The Crafter's Darkness: A Dungeon Core Novel (Dungeon Crafting Book 4) by Jonathan Brooks (e book reading free txt) 📕

the same inner voice that had been talking to her surged again and halted her violent impulse.  As soon as she was frozen in conflict with whatever was causing her to stop, her mind started to clear.  She recoiled in horror at what she was about to do to her Fairy, her guide, her friend; she was seconds away from striking out with some sort of Mana-based attack, which might not have necessarily killed or even hurt Winxa, but it certainly would’ve caused her to leave and never come back.  The diminutive Fairy had warned her of that shortly after they met and there was no reason to believe that anything had changed in that respect.

I’m sorry, Winxa.  I don’t know what came over me, but I think you’re right.  Perhaps that last upgrade screwed me up even more than I thought.

“Please try to stay calm; from what I remember of the other Dungeon Cores I’ve helped to guide, stress and trying to do too much were contributing factors to worsening their already unstable insanity.  So, take it a little easier and try not to stress about things you cannot do anything about – like your friends who left to get help from their leadership.”

There was another flareup of anger at the mention of her friends that had left, but Sandra squashed it immediately without hesitation.  Now that she could identify why she was feeling that way, and that it almost felt artificial, it was much easier to recognize and correct it.  Of course, stress was likely to aggravate that part of her consciousness, and it felt like everything that was part of her existence was full of stress.  Well, everything but—

“You need to find a safe outlet to relieve that stress, or this…whatever it is, insanity or something else…will begin to consume you.  You can fight it, Sandra, I know you can.”  Winxa was right, Sandra could fight it – and she knew exactly how.

Crafting.

After thanking her Dungeon Fairy for her help in bringing her back from the edge of completely losing her sanity, Sandra worked on a few relatively mundane tasks like stocking more of her Roc tunnel rooms, checking on the status of the hostile dungeon entrances again, and even doing a quick check on the status of the new Cores – which were certainly making progress, enough that she thought they might emerge within the next 4 or 5 days.  With it being in the middle of the night and nothing of note going on, the Dungeon Core realized it was quite relaxing just looking around her Area of Influence via her Shears.  Her state of mind calmed even more, smoothing out until she could barely remember the anger she had just felt such a short time ago.

She knew it was lurking in the back of her mind, however, just waiting to strike when she wasn’t prepared.  That worry was stressful, so without much else to do Sandra turned to her favorite pastime, which always made her feel better, no matter what she was crafting.  She vividly remembered that it was only due to her repetitive recitation of crafting recipes that allowed her to keep her sanity in the grey empty space of nothingness after her death, and she knew it would save her again.

 Therefore, since she had time and attention to spare even while using the majority of her Mana to continue stocking her new defensive dungeon rooms, she turned to her own crafting stations, many of which had been neglected.  While she had used the forge quite a bit over the last few days to produce more warhammers for Steelclad Ape Warriors, short swords for her Goblins defending the Roc tunnel, and to produce weapons to trade for mercenaries, she hadn’t really created anything new with her Blacksmithing skills.  Sandra was tempted to just experiment and start crafting something, anything, but she realized that unless she acquired a new metal to work with – she was practically drooling over the potential unlocking of Platinum or Orichalcum even though she had never seen either of them worked before – or had something specific that she needed to craft, all she would be doing was repetitive work that didn’t really engage her like she wanted.

Thinking about Blacksmithing, however, led her to look at Kelerim’s forge – and she was surprised at what she saw.  She felt a little bad about basically ignoring the Half-Dwarf/Half-Orc over the last few days as she was busy with other things, but he had been keeping busy; another 60 Steel swords were stacked neatly in the corner of his forge room.  He had continued creating more weapons for the Orcs, not through any obligation to them or to Sandra – but because he was improving his craft, and it made her figurative heart soar to see his progress.  Comparing the bottom of the stack of swords to the newer ones on top, there was a definitive difference in their quality; most might not be able to see it, but the practice and honing of his skills was directly translated in how well-made they appeared.  Not quite masterwork quality – yet – but Sandra thought that with a little more instruction from her he could get there quickly.

She reminded herself that when he woke up the next day and there wasn’t an attack going on or anything, she would work with him to refine his abilities, as well as show him how to work Titanium – which he appeared ready to learn.  Sandra was proud of what he had accomplished in such a small amount of time and she realized that she enjoyed teaching him – and would love to be able to teach all she knew to those willing to learn.

She spent about an hour crafting and enchanting more composite bows like the ones the Elves used, and while she wasn’t exactly experienced enough with shooting bolts to refine them,