Chapter: A new place a new problem

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Quest: Restoring Beast Mountain Dungeon Part 1

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Congratulations! You have taken control of Beast Mountain Dungeon. Its condition isn’t the best and it will require work to repair. I hope you brought a hammer! Or crafters.

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Requirements:

Repair the main mana gathering formation

Repair the secondary mana gathering formations (0/10)

Repair the Metal Beast controlling formations (0/3)

Repair the containment formation

Repair containment formation sub-arrays (0/12)

Activate KnghTNG mining machines (0/4)

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Rewards:

Up to 200 ore per day

+100 mana per day

+1,200,000 EXP

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The screen appeared in front of Erik and Rugrat.

“What’s a KnghTNG?” Erik asked.

“A KnghTNG, it breaks down rocks and pulls them out of the ground. The gnomes naming conventions were a bit different.” Rugrat and Erik looked to him with clear questions.

“Okay, so they named things based on the sounds that they made most of the time.”

“So what’s a Vzztpssht?” Rugrat followed up.

“There are a couple different types, but they’re basically mana powered items that can do the work of people. They were used for jobs that no one else wanted to do primarily,” Egbert said awkwardly.

“A genius race that named a robot Vzztpssht,” Rugrat muttered.

Egbert looked like he was trying to find some thread of hope to grab onto.

“Yes,” he finally said, deflating as much as a skeleton could.

“What is the power used for?” Erik asked.

“A part is used to keep the different formations running as well as the Vzztpssht’s that maintain them. I have needed to activate more formations upon the arrival of more people, so that the city’s air isn’t toxic. More power is needed to use the smithy and alchemy workshop.”

“Okay, so what are our options for getting more energy?” Erik asked.

“The first is to repair the formations in the metal domain. First we need to reconnect the formation there to the one we control here, with that active and if the formation in the metal domain isn’t too broken, we’ll be able to gather some more mana, then go system by system, repairing them. I would not suggest this method. I would instead suggest we go with the second and third option. We fuel the dungeon with mana stones and gather mana cornerstones, or you take the core of another Dungeon.”

“How do we take the core of another Dungeon and what is a mana stone or cornerstone?” Erik asked.

“Now you are dungeon masters, if you are to beat a dungeon and make it to the end of the dungeon you can control it, take it over for your own, or you can destroy it. You take the resources of the dungeon and its core. Mana stones are stones formed from mana, they have different grades but they are useful for people looking to increase their mana gathering system, or any mana based system. They’re the primary currency in the higher realms. A mana cornerstone, is the seed of a mana mine. If given enough time they will increase the ambient mana in an area and produce mana stones. These are more long term power solutions, given enough time then the entire dungeon can run off of these, but they’re incredibly expensive and rare.”

Erik was filled with even more questions.

“Okay, first, do you have any information on the formations, like pictures or documents?” Rugrat asked.

“Certainly I have all information resources contained in here as well as other valuable supplies. Egbert pulled one of his finger bones out, the rest of his finger didn’t collapse as he held it out.

Rugrat pulled his head back into his neck trying to get away without moving, revealing a few unflattering chins, “That ain’t natural.”

Erik took the finger bone, even he shivered a bit as he looked inside the ring.

It was filled with books and scrolls. It wasn’t a simple storage device either, it had sixteen square meters of room, putting it in as a Lesser Earth Grade Storage item, worth three hundred gold.

There were some potions and other organic goods kept inside as well.

“The main mana gathering formation looks like this,” Egbert moved his hands through the light in the center of the room, a massive formation appeared, multiple shapes were linked together. The hologram became layered not only were there shapes within shapes, but they were up to twelve layers deep within that.

“Do you know what needs to be repaired?” Erik asked, seeing Rugrat’s lost look as he tried to find something familiar in the image.

“This section needs to be fixed to link our floor to the mana gathering relay there,” Egbert circled a section and expanded it.

To Erik it looked like a pile of coding, he had no idea what it was trying to tell him.

“Will the robots be able to fix it?” Erik asked, seeing that Rugrat was still clearly in over his head.

“They can perform maintenance but they don’t have the ability to repair the formation,” Egbert said.

“Looks like we’re going to need to get a dungeon core,” Erik sighed.

“Yeah, that shit is way too complicated,” Rugrat shook his head. “Leave me with my weapon formations, those massive area arrays are a nightmare.”

“There are a lot of different dungeons,” Egbert said.

“A skeleton!” Blaze’s voice came from the stairs as he looked at Rugrat and Erik talking to Egbert.

Erik realized that Blaze was pale as he shivered slightly, holding up his sword.

“Blaze, this is Egbert, you can lower your sword he’s controlled by Erik and me,” Rugrat said, reassuring Blaze.

“It’s a skeleton, a creation of dark magic and necromancy!”

“Hey! You tell your mom and dad that!” Egbert said indignantly.

A weird expression appeared on Erik’s face.

“You insulting my parents demon born!” Blaze yelled, his color coming back.

“You insulting mine you pipsqueak ting user!”

“Ting?” Erik had to ask.

“That thing,” Egbert said, pointing at the sword.

“Gnome naming conventions?” Rugrat and Erik looked at one another.

Blaze was looking thoroughly confused seeing Erik and Rugrat’s relaxed manner.

“What’s going on Blaze?” Erik asked.

“We’ve found another building on the level, it looks to be some kind of stables. We haven’t sent people to investigate there are also piles of materials stacked with some weird machines around them. They look like the one that is in the smithy. The villagers are moving to the central area,” Blaze said, lowering hs sword even as he looked sideways at Egbert who bit his teeth together loudly.

“Egbert stop growling at the guests,” Rugrat said.

“Wasn’t growling,” Egbert complained under his breath.

Does he even breathe?

Erik disregarded this and cleared his throat.

“Good work Blaze, we’ll be down in a minute,” Erik said.

“Sir,” Blaze said, he cast another look at Egbert who was making a fist, rotating his hand around the other.

His pinky finger flipped up.

“Oh sorry, I didn’t know that would happen!” Egbert said, sounding pure as virgin snow.

Blaze looked to Erik and Rugrat, clearly confused as well.

“I think he meant the middle finger,” Rugrat said.

Erik nodded while Blaze’s confusion increased.

“So, Dungeons and their cores?” Erik asked.

Blaze started walking away, opening his mouth and closing it as the others talked before he simply shook his head and walked downstairs, talking about the devil’s creatures and their curses.

“There are three kinds of dungeons, free or random dungeons that aren’t controlled by anyone and have been randomly created or formed. Then there are controlled dungeons, these have been created by something or someone, meaning that they usually have their own dungeon master. Then there are Special Dungeons, these dungeons can be controlled, but they cannot be destroyed. Only a dungeon master can destroy or take over a dungeon.”

“So we need to destroy a dungeon, take it’s core and then that should increase the amount of power that we get?” Erik asked.

“Doesn’t sound too hard,” Rugrat said.

“There are only a few dungeons in the first realm, most are in the higher realms, with them having more ambient mana it is easier to support their mana needs. I can give you a skill through the ten realms that will allow you to sense dungeons,” Egbert waved his hand as a golden spell formation appeared above his hand and he passed over two parchments.

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Skill: Dungeon Sense

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You can sense dungeons within a 5km radius, as you increase the level of your dungeon your dungeon sense’s power will increase.

Can be cast once per day

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Cooldown: 1 day

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“Is there anything else we can use to increase the mana we have?” Rugrat asked.

“Anything that contains power really, if you cast spells, not all of the mana is used, most spells are pretty wasteful, the mana gathering formation will naturally collect this mana and bring it back to the mana seed. If one just pours their mana out while in the mana gathering formation again this will increase the flow of mana. Monster cores, people or creatures dying,” Egbert shrugged.

“Monster cores?” Erik tossed Egbert a lesser Mortal monster core.

“Really? Monster core and you give me this bauble? I’d need about fifty of these to have enough power for one more day,” Egbert said.

“Should give us a few more weeks,” Rugrat said.

“How much power does it take to teleport five people back to the Beast Mountain Range?” Erik asked.

“One mana stone, though you can just take the emergency exits,” Egbert said.

“If we had the people killing in the beast mountain range they could increase their strength, get more resources, go to the border towns, and sell off the goods we have, then feed the monster cores to the dungeon?” Erik thought aloud, looking to Rugrat.

“Doesn’t sound like a horrible plan to me. Though if we really want to solve this problem we’re going to need to head to the second realm as soon as possible to get another dungeon core to stabilize this one,” Rugrat said.

“I’m interested in what might be waiting for us in the second realm.

Erik couldn’t deny the allure.