Dragonheart Core

I was listening to Nicau's conversation with Kriya, the healer still bleary but starting to sharpen her awareness as this new page of her story turned over, when something else dragged my attention away. Something rather important.

Because in the center of the Hungering Reefs, the Ancestral Tree was shuddering.

I had been focusing, but I would say this took precedence.

My points of awareness spiraled, circling over the island in the middle of the lagoon—the vampiric mangrove's branches shook, thorns rooting in and out as it reacted to something, stirring like a predator in search of prey. Was it sick? Was something wrong?

Then the bark at its core split, crimson red and weeping sap, a presence building and doubling and snarling at the bit–

And Svythe stepped out.

She shook out her head, crown of thorns rustling as though in the wind. Her pure white eyes were eerily sharp, focused—she clenched the claws on her remaining arm, armour bristling. Wariness. Readiness.

Her voice was a garbled mess, unadapted to her throat, but it came regardless. "Threat. Danger," Svythe said, growling over the words.She tilted her head to the side, testing an unfamiliar phrase. "Marquesa de Wolf."

What. What?

Svythe's mana fluctuated, biting as she felt my confusion. Her memory poured over our connection, Otherworld mana simmering beneath the surface. She had felt her tree call to her, a humming melody that sung of old wood and blood-covered thorns, of a piece apart. I had watched this, actually—had seen her press her clawed hand to the bark and her Ancestral Tree open to accept it, allowing her within. The blessing of the hunter.

Then I'd– gotten distracted. Yes. In my defense, many things were distracting in my dungeon, and that had been shortly before Kriya woke up. So maybe I hadn't noticed when Svythe not only entered her tree, but also left my dungeon.

There was a trimming, somewhere in Calarata. She had known about it, had felt it like a limb apart—not painful, but aware. And as soon as she had been Named, she had followed it, searching for that last piece of her Ancestral Tree. Her memories from before her evolution were hazy, but she knew what had happened. Someone had taken it. Had clipped a branch and removed it; and she had found them, had found the thief, and hadn't killed him.

His face in her thoughts was indistinst—she wasn't one to focus on human features other than them being human, but she had noted his red hair, which I had only seen on one human in this area, that of the Scholar. Nicau knew him too, the previous invader who had then been put into service by the Adventuring Guild. Nicau thought he wasn't there willingly, which I had found a strange enjoyment but hadn't thought much of, until now. Because now he was reaching back to me. Communicating in the only way he had access to. @@novelbin@@

I didn't know why. It had– he had been in partnership with Gonçal, no? Something about the alliance reaching between us, the schemas simmering in my core. Was he trying to reach out to me?

The Scholar—Ealdhere—had only said one thing to Svythe, eyes wide with fear and voice shaking. The dungeon is in danger. Can you tell it the Marquesa de Wolf is coming?

Nicau hadn't trusted her, which meant I certainly didn't. And now she was coming, and coming in a way that the Scholar of the Adventuring Guild thought to warn me, despite what should be loyalty to other humans.

Fuck.

Svythe made a clicking, rasping sound in the back of her throat, like branches dragged over stone. She could sense my paranoia, even if she didn't fully understand it. Her Name had boosted her intelligence to a level even I was proud of, though her perspective stayed alien. She knew this was a threat.

And gods, was it a threat. Seven floors to my name, and I knew I was strong, but the War Horde had shaken that confidence. It didn't matter how powerful I was if they could just skip past all my danger.

Did I think the Marquesa—whoever she was—could be tunneling down now to my core? I didn't know. That was the scary part of being a dungeon, I was finding; the world was impossibly large but I was remarkably stationary, locked within my halls without a chance to look elsewhere. If I hadn't Named Svythe and she had somehow followed her missing sapling to hear this from Ealdhere, would I have ever known a threat was coming my way?

I wouldn't.

Thank you, I murmured to her mind. She hissed, tail swishing, before slipping into the water to hunt—either the teleportation exhausted her, or she wanted to reward her Ancestral Tree with blood. Both were options.

But I had to focus.

There was a threat coming, one I had to counter, and the War Horde had already shown the weakness of my floors by punching through. I needed more. My upper floors were strong, and any effort I put into improving them would only be destabilizing the balance I'd built. Instead, I had to focus down. ʀ𝓪ΝǑβƐś

I flicked a point of awareness back to my core—the golden runes inscribed over the surface were starling-bright, burning with an anticipation I couldn't name, and all the schemas that slumbered under the surface. Not quite full, but close enough. The War Horde's attack, partial though it might have been, had filled me. Enough mana to work with.

If the Marquesa de Wolf was coming for my core, then I would be moving it further down.

Originally, the plan had been to completely fill my Heartwood before starting on the ninth floor, but plans were decidedly less important when faced with the possibility of my own extinction.

I would be adding creatures to the Heartwood, though. I was well beyond leery of leaving it entirely empty, even with the trick of its exit being above instead of below—I wanted something to serve as defense, no matter how much I was able to build below. The bugs and scuttling prey I'd added were not enough.

My boundless jaguar was already here and laying claim to her territory. She seemed brighter than before, her fur more vibrant, the feathered tip of her tail a near iridescent blue. The Jungle Labyrinth had been her kingdom before, tunnels prime for her speed and athleticism, but here was simply more.

The cobweb banyans spread like veins through an arterial heart, interweaving and threading from stone to stone, and she relished in them—her six limbs carried her up and up and up, towering amongst the cypresses and cloudsire palms, ignoring the laddercaps to leap up with a grace few could compare. She'd already hauled a bounding deer's corpse all the way to the canopy a thousand feet up, eating it at her leisure, channels flooded full of mana. Even if I wanted to spend the majority of my mana on my ninth floor, she would serve as a handy deterrent.

But not all. I couldn't rely on only her.

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I'd dug a small pond in the side, pressed against the back wall with a freshwater stream feeding a waterfall to trickle down. A lovely little paradise. The intention had been to simply provide a place for my mangroves to grow, for all I'd wanted to keep their number minimal in order to keep myself from growing predictable, but now I thought of a new use. A very rude one.

Behind the pond, I grabbed several points of mana and began to dig, tunneling into the stone. I ducked and wove it around like some of my previous tunnels, just high enough the water lapped at the edge instead of filling it—any invaders who had come the past seven levels would see this and think they knew what was ahead of them. Yet another tunnel to walk through and continue on towards my core.

Unfortunately for them, I had obtained a schema some weeks back that would be perfect for this. My shadowthief rat would earn her keep with this.

I plucked at the schema, unspooling it from my core with gentle care. Peering at its intricacies, I made sure that this tunnel would function as its home, and then I began to weave.

Nearly twenty points of mana, enough I almost wanted to weep from the loss, and a cavern-mouth coalesced within my halls.

It was easily fifteen feet tall, some twenty-five long, and nearly all of that was its maw—an enormous, gaping thing that hollowed out its body, which wasn't much of note elsewhere. Four stubby legs, little more than the idea of moving, and pale, vacant eyes—all of its sensory organs were within its maw. And what a maw it was.

Jagged, irregular teeth, lumped and formed like stalagmites, all as grey as the rocks around it. Its tongue mimicked a boulder, flat and pockmarked, but even I could sense the strength within it; used to tug things further into its gullet. Even its gums were a mottled grey-black, the better to disguise and hide away. No light, nothing to showcase the more living elements of its mouth. Invaders would simply think they were walking into a tunnel.

I peered at its—his—mind. Not a terribly clever creature, which did make sense; he was a slow and ponderous thing, mostly concerned with the exposure of his back and flanks. He plodded deeper into the tunnel I'd dug for him, wedging his maw in until he was entirely hidden, just a cave snaking deeper into the mountains. Then he did something with his jaws, locking the bones in an open position, and–

Sat. And waited. His thoughts were content with waiting for however long it took before someone would enter his mouth.

Well, I supposed not all of my creatures could be ambitious hunters with aspirations towards evolution. I needed a few traps as well.

I also just needed more.

What else did I want to add? The boundless jaguar would serve as a singular threat, punishing any who strayed from the group, and the cavern-mouth would be a one-time stopping force—but I needed something on a larger scale. A group of something, capable of dismantling full parties should they make it this low.

Two options—either verdant howlers or terrorbirds. Both collected from the Myvnu Jungle, perfect for this environment, and hopefully with prey populations established enough to support them.

I stared over my green hell, considering. The boundless jaguar wasn't limited to the ground, able to climb all over the canopies, and would be perfect to knock away those who were trying to ascend—so did I want another species capable of that, or someone to fight them on the ground? From what I had surmised from their schema, the terrorbirds weren't those that flew, despite their species; while they could climb with their powerful legs and beaks, they much preferred running. But they were also much stronger than the verdant howlers, who were light enough for clambering through vines.

Hm. A tricky question.

I spread out my points of awareness, listening to the clicking and chattering insects that filled the level and all the myriad disasters they were. I had prey populations beginning to form, stabilizing out until I no longer had to feed them with my mana, but they weren't particularly strong other than being annoyances. I wanted something stronger.

Well. Actually, I did

I dispatched a part of my consciousness up, flitting through the floors until I arrived at the Jungle Labyrinth. Mantises scuttled through the darkness, blades held high and multi-faceted eyes gleaming, corpses in their wake. Serpents slithered around with pale blue eyes, Veresai's presence diffusing through the tunnels. I didn't look at them. I still didn't know what to think about her and her geas, her obstinance building until it threatened her creator. Until this threat was dealt with, I would be ignoring it, though. I had other things to focus on.

I slipped into the Stone Jungle, still purposely keeping my gaze away from the den at the back. Let Veresai seethe from my lack of attention. Maybe she could take that time to think instead.

The actual creature I was here to see raised her head, jade-green eyes glimmering. The forestfall ratkin.

Gather your followers, I murmured, pressing into her mind and filling it with all the sheer greenery of the Heartwood, all the plants she could utilize and master with her mana. A miracle of potential.

Her head tilted to the side, sniffing at the air, whiskers twitching. She settled on her back paws, a thrum of power in her chest where she had swallowed the jadestone—all around, the mage ratkin she was training squeaked curiously at their leader, wondering what she was thinking. She churred something to me, a question.

Room to grow, I soothed, more of a promise than convincing. Here in the Jungle Labyrinth, all my ratkin were caged by Veresai, unable to evolve when her serpents claimed all the prey and invaders. It had only been Syçalia's death that had evolved the forestfall ratkin, and she hadn't earned that easily. There are more here, but not territory. Free to improve.

She let mana spark over her fingers, drifting over her earthen fur. Moss crawled down her back. Considering.

Then she nodded.

Perfect. I shoveled appreciation in her mind, letting it spill over to the others, then I flew back to the Heartwood, carving a few larger dens for the ratkin to inhabit once they made it down here. They would find this a better home than the Jungle Labyrinth, both from lack of Veresai and the increased presence of plants. She wasn't called the forestfall ratkin for nothing—I had wonderful dreams of her wielding entire cobweb banyans, thundering all invaders with branches like blades—and I was very curious how this would develop her.

So. The boundless jaguar, the cavern-mouth, and now the ratkin—I still had some mana I was willing to spend here before moving onto my ninth floor, and this had changed my decision somewhat. The ratkin would fill in the ground, thrashing all those who moved on foot, growing in their own power.

And then it came down to prey, unfortunately. The terrorbirds were large and powerful and dangerous and hungry—they would require large beasts to hunt, and I didn't know if I had enough to feed them. But verdant howlers could eat plants, fulfilling at least half their diet. Simply the safer play.

But the second I had the mana, I was making an entire flock of terrorbirds to rampage over my floor. Since I'd seen the skull Nicau had pulled from his bag, I had never wanted anything more. Something with talons large enough to crush a human's skull and the bitter aggression that claimed their territory with more than presence—that was perfect for my dungeon.

Just not yet. I could wait. The threat came first.

So I grabbed fifteen points of mana, enough to leave me with plenty to begin carving out my ninth floor, and wove together a troop of verdant howlers.

Not nearly as mana-intensive as the cavern-mouth, but I only managed to make four before my allotted points dried up. But already they started to spread over the Heartwood, black eyes curious and prehensile tails curling. They were around three feet tall, covered in mottled green fur, armed with sickle-like claws and a jagged bite—more built for harassing than lethal blows, but Nicau's memories carried the death of the kobold at their claw. They hooted and shrieked at each other, dividing up the hierarchy—one of the females bullied her way into de facto leadership, beating her tail against the ground, punching the air. Her eyes gleamed with fervour, fangs bared.

The others squawked their agreement and took to the vines with her, clambering up into the canopy—from across the wall, the boundless jaguar raised her head, tail twitching. I hurriedly pushed a little suggestion to not kill them until there were enough to maintain their own population. Please.

She huffed and settled back on her perch.

But now the Heartwood was, if not strong, at least something—the majority of the challenge still came from attempting the climb up to the exit, but now invaders would be harassed on their way down, liable to fall to their untimely demise if they ever faced one of my creatures in battle.

I watched the verdant howlers make it up to the first layer of canopy, five hundred feet up, and begin exploring for somewhere to roost. The cavern-mouth shifted in his tunnel, jagged teeth braced, the boundless jaguar resting after her kill.

Okay. Well. Nicau hadn't seen the Marquesa fight, and Ealdhere had only told Svythe that she was coming, not how strong she was. But I hoped this would be enough, if for some fucking reason my previous seven floors weren't. Or if she would also find a way to punch a hole through my lower floors, since that was something invaders just did.

But I wasn't done yet. Gonçal had granted me three arctic schemas, and I had others that would fit the place, and I wouldn't be letting invaders just waltz to my core. My ninth floor would stop them.