It was the same pool.

Absolutely nothing had changed.

The basic pool, with the same bland stones around it. Nothing seemed to have changed. I even called Edwin in to come test the waters for anything and nope. Nothing happened. Just Edwin trotting in the shallow water and me floating over him and the reflection of that in the water. I even tried checking its bio to see whatever it was but all I got was this:

[Reflection pool: Made from The Major Core of Ice’s will. No additional information is available.]

Even the system didn’t know anything. Maybe I could-nope, I can’t demote the boss once it’s there. What was I even supposed to do in this scenario?

Roll with the snow I guess. Time to do what I do with most problems and ignore it.

Luckily, creating the boss didn’t cost anything major, so I’d be able to continue the plan without problem. In order for it to work, I’d need to spend mana from my level up investment, so I would be left at level 10 for a while.

The plan would go as follows: Merry would act as Xylia’s guard, taking care of anything that got too close to her. Edwin would take the monsters and go on the offensive, clearing the path for Xylia and Merry. I would set up an investment to continuously use [Cold wind] to weaken the fire monsters as much as I could. When Xylia was safely out of the way, we’d retreat and prepare for a full on siege.

Merry went to Xylia’s room to grab the girl whilst I summoned the ground force. They nearly took up the entire land space on the first floor. The salamanders and slimes were mostly chill, the new foxes all bounced around like a bunch of puppies. It was honestly really striking to see Edwin at the head of such a large and energetic force.

Xylia seemed impressed as she stepped out of her hidden room. She stared with wide eyes that seemed to be trying to take everyone in at once yet were failing miserably. Merry motioned to her the plan and she just kind of went with it. I’m honestly fully convinced she has no clue what’s happening.

Everyone was corralled into position. All the little fishies splashed goodbye. Xylia waved back though still dazed. Edwin roared, a chorus of barks, growls, splashes and confused Xylia sounds roared back.

“On my signal.” I said to everyone there (except Xylia, who couldn’t hear me.)

Everyone tenses. The air felt electric and cold.

“For the glory of winter, we move!”

The drake roared. Edwin roared back.

“Charrr-wait.”

Everyone took a step and stopped. It looked like an avalanche had hiccupped. Everyone’s eyes were on me, mine were on a new screen that had appeared.

[Moving a large amount of monsters outside of a dungeon constitutes an act of war! Admin permission is required before this action can take place. Attempting to continue without admin permission will result in heavy penalties.]

Aww what? That sucks! I need an admin to do this? Ugh, this is going to- wait, I’m an admin! [Major Core of Ice] said so! I’m glad I remembered. I tried to bring up whatever I needed to in order to grant myself permission.

{[Grant permission for the dungeon: “Major Core of Ice” to wage war with the coreless dungeon: “Mt. Fugra”? At least half of all admins must agree before action can be done.]}

Ah phooey. There goes the reach around. Ah well, might as well say yes and see where it gets me.

{[Major Core of Ice has granted permission]}

{[Major Core of Ice has received permission with at least half of all admins. 1 vote was made. Major Core of Ice may now declare war.]}

Huh? Mission success, I guess? Uh…I’m not really sure what happened there. I got what I wanted but, I suppose, yet I was the only one who granted me permission. If I needed half of all admins to agree, and I only was able to grant it, wouldn’t that mean there were only two admins? And that’s at best, because it said “at least”.

That was a mildly concerning thought. Especially because I don’t know what admins do. I have no work experience for this job.

The stifled rustling of my troops pulled me out of my thoughts.

Aw well. I can think about that later, for now, we’ve got a war to win.

“Sorry ‘bout that! Let’s try it again.” I cleared my nonexistent throat. “Everyone! On my signal! Ready?...”

Everyone tenses. The air felt electric and cold.

“For the glory of winter, we move!”

The drake roared. Edwin roared back.

“Chaaaarge!”

The battle was brutal.

My forces slammed into the fire monsters, apparently catching them by surprise. Whatever the opposite of [Winter Lover] was, the volcano didn’t have. Or, at the very least, it had a much weaker version of it. Perhaps because it was a “Coreless dungeon”? It’s easy enough for me to guess what the means in general, but not the specifics.

Regardless, their lack of a reverse [Winter Lover] attribute mean that [Cold Winds] in combination with my monsters pretty high [Fire Resistance] (they all varied slightly at different levels, averaging at around 22 but Edwin had the highest at a whooping 53, easily the highest skill in the entire dungeon) meant that my monsters ended up holding their ground at lot better than expected.

Edwin especially cleaned house. Seriously, that guy’s a monster above monsters.

When enough fire monsters had been cleared, Merry beckoned Xylia over. The two dashed away like sled dogs through a snow ladened forest as they disappeared over the turns of the cave.

The drake roared as it lunged for them.

But Edwin was faster. Clamping his jaws over it’s neck, Edwin threw the drake against the wall. The drake, damaged but very much still alive, hissed, Edwin hissed back. The two squared off, all of the other monsters, of both fire and ice, avoided them. No one wanted to get in the way of the clash of titans.

Although Edwin was doing quite well, the others…weren’t. While we were winning, in the sense that there were more casualties on their side than ours, that didn’t mean we were casualties free. 6 slimes and a salamander had fallen on our side. It was…saddening to see them go…

…distraction…think of a distraction.

…What’s worse is that I couldn’t gain mana from the fire monsters, when they died out there, I couldn’t absorb them like I could in the dungeon. Thankfully, two of the fox pups seemed to realize this. As Xylia and Merry escaped, the fighting became more rigid. There was enough time and space for two foxes to start dragging all the defeated enemies into the dungeon where I was able to absorb them.

They also started doing this for the wounded. Taking one of the shivering salamanders and another fox back to the moat, where our Bernardfish would work on healing them back up. Once they were back in fighting shape, they’d dive back into the fray, adding one more advantage to our side.

The slimes were largely excluded from this as they’d just kind of…pop, I guess is the right word. They didn’t exactly leave anything behind when defeated or injured. Except for a small burst of their element around them. I suppose that would be quite potent at higher levels, but considering that everything needed to survive in order to gain levels, I really didn’t see my slimes gaining that ability in the near future.

That being said though, in the future, I may need more ground troops in the future. So I set up an [Investment] to work as a fund for these monsters. I didn’t set it to automatically spend anything, so it would just sit there until I used them myself.

And there goes a pup…

I can’t watch this anymore…The plan was to keep fighting until Merry returned. The [Cold Wind] was set to keep going, I wasn’t needed in this affair anymore. I retreated into the “empty” boss room.

The water was still, a perfect mirror of the roof.

…

I hate seeing people get hurt. Fire creatures are one thing, but my ice monsters, or heavens forbid another person, I-

I’d just freeze up.

…

I just…needed some peace and tranquility at the moment…

…

…The roof was looking kind of bland, I guess. I added some tiny crystals to the wall, the glow of jellyfish focused in such a way to make it a roof of stars.

There, that looks a lot better. The reflection pool was able to properly reflect the little lights, greatly improving the atmosphere. It almost looked like a lake. I decided to expand my “boss” into something a bit larger, removing most of the sides so that water covered nearly everything, turning it from a lake into a sea. With a little more touch up, I was able to alter the exit to be hidden from the front, so it looked like you were just staring out at the open sea. It was quite beautiful.

It was less than knee deep on a person, so even Merry could easily wade through it (which kind of negated the whole boss thing but it wasn’t doing that in the first place). Now the entrance to the second floor would need to be altered to match-

The world fell into the void.

I fell onto the ground hard. The impact stinging my arms and legs. All around nothing but endless black abyss loomed.

I looked at my hands, able to fully see them for the first time since I became a dungeon core. I patted myself down. I was in my normal santa inspired get up, to the point where even my santa hat was atop my head. I fumbled looking around for anything nearby.

Someone was there.

It was a figure I had seen before, back when I acquired the [Major Core of Ice]. We locked eyes, I got a better look at its beady red eyes that stared through my soul. I scrambled back. I tried to float away, or phase through the ground, but I couldn't do that here. Not with a physical body. I was literally out of my element here. I know I started saying something but no coherent words that I would recognize were a part of it.

It raised a boney finger. It took a step closer, the darkness around me pushed inwards.

“You…”

It didn’t say so much as the word crept out from the darkness, enveloping my entire body. It worthed like worms on my skin.

I screamed. I begged for help to come and save me, as he stepped closer and closer. I pounded on the floor, pleading that it would somehow give way and let me escape this nightmare.

And amazingly enough, it did.

The ground shattered like an icy lake, dropping me into a wave of colors. The world of colors engulfed the void, and the figure with it. The feeling of it watching me disappeared.

I was left alone as colors danced around me. A wave of sublime peace washed over me as I floated on an endless ocean.

“Welcome back to the judgement zone…”