(finished) Monster Haven 2 - Chapter 1: Hero Farming

Hey dudes, so in finishing Monster Haven 2 there were some significant changes in the earlier chapters. I'll be releasing a chapter every day until we're caught up to chapter 11, and then return to the M-W-F schedule. =) happy reading.

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Hero blood sprayed across the dark walls of the Monster Haven maze beneath the city proper. Greg stepped on the fallen priestess and yanked his hammer from her crushed chest.

“No time to rest! Get on the next wave,” Dolli called from the back of the defense unit. She dropped a Gravity Sink just ahead of the frontline heroes as they advanced toward her group of new trainees.

It’d only been a few short weeks since the town of Little Crossroads had become a dungeon, but already Dolli and her remaining monsters were making the most of the dire situation. The heroes—who’d been completely absent when they were a village of citizens—now flowed in droves. They all wanted to see the village-turned-dungeon and destroy it if they could. But that wasn’t in Dolli’s agenda; not now, or ever. So, everyone trained in combat, and everyone defended Monster Haven.

Clashes of steel and shouts of combat broke through Dolli’s thoughts, returning her to the battle at hand. A dual-wielding fighter was creeping up on the slender Oakenheart at the right flank, Henrietta, who was too busy sending toxic waves of pollen into the crowd to notice.

“Watch the right flank!” Dolli called but took no action.

Henrietta was oblivious to Dolli’s warning, grinning and chanting as her thorny vines wrapped and trapped the heroes. The fighter was nearly upon her, but still Dolli did nothing to stop him. The trainees would all have to learn the sting of forgetting one’s role in the carefully orchestrated system, and though Dolli didn’t like it, sometimes pain was the best teacher.

“Right flank!” Dolli called again, but it was too late. The fighter cut down into the Oakenheart’s shoulder, severing her limb. Henrietta shrieked and dropped back. Dolli surged forward, protecting the healers in the back from the gap opened in their defenses.

She cast Fold Reality below the attacker, then opened the second portal into the middle of the battle. The hero yelped in surprise as he dropped through the ground and then fell from the ceiling into stabbing swords and swinging hammers. He was pummeled with more than a little friendly fire and Dolli smirked.

“Why didn’t you help me?” Henrietta screamed and cradled her oozing elbow.

Dolli turned, looking past the slender woman to the healer Wispelle. “Get her back out there.”

“I’m talking to you!” Henrietta lashed a thorny vine through Dolli’s form to get her attention. It didn’t hurt, but it sent a wave of frustration rippling through her.

Dolli looked to the battle. It was well in hand with Greg at the front, so she addressed Henrietta. “I warned you, twice. You knew what you were supposed to be doing—”

“But you let him cut my arm off,” she cried through the words, a new Spark-misty forearm growing from the oozing stub that had been left from the fighter’s attack.

“No, you let him cut your arm off,” Dolli corrected. “You were supposed to be watching the right flank, but you were caught up in battle instead of paying attention.”

Henrietta winced and bared her teeth while the arm solidified. It glowed a soft white, and then the rejuvenation spell completed. Her brown and tan grained skin was clean and fresh compared to the blood-spattered bicep above it.

“My Spark is low,” the Wispelle said as he excused himself from the battle. He moved to the back and was replaced with one of the other waiting Wispelle—as Dolli had designed.

The underground fell quiet as the last hero gurgled a final breath.

“I don’t see why you didn’t just help me,” Henrietta growled.

Dolli thought on it for a moment, wondering if the truth would incite even more anger from the Oakenheart. “We will all get hurt. We will all die defending our home. We have to get used to it.”

Henrietta sneered. “So, you let him cut my arm off so I could get used to it?”

“What’s all this whinin’?” Greg boomed, pushing through the crowd.

“The negligent witch is back to her lazy ways,” Vilhelm—the bear-like Osorath—snarled and stepped up to Henrietta’s side to comfort her.

Betrayal prickled the back of Dolli’s neck and heat swirled in her stomach. It had only been a few short weeks, not nearly enough time to rid herself of the old nickname or the old feelings of resentment.

“And you could do better?” Greg asked Vilhelm.

Vilhelm’s lips curled back, revealing pearly white teeth. “I wouldn’t have trapped us in this tomb, that’s for certain. We could be out there taking the fight to the heroes, but instead we’re in this dungeon maze, defending what? Flower beds and taverns?”

Julie, the head architect of the whole underground, tutted. “You’d prefer we fought on the streets, in our homes?”

“I’d prefer if we weren’t trapped!” Vilhelm’s maw snapped in Julie’s direction and Greg prepared for battle.

Dolli put her hand out and shook her head at the massive Blacksmith. The crowd was watching her, Greg, and Julie—they were some of the dungeon’s leaders after all—and they couldn’t respond with violence to their own people.

“Vilhelm, these dungeon mazes do not just protect flower beds and taverns—or even our homes, Julie. They protect the last bit of our former lives, our passions and pursuits. I wouldn’t trade that for taking the fight to the heroes out there. I’m perfectly content with letting the bastards come to us.”

“You would be content with sitting on your arse,” Vilhelm said snidely. Henrietta was quick to laugh in agreement.

“That’s enough from the both of ya,” Greg said, surprising Dolli. He’d grown more supportive of her leadership since the battle with Keegan, but this was the first time he’d outright defended her.

Yet Dolli sighed in defeat. His defense of her, as much as she appreciated it, wasn’t the right tactic.

“No, he can speak his piece. I want to hear his grievances, but it doesn’t change the fact that I am Overlord, and we are a Defender type dungeon. This is our reality. We are bound to this town—unless you want to go it alone,” Dolli offered the Osorath.

Vilhelm’s heckles dropped, his ears smoothing against his head. “That would be suicide.”

“It might, but wouldn’t you be happier taking the fight to the heroes?” Dolli asked. Her tone was even keeled, despite the gnawing frustration in her gut. Some of it, she knew, was her people’sfrustration. She felt their thoughts and emotions almost as easily as her own—though she’d grown adept at identifying which was which.

Vilhelm growled. “Why didn’t you put it to a vote, let us all decide our fate?”

“We were a mouse fart away from gettin’ wiped off the map, lad. She didn’t have time for a vote, she had to act,” Greg said in his colorful way that made Dolli chuckle. A mouse fart was a very small measurement indeed, and it was about that close of a battle.

“Just like she acted when we were dyin’ of the plague?” Henrietta sniped.

The growing crowd rumbled with murmurs of agreement, and disagreement. Split feelings of injustice and righteousness went to war inside her, neither of which were her own emotions. She’d lived the life of a pariah, she’d accepted her guilt for the lives lost, but had also come to terms with the decision. She’d saved more than she’d condemned, and it had been a hard choice to make, but one that had to be done.

A soft green mist that smelled of morning dew manifested in the room and all emotion faded. Doubt, worry, fear, everything, all gone. Dolli turned to see Julie, her hands weaving and emanating vibrant light as the spell came to an end.

Julie smiled softly. “There. Now we can think clearly.”

“Did you enchant us?” Vilhelm asked and a pang of anger zipped through the room, inciting the murmurs once more. He must’ve resisted her spell.

“I just thought it would be easier to talk,” Julie said.

“You used your magic against us!” Vilhelm’s anger was palpable, riling up the crowd.

“Enough!” Dolli boomed and everything went deathly still. Her Overlord Presence was in full effect, something she tried not to use for sake of calling herself an equal to her people. “Vilhelm, you are free to do what makes you happy. You as well, Henrietta. But if you stay here, you are committing to being a part of this community. You must defend and protect it. You must do your job, or we could all fail.”

Vilhelm stalked away without a word, and half the group disbanded. The remaining monsters looked between one another with confusion and Dolli waved them off. “There are no imminent threats. Everyone is free to return to their tasks, or whatever you were doing before. We’ll train more soon.”

Everyone except Greg slipped away into the shadows, heading to the respective postings or exits to get back to the city above.

“That’ns trouble, I know ‘cause I was just like him,” Greg warned.

Dolli nodded. “He can stay or leave—or challenge me I suppose, but that wouldn’t change the fact that this is a Defender dungeon. We’re here for life.”

Greg sighed, a loud rumbling sound like a volcano preparing to erupt.

“Want to blow off a little steam?” Dolli asked with a smirk.

“He’s still got that quest, then?”

“I don’t know why he won’t drop it,” Dolli said.

Greg grinned. “Well, let’s ask’m.”

“Follow me,” Dolli said.

She led him up through the dungeon maze to the cottage where Nubiri had made her roost. It was a tall spire with a platform at the top that supported her egg and just enough room for Nubiri to curl up with it. Greg had also constructed a bit of metal scaffolding over the cottage that Nubiri could perch on, though she rarely used it. The wyvern perked up when she saw Dolli.

“Ready?” Dolli asked Nubiri with a smile.

“Alwaysss,” the wyvern hissed, the vengeance thick in her tone.

Dolli opened the Hero Quest menu. There was Keegan, still holding on to the plague quest—though he’d never returned of his own volition since the night of his failed guild raid. The “Summon” button wasn’t always active, but today it was. Dolli had yet to figure that out, but it didn’t matter much. They only summoned him for fun now, and of course, to incentivize him to return Nubiri’s eggs.

“Here we go. Three, two, one,” Dolli said, her thoughts hovering on the text next to Keegan’s name. With a blink, she activated the spell to bring the hero across the wide distances of the five kingdoms to her dungeon.