Chapter 14 - Minor issues

Day 16

Mike’s POV:

Mike was on the second day of his current hunting trip. He had found some deer and wolf tracks the day before, but he decided to leave them alone. He would not get any reward for them from the dungeon and in comparison to the ten silver, it would be a waste of time to bring them back his village. A while later he came across another animal track. He saw that it was from a large feline, but he wasn’t sure whether it came from a large panther, a jaguar or a small tiger. He knew he’d have to be careful if he wanted to follow the track. A large cat wasn’t as sturdy or as strong as the black bear he killed, but they were a lot faster and had better senses. If the cat noticed him before he discovered it, he would be the one who was getting hunted. Mike was not looking forward to a close combat situation with an unwounded feline predator, so he decided to be extra careful.

After he checked his gear and he got his trusted bow ready, he started following the trail. He dedicated extra vigilance to the trees. Cats were good climbers and if one attacked him from above, he’d be done for.

A while later Mike got lucky, he spotted the cat first. It was a large panther. He saw it lieing on the low grass of a small glade. It seemed like it enjoyed the sun. He smiled, his position was almost perfect. The arrow he choose was extra made for piercing bones. He aimed for the side of the cats head. His arrow should be able to pierce the cats skull, which was much more delicate than a bears. Praying for a moment that he made the right choice, he let go of the arrow and then he immediately put another one in his bow.

When he took aim again a moment later, he saw that the second arrow was not needed. The panther was not moving. Slowly he went closer, then he relaxed when he saw that his arrow went with more than one third of it’s length inside the cats skull. He put away his bow and decided to grab his spear, better safe than sorry. When he got to the cat he checked it’s pulse to make sure that it was death. He didn’t find one, so he pulled out the arrow from the skull, cleaned it up a bit and put it back into his quiver. Then thought about his way back.

Luckily the cats trail had brought him closer to the dungeon again. He estimated the distance he needed to walk at around two kilometers. Still it would be an ordeal to carry the cat, that was around 80 kg, on his back through this terrain. He sighed, but after learning early in his life that lamenting would not help, he started his arduous journey.

He finished half of the way back when he suddenly felt a sharp pain on the lower right side of his back. Mike instantly stopped and he checked the spot. When he moved his hand there he felt an arrow shaft and blood. He immediately decided to drop the panther and take cover behind a tree. He then tried to find an attacker, only to spot a group of goblins running in his direction. One of them made a gesture with his staff and suddenly a fireball was flying in his direction. Mike reacted quickly, he took two fast steps to the side and let himself fall to the ground. He was lucky, the fireball hit the tree where he was standing moments before. A wave of very hot air moved above him and singed his hair. It took him all of his willpower to get up, despite the excruciating pain from the arrow in his back.

He started running, but he could see the goblins following him. With the arrow wound he could not outrun them. Even if, they could just follow his blood trail. He decided that his only chance was the dungeon, so he went for it. The next 15 minutes were the worst of his life. Holding his distance to the goblins took all of his strength. Occasionally there were arrows flying in his direction, but he was lucky that the goblins were bad shooters and did not manage to hit a moving target. When he reached the entrance of the dungeon he was already running out of steam. The leading goblins with melee weapons were only five meters behind him. When he entered the dungeon, he didn’t stop running, he just shouted:

„Neo, help! Please! Goblins!“

For what felt like an eternity he didn’t get an answer, but was probably only for one or two seconds.

„Wonderful! Very thoughtful of you to bring a whole bunch of them to me. It’s also smart, this way you didn’t have to carry their dead bodies yourself.“

Mike was speechless, this would be the end for him. The stupid dungeon didn’t notice his predicament. Then he heard the shattering of stone. A black bear, looking exactly like the one he killed, broke through what seemed to be a very thin stone wall at the side of the entrance. Following behind the bear were at least ten wolves and they were immediately attacking the arriving goblins.

„Hehe, just kidding boy. You can relax, I’ll take care of them!“

What then followed was a bloodbath. The goblins were totally hit by surprise, but they gathered themselves quickly. Two of the bigger goblins uses their shields and spears to block the bear. The rest attacked the wolves in a frenzy.

At first both sides seemed to be evenly matched, but then another fireball changed the situation. Half of the wolves went down immediately, the others were heavily scorched. One or two goblins were killed by the fireball too, but there were still more than ten goblins standing. Just when he thought the dungeon would lose, he saw another wolf coming from the neighboring room and directly attacking the goblins. One second after the first, another one entered the fight, then another and so on. It did not seem to matter how much wolves were killed, more of them just kept coming from that room. He didn’t know what was going on, but the wolves slowly, but surely started to overwhelm their foes. When he saw the last goblins breaking and trying to flee, he sighed with relief only to lose his conscience shortly after.

Neo’s POV:

Neo was just absorbed in his formation when he heard Mike’s call for help. Then he saw the first goblin enter and he could not resist to tease Mike a little bit, so he pretended to be oblivious to his situation. In the meanwhile he commanded the bear in his hidden guard room to breake through the fake wall and the wolves to follow him. When he saw more and more goblins enter, he calculated that his guard detail was not strong enough to handle them. He still had no animal material left to create a reinforcement, so he did the only thing that came to his mind: After using his magic to create metal spikes on the walls he comanded all of his remaining wolves and bears to sucide into them and then absorb their bodys to refil his stock. He was just right on time, when a fireball mowed down most of his forces, he started creating now wolves in the guard room. With his high mana regeneration he was able to create one wolf every second. The following battle reminded Neo of the rabbit attack on the wolf. Again he was grinding down a superior enemy with an endless amount of flesh and teeth.

When the last standing goblins lost their will to fight and decided to flee, he spotted a grey blur flying in their direction. It took him a moment to realize that it was his little dungeon fairy Luna riding on Mr Floppy.

„Die you scum! Feel the wrath of the mighty Luna.“

The first of the goblins had no time to react before a lance pierced his skull. Then, when another nearby goblin tried to intervene and attack the fairy and her rabbit, something impossible happened. He saw the little flying rabbit spitting a fireball at the goblin, setting it on fire. Neo was stunned for a moment, while Luna quickly dispatched another foe. The last two of the smaller goblins managed to flee. He decided against pursuing them. His wolves could easily get them, but maybe they would come back for revenge with the rest of their tribe. That would bring him a lot of additional life energy.

When he looked over the room after the battle, he counted 23 dead bodies in the room. The loses among his wolves were over 40. When he decided to absorb the dead goblins, he kept Luna's warning about gathering too much life energy in his mind and immediately upgraded when he could.

Upgrade dungeon level -> 6 Costs: 160 life energy Upgrade dungeon level -> 7 Costs: 320 life energy Upgrade dungeon level -> 8 Costs: 640 life energy Upgrade dungeon level -> 9 Costs: 1280 life energy

That was much faster than to wait for living creatures to generate life energy he thought and checked his new status window:

Name: Neo

Species: Dungeon core

Affinity: None

Rank: F-4

Level: 8

Structural Integrity: 4/4

Mana: 2505/2505 (595)

Floor area: 3100/25200 m²

Max dungeon extension from core: 393 m

Mana Regeneration: 3600 /h *2*50000% = 1000 /s

Life Energy: 634.8

Life Energy generation: 5.27/d

Wonderful, his maximum floor size increased tremendously. He would even be able to condense his core again after he extended the dungeon. His regeneration just doubled, but the next core condensing would improve it again. Two more levels and he could get the skills Luna talked about. Then he put his expansion aside, he had more pressing issues. He needed to have a serious discussion with a small fairy about a rabbit and he had to check Mike's wounds.