While I could send the Lightning Mage another fake request for a Hidden Magma Pit, I wanted to learn more and decided to fakely request a creature this time. I had already filled the 9th Floor with all the fledgling elemental Earthquake drakes I planned on making for the Floor. But with my unfinished Floors being hidden from view, the Lightning Mage didn't know I had already made them, so fakely requesting Earthquake drakes seemed like a good idea to me.

After all, it would kinda defeat the main purpose of sending fake requests to make the elves think I was actually Caged, if the 9th Floor only contained traps, puzzles, and creatures I hadn't requested. Instead I planned on letting them think my more complicated creatures, traps, and puzzles had been made before they had Caged me.

Of course this trick wouldn't work for later Floors but it gave me a bit more leeway for now, and by then I might have found a better solution.

Earthquake drakes could, as their name suggested, make earthquakes on command. They looked like giant lizards made of volcanic rock and they could completely disappear underground in seconds.

They really only fit my volcanic theme due to their prefered habitat being the ground - as in 'in the ground' not 'in a cave' - near volcanoes, which had affected their appearance and gave them their natural heat resistance.

And lastly, they were naturally the karmic variety.

All of these facts, one could quickly learn about them - except the heat resistance perhaps - if it came to a fight, so I saw no issue in sharing it with my 'captor'.

This time I remembered to keep in mind that normal Dungeon Cores weren't sapient. With that in mind, I had decided I would first 'request' a level 1 Earthquake drake, then wait a bit before 'wanting permission' to level it up 1 level, wait a bit, then repeat until it had reached its proper level.

I would essentially be spamming her.

She asked for this!

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After having eaten breakfast, checked up on her fellow leaders, answered any question they had for her, and written down all knowledge given about the requested 'fledgling karmic elemental drake - Earthquake', Sarzina Acacia began asking if anyone wanted to explore the first three or so Floors of the Dungeon with her. She needed someone to break open the door at the end of the 2nd Floor in case she couldn't solve said puzzle today. The elven noblewoman could simply have brought Oona along, as the dawon wouldn't earn any EXP at such early Floors anyway. But before Zina had done so, an elf dressed for labour intensive work including metal tipped boots and thick gloves asked her a question as she walked by.

"Dungeon mistress Acacia? I can perfectly understand wanting to respect the dead by keeping people from entering the Dungeon. But I believe having it closed off for too long might simply make people even more wary of the Dungeon than they already are." His brave start had turned to nervousness the more he talked. He nervously shuffled his feet and rubbed the back of his neck with one hand before he continued. "I'm not an expert, of course! I guess it just made me wonder… Oh… When are you gonna start letting people in the Dungeon? And! And… Will there be an entrance fee right away, or only once the town has been established?" The last bit came out in a hurry.

Thinking quickly, Zina replied with confidence. "For now there is no entrance fee on entering the Dungeon, nor is there any tax on loot. But as the Dungeon is still largely undocumented, any potentional Party will have to include me and follow my instructions. This is so I get the opportunity to document any detail I deem necessary. Once the first tier has been documented to my satisfaction, I'll start allowing Parties to enter without me in exchange for a fee."

Honestly, however, Zina had completely forgotten it was illegal to enter a tamed Dungeon without getting permission from its dungeon master. Normally this permission was given through one of the dungeon master’s employees specifically hired with that purpose in mind, though that was rarely their entire job. Normally they would also sell information about the Dungeon and/or collect tax from returning Parties.

However, this early on people would have to go straight to Zina for permission to enter her Dungeon. Lieutenant Alnus had placed a pair of his soldiers as guards next to the Portal, but with it generally being the more wounded ones, Zina was a bit surprised that no one had simply entered the Dungeon regardless. That is surely what would have happened had the Portal in Galhatalos - the capital of Alfamér and Zina’s childhood home - had that few and even wounded guards.

But this wasn’t the capital, and with not even 200 people here everyone would quickly know who broke the law. In a bigger place, simply disguising oneself would mean one’s identity would be hard to discover, but here it would be fairly simple to check who was missing. There were Skills and Abilities, which would allow one to identify at least part of one’s identity, but guards rarely had them. Getting past the guards without getting caught and revealed was instead the hard part.

Which would explain why Galhatalos need much better security around their Dungeon Portal before it would scare away criminals, while Zina’s Dungeon only needed to have a wounded pair watching the Portal.

Still, Zina hadn't considered if anyone, beside herself, might have wanted to enter the Dungeon. She had been too excited over and focused on learning everything she could about her Dungeon to notice much of anything else.

But now that it had been pointed out to her, Zina simply had to find other enthusiasts to share her excitement with! "Did you ask because you wanted to enter the Dungeon yourself, mister…?"

"Right! Sorry, mistress! That was rude of me! My name is Merellien Betula. A pleasure to meet you!" Mister Betula took a deep breath to calm himself down after his embarrassment before he continued. "I must admit to being one of the wary ones, dungeon mistress. It killed more than half the company! I'm just a simple mason! I would be crazy if I wasn't a bit afraid! But I believe it's better to face one's fears than to run away from it. As such, I want to enter the Dungeon."

Mister Betula then gave Zina a small, nervous smile. "But at the same time, I don't want to try my luck too much, so I don't want to go too deep!"

Not wanting to take risks was something Zina could only partly understand. To her eyes, high risk simply came with high rewards.

"Well, mister Betula. I'll only be going to the third Floor today, if you or anyone else wishes to join me."

He tilted his head in response. "When would that be? I have work till three you see."

That was several hours later than she had planned on starting, but the interaction had Zina consider how many others might want to join her in the Dungeon, so she quickly decided to take some time to ask around. Clearly she also had to let people know they could ask permission to enter the Dungeon. She hadn't realized it hadn't been obvious but thinking back to the previous day, Zina finally took notice of the complete lack of any such requests.

People had, however, been very curious on what the level requirement for entering her Dungeon would be. Having completed her test, Zina now knew there would be no such requirement. The monsters, at least those on the first two and the last Floor, only attacked in self defense or if one entered their 'home', so all levels would be able to handle it.

"Three works for me. We can meet by the Portal with anyone else that wants to come. Only four can enter at a time, but I wouldn't mind going multiple times today."

"Brilliant! See you then, mistress!" With that he went back to work.

Zina spent the next couple of hours informing people that they could enter the Dungeon for free at the moment, if they followed her orders while they were in there. She had quickly gotten the feeling that people didn't wish to enter her Dungeon. Apparently, her Dungeon was seen as 'too dangerous to be worth it'.

Which was nonsense of course!

One soldier had seen his comrades decline the offer to enter the Dungeon for a second time and jumped up from his chair to proclaim how he, unlike the others, wasn't a chicken.

But he was the only one aside from mister Betula, who wanted to enter the Dungeon.

I don't understand? A harder challenge means it has more to teach you. Why don't more people want to learn?

Shaking her confusion off, she went to go get Oona before meeting the other two at the Dungeon Portal. The soldier had seemed like the rowdy, disobedient sort. Zina wanted her dawon to keep an eye on him, so she could focus on documenting her Dungeon.

Might as well have her be the 4th member of our Party since no one else wanted to join.

Well. Maybe… what was his name again? The mason? Well, maybe he invited one of his coworkers to come with us, but with the reaction everyone else had, I do doubt anyone accepted such an offer.

Zina rolled her eyes, though only Oona saw her do so. Morons!

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My 'request' for a level 1 Earthquake drake was accepted once the Lightning Mage had written down its description. Any time I 'requested permission' to level it up she made a quick note in her notebook before simply accepting the request.

That's… uh… promising? I think? I didn't really know what to think about it, but at least no one would suspect anything once my 9th Floor was revealed.

Not where that was concerned at least…

At what must have been around 3 o'clock, the three elves and dawon met up near my Portal. While I could perfectly tell how much time had passed, and my entrance timer told me when the sun rose and fell, I had had no idea what time that happened before now. A quick bit of math informed me that sunrise happened around 8:10 this time of year, while it fell at around 16:05. This was plus/minus however many minutes the makeshift Party had been late or early to their meeting point.

Before the Party entered, the Lightning Mage explained how my creatures didn't attack unless in self defense or if their territory was invaded, before ordering the other two elves to not attack any of my 'monsters' unless she specifically told them to.

The soldier, who had some type of stone hammer clearly meant for battling with him, had already seen this as he had been there when I was 'tamed', and so had no problem with it.

The mason was likewise carrying a stone hammer, though this one seemed to be meant for hammering nails, as well as a barrel lid, which was probably meant to function as a makeshift shield. Maybe they don't intend to complete my Dungeon? The Lightning Mage will have no problem protecting them if they're not going all that far down, regardless of their own levels and combat capabilities. That would certainly explain why the mason guy has no armor either.

Said badly prepared mason stated he had heard the rumor of my 'monsters' not attacking anyone near the end of the trip. But then he informed the other two that he, like most of his coworkers, hadn't actually believed the rumors. Apparently, the civilians generally thought the 'only in self defense'-thing had been some weird form of coping mechanism meant to somehow deal with the soldiers' survivor's guilt.

After that small talk, the Party entered my Dungeon.

Sarzina Acacia Elf Noble Elemental Mage - Lightning Level 59 Oona Dawon Level 59 Ruehnar Ilex Elf Tank Level 25 Merellien Betula Elf Labourer Level 22

As they entered my Dungeon I took a quick glance at their Auras, not bothering to get their exact numbers. The two almost 7th tiers had very neutral gray Auras, suggesting karma levels at around 50%. The soldier's was dark enough that my traps would trigger for him, but only just so, meaning close to but either under 25% or at it exactly. The mason's had a lighter Aura than the first two, not by a whole lot, but enough to put him closer to 75% than 50%.

I only wasted 4 seconds on this - one for each Aura I glanced at.

The mason was a bit wary at first, but quickly realized that the unbelievable rumor had actually been true.

The Party - and more specifically the soldier - walked, partly by design on my part, partly by accident brought on by the Lightning Mage thinking traps didn't work on my first two Floors, right passed the Hidden Spike trap in The Burrow Trap Room.

But the traps in The Trap Corridor weren't as easily avoided.

Mind you, they were pretty easy to avoid. But with these one would have to actively try to avoid them in order to do so.

The Lightning Mage and her dawon walked first and no traps were sprong. Then came the soldier, and suddenly darts were flung out of the wall after the trap's pressure plate had been carelessly stepped on.

It didn't harm him much. His Class told me his primary Score had to be Toughness, so him only getting bruised by the darts didn't surprise me.

The trap triggering coursed a lovely amount of confusion, but had the Party put up their guard against traps. The soldier carefully triggered the remaining traps in The Trap Corridor, which the Lightning Mage pointed out to him, and thus wasn't further harmed.

The Lightning Mage incorrectly concluded that my traps must have been altered to trigger the third time the pressure plates were pushed down instead of the first time like the traps in most Dungeons. Apparently, this phenomenon was rare but not unheard of.

The Lightning Mage then noted down how everyone but the soldier could see the bìxié in The Orchard. Naturally, she had no idea why that was. She simply claimed she needed more data to draw a conclusion.

The next while went much like it had done for the Lightning Mage the day before, but once the Party entered The Forest of Territories, she ordered them to check the top of every tree and behind every rock for the missing key, just like she had planned the day before to do alone.

Naturally, no extra key was found, even though they searched in all three rooms on the Floor.

Then they tried her second 'credible' idea and began killing my creatures. The grass and leaves turned red, and the Party quickly realized my creatures gave them no EXP nor loot.

Experiencing Peace couldn't so easily be cheated after all!

Not finding the last key simply made the Lightning Mage even more excited for the 'challenge' my puzzle provided her, before she ordered her dawon to ram the locked door open.

With the puzzle door broken the three found keys disappeared so they couldn't be used for the next locked door.

At The Watchtower Crossroad 6 kobolds stood in their watchtowers with their crossbows ready to fire at the approaching elves and dawon. The 6 galespikes of the room took to the air and began flying around in the airspace above the 4. Not in circles like a vulture would, but in a chaotic cloud of beating lime-green wings.

My visitors tensed up, the mason even froze in place completely for several moments, but they didn't attack my creatures.

And so my creatures didn't attack them.

Having entered a room not placed on her map, the Lightning Mage ignored my creatures as she drew the room and its details onto her map. Then the Party started walking again, with the soldier and mason only taking their eyes away from the galespikes overhead when the Lightning Mage warned them of my traps.

After passing the stream and noting down the two level 5 Lightning sea serpents, the Lightning Mage picked a watchtower to climb, wanting to see how the kobold would react.

It was the watchtower with the key-carrying kobold in it. Which I doubted was an accident.

The elf and kobold stared curiously at each other for a while, before the kobold slowly lowered its crossbow. I had ordered it not to speak, otherwise it likely would have said something.

Actually it's quite a wonder the mimic of the previous Floor haven't disobeyed that order already. Seeing as it has the intelligence and attention span of a child.

… Must be its instinct to stay hidden kicking in. Speaking does make hiding much harder.

"Fascinating!" The Lightning Mage exclaimed before writing the kobold's reaction down.

Then she tried to take the thread necklace with the key off the neck of it.

The kobold slapped her hand away.

The Lightning Mage raised an eyebrow as the two began staring at each other again.

Then - finally - the Lightning Mage decided to try asking politely.

In response the kobold took off its necklace and handed it over.

The Lightning Mage got so thrilled by this she dropped the key in her haste to write it down…

At The Yak Pasture the mason had finally picked up his courage as he was the first one to pet the yaks. Neither of the other two elves had thought to try and touch any of my creatures before. While not all my creatures would allow themselves to be touched - the Mist pixie for instance -, this was domesticated yaks. They really didn't mind and soon all three elves were petting my yaks.

The simple act of petting one of my yaks raised the soldier's karma level, and as I could sense that he would no longer trigger any of my traps, I knew he was now at 26%.

That, and I got EXP for redeeming him.

1 level 25 sapient has been redeemed in your Dungeon.

You have gained 5,000 EXP.

First of Your Kind rewards you 1,000 EXP.

Weeding the World rewards you 400 EXP.

Nice! I redeemed him with the power of pets!

But I would likely never know exactly what thought had run through his mind in that moment.