I didn’t know what to do. I could see that while most of the animals had simply kept going down the hill a significant number had broken away from the herd and entered my dungeon, with more and more following them.

The pitfall trap at the entrance had done nothing to stop them. Only the first animal had fallen in and the rest had simply jumped passed it after that. To further prove how useless the trap was even the animal that had fallen in had quickly managed to get out somehow. The falling rock trap in the first room proved a little more useful when one of the invaders became injured when the trap triggered and the rock dropped down on the unsuspecting animal. The other invaders weren’t scared off however as they just kept pouring into my dungeon advancing deeper. In fact, the injured animal soon died after being trampled to death by its comrades.

I got a system notification about the death of this one and I finally found out what sort of creatures were invading me. Something called ‘Long-haired Aurochs’. Whatever they are they are bigger, stronger and in far greater numbers than my weak fairies. Thankfully the system didn’t mention anything about them being counted as a sentient race. Maybe they would just turn back and leave once they reached my impenetrable doors? The pack had split in two after my first room and seconds later they entered the next rooms on both sides.

Here I at least had confidence that they would be forced to follow the paths at the edges of my dungeon before eventually being stopped by the doors right before the paths converge again. In fact, I was so happy when I noticed the first aurochs do just as I thought that I relaxed a bit. Soon after however as the rooms quickly filled with more of them until in quick succession both my doors were broken down by members of the pack struggling for room to move.

What the... They didn’t even charge at the door and it just crumbled anyway!? These doors are the worst! Lilly told me they would stop the wildlife and yet they crumble at the slightest touch? She has some explaining to do when she comes back. That is if I’m still alive when she returns. Since my traps have now proven useless and the doors more so I’m now feeling extremely vulnerable. The fact my doors proved so useless really damaged my confidence. I put so much trust into these seemingly bastions of defense that now crumbled into splinters I really thought I would be safe from anything aside from sentient creatures.

After a while I sense that the herd has moved beyond my ability to sense them and no more are entering my dungeon. That still leaves the ones already here though so it’s not something that helps me. What does however make me relieved is the fact all my hallways and rooms are connected in ways that sometimes when the invaders split up, they end up on a path going back towards my entrance. I was really hopeful for about a second there until my second set of doors break opening the path to get closer to me. Just three more doors between me and death and I doubt the two doors in the hallways will stop them. With the doors in the rooms there was always a path for the leaders of the pack to go and thus avoid getting close enough to break my doors but since these doors are inside the hallways itself the only way the aurochs can keep moving is by just charging at the utterly useless things I used to trust so much.

A minute later my prediction comes through and both the doors on the left and right break down by the leading aurochs. These doors seemed even more useless as they exploded into tiny splinters by the charge. Now all that stood between me and death was a falling rock trap that could only injure one invader at best and a door I now expected to break if even one of my fairies touched it.

I get the sudden sense I’ve forgotten something. I try to remember what it was in a hurry before in invaders reach me. When I do eventually realize what I had forgotten I’m only mildly filled with a sense of embarrassment.

My fairies! They’re supposed to fight and guard me and I have them all inside my Core room standing around doing nothing. Granted they seem weak and useless but there are 84 of them. Maybe together they can do something. I quickly use what remaining mana I have to summon 12 iron daggers. I can always summon more fairies later but I need them to be as lethal as possible right now and I don’t think a few more newborn fairies will do more than actually having 13 fairies armed.

“Children. I need you to listen.” I decided to call them children. Compared to me they’re all at least a day younger. I’m old and wise compared to them.

“I made 12 more daggers for you. Give them to the 12 fairies summoned after Buttercup. I’m sure you’ve felt the ground shake and heard the distant rumbling. The truth is we’ve been invaded and I need your help to protect our home. I know you’re not that powerful but if you work together, I’m sure you can kill or drive off the invaders. They are a large herd of long-haired aurochs. They’re big and strong and my defenses can’t stop them. But I believe in you. Together you will prove that our dungeon is not defenseless! Let this be the first of many victories!

I might have motivated them a bit too much since they began rushing out the door towards the oncoming invaders. I hadn’t even made the door open and they could still open it. So not only did the big beasts break the doors down easily even my small fairies could open them without my help. If I survive and Lilly does come back, I should ask her how doors could possibly keep me safe. They’re the most useless things I’ve summoned so far. Even the plants I spread around caused a few beasts to stop and eat them if nothing else. That’s a far better help sadly.

The fairies charge out into my boss room just as the first aurochs came from the opposite hallway. Now all I could do was hoping that maybe my fairies weren’t as bad at combat as I thought they were. I realized very soon that maybe I had underestimated my fairies just a bit. As soon as they spotted the beast over 20 small green light balls were summoned by the fairies in front and sent towards the beast. The beast cried out in pain and just collapsed. The momentum carried it forward a few meters but it had already died, leaving a trail of blood on the ground behind it.

Okay so in groups it seems even my weak fairies pack a punch. A few more beasts manage to reach the boss room but they fare no better. In fact, since more and more fairies fly out of my core room the beats ended up dying in a far more gruesome way. The third and last aurochs had almost exploded even. I looked on with mild chock as the fairies continued flying forward without stopping.

Since I didn’t seem to be in immediate danger thanks to my surprisingly effective defenders I calmed down and spread my consciousness across the entire floor to see how many invaders there were. I had been so panicked I never really checked since there were other things to focus on. A quick count and it seems there weren’t as many of them as I had imagined there to be. A few were even leaving my dungeon right now having somehow come back to the first room and found their way out.

Some of my fairies had run out of mana to cast their little glowing ball spell now. At least I assume so since I saw some of them clawing and punching the invaders. It didn’t really kill them or even hurt them all that much but I appreciated the enthusiasm of my fairies. They fought as hard as they could. Buttercup along with the 12 other fairies that I had given a tiny dagger were more successful in killing off the invaders. It didn’t work as a bombardment of magic but they brought them down nonetheless. I resolved to give them all daggers and armor after this. I know I had already said I would but I was only going to do so when I had mana to spare but now it moved up to my most prioritized thing to summon.

I made sure to guide them so they could kill all of the invaders without having to look for them or run into other groups of fairies as they had now split up into several different groups. More and more fairies had run out of mana to cast spells so it took longer and longer to kill off the aurochs. Thankfully they weren’t in a stampede anymore and were just walking around getting lost in my hallways. It took some time before the last of them had been killed or driven out of my dungeon.

The invaders have been defeated. Well done.

Such a short message from the system. I felt annoyed all I got was a ‘Well done’. This was an epic battle for survival. I deserve something more. At least I had a few more messages to read that I had ignored while my fairies were fighting.