The delegation stood before the entrance to Goblin Cave. There were only six of them this time: the leader from before, one of the trios (including one of the surveyors Goblin Cave had knocked out last time), as well as two adventurers it didn't recognize: not by sight, and not on closer inspection when they stepped inside.

It actually couldn't get that good a look at them once they stepped inside; they were armored with significantly stronger mana barriers, starkly limiting their mana diffusion while also preventing its own mana from being able to inspect them. The mana shields were linked together with an interesting conduit formation: a tight shell of densely-woven mana on the outside and clearly something else on the inside, since it was transducing enough mana to keep all six barriers maintained. It was being cast by one of the new adventurers; all the cords radiated out from them. It was an interesting technique Goblin Cave hadn't seen before. It wondered if it was a system spell it wasn't familiar with, or done by direct manipulation of mana streams. Overall, this made it hopeful that their shields wouldn't burst at the slightest mana turbulence.

They made their way down, following the same path as before. It had ended up making some test models of various mana flow experiments down in the mana bellows; it had considered briefly making some kind of entrance chamber to speak to them, but... that could come later. It was still very strange to consider restructuring parts of its dungeon that adventurers had already seen; it had a very long habit of explicitly never doing that.

It was breaking a lot of habits recently.

"Regent," the leader said, when they were down in the arbitrary mana pump chamber it had apparently turned into a meeting hall. It had prevented the mob spawns from respawning, at least. "Are you present?"

YES, Goblin Cave wrote.

They gestured with their hands. "I would like to introduce ourselves, for your benefit, in the hopes we do not get off on the wrong foot. As I said before, I am the head mage-technician on this expedition. Doctor Madina Barat Kete, at your service." They did a weird movement with their hips and knees. "This," they said, gesturing at the adventurer maintaining the mana wards, "is Professor Arman Orlov Issyk, our expert on mana dynamics, who may be able to answer some of your more... esoteric questions on mana interactions." They did another weird movement, not the same. "This," they continued, gesturing at the second unknown person, "is Knight-Diplomat Timur Sultanov Masquar, an official emissary of her highness the Duchess." They did yet another weird movement, not the same as either of the other two. "As well, these are three of the survey members, who you met previously." That was the other three.

It was genuinely very difficult for Goblin Cave to pay attention for all of that. Listening to speech wasn't something it did very much of, and it had a deeply-ingrained habit of flitting its attention away to something else whenever adventurers got boring, which was constantly. Ranks and names it didn't care about.

The leader continued talking, after a long pause. "We are... willing to leave and seal off this entrance, if that is your desire, but it is our hope we can come to a mutually-satisfactory agreement. If you have questions, we may be able to provide answers." There was another pause. Goblin Cave wondered if it was expected to communicate now.

For all it had designed away in the aftermath of the initial meeting, it still had very few concrete, specific ideas for what it wanted from adventurers. Well, it did have one thing.

WHAT IS 'DUNGEON THEME'? ARE YOU AWARE OF THE PROCESS BY WHICH DUNGEON RANKINGS ARE DETERMINED?

The leader looked at the other two. One of them spoke up; the one that wasn't casting spells. The... Goblin Cave struggled to remember. The knight-diplomat. "Dungeons, uh," they started, voice a little unclear. They coughed. "Dungeons are narrative creatures. They seem to build themselves from a limited blueprint of components, and frequently construct a false narrative, a storybook fable, adventurers are expected to play along with. They can become very hostile when the theme is broken or shown to be false, but conversely, some adventurers enjoy... matching wits with the dungeon, so to speak, and engaging with the narrative presented to them. As to your second question—" they continued, but Goblin Cave interrupted them. Had been interrupting them for most of their speech; writing everything out took time.

THEY DO THIS WHILE THE DUNGEON IS TRYING TO KILL THEM?

They nodded. "Yes. There is... many adventurers feel there is a sense of sportsmanship to delving a dungeon. It is a lethal engagement, certainly, but one that can be performed enjoyably. Dungeon-delvers can be a suspicious lot, and many dungeons are said to have a sense of fairness to repeat delvers — preventing from killing them when the option is available, for example. Or redesigning certain passages to challenge adventurers in varying ways, when adventurers present engagement." They coughed again. "That being said, many dungeons... do not show those qualities. It varies highly."

Goblin Cave tried to think back. It had had some repeat delvers, certainly. It had never felt any fondness for them. WHAT ABOUT DUNGEON RANKINGS? it wrote.

"No, we are..." the adventurer talking looked over at another one of the group. "We know very little about dungeon rankings. You are referring to the system pane?" They asked, and the leader made a soft zssst noise with their mouth.

YES, Goblin Cave wrote.

Things continued like that for a while. Goblin Cave asked for information about Darkwood Grove (nearby; six day's travel away in a valley between the foothills) and Deepmine Delve (roughly three weeks travel by road, since apparently their roads went down into the foothills, then over, then back up into the mountain slopes); as well-established dungeons they might have given it some concept for the practicalities of dungeon defense they took. It did not get much useful information back: apparently Deepmine Delve was on the more lethal side of things, and Darkwood Grove apparently constantly revised its structure, growing immense trees in days, whenever an adventuring party completed some of its trials. It was 'popular', insofar as a dungeon could be popular. And then, for completeness, and also in an attempt to throw off the trail, it asked: AND WHAT ABOUT GOBLIN CAVE?

The thing was, while it had been asking about the other dungeons, something else had been happening. One of the survey team, one of the original group that wasn't the one it had knocked out earlier, wrote something down. They were holding a piece of parchment and a stick of oiled pigment within their folded hands, and around when the knight-diplomat mentioned the system pane, they began scrawling out letters. It made Goblin Cave feel much better about its own lettering; their handwriting was haphazard and slow, blotting over itself and smearing pigment, and between the fuzzing effect of the mana shield and their poor writing it took it a non-trivial amount of time to decypher what it said.

"DO YOU ACTUALLY HAVE ACCESS TO THE DUNGEON CORE'S SYSTEM CONTROLS?" was what they wrote. "DO YOU HAVE A WAY TO PRODUCE A NON-NATURAL MANA VALUE?"

That was extremely peculiar. Non-natural mana value? Was this a question about... negative mana? Or something more esoteric than that? The thought had never occurred to it. As far as it was aware, mana values had always fit between zero and the maximum mana for a given creature — mobs, itself, or otherwise. What would a negative mana field even look like? If one had a spell that cost negative one mana, could one chain it forever by alternating with a spell that cost one mana? Or could one only cast the spell if their mana value was less than negative one, and it would increase the value towards zero? Goblin Cave very much wanted to interrupt the entire proceedings and ask why the person had asked that, but... it had unlocked a mimic mob; it knew about deceit. The one adventurer was attempting to deceive the others by asking it questions in private. Goblin Cave had no clue how it was expected to respond, given the situation.

"Ah," the leader said, answering its question about Goblin Cave. There was a faint fluttering of their eyes. "Goblin Cave is considered an easy, low-level dungeon, with no notable resource or type specialization. Due to its location close to the realm of the Lesser Horde, it is in practice unregulated, and often used by initiate adventurers seeking to gain their first levels. We do not know anything of note about it, and it has never been worth investigating deeply. In straight-line distance, it is the closest dungeon to your laboratory here, though it would require traveling directly over the mountain ridge to the other side."

Goblin Cave had mostly asked because it would have seemed suspicious if it didn't. It was mostly thinking about negative mana, and only wrote out a perfunctory I SEE message in response.

"Do you have any further questions at the moment, Regent?" the leader asked, making yet another weird gesture with their body.

Yes, it had an enormous volume of questions. But sitting here laying them out one-by-one while adventurers stood around inside it really did not seem like an enjoyable use of its time. It wanted to jump ahead to the experimentation portion of the visit. It saw a way out: I WANT BOOKS ON THE SUBJECT OF MAGIC, DUNGEONS, GEOGRAPHY, AND THE SYSTEM.

They seemed prepared for that. "Certainly, Regent," the leader said, and the caster stepped forward, presenting... a book. They spoke: "In anticipation of your request, we came with a copy of On the Mysteries of Mana Harmonics and their Application, fifth edition, an advanced textbook we use at the University of Taraz. We give it to you in the hopes that it meets with your approval." Lacking anywhere to put it, they took a few steps forward and placed it on the floor, midway between where they stood and its own mana lock. Goblin Cave skimmed through it. There wasn't anything in the table of contents that was directly about flame wisps. There was a lot of notation. It would be something to look over later.

GOOD, it wrote. There was another question it had wanted to ask adventurers for a long time. It was difficult to turn it into a direct query. What was the point of delving dungeons? Why did adventurers risk death for power? What use did they find in leveling up, in grinding skills. What was the end goal of their adventures? If they delved dungeons for power, then what did they gain power for?

WHAT IS IT YOU DESIRE?, it wrote.

"Ah, well, we must commend your craftsmanship. We inspected your manastone gems; they were remarkably mana-dense. More of them would be a more than adequate payment for anything we could provide to you. We'd be happy to send you a supply of any resources you desire — books, theorists, or any mundane materials you desire... or to aid your studies in any other way! Just for a stipend of manastones."

Disgusting. Goblin Cave supposed that was as good as it was going to get. Power for power. More for more. As always, avarice ruled their desires. HOW MANY MANASTONES? it wrote.

"While we analyze the initial sample, we're prepared to offer thirty six manastones of the same cut per month to supply you with any materials you require."

Thirty six rhombic dodecahedrons didn't stack neatly. The closest number that made a structured stack was thirty two.

32, it wrote.

The adventurers looked at each other. "Thirty two manastones would be acceptable."