The Crafter's Dominion: A Dungeon Core Novel (Dungeon Crafting Book 5) by Jonathan Brooks (e ink epub reader .txt) 📕

The first were classified as Werebeasts, a variation of the common Beast-type dungeons – a variation that made them even more dangerous, unfortunately.  Basically, take all of the different beasts – wolves, bears, boars, large cats, and worse – and combine them with the basic shape of a Dwarf (or, from what he heard was more accurate, an Orc or a Human based on their proportions), add in some heightened intelligence, and you ended up with some dangerous combinations.  Beasts normally didn’t scare Dwarves because rarely could they bite or scratch through their armor, unless they were extremely powerful; Werebeasts, however, were dangerous because they thought about where to attack instead of attacking whatever they could reach.  Many a Shieldman had been injured or killed from a claw sliding perfectly through a joint in their armor, or from the Werebeasts working together using simple-yet-effective tactics to isolate and tear apart a single Shieldman.

The only thing the Shieldmen had going for them when facing off against any of the Werebeasts was the fact that none of them were as large as their Beast counterparts; there weren’t any 900-lb Werebears, for instance, nor were there any 15-foot-tall Dire Werewolves to menace them.  At least, none that anyone had seen in the past.  Most of them were between 6 and 8 feet tall, weighing anywhere between 200 and 400 lbs; still larger than any Dwarves – except for Gerold in his Deep Diver suit, of course.  While wearing it, he was nearly on par in the height department, though he had an advantage in the weight category, as the suit was made of heavier metal than flesh and blood.

“Oh, no – not them!” he exclaimed in disappointment, seeing the other type of dungeon monster.  Bugs.  Creepy crawlies.  Pests.  Vermin.  6 and 8-legged nightmares.  Insects of all different types flowed around the Werebeasts, filling in the spaces in between with their chitinous bodies, too many legs, and multiple eyes.  Unlike the smaller bug-like constructs that Gerold had seen in Sandra’s dungeon, these ones weren’t tiny enough to squish with a well-placed boot; no, these were much, much larger, coming from a dungeon that they had classified as having Gigantic Bugs.

There were Giga-spiders, Giga-beetles, Giga-ants, Giga-centipedes, Giga-bees, and even Giga-mantises, which were lethal with their razor-sharp forelegs that could slice a person to pieces – when not protected by armor – in a matter of seconds.  For the most part, Gigantic Bugs were usually more annoying than deadly, but when accompanying the Werebeasts, they were obviously proving to be more than a challenge as they overwhelmed with sheer numbers.  When even the Giga-ants were a foot and a half long and were arriving in groups of 20 or more, that kind of thing could quickly become a problem, especially if one needed to defend against a more powerful threat like a Wereboar or a Werecat.

Individually, each of the monsters wouldn’t have been much of a problem; together, they were proving to be deadly.  Gerold again evaluated where he would do the most good; he thought it would probably be prudent to protect the armed civilians the most, as they were the ones that were dying at a more prodigious rate than the Shieldmen.  “And, well, I really don’t want to be near the other Shieldmen right now, because there’s now some bad blood between us.”

He hated thinking that way, but it was true.  He wanted to help, but the way they had reacted and treated him when he arrived back home was still freshly impressed on his mind.  He had to admit to himself that there was good reason for them to feel so strongly about him losing his armor, because of the scarcity of said armor nowadays, but to go so far as to lock him up felt unjustified.  Still, he wouldn’t let them just die and would do what he could to save them – even if he didn’t want to.

“Your Highness, you need to retreat down the tunnels while we hold them off!” A sudden shout caught Gerold’s attention as he started to move towards the line of civilians doing their best to keep up with the onslaught.  The monsters seemed to just keep coming with no end in sight, but if the former Shieldman had learned anything from Sandra, it was that there would be an end, eventually; there was a limited amount of the “mana” she had at her disposal, and these dungeons would be just the same.  However, he also remembered that she had mentioned that the deaths of people in her Area of Influence gave her more of that mana, which meant that unless they put a stop to so many casualties, the monsters would keep coming without a stop.

“I will not!” came a different voice, one filled with strength and resolution.  “We must contain and seal this breach, because I cannot permit the monsters to gain a foothold in my Kingdom!”

My Kingdom?  “Is that…King Mynag?” he asked loudly in surprise, and this time he actually got someone’s attention.  A Shieldman turned towards him from the line, and Gerold was surprised to recognize the description of the King in his armor.  It was flecked with white, yellow, and red, which was an unusual combination of Holy, Air, and Fire elements that he knew the King possessed.  While he wasn’t actually acquainted with the King, he remembered seeing it during the ceremony in which he was presented with his armor and became a Shieldman; it was only a brief glimpse of the King, of course, but he would remember the look of that armor anywhere.

“Parten!  What is this?” King Mynag asked in a shout, before turning back around to the line and splitting a Werewolf in half with his battleaxe, ending its efforts to sneak up on the important personage.  The attack had been so fast that Gerold knew it had been enhanced by the King’s elemental