The last few days had fallen into a similar routine.

  In the daytime, I watched the adventurers stomping through the Dungeon, and then, during the night, I did some minimal experimentation. It was boring as hell, but I forced myself every night to ensure the planned experiments were performed on the results noted. Progress was equally as slow.

  I was now making limited headway in some areas, especially towards the planned special minion for the tenth floor. Bats were now becoming an option that I could use in the future, but for the moment, I had no genuine concept or idea of how to use them. The ninth floor was a different story as I already had a plan and was working towards it. I was sure I had the resources to make it happen, but I was still concerned about the mana I possessed and could regenerate. More and more adventurers pushed into the sixth floor, and my reserves were taxed daily.

  The majority was still avoiding the seventh and eighth floors, but the most daring risked the lower floors, but fewer than before as the casualties mounted, and those daring ones who were not ready never left these floors.

  The day was progressing, and nothing inspiring happened. A few teams came through, but they stayed above the fifth. I suspected there would be another two or three teams today before they wrapped up with the miners, as the sun would set, stopping them entering. I positioned my view in the rafters, looking at the doors with Larry, wondering who the next team would be.

  After a few moments, the doors opened, and I got the first surprise of the day.

  A new team entered the room, and they were all extremely short with big beards, except for one. I was excited because it looked like I was having my first dwarf party. That's what they look like, and their appearance is very stereotypical.

  Short. Check. Well armoured. Check. Beards. Check apart from one.

  It might be wrong of me, but I'm calling them dwarfs.

  As the group filed in and looked around the entrance room, I looked at them with my Mana Sight. They lit up with numerous items and enchantments, mainly across their armour and shields. It looked like this was an experienced and exceptionally well-funded team. I suspected they were silver, at least maybe higher, and this got me excited a bit to see how a higher-grade team would operate within my Dungeon.

  They quickly spotted Larry, and he was watching them as they discussed what, if anything, they were going to do with him. He sensed they were deciding on a course of action and was ready to bolt if needed. I looked over the team again and noticed that there was not a single archer amongst them or a ranged weapon as far as I could see. Only the unbearded one was unarmed as far as I could tell, carrying a massive dimensional storage bag covered in various tools and blades.

  Apart from one who carried an axe, Hammers seemed to be their weapon of choice. Each was wearing a set of what looked like scale mail, and most carried shields. These Shields were thick and sturdy, with brass covers over a thick wooden layer or bound by a band of iron.

  I thought they would have come dressed in plate, but as I watched them move around, I realised that the scale mail was a better choice as it gave them a far greater range of motion. This group seemed to have found a balance between protection and mobility.

  I listened to their conversation as they wandered around. Most seemed to be looking at Larry, wondering what they should do about him. The clean-shaven one was the only one not paying attention, and he searched every cupboard in the room. He found the bottle of poisoned wine. He pulled out a crystal from one of his pockets, and it lit up a sickly green. He quickly put the bottle back.

  The group ignored Larry, as he was not making any threatening moves, and started to move into the Dungeon.

  The next hour was boring as they slowly made their way through the first and second floors. They were not rushing and were taking their time studying different aspects of my Dungeon as they went forward. The tin vein on the first floor had drawn some attention, and there was a brief discussion on mining it, but they decided to leave it for another day.

  The second floor did cause some consternation as they were forced to wade through the water, which was far deeper on them than anyone else who had traveled into my Dungeon.

  They were halfway through the second floor when I realised that two of them were females of the dwarven species. I was pretty surprised by this as they, too, were bearded, broad, and squat. Their arms seemed as muscular as the males '. If I had not heard a passing comment, I would not have realised that they were females in the first place.

  The things you learn.

  One of them seemed not to be a rogue or a thief but some form of engineer. It was one of the females, and she was very interested in the traps I had created on these floors. She commented on their simplicity and the functionality of the design. I was not insulted by this as they were, in truth, everything she said.

  They did not seem too impressed with the first two floors, but the third was far more interesting. The male dwarfs quickly took down the boars, and the clean-shaven dwarf worked on their bodies, harvesting everything he could. Heavy hammers proved to be brutally effective in crushing the boars. The three dwarfs with shields proved very effective at meeting and holding a boar charge, allowing them to counter-attack with one or two quick strikes, killing my minion.

  The clean-shaven dwarf seemed interested in everything and tried to take everything that wasn't nailed down. No, that wasn't true. I even spotted him attempting to take things nailed down on several occasions. One of the female dwarfs regularly yelled at him about his preoccupation with acquiring everything he could. Such terms as "thief", "sticky" "fingers", "no moral compass", and "downright skullduggery" were some of the nicer things she said about him.

  This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it

  Regarding the third-floor guardian, I was most upset with how easily they dispatched it. My boar charged them. One of the shield bearers stepped forward, triggering a skill and glowing to meet it. The impact was loud, but the dwarf didn't move. This allowed another one to step in with his hammer glowing and deliver a massive blow to the guardian, shattering his skull and killing him instantly.

  They rested here as the body was stripped.

  The spiders on the fourth floor proved to be no match for them, and they quickly steamrolled over the numbers that tried to swarm them. They did not seem interested in the webbing around them and were moving through the floor. All the rewards were collected, but nothing else was taken. I warned Queen about what was coming, and she prepared herself.

  It did not help. She fought and used all her tricks, but she was no match for them, and she fell.

  The fifth floor was a bit different. Their engineer was having a great time figuring out my traps. They all seemed able to spot the traps in the ground with no problems and avoided them. Likewise, the worm's ambush proved ineffective as they were spotted well before they could jump out of the ground. The worm thick hides proved to be slightly more effective against the hammers that were in use. Their shields also took more damage from the worm's counter-strikes. But like the floors above them, they marched on, beating down each of my minions as they were revealed to them.

  The guardian put up a bit of a fight but was quickly beaten down as the others were. Sure, it took longer, but it seemed inevitable as they could also break its charges. Its hardening ability brought it a bit longer, but it, too, fell.

  They had gathered in the stairwell room, ready to descend to the sixth floor, and I had warned Krag, who was getting ready for a good fight. I think he was going to get through the sixth to him…

  Why was Larry running down the stairs?

  I shifted my attention back to the entrance room as the doors exploded in from something impacting them.

  The familiar red alert over a void-corrupted creature appeared.

  "Fuck!"

  ## ## ## ## ##

  "What was that?" Gornax asked, looking up the stairs. A strange sound reverberated down. Then, it seemed like the Dungeon shuddered. It was subtle, but they sensed it.

  "It sounded like wood smashing," Stonus said. The whole group had heard that and was now looking up or at the stairs. "Maybe the doors upstairs?"

  "Aye. I think you are right, best…" Thrum began speaking. Suddenly, a local creature called a sharoon and what looked like a bright pink Pixie came running/flying down the stairs. They did not even stop and passed the surprised Dwavern group standing there.

  "That's not a good sign." Snortax jumped into a defensive position, ready to be attacked by whatever was coming behind them. The others quickly matched him.

  "Something is happening…" Thrum started to say as they heard something else coming down the stairs. "Shave me beard! We hold here, but be ready to pull back into the floor again if we must."

  Something blurred down the stairs and collided with the wall of shields that they had set up to protect themselves. Snortax, Gornax and Stonus were soon engaged and fighting desperately. Thrum managed to get a look at it, and the blood in his veins turned to ice.

  "Fearfiend! Brace for psychic attacks!" Thrum warned his teammates. It was moving fast, but he could see it now, and what he saw was something wrong even beyond this monstemonster's sight. The air around them suddenly thickened and then contracted as fear surged through them.

  "Benevolent Ilinia, protect us from this fear." Val'nira suppressed their fear with a benediction to her goddess. The fear that we were about to build was suddenly pushed back but not completely gone.

  "Hold it while I cast my runes!" Thrum ordered the fighters as he opened his palm. It was a stone engraved with a rune of his people, which glowed with magical energy. He focused on triggering the spell within it, and the rune appeared in the air with a faint red glow. He focused on the monster attacking them, and the room became a ball of red energy that shot across the room and hit the monster. When it collided with it, the beast exploded into flame.

  "[Firebolt] was not as effective as I wanted. Be ready for more."

  The fighters didn't answer as they were too busy triggering their skills and abilities, trying to stay alive. Thrum was half paying attention to the fight as he dug out more runes from a pouch on his belt, ready to cast. He counted at least eight skills triggered in the battle already, and they barely held the line.

  The Fearfiend was lashing out with large talons on its hands, slashing through the shields and damaging them. Parts of them were falling free and onto the ground, and it was not going to be long before someone was going to get injured badly.

  Snortax triggered a [Multi-Thrust] as his arm blurred as he struck at the monster. It dodged one of his attacks, but the second made contact, slashing into its hide. The axes enchanted edge cut into it. Purple ichor oozed from the wound. It flashed back, catching him on the shoulder and ripping into his armour. His shoulders had plate sections on top of the scale mail they were all wearing, but this did not reallyt him as blood erupted from the strike as the monsters raked upwards.

  He fell back, cursing, and the other two fighters pressed in to protect him. Val'niVal'niraed him by the scruff of the neck and pulled him back so she could heal him. Stonus blocked an attack with his shield, but the Fearfiend stabbed with its talons instead of swiping at him. His shield stopped them, but not entirely, so that he could punch through and pierce his armour on the arm behind the shield. He grunted in pain but held his ground, hitting back with his hammer on the arm that had penetrated his shield. This time, the monster reeled back in pain.

  Thrum began spinning as he quickly unleashed three runes. The backlash of the mana depletion forced him to his knees. Thankfully, the three spells he cast hit their target, and the monster was pushed back by the three separate elemental attacks. The confined space they were fighting in was working to their advantage.

  Val'nira cast a healing spell on Snortax that stabilised him, and she pushed him back into the fight. As soon as he engaged, she pulled Stonus out to heal him. To do what needed to be done, Thrum trusted his team as they had spent decades travelling together and fought more battles than he cared to remember.

  He got back up, fighting back the effects of mana depletion. He was watching a fight and quickly realised that they were losing. The fiend was pushing them back slowly, step by step, but they were giving ground.

  "Fall back to the doorway. We will use it as a chokepoint," he said. Tyrax, who was in it, quickly pulled back as they began repositioning themselves. The fighters pulled back in a staged retreat to a better defensive position. The fiend started to follow them but then suddenly stopped and ran down the stairs further into the Dungeon.

  "By the ancestors, what is happening?" Gornax exclaimed.

  "I know, but we're leaving out of here." Thrum knew there were times when retreat was the smartest thing to do.