Chapter Twenty

The gem was conflicted. At first it had been doing its best to dissuade invaders from entering its territory and it had been happy with the results. Now it wasn’t so sure. The best way for it to grow was for invaders to enter its territory and never leave. This was a problem since it had started getting fewer invaders ever since it got its first kill. The problem was made worse by the fact that the invaders that still came were all competent.

It was considering the best way to correct this when two invaders it didn’t recognize dashed into its territory. It tried to claim them to see if it could get an easy victory, but something strange happened. Previously when it had tried to claim invaders they either had no defenses or they had a bubble of mana surrounding them that prevented its mana from getting close to them. These invaders were different.

There was no bubble of mana around them. Instead, they had a dense layer of mana that rested just over their skin. The gem poked and prodded at this layer and found that breaking it would take an astronomical amount of mana. These new defenses likely meant that they would be fearsome invaders, so the gem called for its defenders to prepare for a fight.

The invaders skillfully avoided its traps while moving through the territory and only stopped when they reached the passage to its upper floors. Once they stopped they started talking and the gem learned that the invaders new defense method was not without its flaws. When they only had the layer of mana over their skin it was possible to listen in on their conversations.

“What are we stopping here for man? I thought we were just going to go straight to the valley and get a quick harvest before going back? If we don’t hurry people will notice we are missing.”

“Were you even listening during that dudes presentation back at the guild. He said that if you go all the way to the top there is an island covered in flowers that only has a bear guarding it. We have to get there before somebody else takes them.”

“He also said that the chick in charge banned anyone from going up there after some people died.”

“That’s not an issue. I asked around and the ones that died were two farm boys playing at beings adventurers. We’ve done plenty of dungeons before so we shouldn’t have any issues.

“Alright, but if something goes wrong I’m leaving your ass behind and running”

“Don’t be so dramatic man. They said there are only some plants and some fish before we reach the top.”

As they finished their conversation they climbed up to the plant floor and continued onwards. Before reaching the next floor they stepped too close to one of the gems new plants and suffered for it. The sharpened leaves fanned out leaving a number of shallow scores along the invaders arms.

That stopped them for a second, but it wasn’t enough to deter them entirely. They patched up their wounds before going up to the fish’s floor. Once there they took out their shields and started to walk forwards through the rain of fish. Once they were about half way the gem ordered its creatures to strike.

The first to get their attacks in were the snakes. They slithered underneath them and bit their legs while they were occupied blocking the fish. That was enough to send one of them careening off the path into the plant filled sides of the cavern. He tried to get up but before he could a massive green mouth closed over him.

The other one managed the snakes’ bites better but he was doomed as well. He tried to stay on the trail and back up to the exit despite the pain and succeeded until the rabbits came in. They rammed him in the back of his knees forcing him to fall to the ground. He instinctively put his hands down to stop his fall and that is when the fish got him. Without his shield covering his face the fish bashed into his unprotected skull and he dropped like a sack of potatoes. Once he was on the ground the rabbits ate him to ensure that he was gone for good.

Luckily the one that was captured by the plant was still alive for now, so the gem could focus on absorbing information from them one at a time. The information that these bodies brought was very different from what it got from the first two it killed. Their minds were filled mainly with fighting techniques and useless thoughts about girls and wealth. Those thoughts were pushed aside to look for more valuable information.

Below the useless thoughts were two very valuable bits of information. The first was that they called themselves adventurer’s and that they were just a small part of the group that had come to plunder its resources. The second was the existence of runes. The first meant that it needed to start preparing now. More defenders needed to be upgraded before the raids started in earnest and more traps needed to be placed. It also needed to double check that the wolves and the drybolds were able to work together smoothly.

The second piece of information was more related to its long term growth. Apparently the runes were something the invaders used to help control mana. They had three different runes on them that would be very helpful for research. The first was a rune they both had. It was a rune that used mana to create a shield that only repels mana. That was what had prevented its mana from effecting the invaders.

The effects of the other two runes were less clear. It knew the invaders thought of them as wind and fire runes, but it hadn’t been able to pull out how they were actually used. Unfortunately there was no time to experiment with them for now. The top priority needed to be enhancing its defenses. It had some rabbits bring the runes to its main body and then it set to work upgrading more creatures.

Its snakes had been key to defeating the most recent invaders so it tried to upgrade one of them. It forced mana into the snake and pushed for the mana to solidify. That showed no signs of happening so it pushed even more mana into the snake. There were still no results so it continued pushing mana into the snake, and only stopped when there was a pop and the snake went everywhere.

The brightside was that the gem was feeling much less exhausted than it had after enhancing the bear and felt no need to hibernate. The downside was that the snake had exploded like an overfilled balloon. That wasn’t the ideal outcome, so testing continued on all its less important creatures.

Mice, Squirrels, bees, rabbits and more all experienced the unpleasant sensation of being stuffed to death for the gem to discover a few things. The first was that some creatures just can’t be given solidified mana. One rabbit may look identical to the one that already had solidified mana, but if mana didn’t start coming together on the first injection it never would. The second was that enhancing creatures did not necessarily mean losing consciousness. Smaller creatures could be enhanced with just exhaustion and lack of focus as side effects.

With this information it was time to enhance a more useful creature. There was already the bear guarding its main body, so it decided to enhance one of the creatures guarding its valley. It tested a few of them and found a powerful creature that had potential. It was one of its moose. Despite not having been used in defense yet the gem knew they would be useful. They were large, could move quickly, had a deadly kick, and had deadly horns as well.

Once the decision was made the gem started to enhance the moose immediately. It kept pushing mana into the moose until its core formed. Once it was done it felt exhaustion start to take it. The exhaustion this time was not as bad as after the bear, but it instinctively knew that the best way to recover was to let its focus slip away and wake up in a few days.

Olivia

Olivia looked at Adrian and wondered why he had to come by first thing in the morning and make the whole day worse.

“So you're telling me you already lost two adventurers despite the fact that we haven’t even started sending them into the dungeon yet?”

Adrian pulled as his collar as he spoke

“Err. If you want to put it negatively I guess that is accurate. I’m sure they just got drunk and are lost in the woods or something. I just need you to authorize a search team so we can go find them.”

Olivia sighed

“If we are going to be working together then you need to get better control of your subordinates. How am I supposed to trust you to do anything If you can’t even keep track of all your people? Take whoever you need for a search team this time around but make sure we don’t have to waste man hours doing something like this again.”

He gave a half bow and said “I am forever grateful for your assistance.” before walking out the door. Olivia yelled at his back as he left

“Make sure to keep me informed on the raids once they get started.”

With that unpleasant conversation over with Olivia shifted back to her original plan for the day; recruiting people to clear farmland so they don’t all starve when winter comes. That task combined with all the general management she had to do kept her busy for the next week until Adrian came back to her office. As he walked in she said

“So What do you have to tell me this time?”

He shifted foot to foot to stall but eventually had to speak

“Ah well, I’m embarrassed to tell you about it but all our raids have been unsuccessful. On top of that we lost two more adventurers in the raids.”

Olivia’s immediate response was to question the “two more” he mentioned

“When you say two more is that your way of telling me you never found the adventurers that went missing last week? That you have actually lost four adventure’s in the space of a week of raiding?

Adrian grimaced

“That is correct.”

Olivia felt a migraine coming on

“Why don’t we send some of the adventurers that were successful before into the dungeon then? I know you want your boys to get the glory but if we don’t have results before the transport ship gets here it is going to be both our asses.”

Adrian stiffened as he exclaimed

“No No No. Just give me one more week. If I haven’t gotten results by then you can do whatever you want.”

Olivia nodded and Adrian left the office without another word. She got back to managing the settlement until Adrian came walking back into her office with his head down a week later.

“So what do you have to tell me?”

Adrian gritted his teeth

“I’m afraid we still don't have any results.”

Olivia thought in silence for a second before saying

“Okay. Cancel whatever raids you have planned for tomorrow. I am going to send John, Camille, and Sam in instead and see what they can do.”