It’s been a busy last few days. Adventurers are now being allowed regularly into my dungeon by the knights. I’d love to know more about what’s going on in town but several guards are posted outside the cave at all times, meaning Mary can’t go spy for me without getting caught. From the snippets I can gather from the adventurers “Brooksdam”, the name of the nearby town, has undergone heavy restructuring after my discovery. I’ve also heard that inventors have been hard at work using my dungeon’s materials to create cosmetic items. Hopefully I’ll get the chance to learn more about the outside situation once the entrance becomes less crowded.

Regarding the influx of visitors I have some mixed feelings. Testing out the strength of the dungeon and exponentially increasing my mana intake is great but killing so many people leaves me with immense guilt. Out of all those who come into the bog only around 30% are leaving alive. The 70% that die appear to be youths who want to make it rich in the new dungeon or go on an adventure with their friends. Honestly it’s disturbing how close in age and personality some of them are to the old me...

Until now I’ve been able to ignore the guilt with my survival instincts and work but after putting up stronger defenses I’m left more time to ponder the ethics of my actions. At this point so many have died within my bog that each death holds less weight that the last. One could argue that letting myself become enslaved would be for the greater good. Certainly the resources my core would provide to millions are worth more than just my life? But at the same time an eternity as a slave is no better than hell. I have no plans to let myself be captured, but I’ll not kill outside of self-defense if I can help it.

Somewhat related to my humanity was an unsettling realization I had the other day. That I had gone almost an entire week without thinking about my old life at all. Sure I’d been busy fixing all the errors on the second floor but that realization hit hard. It’s barely been a month and I’m already moving on from my friends, family, and home? I can’t exactly go back or anything, but the idea of forgetting my last 18 years is a scary thought.

Moral philosophy aside, business is booming.

Such an increase in visitors has exponentially increase mana production resulting in several new level ups and skills. Each human tends to net me around 300-500 mana each. Stronger people tend to give more but latent sill or potential also seems to be a factor. I’ll see a few hundred people a day so even with the cost of [Population Control] maintaining the ecosystem I’m easily making a profit. I can only imagine how much higher the rate will get when the Smoldering Sequoia is reached.

As a side note adventurers are currently exploring the floor repeatedly to farm my monsters. Several could theoretically defeat the Swarming Slime and advance but none have safely passed the Giant Vampiric Shrooms without dying to the Thrall Spores. From what I gather researchers in town are hard at work trying to counteract the effects so progression can resume. By some lucky miracle the first flora choice I’d made has bought me time to hammer out the kinks on my second floor before any adventurers make it down. Although the lack of visitors in my Save Point does make me question the time investment...

Currently I’m sitting at level 17, a huge leap from level 10 when the dungeon was opened. For the selection at level 15 I’d chose Lamias and Sakura trees. I am slightly worried that the list of choices hadn’t updated from level 10’s but I can only hope for more at level 20. As for skills I’d received new ones at levels 15, and 17.

Level 12 granted me the skill “[Auras]”. This seemed like the first skill I’ve received so far with the potential to grow with use. Dumbing it down I could create special effects in designated areas. For now I only had 2 [Auras] I could use. “[Recovery]” and “[Lust]”. Each would take a small amount of mana from my capacity every 24 hours. The cost was actually very cheap and all the auras I have currently I’m charged 565 a day.

[Recovery], as the name suggests, speeds up the bodies ability to heal for any creatures in the designated area. On the first floor I placed 3 of this type. 1 in the Timber Wolf Alpha’s “den”, 1 in the Tempest Hares largest warren, and the last directly around the piranha queen’s school of guards. Hopefully these would reduce how often [Population Control] charges me mana. I also plan on placing [Auras] of this type in the Save Point beds once adventurers break through the Vampiric Shrooms.

[Lust] would drastically affect a living creature’s libido. For my creatures this meant they would seek out the nearest member of the opposite sex and... uh... you know. Just as an experiment I placed a [Lust] aura in front of some adventurers. It wasn’t as dramatic as my creatures but several members of that party turned bright red and quickly left the dungeon in pairs. I couldn’t just use this affect to chase everyone out of the dungeon. But on young teenage adventurers? The effect was much more pronounced.

Level 15 netted me the amazing skill [Micromanaging]. This absolutely divine gift from God was used to accomplish the tedious tasks around the dungeon for me. Only simple orders could be given but it really eased my mental burden. Some example orders I gave included changing the Save Point bath water, keeping the steam and smoke levels on the second floor manageable (more on this later), and changing the artificial lighting of the dungeon from day to night every 12 hours. Along with [Micromanaging] I also increased my floor count to 3 and my names to 5.

Finally at level 17 I received [Note Keeping]. This one created a new tab on my dungeon status that I could view dungeon statistics and make personal memos in. I quickly transferred all my known creature descriptions, evolution paths, and mana costs into this skill for future reference. Now that I can create over 100 species of varying utility having a dungeon encyclopedia will only grow more helpful moving forward.

With all the new skills and notes my [Dungeon Status] looks like this.

Unnamed Dungeon Level 17

Mana Capacity 0/150,000

Mana Bank: 35,567/50,000

Passive Regen Rate 220/day

Floors: 2/3

Named Creatures: 1/5

Skills: Remote Absorption, Create Creature, Create Flora, Dungeon Status, Naming, Expansion, Terraforming, Marking, Mana Bank, Loot Control, Creature Core, Treasure, Banners, Population Control, Bosses, Auras, Micromanager, Note Keeping

Traits: Fast Paced, Purposeful, Perfectionist

Notes: 1. Finish Second Floor before even making 3rd floor. Since previously this earned us a trait.

Use Mary or one of the Anomalous Anaconda’s to steal a knight’s horse. Name more creatures so we can have more direct subordinates like Mary. Come up with idea for 2nd floor’s boss. Reward the first group to enter the safe zone by giving them some free Rhilos as a welcome.

After testing my new skills I looked over at the several blinking evolution messages. I chose to begin with the only creature ready to evolve on the first floor, my Screech Owls.

*YOUR SCREECH OWL HAS REACHED THE EVOLUTION THRESHOLD! 1 OPTION AVAILABLE. WOULD YOU LIKE TO EVOLVE YOUR SCREECH OWL INTO AN “AURAL OWL”?

YES/NO

After evolution the birds grew to almost 3 feet tall with wingspans of about 7 feet. Only one new body feature differentiated the owls from just being a larger color swapped version of their species. The formerly pointed beaks were now in the shape of large megaphones and their feathers had changed to dulled greens and browns to match the canopy of the bog.

Using their bright yellow beaks the owls could amplify the already impressive calls of the birds. The sounds were so loud and released with such force the mangrove leaves would rustle and anyone nearby would likely rupture an eardrum. Similar to when Mary had just been a normal Apparition the Aural Owls could parrot the voices of people. Only difference being the owls could only repeat sounds they’d heard while Mary could come up with her own voices and phrases. Not that it matters given the abundant source material of cries for help.

Spending some mana I replaced the population of normal owls with the new evolution. These owls were certainly not the main threat of the floor but would provide great support to the other creatures that walked the branches of the bog.

This revealed that I would need to wait until very few or no adventurers were on the floor before changes could be made. The knights were actually doing me a favor by closing my entrance at night. Hopefully when people begin staying in the Save Point it won’t get in the way of managing the different floors.

Before I could even begin with the multitude of evolutions within the burning forest I needed to change some things on the floor itself. The first and most pressing issue had arisen not even a full hour after I built the prototype. Put simply... almost all the original bats had died.

The cause? Smoke inhalation.

Given that I don’t need to breath myself I had completely forgotten that smoke wasn’t just a visible indication. Part of this I blamed on the Anomalous Anacondas completely breathable smoke changing my perception of how it functions. Needless to say I assigned [Micromanaging] to routinely absorb the smoke like I had been doing before and made a new colony of bats. Fortunately I’d noticed the problem in time to save the creatures on the forest floor.

Also related to the smoke I had learned that a “barrier” of sorts separates my floors. After the smoke debacle I’d been worried about the smoke raising up into the Save Point and Bog. But when I checked no smoke could be found outside of the second floor. I hadn’t done anything myself but the smoke would dissipate before rising up the spiral staircase. This likely exists so that my floors can all exist in close proximity. For example, if I made an ice floor directly behind a fire floor the temperatures in each would remain constant.

Next I made some alterations to the stream. My idea of the salmon swimming up and down stream had worked, even more so with [Micromanaging] changing the current’s direction, but the other fish had needed some assistance. Other than the bottom dwellers like my catfish the bait fish had struggled to survive. To give them a better chance until evolution, I dug out some tunnels for them to breed and break from the current in.

The final change made to the floor design was a large Masonry Oven for my Clay Golem project in the back of the floor. I haven’t spent much time with them yet but I’m determined to make my golems useful. The idea is to dry them out and create something resembling Brick Golems. Whether or not altering their base material outside of evolution will result in anything interesting is yet to be seen.

Now upon entering the floor an invader would be greeted by stinging smoke in their eyes and the majesty of trees so tall the tops literally reached above the “clouds”. These clouds were always shifting between black smoke and white steam, hidden just behind them the shadows of flying foes that tore through the air itself. In the blazing forest in front of them the crackling of wood and occasional explosions would make moving forward intimidating.

A scene set in my mind I got to work on the other evolution options.

*YOUR SALMON HAS REACHED THE EVOLUTION THRESHOLD. 2 OPTIONS AVAILABLE PLEASE SELECT AN EVOLUTION OPTION.

TORPEDO FISH: These fish love jumping out of the water and their hardened skulls and rock-hard scales turn this into a weapon.

SPECIAL CONDITIONS HAS BEEN MET: SURVIVE IN HEAT HEAVY ENVIROMENT

RED TORPEDO FISH: Keeping the jumping habits of the standard torpedo fish the red torpedo fish awakens a fire affinity that superheats their hardened skulls leaving bruises and burns on any victims.

Obviously I opted for the Red Torpedo Fish and watched as the fish’s bone structure seemed to change. They didn’t increase in size or color, although the reds of their scales became more pronounced, but the shape of their heads changed. Instead of the curved jaws they previously had, their heads had become rounded to a blunted point. I took a closer look and saw that this new skull shape was almost 2 inches thick with a small hole in the middle I assume they fill with fire magic of some kind to superheat their heads.

I watched them swim for a little bit and grew scared for any adventurers that try to wade through the stream. The second anything living enters the stream hundreds of the Red Torpedo Fish leap out of the water red hot with severe force behind them, rocketing their entire bodies into whatever prey was in the way. Not a great way to die.

The next species up for evolution was my Red-Tailed Hawks.

*YOUR RED-TAILED HAWK HAS REACHED THE EVOLUTION THRESHOLD! 3 OPTIONS AVAILABLE. PLEASE SELECT AN EVOLUTION OPTION.

BALD EAGLE: A more powerful base creature than the hawk becoming a bald eagle simply improves upon every basic characteristic of the Red-Tailed Hawk. HONED HAWK: The powerful sharpened feathers of the enhanced Red-Tailed Hawk have become more refined as they have faced intense winds. This makes the feathers and bladed wings even sharper than before. The sharpened figures can be detached at will. SERRATED HAWK: Primarily fighting with their enhanced talons and wings, the Serrated Hawk are warriors possessing a strong code of honor. As a result of dueling with each other to grow stronger these noble birds have worn down their wings. Using the newly shaped weapons they are capable of catching and then shattering blades.

This is the first group of evolutions in a while where I’m having a hard time choosing. Honestly I’d be fine with either Honed or Serrated Hawks as both adapted my original idea of sharpened feathers into something new. I have 5 hawks ready to evolve right now but only 2 have access to Serrated Hawk which seems to be the rarer of the two option. Unfortunately both were male so I’m unable to create a breeding pair right now given how expensive summoning a female would no doubt be. Regardless I made both males into Serrated Hawks and evolved 2 of my other hawks into a breeding pair of Honed Hawks. I left the other female alone for now and hoped that later she could become a Serrated Hawk naturally.

The new Honed Hawks were incredible to watch and listen as they flew in between the towering trees and through the false cloud layer. Their feathers were now a metallic grey and their main bodies seemed to have become thinner and more streamlined. Their wingspan had increased to a staggering 13 feet with each wing becoming a solid blade when all their feathers aligned. I ordered some testing and the wings were sharp enough to cut straight through the redwood’s branches with enough speed built up. Of course I discouraged this behavior after rebuilding the first tree.

My new Serrated Hawks were just as amazing. They hadn’t had the same increase in wingspan as their brothers and sister but had instead grown in talon size. Each of the retractable blades was over a foot in length and sharp as knives. Their bodies had grown so muscular they could likely lift one of my Alligators off the ground. But the main difference came in their wing shape. Unlike the Honed Hawks unblemished wings meant for slicing the Serrated Hawk’s ununiform wings had a ghastly appearance similar to a chainsaws blade.

I decided to test out their close combat skills against one of the caribou that wasn’t ready to evolve. The results were devastating...

The caribou charged the hawk as soon as it realized it was under attack, only for the hawk to lift it’s left wing up like a matador’s cape and swing down when the beast passed underneath. Using the momentum of his swing the Serrated Hawk lifted himself onto the caribou’s back. Once on top, he deployed all 8 foot long talons into the caribou’s back. Putting the wailing caribou out of it’s misery the hawk decapitated the beast with its right wing.

Needless to say these guys would likely be the dominant species of the Smoldering Sequoia for the foreseeable future. Even the best tanks and brawlers I’ve seen so far will need serious healing after an exchange with one of these monsters.

Having utterly scarred the 6 remaining caribou I looked over their evolutions to distract them.

*YOUR CARIBOU HAS REACHED THE EVOLUTION THRESHOLD! 2 OPTIONS AVAILABLE. PLEASE SELECT AN EVOLUTION OPTION.

ETHEREAL ELK: In the mana dense antlers of the Ethereal Elk grow magic stones that can be used to create a multitude of effects. PERYTON: A species long believed to exist only in legend the Peryton are caribou that have gained the ability of limited flight through large wings extending from their back. They are fabled to have speed capable of creating sonic booms.

Fortunately I could have breeding pairs of both with 4 Perytons and 2 Ethereal Elk. A boon I was lucky for given their insane mana cost. I summoned one more of each and found the Peryton’s summoning cost to be 2,000 mana and the Ethereal Elk close behind at 1,800. Even with my insane current mana intake that is simply too pricy when I could just breed them.

High mana cost will likely be pretty common moving forward. As my creatures grow more complex and powerful the price of upkeep will grow respectively. This is probably how the voice stops me from summoning monsters I’m not ready to handle yet even if I absorb them. Kind of a natural power scaling to prevent a dungeon only summoning Ancient Red Dragons on every floor after being given one.

The Perytons immediately grabbed my attention as they stretched out their new brown and blue wings. From what I could tell the males had blue wings with hints of green while the females had brown with bits of red. Other than their new 7 foot long antlers the Perytons had remained the size of normal caribou. Said antlers curved backwards before arching back to in front of the Peryton’s head like bull horns. Completely black and coarse as sandpaper, anything pierced by the antlers would experience intense pain upon removal. Other new features included a front pair of birdlike feet scaled like a chickens, and hooves heat resistant enough to walk atop Igniting Ivy but I didn’t investigate much further distracted as I was by their wings.

Only capable of limited gliding the seamless transition from fur to feathers were straight out of mythology. But don’t be fooled into thinking they are just for looks. By beating their wings and activating a skill the Peryton could make sudden bursts of speed. While not truly fast enough to make sonic booms the Peryton still made large cracking noises as their wings snapped back to activate the skill. It was a technique they couldn’t use often due to how taxing it was on their bodies, but it was effective, nonetheless.

Extremely please with the strength and sounds my Perytons added to the floor I began inspecting the Ethereal Elk. Who, while less physically gifted, were stunning in their own right.

Each Elk had shrunken slightly to the size of an adolescent caribou and grown skiddish in personality. Making up for these new traits were their gorgeous pearl white antlers. They rose straight out from the elk’s head before splaying out in a wonderous array of colored jewels for about 4 feet on either side. The various gemstones were embedded into the antlers themselves, varying in size, color, and shape. Soon it became obvious that the gemstones were actually organic and were a byproduct of the mana rich interior of the antlers. Given enough time, helped along by [Fast-Paced], the stones would fall onto the ground below.

Intrigued I began picking up the magic stones before assigning the task to [Micromanaging]. Each of the different stones contained trace amounts of different magic elements. or example the red ones carried fire and the green ones carried an air affinity. Hopefully once these elk breed and more of them surround the floor I’ll have a steady free supply of magic stones for future projects.

Ideas were already flooding through my head for potential uses for the stones. In fiction they were always used to power magic tools or weapons. I wonder if installing these in future floors or even inside my slimes and golems will result in anything interesting?

As for the Ethereal Elk themselves they used the stones to launch magic projectiles. The water affinity male would shoot thin pressurized streams while the light affinity female would create orbs of light that explode when touched. Hopefully I can get at least one Elk of each element once they begin breeding. If they only replicate their own affinities I’ll need to spend some more mana than anticipated.

The last creatures currently capable of evolution are the adorable Ocelots.

*YOUR OCELOT HAS REACHED THE EVOLUTION THRESHOLD! 1 OPTION AVAILABLE. WOULD YOU LIKE TO EVOLVE YOUR OCELOT INTO A COAL CAT?

YES/NO

Only about 12 of the original 30 Ocelots had made it to their evolutions. The other 18 all falling victim to the Red-Tailed Hawks and Fruit Bats before their time.

The new Coal Cats were huge compared to the small jungle cats now matching a panther in both size and color. Unlike a panther however the Coal Cat’s maintained the Ocelots spotted patterns, although they now pulsed a deep red instead of black. Other than the contrasting rings the Coal Cats were entirely black. Even their sandpaper tongues were devoid of all color.

Other than the spots the Coal Cats also gained 3 tails with red, scythe shaped bones on their tips. Unfortunately the red color wasn’t created from being superheated but was just the natural pigment. The same could not be said for the red spots.

Every spot was heated both inside and out. By opening the spots like valves the chemicals inside the cats would release copious amounts of pressurized steam. Their main method of attack would be grabbing the enemy with their tails and pulling them against the steam blasting spots or powerful jaws.

The Coal Cats quickly spread out amongst the floor seemingly solo hunters. I let them do as they please and was pleasantly surprised when they started creating small ambush spots. Some would lie in the towering branches waiting for an animal to pass beneath for them to pounce on. While others sat on the forest floor hidden behind boulders, in bushes, or even digging small holes to leap out of.

Between the Coal Cats. Ethereal Elk, and Perytons my forest floor was now as populated as the cloud layer. And while the two species of hawk are undoubtedly the dominant species, the forest walking animals will give them plenty of opportunities to sweep in for the kill while their prey is distracted. The only disappointment had been the Fruit Bats.

The 200 bats have bred, becoming about 350 in total. My other animals have been hunting each other and steadily gaining experience, except for my Solar and Volcanic Salamanders who I’ve ordered not to hunt until the other populations get high enough, the Fruit Bats however rely on group tactics. This means the amount of experience towards their evolution threshold was being divided against hundreds for every kill. On one hand this was great because they should all evolve around the same time on the other though, they would take an extremely long time to do so.

All my tinkering done I almost wanted someone to reach the 2nd floor. But my overall safety is what really matters. It would unfortunately be better if no one ever saw this new ecosystem. But if someone does I won’t disappoint them!

Finishing off my work for the day I ordered Mary to begin hunting adventurers across the first floor. If I have any hope of gaining information on the world outside I need her stealth abilities to increase further. According to her the only way that’s possible would be another evolution. So for now I’ve given her permission to hunt to her black heart’s content.