The Crafter's Dungeon: A Dungeon Core Novel (Dungeon Crafting Book 1) by Jonathan Brooks (best books to read for students TXT) 📗

not having any “special attacks”.  As the four remaining, partially damaged constructs entered the large birthing chamber, a dozen Territory Ants seemed to spawn out of nowhere and attack her Centipedes.  They were three times the size of a normal Ant, which meant they would have difficulty moving down the lower tunnels, but they appeared to be there only for the purpose of defending the Queen.

Their larger heads and bodies made it difficult for her constructs to effectively attack them, while the Ants’ bigger and sharper mandibles sliced massive furrows into the sides of her Centipedes.  Two of her constructs went down quickly within the first minute, but not without inflicting their own casualties; half of the dozen that had attacked were crippled when the Centipedes switched from trying to attack the bodies of the Ants to their legs – which were much easier to reach and amputate.

The two remaining constructs used the same tactic and their superior agility (and dozens of legs) to maneuver away from the deadly sharp mandibles to cripple the last few guard Ants.  Unfortunately, in the process, one of Sandra’s Centipedes got hacked apart when one of them was set upon from three sides, leaving only a single segment left over when all was said and done.  The remaining, mostly whole construct was able to take advantage of the Ants’ attention on its unfortunate brethren and managed to snap through dozens of Ant legs, removing their threat once and for all.

The fight also allowed more generic Territory Ants to birth in time to attack in a large wave, which swamped the biggest threat to their existence: the 21-segment Centipede still standing.  Sandra instructed her other construct that only had one segment to retreat for a moment and start making its way to the Queen.  From her constant surveillance of it over the last day, she had seen that the massive insect didn’t seem to have any real offensive or defensive weapons; although it was at least ten times the size of the Ants it birthed, it didn’t have any mandibles and its body was so big that it couldn’t move quicker than it needed to in order to lay eggs around the room.

Therefore, as Sandra’s larger Centipede was being slowly whittled down by the spawning Ants, her single-segment construct quickly rushed the Queen.  Two Ants tried to intercept it from the cluster surrounding her other force in the room, but her monster was surprisingly fast now that it didn’t have to transport twenty-four other segments.

It reached the Queen at least two Ant-lengths ahead of them and immediately attacked the head of the oblivious matriarch, clamping down and slicing through its right eye and upper antennae.  The massive Ant reacted by rearing up in pain and eliciting a horrendous shriek out of its huge mouth that Sandra wasn’t even aware the insects could make; her segment was fortunately able to hang on as it had clamped down with its pincers and was lifted into the air.

Seeing an opportunity, Sandra had her construct release its hold on the side of the large Ant’s head, while she watched the Queen’s scream of pain immediately call over the remaining Ants that were finishing off her other Centipede.  They rushed to her aid, but they were too late: her single-segment construct fell off towards the mouth of the humongous insect and easily slipped inside.

Less than a minute later – and after more screams and massive internal damage – the Territory Ant Queen fell to the ground with a loud *thump*, squishing a couple of smaller Ants that were swarming around trying to find some way to help.  Everything in the central birthing chamber was silent for a few moments, before her remaining segment started to cut through the side of the now-dead Queen’s head with disgusting squishing noises.

The Ants quickly attacked and destroyed Sandra’s remaining construct, before turning to leave.  She wasn’t sure if they were planning to mindlessly attack her dungeon like they had been doing, but she wasn’t taking any chances.  Three more Centipedes that she was able to produce before the attack in the Queen’s chamber finally arrived and were quickly able to wipe out the remaining Ants in less than a minute.

There were still dozens of eggs around the room, however, but Sandra was hesitant to destroy them before they hatched.  For some reason, even though her constructs had killed thousands of the Ants before that – as well as disemboweling their Queen – the thought of killing them in egg form was abhorrent to her.  Still, she didn’t want to leave anything behind that might be able to attack her unexpectedly again. As a compromise, she chose to wait until they hatched and attacked her Centipedes before she would decide what to do about them.

But they never hatched.  Sandra waited for over five minutes for anything to happen, but their previous accelerated spawning seemed to have come to a halt.

What’s going on?  Why aren’t the eggs hatching?

Sandra actually forgot the Fairy was there for a moment because all of her focus had been elsewhere.  “Now that the Queen is no more, they won’t react the same way.  Most likely they will stay inert until either another Queen arrives, or another colony moves in.”

When she looked at them closer, Sandra could see that Winxa was right.  They didn’t seem to be growing or moving at all, and none of them appeared to be as “active” as they were before – if that was the right word.  In fact, they almost felt similar to the corpses of the thousands of Ants that were killed and absorbed; going even further, they almost felt like…

New Monster Seed Origination Material found!

Territory Ant Egg

While the Territory Ant Egg cannot be directly used as a Monster Seed, it can be combined with specific other materials to create a whole new Monster Seed.

What!?  She had