The Crafter's Dominion: A Dungeon Core Novel (Dungeon Crafting Book 5) Jonathan Brooks (books that read to you txt) 📖

tire from the use of so much power draining through their bodies, and eventually they would reach a breaking point.  They might be more powerful than almost anything she’d seen before, but there would be a time where they could only take so much.

Luckily, that time was not today.

“Go!  Break through to the other tunnel!”  Sandra translated the Elven King’s words to everyone, now that she had the focus to do it, and she watched as they all advanced as a group toward the far end of the massive room, rolling over anything in their way as if it were all an inconvenience.  The small tunnel leading towards what Sandra assumed was the Core room seemed impossibly far away, but the party managed to break through everything in their way.

Standing in front of the tunnel were 4 Goblin Necromancers, safe behind their Spirit-based bubble shields, and Sandra wondered how they would get through—

At least, that was before she watched Princess Celeste, Gerold, Palzerk, and Owchet step up and quickly smash or slice the Necromancers apart, leaving them in pieces on the ground in no time flat.  I guess they can’t really withstand melee attacks.  She was wondering if they had a weakness, so that was good to know.

There were still dozens of Goblins trying to reach them, but the party ran through the tunnel to the Core Room with great speed.  As soon as they entered, the other party members engaged those Goblins protecting the Core, which was a greyish-glowing crystalline shape floating in the center of the room.

“Do it, Echo!  We’ll hold them off!”

The Elven Ranger obeyed the order from her Queen, and Sandra watched as she flew up on Starlight 3, pulling the Resonating Prismatic Core from the pouch in front of her.  Strangely, even though the Core was in another dungeon entirely and should be completely cut off from her, she could feel the connection with it, stronger than any other connection she had with any of her Dungeon Monsters.  Probably because it is a part of me.

Dodging arrows shot by Goblin Archers and fireballs flung out by Goblin Mages, Echo deftly flew her Pegasus next to the Spirit-based Core and held out her hand holding Sandra’s Prismatic Core—only to have an arrow shoot her in her hand, knocking the Core away and flinging it out of her control.  Echo screamed as she tried to grab it, but she was too late.

It fell toward the ground, heading for a fate of being lost in the press of Goblin forms below, but it suddenly stopped in mid-air.  Sandra used the Totem she was looking out of to see the Elven Queen holding her hand towards the Prismatic object, before moving it towards Echo.  Just as she was about to hand it off, an arrow flew out of the press of enemies and slammed into the Queen’s side, plunging into her flesh an inch before stopping.  The sudden impact and pain caused the Royal Elf to lose her concentration and the Core dropped—

—but Echo reached out with her good hand, snatched it out of the air, and in one smooth motion swung it around and touched the other Dungeon Core.

Sandra immediately initiated a Bond with the Goblin Core, hoping and praying to the Creator that it would work.  She felt a momentary stab of worry as nothing seemed to happen for a second…and then her mind went blank.

Chapter 48

The blankness in her mind felt like it lasted an eternity, but when she was finally aware of the world around her, she was cognizant that very little time had passed.  Point in fact, it appeared as though not even a second had progressed – nor was it currently progressing.  The world had frozen around her awareness.

“WHO ARE YOU?!  WHAT ARE YOU DOING TO ME?!”

The angry voice seemed to come from nowhere and everywhere at the same time, but she intuitively knew where it originated.  Looking around the Goblin-Classification Core’s “Core” room, which was a strange experience because she shouldn’t be able to see it like that, Sandra focused on the greyish crystal near her.

“My name is Sandra, and I’m here to help—”

“YOU!  YOU ARE THE ONE THAT IS PREVENTING ME FROM GETTING WHAT I NEED!  I WILL DESTROY YOU!”

Such rage was not wholly unexpected, because she had experienced some of it herself with the Core soul fragment in her own mind, but this was on a whole new level.  She was suddenly glad that it hadn’t been a full-strength Core that had integrated into her consciousness, because she wasn’t sure if she could’ve withstood it for long.

“No, I’m only trying to keep you from killing any people—”

“WHICH IS EXACTLY WHAT I NEED TO DO TO EXPAND AND BECOME THE STRONGEST DUNGEON IN THE WORLD!”

Sandra could instantly tell that the Goblin Core wasn’t going to listen to her, no matter what she said.  It was too consumed with anger, rage, and the drive to fulfill its contracts with the Creator that nothing would change its mind; as far as it was concerned, it was right, and she was wrong.  From its perspective, Sandra was the bad one, the evil one that was blocking it from fulfilling its destiny.

She was reminded of her days as a merchant with her father, and an incident with a supplier of enchanted weapons.  The supplier, who was one of their regulars up to that point, insisted that one of the swords he was selling to them had an enchantment on it that it didn’t.  Neither the supplier nor her father could actually check it to see if it was indeed enchanted – but Sandra could.  She recognized that it was enchanted with a Minor Fire Resistance enchantment that would allow the sword to withstand quite a bit of heat, but it was entirely different from what the supplier insisted was on there.  She couldn’t