Worthy Core

DAY 812

Although the dungeon had undeniably won a great victory in the 'Battle of Floor Four', the celebrations the next day are rather muted. In absolute terms the dungeon's defenders had taken rather light casualties considering the scale of the conflict. Expendable dungeon monsters had been there to take some of the heat, and the shortcut portals leading to magical healers provided a level of medical evacuation virtually unheard of for a medieval world. A day after the battle almost every defender who had been wounded had already been healed.

Not everyone lived long enough to be evacuated, though. Of those who had been killed by enemy arrows, magic, or monstrous jaws, six had been soldiers from the Rainlander army. Another ten Rainlander Challengers had fallen as well, including Lady Nalina Evervein, the posthumous hero of the hour. Between her loud speeches and her incredibly dramatic manner of fighting, most of those involved in the battle had seen her singlehandedly battle a wyvern, or the draconic commander she had faced afterwards. Her surviving companions were quick to credit her for their ultimate victory, and many a drink had been toasted in her name that evening.

As for the other side a full squad of Dungeon Legion monsters had been destroyed, forty-two Domain soldiers killed, and forty-three captured. The injured prisoners had been healed, although not all had lived long enough to actually be taken into custody. By most accounts a trade of sixteen combatants for nearly a hundred enemies would be a sizable success - especially when those casualties include the first draconics of the invasion. The dungeon had even acquired another pair of achievements, although ironically one of them was only due to the defenders also being counted as 'intruders' by the dungeon system.

The problem however was that aside from losing the commander of the battle - and one of the few Supremes defending the place - there had only been a bit over a hundred mortals defending the dungeon to begin with. Furthermore, everyone had spent the last three weeks crammed in together with only an inn, a lounge, a chapel, a few sparring rooms, and a number of somewhat-private bedrooms to spread themselves out in. To say that everyone had become rather familiar with each other by this point would be an understatement, without even getting into the number of mortals busy getting intimately familiar with each other. Which is to say, every single person in the dungeon had lost friends in the battle. Party members, lovers, even family members in a few cases. One gnoll had lost his wife defending the walls, and the man had been utterly inconsolable when he heard the news.

The fact that Domain soldiers still lurk within the dungeon, occupying three floors, doesn't help to settle anyone's nerves.

Unfortunately, Xenia has a few other concerns on her mind at the moment distracting her from the issue of keeping up mortal morale. Most urgently the dungeon master finds herself suffering from success, and the burden of caring for another forty-three prisoners. They'd already been keeping a few in a hidden prison on Floor Eight - the kidnapping victims of the ambush some time earlier - and Lyota has her own private cell. There's simply nowhere on the existing floors to put another forty people, though. Floor Five might have the space, but its status as a 'safe floor' means that putting a potential source of conflict there is exceedingly risky. Should one person get hurt attempting to escape, a huge portion of their extra living space will collapse in response - or at least become a massive drain on Xenia's mana reserves. So, Xenia put her new 'guests' on the only floor that currently has the room to spare - the new Floor Eleven.

"I'll admit, when I was thinking up potential designs for this floor, I wasn't expecting to end up going with a prison."

Sincere eyes the mortals below from the 'observation deck' built into the prison's ceiling. "If I recall, weren't there some fire and magma-related unlocks when we got this floor? That would certainly be rather effective. Placing rivers of lava around stone islands from which unequipped soldiers are unlikely to escape. Save for the flying demons, I suppose, but we could keep specialized cells for those."

Xenia shakes her head. "You're already forgetting your old mortal limits, Sin-man. You put a bunch of people next to that much heat and you're begging for heat-stroke and dehydration. It would be cost effective when it comes to guards though, I'll give it that."

"True, true." Sincere gestures at the floor below, and the shifting forms scurrying across it. "...Spiders, though? True, our arachnids are quite high tier. But these aren't sapient monsters, how do you plan to employ them as guards?"

The reincarnator taps her forehead with a grin. "It's about efficiency, Sin-man, like I said. Sapient-tier monsters are expensive, and take up a lot of the floor capacity. Probably enough to guard some prisoners...but this floor is also way too fuckin' close to the Core Chamber for comfort. I want some ready for a battle too, just in case. But with spiders, here's the trick." Her grin turns wide and toothy. "Most of them are crap. Completely mundane spiders! A kiddo could step on em!"

The demon furrows his brow. "So...the guards are a bluff?"

"Mostly a bluff. Mundane F-tier spiders cost me damn near nuthin'. That leaves me with plenty of capacity left over to swap in every, say, one in ten with one that's super fuckin' poisonous. Venomous. Whatever. And dungeon spiders are just smart enough to follow an order like 'only bite intruders who step into the hallway'. Oh, and the webs are basically free too, included with the cost of the monsters I guess."

Sincere peers again at the floor below, although it's rather dark even for him. "And I imagine the mundane and the lethal spiders are identical, then?"

"Damn near! Slight difference in the spots - but you'd have a hard time telling with the lights kept this dim."

The Core Guardian nods. "I see. So spiders hiding in all of the nooks and crannies, convincing the guests not to break out of their cells. And then the mortal and sapient guards are...?"

Xenia gestures towards one side of the dome-shaped floor - about half the radius of Floor Four, but much shallower, given the more crowded state of the old tunnels this deep within the mountain. "I did put a few mortals on guard duty, but only ones we trust like the Miserables and Dungeon Fuckers, and even then they're only guarding the entrance side of the dungeon. Feels itchy if I have mortals standing right outside the Core Chamber, y'know? That side has some Arachnos Champions, and I'll post a few up here to keep watch on everything. There'll be webbing from the ceiling to the cells down below, so they can get down pretty quickly if anything goes wrong."

"And if they do I'll be ready nearby, I suppose. Not to mention Bill...although I notice we haven't seen him recently. Are you worried about tipping our hands concerning our divine guardian?"

The dungeon master frowns at the reminder. "Apparently giving a dead guy a body - even one limited to the dungeon system here - is more difficult than respawning a dead monster. If he gets killed in battle it could be a couple of days before he can come back, and even then it might be with injuries. Had a chat with Kahlia about it the last time I popped over, apparently damage he takes is directly reflected on his soul, or some shit. Not too bad if it's some light injuries, but rough if he loses a head or something. Given that he's not tied to a floor like most of you guys, I'd rather keep him as an ace up my sleeve. Especially if they manage to get into Floor Five. God, that would suck."

Sincere winces at the thought of soldiers rampaging through the inn. "Indeed. So, given that our prisoners do indeed seem to be safely tucked away, do you think we have any particular use for them? Intelligence, perhaps? Or...perhaps it's time to consider Lyota's pledge of loyalty?"

"I'm still not - ughn!" Xenia wavers for a moment, one hand on her stomach, and Sincere quickly moves forward to help steady her.

"Easy there! Your offspring, I imagine?" The man curiously eyes her trim midriff. "It feels strange to be unable to judge their, ah, physical progress."

The expectant mother gives him an uneasy grin. "Ha, you're telling me! I can still forget they're in there, sometimes, if I'm not thinking about it. And if they ain't kickin' the shit out of me, of course. I think I might be...halfway there, though? Not bad for three weeks with twins, I suppose. Maybe I woulda gotten pregnant more often back in the day if it was this quick. ...Probably not, though."

"I suppose there are more long-term concerns. But speaking of - Lyota? I have to admit, I'm quite envious of the woman. There had been a small part of me hoping that I might find my own ENLIGHTENMENT when I studied the remains of the Great Dungeon below us, although that was unlikely. More so, knowing now that the Great Dungeon survived and took most of their secrets with them when they left. Still, part of me wants to meet with her myself, and see what it's like for her."

"Ugh, hoped you'd forget about that question." Xenia sighs. "I'm...gonna talk with her. Soon. I mean, we could use her help and it ain't like I don't believe her. I just...redemption?" She shakes her head. "After all these years, is it really that easy? You asked me most days, I woulda told you it wasn't even possible at all."

"Well, as a man rivaling you for longevity, I certainly don't agree with that." Sincere gives his boss his most charming grin. "Especially given what I saw in my youth, and with most of my early acquaintances being other former demon slaves. I believe I've mentioned that as summoned demons go, my fate was rather...comfortable compared to most. I did research into magic and weaponry, but I wasn't forced to fight. I wasn't forced to kill. Or to do the...other things many other summoned slaves were forced to do. You know, many forms of demon went virtually extinct on this realm after the Age of Warlocks came to an end?"

Xenia raises an eyebrow. "Oh? They were hunted down, or something?"

"In some cases, and certainly many were killed like that, yes. But the breeds I'm referring to - they starved to death. Or died in the attempt to feed themselves."

Xenia's expression grows more concerned. "Eh? I know you demons 'eat' funny, but how did they starve?"

"By no longer having access to their particular diets, in a world without constant warfare and death." Sincere takes a deep breath before reciting a list. "Behemoths, who feed on calamitous destruction - the ruining of cities, the slaughter of armies, the massacre of civilians. No place for them in a more peaceful world. Fiends, who thrive on emotional pain and torment. Succubi and incubi can feed on physical pain, but that can be given consensually. Fiends were...the worst sort of torturers. Their hungers could not be sated with anything remotely consensual. Very few yet remain. Even gremlins, who merely feed on chaos and surprise are nearly extinct these days. Living off of harmless pranks is a meager diet."

"That's...wow." Xenia sucks in a breath. "I didn't really think about the whole variety out there - makes vampires feeding off blood look lighthearted in comparison. Must have been some serious assholes, huh?"

"Well, most, yes. But that's the thing." Sincere looks off into the distance, living in a memory. "There were good fiends. Noble behemoths. Caring gremlins. Left to their own devices, perhaps they would have tortured the malicious, or destroyed the tyrannical. Perhaps difficult to justify, still. But they would have sought out ways to live with their existences. But they were all of them shackled slaves, and so they turned their hungers on the targets their masters chose."

"Fuck. So...you're saying anyone's got a decent chance at being an alright person, deep down? Even if they do bad shit?"

"Well, that, and..." Sincere prods Xenia in the shoulder, hard enough to put her avatar off-balance. "And that any one of them would have, ironically, killed to have had a shot of redeeming their sins in a manner approved and sealed by a god. I understand there's as many philosophies under the sky as there are people, and the meaning of 'redemption' is not something that's shared by very many of them. But you have found one meaning, and it is by no means false. So...perhaps just this once, don't 'look the gift horse in the mouth', as I believe you've said?"

The man's tone makes Xenia chuckle. "I suppose I can't argue with that logic, smarty-pants. Alright, yeah, I'll talk to her! But there is one other thing on the to-do list, and I ain't just procrastinating."

"Only one?"

"Well, one big one." Xenia's smiles evaporates with a sigh. "We still got a guardian candidate to figure out what to do with..."