A Dungeon’s Survival

Connie

Boom!

Ha ha, I chuckled.

I'd finally found a use for the instability of fused mana crystals. By combining two different elements with as little division between them as feasible, it was possible to get them into a state that could be detonated by only applying a bit of physical force. Unfortunately, it still required more than I could figure out how to apply through something like pressure plates for the time being, but so long as I could convince my invaders to attack them themselves, they made for excellent explosives.

“Ugh,” the Hero groaned as he tried to wave away a cloud of debris that the last blast had stirred up.

It wasn't as though the crystals were unavoidable or even particularly dangerous to the pair of invaders, but with as much Floral Accelerant as I'd had spread throughout the staircase to my second floor, just trying to go down it alone was time consuming. It had even gotten to the point where I'd begun running into problems with all the plant life getting in the way of my mana flow. If there was much more, I would've been at risk of having some of my first rooms disconnected from the rest of my Dungeon. The fact that I'd embedded unstable mana crystals into all of that foliage just made it all that much harder to get through.

It didn't matter that Fable was trying to point out where she sensed them to the Hero. The time he spent trying not to hit the crystals as he slashed a path through for them only slowed them down further, not that they had a better option available to them. Sure, they could've just blitzed through or even climbed over, past, and around all of the plants, but in the end, everything would've been a time sink. That was the beauty of it, and that was also why I felt comfortable taking a minute to review the slew of System notifications I'd received as they attempted to make their way down the path.

[Vie and Pee (Level 18) have killed a Human Ice Mage (Level 31)! 345,600 experience gained.]

I once again felt a surge of joy reading that message. I hadn't been sure they'd be able to do it. Their role in all of this was more so just to distract the other delvers than anything. The fact that they'd managed to take one down already was far more than I could've hoped for, but that wasn't all. There were still plenty more notifications to get through.

Vie and Pee (Level 18) have gained 287,499 experience!]

Vie and Pee (Level 18) have gained 6 levels!]

[An advancement bonus is available for Vie and Pee (Level 20)!]

Vie and Pee (Level 24) have reached their level cap and are unable to gain any more experience for the time being! 501 experience has been added to your Shadow Viper experience pool.]

[Achievement gained: Peerless Assassination!]

[Achievement gained: Level Restricted!]

[Achievement gained: Outpaced Growth!]

There was a lot there to process, but most importantly was the exorbitant amount of experience. Not only had Vie and Pee managed to reach their current level cap, but with how much experience I'd already had, I couldn't help but to suspect this sudden influx might've even been enough to get me two levels. Before I could confirm that suspicion, however, there was something more urgent I needed to take care of now that I had the chance. Vie and Pee had reached level twenty-four. That meant they had new stat points that needed allocating.

Hastily, after a single, hesitantly spared glance to make sure the two invaders' progress was slow enough that I could afford to, I split my focus and brought one of my perspectives to where precious defenders fought for our continued survival in my first room. There, they were locked in fierce combat with the giant who, frankly, looked more like a walking corpse than a man. From the blood, ash, and even patches of frost that covered him to the mangled scraps of metal clinging to his body that made it seem like clothing was more of a suggestion to him than anything else, I struggled to comprehend how he was still standing, let alone fighting. He lacked even a weapon, and I couldn't begin to guess what must've taken place to bring him to such a state. Whatever it was, however, I knew it had to have been impressive.

I took all of that in as I watched and waited for a lull in their fight as not to distract Vie and Pee. The moment one arose, though, I capitalized on it.

Stats, I projected my thoughts to the pair, what do you guys need?

Vie's response was immediate, as if she'd been awaiting the question, “A quarter to AGI and a quarter to STR.”

Pee's answer came a moment later, “Half to SOUL please!”

“MIND for my bonus stats.” Vie finished.

Got it.

I willed for it to be so and put the last uneven point in their STR. After that, I wished them luck and retreated my split focus back to the other set of intruders. As I did so, I thought I could make out the gruff words, “Now, that's more like it!” but that wouldn't have made any sense, so I chalked it up to my imagination and moved on.

From there, I directed the bulk of my attention to the achievements I'd gotten. I didn't care enough to read through them thoroughly, but still, I knew there could be something important there, so I quickly skimmed through them.

[Achievement: Peerless Assassination

Description: One of your monsters has killed an individual with a higher rarity than themselves in a single attack.

Reward: The experience awarded for the kill has been doubled and the quality of the monster's evolution choices will be improved!]

[Achievement: Level Restricted

Description: One of your monsters has gained the necessary experience to reach the next tier but is unable to until you do first.

Reward: The monster has gained +1 to every stat!]

[Achievement: Outpaced Growth

Description: One of your monsters has gained the necessary experience to reach the next tier through only earned experience but is unable to until you do first.

Reward: You have gained experience equal to the monster's total experience. You have gained 587,998 experience!]

I froze upon reading that last one. The reward was amazing. With that much experience, I could almost certainly get something useful before the final confrontation. With that in mind, I closed out of the alerts and practically scrambled for a different System menu.

[Experience to next level: 1,053,887 / 225,000

Level up?

Yes / No]

Holy.

After only a brief glance at the excessively large number, I mentally screamed my answer, Yes!

[Please select a perk.]

Uh, I froze a moment later.

It'd been a while since I'd last made the mistake of not setting my focus before leveling up, but to be fair, it had also been a while since I'd last leveled up in general, and so far, my solution of setting it to whatever I needed well in advance had been holding up. As it stood now, however, I'd still had it set to Monster Variety since I'd been in need of a new plant monster, something my Mandrakes arguably alleviated the need for. That meant the choice for my first level up reward were unlikely to be immediately helpful. I kicked myself for that. Then, I hastily brought up my options anyway.

[Crystal Muncher

Level: 1

Cost: 80 DP

Health: 80 (110)

Stamina: 80 (110)

Mana: 160 (220)

Stats: FORT 16 (22), VIT 8 (16), STR 16 (23), END 16 (22), SOUL 16 (22), MIND 4 (10), WILL 16 (23), COM 16 (22), DEX 4 (10), AGI 4 (10)

Skills: None

Abilities: Mana Sense, Elemental Shift, Mana Roar

Description: A large crystalline beast that stalks the Great Caverns. It feasts on mana crystals, incorporating them into its body and using them to augment its magic. Despite being blind, these solitary monsters are extremely territorial, using their Mana Sense to attack anything that moves.

Upgrades: Professional Amateur (+1 to every stat), A Walk in the Park (+5% to DEX and WILL), Too Close for Comfort (+1 to every stat), Deathtrap (+1% to every stat), Forceful Eviction (+1 to STR), Toxic (+1 to VIT), Kill Zone (+1 to every stat), Mass Grave (+1 to every stat), Raid (+1 to every stat), Great Raid (+1 to every stat), Generalist (+1% to every stat), Grand Raid (+1% to every stat)]

I initially planned to skim past anything that wasn't a plant, reptile, or otherwise versatile enough to warrant the selection, but the stats of the beast alone were enough to make me do a double take. Realizing it had abilities in common with both my Crystal Puffers and Prism, I couldn't help bringing up its last one out of curiosity. As it turned out, Mana Roar was similar to Mana Puff but only used twenty percent of the creature's available mana. It was good, certainly, but it seemed to have too much in common with my Plated Gators for me to seriously consider it, that along with its outrageous cost. With that being the case, I regrettably moved on.

[Monster Upgrade: Mana Pecking

Description: The beaks of all bird monsters become twice as resistant to magic.

Effect: Every species of bird monster gains the ability Magic-Resistant Beak.]

That is horrible, I stated plainly.

An ability that only affected bird monsters was bad enough, but one that only affected their beaks? I couldn't even see a use case for it outside of airdropping dangerous potions onto invaders, and even then, I couldn't imagine it working perfectly. I could immediately see why I'd been offered the perk, but that didn't make me any happier about to see such a useless option.

Rejected! I declared immediately before checking my last option.

[Item: Empty Book]

I didn't even finish reading the specific details of that one. I just chose Crystal Munchers before switching my focus to Monster Upgrades and pulling for the level up menu once again.

[Experience to next level: 828,887 / 256,000

Level up?

Yes / No]

[Please select a perk.]

[Monster Upgrade: Empowered Mushroom Husks

Description: Trentis and their evolutions gain greatly empowered stats at the cost of becoming mindless beings, incapable of thought or independent action.

Effect: Trentis and their evolutions gain the ability Hollow Power.]

Vetoed.

It was an ability that would be perfect for creating puppets for Archie, but he himself was a Trenti, and that was the last ability I would allow any of my friends to have.

Next.

[Environment: Great Caverns Deep Passage

Description: You can incorporate aspects of a passage from the depths of the Great Caverns into your Dungeon.

Effect: Allows you to summon and modify different uncommon types of stone, uncommon mana crystals, and some types of subterranean vegetation.]

Wait, isn't that …

It was nearly identical to the Great Caverns Passage environment I already had, the one that gave me access to mana crystals. Immediately, I found myself wanting it, but unwilling to pass up on something better out of carelessness alone, I at least decided to read over my last option. As soon as I read its name, though, I selected Great Caverns Deep Passage.

I barely used the traps I already had. I didn't care how useful a Potion Dispenser could be. It would contribute nothing we couldn't already manually replicate, so with my decision made, I moved on to my last level up.

[Experience to next level: 572,887 / 289,000

Level up?

Yes / No]

[Please select a perk.]

[Monster Upgrade: Crystalline Symbiosis

Description: Crystal Puffers and their evolutions become better at filtering and adjusting to different mana types, enabling them to more easily root in other crystal-based lifeforms.

Effect: Crystal Puffers and their evolutions gain the ability Symbiotic Rooting.]

That seemed oddly specific, though useful. Immediately, the new monster I'd just unlocked, Crystal Munchers, came to mind alongside the heavily modified Bloodthorn Vines I already been using Crystal Puffers in conjunction with. With something like Crystalline Symbiosis on top of whatever new mana crystal types I'd just unlocked, I imagined it'd be possible to create something truly formidable. The only downsides were how limited the crystal-based lifeforms condition sounded and the fact I hadn't even decided whether or not I'd be using the new Crystal Munchers to begin with.

Still, it was an enticing offer. If nothing else stood out to me, I would probably end up taking it. With how limited my time was and with how fast the invaders were approaching the boss room, however, I didn't have long all that to deliberate the pros and cons of the upgrade, so instead, I moved on to the next option.

[Monster Upgrade: Undead Theater

Description: Stein (Level 1) gains the capability to mimic abilities at a fraction of their original power.

Effect: Stein (Level 1) gains the ability Imperfect Imitation.]

Sparing only a glance at ever-advancing hero and mage, I brought up the specific details of the offered ability.

[Ability: Imperfect Imitation

Description: You can reproduce imperfect imitations of abilities you witness being used.

Effect: When you witness an ability being used, you can copy it until you yourself have used it. You are unable to copy passive abilities. Your copied versions of abilities are only 50% as potent as, last 50% as long as, and are 200% as expensive as the original versions. You cannot copy a new ability until 200% of the cooldown of your last copied ability has expired. For every 50 points you have in (MIND), your copied abilities get a little closer to their original counterparts, receiving +1% additional potency, +1% longer duration, becoming 2% cheaper, and having their cooldowns reduced by 2%. For every 50 points you have in (WILL), you can have an additional ability copied at a time.]

It was perfect. Well, technically, it was imperfect by design, but for the one in charge of my Dungeon's training and skill development, I couldn't imagine a better ability, save for maybe a working long-term memory. Still, this was a close second, and for that reason, I nearly picked it on the spot. With that being said, however, Crystalline Symbiosis did still warrant consideration, and there was an entire other option I'd yet to review, so reluctantly, I brought up my last choice.

[Aspect Upgrade: Potent Flame Gel Excretion

Description: Flame Gel Excretion becomes more potent.

Effect: Flame Gel Excretion receives the following change: The potency of its effects is dependent on your (SOUL). → The potency of its effects is dependent on your (SOUL) and (COM).]

Unfortunately, it, too, was good. It seemed the System had saved the majority of solid picks for my third level up, which made the selection all the harder. Hastened by the duo who was just beginning to chop their way into the room I normally kept my boss Bloodthorn Vines in, though, I was forced to quickly make a decision.

Well, at least that bought me a handful of minutes, I thought to myself as I chose my preferred upgrade, but now, I guess it's time for the main event. Ugh, I really hope Noctis hurries up.

Our last stand was about to begin, but first, a glance at my status screen told me I had two hundred forty new points of DP and mana to play with. If we were going to hold our own against a Hero and this mage of all people, I wasn't about to allow a single point of that to go to waste, and as it stood, I just so happened to have three monsters that could use some quick upgrades.

Loot, I called out as I brought up Monster Customization, prepare our last resort and be ready to use it at a moment's notice. We'll handle the rest.