Dungeon Emerges

"Next came the ordinary monsters."

Lucifer looked at the mere 130 points of Primordial Power remaining on the panel. He had no intention of saving them. Now was not the time to hoard resources. If he failed to stop the adventurers three days from now, they would pierce straight through to his deepest core and turn him into the adventurers' shape.

This time, however, Lucifer did not intend to use his talent to create monsters. The Magic Spring and Magic Iron Vein had both been nearly depleted and needed time to recover.

But that did not matter much to Lucifer. The monsters he wanted to create now were merely template monsters inherent to Dungeons—the common low-level monsters found in other Dungeons.

His only requirement for them was that they serve as cannon fodder to interfere with and confuse invading adventurers, creating opportunities for the monsters he had truly created to guard the Dungeon to kill them.

"Slimes, Goblins, Wolf Beasts, and Gnomes really are classic Dungeon monsters."

Lucifer recalled the knowledge he had gained after becoming a Dungeon. These things were innate to Dungeons. Those Dungeons that had never developed self-awareness instinctively created monsters according to these knowledge templates.

The abilities and habits of these monsters had long since been thoroughly studied by adventurers. Even novice adventurers who had yet to become professionals would not fear such low-level monsters as long as they had a little courage.

These monsters, fit only to be cannon fodder, had one advantage for Lucifer: they were cheap.

0.1 points of Primordial Power was enough to create ten of them, and no other resources were needed. They were simply the perfect cannon fodder. After all, even the monsters Lucifer created were fairly strong.

But against a constant stream of adventurers and three whole floors of vast, empty Dungeon territory, they were simply too few and far between.

"Monster Creation!"

As the Primordial Power on the panel began to drain continuously, low-level monsters began appearing in endless numbers throughout the Dungeon's three floors. The hard rock walls transformed into nests that birthed monsters, and Green-skin Goblins and Slimes crawled out one after another.

The moment they appeared, these monsters began wandering through the Dungeon according to their instincts, or chose suitable areas to settle in.

"Awooo~~!"

Suddenly, a mournful wolf howl drew Lucifer's attention away from creating monsters. When he projected his mental power over, ripples spread across the surface of the great orb of light, and he saw that the newly born Goblins had surrounded several Wolf Beasts.

Then, without caring whether their targets were male or female, those creatures began forcibly mating and reproducing. A swarm of Goblins pinned five Wolf Beasts to the ground, while a mutated Great Goblin pounced forward and began plowing away. In less than a minute, he had ravished each of the five Wolf Beasts in turn.

Afterward, the other Goblins crowded around as well, and the Wolf Beasts' bellies began swelling at a visible rate.

[Name: Goblin]

[Level: lv1]

[Skills: Forced Reproduction lv1, Rapid Growth lv1, Corrosive Stomach lv1]

[Description: A green-skinned monster resembling a cockroach. Every member of its species is male, yet they possess powerful reproductive abilities without reproductive barriers, allowing them to forcibly reproduce with any species. Their vast number of offspring and short growth period make them as difficult to eradicate as cockroaches. If you discover one Goblin, that means there are even more lurking where you cannot see.]

After glancing at the Goblin's panel, Lucifer could not be bothered to care about such cannon-fodder monsters any longer. Once he had used up the remaining 130 points of Primordial Power, a total of thirteen thousand cannon-fodder monsters appeared across different areas of the Dungeon's three floors.

Goblins wandered everywhere, casually stuffing mushrooms growing in the corners into their mouths. Some Goblins that provoked Puchi stepped into the dense spore fog and quickly died from the toxins, becoming nourishment for Spore Reproduction. Meanwhile, numerous Slimes gathered around the Steel Slime.

Wolf Beasts roamed through different cavern tunnels, while ugly Gnomes no taller than human children used crude materials to set traps in corners and dark areas of the passageways.

Their figures filled every corner of all three floors.

The once-empty three-floor Dungeon now seemed full of life. Vast quantities of mycelium continued to grow and spread, while glowing mushrooms illuminated the pitch-black caverns. All kinds of mushrooms became food for the many Goblins and Gnomes.

However, Goblins and Gnomes often picked poisonous mushrooms. After eating them, they fell into mental frenzies and became fertile beds for spore growth.

Meanwhile, the many Puchis continued spraying spores as they moved toward areas the mycelium had yet to reach, expanding the range of the entire Mycelial Network. The spores sprayed by the newly born Puchis and all kinds of mushrooms formed a faint spore mist within the caverns.

Three days passed in a flash.

"Only half an hour left until the Dungeon emerges?"

In the deepest room on the Dungeon's third floor, Lucifer looked at the countdown on the panel. Over the past three days, he had pushed everything he could do to the limit—at least, that was how Lucifer saw it. Incidentally, the Primordial Power that had originally been depleted had recovered to 120 points.

In addition to the 30 points of Primordial Power automatically added each day when the Dungeon absorbed Void Power after reaching lv3, the Fungus Lord, a monster born as a special resource, could also provide Lucifer with 10 points of Primordial Power every day.

Lucifer had not used this Primordial Power for the time being. The Dungeon already had enough low-level monsters serving as cannon fodder, while he lacked sufficient materials to create special monsters.

Therefore, Lucifer planned to save it for emergencies. If he could not stop the adventurers three days later, he could still urgently create cannon fodder to delay their progress in exploring the Dungeon.

If he did stop them, then Lucifer would need to accumulate Primordial Power to raise the Dungeon's level.

After all, the more floors the Dungeon had, the stronger and safer he would be.

While Lucifer waited for the Dungeon to emerge, on the southeastern border of the High Rock Kingdom—

The border town of Marguerite.

The earth let out a violent roar. Everyone in the small town clearly felt the ground begin to shake fiercely. The civilians of the town fell into chaos because of the sudden earthquake, but the adventurers staying there and the nobles who ruled this territory became excited instead.

Inside the castle at the center of town, Viscount Korien Os, who had been taking an afternoon nap, abruptly sat up from his bed. Without even having time to put on his clothes properly, he ran straight to the castle's highest observation platform and looked toward the source of the tremors.

His heart pounded wildly, and his body trembled slightly.

Looking out, he saw that at the edge of the town below, many of the shacks haphazardly built in the slums had collapsed from the earthquake, while countless civilians in the streets had fallen into chaos.

But at that moment, he could not care about any of that. Both hands gripped the cold stone railing tightly as his gaze fixed on the junction between the distant forest and marsh. Two stone pillars dozens of meters tall rose from the ground, supporting an enormous stone gate.

With a creak.

The massive stone gate opened on its own, revealing a huge, deep, dark hollow.

"Dungeon! A brand-new Dungeon that has just emerged!!!"