The Heart Grows

Dungeon Status:

Tier 1

Level 2/10

Heart 6400/6400

Experience 100/1600

Workers 5/15

Monsters 0/16+1

Traps 13/25+4

Rooms 19

Food 312

Timber 783

Iron 251

Steel 0

Charcoal 0

Mana 23

Rock 738

Gold 203

Leather 223

Leather Sludge 195

Lava 28

Explosive Runes 4

Triggered Explosive Runes 7

Quest: Have 10 adventurers in the dungeon at once

Quest: Get 10,000 gold

Things were on track. Travis had gotten Robert to build the glass smith room adjacent to his alchemy lab, then he and Ludmiller had built some extra bedrooms before they each found one of their own and slept.

Stephan had returned to cutting down trees. He'd worked for a few hours before likewise finding somewhere to sleep.

Penelope had stayed up far later, chatting with the three adventurers and discussing what the best way to handle relations between the city and the dungeon were. Listening in was a nice distraction for him from the peace that had settled over the dungeon.

When the adventurers left and Penelope went to the sleeping quarters to sleep, Katelyn was just getting up and swapped places with her. "Trav," Katelyn said, "today we're going to work on your magic."

"But we still have one triggered rune missing."

"That's easy to fix. I already have a full tank, so…" Pulling a rock from behind her back, Katelyn imbued it as a triggered explosive rune. "Now, give me a chance to have breakfast and I'll put all these runes in the traps again, then we can talk about magic."

It was hard to be so excited and, at the same time, patient as Katelyn went about her morning routine then carefully added the bombs back to the trap.

"I like the change to this tunnel, Trav. Having the main entrance lead directly to your heart seemed a bit stupid, but I didn't want to say anything." She climbed out of the pit trap and carefully reset it. "Though you'll want to get Robert to move the donkey and cart rooms upstairs. Having the poor animal right beside this powder keg is probably not all that nice to it."

"Yeah. I'll get Robert to move it when he's awake. I think we need some other things upstairs. A timber mill at least, and probably a tannery too. Keep them in a hidden section that's really close to the entrance." Adding a pair of rooms to the first floor planning, Travis mentally tapped his chin. "I really should build a maze up there, too. Something to really screw with adventurers and make them—"

"They'll map it. It won't do much more than slow them down." Katelyn paused and looked at her hands. "But you could pepper it with triggered runes. If I could build up my mana a bit more, I could even scribe regenerating ones."

"I like that idea. They're great because they don't count as a trap. Can rogues even disable them?"

"Yeah, and they're worth a small fortune. Imagine a rock you could throw, have it blow up everything in an area, then you can just walk in and pick it up again. All they have to do is re-calibrate it to trigger on dungeon creatures." Walking to the heart room, Katelyn seemed to bounce with new energy. "First, we need to get you faster mana. It might just be a way to trigger more upgrades for you, but you being able to use spells more often is a good thing. That fire wall, for example."

"Those adventurers sure seemed reluctant to go through it."

"Yeah, that's reasonable, too. It was hot and I couldn't see to the other side of it. As far as I could tell, you'd filled the whole hallway with them." Sitting down and setting about relaxing herself beside his heart, Katelyn said, "Now, I want you to focus on only your heart room, but first, let's start with everything."

"Everything?"

"Yup. Reach out and feel for the whole dungeon—every tunnel, every room, and every trap. Focus on the entirety and tell me when you have it."

At first Travis just looked at the plans. He spread his focus in a wide net and felt out each room, even adding his awareness of each kobold and lizard within that. Finally, he poked open all the menus. "G-Got it. Wow, this is a lot to take in. I even opened all the menus and stuff."

"Perfect. Now I want you to focus on it all until it is all getting your attention. Just a huge, whole that is you in the extended sense."

"Right."

"Now, one by one, close the menus. As you close them, focus on willing them out of your attention. Narrow yourself down to the dungeon and only the dungeon." She waited for him to acknowledge her again. "Now, slowly, roll your focus back from the entrance. The tunnel up there, the new tavern you built, even any planning. Bit by bit, focus on it, accept it, and let it go from your mind."

It was a heck of a task, but as Travis worked at it, gave up the light of outdoors, the watering hole, the maze he'd been planning out, and even the stairs, it was like the rest of the dungeon became more real and there. "Okay."

Katelyn could feel a greater density to Travis' presence and mana in general. She wondered if his nature was purely mana. "The stairs are first to fade out. The tunnel from the gold mine is next, the new planned areas, their tunnels, even the one building down there you've finished. Draw yourself tighter toward this room. One by one examine the warehouses, the traps, even the donkey—let them all fade from your awareness."

It was definitely growing more mana-dense, and Katelyn almost felt overwhelmed by Travis now. It was a heady mix for a kobold with no protection against the whims of the dungeon. "The glass smithy, the alchemy lab, my library, each of the rooms grow in intensity and then wink out one by one until you just have the sleeping rooms and this room.

"Each kobold needs a special little touch, a focus on them to remember who and what they are before you hone down more and more to just one room, this one."

Katelyn's eyes were wide now as she meditated too—but in her case it was to keep afloat in the most mana-dense environment she'd ever been in in her life. It was almost like drowning, only she could breathe this weighty mass with comical ease. Katelyn only worried about what it would do to her.

"I can see the mana in this room," Travis said. "I can feel it, too, through my heart—but I can see it with your eyes. It's amazing!"

Amazing was such a small word for how Katelyn felt. Her personal mana was full and then some—that was without doubt. Each breath she took added a little more to her. She opened her mouth to explain something, to beg Travis to spread out again, or plead with him to never stop—she wasn't sure which—but no words could make it out of her body.

Seconds slowed to hours for Katelyn, but the eternity between each of her heartbeats paled into nothingness when she felt Travis' magic focus down further onto her. It pushed, prodded, and wrapped around her like a cloak, becoming so thick and dense that it felt like she was bundled up in a cloak made of iron.

"That's interesting. Your mana is just like mine, except for the density of it. You can hold so much mana, but with the density of mine in you, it's like you hold a hundred times more."

"A hundred times" seemed like a gross understatement to Katelyn. This was supposed to be an opportunity for Travis to experience his own mana, but so far he seemed more attentive to her.

A little more pressure from him and something seemed to give way inside Katelyn. Gasping, she managed to focus her eyes again—only to see Travis' mana and presence thick in the room—and thick in her. "How are you—what did you do to me?"

"There was some kind of barrier. When I poked it, it disappeared. Did I hurt you?"

"I don't think so. I think—my mana is denser now. How did you do that?" Katelyn felt amazing. She felt like there was no spell she couldn't cast and nothing she couldn't do. Reaching out a claw, she gently touched Travis' heart.

"Like I said, I just touched you. I—I need to let go of this focus, it's too much."

The mana in the room drained to a more natural level and Katelyn could focus more. She was still uncomfortably aware of how much more mana she had. "I feel itchy and bloated. This is all your fault." Laughing as she stood up, Katelyn felt exactly as she'd said. "Did it help you in any way?"

"You could say that. I have two new spells!" Travis sounded excited and Katelyn had no doubt he was. "The first is Concentrate Mana. I think it does what I just did in here—focuses a bunch of mana so you can charge from it. That costs one mana per cast and each cast seems to last an hour."

"It's not really charging, so much as you cramming mana into me like a—like a sausage." Katelyn had fumbled for a good analogy but, in the end, had grabbed at the worst like it was a life preserver. "But I could see this being useful. I actually have more raw mana in me like this. Also, we were trying to find ways to improve your mana, not find useful new ways to use it up."

"The second spell," Travis said, not rising to the bait, "is another resource creation one. Create Mana Shrine, works like that one that makes a mining resource, but makes a mana regenerating shrine appropriate to the level. I assume it has a limited use."

"It'd be pretty crazy if it stuck around forever." Katelyn spun in a circle, almost tripping on her tail in the process. "I'm going to go use this mana up and see if it comes back this dense." Walking down the tunnel and to the library, Katelyn pondered the best way to try using up all her mana.

Pulling a rock out from behind her back, she closed her eyes and focused on the rune to make a triggered explosive rune, but brought the recharging form into it too. The more mana she spent now, the faster the recycle time would be once it was made—assuming she could make it.

Katelyn poured mana into the stone, feeding the patterns and reinforcing them, marveling at how easily such a huge quantity of mana could be worked—but then it stopped. She let out a whine as the rune was almost done. "Trav! Can you cast that concentrate mana spell on me?" she asked as she struggled to hold the partially-finished rune from dissipating.

Travis acted first and asked second. Ticking down his mana, he flooded the library with it and asked. "Why did you need that so soon?"

The flow of extra mana was exactly what Katelyn needed. Converting the mana that pooled around her and sending it into the rune, she felt the crafting complete with a sigh of relief. "I did it!"

Katelyn could also feel the mana flowing into her, filling her at about the same rate as if she were meditating, though still with a greater density.

"So I guess now we find good spots for them in the maze and cement them in place? I was planning to let that be Ludmiller's project, if she wants it," Travis said.

"Yeah. That would be a good idea. She's new and needs to have something to do. Just a problem with these, they only reset every four days. It's the best I can do until I can hold more mana." Setting the rune down on the little lectern, Katelyn was used to the sight of it disappearing enough that it didn't bother her to see it just fade out of existence.

"So that's it? The kobolds are fine with us inspecting the dungeon in its entirety so long as you are there safeguarding it? Seems too easy." Brolly Windchime sat at the table with the three adventurers, taking their report after they'd all slept off their hangovers. How they'd gotten blind-drunk in a dungeon he wanted to find out.

"We have contracted to the kobolds for this service, Brolly. You know we won't take their pay and split, and I think they know that too. They're not evil. They have every right to feel safe." Leaning back a little on his chair, Brayden Smith waited for his breakfast to be brought out.

"If you want to tell them we are ready to go ahead in two weeks, that would be perfect." As soon as he said it, Brolly watched as Fife's arm reached out toward him. "You'll get paid for the courier work."

Jack barely paid any attention at all. He'd spent the morning researching the name Penelope had told him—the wizard they had in the dungeon. Katelyn Arskith was a genius, or so the witch who worked in the local bookshop had told him. Researching new ways to make magic more efficient and easier, she'd suddenly gone missing and her old school was offering a reward for her whereabouts. He didn't care one bit for a reward—he wanted to meet this wizard and learn everything she could teach him about magic.