The Dungeon Fairy: Three Lives: A Dungeon Core Escapade (The Hapless Dungeon Fairy Book 3) by Jonathan Brooks (the false prince TXT) 📕

His charges, the Dungeon Assistant Fairies that were assigned to every Core in the upper third of the continent of Abenlure, had all been removed from their dungeons; some hadn’t wanted to leave and needed to be ordered to, which the Council Leader could understand, because they had been Bonded to their Cores for centuries in some cases.  Despite their reluctance, they left and had their Bonds dissolved either by the Core or back at the DPRC shortly thereafter.

However, that still left Malachite’s “charges”: the Dungeon Cores themselves.  While the Council placed Dungeon Assistants with their Cores, ultimately their job was to regulate the dungeons that dotted the world; sometimes that meant “culling” some that didn’t want to conform to the rules, but in the end it was all towards a singular goal.

In effect, it was to keep them all alive so that they could maintain the balance of primordial energy in the world.  Abandoning the Cores in the north to their fates was certainly counter to what he and the Council – and all Fairy-kind – strove to control.  It was encouraging – and confusing – that the rate at which the Cores were being destroyed had fallen once their Dungeon Assistants had been removed…but it was still happening, nonetheless.  There had to be something they could do about it, and unfortunately that probably meant taking a risk.

“Lapis, the discussion isn’t over.”  The Head Instructor had been in the middle of flying away – obviously intent on finishing up the reassignment of Assistants, now that they had so many without a Core – but he turned back at Malachite’s tone.

“What is there to talk about?  We can’t help them, so there’s no reason to—”

“And if there was a way to help them?  What about then?”

The Head Instructor stopped talking but his mouth remained open in mid-speech, his eyes searching Malachite’s for some sort of answer.  “What are you implying?”

This was it, the moment he had been dreading – because it would put the Council Leader at great risk.  “I’m implying that there might be a way to move the Dungeon Cores away from their locations.”

“How?  That’s impossible,” Lapis stated firmly.  “They are tied to specific points where the upwelling of energy is the strongest.  In short, they cannot be moved.”

Malachite hesitated, before forging ahead.  “All true—normally.  But I think I have a way to move them.”  He took a deep breath, nervous about admitting this next part for some reason.  “I received something else in addition to being able to speak with Tacca’s new Dungeon Core form when she Bonded with me.”

“Received something?  What are you talking about?”

Malachite pulled up his Dungeon Assistant Information, seeing the ability on the list that had been unlocked when Tacca Bonded with him – the process of which he was still a bit confused about.  “Over 5,000 years ago, after I became a Supreme-Rank Dungeon Assistant, I received a ‘Locked’ ability that I could never figure out what it was or what it did.  Nothing and no one could tell me how to unlock it, so I had completely forgotten about it.  However, after the Bonding with Tacca, it seemed as though she had somehow unlocked it into something called ‘Core Translocation’.  What it does is a little muddled, as I can’t get a clear picture of what exactly it will do.  What I can tell you, though, is that it might be the only way to move one of the Cores that are in the path of destruction left behind by these mysterious six-armed people.”

Head Instructor Lapis was silent as he stared at the Council Leader – along with the half-dozen Fairies in the Council chambers, who were working on various projects.  “…What?”

“There’s a bit of a risk, however, as it requires my full capacity of Fairy Mana to activate,” Malachite continued.

“Well, then, you cannot do this; if you use that much Mana all at once, you’ll be—”

“Yes, yes – I know; I’ll be drained and will be highly vulnerable for a short time until my regeneration kicks back in.”  The Council Leader knew the risks, not just to the Core (because he wasn’t exactly sure what would happen) but to himself.

Draining that much Fairy Mana from his body in one go would leave him incapacitated for at least an hour.  It was one of the downsides of living so long and becoming a Supreme-Ranked Dungeon Assistant; his body was now wholly dependent upon the Fairy Mana inside of his body that expending it all so suddenly was detrimental.  It wouldn’t kill him, thankfully, instead just shutting down his mind and body to a state not unlike a coma.  Any regenerating Mana over the next hour would be used to revitalize him, and he would be back to normal; that would also be when he could use any available Mana to use on other abilities – like his own personal Translocation so that he could leave from wherever he had collapsed.

It would not be a fun time and it could be extremely dangerous, but it would be worth it if he could save some of these Cores.  The balance bar above their map was steadily tilting in favor of the mortal races; it had been relatively stable over the last few months, even with all of the destruction, because many Raiders – and even non-Raiders inside of a few villages and towns that had been attacked and wiped out – had been killed along with the nearby dungeons.  However, now that most of the people had been evacuated before they could get caught and die, the balance was being upset again.

“You can’t risk yourself like that, Council Leader,” Lapis pleaded.  “Besides, you don’t even know if it would work.  Plus, where would they go?  Would they even be able to