I watch my scions share some knowledge with the Stag, and it’s an interesting experience. I can feel Rocky latching onto wavelengths and the fact that infrared is thermal. It’s pretty cool watching the Stag gain the fire affinity, and funny to feel the Southwood’s reaction to it.

I think he was expecting it to take a lot longer, but Rocky isn’t an Affinity Savant for nothing. From what the Stag was saying, it also helped that he’s so experienced with his light affinity. I also don’t doubt Rocky will figure out light if he wants it next. He can already change the pitch of his sounds, so he knows how to adjust wavelengths. He just needs to figure out which part of fire to stretch to do it.

I think he wants lightning first, though. He’s managed to convince Fluffles to sling a lot of electricity as they start sparring. Whether he’ll learn it before he has to go, I dunno, but I let them all have their fun.

I check in on Leo and Honey, and the two are already hip deep in organizing the denizens to come home, and organizing the ones they brought to fill in the gaps. They’ll probably want a day or two to debrief everyone, and not even Rocky will be able to avoid a proper debriefing, once he’s had his fun sparring.

Teemo is hanging out with the delvers, and they all seem in pretty good spirits. A lot of them have never been here before, and Yvonne, Aelara, and Ragnar are having to herd cats to try to keep everyone on the same page. They’ve already sent a few of the more ranger-y ones out to scout the clearing and the hole. Most of the adventurers are happy for now to do some low-effort delving and resupplying, and the Southwood is more than happy to let them.

All of that leaves me with very little to do in the Southwood right now, so I give my new ally an encouraging pat on the bond before turning my attention back to my own territory.

Coda hasn’t been resting on his laurels while everyone is on a road trip, and has managed to get a lot of progress done on the entrance to the lava labyrinth. With the first floor of the lighthouse finished, and the masons over there having more of an understanding of what Coda needs them to do, he’s had to oversee them less and less, letting him oversee my ratlings more and more as they carve and work the entrance.

The stalls and other structures were easy enough for them to build, and Coda has even wrangled a few rockslides, magmyrm, wyrms, and even a basilisk to help. The slides aren’t the strongest in their earth affinity, but they still make it so much easier to properly fix the supports of the buildings into the cavern. My more fiery denizens are working on the more aesthetic aspects, including the wyrm mouth for the entrance.

For now, we’re not going to try to make the mouth open and close, and will be staying with a more traditional door for if I need to try to discourage people from heading inside during renovations or something. The wyrms and basilisk have been happy to spew magma where the magmyrms want, and the volcanic ants have been shaping it as it cools, slowly sculpting the open maw of a wyrm. They even infuse a bit of their affinity into their work, which has drawn Thing to investigate.

The magmyrms are using it more for lighting and because it looks cool, but Thing seems very interested in what they’ve done. I think it’s some kind of runework, but I don’t really understand the specifics. I just know it looks cool, and doesn’t make the ambient temperature feel like an oven.

Delvers have been curiously watching the work, but nobody has tried to interfere in anything, which is good. Fewer interruptions means quicker and cleaner work, which means the entrance will be fully functional sooner!

The new quest board is already up and running. Quest web? Quest… dangling signs? I’ll need to give it a better name later, but whatever I end up calling it, it’s already giving delvers a bit more guidance, and giving me a bit more mana. I’ve seen a few strange quests in there, too. ‘Only Turn Left’ is a weird one, and I don’t think anyone’s taken it yet. Maybe once people get more used to the labyrinth, then they’ll be more willing to take a challenge quest like that.

Some of the ratkin have even come by to help set up the smelters, and I wonder if it’s similar for them as the lighthouse is for the masons. Either way, my dwellers seem to be happy and enjoy the work, and I get more of a discount for the rooms. One is as discounted as I think it’s going to get, so I go ahead and just spend the mana for it. It’s cool to watch the subtle and not-so-subtle changes when making a room.

In the old days, the most basic things would just pop into existence, like the bit of parchment in my first library, way back in that small ant chamber. Now, I watch the mana shape and change things, reinforcing the oven there, where it was a little thin, properly setting the basic crucibles, forming pegs on the walls for the tools to hang on, and more. It feels nice to make a good workshop like this, and I can easily imagine the delvers working away, sometimes laughing and carrying on as they work, sometimes being deadly serious and focused.

It makes it easy to understand why a dungeon would go for the full toybox route. Lots of mana generated, hardly any mess. Well, I’m sure my ratlings will need to clean the smelters and forges regularly, but that’s a mundane, boring kind of mess. The more exciting messes can make even more mana, but all too often have a cost that I don’t want my delvers to pay. It’s also easy to see why most dungeons go more belligerent. The mana I get for ‘defeating’ a group of delvers in my labyrinth shows how lucrative that can be. But I’m glad I’ve been able to walk a more middle path, take the road untaken. I can kinda have my cake and eat it, too, which is one of those sayings that makes more logical sense if you reverse it, but eat your cake and have it, too, doesn’t flow quite as well.

My fuzzy philosophical introspection is interrupted by Violet, who sends a sudden spike of worry through the protege bond. I push thoughts of cake and how I probably will only ever have cake and never eat it out of my mind, and focus on what she’s so alarmed about. It’s difficult to narrow it down at least at first.

Her scions are all on high alert, and I can see a lot more spores in the air as Cappy does his best to defend his home. Legs is suiting up in all kinds of metal and looking pretty intimidating. Nose is buried near Violet’s core, preparing to grab anything that might somehow slip past Legs and Cappy. And Onyx… what is Onyx doing?

She has two clawed gauntlets now, and is slowly prowling around, instead of taking a defensive position like the other scions. She notices me, or Violet does and she gives her some direction. Either way, the shadowy gremlin points out the swirling mana in Violet’s domain.

I’ve never seen that before. At first glance, it’s just a huge mess. I can feel Violet getting a lot of mana from it, but I don’t know why the flow is suddenly acting so weird! I take a few moments to focus and pay more attention, and start noticing little patterns. It’s not just one big mess… but a lot of smaller ones. Taking a step back, it’s easier to see, and I suddenly realize what’s happening.

I bring my attention back into focus and try to figure out what’s the best way to put it to Violet. Firstly, I try to get her to calm down, to impress on her that she’s not in any danger. Sure, it’s a surprise, but it’s also one we probably should have seen coming. I also start shunting the mana she’s getting into the alliance pool for now. I don’t know if dungeons can get sick from too much mana, but I’d rather be safe than sorry.

Me taking action seems to calm her a bit, so I draw her attention to the cause of the sudden increase of mana: the scythemaw nests. More specifically, the scythemaw eggs. Even more specifically, the hatching scythemaw eggs.

Onyx scratches at the surface of one of the nests before Violet tells her to stop, and I suggest sending Nose to poke in and get a better look. I watch the mana flows as some of the eggs start wiggling and moving more, and Violet’s panic shifts to an intense curiosity. I can’t really explain the complex process of hatching and how it differs from spawning, partially because I don’t really understand too much about how spawning works.

Thankfully, I don’t need to try to figure out how to explain the birds and the bees, as one of the leathery eggs sprouts a gash. Violet is alarmed at that for a moment, before the first scythemaw baby pokes its little head out.

Oh no. They’re adorable. While most mammal babies look a bit underdone at birth, and a lot of birds look like nightmares, most reptiles and amphibians look all shiny and adorable, and it seems like scythemaws are no exception. The baby looks just like a baby alligator, with stubby little mandibles poking from its cheeks.

I’m not sure I’ve ever missed having hands more than I do right now. I just want to pick it up and hold it and pet it and call it George. Violet seems curious about them, and my own feelings on the matter seem to have convinced her everything is fine, even if she doesn’t share my opinion on how cute the things are.

She nudges me with a bit of concern, and reminds me that I can’t just sit here and squee at the things all day. No matter how cute, we have a pile of newborn apex predators to deal with. I don’t think they’ll be dangerous on their own, but if we want to keep the local scythemaw population stable, we should probably try to figure out how to get them to the water.