The Dungeon Fairy: Two Choices: A Dungeon Core Escapade (The Hapless Dungeon Fairy Book 2) Jonathan Brooks (online e reader TXT) 📖

interior of the Core Room.  “Look, it seems that there is another room…or something.”  Despite being a “Scout”, he didn’t sound very confident about that.

When they investigated the next room, the two Fighters did their thing and explored the entire empty room looking for traps, but there weren’t any there.  Neither were there any in the second or third rooms past her Core Room, though in the fourth there was a change.  Near the entrance of the room, Tacca had spent a little of her regenerating Dungeon Force shortly after she made her creatures down below to create a small Explosive-based trap in a 1 ft. X 1 ft. square on the floor; even though it was relatively small, it still cost 100 DF to produce, because it wasn’t part of her Specializations.

Both of the Fighters ended up missing stepping on the activation trigger as they investigated the room half-heartedly, which was the whole idea; without anything obvious in the previous three rooms, they weren’t expecting anything to be there.  Fortunately for Tacca, it wasn’t missed by the others as they traveled through; the Gnome Healer stepped on it and an explosive force propelled her upwards, cracking the bones in her lower leg from the sheer power of the explosion, though the cloth robe she was wearing prevented most of the damage she would’ve experienced slamming against the ceiling…and the impact against the ground afterwards.

The shock of the injury was still reverberating through the Gnome’s body as the Elf quickly pulled out a dark-purple potion from her bottomless bag and force-fed it to the seriously hurt Raider.  That’s…wow.

“Yeah, I think that’s a High-grade Elixir; those are supposed to be a rare reward as well…Reward Tier 7 if I remember correctly?” Shale stated with a question in his voice, as if he wasn’t sure.

Tier 8, I believe.  Just another thing that makes this whole thing not make sense.

“Why did you waste that on her?  Those things are expensive, you know.  You had better keep the other one safe in case I need it,” the annoying Fighter said with more than a little threat to his voice.

Everyone ignored him and didn’t respond, but they also didn’t protest.  Within seconds, the mess that had been the Gnome’s lower leg was literally reshaping itself back into health, and any of the external wounds that had been there were now gone.  The Elf helped the smaller Gnome to her feet, which the Healer did gingerly, testing her healed leg and shaking uncontrollably.  There shouldn’t have been any pain anymore because the Elixir should’ve eliminated all of it, but the mental trauma of such an injury would likely linger.

“Stop messing around; I don’t know how deep this place goes, and you’re wasting time.”

The fact that none of them responded other than with some murderous looks when his back was turned convinced Tacca that the “leader” of the Raider group was somebody important. They could make derisive remarks under their breath and even laugh at him all they wanted, but it appeared as though they were past that stage; physical harm was in all of their eyes as they stared at the arrogant Raider walking down to the next room – even the other armored Fighter.

Despite the contention between them, the two Fighters did a thorough job of checking for more traps – which they found in the form of additional explosive squares seemingly set at random throughout the empty rooms.  They weren’t necessarily designed to kill them, because they barely did anything other than forcefully move the Fighters across the room, but merely to delay them.  Fortunately, her preparations down below were complete by the time they reached the very last room.

“Who the heck is that?  Where did they come from?”

The confusion and shock in the lead Fighter’s voice was genuine – not that it was surprising.  From the entrance tunnel leading into the room, he and the others could easily see what appeared to be 5 Raiders racing across the room after catching sight of them, headed for some sort of exit in the side of the room.

“No idea; they aren’t from the group that went in before us, I can tell you that,” the Gnome Healer responded.

“Well, we can’t let them see us in here; the Minister made it abundantly clear that we shouldn’t arouse any suspicions,” the Elf followed that up with information of her own.  “The illusion we had on us was canceled as soon as we entered, and if someone sees us like this…well, let’s just say it will be much harder to place blame on the decrepit group we acquired this spot in line from.”

“Wait, I didn’t agree to this—”

The angry Fighter cut off the Gnome’s objections immediately.  “It’s too late for that now; we’re already committed and it’s doubtful we’ll get another chance like this.  After them!”

Tacca had been hoping for that response, but neither she nor Shale had known exactly how they would react to seeing another “Raider group” inside of the dungeon.  It was a toss-up between them turning around and leaving or hunting them down so that there were no witnesses to their deeds. In the first scenario, they would just leave and hopefully never come back – which would keep Tacca and her dungeon safe.  In the second scenario…well, they were all about to find out.

Fortunately, none of the invading group seemed to notice her invisibly watching from the upper corner of the room as they raced across to where her creatures had “escaped”.  In reality, she was able to slightly alter the Rotating Stone Bridge that led out to the exit staircase leading up to the surface so that it would stay open for longer than usual before resetting; by having one of them push it open before the group intent on destroying her Core arrived, it was already open when they arrived.  Then,