The situation of the dungeon was far from settled after day one. Besides Mir who obtained five islands quickly, specifically, the farm islands, the other factions, pirates, marines, wind elves, flower spirits, lightning spirits and dwarves could get at most three islands with one of them getting four. The island distribution on the fifth floor was complete almost before the first hour.

Thankfully, the requirement of five islands didn’t require just five from the fifth floor but was in general. Mir had the advantage on the fifth floor but she fell far behind in number compared to the others.

Marines, pirates and flower spirits possessed the most overwhelming numbers on the floors below and so the fourth floor, with 24 islands, Mir obtained only 3 while the marines obtained 6, the pirates gained 4, flower spirits gained 4. The lightning spirits gained only 2 but it allowed them to establish their nation. Peter gained 2 islands as well while the dwarfs gained the last 3.

The change in the sea already began after this as all the factions formed their nations. After that, the lightning spirits even had an amazing event where the clouds around them became darker and electrically charged, creating a natural defense.

The islands all gathered in different regions of each floor and like before, Mir took the entrance island to protect that safe zone.

She was hard pressed on the third floor and went herself to quickly and successfully gain 6 islands of the 32, thanks to her searching skills. She was the first one to reach the second floor and obtained 10 of the 48 islands and the same for the first floor where she protected the entrance of the entire dungeon with her nation and made a perfect habitat for the elves. When it was all said and done, the result was that the entrance and exit were actually much closer to each other but the compass didn’t point at it and the dungeon prohibited arriving at the boss island without going through several islands.

Slowly regions in the dungeon began to form. On all floors, the islands of each nation moved under other islands of the floor above. They formed an upward stream within the territory allowing that nation to climb within their own territory.

Although the boss island wasn’t included, the fact that the entrance islands was obtained by Mir exclusively, caused all boss islands below them to fall under her jurisdiction. Hook was resentful but his own territory was near his boss island which was kind of a show.

The dwarfs though had the best advantage, their nation went all the way to the sixth floor and they were the first to cause conflict. Shockingly, the dwarfs and runts had wanted to recruit the snow spirits and Nick. They counted them as runts, which they technically were, but both Nick and Kris rejected saying they weren’t interested in being embroiled in the fan fare they were accomplishing at this time.

To the shock of the bell flower empress and Mir, the dwarves attacked Santa and that was when an amazing event happened as Kris and Nick along fought back. The dwarf king was thoroughly beaten and bound up by a strange chain that Kris carried under his blood red coat while the man himself used an old cane to fight.

Nick pulled out two scimitars and skillfully used them to fight in large groups.

At the end of the day, the two left and returned to their island. Being the only non-connected island on the sixth floor, it still didn’t have much space to hide in but after the first incident, they began to think of raising security and training a small combat group of snow elves and one Christmas elf.

During all this, Dia was hiding in her bed sobbing. Mir knew she was like that but couldn’t visit for fear of an attack. She could only hold out for the time being and reinforce her power. Thankfully, her unique aura actually caused a great deal of plant monsters to be born. What is more, they weren’t low grade but intelligent kinds.

The number of tree warriors increased as did all the plant creatures.

Mir could only cry out in joy when Great Treants appeared on her islands. Unlike the silent treants, great treants were wise beings of the land and were very strong.

Along with great treants, a secondary evolution path for the alraunen appeared which was the Dryad.

Dryads are great beings of the forest. They are completely humanized and made of flesh and blood, but they are even more spiritually in tune to nature than wood elves. Their only fault is that they have no shame and are somewhat lustful beings with impressive vigor.

The appearance of these creatures was a breath of fresh air for Mir because great treants were good at controlling a forest under their watch. They became the ‘leader’ of each island. What was best about them is their ability to breed plant based monsters by catching wild animals and mutating them. The animals are still wild but they become controllable by the great treant.

***

By the third day, the first five floors were completely separated into seven regions. The names of the nations were decided as well. Mir called her nation, The Mystic Forest. Peter had the easiest name, the Lost Kingdom. Following him, Hook named his nation Tortuga. Then the marine fleet admiral halfling followed suit and named their nation, Oceania. The queen lightning spirit priestess called her nation, Lightning Sky Kingdom, followed by the bell flower empress that called her nation, Thousand Blossom Empire. The last were the dwarfs who named their nation, Under Field.

That was when problems arose, where nations exist, the desire for expansion also existed. In fact, the two most excited to obtain a nation, Peter and Hook, were the ones that gathered the fewest islands. Peter obtained 18 and Hook gained 20. After them were the lightning spirits with 26, the dwarves with 27, because they had access to the sixth floor and took 8 islands that were closest to the entrance, 29 for the flower spirits and Mir gained 34.

Her large number came from taking 10 islands from both the first and second floors.

That was also the day war broke out. After one day of rest, a large number of creatures evolved and bulked up each nation. As such, Hook could not contain himself and began an expansion war.

Unexpectedly, he took Mir as the weakest nation due to her low number and few ships. Of course, that wasn’t possible because her nation held all the entrance islands in the first five floors. A large number of dwarves lived in these places and they built boats for her.

Adventurers had long since evacuated the dungeon. With the entrance as a safe zone, Hook would only be able to attack the surrounding islands but that was what he wanted. However, Mir wasn’t someone easy to battle and in a fair fight between Mir and him, his dull wild gales weren’t enough to stop him from being killed by Mir. He would respawn at his pirate base but his crew would need to be rebuilt making him weakened for a period of time. What she most wanted was to buy time until Dia regained control.

Sadly, things didn’t happen as so well. What followed was a war between the three spirit nations on the fifth and third floors where they all left in a stalemate and soon countless battles came after.

Even she was embroiled in various battles, the hardest part was that her strong fighters were stuck to the islands so she was a defensive fighter instead of an attacker.

She could only play the defensive game while the nations battled in a stalemate war without any advances since all the monarchs were pretty much even in strength.

***

The adventurers guild was full of headaches. When suddenly voice covered the entire dungeon, they found it interesting but they finally knew how serious it was when the adventurers began to appear in mass at the entrance.

After the first day, the master dungeoneer came with a solemn news, “The dungeon experienced a huge boost of growth just now. The boss of the fifth floor seems to have grown stronger somehow,” the dungeoneer said to the guildmaster.

Even though they both were A ranked adventurers, that was temporary now. The Adventurers Guild was already deciding the level range based off the new leveling system.

There were few people at level 600 and those people were the highest ranked adventurers but now that the limit was pushed back a full 400 levels and the potential of the world’s creatures were improved, they couldn’t keep grading based on the old system.

“It’s good everyone cleared out, the dungeon has changed far too much and it’s madness with the dungeon residents warring against each other right now,” the guildmaster said.

“I can feel it from here, even on the first floor, there is a large amount of movement in the dungeon at this moment. It’s incredibly complex this so called ‘Nation System’,” the dungeoneer said with a sour face. This was never heard of so how could he not be irritated by the lack of knowledge.

“Since the dungeon is unavailable now, I will take my leave to the HQ and report this myself. I will also request a new evaluation team and see if they officialized the new ranking system,” the guildmaster said.

The dungeoneer sighed, “I shall watch the dungeon from here, I do not have much of a vision of the entire dungeon, but I can follow a few things and hear a few things thanks to my sigils,” he said.

“Thank you, let’s hope this chaos straightens out by the time I return because I don’t want to lose such a good dungeon,” the guildmaster sighed and stood up before taking a sword from behind his desk then walked out.

The dungeoneer began to give out orders and sent out missions for guild scouts to scout out the situation of the dungeon and gather information.

***

WAAA! WAAAAA!

A very loud crying was heard in a snowing but clean snow covered island. Throughout the sixth floor was a huge blizzard and below the dungeon it was snowing very strongly. A clear display of Dia’s sad state which affected both the dungeon and below it where she rains or snows. Even her sadness could be felt making the blizzard a bit more sad.

Kris had her in his lap and she was crying into his coat while he slowly pats her head. Misty was on her shoulder patting her cheek and whispering little things to make Dia calm down, which didn’t work but she didn’t give up. Nick was next to them while the Christmas elves and snow elves were even more solemn. To them, Dia’s happiness was the best thing yet now she was incredibly sad.

They hid it but all the elves had a burning fury in their eyes. It wasn’t limited to them. Jack was a very rare exception in the sixth floor and because of the craze of expansion, the dwarfs didn’t stop at Nick and Kris, they tried to force Jack into their nation but the result could be said to be more than obvious. Nick and Kris allowed him to move into their island and with a few skilled elves, they made him a special fur coat. He previously didn’t have any winter clothing but his size usually made it that he felt less cold or danger from cold. That didn’t mean he didn’t feel uncomfortable.

He sat outside while his eyes were bloodshot as he rubbed his mallet and lightly tapped his own palm on the face.

Ever since all this started, not one of the ‘kings’ ever thought about Dia’s feeling and now Jack was barely holding himself back only because he didn’t have a boat for himself. Otherwise, he would have raided the fifth floor and killed all the monarchs who were warring right now.

Even the dungeon residents were evacuating the dungeon and this was dangerous because the dungeon grew from the mana released from the dungeon residents. The only dungeon residents left were the lost boys, orphaned children who lived with Peter.

After a while, Dia stopped crying, “Come on child, don’t cry and smile,” Kris said and sighed before looking at the snow spirits who ran into the kitchen and returned with rice cookies from the cultivated rice and milk. “Here, eat and drink some, it will cheer you up,” Kris said giving her a cookie.

She took it and emotionlessly munched on it and drank the milk, “Needs chocolate…” She muttered sadly and just rolled herself up in his arms and quietly sobbed.

“Dia, please cheer up, come on, can’t we find something to play around with? Maybe a snowball fight?” Misty said to try and distract Dia.

“That’s it! I’m going to go down there and resolve this!” Nick shouted but as his arm reached the door, a jingling chain wrapped around his arm. Looking at the source, it came from inside Kris’s left sleeve, “Don’t do something stupid, we aren’t even strong enough to fight them all. Dwarves and several runts are one thing but Hook, Peter, the bell flower empress, the queen lightning priestess, how do you expect to fight so many high ranking creatures alone?” Kris said.

Nick scowled, “And how are we supposed to stop them!?” Nick shouted.

“Nick, please! We can’t agitate the situation more than it is!” Misty said.

“P-Papa! Papa!” Dia muttered in her half asleep state while tears streamed down her little cheeks making the two scowl but they calmed down.

“Nick, go back to making toys, it is almost the end of the year when we agreed to do the run. The island is hidden and without our permission, the dwarves can’t enter. Let’s just go about it carefully for now. If need be, we go and help Mir if things get out of hand,” Kris said.

“He is right Mr. Claus, we shouldn’t make things more chaotic or Dia will only feel worse than she already is,” Misty said depressed.

“Fine… Everyone! Back to work!” Nick ground his teeth and stomped his way into the workshop, far from happy to work with such an angry mood.

With the mood so bad, the construction speed was very slow and the toys weren’t good for gifts so Nick decided to stop until this whole mess was over. Instead, he walked out to, amazingly, train himself, the elves and the numerous toy soldiers to make them stronger.

***

Approaching the first full week, Mir was getting more excited that things haven’t gotten out of hand but sadly it wasn’t to last. As night fell and the last day started, not just one but all over the dungeon things reached a fever pitch.

No matter which group it was, only Mir stood back and fought on the defensive while the others seemed to have lost their mind and entered into a berserk rage. Mir was trembling as she saw the dungeon reduced to such a state over a partial weakening of control of the dungeon creatures.

It reached such a serious situation that Mir searched for Sandy again and begged him to form a dream sand barrier around her nation and could only retreat in this manner. The barrier was formed on all floors and no one could pass it without being underwater. That still didn’t help the situation of the dungeon though.

She took this chance to check on Dia but sighed as Mir found that not only could she not find the girl, she couldn’t see into or enter Nick’s island. However, seeing as Dia was nowhere else she could only be with them. Waid was the same and was nowhere to be seen but Pearl said that he was randomly wandering while not wishing to be found so even if she wanted to locate him, she could not find him.

Mir calmed down when she heard that and was able to peacefully return to the floors below to prepare her forces with a more calm attitude. She even tried to organize unique conditions for variations and other plant creatures to spread out the variety. She just never expected that in all this chaos, the animals and intelligent monsters would enter after the seventh day making even her own waters dangerous with crazed wyverns and sky sharks all over the place. Third floor blade wing flying fish appeared flying and swarming while balloon octopuses hooked onto any ship they could encounter as they also swam and flew.

At one point, one of them attacked Hook who scowled and blasted it with air only to discover the complete immunity to wind magic when the octopus swallowed his magic and suddenly tripled in size like a hot air balloon but didn’t pop. Instead, it made it easier for the octopus to wrap his ship by pushing the air into its tentacles and stretching them.

Only when pierced by swords, with a lot of force, thanks to its elastic like body bouncing off weak attacks, would they blow up releasing their gathered air, causing massive damage to nearby boats. Also if they are too close, they would be pushed and smashed into each other.

Everyone felt the true fear of these seemingly weak creatures since a large number of monsters in the dungeon used wind magic.

It also didn’t matter how sharp wind magic was, even Peter was almost eaten by the octopuses and his wind blades weren’t affective.

It was this moment that Mir knew something was wrong, she could understand if things were simply bad due to war, but it felt like something was making everyone go crazy. Dia simply being sad wasn’t enough to cause this, it was now that she knew there was something instigating this ‘craze’. The problem was that she couldn’t feel from where.

She was only depressed that Sandy wasn’t stronger because then he could simply send a huge wave of dream sand through all the dungeon and put them to sleep until Dia gained control and put things in order. Sadly, everything was a mess and everything was only in a feeding frenzy to the point that both her and Sandy had to enter the most central point of the war where all the kings were located.

Even without a storm brewing, Dia’s clouds turned completely black from the chaos causing Mir’s heart to sink when she saw this because it made her feel like the dungeon instinct was possessing the dungeon. It was just like this that monsters in a dungeon where the dungeon instinct was in control would act. Complete carnage where only the strongest survive.

At this time, she felt a piercing danger coming from above and didn’t think twice to use magic to teleport only to see a white-blue, incredibly powerful, lightning bolt come down from the sixth floor and into the sea of the fifth floor. Instantly 100 meters of sea water was frozen and a massive pillar of ice burst out that was constantly growing more.

All the kings and monsters felt immense danger and ran away. A large number of ships and creatures were frozen solid before they could even react while many others got away completely fearing for their life.

This spectacular display of power caused all the crazed monsters and people to wake up trembling, not from the cold, but from the fear of that ice encasing them. Cold sweat covered the bodies of all the creatures there and they couldn’t help but stare at the ‘island’ of ice spikes and pillars at the center of the battlefield, where countless members of the dungeon were frozen to the core.

They all gulped and fearfully looked up at the source where they found a clear, frozen tunnel of ice opening up from the ceiling and from it, a very powerful feeling came. It was then that everyone, after calming down, noticed how unexpectedly thin the mana in the dungeon was. What is more, it was moving towards the creature coming down the tunnel as if he was swallowing all the dungeon’s mana from the sixth to first floors.

It was only when he appeared that everyone’s eyes widened as they shivered at the cold glare he had and distanced themselves by dozens of meters from fear of this man that appeared. In his arm was, unexpectedly, Dia, who was hugging him like a little koala and burying her face into his shoulder.

The man looked around and narrowed his eyes, “Now… who shall explain what you all were doing?” he asked, his voice feeling like it dunked everyone under sub-zero ice water.

No one wanted to go against him, but everyone was curious what kind of monster he was.

“W-Who are you?!” Hook shouted at him.

The man looked at Hook, “Me, my name is Jack Frost!” he said and pointed a cane in his hand at Hook, “And this is for scaring Dia,” he said. Suddenly, the strange frost covering his staff glowed and before Hook could react, a bolt of Ice magic shot out and slammed right through Hook.

A large hole was bored through Hook’s heart and he looked down as his body slowly froze from the hole and soon his body broke down completely.

Everyone felt a cold and unexpected flash happen as Peter was the next one to be frozen. “Now, someone come and tell me what happened,” he said and Mir quickly flew up then began to explain the entire situation.