Valens painstakingly adjusted the angle of another piece of wood on the crude house he was building. The rough plank wobbled but held steady as he melded it to the other roof pieces he had assembled. The entire structure groaned slightly but held. The core sighed, who knew that building actual buildings instead of massive caves would be so hard? Well the only tricky part was the roof of the buildings, the walls were easy enough to make. However, the pesky little coverings kept crashing down on him. Sighing, he absorbed his crude but functional collection of wood and recreated it several times in quick succession. Looking over the rest of the tiny village he nodded in satisfaction, finally done.

Just then one of the roofs listed slightly to the side threatened to fall off at any moment. He sighed, thought about fixing it then decided not to bother. After all, who was going to believe that goblins could create a village without messing something up? Well goblinoids now he supposed, there weren’t that many actual goblins down on the twenty-fourth floor. It was mostly hobgoblins with the occasional orc. Orcs were the tier three goblinoid evolution and boy were they fun. The brutes stood at least six and a half feet tall; they were taller than most humans and towered over their less evolved brethren. The orcs were built like trees, massively strong, and just a little bit smarter than the hobgoblins.

In any other creature, the bump in intelligence might not have been noticeable but for the goblinoids it definitely was. Even if that intelligence was mostly manifesting itself as sending others first to test things and clubs. The clubs were quite effective though, with massive branches that the orcs used to devastating effect. He could wait for an adventurer to make it down to these floors and get a face full of wood. The orcs were impressive, but still got picked off occasionally by the floor’s other denizens that had figured out the concept of cooperation.

Still, he was starting to rethink having a goblinoid boss, he’d have to wait to see how they did against the humans but if they were half as effective as he thought then one would make for a devastating boss. After it went through its pathetic phase as a goblin, which would prove Magnus right again. He sighed in exasperation, at least the drake did gloat that much. He shook off his annoyance as he watched an orc rip an entire small tree out of the ground roaring. Granted it was a smaller tree and the orc immediately toppled over backward but still, it was cool.

He directed the group of goblinoids up the river to their new homes he had painstakingly created. Then he looked at the tree now on the ground and looked at his precious houses. They were going to get trashed weren’t they, he sighed heavily it would be fine. He did absorb an entire hut so he could recreate them at will and welded the roofs into the stone of the walls so they wouldn’t fall off again. Next, he made a few more clusters of houses around the floor and that was that. He didn’t point any goblins in the direction of his other tiny villages, if they found the buildings great and if not maybe the adventurers would use them.

Valens kept looking around the floor noting that the lizards were starting to make their way down from the tier two floors. Suddenly his thoughts screeched to a stop and he refocused, yep sure enough a few tier-two lizards had made their way down through his icy floors. He then checked his patterns and groaned in annoyance as he saw the tier three dire salamander sitting on the list. He had completely forgotten that he got that pattern when Sora had evolved, he could have had tier-three creatures ages ago. Growling in frustration he created ten of them around the floor and then squinted in annoyance as his mana dropped like a rock.

Now he had to wait until he could start expanding again and he had to put the salamanders on the rest of the desert floors too. The core let out a little scream, careful to make sure it wouldn’t disturb Magnus, he could not believe he forgot about his free pattern. Metaphorically banged his head against a wall a few times in exasperation before giving up the futile exercise, and settling down. First, he decided that the salamander population could just grow on its own, he had better things to do than populate each floor himself. Then could grow on the twenty-fourth floor and then he’d send up populations to his other desert floors.

He glanced around the floor and spotted one of the orcs trying to break down one of his huts. The dully monster was hitting the wall with its club for some reason, and shocker the wood gave out before the solid rock he’d made the walls out of did. Maybe his construction project would last for longer than a few days. Then he looked over and saw a trio of goblins who’d somehow made it on top of one of the structures and decided to jump up and down on the roof. Predictably the less-than-sturdy wood collapsed under them, spilling them into the house and onto the head of one of the hobgoblins. Valens groaned in despair as the goblins were chased around the crude village by the irate hobgoblin, his poor houses weren’t going to last a week were they?

The Hunter slept deeply boredom gnawing at her scales with an insatiable hunger. It had been many cycles, many days as the creator said since she had last set foot outside of her domain. She had grown strong, the creator’s power rushing through her to grant her a new form once again. Unfortunately, the Hunter had been unable to explore the limits of what this new body of hers could do.

Sighing she stretched and stood up for her bed of moss and grass. It was softer than the cold hard stone, and the Hunter appreciated the comfort it provided. She bounded across the room, testing her speed, gripping rocks in her fangs and tossing them. The last time her form had shifted it had taken her many cycles to adjust and fight at her best. That time could and would be reduced, she would learn the limits of her body before the order came to hunt once more.

She hoped the order would come soon, so she lifted the largest rock she could find and threw it against the wall of her domain. It shattered in a satisfactory display of her new might. Vaguely she thought that her hunting grounds might be ready soon, the great one had only turned his attention to her a few times recently, but each time there had been a sense of growing anticipation. Each time it had happened she had martialed herself for the command to hunt, to fight, to grow strong on the blood of her enemies, and serve her creator. But it was not to be, not yet at least, the day would come when she was set loose once more, it would be soon she knew it.

Aspen chased around the fluttering beetle as it sought to escape her grasp. That wouldn’t do at all, a gust of wind caught the insect and her new pet sailed through the air. She grabbed the and stuck it securely under her arm again ignoring its flailing legs. There, all safe now, She had been worried for a second her new friend would get eaten by a bird or something. Those feathery scoundrels were everywhere even in her little stretch of forest. Well, they did sing very nicely so she did go remove them all. It would be so much work too, finding so many things, and then fighting, it was better just to leave it alone.

She was very much enjoying her room, without having to fight anything that didn’t come to her. No chasing things around like a wild hummingbird, it was wonderful. Aspen knew she’d be sent traipsing off to fight things again eventually but for now, she could relax. Settling down on a nice large branch she lay back enjoying the sounds of the forest around her. It’d only be a short nap, just a few minutes then she’d go back to playing with her beetle friend. In only a few minutes the little fae was fast asleep.

Swords clashed against her carapace, and a shield slammed into her mandibles but the chimera refused to die so easily. The group that assailed her room was massive, too many for her to kill. Still, it was a good fight, and the next time she faced a challenge like this she would be ready. Twisting to the side her mandibles caught the arm of one of the invaders and tore it from his shoulder.

A blade skittered off her improved carapace, failing to pierce her fearsome shell. The chimera took the opportunity to lunge forward and finish the injured invader. The essence of the enemy flooded her system filling her with potential, she could feel a portion of that same essence rush off to her creator, down deep below. She rejoiced at being able to help her monarch in some small way, the humans assailed her almost daily by this point, and converting their wasted essence and feasting on their flesh was always a welcome experience.

Another blade struck her, this one curved and attached to a much longer wooden stick. The unknown weapon bit deep into the wide of her shell, drawing a weeping line of blood. Gnashing her mandibles the chimera launched herself at this new threat, heedless of the pain her injury caused. She struck the invader full in the chest, he tried to sweep down with his deadly weapon but he was too slow. Her mandibles found his throat, and he only managed a gurgled scream before succumbing.

Before the chimera could celebrate her victory she felt a sharp pain in her abdomen, where her wound was still weeping drops of blood. Wheeling around she found another human backing off swiftly now weaponless, and with no shield. Chuckling at the poor fool who thought to challenge her unarmed, the chimera gathered herself for another leap. But instead of launching herself across the room in a deadly arc, instead, she stumbled and crashed to the ground.

She felt his legs collapse beneath her and a familiar cold started to spread throughout her body. Her injuries must have been worse than she had originally realized, she was dying, again. She didn’t have long to dwell on her failure before another human stepped forward and swung down at the fragile portion of flesh connecting her head to the rest of her body. It took the human three swings before the chimera succumbed to her injuries, a fact that inordinately pleased her as it again showed the strength of her new armor. Her new chitin was rebuilt into a more rigid and bone-like structure based on both the scales of the lizards and bones of the lesser creatures of her home.

As consciousness began to leave her, the chimera gave thanks to the creator, for always allowing her to rise anew even when she failed. Next time she thought, next time things would be different, not that different because change never happened all at once, but different all the same. Perhaps she should begin trying to create a proper neck structure for herself, so she could more easily move her head and eyes. If she had better awareness perhaps she would not have suffered her original injury at all. Her musings ended as the comforting darkness washed over her, and she awaited rebirth sheltering beneath the mighty carapace of her monarch.