The Crafter's Defense: A Dungeon Core Novel (Dungeon Crafting Book 2) Jonathan Brooks (large ebook reader TXT) 📖

had been telling her for the last couple of hours with great interest.  Once the Gnomes had gone to sleep, she had even checked out Sandra’s growing room with the Orange Trees there, as well as looking over the sleeping/unconscious forms of all of Sandra’s Visitors.

“That first question is the easiest, so we’ll get that one out of the way.  In general, the Core Size Upgrades take approximately the same time for each Core, though they can differ slightly depending on the kind of Core it is.  The difference is barely noticeable, however; a few minutes longer or shorter when it already takes 48 hours – or more – isn’t that big of a deal.  I’m assuming that you’re asking because you want to know how long you’ll have until you need to worry about them attacking you again. On the low side, I’d put them at least a day and a half out before they likely finish their Upgrade, but keep in mind they will likely be fairly depleted just like you usually are after your own upgrades.

“As for your second question…I’m not sure.  Remember, just because you can understand them all and ‘speak’ to them, that doesn’t mean that the Gnomes will be able to speak Elvish.  It’s more likely that at least some of the older Elves will speak at least some Gnomish, but I can’t guarantee that.  And before you ask, the same goes with the written language – they won’t be able to write anything that will be understood by the others, unless the Elves can read Gnomish, as well.”

What about you?  Do you think you can teach them enough to communicate with the Elves?

“The same ability you possess lets me understand and talk to any race, which is how I can speak with any Dungeon Core I am supposed to be guiding; only a fraction of the Cores I’ve met personally were Human, you know.  Just as you can, I can read any language – but I can’t write anything.  Besides, Dungeon Fairies interacting with or helping any of the races is kind of frowned upon, though not necessarily forbidden – and I don’t want to push my luck with that right now.”

Essentially what you’re saying is that unless one of the Elves speaks Gnomish, I’m likely out of luck.  I may just have to see if one of them would be willing to try, however; it can’t hurt, right?

Winxa told the Dungeon Core that it was up to her, though the Fairy didn’t hold out hope.  Sandra was more positive and thought it might have a chance of working; if it did, then she wouldn’t have to worry about the arrival of an Elite team of Elves bent on her Core’s destruction.  If it didn’t…well, she would worry a bit more about it after that.

That was for later, though, because right now she got started on a few crafting projects that she had been neglecting.  First, she wanted to finish her plant growing and Thread-making crafts with Cotton and Jute.  It felt unfinished and she didn’t like things to go unfinished once she started down a path.

In her growing room, she ate and absorbed one of the Orange Trees; just as she had hoped, it had given her access to a new type of wood.

New Monster Seed and Origination Material found!

Orangewood

While Orangewood can be directly used as a Monster Seed, it can also be used as a material for use in the dungeon or other purposes.

You now have access to:

Tiny Orangewood Chip

Origination Raw Material Cost: 500

Origination Mana Cost: 100

Monster Min. Mana: 100

Monster Max. Mana: 200

Sandra left all of the other trees alone for the moment, as she wanted to keep the fruit for the Gnomes to eat if they wanted it.  She had plenty of other space in the room for growing more plants, after all – which was precisely what she did. Using her helpful little Golems, she created Jute and Cotton Seeds and planted them in two different plots.  She alternated the trap triggers so that they were active for approximately five minutes for the Cotton and twice as long for the Jute, as she knew it would take longer to grow.

Rather than watch that for the hour or so that it would take for both of them to mature enough to be harvested, she spent that time seeing to some more unfinished business.  As soon as her Mana had filled up to nearly full again – which only took about 50 minutes or so – she began placing traps in the rest of the rooms she had created for defense earlier; just because the threat from the reptile-based Dungeon Core was on hold and the Elven hit-squad wasn’t supposed to be there for another week or more, that didn’t mean she wanted to leave her dungeon unprotected any longer than necessary.  Therefore, she finished what she had been doing before the Gnomes had been attacked.

The fifteenth room down from the surface was filled with exactly 1,000 Segmented Centipedes; she wasn’t exactly sure what she was thinking at the time when she had originally placed them all there, but she thought she had an idea on how to use them now.  While the Centipedes were not too dangerous by themselves, Sandra had seen first-hand in the Gnome village attack how deadly a swarm of smaller monsters could be.  By utilizing a trap that combined Nether and Spirit, she was planning on taking advantage of their greater numbers.

Unlike her tenth room that combined Holy and Spirit elements together to make victims feel euphoric while they were killed, this one would instill quite the opposite emotion: fear.  Shadowy “apparitions” would float around the room that were about the size and shape of a 5-year-old Human child; when they touched someone or some creature/monster, an illusion would pop up of whatever their