** ** ** Bastill ** ** **

Well that could have been worse. I could have been shackled to a stone slab naked about to be stabbed in the heart by a psycho cultist.

He really needed to stop doing that. He checked his mana to determine how long he’d been unconscious. He had one hundred and fifty mana, which calculated to a day and a half. It had been three days since the girl had been here. There was bound to be others coming to test him. He needed to be prepared. He looked for the fox, but it wasn’t around at all. That wasn’t good. He hoped he hadn’t killed it… He rather liked that fox. He looked at his notifications while trying to wrap his mind over his next plan of action.

New Floor Boss

Named: Kitsune

+Revivable

New Ability Learned!

Magic-Blood Magic

New Creature Evolved

Learned Bloody Fox

This was great news! He now knew how to create a deadly creatur. It cost ninety mana to create, which was rather expensive. He had absolutely no clue what this blood magic was. He would need to check that out later. While he was pondering over what his next step was he felt the presence of Kitsune come into the dungeon. Focusing on the beast, for that is what it was now, he noted that its head would now reach the height of a man’s shoulders. It’s upper red coat was a deep dark red, while its stomach was no longer white but a pitch black. In its mouth it had managed to drag back an injured boar. The animal was on its last leg, but Kitsune quickly killed it when he was inside the cave by causally swiping its paw through the dying creatures throat. “A gift for you my creator, I thought it would be a pleasant surprise to have a new beast. I was worried when you didn’t respond after I awoke.”

New Ability Learned!

Mind Speak- More complex form of basic communication with lesser creatures.

Kitsune now was not only loyal, but far superior in intelligence than he had been before. It had already been the smartest animal he was able to create, but now its intellect and wisdom had clearly gone up by leaps and bounds. Being able to bring back a large creature without killing it outright and dragging it all the way here was already quite an achievement. He dissolved the animal on the floor. He was also excited to have something intelligent to talk to. The squirrels never seemed to understand him, and the birds were always busy, not to mention lacking intelligence. He responded, “Why thank you Kitsune, it’s great to see you and please, creator is too formal call me Bastill. Sorry I wasn’t awake, I normally don’t rest but giving you your power took a lot out of me. Is there anything I that I can help you with before I get to work making protectors?”

Animal Death

Forest Boar x 35 mana

Learned Forest Boar

Finally having someone to talk to was a load off of Bastill’s mind. Kitsune responded, “I understand and am deeply grateful Bastill. I only have one request. I don’t want to be the only one of my kind. Could you create me a companion?”

He felt that was a valid request. Kitsune was a truly beautiful creature. Before he created a new Bloody Fox, he used Observe as he pulled up its stats to see what its abilities were.

Stat Menu

Level: 20, Race: Bloody Fox, Name: Kitsune, Age: 1, Gender: Male, Vocation: Floor Boss

Characteristics

Strength:15, Constitution:15, Dexterity:20, Intelligence:25, Wisdom:20, Charisma:10

Traits

Blood Magic-Sparked by a catalyst, this creature now can control blood magic.

Revivable- Able to be created with all its memories and power.

Spells

Blood Sap- The taste of blood gives a temporary 10% increase to creature’s characteristics until the end of the fight.

Innate Abilities

Retractable claws-Can withdraw claws, Claws-Slash, Advanced, Maw- Bite, Advanced

It appeared that the Ceremonial blood must had sparked the blood magic ability, which in turn allowed him to gain it. He was quite impressed with his creature’s ability. He was D ranked and would have easily been able to defend against that adventurer that stumbled in here before. He still couldn’t believe those birds had lead a human here. They were probably trying to kill him. He thought they had been tamed but he was having second thoughts now. An interesting thing he noticed was that instead of skills it had Innate Abilities, which seemed to list their effectiveness or skill. By making another Bloody Fox his mana available went down to ninety-five. He decided to compare the two stats of the two Bloody foxes he had now. He observed the newly made creature.

Stat Menu

Level: 15, Race: Bloody Fox, Name: (Not Named) , Age: 1 , Gender: Female, Vocation: Common Monster

Characteristics

Strength:11, Constitution:12, Dexterity:22, Intelligence:23, Wisdom:17, Charisma:10

Traits

Blood Magic-Sparked by a catalyst, this creature now can control blood magic.

Spells

Blood Sip- The taste of blood gives a temporary 5% increase to creature’s characteristics until the end of the fight.

Innate Abilities

Retractable claws-Can withdraw claws, Claws-Slash, Intermediate, Maw- Bite, Intermediate

It seemed that his floor boss had stronger innate abilities and a larger level. He was also revivable which pleased him. He would hate to lose what was becoming his only friend. The new fox wasn’t named and was female instead of male. It still had the blood magic; however, its spell was a lot weaker. The Common Bloody Fox was half a foot shorter than the floor boss. His favorite part of the foxes was their large wisdom and intellect. Kitsune thanked him graciously, “Thank you very much we will scout the area and occasionally bring back any creatures that we think will be helpful. We will also let you know if you have any approaching adventurers. Also, we thought we could take the second room. I went in there earlier and it felt right.”

Bastill agreed with Kitsune. Honestly, he couldn’t have said it any better or rather probably wouldn’t have. Over the next hour he worked on his next creation. The Common Spider to giant spider. He spent fifty mana to raise it too two feet tall and four feet wide. He then invested twenty mana in its barely existent venom. Then he put another thirty mana into its carapace, hardening it to a large degree. Then for fun he put ten mana into its tiny body hairs, which now where six inches long making it look much bigger than it really was. It wasn’t a usable feature, but it would surely creep the hell out of invaders. He had put a total of one hundred and ten mana in the project. He managed to afford it due to five more boars being dragged in and killed by the fox couple. He checked the new notification he had gotten after completing the spider, then he observed his newly made spider.

New Creature Evolved

Learned Furry Giant Spider

It cost seventy to create. He assumed it cost so much to evolve due to how long it would take for those natural changes to occur. After all it had increased in size by an enormous amount.

Stat Menu

Level: 9, Race: Furry Giant Spider, Name: (Not Named) , Age: 1, Gender: Female, Vocation: Common Monster

Characteristics

Strength:19, Constitution:17, Dexterity:14, Intelligence:8, Wisdom:8, Charisma:8

Innate Abilities

Maw- Bite, Numbing effect, Intermediate, Toxin- Numbing Effect, Novice, Web-Capable of making living corridors or shot at enemy to entangle, Intermediate

It was more focused on strength and constitution and had a low level as well. It also sadly didn’t have any traits, but the venom ended up gaining a weak numbing effect. He also wasn’t sure how to give it blood magic and didn’t want to get knocked out again so didn’t attempt anything. Bastill tried bouncing ideas off of Kitsune when he was in the cave. Kitsune had mentioned how they birthed in large quantities and to try using that. Bastill decided he should make a second one but make it male. Making a second one brought his mana down to one hundred. He then used fifty more to make a crack in the ceiling in the second room that lead to a massive area above the room.

His hope was that they would breed quickly due to the Caring Mother of Fertility Statue. He proceeded to extend more space into the second room. He ended up extending past both statues on either side of the room an additional thirty feet. The statues were now sitting isolated on a circular pedestal. This put the second room at a dimension of thirty feet wide and ninety feet long. He put a large hole under the pedestal with the Guardian Knight of Honor on top of it. He made it big enough for the Kitsune to get in while putting it out of view of the doors entrance.

The room felt sparse, so he tried planting a couple ferns. Adding ten for ten mana bringing his total down to forty. He had placed them equally apart, but it was very unimpressive. He tried injecting each with one mana, bringing his total down to thirty. He didn’t have time to focus on a task that was so useless, so he abandoned the project. Instead he started making more rooms that expanded from the second room and the third room. He had the new male spider assist the foxes. His first spider had tragically died and even worse Bastill had witnessed the horrifying scene. He had unfortunately focused right on the spiders while they were finishing their mating. The male spider certainly moved faster than he thought it would. What shocked him more was when he watched the female eat the male spider. Talk about a one-sided unhealthy relationship. Luckily, he gained back the mana to re-make it.

His plan was to increase his passive mana consumption. He hoped he would be able to constantly keep making new rooms until he had a network of five rooms with the last leading down to another five on a second floor. He was constantly extending his influence and carving out rooms. He was only capable of keeping up this astounding rate by having the foxes and spider constantly bringing in new animals to kill. He realized he wouldn’t get chances to let his creatures wander around outside the dungeon in the future. Might as well use the resource now while he could. He imagined any adventurer would be rather concerned if they noticed a floor boss wondering around. This would be the best opportunity to gather new creatures. He ordered the two birds to bring back live insects and kill them in the cave. While he occasionally made an extra Blood Fox to help.

** ** ** Alice Everglade ** ** **

Alice and the rest of the team sent to investigate the dungeon made good time in their travels. They arrived late at night on the third day and decided to set up camp for the night before going inside the dungeon. The team was composed of Daniel Langton, the dual sword wielder as team captain and three additional members. Daniel was a capable leader and had quickly picked up partners he had adventured with before. He picked up a healer, a mage, and an axe wielder.

The Healer in the group was named Stelle, she ranked B and practiced basic magical healing as well as other mundane approaches. She was quite accomplished with alchemy, although she didn’t actively fight, she was well acquainted with a spiked mace that she used to protect herself when situations got out of hand. She was rather kind and loved demonstrating different uses for herbs. Alice got along well with her and spent most of the time talking to her.

Next was the support mage Carter. He didn’t talk very often, but she had been told he specialized in affecting large areas with his spells. He was also B ranked. He didn’t seem to have mana preference though. It was common for magic users to specialize in a certain elemental source of mana. The basic sources were Light, Dark, Fire, Earth, Water, Air. Light and Dark were occasionally referred to as holy or unholy, because light in an altered form can become life magic, while dark can become death magic.

The last man was Derk. He was a small giant. He occasionally would make the dumbest jokes which seemed to amuse Daniel. She really hated his sense of humor. He had a massive kite shield as well as a battle axe, which he wielded one handed. He was ranked C. It was truly impressive to watch him go through several battle drills. His shield was always in a guarded position while his axe weaved itself through the air. Not as fast as a sword blade traveled, but you could hear it hum with all the force that it carried. She could imagine that no one would want to be on the receiving end of such a blow.

In the morning they all prepared for the dungeon dive. Alice put on her brand-new armor that she had managed to pick up right after talking to E, the guild Master. It was a medium set of plate armor, with a half helmet so that her vision wasn’t obscured at all. It weighed down her movement slightly, but she would work on fixing that. She made sure to oil all the overlapping bits, to make sure it moved as smoothly as it could. She had been practicing each night in the new suit of armor to get ready.

When everyone was ready they gathered up in the middle of camp, before making a quick plan of action and heading out to the dungeon. They arranged themselves, with Daniel taking the forward position. With the axe wielding Derk the right side, while Alice took the left side. Between them were the mage and the healer. The two sides where responsible for not only guarding against flanking, but on watch out for rear ambushes as well. Daniel had taken the front, because they weren’t sure about the level of creatures that they would be dealing with yet. He was there to test the strength before giving any others a chance. This way he could determine whether or not they could safely fight the creatures without assistance.

As they stepped foot in the main room they noticed the beautiful statue. Even after seeing it the first time she was still shocked and amazed. She noticed that the pitfalls seemed to have been removed from the room. Each stepped up to give an offering to the statue. Each gaining a twenty-four percent boost to all their characteristics. Daniel had offered a High-Quality Steel Dagger, while Stelle offered a medium strength Healing Potion, Derk tossed in his half empty flask, Carter had placed in a mysterious metal totem that he had been messing with the whole trip, and Alice had offered her old spear, because she had bought a new spear from the market along with her armor.

Her new spear had an additional four inches of bladed metal at the tip giving it a total of ten inches. It wasn’t as broad as the other blade had been. One of the bladed edges didn’t flare out as far out, giving it the look of a short knife blade attached to the shaft. This caused an increase to its deadliness and added an alluring flair to her already mesmerizing talent with the spear.

They decided to try to explore the rest of the dungeon. The next room Held two more statues that faintly glowed. They were nowhere near the beauty of the Dungeon Goddess; however, they were still much more beautiful than any that could be found in their city of Azul. The two depicted a Knight and a Mother. The rest of the room had ten enormous overgrown ferns with fifteen of so medium sized ferns surrounding each, obscuring a lot of their vision. After investigating the statues for a few minutes, they didn’t seem to have any effect. Just when they were heading for the next room, two shadowy figures lunged at them from behind just as Daniel began to yell a warning. Alice was the first to react.

The figure had seemed quite large and she wasn’t sure the thrust of her spear would be able to prevent it from bowling her over and knocking their support element down. To make up for this she stuck the butt of the shaft onto the ground while shoving her right foot against it. Her left leg took a step back a knelt onto the ground. She had her hands spread wide with her right arm holding the bottom and her left arm up higher controlling the direction of the spear head. The figure impaled itself onto her spear since it couldn’t change direction and its entire weight was used to puncture its thick fur. She was soon face to face with the largest fox she had ever seen in her life. It had a deep red coat. But what really caught her attention was its beautiful purple eyes.

Derk had been half a step behind her in his reaction. He had bashed his shield forward with his massive strength while also starting to swing his battle axe knocking it back momentarily. Before the wolf could move the axe swing came into contact with the beast cutting deep through its shoulder. Derk chose this time to speak, “Well luckily they didn’t out fox us, eh, right Daniel?”

Daniel gave a little chuckle as he replied, “Good thing indeed Derk. Well it looks like we have some idea of what’s in this dungeon. I didn’t get a good read on their strength, but they seem to be in the E range as far as Monsters go. They were rather crafty even for foxes. I wasn’t aware of them until the last seconds. Let’s try to harvest some of the more important parts of it too look at later.”

The captain had a fancy storage pack that could hold a near infinite number of items and barely weigh a thing. The healer was currently holding it. Since she was also had the most knowledge of crafting she took the liberty of carving up the fox’s parts to store. She also showed Alice which parts she though would be important, while the others held vigilance. In the end they collected a couple mysterious organs, the eyes, the claws, the teeth, a bone, and one of the least damaged pelts

Meanwhile they were attacked twice more by the foxes. Daniel ended up defeating both, playing a little bit to get a feel for their strength. Carter talked for the first time to simply comment that the creatures were called Blood Foxes and seemed to have some weak Blood Magic affinities. He didn’t comment anymore leaving her to wonder which source blood magic would fall under.

In the next room there were no plants. There was only one simple statue against one of the walls. It was far more exquisite then the last too and nearly life like as the Dungeon Goddess had been, however it was missing a rather important part. It had no head. Alice was so angry at the obviously ruined statue that she spoke out loud, “Who would dare decapitate such a beautiful piece of art?”

** ** ** Bastill ** ** **

WHO WOULD DARE RUIN SUCH A BEAUTIFUL PIECE OF ART!? I SWEAR TO GOD THAT UNKNOWN REWARD WILL GET YOU BACK FOR WHAT YOU MADE ME DO.

Bastill mind blew up in anger after hearing her comment. After her initial reaction to the Goddess of the Dungeon he had been so pleased and had even forgotten about the old headless statue. It was now a permanent stain on his dungeon. He considered removing her head and placing on the statue. This came across his mind for two reasons. One she really did have an angelic face. Second because SHE CAUSED HIM TO CHOP OFF THE ANGEL’S HEAD, which made replacing it with her own a reasonable request. Though he imagined the blood would stain it horribly… Well and the fact that her head would slowly rot on top of the statue, but besides that he considered it a decent plan. Thinking of how angelic her face was he was struck with a genius way to not only fulfil the reward honestly, but also get his vengeance. It would be a surprise for the next time she visited.

His last day and a half had been very fruitful. Bastill had managed to finish the network of five rooms on the first floor but was only able to complete two on the second floor. He had ended up making and maintaining eleven more Blood foxes along with nine more female spiders, each of which would force his male spiders to join them in their dirty little crevice where they would eventually eat them. He was not a fan of spider relationships.

His failed fern project had amazing taken off during his time working. Each fern now reached the fifteen-foot ceiling. Each had more medium sized ferns around it reaching four feet tall. He was very pleased with this occurrence and planned to plant more herbs around his dungeon after these adventures left. It seemed that the natural dense mana naturally speed things up and injecting one mana had an enormous effect. Another thing that happened during his construction is his passive mana absorption went up to a huge margin. It was now at five hundred. The second he decided to take a break he would be sure to bump up to the next level. But between building rooms, creating creatures, he hadn’t stopped yet.

Other things happened in the last day and a half. He had gained several new creatures from the foxes and spider, such as: Hedge Hog, Racon, Deer, Lizard, Wolf, Bear, Goat, Hare, Beaver, Weasel. The Bear had taken several foxes and ended in a few deaths. The birds had brought back a few interesting specimens as well. He had also gotten a Leaf Imitator, Stick Bug, Praying Mantis, Centipede, Frog, Rat, Scorpion, Pill Bug, Beetle, Butterfly, Worm. In reality, he had gotten a lot of worms. The two birds also managed to work together and drag a young bat in the cave. He noticed that his creatures could eat but being in his dungeon the mana seemed to satiate their hunger.

Due to the adventures he was now down to eight of his Blood Foxes. They were all Hidden around the first floor. Kitsune was in the last room on the second floor. This is where Bastill had moved his core. He had the birds move him to the new location after he dissolved their nest. He created a new one in the new room. He had started to enjoy his little perch.

The new offerings had been great. He had learned High Quality Steel Dagger, Medium Healing Potion, flask, Fire water, which had been in the flask, and Steel Spear. The totem that was tossed in turned out to be imbued with magic, but not of specific type. It was called Mana Infused Iron, he wasn’t sure what it did, so he decided to play with it later.

The Adventures meanwhile had been steadily progressing through the rooms. He was now down to two Blood Fox’s but decided to let them hide in their den after the adventurers began heading down to the second floor. One of the two blood foxes was the first he had created. He also suspected it was pregnant and didn’t want it to go out and battle. It had started getting quite fat but didn’t want to ask it. It had always been taboo to ask women if they were pregnant. After asking and being wrong he had never asked another woman. Things were seemed to be going well. He was pretty well defended. Despite the fact that the adventurers were pretty much easily wiping out every single challenge they faced. Even their bloody healer bashed into two skulls of the foxes with a gnarly mace. After noticing that she was ranked B it made more sense. The only person that didn’t do a thing was the Mage they had. He decided to use observe all of them besides Alice. He was already well acquainted with her he thought as he remembered his headless angel.

Observe Analysis

Level:49 Race: Human Name: Daniel Langton

Age: 45 Vocation: Dual Wielder Gender: Male

Level:35 Race: Human Name: Stelle Gronde

Age: 39 Vocation: Healer Gender: Female

Level:50 Race: Human Name: Carter Tisher

Age: 50 Vocation: Large Scale Sorcery Gender: Male

Level:29 Race: Human Name: Derk McClain

Age: 25 Vocation: Barbarian Gender: Male

Damn they are pretty powerful. An A ranked member, a B ranked, a C ranked, a D ranked, and Alice the Beheader is an E.

He caught bits and pieces of Derk talking about breaking into the C rank this month which confused Bastill at first until the man started elaborating about how his skill had been just too formidable to stay at the D ranked. With that in mind he pieced together that the guild must have their own ranking system. That would make it harder for him to really know an individual’s strength. However, a rough estimate was better than nothing. He decided to check his stats while the adventurer’s proceeded. They weren’t that interesting to watch.

Stat Menu

Level:4, Race: Dungeon Core, Name: Bastill

Characteristics

Mana Capacity: 200/350, Mana Absorption: 500/day, Creatures:15, Rooms:12, Floors:2

Abilities

Expand Consciousness- You can now use mana to expand your body around you, which in turn gives you a greater area of control. Current mana cost: 1 mana per every 4 cubic foot.

Passive Mana Absorption- You no longer need to pull mana to you. It is now naturally drawn towards your core. Current rate 500/Day. To increase grow stronger or larger.

Stone Touch- Due to your talent and diligence your ability working with stone has increased. You have a great understanding of the stone you work and are able to make stone you work on glow with radiance.

Observe- Ability to see the level and vocation of other creatures, while seeing the whole stat menu of dungeon creatures.

Forced Evolution- Ability to see inject mana into a creature body part or characteristic, which will evolve the creature and raise its level and abilities.

Dissolve- Lets you dissolve matter and recreate learned matter with mana.

Mind Speak- More complex form of basic communication with lesser creatures.

Magic- Blood Magic

Learned

Materials -1 cubic foot

Coal: 20, Dirt: .1, Agate:5, Quartz:5, Granite: .2, Marble:10, Fire Water: 5

Creatures

Insects- Common Spider:.1, Flea: .05, Tick: .05, Leaf Imitator: .2, Stick Bug: .2, Praying Mantis: .3, Centipede: .3, Scorpion: .3, Pill Bug: .1, Beetle: .1, Butterfly: .1, Worm: .1

Animals- Grey Squirrel:10, Blue Bird:15, Red Fox: 35, Common Gardner Snake:5, Forest Boar:40, Hedge Hog: 12, Racon: 25, Deer: 40, Lizard: 5, wolf: 45, Bear: 60, goat: 35, Hare: 12, Beaver: 20, weasel: 12, Frog: 4, Rat: 8, Bat: 8

Created Beasts- Bloody Fox: 90, Furry Giant Spider:70

Objects

Door:1, Leaf: .1, Toad Stool: .1, Moon Shade: .5, Mandrake root: 1, acorn:.1, fern: .1, elder berry bush: .1, whistling leaf: .1, and elves ear: .5, Bird Nest: 2, High Steel Dagger: 20, Flask: 5, Steel Spear: 20, Mana Infused Iron: 100

Fluid- Per Bottle

Fire water: 5, Medium Health Potion: 20

Catalysts

Ceremonial Blood??

They defeated a couple spiders he had on the first room second floor easily, however the big barbarian that liked to brag seemed to avoid fighting them. Leaving the battle to two – the sword wielding fanatic and the spear wielding manic. He suspected this Derk character was not a fan of spiders, which he found quite amusing. The spiders despite some odd traditions were staring to grow on him, they weren’t too bad after all. They began to approach the last room with the floor boss. Right before they arrived, a catastrophe erupted. Ten very pregnant spiders let out a fierce cry. Bastill had been really curious when the Spiders didn’t lay eggs in the beginning but now he was terrified.

He had at first thought that eating the father had been cruel and out of line. That was before watching one hundred baby spiders cannibalize their mother ten times in a row. They ate her alive as they began crawling outside of her body. One thousand spiders rapidly started developing until they reached a foot tall, where their growth persisted but vastly slowed down. They would still grow to two feet given another day. Several of the females began mating and consuming their mate. About fifty spiders were eaten while the fifty soon to be mothers went comatose preparing to give birth a day and a half from now. Another five thousand spiders would be hatched in the days to come.

Oh god no... NO NO NO. I need to get rid of these or at the very least remove them from the room increasing fertility and growth.

He didn’t like spiders anymore. He needed to curtail the population of spiders immediately. Having a spider predator would be a great idea. Anything that would eat spiders naturally would now most definitely be eaten by the spiders. With the behemoth increase in monsters he began to lose his grip on them. He had never had over thirty creatures under his control. In under ten seconds one thousand spiders had been birthed at once. He completely lost control of all spiders in his dungeon. He just couldn’t make mentally hold onto them. Nine hundred spiders began to spill out of the small crack in the second room.

Creature Control Has Been Lost

-Furry Giant Spiders x 950

Oh shit, oh shit. Too many.

He warned the two hidden Blood Foxes to run to the Floor Boss room. The spiders were out of control and started swarming after the two vixens. The adventures meanwhile had stopped after hearing the sound. They were trying to decide what one earth was happening. They had a defensive formation set in the room as they waited to see what was going on. They saw two Blood Fox’s Sprinting with their ears flat and tails tucked. Seeing the fox’s odd behavior, Bastill watched as the man named Carter made everyone stand down. The foxes quickly past them and into the other room holding Kitsune.

Thirty seconds later the spiders came into view of the group of adventurers. He watched several things happen. First the man named Derk let out a blood curdling scream, which proved his fear of spiders. The swordsman swore as he began giving out orders and conversing with the mage who had a deep frown on his face. The only facial change he had seen the entire time from the weird man. The healer let out a deep sigh as she prepared herself. Last was Alice who simply took on a determined look.

Oh, those adventures are so screwed. However, I won’t really be at fault since I don’t have control over the spiders. Well that’s the way of life. Sorry you drew the short straw.

Bastill knew he was just fooling himself. This whole thing was his fault. Also, the rest of his creatures were in danger as well. I mean it was okay if Alice died she ruined his statue, but these other adventurers hadn’t done anything to him. This was wrong and his fault. He didn’t know what to do so he turned to his only friend for guidance, “Kitsune, what am I supposed to do?”

Kitsune Replied, “Bastill we do the honorable thing. We brace ourselves and fight for we know it’s the right thing.”

If only I had a water spout this problem could all be washed away.