The Crafter's Dilemma: A Dungeon Core Novel (Dungeon Crafting Book 3) by Jonathan Brooks (english readers txt) 📗

non-existent, so hopefully there wouldn’t be any major surprises.  On the other, it could finish upgrading at any time; with the Temporary Enhancements as well as its already fairly large AOI, it was possible that it could reach some other settlements.  Maybe not the Elves quite yet, but the chance that it could potentially reach the Orc village was worrying.  She was hoping to destroy the Core before it could get the chance to upgrade, but now it appeared as though she had waited too long.  With who knew how many Undead were in the “dead zone” she couldn’t reach, the potential for disaster was right on the forefront of her mind.

* We might need to move a little faster than I had planned; I’m halfway convinced that the Core is already undergoing its expansion process and it’d be better if it was stopped before that’s completed. *

Although she was confident they would eventually destroy the Core, she couldn’t quite tell how long the dungeon was from looking at it underground from her Area of Influence.  All that she could tell was that it was at least twice the size of what the Reptile-based dungeon had been, but even that could be deceiving as it seemed to branch off into different directions multiple times.  If the Core had enough time to send its Undead aboveground to the Orcs and destroy them all there, the influx of Mana would allow it to create more hordes of Undead…or potentially something more powerful that she had yet to see.

Fortunately, everyone seemed to understand the danger that would arise if that were to come about and pushed for speed.  Therefore, sending caution to the wind, she ordered everyone to slowly start filing inside, while the Shears and Forces already inside were approaching the next room.  The second room contained skeletons – a lot of them.  Sandra counted 60 of them inside the 50-foot by 50-foot room with a relatively low 7-foot-tall ceiling; the tight quarters meant that a few of her Shears were snatched out of the air as they flew by, though her Forces were unharmed even as they were kicked around like children’s play balls.  Again, as per their orders, her constructs flew and rolled around until they found a trap – which just so happened to be a small trigger in the precise middle of the room.

The room went from dimly lit to complete darkness; it was somehow so dark that even her constructs had trouble “seeing” despite their lack of physical eyes.  Their sense of things around them dropped to only about a foot, which caused many of them to crash into the skeletons or the walls, doing some damage to the Undead but doing even more to themselves.  It took all of 5 minutes for her constructs to be destroyed, though they took a few of the enemy with them in the process.

Sandra immediately sent in her Apes that had been sent to destroy the zombies in the previous room, and she finally saw the delay in their responses as it took almost 5 seconds for them to respond.  Thinking back to the Reptile dungeon, she was convinced that it actually took longer now than it did back then.  It must be because of its higher Core Size or something along those lines; that also means that any future dungeons that I may need to destroy that are even more powerful could be a major pain.

Her Apes crashed into the room and started swinging their warhammers around, smashing through the skeletons there in the same complete darkness that was still activated.  The Undead didn’t stand a chance and most of them were quickly destroyed; then, because her constructs couldn’t “see” that well, some accidents started happening where they inadvertently started to hit each other with the powerful weapons.  One of her Apes was hit so hard with an impact by a Titanium warhammer and a Fireburst enchantment that its Steel chest caved in and the glowing “power source” inside of it was extinguished.  A few others were damaged as well – with one now even missing a leg – before they finally stopped fighting at her delayed command.

She brought in the 6 Celestial Authorities next to help mop up the remaining skeletons, who were ineffectually beating on her Apes that were frozen in place by Sandra, which she belatedly realized she should’ve done in the first place.  She was so used to her Apes being such powerhouses of destruction that she didn’t even think about it, and that was something that was going to have to stop if she hoped to succeed; unthinking actions like that could result in the deaths of more than her constructs and Dungeon Monsters if she wasn’t careful.

Her Angel-type Monsters walked into the room and the darkness was pushed back – but not completely banished.  Her Authorities dimmed a little themselves, but it wasn’t progressing more than a slight amount; they immediately ran forward and mopped up the rest of the skeletons, making the room “safe” once again.  Sandra wasn’t sure how long the trap would last, however, because from her experience something like what was being done to make the room darker didn’t expend as much Mana as the shadowy tendrils from the previous room.

Therefore, she had her Angels park themselves around the room, which helped to brighten up the place just enough to see everything without tripping over the Monster Seeds that were still on the floor.

I guess that proves it; the Core definitely had the opportunity to absorb all of these – because Felbar was in the previous room.  It has to be upgrading right now.

Sandra brought in another group of sacrificial scouts from outside, determined to keep going quickly but still trying to be as safe as possible.  Meanwhile, the last of her Dungeon Monsters were coming in behind the Dwarves and Echo astride her Pegasus – though she