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

and creatures give plenty of their own.  When they venture out to acquire more Mana, they undoubtedly riled up entire communities of natural monsters that struck back with savage intent.  If the Core leaves them alone – which is not likely – there probably won’t be any retaliation, but if not…well, I figure you can guess.”

She certainly could.  What she saw inside of the deep recesses of the forests appeared dangerous even to Sandra’s dungeon and she wouldn’t want to get on their bad side.

The Gnome town she encountered in a stand of trees equidistant of the two forests bracketing Gnomeria was the largest evidence of civilization that she had seen since she was still Human.  The town had at least 40 buildings of varying sizes, including – when she peered inside – one large building that housed 6 War Machines (not the ones Sandra had helped create, but the original ones).

The problem was that there seemed like there was room for a lot more inside the large open-front building, which the Dungeon Core thought that likely meant there had been some attrition in their ranks that hadn’t been replaced.  Still, they seemed like they were still in a better position to defend their people than any of the others. They also had high walls surrounding the town with the same stationary crossbows Sandra had seen in Felbar and Violet’s smaller village, as well as a few unique-looking machines that had enchantment runes all over them.

There was no point in looking further at any of the villages (and one town) she had located since she couldn’t really communicate with them, but it was good to know they were there.  After leaving a few Shears above all of them to keep her informed of their status in the future, she then turned her focus to what was happening closer to her own dungeon…and the people under her care.

Chapter 27

Sandra finally took the time to look over the notification she received after upgrading her Core Size; she had ignored it at first because anything relating to that time spent in…torture…made her want to panic again right after she had recovered.  Now, though, she was able to concentrate on it and pay attention with only a slight tinge of insanity touching her thoughts.

Core Size Upgrade Stage complete!

15/15 Completed

Your Core has grown!

Current Size: 23

Mana Capacity increased!

Raw Material Capacity increased!

 

New Constructs option!

Core Selection Menu

Dungeon Classification:

Constructs (Adv. Level 1)

Core Size:

23

Available Mana:

15896/38199

Available Raw Material (RM):

10250/86279

Constructs Creation Options:

19

Advancement Creation Options:

8

Constructs Creation Options

Name:

Mana Cost: (45% Reduction)

-----

-----

Mobile Fortification

27500

Iron Colossus

41250

Gravitational Devastation Sphere*

15000

Other than the expected increase in her Mana and Raw Material maximums, she also got access to another construct…which she couldn’t create yet because it was out of her price range, essentially.  The Advancement of her Classification had been beneficial at the time, but now it seemed to be coming back to bite her in the metaphorical butt.  If she did her calculations right, without the reductions afforded her by the other Advancements she had unlocked, the Iron Colossus – which sounded much more impressive than the Mobile Fortification – would’ve cost 75,000 Mana!  As it was, 41,250 Mana was still too much for her to afford, and without upgrading her Core Size again or getting the last reduction in Mana Cost (to a full 60% reduction), she was out of luck.

Sandra wasn’t going to be upgrading her Core Size anytime soon, and a fresh look at her available AP showed that she was at 68 from her recent activities – far short of the 120 AP she would need to afford the last reduction.  It wasn’t really important at the moment, anyways, because it sounded like some sort of “Boss” construct and there were plenty of other constructs or even normal Dungeon Monsters she could create that might be able to fulfill that role.  Her Aerie Roc, for one, was relatively similar in size to others she had seen or heard of, so it could work in a pinch if necessary.  Fortunately for Sandra, she didn’t seem like she was in danger of coming under attack.

That didn’t mean she would deliberately sit around and not protect herself, however.

While she waited for the rest of the world to wake up and start moving, Sandra occupied herself with figuring out how she wanted to defend her Roc tunnel.  She had originally constructed it just to move the massive birds out of her Home room, but now it had turned into a major thoroughfare that many of her constructs and projects were using to get to the outside.  Not only was it the only way for her Animated Slab to leave her dungeon with supplies, but her Mobile Fortification wouldn’t have been able to leave otherwise.  If she ever got around to making her new Iron Colossus, she could even make it the boss that was stationed right in front of her Home room entrance.  It was just so useful now that she barely even used the workshop anymore and did most of her crafting down below because it was more convenient.

It was also more dangerous not having much – if any – protection from the outside world through the tunnel.  Therefore, as the Shieldmen went out to patrol the forests in anticipation of the Goblin and Golem-Classification Core upgrades, and the Elves prepared by creating sharp roots that shot straight out of the ground and faced outwards in a big circle around their village, Sandra started the creation of defenses for her Roc tunnel.

Before she did anything else, Sandra used her Mana and the Bulk Elimination technique to create more rooms along the lengthy Roc tunnel.  The tunnel ran for miles, but she didn’t need hundreds of rooms – because that would probably