The kids make pretty good time as they head deeper towards Violet, and I make sure one of my ratlings drops a beat up pick along their path before it continues on its way. They dont miss it, and soon enough, Rezlar is whacking away at any nodes they come across in the tunnels.
Even I can tell he has a lot to learn about mining, but hes pretty good at pacing himself, so hes not wearing himself out. Freddie is also slowly learning how to field dress things, though hes still making a pretty big mess. He doesnt have too much difficulty getting a hide off of a dire rat, and skinning a viper is pretty simple, too, but any magical bits of my denizens are still out of his reach.
Rhonda isnt having much difficulty with her gathering as they journey underground, easily plucking various lichens and fungi as they pass the nodes. To be fair, though, shes had actual experience with her gathering. She gives Freddie a few pointers with some of the dressings, but she has clearly learned more about herbalism, despite how easily I saw Staiven process that widow a while ago.
While they travel and have fun, I check on how the scale painting is going for the twinsnake, and it seems to be going great! It might look like the snake is being devoured by a swarm of ants, but theyre actually carefully applying the metal transmutation to the scales, and the snake doesnt seem to be suffering any for it. Queen is waiting to give it the lightning essence until after the scales are done, not wanting either process to potentially interfere with the other.
Thats fine by me. While the twinsnake would respawn if anything goes too poorly, I wouldnt want to waste the time on failing. I would worry about traumatizing them with a brutal death, but my denizens dont really seem to mind dying all that much, as far as I can tell. Death is probably a bit less traumatizing when you know youll just respawn.
I take my time to watch the ants work on the twinsnake as the kids get close to Violet. Theyll be safe with her, and Queen would probably like me to relay anything particularly interesting later, via Teemo.
The young dungeon takes her time deciding when to expand. While her mentor has given her a quest to do so, theres no true urgency to it. She has the mana for it, but shes still a little nervous about expanding beyond the solid door her mentor gave her.
Her mushroom scion is confident there will be no danger in the small cavern outside her current borders, even with the scythemaw eggs. He doesnt know what theyll do when she expands, and thats honestly part of why shes been delaying her mentors quest. What if she gets a scythemaw spawner? What if she gets a scythemaw enclave?! What if the poor eggs just die?! She doesnt really like any of those possibilities, and her scions cant think of anything else that might happen when she expands.
Her mentor doesnt seem to know what might happen, either, but hes not worried, which makes her at least pretty sure the eggs wont just die on her. Theres still the possibility of her gaining scythemaws, though, which she doesnt like. Theyre big and scary and mean. Her centipede scion thinks they could be nicer if she raised them, but she doesnt know how to do that. She doesnt have the kind of water a scythemaw would need to live in, anyway.
She could upgrade some of her own things a bit more to further delay, but her mentor is right about her needing some more room. Her little cavern is pretty overrun right now. She likes the movement of her denizens and her bunnies, with the latter being great bait to lure things for the former to kill. She doesnt like hurting delvers, but she has no qualms at all about destroying invaders. They only give mana when defeated, not when they beat her denizens or kill a bunny, and her mentor has no problem with wiping them out, either, so shes happy to follow his lead on this.
Her door slowly creaks open, and she sees some familiar faces, though their clothing is different. Oh, and theyve brought one more, too. She still sometimes thinks of the two as walking mushrooms, remembering her first experience with Rhonda and Freddie, and their spiders. She still thinks Rhonda looks a lot like a mushroom, even after Teemo explained her wide cap is a hat. Shes been hoping her mushrooms will develop caps like hers. It just looks interesting.
Freddie is at least easier to identify as not a mushroom, though his shield on his back makes her think one is growing from him, sometimes.
Their new friend is not a mushroom at all, though he seems friendly enough. He has a new weapon that she hasnt seen before, which reminds her of one of her centipedes legs, except it doesnt bend and move like they do. She simply watches as they enter, their weapons ready. She knows they know she wont actually attack them, but outside is still dangerous, and something could have slipped in.
They quickly see everything is as it should be, and so relax and put away their weapons, and Violet enjoys them simply wandering around. Rhonda starts picking mushrooms, and Violet enjoys the mana gained from it. Shes a bit surprised when she gets a surge, but a question through the bond to mentor Thedeim gives her a simple answer: quest.
Teemo had told her about her mentor giving quests, about how it gives more mana all around, and she would very much like to be able to give her own quests if thats how they work.
Rhonda continues to walk around, gathering some mushrooms and just being a good delver while Freddie and the new one start to hunt her bunnies. Her bunnies are quick, but so are the delvers, and the newcomers sharp leg easily dispatches whatever bunnies he gets close to. Freddie takes his time to skin them, and another surge of mana lets her know he had a quest, too.
She watches the newcomer, wondering if he has a quest, but it soon becomes clear he probably doesnt. He says something to the others, who simply shrug and shake their heads. Maybe he was asking about a quest? She should ask mentor Thedeim about it later or Teemo. She thinks its a complicated enough answer that shell want the Voice to help.
As the delvers prepare to leave, she gets a feeling from her mentor. He wants to have a boss fight in her territory? Shes reluctant, remembering how scary the scythemaw was, but he assures her it shouldnt be as dangerous as that. He even indicates hell have some healing ants and slimes nearby, just in case, which eases her concern a lot.
She decides to let her mentor challenge her delvers, knowing theyre some of his favorite ones, too. He wouldnt hurt them just to give her some mana. Just a few seconds after she gives permission, she feels the doors open, and she sees what the boss fight will be.
The delvers do, too, and immediately draw their weapons and watch as the odd monster enters. Shes seen some of her mentors snakes before, but this one is larger than most, and has two heads! Even more, its shiny, looking like its made of the same stuff Freddie is wearing. The ten-foot long snake rears up as it coils itself some, an arc of electricity traveling up the connection of the necks to the body with a crackle. The lightning dissipates as the two heads hiss, one revealing wicked fangs, and the delvers prepare to deal with her mentors challenge.
Freddie draws his shield, then draws it another few times. Violet doesnt know how he does that, but she cant think of any other way for him to have so many shields around him. He shouts as he slams them into the ground, forming a wall.
Palisade! While their conversation may elude her, skills are a lot easier to understand. The newcomer conjures a water version of his stabber as Rhonda and Lucas start working together on some kind of spell.
In response, the twinsnake starts its offensive. The two heads hiss once more, and each has an attack to test the delvers. One sends a strong kinetic punch at the shields, as the other delivers a bolt of lightning that arcs along the barrier. Something in the protection fails, letting some of the lightning through, giving all of the delvers a nasty shock.
Fiona jumps forward to start patching the barrier, but Freddie lets it come apart as the attacks come to an end. He, Rhonda, and the newcomer all charge the snake, which seems to catch it off guard. It recovers just enough by the time Freddie barrels into it, catching his charge and only being pushed back a few inches. The heads try to strike around his shields, but Freddies friends dont give it much chance to do so.
Fiona is working on trying to tie the two heads together with her silk, while the newcomer lashes and lances with his weapon, the water double striking a heartbeat behind each time and driving the fanged head back. Freddie gets a good swing of his axe, but it only skids along the shiny scales of the boss, rather than biting in.
He shouts and the newcomer stabs at the main body of the snake, and he has better luck. The shiny protection has small gaps, Violet realizes, which the stabber is perfectly made to take advantage of.
Not that the snake is going to just let him. It tries to focus on the stabby one, but Freddie and Fiona are experts at getting in the way. Rhonda shouts from the back, and the stabber nods uncertainly as his water stabber intercepts a stream of green fluid from the fanged head. After a few more moments of attack and defense, the stabber takes a step back and shouts.
Undertow! Water seems to just bubble from the ground and move with speed, breaking the stability of the snake. Rhonda takes the opportunity to unleash her own attacks, and the stabber shouts with her.
Rime Tide! the water crytalizes, holding the snake in an awkward position for a few moments, though the snake quickly starts to regain its posture.
But not quickly enough. As the ice formed on the snake, fire started to lick around Freddies axe, and this time its him and Rhonda who shout.
Blazing Strike! The heat of the attack, combined with the snake being off balance, lets Freddie find or perhaps create a large enough gap in the scales for his axe to bite deep. The fanged head gurgles a hiss before going limp, and the other head shatters the ice with a kinetic burst.
It brings its tail around and bashes Freddie back a couple steps, and turns its focus on the stabber. He looks nervous, but a shout from Freddie helps stabilize him and his nerve. Freddie shouts again and the stabber shouts as well.
Urchin Stance! Freddies shields move to surround the stabber, as he draws several more of his water stabbers. He goes on the offensive, his attacks poking through small holes in the shield coverage to score hits on the wounded snake. It tries to attack back, but each strike is not only blocked by the shields, but then countered with the sickly-green water of the stabbers.
The snake fights valiantly, but each strike weakens it, slows it, and before long, the stabber gets a clean shot through one of the snakes eyes, and the beast falls. Rhonda whoops with excitement as they get their experience, and Freddie smiles wide. The stabber, though, practically collapses to the ground, rolling to his back to stare upwards as he tries to catch his breath.
Violet is surprised at how well the delvers fought. It wasnt the singular overwhelming attack she saw defeat the scythemaw, but it was still very impressive! And it wasnt as scary as the fight with the scythemaw, either. She lets them relax as she digests the fight. Should she try to make a boss? She doesnt want to have a fight like that all the time but maybe a scion would work?
Her mentor has a scion intended for fighting, maybe she should copy that? She looks at her own scions, and slowly decides neither of them would be really fit for something like that. Her centipede protects her core, and her mushroom keeps her informed of the outside. If neither of them will work maybe a new one? She considers the expansion available past her door with a new perspective. Not only would she get new territory, but she should get a new spawner or two, and her mentor will certainly encourage her to get a new scion for each spawner. Perhaps shell try to make one of them into a boss.
Shes still not going to do much fighting but she did get a lot of mana from that scuffle. Maybe an occasional battle wouldnt be so bad.