Dungeon of Knowledge

Chapter 183: Hunting Undead in the Forest

CalenCalen skirted the stagnant pond and the wisps of violet mist that seeped from its waters, scanning the decayed trunks for signs of undead. He did not have Mato’s attachment to nature, but even he felt sick at the sight of the creeping miasma and death that hung over the rotting remains of the vibrant forest he had spent so much of his youth exploring.

He glanced backward guiltily, catching sight of Seth bringing up the rear with his skeletons. he quickly corrected himself. Alexander Gray, however… he deserved every bit of Calen’s ire. If they hadn’t already killed him, he would do it again just because of this devastation.

He darted up the side of a low rise, weaving around the rot and decay, and paused as he reached the crest, studying the landscape up ahead. Both Teagan and Aiden’s groups had jumped at the opportunity to join him and Mato on this hunt, so he was escorting an entire raid group of bronze-ranked adventurers through the decrepit fallen boughs of the once beautiful forest to the south of Myrin’s Keep.

“Show me,” he said. His shadows, Willow and Devan, approached, demonstrating the results of their training with the guild – both moved across the soggy ground with respectable silence and stealth. Calen nodded to himself. They were well on their way to becoming skilled scouts.

“Here,” Willow said. “Cami can smell them.”

The Adventurers Guild had been contracted to decontaminate the blight with a priority to focus on opening the South Road. This was the same road the Kel’darran slaver caravan had taken when they had captured Malika and him. Most of the trade with Southport and the southern half of the continent remained blocked and the town had had to tighten their collective belts to make ends meet. However, even the Guildmaster balked at the magnitude of the task before them.

he thought.

Cami sniffed at the dirt, wandering about in random circles for a while. Suddenly the imposing Timber Wolf stiffened, her hackles rising to expand her already impressive bulk, and then glanced at Willow as if encouraging her to follow and padded off down the hill in a direct line.

“She found something,” Willow said, unnecessarily.

Calen examined the trail carefully. His Explorer skill quickly identified what Cami had found, traces of unnatural scrapes and prints. “That looks like the abomination,” he said.

“Definitely,” Devan said. “Here, look at this.” Her sharp eyes had picked out some scrapes along the bole of a dead tree – marks that were anything but natural.

Calen nodded. His companions had invested well, their perception skills were excellent. He glanced up at the sight of a pair of zombies shambling along, following the tracks with unerring accuracy.

“Abomination,” Seth said, quietly.

And then, of course, there was Seth. The necromancer could see undeath through the eyes of his minions.

With the trail finally found, they made quick progress, winding their way across hills, past ponds, and through valleys. Behind him, the occasional sounds of combat drifted across the dead landscape as the remainder of the raid group tackled the wandering undead, but Calen remained focused on his primary prey, his unease growing as they drew closer. The area they traveled through was already unnatural enough, filled with shambling undead, blighted trees, and even miasma seeping from the ground itself – but despite all that, something even more unnatural lurked nearby, just below the threshold of his ability to clearly identify what it might be.

But then, as he passed a dense pile of decaying wood where several trees had collapsed, he caught sight of the twitching, shambling mass of stitched and animated undead flesh, spewing clouds of dark gas into its surrounds. It shuffled about unhurriedly, multiple eyes swiveling back and forth independently as if

“Level?” Ali asked.

“Yes!” Ryn grinned. “What are you planning to do today?”

Ali glanced at Malika for a moment. Mato and Calen were out helping the bronze-ranked guild members today, so she had a little free time. “I think I need to clean up a little, and maybe do some maintenance on the dungeon today.” There was a whole long list of things she had been putting off due to lack of time.

“In that case, I think I’ll return this stack and get a new batch,” Ryn said, placing a hand on top of the pile of books that was nearly as tall as Ali.

“Ok. Do you want to come with me, Malika?” Ali asked. “Or stay here?”

“I have a martial arts class for the new recruits in half an hour,” Malika said, looking up from her studies.

“See you both later then? Maybe around dinner time?” Ali asked.

“Mhm,” Malika nodded.

“Sure thing,” Ryn said with a wave. Then the pile of books under her hand vanished into her storage, and she vanished immediately after, presumably to the library.

Ali thought, heading out into the forest cavern.

***

The first thing Ali did was to substantially expand her crop of Flame Lashers and Fire Grass. With the amount of time they were spending in the mines, they were using them up at a phenomenal rate.

It was not the first time she had thought that, but each time she worried that she would be putting Morwynne or Eliyen out of business. Not that she was planning on flooding the market or anything. More critical, though, was the fact that she had always struggled to find space in her Grimoire – in this case, being able to have them made from ingredients and components she could create was simply a minor inconvenience in time.

She flew up to the grove and set to the task of deconstructing the zombie and skeleton corpses her minions had piled up for her. Interspersed in the pile were the occasional assorted Kobold or Slime – either her own monsters killed in defense of her domain, or some interlopers that managed to sneak in from somewhere. She quickly discarded the imprints for the undead, but she wasn’t quite satisfied until she grew a bunch of jasmine and peacebloom to mask the odor of rotting flesh.

She flew across the cavern, heading toward the sewer, but on the way, she stopped to check in on her newest wolf pack boss. It hadn’t been tested by the adventurers from the guild yet, but just by the undead corpses strewn about she could tell her boss was a resounding success. Enough that it took more than twenty minutes to clean up the mess.

Leaving the steady trickle of skeleton incursions to her wolves, Ali headed on up, shifting her awareness through her various monsters to survey her domain. Not much needed fixing in the sewer level, except the enormous piles of trash collected at the bottom of some of the entrance tunnels. It seemed that it was not just her minions collecting trash now – some of the townsfolk must have decided her sewer was a decent garbage disposal.

Ali gazed up at the towering pile, amazed at the sheer amount of junk her Kobolds had collected. It would take a while, but she hoped that buried in there somewhere was a gem of some kind that she might find useful.

She was about halfway through the giant stack when something clinked and her eyes caught sight of a small leather pouch. Ali picked it up and carefully tried to untie the string, but the stitching had rotted, and the entire thing crumbled, spilling a handful of tarnished copper and bronze coins across the ground. But among the dull coins, something gleamed brightly. She flew down to investigate and there, nestled on the moss, she found several small coins with the stamped image of a regal Sun Elf on one side and Elvish writing on the other. They gleamed with a shining silvery-yellow as they lay on the palm of her hand.

Ali turned them over several times, studying the pretty gleaming coins. They were not a denomination or mint she recognized, but there were enough of them to learn, so she quickly committed the Elven Royal Quarters to her coin imprint. she wondered. Elven currency – Elves in general – were not unheard of in Myrin’s Keep, but they were certainly not frequent visitors.

Ali continued her chore, laboriously deconstructing her way through the entire pile, but nothing else seemed useful until she finally reached the bottom of the pile. The Kobolds had made a round past some of the smithies – several dozen chunks of metal lay on the ground, offcuts and discards from failed projects. Ali shrugged and fed them to her deconstruction skill.

She moved automatically to dismiss the imprint like so many other worthless ones she earned disposing of the endless trash piles, but then she paused. Her Grimoire had only wood and stone that she could use as materials with Domain Mastery, having discarded bone, water, and even fire silk as lower value or easily replaceable.

If it worked like stone or wood, she would be able to use it with Sculpting and give her alternatives to her barrier magic for blocking off passages or making walls in her domain. She could even see uses for it to repair railings, ladders, and walkways in the Grand Library.

she thought. She had been hoping to use it for a good monster imprint that might help out in the mines, but there had been little opportunity to find one recently. she decided.

As soon as she committed the imprint to her remaining chapter, her Grimoire shone with brilliance. Pages flickered and shuffled around in a gigantic flurry, startling her with the suddenly energetic reaction. And then her notification chime went crazy. Quickly, she caught up on the notifications.

Ali stared at her Grimoire, baffled at the dramatic activity. Something similar had happened when she had committed the wood imprint, but this time she didn’t have a whole bunch of metal trees to explain it. She looked a little closer, and suddenly the chapter changes made sense. Her crawler had inserted itself into both the grass and the elemental imprints, but it didn’t take up any extra pages – whenever she opened one of those chapters, her Grimoire simply moved the relevant pages for the Bamboo Crawler into the currently open chapter. The same thing seemed to be happening here, chunks of pages were rearranged from her coin, weapons, and armor variants, indicating that her customization had found subsets of those that it could categorize as metals.

she realized, noticing the conspicuous absence of Eimuuran Steel and Thuli’s new Fireforged Steel. She puzzled over that for a while, tentatively concluding that perhaps there was some special magical structure or technique that set those apart from the other more normal metals. It didn’t explain why Darksteel had been included, though.

Still, she now had access to a sudden wealth of metals she could use. Obviously, she tried it out immediately, summoning a chunk of Electrum and twisting it in her hands with Domain Mastery to form the shape of a small diadem. She warped it again, turning it into a small tree, finding the metal satisfyingly easy to work with and stunningly beautiful in sculpture. Then she turned the brick walls in the entrance shaft to gold before shifting them to a more practical granite. She did find a practical use for her newest imprint almost immediately, replacing the rusted iron hoops stapled into the wall that served as a treacherous ladder with a far safer set of steel steps.

***

“So, what do you think?” Ali asked, pointing at the lake.

“You want some better protection for the lake, but you want it to still be accessible to the guild?” Calen asked. He hovered beside her on his slowly undulating, shimmery wings.

“Yup,” Ali nodded. “The Timber Wolves are probably a stretch for the bronze-ranked adventurers, so I want something a little easier to ramp them up – but not too difficult that they can’t kill them – I still want them to be able to collect water for Morwynne and Eliyen.”

“You don’t make it easy, do you?” Calen chuckled.

“Hey… I have more requirements than those uncultured dungeons. I have standards, you know?” Ali quipped.

Calen chuckled. “The bronze-ranks gained a couple of levels on our excursion, so they might not be that far off. What abilities haven’t you tested out yet? The Domain Skills.”

“Well…” Ali said, consulting her notes and her skill descriptions. “I think Twin Binding sounds very cool.”

“Do you have much that works in the water?” Calen asked.

“Oozes – maybe the Scalding Slime? Or a Brine Ooze could be good,” Ali said, recalling her adventures in Naia’s dungeon. “I have the Stinging Jellies, but they’re a low-level swarm monster.”

“What level are you thinking?”

“Something close to twenty,” Ali said. This much she was certain of. At twenty-six, her Timber Wolves were likely to be a big challenge. Once some of the bronze-ranked adventurers unlocked their level twenty skill, it might be more accessible.

“Ok, that seems doable – but Twin Binding requires another monster, right?” Calen asked.

“It does,” Ali answered, sharing the skill with him one more time.

Twin Binding

Requirements: Raid Enhancement. Two minions.

Source: Twin Wights

Choose a second minion as the twin target, binding both together with the bonds of magic. Each minion of the pair can be assigned a single Domain Magic skill. When one of the pair dies, the other is restored to full health and gains the Domain Magic skill of its partner

Skill – Domain Magic

“Another ooze?” Calen said, frowning.

“Wait, I know!” Ali exclaimed, “Shamans!” Her Storm Shamans’ lightning skills had worked surprisingly well underwater, and she could split the boss between the land and water.

“That could work,” Calen said. “You just need to decide what to give each of them, considering that the other will inherit the ability once one dies.”

“I was thinking Clone for the Shamans, that would make three of them,” Ali said.

“Well, that sounds devious.”

“Too dangerous?”

“No, it will encourage skillful planning,” Calen said, pursing his lips.

“Ok, I just don’t know what to do for the water part. I like the Brine Ooze…” Calen’s assessment of difficulty was what Ali had needed the most – he was the one who worked with the guild team leaders on strategy and planning, and so he had a far better handle on what they were capable of tackling. On her own, Ali had gotten carried away a few times already and created bosses that might be far too difficult.

“What about that Nova Strike you got from the Piercer Scorpion boss? The Brine Ooze could live in the water and act as ranged area damage from there.”

“That’s a good idea,” Ali said, working through the combinations in her head. “Let me try it.” She pulled out her Grimoire and summoned two monsters.

Ali examined her Goblin’s armor critically, making a few minor adjustments until she was happy with what he was wearing. Then she turned them both into a raid boss.

Ali winced reflexively at the sudden notification of her reservation cost, but then she reminded herself that it was no longer an issue. What should have been a cost of over four hundred mana for this raid boss had been reduced by her newest Mana Efficiency advancement for Domain Mastery by a little more than half. In fact, the reason she had considered making a new boss at all was the huge reduction in reservation cost she had earned across all her defenders.

“Cost?” Calen asked.

“Two hundred and twenty-five,” Ali said. “I could afford to make a few more.”

“Not bad,” he said, eyeing the two monsters. Domain mana surged through them, and suddenly the shaman duplicated himself using the Clone skill. A few seconds later, they duplicated again, making three. The much larger Brine Ooze slithered into the water and vanished from sight.

“So, three lightning bolt shamans, and a bonus surprise,” Calen said, nodding his approval.

“Ali instructed. Immediately, water-affinity mana surged from the lake and a ring of Waterbolts sluiced through the surface of the lake, firing in all directions. Another volley followed, and then another. “

“That’s pretty awesome, Ali,” Calen said. “If they kill the shamans first, then the Ooze gets Clone, right?”

“Yup,” Ali said. “And if they kill the Ooze first, the Shamans get Nova Strike.”

“So, lightning apocalypse,” Calen said.

“Yes, something like that.”

“Wait, didn’t you say the Death Wight also transferred his affinity to the Bone Wight when we killed him?” Calen asked.

“Oh, yes,” Ali said. “Wait, shit, did I make this thing too strong again? What will happen if the ooze gets lightning?”

“Uh, fuck,” Calen groused, but he was grinning at the same time. “We’re going to have to test this…”

It turned out it was not that difficult to test. When she and Calen killed the Ooze, the Shamans gained water affinity and took to the lake in an instant, suddenly able to breathe underwater, swim like fish, and perform minor feats of water manipulation. After Ali forced the boss to respawn, they killed them in the opposite order, turning the lake into a trio of Brine Oozes simultaneously firing ring volleys of Waterbolts and acting like mobile Lightning Nova totems.

“Well, that’s going to be a real challenge,” Calen observed.

“Nice for defending my domain,” Ali said.

“Well, not much is going to get this far,” Calen said. “Not with that Timber Wolf boss guarding the lower entrance.”

“I have an idea for that,” Ali grinned. It was something she had thought of while reviewing her Runic Script, and it was high time she tried it out. Ignoring Calen’s raised eyebrow, she summoned a large golden disk of barrier magic, supported by her domain. Then she spent several minutes inscribing her runic circle into the golden surface, tying it off and attaching it to the domain mana also.

Teleportation Locus – level 42 (Arcane)

A magical locus that serves as an enhanced teleport destination.

Runic Circle

“Teleportation locus,” she said, answering Calen’s increasingly curious stares.

“What are you going…” he asked, but then trailed off as she waved the barrier disk up into the air till it was hovering right over the center of the lake, and then flipped it upside down. “Oh… Ali, that’s evil.”

“I know,” she grinned, “Come on!”

It didn’t take long for her to inscribe several domain-attached Static Teleport runic circles around the cavern entrances near the path down to the ruins through which undead and kobolds still trespassed into her domain.

A few minutes later, a slightly tougher zombie managed to avoid her regular defenses and stumbled across one of her new teleportation rings. There was a brief flash of arcane mana, synchronized with another off over the distant lake. The zombie appeared right below her barrier disk and fell flailing into the water. Distant lightning flickered, followed a few seconds later by the sound of thunder and Ali’s chime sounded.

“Evil,” Calen muttered, but there was a big grin on his face.

----------

/Dubat-litrpg