Valleria trudged to the Wartskin Kobold’s outside the gate, a small cohort trailing behind her. Silver’s grip on his spear was white knuckled to her right, but it seemed to be for nothing. Even as they approached, the heated discussions of the Wartskin Kobold’s quieted, and they stared at them nervously. They had pointed at Valleria and Silver in particular, talking animatedly.

Now they were bowing.

More than a dozen Kobolds in tattered cloth and blemished skin prostrated before her, pressing their heads against the dirty ground. The mushrooms in the field had been cleared in the dark, but new ones were growing to waist height around them.

“I’m too fucking tired for this.” Valleria said as she stepped towards the Kobolds, some of which sent furtive glances upwards before turning back to the ground. The oldest(and biggest) among them hobbled to her knees, still bowing slightly.

“Valleria of the clan below. I am Sigur, formerly of Clan Wartskin—”

“Formerly?” Valleria looked her up and down. The lady was ragged, sure, but unscarred. Not even emaciated, if anything, she looked well fed compared to the other Kobolds there. “You’re an Exile? You don’t look one.” Valleria stretched. She had dealt with too much shit today to really care about any fake propriety.

“No… we are not Exiles.” The Kobold stared back at the ground for a few seconds before looking up. “We… want to leave clan Wartskin.”

“What?” Valleria frowned. “Why would you want to leave Clan Wartskin? And why did you come here?”

“The clan elders have all gone mad!” A scraggly Kobold yelled, standing from the crowd. Others nodded or shouted their assent, rising. “We heard from Kobolds of Wartskin that an exile left clan Longtail and survived. We came to seek refuge.”

“Refugees?” Mark asked. “Interesting… what do they mean when they say they’ve gone mad?”

“They’ve gone mad? Like they’ve been changed?” Valleria asked. The fat, older Kobold in front turned and directed an angry look at the Kobold who had spoken out of place. He looked abashed returning to kneeling.

“The Elders started to change weeks ago. First it was just an increase in hunger and size. They welcomed the power of that cursed treasure.” The Kobold paused for a second, a haunted look in their eyes. “It made sense right. To get bigger they would need to eat more. They thought that the changes and the power it promised would come without cost. Then they started losing themselves. They started eating more and more… until we ran out of food.”

The leader of the Wartskin Kobolds spoke as if this was supposed to explain everything. Valleria tilted her head, prodding her to continue.

“Eating more? That’s it? And the dungeoncore didn’t just make more food?”

Sigur looked up, meeting Valleria’s gaze.

“They started eating the other Kobolds. By the time they were big enough to need to, none of us could stop them. We’re all too weak to fight back. We hope that we can find a place among your clan, even if we have to work the dredge.”

“Let them in.” Mark said before Valleria could reply.

“Mark… they could just be lying. They might just be trying to attack us.” Valleria stepped back, speaking in a hushed whisper. The crowd of Kobolds looked at her nervously.

“They clearly need help… look how ragged they are. And… we will need help if we want to fight back against the other clans. Even with all of Clan Wartskin, clan Longtail probably out numbers us. More than wanting to help them… we need them.” Mark said, sounding pained.

“You’ll follow me inside in a moment. Stay here.” Valleria said, biting something back before looking towards her little brother behind her. She stepped back slowly, facing the Wartskin Kobolds as she backed away. She turned to the Kobolds on the wall. “Open the gate!”

So many things were going wrong at once.

Mark was doing the metaphysical equivalent of shoving his face into his hands. Alverost was non-responsive, but Mark could feel him almost twitch with every expansion into the new, rotting domain of city at the outskirts of Clan Tinyfinger territory. All of the buildings they had absorbed were dilapidated, some more than others. Rotten piles of former structures marked the edge of the clans core territory, buildings that had been collapsed or scrapped for resources revealed only as particularly messy and displaced earth. It was obvious where the clan had given up, leaving Skeletons of wood behind.

A group of refugee Kobolds with what seemed to be a type of genetic leprosy were currently in the top floor of their dungeon, the exposed inner area of their fortress. Mark had allowed them to move in, but listened to Valleria’s advice. They had been left there at the outer edge of their territories— a strong metal gate and a boulder trap between them and the entrance.

Mark suspected he didn’t have much to worry about with them. They were currently spread among the floor, split between rooting out and eating the mushrooms growing from the ground. Actually, now that he looked, he could see that the area they had waited at in front of the gate was suspiciously devoid of mushrooms. And—

Oh, that one’s eating the chair. He had made those bitter. The Kobold didn’t seem to care, chewing through the chair with only a mild look of displeasure on his face. Mark could remake the chairs later. Out of wood this time, maybe. Less edible. Although there was a suspiciously shaped chunk of table missing… he had more important things to attend to.

“I just touch this… and thats it?” Zeek asked, preparing to be the first to assimilate, leading the way to his people. To be honest, Mark couldn’t wait. Needing to rely on other Kobolds to communicate had been a pain.

“Once you touch it, Mark will begin the process.” Valleria grimaced “The dungeon will work its way through you, changing you— healing you. Then you will be able to hear them.” Valleria replied, sitting leisurely at the table. She had to turn to look at Zeek. She had been staring at Con who, in turn, was eyeing the room with wonder. He hadn’t looked away from the Centipedes on the ceiling since he had arrived.

Valleria stared at him as if he would disappear when she blinked.

“Does it… hurt?” Zeek asked, rubbing his chin thoughtfully. Mark’s dungeon roots reached up through the table and moved unnaturally in the air, sinking and bubbling like a fountain of mana. It took him some effort to maintain them there, constantly pushing them back up and out of the Fungiwood table that was fused to the ground.

“Are you afraid of a little pain?” Axel hissed, his tone mocking.

Zeek looked to Axel, before looking around the room one last time. Mornlight had since faded, not that it could be seen from below the spiral staircase that lead to the fortress above. The courtyard turned audience chamber accommodated the Kobolds well— the half that had returned from their trip. Clan Below Kobolds helped tie or bandage wounds on Clan Tinyfinger Kobolds that had survived. Some were gored, cut or slashed. One was missing an arm entirely— and not to a blade. It wasn’t a clean cut, but the kind inflicted by razor sharp teeth serrating through flesh.

Seemingly discarding his inhibition, Zeek slammed a hand into the fountain of roots.

With Alverost not available to help induct the clan, Mark found himself wondering what Alverost would do. Alverost might be a cut-throat, semi-murderous, un-empathetic dark wizard, but those traits just set him up to be a great politician.

And Alverost would do something… flashy. Currently, Mark had a huge supply of mana flowing into him through the territory they were joining. Mark reached out, his mind brushing against Zeek’s as the dungeon roots spread throughout his body, breaking into his flesh and leaving scraps of themselves behind all throughout. Zeek’s mind was old, and now, paying more attention to the process than with Valleria, Mark realized he could see and feel Zeek’s memories. It was as if their minds were rolling against each other, two seas of memories boiling and exchanging thoughts.

Mark could remember alien things, scenes of a life in the rot-city that hadn’t changed in all of its years. Scenes of the Hallow flooding with water, the window howling as it came, Mark at the head of a band of Kobolds that dragged nets through the river, catching the garbage that flooded downwards. Fighting back Kobolds with spiraling horns emerging from the back of their heads. Watching as more and more Tinyfinger territory was lost, buildings salvaged until they collapsed. Alliances faltering or ending in betrayal.

Mark cleared his thoughts, shaking off Zeek’s memories. He began to change him, reversing his aging and flooding the newly forged meridians with mana. Mark strengthened his muscle and bone, and brightened the dark color of Zeek’s scales, which lightened from a dark yellow to a near shining gold with extreme speed. Zeek gasped, doubling towards the table as his body creaked.

Hmmm, that was odd. Mark noticed an abnormality with Zeek’s eyes, something like an error or intentional misconfiguration, not unlike the rat Kobolds. Mark undid the changing, curious of what would happen. For a moment he paused, wondering about the ethics of experimenting on living, thinking test subjects like this. Then he continued. In the worst case, he could simply reverse or heal it— he was even able to rebuild limbs, after all.

The Tinyfinger Kobold’s in the room shifted, Simon nearly jumping out of his seat towards Zeek, before looking back at Valleria. She was whispered to Con, patting her little brothers head and pointing at the Centipedes above. He calmed, but still stood by Zeek’s side.

Zeek pulled his hand from the dungeon roots with a roar, Mark having finished changing him. His body was literally steaming, damp moisture from his clothes evaporating in the extreme residual heat created during his body’s change. He panted, leaning heavily over the table a full head taller, before opening golden eyes that glinted in the rooms dark light.

“I feel… fantastic.” Zeek’s voice was deeper, the last word he spoke coming out in a growl. His clothing, some of the finest cloth that clan Tinyfingers had, revealed his scaled waist now, the shirt not covering his complete body.

“Good. Hopefully we will be able to rely on you.”

Zeek squeaked like a mouse at Mark’s voice.