I woke up after a rough night of sleep. I couldn’t get my brain to shut down, thinking of all the new things I was going to be trying today. Stumbling a little as I entered the kitchen, I wanted something to pick me up a bit. I made a quick pancake batter, leaving it so thick that it barely flowed. I plopped a good bit down onto my flat top, and while it was cooking I melted a bit of butter in the microwave. That came out, and I mixed in enough brown sugar to make it into a paste and added a generous dash of cinnamon. Just in time, as the bubbles that were on my pancake let me know it was ready to flip. Before I did that, I added my butter mixture in a swirl pattern. Less than five minutes later I was enjoying a batch of cinnamon roll pancakes, topped with strawberry jelly and maple syrup. Orange juice to wash it down was fine, since it was all digital I really didn’t have to worry about the amount of sugar I would have just eaten in real life. Burping in contentment, I headed toward the Oblivion door.

WORLD ANNOUNCEMENT!

Players, we are proud to announce the official beta testing of a new way to play Oblivion Online! Monster races will soon be available for play, but beware! These races come with many drawbacks meant to enhance gameplay and increase the difficulty. Increased difficulty often comes with increased rewards, as many of you well know. For the past several days there have been players using the monster races in dungeon instances. This has inadvertently increased the difficulty of these areas and we are now instituting the following: A monster player that has at least five kills in their dungeon in one day will be upgraded to a champion instance. The increased difficulty and rewards will then be optional, and players will have a warning that not all monsters will behave the same as traditional NPCs.

Well, that was a wonderful greeting. I guess I got under a few people’s skin with all the killing the past two days. As I finished reading the announcement, I felt a push on my shoulder as Khaliss wanted my attention.

“Something up Khaliss?”

“Yes Angus. We are upgraded to a championship instance. This hasn’t happened in many years. Adventurers will be stronger, and we will get a boost to our stats. The gods have told me to offer you a choice, become boosted like us or stay at level one.”

QUEST ALERT:

Khaliss has been instructed to offer you a quest for the remainder of the week. All the kobolds in this instance have been enhanced to champion levels, boosting their base stats. He offers you the same.

Options

Conditions and rewards

Accept the boost to stats

Stats will be boosted for the rest of the week. No additional rewards will be offered.

Decline the boost to stats

Failure conditions: Fail to obtain a kill during the rest of the week.

Failure rewards: Loss of faction points with kobolds and with Khaliss

Pass conditions: Obtain as many kills as possible. Assisting in a kill will count as long as you are in the top two for damage dealt.

Pass rewards: Dependent upon performance.

Accept

Decline

Well, would you look at that. My first quest, and it looked like it would have great options should I manage to complete it. From the way Khaliss talked, it sounded like either the amount or level of adventurers per party would rise. Either way, there was no way I was going to turn this down. “Khaliss, I decline the boost to my stats. It doesn’t matter how many adventurers may come, I’ll take them all down!”

“Well said, Angus. Well said. It’s sad that our compatriots aren’t at your level of confidence, but you have gotten most of the kills so far. It will be the same deal as yesterday, let us know when you are ready to start or we will begin in seven and a half hours.”

“Thanks Khaliss, I won’t let you down.” Not wanting to waste time, I headed out immediately to the cave I had started making earlier. This time I sat right in front of the wall and worked on what Phoebe taught me. Feel the mana flow down my arm, to my fingers. Extend it outward, forming a curved blade, as if my fingers were just one massive claw. Keeping my eyes closed, I flicked my wrist forward and opened them to see what the results were. “Holy shit!” Where before my claws dug in a few inches, I had just cleaved out a gash almost a foot deep for the same amount of mana. I used the next few hours to carve out several large caves above the tunnels, and some that dropped down within the walls.

One of my favorites that I didn’t have much hope for was within the walls. I cut a hole just big enough for someone’s head to fit through, then went back around and wrote an inscription on the wall. “Keep your eyes to the sky, and wisdom shall rain down from above.”

One of my other hallways was a mind bender. Long ago there was a game with an assassin character that had hidden as a jester for so long he lost his mind. Aside from his insanity, he also had a rather high pitched voice, and I thought a hallway conversation with him would definitely creep some people out.

“Welcome, WELCOME! Remember, every day you wake up is one day closer to the last day of your life!”

“Was that the wind on your neck? Or was it a passing blade? We’ll find out soon, won’t we HEHEHEHEHEHEEEEEE!”

“I love the feel of caves! They’re almost as good as the cold embrace of the grave!”

“While you weren’t looking, I welded your greaves together!”

“Ex marks the spot! But which ex is the ex we are looking for? Mother knows, but she won’t tell me!” I put a lot of random pitfalls all along the corridor. Some were marked with exes, most weren’t. I even left some exes on spots that didn’t have any traps underneath, because that would make life far too easy for them. At the very end of the tunnel, I carved a man sitting in the lotus position with several of the chakras marked. The chakra in the middle of the forehead I actually tunneled into a hidden room behind the wall. Above the man I wrote, “Stare into the third eye for enlightenment.”

One hour until adventurers will arrive

Excellent! Almost all of my preparations were complete. There were only a few things I still had left on my list. First, I carved out two new hammers. I made a large bowl right after that, and proceeded to fill it with the stone dust from my two older hammers. That blinding powder was just too useful. My next test was a baseball sized hunk of granite. I know mages are able to infuse mana into objects, especially specializations like Spellswords. Why couldn’t I do it?

So I took my chunk of rock and made it as spherical as possible, since things with regular edges like a properly cut gem would hold the mana better. I sat still, and imagined 10 mana flowing from my hand into the rock. Opening my eyes, I saw that it had taken on a slight bluish white glow. It felt stable, so I put in 10 more mana and watched the glow intensify. At 25 total mana the rock started pulsing, and I felt that it was about to the end of what it could hold. So I dumped in another ten mana and threw the rock as hard as I could. As it flew, a streak of light followed it like a comet, and when it impacted the wall it exploded sending shrapnel everywhere. I rubbed my hands and smiled, these would be great for some of my plans. I made ten of them and charged them with 25 mana each, then headed to one of the last hallways I hadn’t modified yet and took all the torches out of them.

Intruders have entered the dungeon

Oh, perfect time for test subjects! I headed out first to the hole in the wall with the quote about wisdom raining down from above and settled in to wait. Soon enough I heard people approaching. “For a champion dungeon, this isn’t really all that difficult.”

“Don’t jinx us man, bad things will happen!”

“Oh relax Paul, there ain’t no reason to be worried. Even if they are all champions, we are all at level three with skills to match. Dana will keep us healed up, I will knock ‘em down, and you can set ‘em on fire. Nothing to it.”

“Seriously Tom, it isn’t going to be that easy. I bet we haven’t even met the player yet.”

“Trust me Paul, whoever this player is won’t stand a chance against us three. Hello, what’s this?”

“Don’t do it Tom!”

“Paul, it’s just a hole in the wall. I’m just going to stick my head in and see what’s in there. Who knows, maybe I’ll get one of those bonus attribute points. They tend to pop up in the lower dungeons, don’tcha know?”

I was counting my lucky stars. This guy was an idiot, and I saw him stick his head in facing up. TheUnrustableTomman. What a great pun for a name, but sadly you are going to be my first sacrifice. I raised my hammer over my head as he was frantically blinking, before muttering, “Fool” as it crashed down with every bit of force I had into his face. His neck gave a sickening crack, his life bar instantly greyed out, and his companions started yelling as his body shattered in death. I headed up to my hidden corridors, and dropped down around the next corner, waiting to get them.

As I heard them near, I darted around the corner and threw a handful of dust into the nearest person’s eyes, it just happened to be the wizard. Having dealt with him, I advanced on the healer. I could see the terror in her eyes, so I smiled and licked my lips at her. “Hello squishy!” I raised my hammer and made to strike into her upper arm, and when she flinched and went to block high I dropped low and slammed my hammer into the side of her knee.

“AAAAAHHH!”

Having disabled the healer, and given her something to distract her from proper healing, I immediately rolled to my right to avoid any retribution from the mage. I turned back just in time to see him finally blink the last of the dust out of his eyes. Damn, I wish that would have lasted longer. His eyes were blazing with pain and anger, and he lifted his arm and pointed his palm at me in the classic spellcaster pose. I zig zagged back towards him as I pulled out my second hammer, and prepared for some pain.

“[Ember]” he called out and fired a small bolt of flame right into my chest. I was too far away to strike his body, but he helpfully left his arm just hanging out there. I took the bolt straight to the chest, as my twin hammers came crashing into both sides of his hand, mangling it into a nice pulp. “AAAAAH, YOU’LL PAY FOR THAT YOU SONOFABITCH!” I didn’t give him any time to recover and kept pummeling him with overhand hammer strikes. He tried to put up a defense, but anytime his arm raised I switched to targeting that instead of his body. It took longer, but with the pain from a shattered hand he couldn’t cast spells, and mages weren’t generally known for coming out on top in brawls, so it was no surprise that he soon crumpled under my onslaught. I turned to see the healer was halfway down the hall, and hobbling as fast as she could.

Poor thing, she had lost a third of her life, and wasn’t high enough level to cast [Mending limbs], the healer spell that could fix broken bones. I didn’t have much of my stamina left, and I needed a way to slow her down so I threw one of my hammers at her back, wincing in sympathetic pain at the dull thunk from the impact between her shoulder blades. She was pitched forward, stepped wrong on her already injured leg and crumpled into a sobbing heap. I hurried up to her, and wanted to end her misery as swiftly as possible. It wasn’t her fault that her partners were idiots. I held my fingers straight, and imagined a wide blade of mana shooting straight out of my fingers. Holding her head still, I thrust it right at the base of her skull and watched her life bar instantly drop.

All intruders defeated. Forty Five minutes until a new wave of adventurers can appear.

Well, I guess that in addition to getting stronger adventurer parties in here, the time between them also dropped a bit. This would be great! I spent the time making rock grenades and charging them with energy so that I had a stockpile in my inventory. It turns out that a stack of ten of them would fill one inventory slot, and I kept going until I had a full inventory. Keeping my two hammers in there, I had 30 of the stones. Speaking of, I realized I hadn’t identified them. First though, I headed to the fake statue near the beginning of the dungeon to be able to spy on the newest group when they entered the dungeon.

Getting there with only a few minutes to spare, I pulled out one of the stones and identified it.

Mana infused granite sphere

Though nothing beautiful, this carved granite sphere has enough of a regular shape to safely hold a small amount of mana. Beware, injecting mana beyond its capacity will result in instability and possibly dangerous consequences.

Durability: 17/20

Mana infused: 25/25

Excellent, I was going to love using these. Nobody expects a ranged attack in a dungeon filled with spear users.

Intruders have entered the dungeon

Wait, were they not telling us how many intruders anymore? That must be an addition for the champion style of the dungeon. Oh well, it wouldn’t be too hard since we still got notifications when everyone was dead. I made sure everything was hidden, then took out my hammers. Let’s see what we are dealing with. Looks like three adventurers again. A dwarf warrior named StabbyMcStabFace, an elf mage named RyuIsAMage, and a Halfling rogue named Shadow. Nothing out of the ordinary for equipment, but these three just had the air of experience about them.

“Hey guys, before we get too far in here, let me show you something crazy.” The mage started. He stepped to the front of the group, cupped both wrists together at his hips while turning his body sideways. I saw a flicker of flame in his hands before he cried out, “[Hadouken]!” and thrust his palms forward, launching a fireball into the darkness.

“How the hell did you rename the [Fireball] spell, and why do you have it at level three! That’s madness” the dwarf cried.

“Easy. You can rename spells if you want, it just costs a gold coin. Totally worth it when you want to PvP. That way they don’t know what skills you are using.”

“Yeah, well why did you go with that silly name from that game? What was it? Streak Fighter?”

“It’s Street Fighter, and it was a classic when I was growing up! I’m telling you, that move was iconic.”

“It might be iconic, but did you really have to put your hands down by your waist? That’s gotta make it hard to aim. Plus that’s spell has to be a mana sink at this level, how many times can you cast it?”

“I can go twice per battle, but it should take whatever it hits in here down into red for life left, if it doesn’t kill it outright. Trust me, we’re good.”

Damn, this one will be tough. That mage’s ability is a tier two spell, and it causes a lot more damage than [Ember]. In all likelihood it would kill me in one shot. As they headed off into the passages, I went towards Khaliss. I would need backup in the battle, and the Khaliss and Shrik would be my best bet.

I was well hidden in my shadowed alcove when I heard them approach. “Only two this time, shouldn’t be too bad. I’ll start it off by hitting the one on the left, then switch out to the one on the right. Stabby, you catch them with a taunt and finish off the first one while Shadow and my second spell take out the other. Sound good?”

“Yeah, yeah, we got this. Ready when you are.”

I poked my head out and waited for my opportunity. As soon as the mage let out with his first [Fireball] I moved. Empty handed, I got to him the moment before he launched his second strike. I grabbed his left shoulder from behind, and a quick jerk was just enough to throw off his aim so instead of striking Shrik it struck the dwarf in the middle of the back.

“Oi! What the hell ya doin’ hittin’ me in the back like that?” He cried as his health dropped into the red. The mage was unable to answer as I had already reached around with my other hand and slit his throat with mana enhanced claws. I dropped his body and headed forward, pulling my hammers. Unfortunately, Khaliss fell before I could get there. I did manage to avenge him with a single swing upside the dwarf’s head.

The rogue still hadn’t noticed me, so I first took a swing at his lower legs for a crippling blow.

“Gah, where the hell did you come from?” He cried as I connected. “[Slice and Dice]” He somehow managed to split the skill targets, hitting me three times with one knife and killing Shrik with three blows from his other knife. I stepped back a bit to gain some room and evaluate my options. I was faster moving distances, but his attack speed far surpassed mine so there was no way I would be able to kill him without taking some damage. The issue was that he had enough life to ensure that I would fall first if we traded blows. I also had plans for the granite spheres, and I wasn’t willing to release them here.

“Tricky rogue, splitting your skill like that. I didn’t realize that was even possible.”

“Heh, glad you liked it. Figures that the only kobold smart enough to plan an ambush would be another player. I’m sure you’ve come to the same conclusion as I have, right? You don’t have enough life to trade blows and kill me, and if you back off I’ll just heal up and hunt you down. I’ve already tagged you with [Marked for Death], so don’t think you can hide in the shadows.”

“Damn, you already have that skill? Did you three just restart so that you could try out the monster players or what?”

“Actually? Yes, we did. You are the lucky first to be able to fight against us, and I’m rather impressed. Too bad you won’t be able to win.”

“I wouldn’t be too sure about that” I responded, getting a mad plan in my head. If the granite spheres could absorb mana, why couldn’t my weapon? I took a half step back to shield the tell-tale glow as much as I could, and started channeling 30 mana to the head of my hammer. I charged forward, aiming one hammer in a thrust at his left shoulder to keep him from slicing me with both knives and brought the other hammer around in an arching swing for a body blow. His eyes got wide as he saw my plan, but it was far too late. He did manage to bury one knife in my gut and twist it, but my hammer struck him in the side and a blue shockwave of mana burst forth and through his body in a widening cone, taking out the last of his life. I fell on my butt, hands shaking with excitement. I won. I WON!

All invaders defeated. Forty five minutes until a new wave of adventurers can appear.

Wow, those guys were tough, but what a thrill. There truly is nothing better than going through a battle while outnumbered, with little chance of survival and coming out on top. Inspiration comes at the toughest of times, and it truly saved my ass. I need to check how that affected my weapon though.

Double Headed Stone Warhammer

This stone weapon is a marked improvement upon previous designs. The wielder can use it comfortably with one hand, or easily add a second hand for extra powerful blows.

Damage: 10-20

Durability: 6/20

Damn, that move wreaked havoc on my poor hammer, dropping its durability to just under a third of its maximum. Well, it just got upgraded to a desperation move. Ok, enough excitement for one day. Time to play it fairly conservative for the rest of the day. I headed to the darkened hallway, and placed one of the stones in the middle. Walking away, I was excited. The glow was rather eerie, especially against the dark backdrop. I could only see a few inches highlighted in the glow, it wasn’t powerful enough for more. I headed out to the last torch, and carved a message to adventurers. “Wake not the restless dead, for caverns deep are where dark things sleep.”

Cryptic enough, I headed into the hall and put the last stone into my inventory. I also started carving yet another hammer, and spent the rest of the time making a stockpile of stone powder. Preparations complete, I waited for the next group to attempt the dungeon.

Intruders have entered the dungeon

It seems that world message earlier really fired up the adventurers, as the new group arrived right at the forty-five-minute mark. Let’s see how they handle this! Of course I spent the majority of an hour just waiting around, they were taking their sweet time. Soon though, I heard their voices as they clomped along through the tunnels. A team of four stopped at the end of the tunnel, in the middle of the last pool of light. Too far to see their tags, but I could still hear them.

“I don’t like this, as creepy as the rest of the dungeon has been there was always light.”

“Relax Doc, we still have whoever is in here outnumbered and out leveled. Beside the enchantments from the guild crafters will make sure we can take him down. Who knows, we might even get an achievement for all this!”

“Everyone knows there aren’t any achievements available in level one dungeons, Steele. Even if it is a champion instance.”

“No worries everyone, trust the equipment we’ve been given. Here, if the dark scares you that much, I’ll carry a torch. I can still bang it against my shield to activate [Taunt], and that’ll keep whatever appears off the rest of you. If it stops paying attention to me, I’ll light its face on fire and hit it with a [Shield Bash]. Happy?”

“Fine, you got a plan. We will foll, wait a minute. What’s this written by the torch? Wake not the restless dead, for caverns deep are where dark things sleep. Steele, I thought you said this was a kobold dungeon, what’s this about restless dead?”

“It’s just a trick, ignore it.”

“What if it isn’t a trick? What if there are undead here? We aren’t specced out for undead damnit, Slicer went boosted bleeding, Carnage went crippling blows, and you went sword and board. Hell, the only one who would be effective would be me, and I don’t have the mana reserves to do more than a few minor heals! We need to head back and change our gear or we won’t make it!”

Wow, a rather impassioned speech for the healer! Normally he would be right though, I’m glad that I wrote that gibberish on the wall. The more distracted they would be the better off I would be. Heck, if you look at it the faint blue glow could be misconstrued as something undead. Maybe this will work out great?

“ENOUGH DOC! We press on. No going back, no more prattling on about undead. This is a kobold dungeon, and there aren’t any undead here. Now get your game faces on and hand me that torch, let’s get through this darkened tunnel. I want a diamond formation, Doc in back. Everyone keep an arms length distance between us at all times. Got it?”

A chorus of “Yes” answered. Sheathing his sword, the leader took a torch in his main hand and started heading down the hallway. I couldn’t fault them for the formation, but the leader didn’t want to listen to anyone else’s ideas and that would be his downfall. I let them get halfway down before I pulled a stone from my inventory.

“Who dares?” I asked in a gravelly voice. “Ah, the warmth of life ventures here yet again. Come, warm these old bones as I gift you with the cold embrace of death!” I slowly started moving the stone back and forth across the hallway, as if the creature talking to them was pacing.

“No undead, huh Steele! It’s just a kobold dungeon, sure.”

“SHUT IT AND PREPARE FOR BATTLE!”

“Battle? This shall be. . . . a SLAUGHTER AHAHAHAHAHA!!” With my final taunt, I overcharged five extra mana into the stone and lobbed it in an arch towards the party. Following it with a charge, I pulled two more stones and overcharged the first with 15 mana and threw it as hard as I could at the party, right as the first stone got within range.

Slamming the metal reinforcing bands of the torch on the shield, the warrior activated [Taunt] by shouting, “You’re mine you bucket of bones!” When the stone didn’t change directions, he swung his torch at it and missed. The rogue on the left didn’t, and his dagger caused the thing to explode and knock everyone back a bit. The second stone streaked through the gap left by the warrior and hit the healer right in the chest as his panicked eyes widened in terror. The explosion killed him before he could even utter a cry, and finished off the rogue while knocking the already off balance warrior onto his side. As he tried to get up, I noticed that his health bar was down to roughly 40% of its max, so I dumped the remaining 30 mana into the final stone in my hand and launched it at his back. I was close enough that he stood no chance, and the explosion would have blinded me had I not dropped my head in expectation. I pulled out my hammer, and looked up into the darkness. I guess I had extinguished the torch. Quickly activating darkvision, I saw the remaining rogue with only a sliver of life left as he leaned against the wall vainly trying to get over the blinding flash. A hammer strike to his stomach finished off Carnage.

All invaders defeated. Forty five minutes until a new wave of adventurers may appear

Wow, that was incredibly fun! I refilled my stockpile, and headed to one of the main hallways to start work on one of my more ambitious traps. I got into the ceiling and carved out a rather large oblong chamber parallel with the tunnel below. I also left a wide column about 2/3 of the width of the hallway at one end, and coming out of that a bench that headed towards the beginning of the dungeon. Looking at my in game timer, that was all I had time to finish before I needed to head back to my dark hallway.

With about three minutes left on the timer, I made it back and remembered the torch that Steele had dropped. Activating darkvision, I bent down to pick up the dropped torch and was rather shocked when my hand went right through it. Of course, I tried it three times before I realized I was dealing with a bug. Pulling a torch out of my own inventory, I went to the one spot on the wall where the original was and tried dropping the torch. I bent down and was perfectly able to pick it back up. Looking at my clock, I figured I still had a good bit of time before the adventurers got here so I dropped it again, ran down the hall and back and was still able to pick it up and put it in its socket. As I waited, I sent off an email to Emily with my new bug.

Emily,

Found a new bug to report. An adventurer dropped a torch that they had picked up earlier in the dungeon. I am unable to interact at all with this object. I tried duplicating this with a torch I dropped from my inventory, and even leaving the torch and coming back I am still able to pick it up. The torch is extinguished at the moment so there is no further issue on my end at the moment.

Thanks,

Marty

There we go, and sent. I had an idea as to why it would be causing issues, but wouldn’t need to do their jobs for them and if I was wrong I didn’t want to be responsible for sending them off on a wild goose chase. I only needed some new adventurers to come strolling into my area.

Just under a half hour later I heard the echoes of voices. “Right or straight ahead guys?”

“Well, this isn’t a sinister dungeon so let’s go right. I hate the straight and narrow.”

“Seriously Don, if you make that lame joke about the sinister dungeon one more time I am going to decapitate you. I don’t care if we are in the middle of a dungeon with no resurrect scrolls, I’m sick of it. We all know that sinister is Latin for left handed, because you remind us in EVERY. FUCKING. DUNGEON! So stop it already, will ya?”

“Sorry Zena, won’t happen again.”

“Good, now let’s go to the right and see what’s down this passage.”

I couldn’t help but chuckle at them. By this point, every gamer knew about the sinister dungeon that every developer thought was brilliant. Name a dungeon the Sinister Dungeon, and the only way through was to take every single left. It was usually a level one or two dungeon nowadays. As I sat musing on developer choices, the four-person party came around the bend. The leader had to have been a female half-giant as she was head and shoulders above the rest of her party. She went with a massive axe that would likely ruin my day if I let it get anywhere close to me. The rest of the party were two mages and a dwarf warrior who carried a much smaller axe. This was getting far more interesting by the minute!

“Zena, wait just a minute before we go walking through the darkness. I don’t like deviations from the normal, especially in low level dungeons like this. Something isn’t right here,” one of the mages spoke up. To her credit, Zena did listen.

“Ok, everyone check this immediate area. Look for any clues or hints, anything that seems out of place. I’ll even be checking the ceiling. Archimedes, you check the torches. See if any of the sconces turn.” I was impressed. This group was going to be very hard to take down if I let them get within striking range. Good thing I had thirty stones for launching from long range to take them out with.

“Zena, check this out. There’s a poem scribbled on the wall. Wake not the restless dead, for caverns deep are where dark things sleep.”

“Crap, that could be undead. We didn’t bring any cure disease potions, so play it defensively Don. We will go in a T formation. I’ll be in the lead, using my weapons reach to keep them at bay. Good thing I took that upgrade to [Cleave] that has a knockback chance on anything that weighs less than me. Don, you are our second line of defense. If anything gets past me, kill it. Archimedes and FoxFire, You two are the wings and behind Don. Light ‘em up with fire, spreading the love if there are multiple incoming. I want you to weaken them enough that a poke or two from Don will kill them. Don’t be stingy with the mana, we will rest up to full before pressing on. I would much rather it take us a while longer to clear than for us to go charging ahead into a battle we don’t have the resources to win, understood?”

“Yes ma’am!” Damnit, this girl was very good. Even without a healer in their party, this plan would be highly effective against almost any low level dungeon, but it would be absolutely devastating against undead. Most undead took extra damage from fire, and with the damage dealers in the back they would have two warriors able to slow them down with devastating blows from axes before they could get to their opponents. Of all the groups to go through the dungeon so far, this one was the best without a doubt and I was incredibly sorry that I didn’t have enough time to finish my previous trap.

I let them get almost to where the previous group had perished before removing a stone from my bag. “More of the living have come to join the dead, how fortunate. I needed more minions, and you will make a great general my dear. Now, won’t you kindly. . . DDDDIIIIIIIEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!” I screeched the last word as the stone flew through the air, overcharged with ten mana. I took out another stone and immediately charged it with 30 mana and hurled it at Zena, as she was the most dangerous target.

“ONE INCOMING HIGH!” Zena cried as both mages launched their ember spells at the blue object. Both missed low, since they assumed that the creature would have a body. Zena set up with the axe parallel to the ground by her hip, and dipped the head to give extra power to her strike.

Don’s dwarf eyes must have had darkvision, as he cried a warning to her just a little too late, “No don’t, it’s a trap!” The explosion rocked her back a half step and blinded her, and the second rock hit her center of mass and sent her flying backwards with nothing left in her health bar. I was rather glad I had overcharged that last strike, and as I was still just out of their visual range I used the last of my mana to overcharge the last stone and target the dwarf. If I wanted to remain anonymous, he had to die before he could identify me.

“Incoming again!” One of the mages tried to warn him, but it was too late. The stone struck him in the head for what had to be a critical hit, killing him instantly. As he dropped, his body landed on his torch, sending the hall into darkness. I sped past them as silently as I could, keeping to one of the walls. Both mages finally got their hands up and fired indiscriminately down the now empty hallway, terror of the unknown and the loss of their leader completely demoralizing them.

The nearest mage died to the smashing of twin hammers on opposite sides of his head. As the other turned towards the sound, I ducked low and scuttled forward to strike at his hip with my left hammer. As he turned towards where he thought the blow came from, I stood to my full height and cracked by other hammer in the back of his head. He fell on his face, stunned and health bar in the red. I gave a simple strike to his back to end the fight.

All intruders defeated. Forty five minutes until a new wave of adventurers may appear.

I slumped in exhaustion. This constant attack by adventurers was rather draining. I also needed something much more devastating in case I came upon another good leader like Zena. Up until now, all of my stones were about the size of a baseball. I think it was time to upgrade the size. I carved out one the size of a basketball, anything larger would be too hard to throw and anything smaller wouldn’t be nearly as devastating as what I wanted it to be. Before I could identify it, I got a ping from Emily

Marty,

We have looked into your problem and have confirmed the bug. It will take an overnight patch to alter the code. Most likely is that the system flagged the torch as both an adventurer’s possession and a dungeon object. This would leave the object in the dungeon upon death but render it unalterable by any non-player entity. Thank you for catching a minor bug, this has been added to your contributions list.

Keep up the good work,

Emily

Well, that was a nice takeaway. Who would have thought that I would find two minor bugs in the same dungeon? Oh well, on to more explosive things. I dumped all the mana I had into the sphere and identified it.

Mana Infused granite stone sphere (Large)

Though nothing beautiful, this carved granite sphere has enough of a regular shape to safely hold a large amount of mana. Beware, injecting mana beyond its capacity will result in instability and possibly dangerous consequences.

Durability: 98/100

Mana Infused: 50/300

THREE HUNDRED MANA!?! That was sheer and utter madness! It only took a few of the smaller stones to take out the adventurers, and this was over ten times that amount! I was going to have so much fun with this, it’s just too bad that I won’t be able to see the explosion. The thing was far too heavy to throw far enough to ensure safety. I was going to have to drop this thing down into their midst from up above and dive back down the hallway to safety. I wouldn’t be surprised if part of the roof caved in. It took a while, but the mana guzzler finally managed to get fully charged just before my next message.

Invaders have entered the dungeon

Oh these poor, unsuspecting fools. I stored my newest weapon of destruction in my inventory and headed to the ceiling. Once up there, I cut a hole much larger than what I would need so that I could aim the behemoth. It was also closer to the beginning of the darkened hallway. Like the majority of militaries everywhere, I played hurry up and wait.

“Steele, I’m serious. I talked to others in the guild, there are no undead in the Kobold Warrens. I don’t know what killed us last time, but it couldn’t have been undead.”

“I don’t care what others say, there are undead in here. What else has bluish flames and explosive attacks?”

“I don’t know, maybe some new kind of kobold mage.”

“It wasn’t a mage, level one spells don’t fucking change direction. Now shut your mouth and get ready to unleash your strongest holy spells.”

Would you look at that, it looks like Steele didn’t have a great time last time he was here. I instantly switched from feeling bad for the invaders to feeling great that this dick had decided to volunteer for annihilation. I positioned myself so that I could barely see to the end of the light thrown off by the torches, and waited. Soon enough I saw a pair of boots, and decided that these fools didn’t deserve any warning. I silently slid around so that I would see their backs as they passed underneath, and waited.

“No torches this time, Bellamy cast [Holy light]”

“I know the plan Steele, you don’t have to micromanage everything. Give me a second. Amelia, Goddess of Life, I beseech thee. Grant unto this unworthy servant thy blessed light, that I might go forth to hold the darkness at bay. [Holy light]”

Looks like Steele came loaded for bear. [Holy light] was a dual use spell. It created a ring of blessed light that traveled with the caster that would both heal allies and cause slow DoT (Damage over Time) to any undead caught within it. A few seconds later and Steele walked below me, right at the leading edge of the light. You could see beyond it, but the healing edge only went about five feet from the caster at the lower levels. I waited a half second, then pulled out my present. Dumping all 50 of my mana into it, I shoved it through the hole aiming for Steele’s heels. I turned and dove behind me as the tunnel shook violently for a second.

All intruders eliminated. Insufficient time remaining for dungeon reset, day finished.

Poor Steele, he never stood a chance. I peeked over the edge of the hole and looked at the carnage. The floor had a small crater, while the walls were pitted from the shards of the stone. I smiled as I dropped down and headed to the kobold barracks.

“Welcome back Angus.”

“Thanks Khaliss, is there anything you need from me?”

“No, just keep up the good work. I saw you had all the kills for the day, 19 is an incredible number.”

“Will do Khaliss, I’ve got a few more surprises for tomorrow. I just hope I can hold out for the rest of the week.”

“It’s just two more days, I’m sure you will be fine.”

“Seriously? Five days and not seven? Oh thank God, that’s a load off my back. I didn’t think I would have enough to make it through those extra days.” Nodding to the kobold, I inhaled my rations and headed to a bunk. “Logout.”