns, but had thick trunks about as tall as a person. They looked like stumpy palm trees. As far as Tira knew, there was nothing exactly like them alive today - which meant they'd be perfect for her purposes. People would immediately recognize them as something alien to this era. She mixed in a wide variety of other plants underneath them. All of them had unique seeds or fruits - the perfect thing to tempt the unwary dungeon delver. Without sunlight, they'd require her influence to continue to grow and prosper.
“I’m impressed you figured that out,” Pierre said.
Tira sent him a mental shrug. She added a pointed tone to that last sentence, just firm enough to tell Pierre what she wanted to be doing without pushing him too hard.
“And we will get to that soon, I promise,” Pierre said. “But I’d like to know what you’ve done with the other rooms first, so I can best advise you on mob placement.”
He was right, and Tira knew it, but it was hard to be patient when dinosaurs were waiting for her.
She moved her vision to the second mob room. It would seem much like the first, but with more dense undergrowth; however, the path through the plants was more complex, with several dead ends, and she’d scattered in a few special plants. That didn't quite qualify as mobs, but they were the next best thing. If you stayed on the pre-set path, you'd trigger a trap every third or fourth step. If you boldly plunged through the undergrowth, you could avoid all but the obviously lethal plants They spread their leaves across the path, and any pressure on the leaves caused the plant to lash out with toxic vines. They were everything she had gotten through the “Basic Traps” feature -since the reaction was automatic, like a flytrap snapping shut, the plants counted as traps instead of mobs, so they didn't count against her command limit.
A cheap workaround, and one that would hopefully spell doom for a few fools.
Tira zoomed in her vision on some of the more subtle traps to show Pierre what she had done. Pits just wide enough for a foot with downward facing spikes lining the sides. A few places where crushing the wrong plant would send a rock spine dropping from the ceiling. Spheres of briars as large as a man that would spring up around you, biting into skin. It was a room that rewarded those that were willing to take chances.
Tira said.
“Not quite yet.”
Tira groaned.
“Your entrance.” Pierre smiled. “I know you’re eager for the mobs, but trust me - you won’t want to do anything else after you start mob creation.”
“I have my moments. You should be near the surface now, so you can manipulate that without opening."
Tira checked her area of influence and saw Pierre was absolutely correct. She could even sense the open air outside her dungeon now. No large trees, so she must be in a fairly open air. <"So... I guess I could just make a trap door?>
