John watched as Lenny and Jake enjoyed the speakers he had installed in the First Room to listen to music while hanging out. They were currently bobbing their heads, listening to Out Of Sight (ft. 2 Chainz) by Run The Jewels, Lenny with his fingers pointed like a gun at Jake’s fist. They seemed to be enjoying themselves and didn’t seem to need anything currently, so John went back into his Soul Space to check on Gwen. She was now in the Research Room, and John thought she looked pretty cute as she tucked some of her hair behind her ear. Sensing John’s thoughts, Gwen looked up and smiled at him, blowing a kiss before getting back to her reading.

Now that he had made the improvements to the First Room and set up a decent electrical grid that would be relatively easy to expand upon, John wanted to test one more thing. He noticed a connector to the utility grid for Sorenson Station just outside of the First Room. John placed a 100 mana crystal just before it and connected his grid to the connector. There didn’t seem to be any issues with the connection. John considered this a good sign that he could hook into the utility grid when he got Electricity To Mana Conversion for emergency cases when he was low on mana and needed a quick way to charge. Seeing that it appeared to have no inherent issues, John decided to work on his second floor.

John went to the end of his first floor, and instinctively gave his Dungeon the intent to create a second floor. Another portal began opening up, giving him another blank extradimensional space to start building the second floor. John started to carve out a cavern system with multiple paths through it, with one large central chamber, which was roughly circular and had a two hundred meter diameter. There were smaller fifty-meter diameter chambers in every direction, with some that only had connections between other small rooms and some that connected to the central chamber. In one of the furthest rooms, he was able to designate it as the starting chamber for this floor, and as he did so, a Checkpoint Pedestal spawned. John started customizing the various rooms with stalactites and stalagmites, texturing the walls and changing some of the ceiling and floor heights of the different chambers to give each section a unique look.

As he was about to start shaping the central chamber, John received a new notification that he hadn’t expected. Besides the level-up messages he had yet to get to, John received a status update from his Dungeon Bank. John hadn’t been using much mana while making the chambers’ adjustments, and the mana crystal he had placed by the utility grid junction had been filled. As John had been deciding how exactly he wanted to set up the Central Cavern, his regular mana reserves had also filled. However, instead of doing nothing and just increasing the nearby locales’ mana saturation, part of the mana was converted into electricity by the crystals in his local grid. His grid was now supplying electricity to the utility grid of the city at large.

Since he was now a supplier of electrical energy, he was being compensated for supplying power, and the amount of money he had in his bank account was going up. It was nice to see that he could earn money in another way besides selling goods and taking cash from adventurers. However, John made sure to limit the amount of electricity going out to avoid drawing too much attention. Especially since until he got an internet connection, there wasn’t a good way to spend money, and he didn’t want to tempt Jake by giving him a large amount of money to buy things unsupervised. It was also nice to think that he would be able to help a transition to green energy in a multitude of different ways to the world at large and help with pollution and emission problems around the globe by providing a new source of electricity.

John also received a notification that Jake and Lenny had completed Research on the song they had been listening to. Lenny had been curious what a hot dog was. When Jake explained it to Lenny, they got a notification letting them know that they had unlocked a Template for a general sausage Recipe. Different variants could also be created by grinding meats and putting them in a casing, including variants made from Dungeon Creature meats. John had also received another Research notification that due to his recent efforts at trade with Adventurers and by earning the selling Technique under Negotiation by creating an ongoing selling arrangement, he had dropped the R.P. cost of Dungeon Trading to 10 R.P. Since he was already looking into notifications, John decided he might bring up the level notifications and found that Negotiation was now 22, Absorb 19, Creatio 16, and Soul Space 14.

Before John finished setting up the Boss Room of the second floor that the central chamber was going to be, he figured that he should at least create the other kind of Monster that was going to be the main feature of the floor. John called Gwen over because he felt that she would have the expertise for creating this new type of Monster and would probably like to witness its creation. Gwen replied that she would be over in a little while after she finished the chapter she was currently reading, so John decided to watch how some of the Creatures and Slimes behaved while they were in the Zoo. It was fascinating to see the different behaviours from all of the Slimes, each appearing to have their quirks and personalities. John took this as a good sign that the different Slimes would all have the possibility of developing new Abilities or evolving into unique specimens.

John had gotten a bit distracted watching the Slimes waiting for Gwen, so he was surprised when she ran her hand down his arm to get his attention. Rather than being startling, John found the feeling to be almost reluctant, and impulsively turned around and kissed Gwen. In turn, she reacted with surprise to the sudden kiss before quickly and excitedly returning the kiss. They almost reluctantly broke off the kiss, John rubbing a hand behind his head and Gwen again playing with her hair, sharing a bashful smile between the two of them. John gave a sheepish clearing of his throat before asking Gwen, “So, how do I create a new Monster out of multiple different Creatures?”

“I’m assuming you mean from the Apocrita category? You mentioned that you’d gotten all of the different kinds recently. Here, I’ll pull up the description so we can have a quick look over it before creating the Monster.” Gwen said before sidling over and pressing her shoulder into John’s before pulling up the description for them to look at.

Apocrita

Element Affinity: Neutral

Subtypes: Ants, Bees, Wasps, Hornets

Abilities: Hive Mind (Dungeon Ability), Sting (Pain Toxin, Poison Toxin, Caustic Toxin), Flight (Insect Wings), Colonies (Bugs), Exoskeleton, Mandibles, Stout Strength, Panoramic Vision, Litters, Hovering

Cost: 10 Mana per Colony, 0.5 Mana For Non-Colony

Gwen continued what she was saying, “Yeah, it looks like you have all of the different basic types. You may discover new varieties that improve the general physicality or add an ability or two, but as long as you have all these basic types, you won’t have to go through this process again. They will change when they respawn or when no Adventurers are going through the Dungeon.”

“Right, it’s kind of like they get an update, rather than having to install a completely new version of the software.”

“Yeah, that’s a pretty good metaphor for it. And, thanks for teaching me a bit about computers and word processors. Those have helped with me reorganizing my notes better after I have written them.” Gwen said, her research focused side showing through with her smile.

“No problem, any time spent with you is time well spent in my books,” John said to Gwen before a light blush came over both of their faces.

Gwen gave John a quick peck on the cheeks before continuing her explanation of making a Monster that combined the different subtypes. “So like when you created the Slime, you are going to focus on the Creature that you want to turn into a Monster and begin to infuse it with mana. However, this time you will also need to give a bit of thought to the different Creature subtypes so that their Abilities are included in creating the Monster. The resulting Monster will be one of the generic supertypes of that Creature.”

“What do you mean by one of the generic supertypes?”

“Well, some Creatures can turn into a couple of different Monsters. Generally, you will get the most generic of these Monsters, especially since to gain those different Monsters, you may have to imagine a different body shape and subtract some Abilities that the more generic version would keep. There may also be influences due to your location, as Monsters that are more closely in the local part of the gestalt are more likely to show up as Monsters in your Dungeon.”

“So if I want to get a specific Monster out of a Creature, I would have to some idea of what I want to create and what its general characteristics are and picture them while I am creating the Monster? I guess that makes sense.”

“Pretty much, yeah. Are you ready to create your new Monster?”

“I think so. I’ll get started.” As John said this, he kept the description of the Apocrita Creature type in font of his view to help him with concentrating on them. He began feeding the process of creating one of each creature, then continued to provide more mana and pictured the different Creatures joining together. As John did so, the Creatures began to have a bluish glow and, rather than forming individually, were drawn into a singular sphere. As the light dispersed, John thought that the process might have failed since no Monster appeared. However, John realized that instead of the mana dispersing, it had been reabsorbed, as he got a notification letting him know that a new Monster type was available, and John pulled up its description.

Myrmekes

Element Affinity: Neutral, Basic Elements

Subtypes: Worker, Soldier, Scouts, Queen

Abilities: Hive Mind (Dungeon Ability), Sting (Pain Toxin, Poison Toxin, Caustic Toxin), Flight (Insect Wings) (Scouts), Colonies (Bugs), Exoskeleton, Mandibles, Stout Strength, Panoramic Vision, Litters, Hovering (Scouts), Gliding (Soldiers), Climbing

Cost: 10 Mana Worker, 30 Mana Soldier/Scout, 50 Mana Queen, 500 Mana Colony

Seeing the details of the new Monster, John wanted to spawn them as soon as possible and spawned a Colony in the Central Chamber of the Second Floor, guessing that it would be more cost-effective than summoning individuals. His guess proved correct, as generating the Colony gave him thirty Workers, six Scouts, six Soldiers, and a Queen, which would have cost 710 mana to summon individually by John’s quick calculations. As he finished summoning the colony, having spent most of his mana, which had only risen to 510 from his work on this floor, he received another notification. This notification let John know that by summoning a Colony and with the current Abilities John had, the Colony would have an antagonistic relationship with any other Monsters present on the floor, including if another Myrmeke Colony was summoned.

John wasn’t too concerned with this, as his instincts told him that if another Monster predated any Monster, it would be respawned after a couple of minutes in another part of the floor, as long as Adventurers were not present. Even with Adventurers being present, John felt that a small amount of inter-Monster fighting would make the challenge of the second floor of the Dungeon more manageable. If someone invaded the Dungeon intending to harm the Core, the Colony would stop having an antagonistic relationship and instead work with the other Monsters. All in all, it wasn’t too much of a detriment to John, especially when he read that because of the antagonistic relationship of the Monsters on the floor also gave them the chance of gaining new Abilities or evolving if they were successful in their endeavours against other Monsters.

Looking at his new Monsters, John was relatively sure that the Myrmekes would be on the winning end of the equation most of the time. The regular Slimes might have the occasional win against the Workers, but the other subtypes outclassed them. The Stealth Slimes might be able to take down a Scout or Soldier, but they weren’t going to be able to take down the Queen except in the luckiest of circumstances. The Workers were the smallest of the new subtypes, and even they were roughly the size of a golden retriever, looking like a cross between a worker ant and a worker bee, having a more ant-like head and a bee-like body. However, the bee’s wing had become more vestigial and paddle-shaped, appearing to help with air movement in the colony rather than any kind of flight.

The Scouts were the next smallest, and if the Worker were the size of Golden Retrievers, they were the size of Mastiffs. However, their body was much sleeker and aerodynamic, close in shape to a paper wasp, without the other subtypes’ thick back end. Their head was also more comparable to that of a hornet or wasp, having their more crushing focused mandibles than the ant-like pinching and cutting mandibles of the worker. They were also the only subtype to keep wings that could fly, allowing them quicker movement than the other types. John got the feeling that outside of the Dungeon, these would be the types to locate and possibly take down food sources.

If the Workers and Scouts were the sizes of canines, then the Soldiers were wildebeests, about twice the size of the Scouts but only about a third the size of a bull. Their wings appeared to be stuck to their backs, and as John watched a Soldier climb up a wall and jump, he realized that their wings were now webbing between the top parts of their leg, and much thicker than the wings of Scouts. It seemed that the wings now served as extra armour on the Soldiers, along with allowing them to keep some mobility, allowing them to cushion their falls from on high or to glide across the room from on high, allowing them to respond to threats from their lofty perches quickly. Besides their unique wing set up, the soldiers appeared to have the mandibles of both the Workers and the Scouts, giving them the most versatile mandibles so far.

While the Soldiers were the size of wildebeests, the Queen was the size of a bull. Her wings were again unique, being thin, metallic-looking lines on her back. She had three on either side of her back, including one stuck out her thorax to the rear on either side of her body. As she walked by a stalagmite, John watched the wings on that side shoot forwards and cut into the rock, as the Queen seemed to be testing out her power. Judging by the gouges in the rock, the Queen would have a bit more defended to her sides than the rest of the Myrmekes, and that was understating things quite a bit.

John couldn’t see any other of the Queen’s unique features, as she appeared to have the same mandibles as the soldiers and stinger like the rest of the Myrmekes. Her colouration was also the same as the others, with dark red and black bands going down her body. The overall look of the Myrmekes was quite sinister and would be harder to make out in the dark than the traditional yellow and black of bees and common hornets. With their apparent strength and mobility, John was excited to see them in action, even if, for the foreseeable short term future, it would only be against their fellow Monsters.