The Crafter's Defense: A Dungeon Core Novel (Dungeon Crafting Book 2) by Jonathan Brooks (best ebook for manga .TXT) 📕

The lizard had four legs that reminded Sandra of thick tree trunks, and its long neck allowed the head to maneuver quickly in different directions; its tail cracked a tree in half as it passed into the Gnome village valley like it was nothing.  The skin covering the entire gigantic lizard was a mottled green-and-grey color, and it looked thick and extremely durable.

“Does it have wings?” the Dungeon Fairy asked, which tore Sandra’s attention away from it for a moment.

Uh…no, not that I can see.

“Good.  Then that means it’s not a dragon.”

Wait, why is that good?  This thing doesn’t seem good – and where in the world did it come from?

Winxa looked at her Core in exasperation.  “Because—” she started with measured patience— “if it were a dragon, none of those Gnomes, and likely none of your own constructs would survive.  It could go airborne and attack from the safety of the sky; some could even use elemental energy to attack from afar, which could destroy the entire village within moments.

“This sounds like some sort of version of an ancient Saurian.  It was likely one of the more expensive Dungeon Monsters the Reptile-Classification Dungeon Core nearby could produce, and it was probably one that it hadn’t had the Mana to before now.  Since it obviously has access to Steel as a Monster Seed, it’s probably using the Large Steel Orbs as its Seed – or the dungeon had somehow obtained another, stronger Seed at some point in the past.”

But this seems a little excessive compared to the other lizards, crocodiles, and even giant turtles out here.  

“Well, think about your Iron-plated Behemoths over there in that room,” Winxa said, pointing off towards her new massive room she had made to contain her large constructs.  “Those are probably on par with what this Ancient Saurian sounds like, so don’t complain too much.”

Sandra wanted to protest, because the size difference was quite profound – her Behemoths were half or perhaps a third of the size.  Though, when she considered that it was made of thick Iron plates that would protect it from quite a few attacks, couldn’t bleed, and was likely capable of destroying quite a bit with its flails, she had to concede the point.  It wasn’t completely even, but she could see the similarities.

She concentrated on the battle again and saw that the nearly 200 smaller lizards and crocodiles were racing across the distance towards the Gnome village, where they would soon join their brethren and quickly overwhelm the defenders.  That was especially true, because the Gnomish machines somehow sensed the presence of a bigger threat behind them and turned towards the Ancient Saurian.  Sandra wasn’t sure what they could do against the massive monster, but she was determined to help.

To that end, her ground forces were finally starting to arrive.  Her Steel Pythons actually arrived first, having overtaken the others with their spectacular speed.  All six of them immediately latched onto the nearest enemy they saw near the wall, whether it was a lizard, a crocodile, or a giant turtle.  Lizards were quickly crushed by the Steel jaws of her Pythons, crocodiles were wrapped up by their ultra-strong bodies and squeezed to death, and the turtles had their legs crippled by the lightning-fast strikes her constructs could deliver.

Steel Pythons were much more powerful and quicker than the flesh-and-blood reptiles assaulting the Gnome village, but that didn’t mean that they were invulnerable; the utter force behind a crocodile’s snapping jaws crippled the lower half of one of her constructs when it was able to snatch it up as it passed by.  One of the giant turtles – which Sandra hadn’t really seen as very effective up to that point – surprised her by extending its neck out from its shell almost four feet, and it bit down on the tail end of an unsuspecting Python with its own powerful bite.  It was so powerful, in fact, that it sheared through the entire Steel form and left the Python semi-crippled with about two feet missing from its lower half.

For all that, though, Sandra’s constructs were doing quite a bit of damage – but it all took time.  By the time they were starting to get closer to the wall and the reptilian staircases being made with pure Dungeon Monster bodies, the enemy reinforcements from the forest had arrived.  Looking along the walls, she saw that all but one of the crossbows were now out of bolts and the Gnomes were fighting with their Steel knives – and they were slowly being pushed back.

The additional force of reptiles only made it worse; the initial surge of bodies being recklessly flung up to the walls pushed back and overwhelmed half of the remaining defensive positions, leaving only four intact groups of Gnomes barely holding on.  The majority of the newcomers had gone to the now-destroyed positions first, but it was only a matter of time before they fell under the onslaught.

Sandra wasn’t going to let that happen if she could help it.

The rest of her constructs (less her Repair Drones, which were much slower and were still about 15 minutes or more away) arrived just then and literally tore a swathe through the assembled reptilian army.  Her Basher Totems swung their fists over and over, caving in skulls on the smaller lizards and cracking the backs of crocodiles, crippling them and preventing them from moving much.  Her Ironclad Apes picked up the giant turtles (which comprised much of the staircases leading up to the walls) and tossed them away like a flying discus, where they landed at least 100 feet away.  They were hurt by the throw, but not fatally; a few ended up on their backs and had trouble turning over.  The main point was that they were