No Need for a Core?

After he was done with Zushi, Mordecai took a break until after dawn, as he wanted to check in with Moriko and he tended to get very focused while working on the dungeon; he didn't want to let it slip his mind. During that break, he did the next best thing to giving Kazue the cuddles she craved, and that was to settle down with their core in his avatar's lap. He gently stroked across the gold surface of her portion of the core, humming softly to her as the hours passed.

Eventually, the sun rose and Mordecai sent his thoughts to their wife, "Hey love, how is everything going there?"

Moriko sounded amused in her reply, "Kazue is still having trouble with her wings. We're probably going to spend another day here while she practices shifting them away and back smoothly. It's too bad you aren't here to watch, she's doing most of it half-naked."

That did sound like a rather entertaining show. Kazue's avatar had been forced to shift into her fox form to get her dress back off after her wings had manifested, and even that had taken a bit of focus. Shape changing generally made your clothing adapt to your new form, but it did not make the clothing compatible with taking it on or off in the new form, and her dress had not been designed with wings in mind. And even that fox form still had faerie wings; Kazue had to deliberately not let the dress change with her for that trick to work.

"I'll just have to make her demonstrate when you guys get back here," Mordecai said. "I love you both, and I'm looking forward to seeing you again."

"And," Kazue's core interjected, "I'm looking forward to having a body again so I can have my way with both of you."

"Promises, promises," Moriko teased Kazue, "I still amuse myself by making your other self turn a beautiful shade of red."

After several more minutes of banter with his wives, Mordecai turned his attention back to their earth-themed zone. The constant influx of mana from having two regulated streams of delvers gave them a fair amount of luxury in how they spent their mana, but they also spent far more mana per zone than a simpler design would cost. He couldn't exactly complain about that, it was the complex design that allowed them the greater number of delvers. Well, that and being on friendly terms with a nearby stable kingdom. It took a certain amount of luxury time for most people to make the initial foray into delving even the entrance zone of a dungeon. Bad times with local kingdoms had usually meant more in the way of marauders than proper delvers. He had rather deliberately eliminated more than a few groups like that, especially if they were stupid enough to talk about their outside activities while inside his territory. But it was best to not dwell on that part of the past.

The first thing he did to set up the zone was to create sections of malleable shape but consistent areas. Under these divisions, he created a viscous substrate that would act much like magma, though without the heat, and set it to perpetually stir and flow in ever-changing patterns. The sections wouldn't move fast, but the entire zone would be constantly shifting and moving about into random configurations. Enchanting the sections to make their shape malleable made sure that they moved around each other instead of pressure pushing them up or pulling them down, and it made the shape of each zone difficult to predict.

Now that he had his mini-zones, Mordecai started creating terrain for each one. Hard-packed earth. Solid stone. Loose and slippery shale with sharp edges. Shifting desert sands. Thick and viscous mud. unsettled gravel. Flat, hard stone. Shards of obsidian. Different variations of rich earth for growing vegetation.

Given the constant upward climb one had to make, these terrains made for a variable challenge all by themselves. Adding miniature biomes to the sections that could support them only made those areas more difficult as Mordecai made sure those sections grew thickly, forcing one to make their own path.

Once he was satisfied with the basic setup, he started creating variations in the terrain. If one did not watch their step they could find themselves stepping into a hole or tripping over a slight rise, and always going uphill could lead one astray if a small hill rose to the side of your intended path.

The final touch to the environment was to add a constant dust storm. Nothing too harsh or abrasive, but enough to obscure vision. Small objects and creatures were practically invisible fifty feet away, and even a building was completely obscured less than a hundred feet away.

Mordecai had considered having at least slow lava flows with thick crusts, but that was far too dangerous for the level of challenge that was supposed to be represented. Even a silt river would be a bit much. Especially given the creatures he was making for this challenge.

He started with a variety of burrowing animals, such as rabbits, foxes, squirrels, and even some small owls. For all of them he infused them with earth essence and enhanced their ability to burrow to supernatural levels, though this left disturbed ground rather than passing through without a mark like Amber could. All of these he made sure were hard and dense enough that flinging themselves at a foe was a viable attack. On top of that, they could all camouflage themselves against earth and stone when not moving.

For the rabbits he added a smaller version of the earthquake attack that Owlbert and Owliver had. The owls retained the ability to fly and could fling quills like they were rocky darts. The squirrels could generate and throw stones with the same force that a human could throw a stone with a sling. The foxes he made faster and a little bigger, enhancing their bite.

Mordecai also went the opposite direction for a few rabbits and gave them the ability to transform into small whirlwinds of dust and sand. The dust bunnies didn't do as much damage as their cousins, but they made it even more difficult to see and were difficult to damage in their dust-devil form.

After that, he enhanced some venomous snakes that had been in their recently claimed hunting grounds, making them into stealthy vipers with venom that inflicted limited petrification.

To a certain extent, all of these were dangerous skirmishers. Mordecai also needed some front-line melee, and for that role he recruited badgers. While they had the same burrowing and camouflage abilities as the others, their primary power came from simply making them bigger and reinforcing both their claws and their thick fur coat with iron, making a form of organic steel. Badgers could already be surprisingly dangerous animals, making them larger and tougher made them suitable challenges for moderately experienced warriors. In a solo fight, he would expect Fuyuko to currently be able to beat a single one, maybe even two, though she'd hardly be able to come out unscathed.

As a final ambusher, he took some of the tiny constrictors that would normally be too small to be a threat to even a child and enhanced them into powerful stone pythons. In solo fights where they got to ambush a foe they were at least as dangerous as the badgers, but they were far less effective in stand-up fights. They could also make a nasty surprise in the middle of a battle.

For rewards, he gave all the earth-enhanced creatures here small gems in the center of their foreheads. A straightforward reward, but fairly appropriate. Fancier rewards would require defeating the zone bosses.

When he was satisfied with his work, Mordecai simply set them out to make their homes where they liked in the zone. The bunkin troops were more dangerous combatants than these inhabitants, but for some groups, the issues with the terrain would make this a more difficult zone to cover, and he was rather pleased with this variety in challenges. He'd give them until tomorrow morning to settle in before opening up the zone, and even then he was going to limit this part of the zone to two delves a day for a while. While there were several types of inhabitants, some of them were relatively small in numbers. He was hoping that they would be able to recruit more the next time they expanded outward past the current hunting grounds.

"Your turn love," he said to Kazue.

"I'll take care of it shortly," she replied, "if you can take care of something for me. We've got even more visitors. Can you take care of these guys?"

The visitors in question were a troop of a hundred soldiers from Kuiccihan along with their commander and some support staff. Bellona had passed on a message that they were coming but Mordecai had not been expecting them for a couple more weeks. Kazue had a buzzkin leading them to a potential campsite well to the side of the trading post, so Mordecai sent his avatar there to meet them and take over.

After Mordecai and Captain Thomas Nozin were introduced to each other by the buzzkin, Mordecai asked, "How did you and your troops get here so fast?"

Captain Nozin replied, "Three court mages set up a transport circle. It took most of a day to get everyone formed up and through the portal for the time it was up. They were a little off and we were closer to Riverbridge than they were aiming for, or we would have gotten here yesterday."

Not exactly a cheap method, but for this many troops it was probably more efficient than the transport ships they'd needed for the prisoners. Most transport spells were unreliable with unwilling targets. "Well, we weren't expecting you so fast, so we'll need to ask you to set up camp for now. We're trying to make all the buildings out here from harvested materials instead of mana-crafted. Though come to think of it, we still haven't done anything with the feast hall we had to make in a hurry, you can at least use it as a mess hall until permanent arrangements are made."

"That would be most appreciated by my troops," the captain replied. "Are there any specific expectations or rules we should be aware of?"

"Other than the standard ones we have for delvers, not at this time. However, I have an idea that might be more beneficial than you simply acting as ready troops in case of another attack. Growing stronger is what we need the most, so I was rather hoping we could come to an arrangement for your troops to earn their keep the hard way if there are no regulations against your soldiers earning some extra income on the side."

After a couple of hours of negotiations, they came to an agreement. On any given day, thirty of the soldiers would be paired up and act as guards throughout the trading post and another twenty would be on a rest day. The remainder would be divided between a couple of delving groups, groups hunting, foraging, or logging in the hunting grounds, and construction crews to build their own housing and other buildings. Mordecai and Kazue were willing to skip the guards entirely; they felt more confident in their own inhabitants, but Captain Nozin felt that anything less would not be looked upon favorably by his superiors.

The guards were going to only provide slightly more mana than the soldiers who were resting, so it wasn't quite ideal for the dungeon's growth, but it was still a notable boost of activity.

With that settled, Mordecai decided to check in on Deidre. He found her, Fuyuko, and the little pixie who had become attached to Deidre at the beginning of the river zone. Fuyuko was reading out loud from one of the manuals her group had picked up on their delve, and Deidre was patiently weaving a small boat in the same style that Fuyuko and her friends had used. The pixie was fetching materials and taking care of other small tasks for Deidre. Fuyuko and the pixie were technically pushing the limits of how much they were supposed to help a delver like Deidre, but Mordecai didn't mind. Deidre's circumstances weren't exactly normal.

He waited for Fuyuko to finish her current section before he interrupted the tableau. "Hello Deidre," he said as he walked closer from where he'd been watching. He was a little amused that she was the only one not surprised by his presence. "Fuyuko, why don't you take a break and go get a meal? I'll keep her company for a while. When you are done, bring a meal back for our guest."

"Um, yeah, sure thing," Fuyuko mumbled as she scrambled to her feet.

While the girl headed off, Mordecai turned his attention to the pixie. The small fey had taken up a spiked hairstyle and wore an interesting ensemble of black leather and silver studs. "What has your name become?" he asked of the tiny being.

"I'm Payne!" she declared proudly, then immediately looked nervous. "Um, if that's okay?"

Of course it was. Deidre and Payne; Sorrow and Pain. He really wasn't looking forward to learning the details of Deidre's history. "That's fine, it's clear you two are becoming close." Rather, Payne was making herself Deidre's familiar. It was clearly on the pixie's initiative, if Deidre had tried to lay claim to an inhabitant as a familiar then he and Kazue would have felt it immediately and intervened. "Why don't you join Fuyuko for a while?"

"Ah," the pixie hesitated and glanced at Deidre, who nodded in reassurance. "Okay, I guess. Um, be back in a while." She flitted off after Fuyuko, glancing back occasionally.

Once they were alone, Deidre asked, "What would your majesty have of me?" Her tone was as calm and cool as ever, but there was a hint of mischief in her eyes. He took that as a good sign.

"Please don't," Mordecai said, hands up in a surrendering gesture. "This whole thing is a mess, and the territory that is also our domain feels weird in ways I don't have words for."

"I can only imagine, and hope to keep it that way," she replied as she continued working on her boat.

"So, what are your thoughts and observations about the rest?"

"Mm. You two are a strange dungeon. This path feels so vulnerable at first glance, but with two other paths available, you can always force someone onto them as it maintains a path forward. This has invited many more people into your territory, and you are both so gentle with them. You care about each of them, to a small extent at least." She sighed and shook her head. "I don't recall feeling particularly hostile back in the beginning, but I am fairly certain I did not particularly care about most of my visitors."

"Neither did I," he replied, "not at first. But my first group of people were professional and friendly, and they helped set me on my path. Even then, I don't think I cared as much until I first fell in love."

"Love," she said wistfully, "I can't say I ever really knew that. Perhaps in the care of my inhabitants, when those decisions were mine."

Her phrasing was odd, but the meaning was clear to him. Whenever she'd been enslaved, her masters had taken over even the minor details of who and what her inhabitants were. It would be harder to love creatures you were forced to claim and alter to the whims of another. "What do you know of the conflict between me and the Puritasi?" The conflict that had driven them to enslave a dungeon to use as a weapon against him.

"Not much," Deidre answered. "They've talked about your legend a lot, but I have heard little that seemed worth believing."

So Mordecai told her his story, including many though not all details about what had happened since he had been awakened by Moriko.

"Hmm, more was correct than I thought, if in a twisted way," she mused, "but less was correct about who you are and your motivations." She continued working on her boat-to-be while she thought. "It's hard for me to trust, and you understand why. I find Fuyuko and her connection to the Shattered One to be the most convincing argument in your favor, even above the effects of your being caught between Faerie truth and the nature of your oaths as a priest of Ozuran. Even so, I can not give you the whole of my trust. Not yet at least. There is only one thing that will win that trust."

He sighed and nodded. "And even that level of trust can not be instilled in your core without returning you to your territory, which we can not let happen until after your situation is resolved." Having to talk around the issue like this was annoying, but he didn't want to risk tripping whatever commands she'd been given to not talk about her enslavement or her master.

"Getting a core's trust can be vital to helping a dungeon too," Mordecai said. Deidre narrowed her eyes as he continued, "If a dungeon had, say, found itself forced to hold onto an excess of mana instead of using that mana to grow, a sudden release of that constraint might make regulating the mana difficult. Having some support from another dungeon could help, but there's pretty much only one way for a dungeon to make that connection to another dungeon." Namely, having his avatar hold onto the controlling device until the job was done and he could break her bindings.

But that would put him into the position of holding her core's 'leash' for at least several minutes. "If that caused the distressed core to fight the avatar trying to help it, then it would be much more difficult to get the job done safely."

Deidre's breath quickened as her body tensed, and Mordecai simply waited for her to recover. After she'd managed to relax she said, "That would be asking a lot of a core who had just met this foreign avatar."

"I agree, but perhaps that is a hypothetical we can work on another time. Fuyuko and Payne are returning with your food, I think I'll leave you to them for now. We will have plenty of time to talk in the future, it will be over half a year before we might be able to get you home." Unlike him and Kazue, Deidre's dungeon was limited in how strong she would be allowed to get, lest she break free of her master. So there was an unmoving goal of power to achieve, and he hoped to implement a much more open strategy that would involve a lot of soldiers from Trionea.