Dungeon Core Chat Room.

Okay, I'm serious, Kate. Something incredibly weird is happening in this dungeon. I watched a trio of green and brown monsters fight through a horde of mosaic monkeys and then open up and slide down a secret passageway. One used tentacles to lift it up while the others jumped into it one by one...and then the tentacled monster carefully placed the stone-coloured trap door down on top of them!

This wasn't in the regular section of the dungeon okay? Can no one tell me what's happening? Honestly can someone take me seriously? I got a class skill called [shade's premonition] the other day and it's leveled all the way up to level 14 in only 3 days! That's proof that something weird is happening. The bartender at the pale drink told me that's normal in dungeons and to ignore it but...but really? That's normal?

Am I really the only one who thinks something big is about to happen?

Excerpt obtained from a conversation held just inside the "Hypnotic Dungeon" -Year 2000AS

Rules: Round Robin "till there is one"

You will be given a base in your ring. That base has a fake core and if your core is shattered for any reason you lose.

To even the playing field you agree to do the equivalent of setting your regeneration to the lowest competitor in your ring for fairness. All excess will be gifted away constantly. We recommend putting your dungeon on hold as best as you can for this event to maximize your mana use.

Monsters can be created using materials scavenged in the playing area as well as your inventory. You may not transfer any pre prepared or unique materials into the playing field but anything else is fair game.

Final Description and sign-up.

In the ring there will be periodic challenges of a few different flavors. They will be varied but have a theme of creating monsters with specific effects, constraints or goals. Simultaneously you may attack your opponents' bases and must maintain your defenses while completing the various challenges.

Scoring low in the challenges can result in your elimination, while scoring well can protect you from failure in later ones. It will also add to your total dungeon games score.

Finally rules may be added or removed arbitrarily and if you do not agree to follow the newest rules you may be eliminated.

Good luck.

Enter? Y/N? Current participants [4]

Innearth: hey. So, opinions on newest event?

Abe: sounds fun. I'm in.

Innearth: truce? Alliance? Non-aggression agreement?

Abe: yeah sure. I already beat you in the race I'm happy to form a truce. I'll agree not to raid your stores. Or whatever.

Amy: Hey, Yeah, I'm thinking of joining but I still don't really know what this event is about. Anyone? Also let me in on that truce. Don't turn on each other until the end!

ZeMadDoctor: ...I would prefer not to make a fake truce and then have it be broken later...

Abe: come on bro. A truce is sacred! I wouldn't throw away our continued friendship for a brief chance to win some stupid event. You know me.

Innearth: ...You know doc maybe you have a point.

Abe: BRO.

Innearth: I'm joking. The truce is still on obviously. :3

Fated Eternal Design: Do you know what the event will be like? How are you already making truces, I’m still trying to figure out what this event actually will be about.

Innearth: Adding rules as we go would be scary, but you can always just drop out so best not to think about it. From what I can understand the event looks like we’ll be completing tasks with the chance to sabotage each other.

Innearth: Like if we don’t think we can win against someone we could try taking them out before we have to compete you know? Seems simple enough.

Innearth pressed the participation button “legally binding” himself to the rules and started setting stuff up in advance.

Enough events had gone by that he trusted them now...at the start of the Dungeon games he would have balked at the idea of sending away mana for an extended period of time but now...well now he was having fun and he agreed with the assessment that this only happened every decade. Might as well make the most of it.

He hesitated before stopping both his advancing and inner wars. Finally relenting Innearth told all of his monsters to defend themselves but not seek out or start anything while this event was going on.

As soon as the confirmation arrived, Innearth found he was given a two-story two-room place to work. The bottom room was set underground and had a single tier 1 core on a pedestal to represent what he had to protect.

...the idea that we have to protect something that looks vaguely like us from getting killed is slightly macabre.

The top room was underneath a large reinforced dome of highly compressed and strengthened metallic material. It had an oval-shaped open door on the side and connecting the two floors was a ramp that moved around and down its side.

A timer was set to 15 minutes to situate oneself and prepare. Innearth knew that was a vital amount of time. There was a non-zero chance that he would be attacked in that amount of time and he had to act fast. 15 minutes was just short of enough time to print one of his better defenders – the tank and artillery pair that was the magma spider and crystal bat pair.

He could also have made a snake but those were better at attacking and not getting attacked, than they were at preventing anything from getting past. Finally, he could have made a crystal hedgehog or turtle and it would have printed slightly faster but...it also would have been less mobile and potentially easier to get past than the spider and bat.

Finally. Through the magic of big data, he had discovered more "strong" schematics for the spiders and bats than he had for the lesser created Turtles. The largest problem was being unable to transfer “unique materials” from his dungeon and sadly the living crystal counted. Happily, Innearth had a few schematics that used other options and picked one that flung globs of liquid fire through its connection to the spider.

Side effect of constantly remaking spiders and snakes for their war…when this competition is over, I should start considering if I want to stick with mana circuits or not.

I get that I’m using a broken system…but I also feel like there are tangible benefits to continuing.

Checking around, it appeared there were four cameras focusing on the center of the ring from different angles. From them he could see the sides of all the domes and how their doors pointed inwards. With the angle and distance, he could not see more than that however and he was blind to anything behind the domes.

In the top corner of the event stream there was a graphic of the dotted ring, with names radiating out from each dot-like spokes of a wheel.

Keeping a portion of attention on the screens Innearth tried to plan out what he was going to do next.

I don't really feel like trying to destroy the other Cores preemptively. I'm going to focus on defence and then as soon as that's good enough, scout out the area. I want to know what I'm facing and then I can work on information.

As soon as the time ticked down there was a strange sort of anticipatory pause that stretched out awkwardly.

His pair were at 20s to print when suddenly, from the corner of one screen he watched a swarm of small, four legged, grey creatures – with no head but a sharp horn – rush out of one of the bases. There were 23 of the monsters that ran gleefully towards different cores' bases in a preemptive strike.

It took 40s to cross to reach Innearth’s base and a single spike dog made it a half a meter into his base before it was met with his defences.

A single crystal spike shot out, sliding past the invader's spike before stabbing through the whole length of the monster. The force was enough to fling it out of his base – dead – and Innearth stared after it.

Weak.

But then again if they were making that many it makes sense, they are this weak. I bet they are aiming for Cores who haven't set up basic defences yet.

Every 40 seconds, a new spike dog was released. They were certainly cheap enough to spam and over the first few minutes of the game a dozen Cores fell to the weak swarm.

Every time a Core fell, their name would disappear from the circle graphic and their dot would grey out – from a dark almost black to a light transparent ring.

…This rush strategy wasn’t necessarily the smartest for the nameless Core, however.

They managed to take out quite a few Cores by surprise but by throwing everything they had into their initial strike they didn’t have enough time or mana to make their own defences.

A retaliation strike was done swiftly by a rolling ball of dirt with a sharp spiralling root on its side. The ball calmly trundled into the entrance to their core room and then after a silence trundled out once more – looking relatively smug despite being just a ball of dirt.

Two more incursions happened in the next few minutes – the first by a centipede-like creature that glowed with magma and fire and the second by a spinning kinetic and earth top that jumped around as it moved. The top made its way purposefully across the ring into a very specific cave on some sort of vendetta while the centipede just aimed for the closest core room to attack.

Innearth’s second pair was nearly printed and he started to set up simple traps near his door. He didn’t have much room downwards to place stuff, so he worked off creating void spikes on the side that were controlled with several spinning kinetic plates.

The spikes could be shoved from the left side of the door at a moment’s notice and were made into a “plant trap” by giving them life. Ideally, they could have been controlled directly by Innearth…but he wasn’t sure how to run his influence through something across the system…he expected it was impossible.

He took a moment to check his current stats.

Innearth

Level

56

104/3762 exp to next level.

System Access Level

5

0/2 requirements met to advance.

-0/50 sapient delves.

-Level 64+

Stats

Mana Regeneration

81.87

personal unit/min

Mana concentration

2.75

AMU / personal unit

Mana Storage

6103.20/10345.68

AMU

Physical Storage

56%

Capacity

Age

908 days

2 years

Distance underground

293

meters

Number of floors

13

floors

Titles.

Earth Mana Specialization, Crystal Mana Specialization, Void mana Specialization.

…These games are giving me a lot of levels comparably. Especially that last event…It's almost suspiciously high. Is the system increasing experience gains for the games? Or is it just a product of trying something I haven’t done before…both?

If it is, I should make sure to take advantage of this.

Anyways.

Adding some stats and then creating a separate smaller form specifically for this event, Innearth set up a panel showing his relevant resources just for now.

Level

56

104/3762 exp to next level.

Mana Regeneration

156.5

AMU/Min [225.15 Regular]

Mana storage

6104.65/10345.68

AMU

Time till full

27.09925

Min

So. I spent a lot making those 4 defenders and trap but it was worth it. I’m pretty sure that’s good enough to defend against most anything that can attack me because I used some of my strongest schematics for it… 27 minutes is a bit longer than usual due to my lower regen but It's still a safe number for what is essentially boss level monsters.

…Not having adventurers is actually almost a boon for this event. I can shut down my dungeon much easier and use all the mana I’ve been allowed on this event.

Moving on, I could make a greater crystal snake as a scout…But those cost around 1200 for my current schematics and I don’t want to put in the work to weaken them for a cheaper cost again. This is probably the time to switch to a numbers game. I can make a regular snake with a general weak crystal manipulation circuit for 450. I can also make ones that have stronger manipulation skill that’s more constrained into spikes or making paths like the scout before he ascended.

I could also try transplanting a strong general crystal manipulation that’s close-ranged from one of my greater snakes – but that would up the cost to closer to 800 mana and I don’t want to deal with it not working with the smaller and slightly different shape.

That skill that’s almost a spell would be the most useful in case they need to bring back materials from the surroundings.

Another goal is that I don’t want to drop below 50% of my capacity for long in case I need it for a mini event…and actually now that I think about it, what if an event drops our regeneration down to 0? I think staying near full is the safest.

So, make a dozen normal snakes as scouts, then wait till I regenerate closer to full to make some stronger scouts using the greater general crystal manipulation?

It’s a plan!

Working on creating his snakes and waiting to regenerate, Innearth started sending out scouts slightly later than the Cores who had forgone defence. It was slightly disappointing seeing monsters come back with strange and probably powerful materials while he was just getting ready but the defence he made seemed like a smarter short-term decision.

Especially watching the occasional raid succeed – one “wheeled cart with arms” came rolling back. Its whole back was full of various glinting stones and plants but before it could reach the core room it was accosted by three bandits. The three bandits smashed the cart to pieces before returning to deposit them in their relevant core rooms. To make matters worse a 4th monster made of tentacles that left an ooze across the ground, headed into the Core’s base who just had their resources intercepted and smashed the core inside.

…was that Amy? How many Cores are using tentacled monsters? If that was Amy wow…brutal. Kick em while their down.

A few of his snakes came back in time for Innearth’s new “report” mental mana station to set up.

Around the ring there was roughly a kilometer of rough multi-layered rocky outcrops to explore. For the most part there were “unique” materials that were either embedded in the walls to mine laying about on the floor or deep in small caves.

The truly strong “looking” materials however were guarded by the host's monsters. If you wanted to grab that glassy material that was constantly shooting off sparks hot enough to burn everything around it, you had to get through 3 rhinos circling. Wanted to loot the floating rocks? Had to fight off the mystic parrots to do so.

Based on what he could tell from the reports he was gathering the only materials he was interested in were located behind guardians. That moved up his timeline for switching to stronger scouts to "immediately" and he started printing greater snakes to take over

At roughly the hour mark a popup appeared.

As the initial craziness has stabilized we can now move on to the first challenge. There are 84 cores remaining which means we have a nice even bracket. I love when that happens.

Shortly I will be depositing balls with elements written on them into the center of the ring. Your task will be to make a monster out of nothing but the mana type displayed (and pure mana or non magical materials). None of your unique materials can be used. Max core size is Tier 3. Afterwards your monster will be pitted against a randomly drawn opponent where it will fight to the death for your ranking. There is a non interference rule put in place. Finally once you’ve chosen your element you may not hold onto additional balls. Save it for the rest of the competitors. By continuing you agree to all of these rules as stated in the sign up. Good luck! ~Phantasmal Patterns.

92 small bouncing balls were suddenly dropped into the center of the ring – scattering in separate directions.

Okay! Go! Try and get Crystal Earth or even Void! Grab a good one please I can’t imagine what I’ll do if I’m stuck with something like Air or worse Space or Time.

The newest greater crystal snake shot off at Innearth’s urging. Two cup-like crystals formed rapidly on either side of it as it went to grab relevant balls and bring them back for Innearth to read.

…It wasn’t in the rules, but it appeared most Cores were doing the same. They were getting greedy and trying to collect as many balls as possible before shifting to ones they liked.

As Innearth checked his list he watched one monster actually exit a Core’s base and bring a ball to their friend.

The first batch came back to Innearth. Kinetic mana, Stone mana, Sand mana, Magma mana.

I guess Stones the best here for me.

Keep searching though. I think I’d prefer crystal if you can get it. Crystal or even plain Earth.

Considering the balls Innearth had gained for a moment he sighed and tossed the Magma, Sand and Kinetic ones out into the center again.

Some Cores were playing with the “Once you’ve chosen your element you may not hold onto balls” rule and were hoarding a pile of balls without picking one. It seemed like needless antagonism especially when they were being attacked by monsters desperate for a ball.

…There are 92 balls for 84 cores. More than enough to go around as long as you are fine with getting a non-beneficial or harder mana type.

The greater crystal snake came back with 4 more balls.

Life, Eternity, Dirt, Binding mana, Weapon mana.

Briefly considering them Innearth sent off a message in the group chat.

Innearth: Hey FED? You still in this? Want an Eternity ball?

Fated Eternal Design: Tier 3 mana sounds horrible to use on its own. I’m trying to roll an Air core – simple is best.

…I already tossed an Air core already…oops…he does have a point though, I’d prefer Earth to Stone.

Tossing all 4 of them out into the middle once again, Innearth waited for his snake to return.

This time the snake came back with only 3 balls…they were rapidly being claimed he couldn't do this much longer.

Fire mana, Gas mana, Mud mana.

What are the chances there is a crystal ball left?

Tossing them out, Innearth watched as one of the Cores who had been hoarding a pile finally picked and tossed a pile of 10 balls into the middle. Monsters scrambling to chose something their creators could use.

…one last roll I guess?

Lake mana, Health mana, Sand mana, Binding mana.

The pile was rapidly dwindling and after shifting through everything Innearth finally decided to claim the ball he had.

As soon as he confirmed he wanted to use Stone as his element the ball disappeared, and a new bracket was set up.

Innearth [Stone mana] vs Corr [Mist mana].

Remaining time [23 hours 48 minutes 59 seconds]

Innearth looked at the bracket he was in and then at the greater bracket. He had been unlucky with the random scooping…There were 8 Earth cores and 1 Crystal core that had been taken before he could pick something. Not recognizing anyone his friends were facing he returned to his own pairing.

…Mist. Is this going to be like fighting an Air core? This feels like an altered version of Air vs Earth and I’ve already had to deal with that when I dealt with FED’s spirits…

Let’s see. I can make a stone golem similar to my old Earth golem…that might work reasonably well…The…the biggest problem will be damaging mist.

Small sharp and slow attacks will probably do nothing to it. Mist is slightly easier than air because I think fire could damage it? …I’m stuck with stone, however.

I can imagine if I make a monster big enough to flatten it that might be enough to break apart whatever they make. The more magic I make my stone golem the more its attacks will be theoretical, and magic based than physical and thwarted…SO let’s see.

First I’ll make a monster that’s large and can hit hard with wide attacks and then I will work on making it magical…but that feels like I’m trying to get the best of both worlds :/ Also I’m thinking large but it has to fit inside my base and through the door unless…I want to make the door bigger for some reason?

I’m getting distracted. First let’s get the shell in place.

Innearth worked on using stone mana to make a large car-like base with a dozen wheels on both sides.

Stone mana was easy to work with but hard to work with well. If he were working with it manually making a rough lumpy block would take but a minute while making a similar-sized, perfectly smooth, ring would take almost an hour of shaping. It would have been faster to design a machine to grind and smooth the magic stone afterwards than it would have been shaping it to be perfect.

…The system design panel cheated that whole difficulty shoving the more exact dimensions into a slightly longer print time happily.

“Doughnut with radius of 10cm shoved on pole that’s locked into the middle? Gotchu. That will be uhhhhh 25 mana and 2 minutes thank you very much” "Why you’re welcome Mr System. Pleasure doing business with you”

Setting the 24 wheels onto their own “sockets” Innearth made sure they could all shift in constrained “horizontal range” that would allow turning. Because alone those wheels would not move nearly as fast or as well as Innearth wanted, they each got a small stone core directly in the middle of them.

The next part of this tank of a monster Innearth wanted to work on was the method of attack. Returning to a previous design Innearth took the incredibly old “Gol1&2” schematic and revived the spirit of them back from the dead. Instead of a hooked spear that could stab downwards, Innearth made a large slightly curved flat “fly swatter” on the front. Heading backwards was a counterweight that shifted the center of balance back and forth letting it fall forwards in a large smash or raise up slowly.

Should I even rely on a circuit for this monster? I feel like I need to make sure its smash is a skill that is magical enough to kill mist…but I’ve just been warned off circuits and don’t have enough time to experiment with them.

I can’t imagine any Cores will have made a circuit for a monster that looks like this…so maybe I just have to make a unique looking stone and pure core circuit and “decide” that it will make the smash magical?

…Will it even work if I know that that’s what I want it to do? Do I have to trick myself into thinking its going to work like that? Damn. As useful as the information was it might have been detrimental to find out how circuits work.

…But okay. Maybe I don’t have to pretend. I just have to intend for it to work? That’s how intent works right? …but that’s not how Phantasmal Patterns made it sound like it would work for spells.

…I’m spending too much time on this I’ll just make one and hope for the best.

Due to being made completely out of stone mana there was a huge boost that making the largest core out of stone mana would give. Hesitating on cost Innearth made 1 tier 3 stone core in the very center. Next 4 tier 2 versions in the 4 corners of his fly swatting tank before making swirling connections with miniature nodes everywhere. The whole time he was designing this he was taking into account the print time and despite still having plenty of time left Innearth printed his monster early so it would have time to settle.

…

And then it was time. Multiple duels were called at a time and every time one failed another was called to take their place. Roughly 20 minutes into the duel session Innearth was up, sending his stone monstrosity rolling out.

His opponent was a rubbery frog-like monster that breathed mist into the air around it covering the whole ring in seconds and causing other teams to call interference…

…are you joking? They made a solid monster for me to hit? That rubbery fleshy creature looks like it’s made with pure mana. Are they even trying? FED would have made a creature completely out of mist that attacked from all directions!

Charging out, the tank rolled across the length of the ring in seconds. its large flat “Swatter” pierced through the hidden fog and came down towards the frog.

A rush of thick almost solid-looking mist flew out to intercept the swatter while the frog moved to jump to the side – surprised it had been found in its hiding spot. Despite its best efforts however the palm of disapproval came down hard, rendering all resistance futile. As it fell, a weight seemed to build in the seconds of hang time. The edges appeared to grow larger and its front gained a meteor-like haze of heat on the bottom.

Smack.

…Mist slowly cleared as their creator was defeated. A faint dew covered the ground where a clear squished splatter was left of the frog.

Victor [Innearth]

…that’s it?

Innearth watched as his stone creation rolled back to him and he tried to consider what happened.

Okay so maybe they got an element they were bad at. And I guess I have made earth golems before out of a single element…so I can’t be too mean about this. But wow that was pathetic.

…

Free from the mini event and not sure what to do with his stone monster Innearth ended up sending it off as a pair with a greater snake. They were to find and bring back unique materials as well as continue scouting the greater area their little arena was set up in.

The first event ended without too much fanfare or penalties for losing, but soon after it was over the next event was “Issued”.

Elemental Endurance.

A zone has been set up where an excessive amount of damage will be applied in dozens of different ways. The goal of this mini event is to create a monster that can survive the amount of damage I will be sending its way. No Restrictions on anything other than time. You have only 12 hours to design and create your tank. Penalties are coming into place for falling before others. Good luck!

…this event seems much simpler than the previous. Make a tank that will have to deal with lots of different dangerous areas.

Okay. First off. Healing is important. Lots and lots of health sacks and regenerating fluid to heal those sacks. My current goto tank is the magma spider but its legs are easily damaged and I don’t need it to attack anything. So, let’s start off with my turtle schematic and go from there!

Taking the crystal turtle, Innearth started making space and shoving more and more healing and paired regeneration sacks into its middle. The innards got more and more squished in and its size was increased twice till it was roughly a meter in diameter. Its large crystal cannon was removed in favour of covering it completely with a shell.

The next thing I have to deal with is its shell. Crystal mana materials are strong but shatter easier. They also don’t provide as much defence against the elements as I’ll probably need for this event.

…Flipping between all the elements Innearth could think of he suddenly stopped when an idea struck him.

…What if…what if instead of taking damage I try to neutralize damage? By that, I mean what if I surround it in Void mana?

Liking this plan more and more, Innearth swapped out the turtle’s shell for “void silver” – roughly 3cm thick and insulated by a 1cm thick inner shell of “regular silver”. The inner shell was reinforced with metal mana as soon as it was no longer touching the void and then filled with a squishy pure mana and silicon layer to help protect the organs.

Partway through this design his greater snake and swatter tank came back carrying a vibrating red jewel roughly 50cm wide and 50cm tall. Dropping it caused light to seem to soak out of the ground and a portion of the stone ground was burned away in a pulse.

…do I add this to my turtle? I mean it might be able to neutralize attacks but also putting it in the center of my monster would break it…

It might also be damaged by the extreme effects of the challenge if stuck on the outside…I’ll put it to the side for now and use it later. Good job!

Returning to the design, the stubby legs of the turtle were made of more void. Next, the bottom was tipped in a metal mana ring similar to a horseshoe to prevent it from sinking down into the ground. The legs were a weak point so Innearth set up several “sandwiches” of silver, void silver, silver that prevented something from stabbing up through the bottom of their feet.

Next providing an equal number of 20 life nodes 20 void nodes and 10 kinetic nodes Innearth doubled down on everything he was focusing on…As he made the circuit, he spent some time wondering if it would work, wondering if him wondering if it would work would break it. Wondering if he should even use one…

…

The turtle printed just in time for the event to start. With the number of Cores that had already died, more cameras started to be set up – each detailing a large flat plain beside the ring of dungeon bases.

Trundling along out of the main camera, 83 monsters left the ring but only 81 arrived at the new area.

…Attacked on route huh? I guess that was done to prevent retaliation?

One of the affected cores was raging in the event chat while the other was silent.

Phantasmal Patterns: Not having a monster ready for the event counts as failing it. NO EXCEPTIONS! Sabotage is part of the event my fine Core.

Phantasmal Patterns: For the rest of you! Looks like everyone’s here and it's time to start!

The First challenge to descend was water.

A rain of clear liquid fell onto the group of monsters. Soft splashes fell down and pooled below them while slowly building up.

Looking around Innearth noticed all the monsters were still alive.

Is this designed to break any pure fire elementals? Looks like no one made anything like that this time around. Probably could have skipped this section after noticing no one made anything.

Continuing to watch Innearth saw the water get deeper and deeper till at roughly 3 meters tall, the deluge stopped.

Most monsters were floating at this point except a few like Innearth’s void turtle which was sitting on the bottom – a light whirlpool appearing around them as water was eaten by the void slowly draining the massive pool.

Not giving them much time to rest or orient themselves to the new situation the second stage began.

All along the bottom of the pool, flaps flipped around showing molten coils of red hot metal.

Within seconds the water began boiling, bubbles and steam rising from a hundred points upwards.

The shift was rapid and nearly instantaneous. A dozen monsters broke in the shift as super-heated blasts of steam sheared through and parboiled the weakest monsters.

Phantasmal patterns: I AM A CHEF! THANK YOU FOR HELPING ME MAKE SOUP! EHEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEHE.

Sure enough, the once clear liquid rapidly took on a greenish-brown tint as life-attuned monsters were cooked and distributed throughout the stage.

Slowly the boiling liquid descended, drying up and leaving the raining monsters sprawled about and covered by the remainders of the losers.

Magic filled the air as the ground warped and magma began being deposited about the ground.

...how is he doing all this so quickly?

Like sure he had time to set it up...oh I guess he's skimming mana from all of us in the name of fairness… having a huge amount of mana to work with would help.

He must have made pools of materials beforehand that he's now blipping in.

Some monsters weathered this storm while others preferred dodging the molten rock and metal and finding safe places to land on.

Two more monsters fell at this stage but by and large the monsters that already survived the rapidly boiling water were able to either dodge or weather the lava.

Slowly the room cooled at this point before the next phase began. Coils of spring-like metal were risen from the ground sparking with pinpoints of light as Lightning mana covered their lengths.

As soon as they were in place a dust of sorts started to fill the air.

The catalyst was all that was needed. As soon as the dark metallic dust hit the pillars they were sucked inwards fueling a change of matter to energy. Lightning mana arced up and down each coil and flickered through the air. Arcs jumped from monster to monster damaging and passing through them. Surprisingly based on how the void turtle acted, at least some managed to penetrate its shell…but even if a portion of the mana reached it, all the healing organs were more than enough to protect it.

After a moment of getting hit the turtle seemed to shift slightly – its shell getting darker and it stopped jolting.

This lightning round killed off over a dozen monsters dropping the total still alive down to 30.

Of the monsters still alive, most seemed damaged – smoke rising lightly from their flesh. The only monster decidedly unfazed by the lighting was actually FED’s wind spirit who simply ignored the arcs of mana which seemed to pass by the group.

The next round required some setup and most of the monsters appeared to be healing while they had the chance.

The coils were retracted and replaced with bowls of various-sized weapons. Once those were in place a light wind began to blow across the whole zone. Wind picked up louder and faster and the lightest shards of metal began flipping up and flying about.

As more and more wind started flying around, the whole area began spinning into a light tornado of blades. A shard of metal nearly a meter wide hit Innearth’s turtle melting into it but leaving a gash that healed quickly. Monsters were hit by larger and larger shards – sections of their body sliced off and combined into increasingly more debris shifting about. Despite being made of air FED’s spirit was ripped apart by the greater “air” at this point.

Slowly the tornado died.

12 monsters remained. Of his friends, Amy and Abe’s monsters were still alive. Of his acquaintances Brutality Queen’s dirt monster was still in the running – Life mana positively exploding out of it as it rapidly tried to keep itself alive.

Phantasmal Patterns: Well…A nice showing this round. The goal was to wipe em all out but I’ve run out of prepared environments…So everyone left won! Everyone who fell has points between the previous and the time lasted tallied. I’m dropping the bottom 40…41 I have to make it even. If you see your name in the following list – you lost – I’m cutting your privileges in a moment.

Phantasmal Patterns: Feel free to mingle, the next event should show up soon!

…Alright then.

Innearth was pretty sure his turtle could have shrugged off more damage than it had just been dealt and was almost disappointed the punishment didn’t continue.

Checking the pile of unique materials that had started pooling at the side of his room, Innearth realized he was hoarding. There was a paper-thin yellow fabric that seemed incredibly smooth and stronger than it had any right to be. A sponge-like object that when squeezed released Hydrofluoric acid. There was even a disc that released bubbles constantly when moved.

Those bubbles would attach to anything nearby and slowly build. With enough bubbles, monsters or items could be lifted off the ground.

I mean. Unique materials are fun but as I get older I feel more and more like they are a crutch. What’s the point in making a monster that you can’t remake later? If a unique monster is a boss you have to figure out something new when they die…or collect the monsters parts and remake it…So in that manner unique monsters are just a way to spice up a dungeon. Not something to rely on.

Deciding to use them instead of waiting endlessly Innearth designed a unique spider bat pair. The spider was given the vaguely fire themed…crystal heart of sorts and the bat was given the bubbles as its main form of attack. A kinetic construct was set up to spin and create bubbles on demand while a propeller was set up behind it to blow the bubbles forward without using Air mana.

Moving onto the slippery material Innearth skinned a snake schematic and wrapped it with the smooth material.

Without the scales, it no longer looked anything like a snake but Innearth was hesitant to call this monster a worm with its size and relative strength…You are my sock snake okay? Good luck!

Continuing on Innearth went to make more monsters to send off when the next challenge stopped his army building.

The Ranged Event. Your next monster design goal is to make a monster that can shoot targets accurately using provided ammo. Distance, accuracy, strength, and moving targets are all on the table. Altering the ammo is allowed however for shots to count they need to be using the standardized shots. Good luck!

PS: I’m providing example shots for measurements. Hope it helps. ~Phantasmal Patterns.

Inside each of the 40 existing bases a single lead ball 8cm in diameter was deposited.

Shifting it about Innearth decided to once again alter his turtle design.

Taking the standard turtle and replacing its crystal spike cannon with an empty barrel Innearth considered his ball. The easiest direct upgrade might be swapping it with steam mana…I’m getting relatively experienced with making pressurized shooting mechanisms, right?

It was at that moment something different happened.

A round hole appeared in the side of the wall of his core room as a many-legged earth-based mawwed…spider worm? Spider with a long back? Burst out of the floor.

Orienting itself the creature dashed towards his core nearly ending the whole event right there.

Less than meter away from the core a dashing spider collided with the unexpected monster incursion. Grabbing its side with two legs the spider slammed its long cousin against the wall and with a flash it stilled before flaking away.

Bringing up the rear the bubble bat was left with nothing to do and after moving to return to their posts Innearth stopped them.

I wasn’t going to prey on Cores but hey…retaliation is fine by me. I bet whoever just attacked me saw how well I’m doing and didn’t want me to continue competing!

Innearth waited patiently for good news to come back from the hole. Obviously, he wasn't just wasting time, he had already replaced the cannon on the turtle schematic with a steam pressurized ball launcher and was spending the time slowly tweaking bits of it and checking the stats the system spat out. He was also, as always, printing out greater snakes to send off every time his mana was full.

Finally, after over half an hour passed with no response, he was forced to conclude something had happened.

It's almost like some karmic entity notices every time I get an inkling of arrogance and decides to make me fail. All I can say is in hindsight sending monsters through an easily collapsible tunnel of earth might have been a mistake. Let's prepare better.

Pausing his turtle design, Innearth printed a burrower to accompany one of the greater snakes who had come back with an incredibly shiny rock.

Heading into the tunnel once more, Innearth watched them go, hoping the burrower would be able to protect the snake at the very least even if it couldn’t actively fight.

Innearth started to amass every crystal snake that returned into a standing army inside his "base". There wasn’t enough time to return all the snakes that had been created over the past few days but in the time it took for a response he managed to collect two regular and one greater snake.

...

Roughly 5 minutes of waiting later, a hole formed roughly 9 empty bases down from him. A single pop of a coned snake's head popping out for half a second before retreating, indicated it was his monsters who had made the hole.

Got you.

Innearth sent all three returned snakes towards the culprit with a vengeance.

Disappearing into the Core’s base, all three snakes went in followed by a long pause. Imagining a cartoonist biffing and bopping Innearth amused himself while waiting.

A minute later 2 snakes returned victorious. Both the normal snakes and the burrower had died but the scout and backup greater snakes remained unscathed.

The dot and name faded at the same time as they exited the base and headed back to Innearth’s territory slowly healing small wounds across their flanks.

It was impossible to tell the approval or disapproval of the other Cores' based solely on their base but Innearth was becoming proficient in protecting and anthromophizing vague shapes.

Innearth: well. That's what happens when you attack me without reason.

Abe: lmao.

Amy: first blood? I've knocked out 5 cores already. :3

Innearth: ...okay then.

Fated Eternal Design: I've been ready since this event started. My Masks are good at chucking things let's go.

Innearth: ...don't rush the rest of us, we can't all have designed a monster to chuck metal balls before now.

Fated Eternal Design: why stop at balls. My Masks can chuck anything.

Abe: Explosions are a great way to launch items if you need help.

Innearth: we are fine. In other news the truce will end soon. What say you all?

Abe: gasp. Already ready to backstabbing. Final 4 was the truce not final 40.

Innearth: is everyone still alive? Doc?

ZeMadDoctor: yep. I'm not a part of your fragile truce. But yep I'm still alive.

Innearth: I haven't seen you in events. Have you been participating?

ZeMadDoctor: ...yes of course. I'm still here after all. You know I can make monsters other than demons right? And that I think it's frowned upon to make demons for the events?

Innearth: ...yeah. I think I vaguely remember something about Rats or something?

ZeMadDoctor: They are useful and can hold and operate items. Why do i feel judged.

Abe: done my monster! Can the event hurry up already? I'm getting bored of this event let's start attacking each other.

…

What felt like a moment later it was time to attack. 37 cores were participating in this round. Unlike the previous ones, everyone was prompted to "gift" or teleport their monster to the arena.

A second later it became clear why. With all the dead Cores freeing up cameras, Phantasmal Patterns could show the area off to a much higher resolution. A large cavern full of sprayed out platforms on thin columns was set up. Each remaining monster was placed far away from each other and given a pile of different coloured balls. Innearth’s turtle sniper was given blue balls while Abe's vaguely cannon shaped monster was given orange ones.

Beside the screen, an altered or at least amended rules for the event floated.

Ranged event Dodge-Ball event:

Probably should have mentioned but it's SO MUCH MORE AMUSING FOR ME THIS WAY. The targets in this event are each other's monsters.

Hope you made something that can dodge or protect itself!

The event has started. [37/37 remaining]

...I should be good with the turtle’s shell. It's pretty slow…I thought It would be shooting theoretical targets after all…but honestly, I think it will be fine even with those problems.

Innearth split his focus in two. Based on how his friends were talking, they would be settling this in a straight up battle soon instead of continuing with the events. So far Innearth had made an army of snakes – but he felt like they needed a boss level monster to lead them if he had a chance of winning. Sure the status of boss was weird and somewhat arbitrary from a dungeon perspective. The greater snakes were almost as strong as the magma sisters and were definitely stronger than the beginner and tutorial level bosses.

For this case a boss meant as strong of a monster as Innearth could make.

Innearth shifted to the strongest monster he had currently made. The crystal caverns boss from the crystal dragon.

...I don't think I can repeat that creation without the skull. Should I try anyways? Or pick a different base form?

Waffling about Innearth decided to use it as the base even without the unique material that pushed it to such a high status. It was essentially a snake with legs after all.

Splicing sections from other monsters and using some of the techniques he had learned since the “dragon” Innearth toiled away.

…

On the other side of his consciousness, the dodgeball event played out.

Amy had gone for a simple route which might have screwed her over in a conventional target practice but was paying dividends now. Simply put tentacles would grab balls, pull back, and then throw those balls. Easy enough concept. 4 of its 8 tentacles were used to hold onto the platform and move it back and forth, while the rest grabbed balls and flung them about.

They were reasonably accurate, but above all were much faster than the method of loading Innearth had set up. The turtle had to bend towards a ball, grab it with a small appendage that stuffed it down the tube, then turn and fire.

At least the way the crystal muscles were spread around the cannon allowed it to twitch aim and perfectly account for any movement. Innearth had imagined moving targets flying about they would have to hit for points after all.

The turtle had already taken out 3 random monsters in the first 10 minutes blasting them off the edge and down into the pit below. The pit had been promptly filled with an acidic bath of some clear liquid as soon as the first monster fell down and survived. The liquid melted anyone who fell preventing them from climbing back up.

There was one monster in this event that was cheating harder than any of the others however.

FED’s mask.

It was obviously not able to fall due to being constantly flying but to make matters worse it was snatching other Cores' shots out of the air and sending them back.

Taking one look at that monster and Innearth lost any hope at winning this event. The goal now was to wipe out as many monsters as he could before the challenge ended. Not that he could communicate that goal to the turtle but they seemed to have figured it out on their own.

Reload, Spin, Fire...Reload, Spin, Fire...

The event was down to 12 when Amy's shotput octopus turned to Innearth's turtle sniper.

*Crack*.

A reverberating shot glanced off the turtle's side pushing it sideways slightly towards the edge.

Returning fire, a shot removed one of the tentacles but missed its center.

Turning to reload a second and third shot hit the turtle pushing it further back each time and more importantly further away from the pile of balls the turtle could use to reload with.

Noticing the fire had diverted from it, several of the remaining monsters looked between the two trying to decide which they would prefer to lose.

The consensus seemed to be "Both" and 3 shots were sent from one side towards Amy's octopus with 3 sent towards Innearth's turtle as well.

Two shots landed on Amy while only one landed on Innearth but sadly that seemed to be enough. Pushed the last bit over the edge the turtle tilted – seemed to pause for a second – and then fell to the liquid below.

Amy's monster fared better. It lost 4 of its tentacles defending against the heavy shots but in doing so was reduced to a 3 armed cripple that was slowly trying to regrow.

Sensing weakness a volley aimed once more and the octopus was ripped from its perch falling to land in the acid below.

The rest of the fight played out pretty simply. Abe's cannon had been less flashy of a target but after Amy and Innearth's monsters were gone it quickly became an obviously competent target.

After being removed the last few were whittled down quickly by FED's mask which started systematically striking its remaining competitors until there was one.

Phantasmal Patterns: And We HAVE A WINNER! Similar to the past few events I'll cut this down to the top 18 combined with previous survive! Give me a second and I'll send off the next goal. It's going to be another 1v1 matchup good luck!

Sword And Shield.

You are to create two monsters. One which can only defend and one that can only attack. These monsters will be placed in a 2v2 battle against one another with the defender protecting the attacker as it attempts to wipe out its opponents.

Time until event start [12 hours]

Abe: Okay. This has been fun but I'm getting kind of sick of this you know? It feels like it's going on past its fun point. I'll take out the 4 Cores nearest to me. Amy, Innearth, FED, you should all knock out the 3 nearest to you as well and then once the riff raff are gone we can have a massive battle! I'm making a point to say Doc should remain as well for friendship even if he never officially joined us.

Fated Eternal Design: Roger Roger.

Amy: Already been working on that.

Abe: I bet I can take out my 4 before you can take out your 3.

Amy: ...I'll take out my 3 and if you are still working on yours come and help you out. You probably need it.

Innearth: ...so we arn't doing the next event? It looks like It could be fun!

Abe: Nah. This event has run its course but don't worry we can play games like this sometime in the future if we ever get in the mood.

Innearth: ...okay.

Even as they were talking Innearth watched armadillo-like pulsing monsters roll out of Abe's base and dash towards his nearest enemies two to each side.

Rolling into the bases and unfurling there was a brief moment where Innearth knew exactly what was going to happen before his prediction came true.

*Boom*.

Four bombs went off nearly simultaneously in the 4 bases. Each Core's defenders were blown out the side in a mess of shrapnel and a plume of smoke being the cue the rest of his friends took to start attacking en mass.

Innearth sent off a signal at that point, watching as his 173 greater snake army came pouring in from offscreen.

Exiting the cramped base, his slightly smaller and less intimidating crystal dragon stalked out to head his Army.

Sending a detachment of 4 snakes to each of his 3 assigned targets Innearth watched as defenders poured out each realizing too late that something different was happening.

One squad was completely wiped out and based on the humanoid creature of dirt that slowly started walking out this was Brutality Queen's base.

A moment of glee filled Innearth as he pettily sent over 50 snakes towards her base, the giant dirt golem falling with over two dozen spearing shots and the inside of the base being raided a moment later.

Massive armies were clumped together by both Amy and Innearth – one a mess of slithering snake bodies in a pile the other a mess of slithering tentacles in a pile.

FED had a slightly weaker showing with only a dozen masks but he had one of each type and a modified king of masks backing them.

Abe had a black metal box with treaded wheels roll out. On both side's, several small flaps opened up and 4 "legs" were deployed slowly raising the tank up a meter or so above the ground. A few seconds after it settled bomb-like rolling armadillo slugs started spawning endlessly from its insides and rolling out the flaps to the ground below.

Doc's base had a swarm of activity as rats flew out and started laying traps about the front of his dome, two "plasma rifle" type guards watching carefully the whole time.

Finally as one, each army clashed.

Bombs rolled towards Innearth's line continuously, while snakes rapidly began conjuring barriers between them.

Crystal walls shattered and were reformed continuously while the walls grew thicker and an almost castle formed between them. Lines of snakes flew up both sides of the ramparts and the ranged skills started forming in place to strike the bombs down before they reached the wall.

Below on the inside, Innearth's "Dragon" used a strange sort of dance with intermittent noises to reinforce the wall to the point it stopped shattering with the repeated explosions.

Meanwhile Amy saw the two were fighting and decided to aim for both FED and Doc at the same time. Half her army split and flowed towards the traps guarding Doc's base, prompting blasts of mana shot from weapons while the other half aimed for FED. In front of Doc, turrets sprung to life sending streams of liquid that were ignited into a bed of fire to block the water-based monsters while others sent a hail of metal beating into tentacled flesh.

The contingent of tentacles that were moving towards FED had better luck.

Wind blades and claws and a miasma of slowing speed filled the air confidently but despite their obvious weakness against time-based attacks, overwhelming numbers managed to win out this time. In and amongst the horde were multiple "unique" monsters, one of which was mostly resistant to the time magic and managed to slip forwards and take out the source.

After that, the king of masks seemed to absorb its underlings creating a hulking multiple masked tornado of wind but countless thin spikes of hardened liquid metal pierced and shattered the masks breaking most of the boss's concentration. Flinging themselves into the tornado, a group of 5 bombs crashed from the side and exploded blasting the air apart.

A line that headed into the base later and FED was eliminated.

Abe: HA! 1 down 3 to go!

Fated Eternal Design: ...I guess that's fair. I've been using a lot of mana to keep my dungeon running smoothly I don't want to shut down on my fans.

Innearth: I have no such weakness! Bet you wish you had no adventurers now huh :3

Abe: Nah. Literally, no one is wishing that. Keep making yourself feel better however :3

Churning through their bodies over half of Amy's monsters were killed trying to penetrate Doc's defences before a few actually broke through. Dashing forward they were shot near the door and fell anticlimactically.

Seeming to give up on this area Amy turned her monsters towards Innearth.

The two armies were at a similar size now but Innearth's were on average a higher quality. All his greater snakes had skills and most had strong skills that synergized with each other – some snakes were growing crystals rapidly while others were using crystal manipulation to fashion them into spears and still others were using a crystal shot skill to pick up and shoot those spears across the whole distance of the stadium with which they fought.

Abe sent an endless line of bombs towards Doc and despite many being shot before they could do any damage, each one that made it through broke through more and more defences.

Near the door, a rat appeared holding a great shield of several layers of kinetic magic propping it up while two rats took up positions on either side slow to reload endless pistols at the ready.

That shield is going to foil Abe...might as well help him out, I think I'd rather face Abe than Doc right now.

Sending a squad of 10 greater snakes towards Doc's final stand, Innearth peppered the group with crystal spikes while protecting them with crystal shields that floated in front and on top of them.

Each shot that hit the shield lost all momentum and fell to the ground but Innearth's snakes were able to pick up the unshattered pieces and spin them around to take out the rat holding this shield.

Falling forward to reveal a shocked group, Innearth pushed deeper into the base his snakes disappearing from the camera view and becoming unknown.

Abe: Hey Host! You have plenty of cameras now right? You should show off each of the remaining contestant's bases. We don't know what's happening in them.

Phantasmal Patterns: I guess...I guess it's no longer important to hide what people are making. Request GRANTED.

Abe: Thanks man. 10/10 host btw. You're doing great.

Phantasmal Patters: Ehehehe. Flattery won't change your score young core.

More screens flickered to life showing the inside of all of their bases. More importantly, seeing how the group attacking Doc was doing.

Inside of the base, a rabbit with purple eyes sat surrounded by the carnage of all of Innearth's snakes.

It did not look like a dungeon monster in the vague shape of a rabbit. It looked like a normal creature with something possessing it.

A bomb rolled in at that moment and the screen went black for a second before returning to normal – the bomb's remains eviscerated and strewn about disarmed – the rabbit standing normally and hopping about slightly.

Innearth: Does demon summoning count as disqualification worthy?

Phantasmal Patterns: ...No but that's only because I was too dumb to add it to the rules. I did not think anyone would be so crazy in this event...that's my bad. Ehe. Let me fix this.

New Rule: No demons or MIM's or otherwise uncontrollable monsters may be created or summoned. Please be courteous to your host.

Any Previously created demons must be put down to the culprits best abilities. Thank you. ~Pat :3

ZeMadDoctor: Bah. Fine. I disagree with that "Uncontrollable tag". But fine.

A Kinetic Cage placed at all the corners of the room squished inwards trapping the rabbit and squeezing.

Eyes rolled and hair started vibrating crazily and "glitchily". Jumping around and growing and shrinking wildly. While the creature was squished downwards its cute little mouth opened to a maw of sharp teeth as the demon let out a blood-curdling scream.

As the rabbit was squished its mass grew and strange alien organs began flying out in a steady stream around it.

Moments after it was done all that was left was a mess of purple goo and white hair.

More bombs started to roll in at this moment. Two rats appeared to defend the stairs but were blown downwards as they peeked above the top of the landing.

Rolling down the stairs a final explosive armoured slug ended the Reign of Doc.

ZeMadDoctor: Bah. Not letting me use demons. Bah. I could have prevented that. Final 4 is fine I guess. Good luck Innearth. I'm rooting for you.

Abe: Hey what about me?

ZeMadDoctor: ...

Widdled down, Innearth holed up in a castle which had completely surrounded his base at this point.

Near the wall, the dragon danced as it slowly spelled magic into a large crystal spear.

Turning towards him Amy's army flowed and dodged and then began climbing the slippery smooth crystal slope like it was nothing.

Snakes peppered downwards destroying octopi and squids and tentacled frogs in great numbers while Abe teamed up with Amy's forces a series of bombs rocking the whole structure.

Climbing up onto the ramparts the crystal dragon held its spelled spear in its mouth before flinging it up into the sky where it could be caught by over a dozen snakes at once.

Turning to face the bomb spawner, they focused and released, causing it to shoot across and shatter right before hitting the tank. Roughly 50 smaller spears hit and ripped the metal container to pieces; strange tubes of gel twisted between rollers and covered in half-made casings and eternal growth chambers were revealed before everything exploded.

Chunks of shrapnel broke through Innearth's castle for a moment, but were quickly repaired before he returned to widdling down Amy's forces.

Two squads were sent out at this time, one to each of his friends' bases, the win inevitable at this point.

Innearth: And...Game! I did it!

Amy: ...alright. Well done. Thanks for playing.

Abe: Bro! I knew you could do it.

The floating scoreboard that appeared filled Innearth with a deep satisfaction.

Round Robin "Till there is one" Event Scoreboard.

#1 Innearth.

#2 Amy, Abe [simultaneous knockout]

#3 ZeMadDoctor.

...