Gil strolled out of the dungeon, “What’s going on up here? I hea-” he minced his words; the bloody carnage outside seized his body, ejecting the food in his stomach. “What… the hell… happened,” he said between pants.

“Well,” I replied, “We were attacked by goblins and Alexander the death knight killed the lot of em.” Gil nodded feebly using his tall stick to hold him up as his legs quivered. “Speaking of which, here he comes.” The chill gave away his presence – that and the glow coming from the thicket. He burst through the brush and two goblins dragged their feet behind them. “Woah!” I raised my hands up, “Behind you, two goblins.”

Alexander did not break pace, “I know. They will do nothing. They have learned fear.” Their eyes empty, shoulder slumped, feet heavy. I believed him – and dared not question what he did.

“What do you plan on doing with them?” Gil asked.

Alexander dryly responded, “Interrogate them. Some got away,” he said with disappointment. “That won’t happen again.”

I crossed my arms, “So we are going to exterminate them all?”

The death knight shrugged, “Maybe. Perhaps there are better options.”

Like what, I thought to myself. “Might it be possible to take control of the goblins?” Out loud I walked through the idea, “Goblins are dumb creature but have a hierarchy, a leadership, like any other. Take out the leaders and they either scramble or rampage. However, if we take out the leader and immediately replace them or make them subservient to us, could we not wrestle control of the entire population?”

A phantasmal grin grew on the death knight’s face. He outstretched his arms, “Excellent! Your logic is sound; taking control of these insects should not be a problem. There are many ways to make them kneel – even excluding your dungeon abilities.”

I clapped my hands, “Then we will do that, take over the goblins. Any ideas on how?”

Alexander bowed, “Leave the matter to me. I shall draw the plans and make arrangements and inform you if your powers are needed.”

Gil jumped forward between the two of us, “W-w-w-wait, hold up, is this even a good idea? Think about it! Taking on dozens and dozens and maybe even over a hundred goblins! Those little murderous creatures? Really?”

“I don’t see a problem…” Puzzled, I tilted my head. “We need numbers and strength. Goblins seem like a convenient way for us to do that. But you are right, over a hundred goblins to suddenly take care of would be a lot.” I turned to the spirit, “What do you think?”

“I agree. We can trim their numbers as needed.”

Goblins weren’t finnicky creatures when it came to food; anything that was edible was fair game. The concern was quantity. As of now the few of us here had gotten by with the occasional hunting and some gathering. Converting my mana into food was an option that was also exercised. However, with dozens of more mouths to feed that would be problematic. There was no guarantee they could secure enough food consistently for all of them. If they couldn’t it would risk tearing up chunks of his mana to keep things maintained.

“How about this: you work on the subjugation while I figure out the logistics?”

“Excellent,” it replied to my recommendation. Alexander gathered the skeletons and returned to the depths of the dungeon. Gil had enough of the mess outside and followed behind.

I, on the other hand, was left to clean up. Instead of turning the slashed goblin bodies into skeletons or undead (which I didn’t have the mana for all of them anyways), I used my powers to break down their composition to pure mana. My job was to figure out how to support a surge in our population – and I needed mana to work with. I left the golems on patrol duty in case some stragglers showed up. They were able to take care of themselves; the goblin weapons and fists couldn’t scratch them.

The top priorities were food and housing. Plenty of animals roamed the forest and berry bushes and fruit trees were scattered everywhere. Foraging for food would work, but a more permanent solution would be needed in any situation. That meant investing in animal husbandry and crops. We didn’t have either the animals nor the seeds for that. Once our position solidified, trading would become a top priority.

If their numbers weren’t that great, a combination of hunting, gathering, and mana could subsist until a more permeant solution was created. In fact, the dungeon was situated right next to a large flowing river and the ocean. Plenty of fish available to catch. There wasn’t much to do on this for now, but I had to budget room and plan out for it. On the other side of the river was more flatland, land suitable for tracks of farms. The tunnel underneath was far from complete and would take time. An above ground bridge would be the easiest structure to come up with to make crossing way. The mana to build would be great, and I didn’t have anywhere close. For some time I had gotten by using mana to directly form whatever I needed. It was quick and easy – but the costs were high. It was time to manage his mana pool more efficiently, and that meant harvesting raw resources to supplement his powers. With manpower and trading it shouldn’t be an issue.

Housing would, of course, be in the dungeon. Goblins roaming around outside would be too dangerous. Problem was, I didn’t know how much to build. The number of goblins we would take in is unknown. I had no interest in housing the goblins on the lower levels, close to my own personal space. The second floor would do fine for them.

The floor was rather plain. I had ignored it completely in favor of modeling the bottom levels. It was the smallest of the middle floors. In fact, while the other levels have been outfitted with stone, this one was still all dirt. Keeping in mind the spiraling structure I had in mind for the dungeon, I exercised my powers and extended the dungeon outwards.

This place was a dungeon, but bigger ideas for it were growing in me. A home? A town? A city? I wasn’t sure, so I worked only on the outer edges. An outer ring, like a hallway, formed on the boundaries. A continuous pathway around the entire second floor. From that outer ring, I fashioned rooms along the entire way. They were small, but not cramped. Simple dirt rooms that could comfortably hold four, maybe more if they were small goblins. I left a cross section open, dividing up the rim into four equal quadrants. Nothing was crafted out of the inner side of the ring, thus leaving twenty rooms in total made, all nestled on the outer side. About four goblins each would mean housing close to 100. I didn’t think we could support close to that many so we would have to trim the numbers done if it was that large – but it left room to grow.

I was exhausted. Summoning Alexander to the fighting the goblins to getting to work on the dungeon happened all in the span of one night. Normally, sleep could be substituted for mana. But I had none. Substituting sleep for mana might even be for the worse. When I ran of mana, like now, the weakness and deprivation hit me like a crash. I have been up for over 40 hours doing work and all the exhaustion hit me at once. Dragging my feet I stumbled my way down to my personal chambers and collapsed on my bed. Sleep was instant.

I woke up paralyzed. Slime was sprawled on top of me and its heavy metal weight crushed me. “S-slime, could you get off of me?” Wiggling underneath the slime’s weight I tried to free myself.

Slime deflated its form on top of me, crushing more of my body, “Why?”

“You’re crushing me!” Slime solidified its form back into its feminine shape and rolled over. “Why were you on my bed anyways?”

“I was tired and wanted to sleep with master.”

I ruffled my hand through my hair. It wasn’t a problem as long as I didn’t get crushed, I guess. The bed was big enough. However, ever since Slime had her next transformation into a humanoid state, it was getting harder deciding how to react around it; Slime’s female body blurred the lines between ‘it’ and ‘she’, so I wasn’t sure how to act anymore.

She tilted her head more than 45 degrees, “Troubled?”

“Yeah,” I said, “I’m troubled by the fact that your head is almost upside down on your shoulders.” It giggled and the head snapped back. I got up from the bed and stretched. Everything felt sore and heavy. “How long was I out for?”

Finger to her chin, Slime thoughtfully replied, “Maybe a day and a half?”

“What?” I scrunched up my face. The exhaustion had gotten to me, but a day and a half was too much. I would have to make sure I don’t overexert myself like this in the future.

Alexander walked through the door-less doorway and made his presence known by letting his aura wisp around. “You are awake. Excellent. Preparations are complete. I will need your assistance.”

“…Oh, okay.” It took a second to process what he was saying. “Let me get ready and I will be right out.” Alexander nodded and left the room. I got ready and followed him up.

Slime and I reached the entrance and Alexander stood with the skeletons, Gil, and Tal. The death knight started explaining straight away, “The plan is to corral the goblins onto our territory. I learned that they seek a home, this dungeon, after interrogating the two insects I brought. They will come back eventually, but we will bait them to act now, on our terms. The skeletons will spearhead the assault. Lure them in to our forest. Then, the golems and I will strike and take out their leaders. From there, we capture the remaining goblins and take them over either through submission or through your dungeon powers.”

I shrugged my shoulders, “Sounds good. Let’s do this then.” I turned to Gil and Tal who were also here, “So what are you two doing in this plan?”

Gil sighed, “This guy is making me fight! In case there are too many he wants me to blast them all away…”

“He’s getting you to fight? Impressive!”

He grunted in frustration, “I don’t want to! I’m under duress here!”

I patted his shoulder, “Sorry! I’ll make it up to you – hopefully you won’t have to do anything.” Gil grumbled something and I went to follow Alexander. The goblins were staying at the outskirts of the forest west. Alexander had scouted it, said the trees were thin there and clearings were abundant. Supposedly they had been launching attacks on the roads and travelers using the forest as cover. Another problem to worry about, more unneeded attention.

We continued to trek and my maximum range was dangerously closing – even though it had been expanded a little due to both the expansion of the dungeon and my own powers. Alexander pointed ahead, “Over there they are. The skeletons will draw them out, trigger their assault, and capture them on dungeon territory.” He crossed his arms, however, and looked displeased. “I don’t sense many of them here. Something is going on.”

I took his word for it and we cautiously pressed forward. Alexander was right: there was only a handful of the green creatures around. Alexander dealt with them before they were aware of our presence. While we made little noise, from behind the thicket of trees we heard the cries of goblins. Alexander was not amused. He strolled forward and burst through the brush. I followed.

The goblins were already fighting. A singular knight on a horse rampaged through the little monsters slashing through them with a long sword.

“Another insect to crush,” Alexander coldly said.

I looked closer and rubbed my eyes. “No, wait, I know that knight!”

Alexander looked over to make a comment but he was cut off by a thunderous crash. Down the tree line north a tree flew out and spiraled straight at the knight. He steered his horse out of harm’s way and it splintered into the ground. The leaders of the goblins lumbered out from the woods – five brutish hobgoblins towered out.

This was Alexander’s plan, but I took charge, “We are saving that knight. Subjugating the goblins is secondary.”

The death knight brandished his sword and stepped forward, “Understood.”