Chapter 6

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[Dungeon]

After the group left, I thought about their attempt. It was clear that they had never fought in such open space before. Evidently other dungeons were far more enclosed, more tunnel like. It had taken them by surprise and had forced them to leave earlier than they had planned. Once they got their heads on straight though, I could tell they were skilled. Not as much as Sigurd and his party were, but certainly enough to challenge the deeper floors and uncover more of my work. Their teamwork was good and the way the mage burnt out the wolves was impressive to watch.

I looked forward to their future attempts, but I certainly wasn’t going to hesitate to go for the kill. They retreated through the floor with haste and plenty of awareness. Getting ambushed once had taught them a lesson I expected them not to forget.

I watched their progress with a distracted mind, tracking them until they left my mountain.

Good, it was time to get to work!

Hollowing out a chamber in the mountain was a task I was uniquely familiar with, and though I had progressed in speed from those early floors, it was still a mind-numbing task that drained my mana and willpower. I set to it though, knowing that the faster I got on with it, the sooner I could begin the fun bit, designing my floor.

Wind was a tricky one, it was fundamentally more immaterial than the other elements. Both earth and water had physical forms that could be played with very easily. Earth became my nature floors and the water easily became ice. Fire too was easier, fire was hot, that was its defining characteristic and so modelling my floors around that was an easy way to make a challenge. Wind on the other hand was invisible and although it could be vastly destructive, it was normally peaceful. Apart from its formless nature, it had no physical form or defining characteristic, at least nothing that a floor could be designed around. Traps were an obvious route that I could go; wind blades, pushing gusts, poisonous gas and many many more options floated through my mind.

It was just a question of which one I wanted to go with. I sighed, time to spend some time thinking about it.

By the time I had finished carving out my chamber; a simple thirty-meter square room, I had decided. The first of my wind floors didn’t have to be sophisticated or special in any way, a simple narrow winding path that cut across the room above a deadly fall was more than sufficient. It was my sixteenth floor after all and so it had to be hard. Huge gusts of wind would blow periodically, knocking anything that was on the path, off it. That was unless you made it to the few protected patches, patches that would house my monsters. What they were though, I wasn’t sure yet.

I was finishing off the path through the room when the next group arrived.

Just a little bit more work to finish off the path and then I’d go look at the new group. Though the room was only thirty metres across, the path was a good seventy metres long. I suppose you could jump from one section to another, I thought to myself, pondering options to cheat, nah it wasn’t a course I would recommend, it seemed perilous to the extreme. High risk, very little reward.

That was unless of course you jumped to the secret area. Just as with all my floors I would have a secret area full of treasure, this one would be no different, but that was for later, now I was all about finishing off the path.

Perhaps a little sloping section along the wall to finish, smooth rock, slippery feet and a wall in their faces as they slowly edged along,

Yes, I liked that. The wind would help push them into the wall, but if they were uncertain on their feet then oops, they would fall. This was all about balance and skill.

Yes, I was happy with what I had done. It held promise, I only had to fill it with monsters and loot and add the wind enchants and it would be complete. Oh, and lighting of course, I could see in the dark, but they could not. Low light though, like a moonlit forest, dim and dark, but with a few pale moonbeams shining down.

I could envision it now. I was almost tempted to keep working and ignore the adventurers. But I knew when the boredom set in later, I would regret not having watched them and left the work until later. Besides, it gave me a chance to top up my mana again, and that was always pleasant. Like a filling meal. It made me feel warm and stretched.

I sighed, reluctantly looking away from my work, and guiding my vision up, through the floors to look at the newbies.

And newbies they were indeed. Sloppily patched together leather armour, dinged up helms and swords that seemed more like steel flat-bar than actual weapons.

Not to mention the absolute lack of an equipment belt. How on earth did they hope to survive without any potions. All the other groups had needed them after all. The only redeeming part was the sleek wooden bows they carried with them. They held them with practiced grip, arrows carried in the offhand. It was at odds with the slapdash nature that the rest of them belied.

When I caught up with them, they had made it through the first floor without a problem, so they were at least more skilled than the group of teens I had taken down earlier.

The second floor was another story though, it had far more danger than the first and I considered it to be the actual start of my dungeon.

So far they had managed to make it a decent way through the floor, avoiding everything that was a danger, but I knew it wouldn’t last too long. There was no way I would let them get to the third floor uncontested.

I would kill them, I knew it, it was only a matter of time until they knew it too.

With a few mental prods and pokes I started the wolves gathering. One pack would do I was sure.

Unlike the previous group, they weren’t taken unaware by the wolves sneaking up on them. Instead, they turned as one, firing off a couple arrows each. Arrows that slammed into the wolves, taking each one down with an arrow in the chest and another in the head.

A second barrage finished off the wolves that remained and I was taken back at the sheer efficiency of the group.

What the hell!! I thought to myself, confused.

With nary a pause the men stepped forwards, skinning the wolves with aplomb. They tucked the pelts into their backpacks and moved on, making their way to the stream, and quickly washing off the blood and gore.

The longer I observed them, the more obvious it was that they were familiar with the woodland, they moved with grace and composure, silent as ghosts as they slipped across the floor.

Hunters! That was what they were, no wonder the wolves hadn’t surprised them. Unlike the rest of the adventurers who concentrated on what was ahead of them and not what was around them, the hunters were used to this kind of environment. I wondered how they would fair in the swamp and rainforest, it was subtly different, and they probably hadn’t had that much experience with those kinds of environments.

And if they passed them easily, then I was sure the ice or fire would be so utterly different from what they were used to that they would be taken down.

That was if they weren’t sensible enough to turn back. It sucked, that I couldn’t make them keep going, that any group that was sensible and turned back before things got dangerous would always walk out of my dungeon ahead. Costing me mana by killing my creatures. Gah I hated it, I would kill soon, I promised myself.

Kill, Kill, Kill, Kill I chanted as they completed the second floor and dropped down the waterfall into the swamp.

They looked disgusted as the water flooded into their shoes. They swam forwards out of the clear pool clambering up onto the firm ground that surrounded the pool. From here onwards it was a murky battleground they would have to fight through.

I found myself smiling as they took their first steps, anticipation building.

What would be their downfall, hmm?