Dungeon Core Chat Room.

On this day a dungeon released a particularly nasty creation upon the world.

A sea of solid metal flowed from its insides, eating, consuming and then puppeting hosts in a 19 kilometre area before the silver menace was stopped. An insidious creation, if it weren't for the swift action of Ar'gth'ma who knows how bad it would have gotten. But Ar'gth'ma was nearby and the world was saved as always. Everyone please give a warm belch of praise for our youngest member! I heard you melted everything to the ground with your Rending Acid breath? Well done! I bet that quest gave you plenty of levels huh? Those will be needed in the years to come.

Next on our agenda is the "drake hunters". Ha... Does anyone want to take them out? We normally ignore puffed out adventurers claiming to be dragon slayers but this group has killed 5 dragons in their sleep in the past year! No quest has been released but really. That does not seem balanced. I heard the weakest member of their group was only level 150! That's embarrassing my fellow councilmembers. We can't let them continue like this...all in favour of a more personal "unofficial worldly protection" decision? It does no good for the most important group in the world to be hunted down like common animals.

Excerpt obtained from a branch of the draconic council's meeting minutes.

Lets start working on an alternative mage-countering boss!

Returning to the half cannibalized old oven, Innearth carefully extracted the old "good strength” null stone that was just slightly worse than the stuff Doc gave him.

I want something that’s weaker to warriors than mages. In that regard…well I’m making a boss for a much lower floor than the end of the crystal cavern. Ideally, I should be able to remake it as long as they don’t loot important body parts.

How about working on my humanoid design? I’m positive that the crystal dwarves are much weaker than they would be if I gave them a few extra legs, lowered their center of balance…I think they should be a suitably “weaker” template to work on.

Innearth: Hey Doc. Have you made any monsters with null stone and if so, do you have any notes I should watch out for? I don't want to waste my material. I’m not looking for help designing it, I'm just looking for anything I should watch out for.

ZeMadDoctor: Yep. Okay. Only real gotchu is that by default dungeon monsters see with magic. Null stone will block their sphere of perception.

ZeMadDoctor: If you make a monster with one side completely covered in null stone. They will only be able to see in the opposite direction. If you completely cover it without leaving any holes. It’s even worse and you'll make a blind deaf and dumb monster. One that's worse than a plant. It's more work but you’ll have to figure out how to let them navigate and attack stuff. Good luck!

Innearth: ...good to know. Don't want to trial and error that.

Doc mentioned not covering the whole monster but that was kind of my goal.

Let's see. How do I go about fixing that?

Setting up a humanoid liquid crystal golem in his system design panel. Innearth added a quick metal skeleton and lay a circulatory system of mana circuits – one with no cores yet.

Adding the null stone as a material, Innearth tried placing it about the monster trying to find how it blocked their sight. It was almost insidious how pervasively it blocked the beneficial magic common to all of Innearth’s monsters. The system gave him a solid “Perception x%” when he started looking for it and by fiddling a bit he could put the amount of sight the monster had in various locations. He couldn’t even cheat by leaving small holes for the mana sight to pass through – any hole big enough to work was a massive 50cm+ target on the golem he was building.

So, what exactly am I losing by blocking the sphere of perception and how can I replace it. What senses do most non-dungeon monsters have?

…well okay actually I know that. Various sights that are based purely on reflected light or sound…

They have these complicated eyeballs? Bunch of little reflective bits and…magic readers? How do they work.

…does anyone know how they work?

A few searches later and Innearth decided that either no dungeon knew how they worked, or any that did not care to share it.

…in fact there didn’t seem to be many dungeons that tried to remake senses at all. It made sense when a sphere could do many of the same things and if not better at least easier and with enough functionality for it to not matter.

Does the monster need to see? I can’t imagine it fighting well if it can’t locate adventurers…but then again does it need sight to do so? What about sound?

This was somewhat easier for Innearth to wrap his head around. Sound vibrated stuff and ears worked by vibrating little drums.

…there’s a bit more to it than that but I’m pretty sure I can start with this and continue onwards after.

If I want the boss to be able to feel stuff it has to have a high mana content…so either I can make the “drum” a high concentration or I can run high concentration materials through it?

I guess that works.

Making a thin strip of “pure” stretchy silicon material and then running several incredibly thin…veins of mana Innearth tried to get the design panel to show him its hearing ability.

…that was strangely hard to do. The design panel wanted to help him with anything and everything he so desired – but also didn’t quite understand what he was asking of it.

He wasn’t talking to the panel per se but a strange vision of him arguing with the panel and asking it in steadily worse and worse language filled his core. “Make the vibrations show looking!” “feel outside of body using the inner movement”.

Finally, something clicked and the panel pulsed slightly. His system seemed to have a eureka moment and suddenly – as if he hadn’t spent the past 10 minutes trying to get it to understand what he wanted – the panel showed a nice little section of stats on the side.

Hearing pitch: [Range 44hz-960hz], [Fidelity +- 81hz]

Hearing intensity: [Range 70db-400db], [Fidelity +- 50db]

…that didn’t tell Innearth anything he immediately understood.

Fidelity…those don’t look too accurate?

I guess I can work on making those better?

Trying to: add more circuits, or thin the vibrating drums, or set up dozens of different drums at different positions each stretched at different ranges; vastly improved the stats he was focused on. Final positions bottomed out at 30hz – 1800hz +- 30hz for the “pitch” his boss could hear and 10db-200db +- 5db for the intensity it could distinguish.

That was the best he could get with simply setting up several optimized drums.

…however that didn’t help with the main purpose of this experiment. Figuring out where a sound was coming from.

Realizing most animals had at least 2 “Ears” and that more was better, Innearth started placing hearing chambers all over his golems body. Two in each leg. Two in each arm. Two in the main body (one at the front and one at the back) and then Two on the head (on both sides, similar to how many animals had them).

As he set up this system he tried first the market, then the natural monsters within his lower floors.

Intense study of the outside of their ears resulted in brief experiments with adding large cones to his ear holes and then immediately removing them and simply shaping the metal around the holes slightly to increase the sound heard

Finally trying to get the system to help him give a proper measurement of its hearing ability, Innearth focused on the sight this ear system gave his null golem.

Plenty of abstract stats that didn’t help later, Innearth finally found an easy enough solution – comparing it directly against the perception sphere.

13%.

…not good but not horrible as well as being much better than nothing…and both disheartening as well as a number Innearth was strangely proud of.

He was starting to burn out of this boss monster design, however. He wasn’t sure where to start with remaking light or heat or electromagnetic-based sights, but this was something he could cheat at. A material that could perfectly be controlled to mimic the surroundings later – the core selling claimed it would help with illusion or camouflage, but only had enough for the smallest monster and thus was selling it for the cheap price of 5000 AMU.

…do I want to use it all on this boss monster? I feel like I could spread it out a bit quite easily…

Might as well not be wasteful I’ll try and use a small amount of it. What if I want to give another monster eyes after all!

Making several small protective holes Innearth set up plates of this material. They all gave a blurry view of the surroundings and Innearth didn’t know how to improve their accuracy.

The % was up to 25% now and Innearth felt like it was good enough. The rest of the boss design was probably the most “interesting” in terms of design but was not very hard to set up. The golem was covered in hundreds of small null stone armour plates. They were thick enough to defend against most magic but would probably be sliced open by anything using a physical weapon.

The legs were filled with Kinetic crystals and cores while the arms held a large Sword mana sword. Simple but strong, it was reinforced with metal mana and balanced with a few Gravity and Kinetic constructs – a feature that had become incredibly simple for Innearth to use.

The arms were given several metal mana nodes as well as a few sword mana ones in the hopes that they would manifest as some sort of skill the golem could use with its sword. The center of its body was filled with a couple of life cores and a single large healing potion pouch around where a human would have a stomach.

Giving life to the boss and then doing the easiest test Innearth could think of, he made a beholder for the first time in a long time.

Slowly taking form in front of the golem and then after responding to Innearth's goading, the beholder cast several strong-looking bolts of fire at the boss. Reacting after it had been hit uselessly the golem ran down the hall and swiped – its sword passing through the floating ball easily opening it like an orange as the first caster died.

A few more (more specific mage templated) monsters later and Innearth was starting to worry the boss was too strong…

I guess you can fight a spider as well? See how a more physical monster fares?

Sending a magma spider towards the sword-wielding null golem, Innearth watched as they danced a bit. Jumping back and forth, the spider launched itself at the side and stabbed inwards, piercing the golem's body despite its void mana dimming as it grew close.

Retaliating, the golem bisected the spider with a shimmering slash that extended out from its blade and carved through the magma flesh.

…okay well I think this is fine. I’m pretty sure a physical adventurer can sneak up on it if they want because its still roughly half as bad at noticing stuff as my other monsters.

You get a boss room!

Branching off a parallel room to the sand bed, Innearth made his alternative zone boss and then made a section of the wall that could shatter in a suitably theatric way (to join the two boss rooms together just in case a large group attempted the fight).

Completing stuff I’ve been meaning to do is really satisfying. It feels good knowing the floor feels more complete. What should I work on next?

Okay! I have something other than my ice zone I’ve been thinking about on and off.

I want to figure out how to control madness. I want to figure out how to squash the negative traits in madness combinations…Maybe one day even figure out how to control demons because that’s obviously a weakness of mine. I think learning to control madness materials I can make from scratch might even help me deal with unique madness materials like the metal flesh.

...I think. I think I'm going try it.

I'll work my way up to tier 2 but only after fully trusting myself with tier 1 madness combinations.

First off, the easier one for me to work with – Water and Fire. I've somewhat seen their effects by making monsters with both materials separately...but honestly I haven't touched the combination before. I know enough from other cores to know #1 it makes pressure and steam and #2 not to use it because "madness".

My goal is to control the madness however…the safety warning can be ignored for tier 1 combinations as long as I make them far away from my core. So, let's see. Quartz as my go to, Water and Fire as my mana types. What type of material will this make?

Tentatively making the material Innearth watched as the mana types combine into one and –instead of cancelling as common sense says two opposites should – they started boiling out of control. Steam mana bonded to the base material and it immediately exploded in a cloud of thick hot billowing smoke that rushed thunderously in all directions.

Pieces of the crystal shattered with a incredible force before they could even fully combine with the mana. As flecks of crystal flew away, a milky hole-filled, white material; was seen for a brief moment before it consumed itself. Spending all of its self in its mad rush to fill the hall with steam.

The steam in question moved in all directions simultaneously before rising up to the top of Innearth's hallway. Running along the roof for dozens of meters the steam mana ripped itself apart after spreading too thin. A small amount of it was deposited as condensation where the cloud had passed and now the whole hallway looked slightly damp.

Okay...so from the vague information I have learned – both in terms of experimentation experience and notes in guides – I can control that steam/pressure mana with either Air or Earth. Air is a joke. No way I'm touching that if I can help it. So what about Earth? I think the obvious thing to do is to work off stuff I've already learned.

Making a hollow ball of Earth Innearth tries his experiment again. This time he used the system panel to make everything beforehand because it now accepted his new steam-quartz as a material and he didn’t have to deal with portions exploding as he tried to make something from them.

His system panel did not like to be used to print regular materials, but he convinced it he was making a trap by thinking about his goal in a different way and hoping for the best.

Seconds later the ball appeared – seemingly normal for a good solid moment before suddenly without warning exploding in a massive explosion that was more sound and power than fire.

Steam flew in all directions once more, while shattered shells of earth hit the walls and embedded themselves in it.

...okay. okay. I think maybe it's because it was trapped and couldn’t escape. Let's try and fix that

Remaking the ball and trying once again, Innearth added a few small holes to the side before letting the system print.

This time a bowling ball-shaped grey-brown ball appears that actively starts whistling. Three kettle-like streams of steam started pushing out of the side and...continuing endlessly.

The steam that released was mostly magical this time and while a faint film of water was left behind it was much less than the "consume all the material and dissipate" effect Innearth had before.

After a few minutes of steam, a loud crack sounded out and the middle of the three holes blew out leaving a single much larger but misshapen hole in its place.

The loud whistling sound quieted down to a much softer roar and Innearth watched as steam continued to pour out, faint bits of the source being pulled out as well.

Adding onto the existing ball, Innearth reinforced and shrunk the hole – slowly finding a good size for the ball and then bringing it to a portion of the sensory confusion floor.

Honestly the loud whistling worked better for what Innearth was hoping for than the crashing contraption and Innearth embedded this and a few more balls periodically in cut-off rooms that filled with thick steam.

Okay. Next thing is to try and make a monster out of this.

Working off the old "jumper's template" Innearth made a ball with a tripod of legs.

Instead of liquid filled tubes, Innearth focused on making several shift-able holes that could either release pressure endlessly harmlessly into the air or be forced into tubes set into tubes. A simple "valve" was set up to control the percent of steam being sent either into the pistons or harmlessly into the air.

Continuing to iterate on the design, Innearth lost himself in the moment – spending hours upon hours fixing small sections and trying to better deal with the flow of steam.

There were nearly a dozen limbs by the time Innearth was done. Most were for movement, but a few had wicked-looking spears tipped with void spikes on the end that could be stabbed forwards with great speed.

Inside each pneumatic tube were several small channels filled with liquid crystal. The liquid could extend linearly to the end and pushed through small loops at the end.

By adding a few crystal cores to key locations these retractable channels could push to the end and then retract and reset the pistons. They could also be used to move the pistons with slow precise extensions or retractions however didn’t have enough strength to do so with any real force.

An added bonus that seemed useless but actually made up for a huge problem with this experimental mana. The pressure was immense, constant, but somehow difficult to control despite being “regular”. Even with all the engineering Innearth was doing to fix it the mana seemed to want to break free of its cage purposefully moving in weird ways or speeding up and slowing down depending upon its wild mood.

The design panel could be used to test the effectiveness of both the whole monster as well as individual portions. Picking specific limbs Innearth could see "[400-1000 dmg per strike]" "[reload time 60 seconds]" "[aim penalty 20%]"

That was an immensely helpful “instant update for every single change Innearth made” and the major factor that was making this take so long.

The biggest problem however appeared when trying to analyze the monster as a whole. Nothing would show for effectiveness – no stats – simply a note with "[madness corruption -> unrecoverable]"

That was even worse than the note his crazy balls had – "[madness corruption]" which simply stated there was a problem but still let him analyze his schematic.

Giving life to the steam upgraded jumper, Innearth watched as thick pressurized steam started flowing out the sides and the faceless boiler-shaped creation started to jitter as if about to explode.

Suddenly with a bang, it was off. Steam whistling out of its sides as it sought out and attempted to kill anything within sight.

Similar to the old jumpers, this pure madness-aligned monster moved closer to the “metal flesh” creature from so long ago.

A greater snake was surprised to see the barrel…well barreling towards it at over a hundred kilometres per hour. Hesitating for less than a second it dodged to the side when the steam engine came within “sight” of it and it realized it was in the monster’s path...

Not having enough reaction speed to catch it, the jumper's long metal-like legs pumping in and out and causing it to run like a gazelle (if a gazelle had 9 legs that alternatively hit the ground 3 at a time and belched steam constantly).

Turning a corner wide the whistling monster rushed into a large cavern while faster than anything in Innearth’s dungeon. A void fly got hit by the passing tank, its dense body ripping a gaping billowing hole in its side while getting squished beyond belief. Steam shot from the side of the jumper while it continued to whistle – as if screaming. Finally a normal snake with two rings cautiously came up to its side and stabbed. Its head extending through it with a blue shimmering spike that appeared around its cone head a good 50cm past its tip.

Pulling back Innearth tried to review what went wrong. While watching bits of the monster break apart and slodify in scraps.

The madness obviously. I mean I couldn't hear what they were thinking but I can imagine it was a constant sort of "ahhhhhh kill kill kill" sort of nonsense.

Let's see. I think I read that plants and traps can be made that are less dangerous than monsters so I'll see what I can do with that.

Returning to a trap Innearth haven't thought about in a while, Innearth checked the main trap of the crystal caverns. They used the expansion-like pseudo pressure mana reaction between Water and Fire mana to shoot forward. They could stab from wherever they were located and then slowly reeled back after having shot once.

Innearth had colour-coded them as a trap to add something special to the crystal caverns. Each room in the caverns was a different colour and only crystal spikes that were the same colour as their containing room were dangerous.

They were great! But as Innearth got older they seemed less and less dangerous. That was partly the goal – adventurers had to see a few go off before they knew to avoid them – but most adventurers that reached these floors could just tank them and he did want adventurers to learn the secret and start avoiding them.

The other problem was that comparing it to the void tipped and stomached trapdoor spiders the spikes felt…well lacking somehow.

First things first Innearth made a trap version of the spike using a pressure block embedded deep within the ground.

The steam and pressure pushed out into a large enclosed room and dissipated – Innearth was nearly positive that was not how pressure was supposed to work but pressure mana was weird and as long as the room it was pushing into was big enough it wouldn't increase the atmospheric pressure inside it too much.

It looked like the air was being blown into the room constantly but a closer look showed the only thing moving into the room was the mana. The process…was almost like looking at the side of a stretched treadmill. One where the “track” slowed down and then almost disappeared on the other side before appearing and continuing to push on the other.

Huh.

The steam stone was embedded into a small enclosed container surrounded in a thick layer of Earth mana for good luck. Connected by a 6cm wide output tube upwards and then sideways to the “output room” with a flap. The top slid up into a crystal spike of the appropriate colour and the side broke off into a separate smaller utility tube. This one held a solid “rope” of sorts that slide through a frictionless container down to a reel that could be spun – pulling the spike back and resetting the trap.

Now, How is this going to work.

Claiming the whole area and then flipping the flap and launching his spike a few times Innearth was slightly disappointed considering it moved much slower than the original design.

The further away from the source the steam got, the less effective it became and Innearth was forced to make a second attempt in a new spot. This time only extending up 60cm as the minimum length he could fit all his engineering instead of the original three-meter depth.

How about this one?

Trying again, a massive burst of power released his spike in a hissing whoomp. The crystal whipped up roughly 5 times as fast as the original design while a thick cloud of steam billowed up from the gaping hole it came from.

Shunting the steam back into the steam room Innearth watched the white smoke dissipate slowly as the end of the crystal was dragged over and reset.

...okay. well honestly as a trap this is effective but kind of sucks. It's basically one use – because I can't mend the spike without remaking it and remaking it means my whole pully system is useless because I might as well just remake it straight onto the launch tube instead of all the effort to bring it back.

Let's see if a plant version is better. If it works correctly the spikes should be able to heal that way.

Making yet another version – checking everything once to make sure it was combined and then giving life to the system – Innearth watched with slight anticipation.

The "plant" / living trap was somewhat like a clam. The Earth mana around the pully and around the smoke stone was where the majority of the "life" of the plant was stored. A faint section was attached to the stone itself and the crystal above obviously but the whole thing felt...controlled somehow.

Unable to get it to shoot aimlessly on command, Inenarth got a fly to flit past the top of the spike. Noticing something it could attack the living trap shot upwards gleefully a hissing bellow flying everywhere.

Success!

A similar event was played out with the plant attacking and its spike shattering but this time as the living trap was within range of a crystal pillar it faintly started regrowing even as it was retracted. The rate was abysmal – it would probably take over an hour before anything real was done but this was fine. Automatic resetting was all Innearth cared about.

So the plant feels...it feels almost clinical and focused. Maybe it's just as crazy as the monster was but in terms of the result, it's like it's not being affected at all.

How can I take this and turn it into a monster?

It's a challenge I haven't had to face before and I really want to figure it out. I'm not sure how useful it is, but it's still important to me. I want to finish this up first and then populate the later half of the crystal caverns with these instead. They can get used to the shots near the start and then come up against the more dangerous versions after they know what to look for.

I was reminded of a clam. The hole is kind of conspicuous and while I don’t think I’m going lure adventurers into putting their hands down it I might as well reward those that do.

Making a glittering mana stone at the bottom as a reward and then adding in a sideways spike that could stab anyone who stuck their hands in the trap was complete. If adventurers were brave enough to stick their arm down the hole they could grab a prize. If they were dumb enough to stick their whole arm down random holes they would get stabbed.

…perfect. I think this trap is done. Now to try and figure out how to make a monster like this.

Wracking his core, Innearth slowly moved around his dungeon staring at various constructs blankly as he tried to figure out what exactly his problem is. Is it impossible?

...can I cheat somehow? Staring at the wavering back of the crystal dragon Innearth slowly started to think about what he was seeing. The living crystals were a plant. They were already living and thus did not get integrated into the dragon's body. There's something there…

Innearth wanted to make a steam and pressure monster. But how he was currently making it and controlling it with Earth did not actually need the steam block to actually be a part of the body...he just needed the "side effects" of it being stored inside of the monster's body to consider it a success.

With this new plan created Innearth created a bare bone empty shell of a monster plant. A tube roughly half a meter wide and a full one long with over two dozen holes spread across its top and sides. Each hole extended out in a stubby outwards flaring tube that could easily be connected to and the inside consisted of a single large block of smoke stone.

Giving life to the plant Innearth watched as the ball rolled harmlessly to the side shooting steam at the wall unable to move.

Step 1 done.

Step 2 is to make the monster casing surrounding this tube.

He could either use this already created plant as a component similar to how he "donated" un recreateable living crystal to his panel every time he made a crystal bat. Or, because the system deemed him able to recreate this plant consistently he could simply use it as a "sub schematic" and the system would print them out in the right order. Like how he spawned new mothers covered in separate crazy balls.

Now. Let's make something similar to the last attempt. Setting up tubes connecting the inside to valves and releases and pistons and boiling kettle-like limbs Innearth remade his steam...well it galloped in a way. So steam horse.

Once again butting up against the limitation of his naming pattern Innearth christened the new monster. It was a naming pattern that failed him for the more abstract designs but one he stuck to all the same. Innearth focused on finishing the transplant of the steam source plant. Letting his new steam powered monster spawn, Innearth was almost surprised when it appeared relatively intact and didn’t immediately explode.

We are off to a good start!

Hoping a few times, the belching monster started making a much more subdued path through the crystal caverns.

Instead of starting off at max speed, the steam horse started at a brisk trot before slowly ramping up its run and finally a full gallop.

I...did it?

I'm sure other cores have done something like this before but...well… there are no steam horse designs on the market so it can't be that common. I’m going pretend I’m unique and great and celebrate!

Basking in the brief feeling of accomplishment Innearth turned away from Steam – ignoring the horse to either live or die in the caverns. It didn't really match his theme so it would probably not be remade until Innearth had a proper place to put it but he has more important things to review.

...I should have checked how much experience I had beforehand but I'm level 50 now...I gained at least a whole level from that creation!

My second goal is to figure out what Air and Earth do...I'm not looking forward to this. But I also am? I hate having to use Air mana.

Focusing on Earth first Innearth made a solid blobby ball of Earth mana. Like a ball of grey mud in mid-air, it took less than a single second to transmute his pure mana into this well known form.

Wincing once more he turned to Air. Slowly laboriously he focused on making a slowly spinning ball of Air mana.

You could visibly see it shift from pure mana to Air this time and the resulting blob was decidedly less refined.

Turning towards the center once he was sure the Air was stable, Innearth shoved them both together and watched the block of quartz wither and decay. Unlike the burst of instant smoke that was steam mana, Dust/Dry mana took a moment to get going.

More and more of the crystal flaked off into the air – a miniature dust devil in the middle of the hall. When the whole crystal was finished flacking, the dust devil moved as if suddenly broken from the tether that was holding it in place.

Sliding up against the wall and then inching along the side of the hall, the miniature sandstorm ripped into the dungeon. Grinding the crystal and finally spending itself a few feet further in the magical construct disappeared just as slowly as it had grown – slowly fading away and leaving a powder finer than sand across a huge stretch of the hall.

...okay. Well uh...I guess I have to try giving life to that next.

Unsure of what would happen exactly – but content with the safety of the experiment far away from his core – Innearth made a second dust devil. Making sure to give life to it at the start of the material's life cycle, Innearth sent a spark into the crystal just as it had begun to “flake”.

Immediately intent filled the air as the rest of the crystal flaked off in seconds instead of closer to a minute. Disappearing like a certain snap from a popular franchise the dust floated up into the air and turned grey as it shrivelled and then became a cloud that started to roll about.

Roaring with anger the spinning dust cloud felt like a tornado as it ripped down the hall moving and seeking out something to rip into.

As it moved Innearth tried to think about controlling it with Fire or Water. The storm charged at its fellow monsters – chasing a turtle several steps before catching up and surrounding it in the background.

Seeming to shrivel up like a vampiric victim in a bad horror movie the turtle simply...dried up. A living crystal shot was sent flying through the cloud harmlessly before the turtle expired – flaky bones and skin, covering "air pocketed" dried out bones.

Moving next towards a hedgehog, Innearth stopped the stalking dust cloud with a splash of water.

Turning towards the puddle the dust cloud momentarily stopped its slaughter to attack this new prey. This weak very “kill worthy” puddle must die!

Running over its lengths several times the dust cloud stilled slightly growing meek as it drank the water. A few more puddles were placed and the cloud charged again and again. Each puddle drunk caused it to grow more and more sluggish and full looking as it continued to chase “prey” well past its ability to dry them out.

Next flipping to Fire mana, Innearth created a small ball of fire, pulling the line of mana closer and closer to the cloud. Shaking off the happy sluggishness, the cloud moved first to mad rage as some of the water’s effect wore off, then like a teetering seesaw switched to cowering as it attempted to get away.

Chasing the cloud with a "stick" of fire, Innearth played around with reward and punishment – seeing how simple the dust cloud was able to be controlled with either but especially both of its adjacent elements.

Hmmm. I think I figured this out for the most part...it almost seems easier to deal with than Steam mana.

The problem is as soon as I stop this "control" It goes back to an out of control state.

Can I make a monster that self punishes or self rewards itself? It works a lot better when I can use both. I could do something similar to the inner steam plant and set it up as a pair of monsters?

But unless it's only a drop having both Fire and Water in a single monster goes back to madness again.

…Unless I can make two monsters that touch and are combined but remain separate somehow? Sort of water on one half fire on the other twin type monster? That seems a bit complicated for my goal…

Three monsters it is.

Creating solid crystal bodies without liquid and that resisted being dried out, Innearth gave life to two small wheeled golems.

A red-tinted crystal with a small fire core and a fire crystal on the top of it that shot flames up in the air like a flamethrower occasionally was the bad cop. A blue-tinted crystal with a water core and bent spout containing a water crystal that sprayed a fine mist of water was the "good cop". Because they were meant to work together each had a mental mana connection and despite their contradictory elements the two monsters were mostly crystal and seemed to get along okay.

At least they begrudgingly worked together and didn’t attack on sight.

These two crystals were a recent discovery. When combining crystal mana and other types Innearth was finding more and more materials when flipping through all his "two element" versions. The most useful was the "X crystals" similar to the Kinetic crystals when mana was passed through it they would make a strong burst of the effect. Quartz made liquid crystal but Salt (NaCl) made a water crystal. It was one of those things that didn’t make sense but Innearth just learned to deal with it and move on.

Finished with his drones, Innearth set them up with the dust cloud. The two drones seemed easily able to control the cloud, but beyond that didn't have much purpose.

Or they had a purpose but nothing beyond the narrow goal of keeping the cloud content and scared in the corner of the cavern as they bullied it.

Checking his level Innearth saw he was up once again.

52? This series of experiments is incredibly lucrative. Even if it’s a one time thing I’m making huge gains!

...should I try controlling tier two madness mana? It seems really good for levels. I could try the Kinetic+Mental one!

...no. MIM'S are core killers. Without a lot of life or death force, I'm as good as dead. I would be much better off trying the Life+Death combination.

...and I'm not touching demons just yet. Maybe someday. This madness experiment is making me feel slightly better about handling demons but...I just don't feel up to it.

What was I doing again? I got distracted... OH. I was making my ice area. I think this has been enough of a break lets start expanding it and filling it with more monsters.