The Crafter's Dilemma: A Dungeon Core Novel (Dungeon Crafting Book 3) by Jonathan Brooks (miss read books .txt) 📕

As the first one reached him, Gerold swung his axe upwards and cut all the way through the mist-like form of the monster; he was expecting some sort of resistance, so he ended up unbalancing himself and falling backwards.  It was a good thing that he did, because as he fell on his rear end, he looked up to see that the undead mist was still coming for him even after it paused, reformed, and was plainly reduced in size from his attack.  He was used to having to completely dismember Golems to kill them so it wasn’t that much of a surprise, but it would make it much harder to kill them if it kept on like that.

He got his axe and shield back up just in time to defend himself…but the mists all stopped before they reached him.  Before he could wonder why, he saw them float off downward towards the other undead – which he just realized a lot of noise was coming from.  He could hear the impact of what sounded like something hard smacking against flesh, the crack of bones, and the screech of metal as it was ripped apart.  Finally looking down there, he was shocked to see what looked like some sort of warzone between two different races that he’d only heard stories of when he was a child.

Except, instead of the Dwarves fighting against Elves, Orcs, or Gnomes – or even the fabled Humans – it was a war between strange metal-like creatures and the undead.  Actually, that’s not quite true, he thought, after seeing what he assumed were Elves streaming out of the natural cave near him, though he had never seen one in the flesh.  There was plenty of flesh to see now, however, as he saw nearly twenty of them rushing out without a stitch of clothing or armor of any kind; not only that, but either he was being extremely racist, or they all looked exactly the same.  It was said that it was hard to tell them apart because they all tended to look alike, but he thought that this situation was taking that stereotype a little far.

Accompanying them were large silvery metal monkeys wielding what appeared to be warhammers, strange thick metal poles with three sets of arms that floated just barely above the ground, and even – he had to rub his eyes to check if they were working properly – a horde of Goblins rushing out and getting in the undead monsters’ way.  That was about all they were doing, because they died very quickly and didn’t appear to have much in the way of offensive capabilities, but they certainly were a distraction.

The robed figures caught his attention again as they started to move their arms; Gerold could feel the Nether energy building in them as the area around their hand started to darken.  Before whatever they were trying to do could be accomplished, however, dozens of bright flashes shot out from the Elves, striking the undead figures and interrupting them.  More and more spears of light hit them, and he saw one and then another get pierced as it penetrated its shield of darkness; within seconds they were down, leaving behind their Loot as they dissipated.

But there were at least a dozen more that he could see – on this side of the broken valley, at least – and they continued to try to build their Nether energy up in what he assumed was some sort of attack.  Suddenly, Gerold heard a whistling coming from above and behind him, and he readied himself for another attack by the misty undead; when he looked back, however, all he saw were some strange metallic shapes hurtling towards him out of the sky.  He squatted down and braced himself behind his shield for the impact, but when nothing hit him he looked up to see that they were actually aiming over his head – and striking the dark-robed figures down in the battle.

They didn’t seem to do much good at first, but as the Elves continued their light-slinging attacks he could see some of them penetrate the dark shield surrounding the undead, taking them out one-by-one.  That ultimately didn’t seem to matter, though, as the rest of the skeletons, zombies, and armored undead started to swarm over the initial assault by the metal creatures and goblins.  He even saw one of the Elves get picked up and ripped in half by a massive skeleton wielding a huge bone club, but after the initial blood and insides that spilled out, Gerold could’ve sworn that the entire body melted into a weird multi-colored ooze before dissipating – and leaving behind some Loot that he couldn’t identify from where he was.

“What in the world is going on?” he whispered to himself as he watched the insane battle playing out.  He originally thought the metal creature/Elven/Goblin team would come out ahead, but then he saw the group of undead near the other cave rush over to reinforce the ones closest to him. In addition, the gigantic, disturbing, horrific mass of melded-together bodies was rolling over – at least I know it rolls to move – towards the fighting.

When it got closer, a strange black glow surrounded the smaller undead fighting; it didn’t seem to do anything at first, but when he saw one of the metal monkeys smash a skeleton apart that had the glow, the undead broke into pieces – which then quickly started to put itself back together.  Gerold thought it was similar to how the Golems he was used to killing “healed” themselves, though this was at a much faster rate.

With the ability to regenerate, the battle took an even greater toll on the odd team of combatants; the Dwarf thought it was all over and he looked back