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

Sandra was just glad that Violet hadn’t been present, otherwise she would’ve likely been seriously hurt or even killed; death was something that she couldn’t heal the Gnome – or anyone – from yet, and she doubted she ever could.  That was the realm of the Creator, and she had unknowingly dealt enough with the entity in the past that she didn’t want to jeopardize her existence by trying to reverse full-on death.

She was also glad that she had taken at least a minor precaution and placed her other Unstable Shapeshifter – the original one – at the opposite end of the room.  It had been damaged quite a bit in the explosion but fortunately hadn’t died; a Repair Drone from the next room was able to patch it up before it succumbed to its injuries.  While its death would’ve resulted in the loss of Mana Sandra had invested in it (which wasn’t that big of a deal in the long run), the reality of the situation was that the original Shapeshifter was the only one that had access to the forms of the Elite Elves.

Upon creating another Unstable Shapeshifter – after the invasion by the Elites and after the long process of placing defending Constructs through her dungeon again – she found that a brand-new Shapeshifter didn’t have the ability to shift into anything.  Sandra supposed it made sense, because only the original one had actually gained samples from the living beings in her dungeon; the new one was like a blank slate, without those samples being transferred to it.  Though I wonder if it could procreate and produce offspring with the same samples already inside of it…

The thought of Dungeon Monster reproduction was immediately shut down by Winxa, however.  “Dungeon Monsters cannot procreate because they are formed exclusively by Mana; that Mana will not reproduce itself, as it is a finite resource inside of each Monster.  I doubt even you would be able to work around that simple fact, even given your…unique status…as a Dungeon Core with access to all of the elements.”

Sandra couldn’t help but be a little glad about that, because the entire reproductive process between amorphous multicolored blobs was not something that she wanted to see.  Granted, she could probably force them to change into different shapes that were likely more…suited…for the purpose, but even that thought felt wrong somehow.

Transferring those samples by having the new one touch the original Shapeshifter worked, however.  Some instinct told Sandra that the transfer would only work with the one that had acquired the sample in the first place; she would have to test that later when she had a third available and try to copy those from subsequent Shifters.  She wasn’t exactly sure what difference it made, but again, she had a feeling that “original” samples were the key to how the Unstable Shapeshifters functioned.

All of which made protecting the one that had acquired the samples from the Elite Elves a priority.  While she was hoping to acquire more samples in the future, she was limited on what she had to work with at the moment; if those disappeared completely, then having access to all of the different elements in the future was jeopardized.

* And that brings us to the reason we’re here now.  Echo, Felbar – head over to that stone box in the corner and pick out whatever…calls to you the most. *

Sandra had told Violet not to go into too much detail about the new Energy Orbs that they had created to gradually restore elemental energy; the young Gnome had agreed, as she said it was better that they experienced it themselves.  Felbar shared Spirit with Violet, however, and he was instantly drawn to the Spirit Energy Orb around her neck as soon as he woke up; it was only through Sandra’s intervention that he agreed to ignore it until later.  Echo, of course, didn’t have any clue what they were, so she was going into it blind to what was to come.

The two Sandra named walked over to the stone box, evidently confused; when they got nearer to it, though, they both gasped at nearly the same time.  The box was filled with dozens of Energy Orbs of various types, though only the Spirit, Fire, Holy, and Air ones called out to the Gnome and the Elf.  Without hesitation, they reached down and pulled out their corresponding elements, holding one of each in either hand.

“What—?  Is this—?” they both asked, unable to form a complete sentence as they stared in wonder at what they were experiencing.

* Yes, Violet and I devised a way to restore elemental energy without the need for sleep.  This is why— *

Before she could finish, Echo was gone from where she was standing, running around the room and activating both her light-bending invisibility and her enhanced speed by reducing the air resistance as she ran.  Sandra could still sense her even as she moved because the invisibility wasn’t perfect when she ran, and she watched, amused, as the Elf made at least 20 laps around the room before she stopped.

Felbar and Violet couldn’t see her as well as Sandra could, but they could feel the wind from her passing; the older Gnome barely paid attention to it as he still stared at the Orbs in his hands, but the younger Gnome stepped back and out of the way in surprise.  Luckily, she didn’t run into the racing Elf, and pressing herself against the wall seemed to calm down her surprise a little bit.

“This is amazing!  I can feel my energy slowly refilling; it isn’t enough to completely replace what I consumed while I was running, but maybe…half of it? And given a few minutes or less, I think I’ll be completely full again!  How did you do this?” Echo asked in between large gasps of breath, looking completely