The Crafter's Defense: A Dungeon Core Novel (Dungeon Crafting Book 2) by Jonathan Brooks (top 10 novels txt) 📗

The most-recent rooms that she had filled with deadly traps and constructs she left largely alone, though she did steal away some of the Mechanical Wolves and Jaguars from her latest creation – because they were quick enough to get through her dungeon to join those already leaving.  Those Wolves and Jaguars already aboveground joined them as well, and she chuckled a little bit when one of her cat constructs startled Echo, who had been watching her entrance since the morning after the meeting in the village Sandra had witnessed.

She had been tempted to make some sort of contact with the Elven woman over the last few days but held off because she didn’t want to seem threatening to her.  Looking at it from the woman’s perspective was easy enough – because she had been Human once; being approached by a dungeon’s monster – even if it seemed non-threatening – couldn’t help but put her on guard.  Given enough time when Sandra didn’t show any sort of dangerous tendencies, she thought she might give it a shot and hope for the best; with the departure of what probably seemed like a giant army towards the Gnome lands, however, she worried that she might have just set her cause back without hope of recovery.

I’ll just have to show her that I’m there to help, not harm.  Maybe this is just what I need to prove to the Elves that I’m not a threat; in fact, when they see how much I’m helping, it might convince them to work with me instead of against me.

The other Shears that she had sent towards the Dwarven and Orc villages had seen no danger towards either of them, fortunately, so Sandra was able to concentrate on helping the Gnomes.  She kept one of her floating constructs in both places – as well as the Elven village – just in case that should change, but she also hoped that if an attack hadn’t happened yet, then they were likely going to be okay for the moment.  Of course, if Sandra were to increase her Core Size again, that could change at any time; since it was unknown what the other Core’s sizes were, she could inadvertently surpass them and end up opening up her Area of Influence for them to plunder at their whim.

So, knowing that her dungeon was still defended with at least some of her Dungeon Monsters – not to mention the ultra-deadly traps she had placed – Sandra sped along with them towards the battle raging at the Gnome village. When she concentrated on looking out through her nearby Shears’ vision, she found that things weren’t going well for those trapped within the village.  Already, two of the crossbow emplacements had been overrun, the Gnomes operating them going down fighting; they were all equipped with long Steel knives that were almost like short swords in their hands, which they used to the best of their abilities – which didn’t seem to be much.  One of the smaller lizards with frightening-looking teeth and sharp claws ended up getting skewered by a Gnome defender, but the others of the reptile army swarmed over the others without much difficulty.

The Mana from their deaths started to fill her up, so Sandra immediately started to make replacements for all of those she sent to the southeast; she was hoping they would all come back, but if for some reason they were destroyed she would at least have some backup in her dungeon.  She was saddened at the wholesale slaughter of the Gnomes, who were doing their best to stave off the rest of the reptiles from climbing onto the roofs of their homes; fortunately, even those Dungeon Monsters that had gotten inside couldn’t get to them very easily.  The rope ladders that had allowed the Gnomes to get on top in the first place were pulled up, giving them little to no access from below.

The front ranks of her land-bound army were approximately five minutes away, but her airborne constructs arrived much faster.  Her group of 100 Small Animated Shears, for instance, had passed the others and were rapidly approaching the battle; the Singing Blademasters were going to arrive before the others as well, but were still about two minutes behind her Shears – they couldn’t move quite as fast.

Before they could arrive, however, something at the edge of the nearby forest caught her attention.  A large shape lumbered out from the trees, much larger than anything she had seen so far from the reptile swarm of Dungeon Monsters; sending her pair of Shears that was observing the battle closer to it, she looked on in awe as what appeared to be a giant construct cut down the crocodiles and lizards running past it towards the town.  It was a good thing that her own constructs already had their orders, because Sandra froze in confusion and shock.

Urging her Shears closer, she began to make out exactly what she was looking at.  Standing a dozen feet tall, the construct was created from a combination of wood and metal and looked like a wide, round-chested, headless person with stout arms and legs.  Noticeable enchantment runes were written over almost every part of the construct, which were unfamiliar to Sandra – but it was obvious that they were what allowed the deadly mobile machine to move.

One arm ended with a large spiked warhammer, while the other was equipped with a permanent double-bladed war axe; both of which were used liberally on the surrounding reptiles as it slowly walked towards the village.  The sight of the construct seemed to lift the morale of the besieged Gnomes, as their rate of fire and aim seemed to increase when they saw it coming to the rescue.  It was lifted even further when a second