As much as Alexander tended to be a lecherous bastard, he wasn't blind to reality. The darkened fort housed a bandit group after all, with two zombies at his back, he was hardly in a position to worry about the fate of the bait that lured him here. The dusty old relic of a building seemed to close in on him, the scent of blood from the undead behind assailed his nose but he could still smell that distinct odor as he passed one room after another.
Opening the door had revealed a sight he truly had not expected. Where he had thought he would find blood thirsty bandits, he instead found emancipated people. The sickly individuals reclined around what could only be a hookah, while Alex had never seen a real one in his old life he'd heard about them. Several pipes stretched from the large jar in the center of the room feeding the poor souls scattered on the fringes. Most looked to have been here for a very long time.
The next door was no different, which bothered him. Why would a bandit camp be holding prisoners like this? None looked wealthy, even the more healthy looking ones were still dressed in common clothing that reminded him of the villagers his father use to manage. If they were not being held for wealth, just why were they being kept like this? It made no sense to him. Slowly he left these oblivious souls behind, not even bothering to let his zombies infect them, he was wary what the sickly smoke might do to his undead.
After a half hour of searching he found the stairs down, there'd been two more rooms, each holding people, though the second had seen half the occupants dead. The pipes hung from slack lips, the rank odor of rotting bodies and stale waste had choked the room. Whoever owned the fort now obviously didn't care about the lives of the ones trapped by the pipeweed, such to the point the people died where they laid and likely rotted there too until replaced.
Alexander shuddered at the thought of 'new' users dragging maggot corpses off cushions and taking over in the filth where the corpse had been. Shaking his head he lead his two undead down into the basement level of the fort, he was leary at first, worrying that the zombies crude motor skills might see them topple down the stairs like they would in those old zombie flicks. Undead and complex terrain just never seemed to mesh well, even in the ones where they kept rudimentary abilities like opening doors and such...
This level was thick with the stale stench of the pipeweed. Unlike the floor above, little thought had been paid to ventilating this floor. Opening a door nearly choked Alexander to death when the hazy, smoke filled room spilled its toxic cloud out 8nto the corridor. It was here Alexander finally found the rest of the mercenary group. Half a dozen in that same dark leather armor surrounded a hookah, puffing away completely oblivious to the intruder that looked upon them with disgust.
Leaving them to their sad indulgence he continued exploring this floor, after a few empty rooms the latest showed to be a storage room. Weapons, armor, clothing and various miscellaneous items were stuffed into this room. Whoever was collecting people for their schemes wasn't doing it for wealth as a few full coin purses were near by, the shine of silver whorls and copper marks glittered under a flickering candle. The strange treasure room, or storage closet, made the whole situation even more strange to him.
Continuing on, the lower rooms were much the same as he had already seen, a few hardy souls desperately clinging to a sad existence with a vast majority having died at their stations. Even more peculiar to Alexander, the layout of the fort was almost exactly the same as the one that had held his dungeon door, while from a cost stand point only using a few blueprints for ones defensive structures was very effective didn't that mean invaders only needed to steal one set to understand how to bring every fort to its knees?
Shaking his head, Alexander followed the winding route that in his old fort would have lead to his door and was forced to come up short. Slack jawed he stared at massive transparent door way, if not for the fact that rather than bones it was covered in blades, one could easily mistake it for his door. Looking at it he clenched his teeth and backed away. A dungeon! This changed a great deal if there was a dungeon here he was in much more danger than he originally thought especially if it was belonging to Wrath or Conquest.
Hurrying back to the hookah rooms close by Alexander swept his eyes over the corpses and expanded his magic reaching out to touch them with dark energy, this energy he released through the nearby rooms. Alerts began flashing before his eyes....
The Death Spell [Create Lesser Undead] has been learned?
Do you wish to raise skeletons or zombies?
You have chosen skeletons, [Create Lesser Undead] has evolved into [Create Skeletal Warriors]
[Create Sketal Warriors] +80% Proficiency gained.
Ten Tier 0 Skeletons have been created outside your dungeon.
Eight Tier 1 Skeletal Warriors have been created outside your dungeon.
Due to the extended presence of controlled undead in your area a Tier one Sketetal Warrior has been promoted to Tier Two Skeletal Captain.
Alexander leaned against a wall, clutching it for support, around him there was a rather sickening noise as the skeletons of many of the dead people extracted themselves from their fleshy prisons. Gorey skeletons emerged from each of the nearby rooms filing out into the corridor. The reddish hue on each, the shining blood running down their bones made the sight even more disturbing. At the fore front were eight armed skeletons leader by one that could be considered slightly bigger and instead of wielding a copper sword instead had a bronze saber.
In truth in his rush he had over cast, that empty feeling hung low in his body as he stared at the silent group of skeletal troops. If this dungeon was like his own only ten people could enter so that mean himself, the skeletal warriors, their captain and the two infectious zombies were the raid team. Looking at the basic Tier zero skeletons, he thought a bit then guided them back to the storage area. This time careful with his magic use he touched these skeletons.
Reorganizing undead. Do you wish to upgrade your Tier zero Skeletons into Tier One Skeletal Porters?
Smiling to himself he accepted the change and watched as the rickety basic undead skeletons slightly hardened up. Focusing on his knowledge of the land he directed the porters to begin looting the storage room, grabbing the valuables and carrying them back towards his dungeon. Without guidance he would have to hope the porters could make the trip, with the sun likely having set, or close enough to it, they should be able to trek across the land unmolested unless they got really unlucky with the patrols.
Collecting himself, he rested while he watched the porters efficiently begin loading up on the stuff in the storage room. For basic undead they actually seemed to have a base intellect as rather than say grabbing a pair of swords in each hand and moving off they actively sought ways to carry the most they could in as an efficient way as possible. Say there was a dozen weapons, they would lash the weapons together with strips of cloth torn from common clothing to bundle them together tightly before hoisting the load on their backs.
Alexander had to admit, compared to the Tier zero variant, the Tier one support undead were impressive to watch at work. The Tier zero skeletons had barely survived the shirt walk over as they often staggered on uneven surfaces and scraped against the stone walls. The porters however were rather nimble, didn't mean they were fast, just that they were less likely to trip on a random pebble and be crushed under their burden. Leaving the workers to the looting he returned to his raid group, having the skeletal warriors and zombies fall in formation and escort him through the door.
Idly he wondered if the master of the dungeon was like himself? Sat in the core room watching a raiding party of undead intrude. Was Laytalya this dungeon master's Thersea? Frowning to himself he directed his zombies to take the lead, while their gait down the sloping stone passage was slow, Alexander was more wary for traps. He'd rather risk the tough zombies triggering the things than having his stronger warriors getting smashed by traps. Still as they advanced down the slight slope the shambles did not trip so much as a pit.
Alexander was starting to wonder, was this a newbies dungeon? When he had first found his dungeon it was a straight run to the core, could this be a similar situation? Or did the dungeon owner fully trust the outside mask to hide its undeveloped truth? Shaking his head he strode after the zombies, he started to hope this was an reawakened dungeon, there would be no super powered guardian after all. While he might have a numerical advantage, he doubted his host of weak undead could fight against Jansea or someone of her power.
Finally the path started to level off, both a comfort and a worry, the passage lead to what he suspected was a Tier One layout, a large cavern. As his troop shambles into the spacious room Alexander had to pinch his nose. The sickly sweet pipeweed was thick in the room, it clung around his shins like a low laying fog that obscured the rough floor. Flickering torches were spread through out the room illuminating it with a hazy reddish orange glow. Sending the zombies wide and staying amongst the skeletal warriors he advanced.
As he strode forward he glanced around, from the looks of things stone spires and columns were meant to provide cover for the room, this would be an archers paradise since cover was sparse and hardly covered anything of his size. As they were reaching the opposite side of the chamber Alexander heard a high pitched voice whining urgently...
"Misressssss they're almost here!!!! Oh bother, Mistresss wake up! Wake up damn it! Wakeupwakeupwakeupwakeup...."
A groggy voice responded in a familiar tone, "Huh, whas tha big deal Shankie poo??? Juss send out the gobbosss..."
"Misressssss we did that already! All the smoke knocked them out! It's only you and me Mistressss and I don't wanna die!"
Glancing down unconsciously, he could indeed see the aforementioned goblins laying listless in the smoke. Being much closer to the ground they had ample opportunity to such the foul stuff into their lungs and had keeled over not long being dismissed from their Mistress. Alexander sighed heavily shaking his head in wonderment at why a dungeon Lord would employ this sort of poison... at a level her allies were the only ones affected?
Alexander finally stepped around a large column that hid the exit to the core chamber, as he expected from the voice Laytalya was flopped across a cushion covered bench. A hookah was right by her limp head as she glanced over and exhaled a thick cloud of the sickly sweet pipeweed, "Ohhhh heyyy Alex! Did you get the ears already? What time isss it?" Glancing around she looked rather lost trying to stand up and fix her rather skewed out fit, winking his way she made a peace sign with her fingers, "Hey booboo peekin naughty boy, unless ya really wanna...?"
Alexander face palmed. The guardian visible through the doorway was a pig the size of a mule. It too face palmed with a hoof. Laytalya looked between the two curiously, "Wass wrong you two? Did I drop my pants again?"