Lucifer watched the ants construct the new floors he ordered and frowned, they were working significantly quicker now that they were working on stone that was so close to the surface, but, this was something he wanted to finish quickly so he could go back to studying the queen's body switching magic.

The ants used their specialized mandibles to crush and chip the rock before carrying it off to the waste room. Once the rock was thrown into the waste room a special breed of termite began eating the stone. Lucifer realized why the efficiency was so slow even with an uncountable amount of ants working on digging.

There was a limit to how fast the termites could eat the stone so the ants could only give them so much, the termites had grown the waste room significantly by their own means, but that could never keep up with the demand.

After pondering on the problem for a minute he thought 'I made this waste room as a solution ages ago when I first started having the ants dig for me, back then I didn't have portals or personal dimensions'.

Then he promptly created a portal near the working ants and connected it to a newly created dimension. Normally it would take a large amount of mana to create a dimension with any sort of capacity, however, that was only if he wanted the things inside to be stable. This time he just half-assed the dimension and he absolutely no idea what would happen to anything that went inside, but this didn't matter for waste material anyway.

Lastly, he annihilated the termites with fire.

Using magic near living creatures is difficult for a dungeon but not if they are his creations.

It only took a moment before the termites stopped existing. Which was better than going to sleep and waking to find his entire dungeon eaten.

This casual destruction of an entire species he had created caused him to pause, he thought 'It seems that my personality is starting to warp at an increased pace'. Lucifer did not mind the traps and monsters aspect of his personality shift because he thought of as "just self-defense against intruders", but the slow erosion of any emotion other than a sadistic joy of killing intruders and expanding his dungeon was definitely something he was worried about.

Research into transferring his consciousness into something else became the top priority and he had no more time for playing in the dirt. He manually removed circular tunnels a few inches in diameter several hundred meters deep, then he grabbed all the mana crystals forming around the mana well and shoved them down the tunnels.

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Ahri was wondering around the first floor aimlessly lost in thought, she occasionally met with adventurers which she casually greeted as she passed by, the adventurers she greeted looked disappointed when she ignored them. They wanted the "beautiful fox lady that wanders the dungeon" to give them some pointers about becoming better adventurers like the rumors suggested. However, Ahri was too distracted by her internal dilemma to teach some newbies things they should already know.

After her talk with Rick, it was apparent that Lucifer was not happy with her, she had only learned its name from Rick yesterday let alone learn anything about how a dungeon works like she originally intended. The negotiation where she was made "collateral" flashed through her head and it only made her realize once again how dangerous the dungeon was, It had put itself in mortal peril just to prove that it could not be manipulated, or that's the conclusion she came to when she thought about why it acted the way it did.

She had to decide whether to stay with her master and risk the potential fallout from that, which could lead to the destruction of the entire kingdom if the dungeons words could be trusted, or become truly loyal to the dungeon and leave her master. She and Merlin both knew that one day she would leave for her own reasons, whether it be to further her research or rejoin her clan, but she had no idea it would be so soon.

Ahri's thoughts were interrupted when a familiar feeling popped up out of nowhere and she couldn't quite remember where she felt it before, but it reminded her of Merlin. The feeling seemed to be stronger in one direction so she started to follow it.

The feeling got stronger and when she turned a corner the tree in front of her started rustling, then a figure came out of the leaves.

They wore a tattered cloak that covered most of their body, what caught Ahri's attention was the figure had their arms in front of them appearing to feel around them like a blind person. This seemed odd because a blind person would never survive in the dungeon even on the first floor.

She went closer to help this person, once she was close enough to grasp the person's hand she noticed the horrible burn scars that covered the persons face causing her to gasp, she had no idea how anyone could survive something that would leave a person scarred in such a way.

The person stood still like they were thinking of something, then they suddenly asked: "do you know someone "here" called Lucifer?"

Ahri took a sharp intake of breath at the mention of the dungeon she was just thinking about which the other person's sharp hearing didn't miss. They said "so you do know "him", can you ta--

BOOM----

The ground trembled on the first floor and tremors were felt throughout the city, many noticed the roaring sound exiting the dungeon entrance and became panicked, the mages guild activated the seals on the dungeon entrance in hopes of stopping whatever was inside from coming out.

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The two girls stood there stunned for a moment before Lucifer spoke to them "what brings you back here Selenia, I thought you wouldn't come back and what happened to your face"

Ahri jumped at the dungeons sudden intrusion after the explosion, she shouted: "what was that explosion just now?"

Lucifer casually replied "I was digging"

Both the women rebutted "What kind of digging causes explosions" and they looked at each other.

After sighing, Lucifer replied, "Digging was taking too long so I sped up the operation by blowing the rocks up with mana crystals so the ants only had to transport the rock not cut it".

[Ahri]...

[Selenia]...

Before Lucifer could ask again Selenia answered his question, "I left with the gear you gave me and initially I thought I would live a peaceful life of adventuring, no one would pick a fight with someone wearing that armor set nor would anyone guess that I was the one wearing it. However, the idea of that bastard living a carefree life after he had sent countless bounty hunters after me, forcing me to flee every town I tried to settle down in, made my blood boil. So I used the equipment you gave me to attack his home and kill everyone. Which is why my face looks like this... I had to use poison to kill my way out... then I was forced to flee all the way back here"

Lucifer listened to her story then dryly added "so you underestimated your enemy and suffered because of it"

If her face still had an unscared area she would be blushing after Lucifer hit the nail on the head like that, but there was a part of the story she had to tell that she wished she didn't have to. she began timidly "to create a diversion to escape I had to "lose" some of the armor you gave me" as she gestured to the chest piece that remained and her arms and legs which were obviously missing pieces of armor.

Ahri interrupted "that armor could be traced back to a dungeon and it's only a matter of time before they figure out this is the most likey place for it to come from", the end of her sentence had a little more venom in it than she realised when she thought of how Merlin could be implicated in the matter.

"b-but they might think its just enchanted gear and there are plenty of dungeons how could they track it to this one" studdered Selenia, she did not want to be punished for lying because she knew how much Lucifer hated manipulation and the punishment for it, but she had no idea that it could lead to him being in danger. Salenia could not imagine the punishment for that.

Ahri scoffed "I now remember that chest piece, it was a part of a set of armor. Dungeons make enchanted armor for adventures to kill each other over, but they don't make matching sets. It's obvious that a sentient dungeon made them and my master knew they were dungeon items from a glance, as if others would mistake it like you too. besides a sentient dungeon suddenly appearing is obviously connected to the new dungeon that was discovered"

Selenia paled even further, she recalled that the familiar feeling that made her ask this woman if she knew Lucifer, was the same feeling from the girl on the wyvern she met when she left the dungeon.

Just as Salenia was starting to regret coming back here Lucifer cast a spell, a soft white glow appeared and floated towards Selenia, she shut her eyes and prepared for the worst, however, once the light engulfed her she did not feel pain like she expected, instead it felt pleasant. She thought it felt what being wrapped in compassion or some other word that she could not describe felt like.

She wanted to stay in that comfortable warm light forever, but Ahri's gasp woke her from her enjoyment as the light started to dissipate.

Ahri commented, "all of your wounds are healed, even the churches high priests could not heal such serious injuries that fast". While she absentmindedly thought 'she is more beautiful than I am' and feeling slightly inferior.

Salenia looked at her hands to see the skin by reflex and she was surprised that she could see clearly and her hand was back. She could not believe what was happening as she absentmindedly touched her face, it was smooth as if the scars were just a lie.

She asked "why didn't you punish me"

Lucifer replied "the fact that you came back would indicate that you had no intention of betraying me and that anything that implicated me was an accident, I don't punish accidents because I think that actions without intent are not evil in of themselves. Although if you make the same mistake again I am willing to change my mind. anyway, welcome back."

Salenia fell to her knees in relief, she hated that she was so scared of Lucifer punishment, but the idea of having a home again pushed those thoughts aside. she didn't realize how much she missed the simple days she had in the dungeon, where she did not have to worry about someone tracking her down and forcing her to move locations or worry about someone stabbing her in the back for reward money. Here she knew exactly what everyone wanted, Lucifer wanted Truth without hidden motives, adventurers wanted to strike it rich and the workers that entered the dungeon only wanted to earn enough to feed their families.

Lucifer disrupted her thoughts "so who or what do I have to watch out for"

Salenia suddenly had her newfound comfort disappear as she meekly answered "probably the Grand Dutchy Royalty" expecting Lucifers apparent benevolence about accidents to have a limit, but Lucifer only replied with "hmm" before vanishing, allowing Salenia to heave another sigh of relief.

Ahri waited for Lucifer to act but instead, he left after healing his follower's injuries and welcoming her back after she screwed up so badly, she thought 'maybe being Lucifer's follower is not as bad as I thought, even Merlin would punish me if I did the same'.

Abruptly, a small humanoid crashed into Selenia's face. before Selenia could recover Lucky said "your back big sis I missed you soooo much" before buzzing around her head in a joyous ariel dance.

Before Salenia could talk Lucky fluttered up to her ear and said in a conspiratorial tone "you know Luci misses you too even if he doesn't say it" then fluttering around in another dance that Selenia could only identify as her "pulled a prank dance"

Selenia laughed at the little one's antics and grabbed her out of the air and gave her a gentle kiss on the head, "I thought you were dead, anyway I'm glad your alive I've missed you a little too"

Lucky puffed her little cheeks up and pouted "you don't believe me do you hmpf, well did you know that Luci keeps a doll that looks exactly like you in his special room (laboratory), and when I touched it he scolded me, he never scolds me even when I take the creatures from his special room to play with"

Salenia blushed and asked "he still keeps that I thought he would have destroyed it or fed it to his ants or something"

Ahri was feeling left out and confused asked "who is Luci?, and why is it a he"

Lucky flew next to her ear and whispered "its Lucifers nickname, but don't tell him only I can call him Lucy" before flying off giggling like she usually dose.

"I'm glad she is still the same," said Selenia.