Dungeon Status:

Tier 1

Level 2/10

Heart 6400/6400

Experience 100/1600

Workers 5/15

Monsters 0/16+1

Traps 14/25+4

Rooms 19

Food 312

Timber 83

Iron 351

Steel 0

Charcoal 0

Mana 18

Rock 728

Gold 1203

Leather 248

Leather Sludge 195

Lava 28

Explosive Runes 4

Triggered Explosive Runes 3

Quest: Have 10 adventurers in the dungeon at once

Quest: Get 10,000 gold

Travis looked at the work so far. He'd been spending most of his time focused on magic and swirling it toward him like Katelyn did, while Penelope dug furiously and built the Watering Hole, a Storage Room, two hidden and reinforced doors, and added a new upgrade to the warehouse—storage dropoff. It reduced the room's storage capacity to zero, but let kobolds drop off goods there. Perfect for a by-the-entrance way to get stuff into the dungeon, though it had resulted in a tiny adjustment to his plans.

"Okay, guys and gals, we are going to need some timber next. Steph has pulled-in some, but we're way short and need a lot more for warehouses. Either Robert and Ludmiller or Pen, could you—"

"I got it, Trav. I'm kind of finished with the first part up here. I want Ludmiller to chat with me about traps. I have some ideas, but I think she'd be a valuable resource to have involved." Stowing her pickaxe and drawing her woodcutting axe, Penelope stalked toward the entrance of the dungeon. "Plus, being outside doesn't bother me."

"Got it." Turning his attention back to Robert and Ludmiller, Travis filled them in. "Pen is going to cut wood. If you feel up to it, continue digging here."

"Kay." It was a simple syllable, but it was something Travis had watched Ludmiller struggle with. He waited for Robert to nod too before moving on.

Katelyn was working on runes. He could appreciate that she was working on their defenses—a terrible and amazing defensive trap—before her own projects. Her handling of the last two adventurers had made him shiver in a proud moment. She hadn't toyed with them, kicking them out of the dungeon had just been business for her.

"You know, I can actually feel you when you focus on me now." Katelyn quirked an eyebrow at the lizard sitting on the mantle above her meditation spot. "What's up, Trav?"

"This really seems to be working. All of this. Thanks for that assist with the extra adventurers." It was hard for Travis not to gush. She'd been literally amazing and he wanted to fawn over her for it.

"Idiots thought they could just walk into a dungeon with a wizard protecting it? Nice fire wall, too." She was still meditating, but she seemed to be getting better at holding a conversation and do so. Travis had to wonder if she just hadn't let herself get interrupted enough in the past.

"Thanks, though I really want to get enough mana and regen to start casting this one dungeon spell regularly. Basically, it produces resource nodes. I think that might be a good way to flood the town with raw materials and give them some serious buying power." Travis was already getting excited at that. "It will make us closer partners, too."

"What about the genius loci?" Katelyn asked. "I never felt it when I went to town, but it might start to get curious about us—well, you."

Confusion reigned for Travis. "Huh?"

"Okay, you know dungeons are aware—well, not usually as much as you, Trav—cities grow and get the same way. It's like there's a spirit of a city, but while it seems interested in keeping certain types of people around, and putting things in various places, it generally doesn't worry about individuals.

"That's where I think we've been slipping by it. The genius loci would have freaked out if the people of the city freaked out, but because they accepted us without any hesitation in their greedy hearts, the city accepted us. How it will deal with so much more dungeon stuff encroaching, I don't know. If it becomes aware of us, and doesn't like us, it might start trying to influence everyone in the city against us."

It wasn't a good picture, but Travis liked to think he could at least convince the city that trading was a good idea. "Hey, what if it's only ignoring us because we're helping it grow?"

"Then we'll keep helping it, I guess. If it's that easy to keep happy, we should be fine." With her current meditation complete, Katelyn pulled out another rock and imbued it with the pattern for a triggered explosive rune. "Four more and we can rearm that trap."

She settled back down to start meditating again. "So, what do you want to know?"

"The magic in the books isn't helping. Okay, it did help with meditation and gathering mana, but I just can't cast spells like that." Travis felt a little excitement leave him at the reminder. "So how am I meant to get new spells?"

"Probably the same way I do. I lost all my wizard spells, you know? I can't cast them properly anymore. All I have now are kobold spells." Letting loose a relaxed sigh, Katelyn gestured to the small rows of books on a small shelf beside her. "I've been trying to rebuild all my wizard spells as kobold spells, but it's slow-going."

"How would I do that?" Travis asked.

Tapping her chin with one clawtip, Katelyn thought about the situation before letting out a laugh. "So, everything you know is on a book somewhere in here, right?" When Travis gasped, Katelyn poked at the air with her claw and abandoned her meditation. "Right! So I could help you with these spells, maybe trying to produce new ones for you."

"That'd be great, but you should probably finish the runestones first. I know it's boring work, but now that I've seen them in action, I know I'll feel way safer with them protecting us."

"Right, but you can't tell me what to do on my time off, can you?" Katelyn smirked at the lizard.

Groaning, Travis couldn't stop from laughing. "Maybe it would have been easier if I'd just let you take over. Then you'd have to make all the hard decisions."

"Nope. Not it. You gave me a place where I get to spend most of my time playing with magic. Now you have to put up with the fact I'm going to spend most of my time playing with magic."

"Okay, we have two missing. Porter, who's probably at the town near the dungeon, and Luddy. Doesn't she normally go to that goodie-goodie shrine over on Peterson road?" Sojourn was still trying to deal with the usual after-death-aches and pains.

Shivering at what she remembered, Brace shook her head. "Last I saw, she dove away from the false floor. You were at the back?"

Sojourn looked to Harry. "We both were. The dungeon picked the perfect time to throw a fire wall up, just as some kobold literally set the whole place on fire."

"That was crazy. I barely noticed them and they blasted me with fire. My hearing was shot because of the blast, and then I was on fire and screaming and I woke up here. What was with the gagging thing?" Harry could still taste the horrid thing they'd had in his mouth when he'd woken up. He hadn't even screamed that much.

"Not elf fault. Good traps. Too good." Wild had bitten clean through the gag when he'd been revived. It was a very ignoble thing to do to someone, he thought, but his mind was now on what had happened to Ludmiller. "Where she?"

"That's what I intend to find out. Gotta go to her damn shrine and ask when she revived." Sojourn and his party spent the rest of the morning of their return to the living sorting through their gear to work out what was destroyed beyond use and what they could salvage. Their weapons and armor were, mostly, fine. Some had pieces of shrapnel and others had become pieces of shrapnel. In all, they were severely in the negative for the attempt on the dungeon.

In the early afternoon, just as the group was meeting up after their lunch, Sojourn sat down to a dour party. Everyone was now short gold to pay for a new talisman and get a fresh resurrection-promise from the shrine, as well as replace and repair equipment.

"She not only didn't trigger her talisman, the priest confirmed that her talisman was destroyed. Either she got one at the town near the dungeon, she is still alive, or the dungeon beasts shredded her talisman and then killed her," Sojourn told the party everything he'd learned from the shrine he'd visited. "So that leaves us short of coin and returning to that damn town to see if she's there. If not, we book it out of there and leave that cursed hole."

"Or we just cut and run. That place is too hot for us." Brace stared at Sojourn. "No dungeon could be worth that much lost gold. We still need a new rogue—Luddy wasn't worth spit in the end."

Wild stood up and began walking away from the table.

"Where you going?" Harry called out.

"Find Luddy."

It was distasteful, but to honor his god, Rupert knew the corpse before him needed to be brought back so that the soul that inhabited could seek to restore itself before facing judgment. The ritual wasn't complicated but it always took raw divine power to accomplish. Pressing his hand to Porter's chest, he focused on the debt the man had to pay.

Porter came-to screaming. He screamed the pain of far too much explosion hitting him from all directions at once. Then came the realization that he was alive. He managed to clamp down on his screaming and sat up. Then he fell backwards again as he became too dizzy too fast.

"Sit yourself back and listen, boy. You need to do more of that." Rupert used some divine force to keep his hand pressed to Porter's chest. "You incurred a debt attacking that dungeon. I already passed sentence on the only true survivor of it, and they are working off the monetary value of the debt. You have a spiritual debt to her. What will you do?"

When the hand was removed from Porter's chest, he sat up again and glared at the priest. "Get out of this town and never come back. Sod the lot of you."

Grabbing what items were sitting to the side of the altar, Porter stood up on legs that became more stable as he put weight on them. Marching out the front door of the shrine, he froze.

"By the power vested in me as protector of Northridge by the council and the people they represent, you're being detained." Brolly Windchime nodded to the four guards to collect the man.

"What?! You can't be serious! What are you holding me for?" Porter's hand strayed, naturally, to his sword belt. The problem was his weapon was rolled up in his gear. He glared at Brolly.

"Destruction of property. Since another is already serving time to pay for the costs of the damage, yours will simply be punishment for aiding them in that. Take him to the jailhouse." Walking away from the scene, trusting his guards to do their work, Brolly noticed three faces watching from nearby. He approached them and nodded first to Brayden, then Fife, and finally Jack. "You saw that?"

"Stupid bastard deserves everything you give him. You don't want loose cannon adventurers hanging around." Fife spat after her words and turned her back on Brolly.

Giving his party's tank the space she seemed to need to cool off, Brayden Smith held out his hand to pat Brolly on the shoulder. "I was going to head in and talk to the priest here."

"He's a hard man, but I think a growing city needs that." It had been a hard thing to hear how Rupert had handled Ludmiller and how he had kept the body of Porter while he communed with his god for guidance. "If any of you need me, I'll be doing paperwork."