"
"Guess I'll replace the dead goblins to start with." Recovering from his prideful embarrassment, Frost summoned 4 new goblins for the first room at 30DP a pop.
'The frost wolves will eventually heal by themselves so there's no need to replace them.'
"That still leaves 687DP." Frost rubbed his chin as he thought. Although he could buy some more monsters there was also traps, items and even food available, he was spoiled for choice.
"Why don't you buy another polar bear since you can afford it or perhaps a different D-rank." Maya suggested from his side.
"No, even though I can afford it there's nowhere to place it. You saw how the polar bear treats the other monsters, it's not really a team player…. I could always just save for later, it does cost 10,000DP for a new floor so…. or possibly save up for a spawner…." Frost started mumbling while being lost in thought. Seeing that he was distracted and would be for a while Maya left him to it, moving towards the kitchen.
10 minutes later Frost was still stuck wavering on what to do, his brow was tensed, and he looked quite comical.
Bop! Maya poked Frost on the forehead where the pressure was greatest.
"Frowning so much will ruin that pretty face of yours young master." Maya had finished preparing some snacks and tea but seeing Frost's face in danger she quickly moved.
Frost was momentarily stunned, completely forgetting what he was just thinking about. His face was frozen and his mouth agape.
"Smile young master, smile." Maya tilted her head cutely to the side and gestured with her smooth jade like fingers towards her cheeks in the shape of a smile.
Frost was speechless and subconsciously started to smile.
'Perhaps I'm just overthinking it.' He followed Maya's advice and smiled widely untensing his brow.
"Much better," Maya nodded her head before handing Frost a cup of tea.
"You're overthinking this young master, just go with your gut." Maya fist bumped the air while tensing her abs.
"Go with my gut...."
"Yeah, you know instinct, whatever pops into your brain first when you see the leftover DP. That'll be what you truly want ….or not but it's the best way to deal with indecision yup." Towards the end of the speech Maya lost confidence as she remembered a few times when going with her instincts landed her in a lot of trouble, but she quickly bounced back nodding vigorously and smiling.
"What I want huh…." Frost peered down into his cup eliminating all external thought focusing only on spending DP. A few moments later his eyes lit up and a smile formed on his face.
"….. Goblins yeah and also traps I'd like to see more adventurers fall into the spike pitfall or get clamped by the bear traps. The goblins performed far better than anticipated and followed orders incredibly well, so I definitely want more." The more he spoke the more determined he sounded.
Only one of the spike fall traps were activated by the [Artic Warband] and that was only because Frost arranged for the snow owls and other monsters to guide them to that area. The size of the traps compared the space available in the room made them very unlikely to be triggered so having more would obviously increase those chances. Even if they didn't fall in and die or receive injuries witnessing Thorin being pulled in by his beard was hilarious in itself. He cried and moped for ages about his poor beard causing Frost and Maya to laugh hysterically.
The goblins however were incredibly cheap and outperformed the limits of G-rank, hell if Frost had enough, he was confident he could even ambush and kill high level adventurers.
'It's a shame that the goblins only come armed with a blunt rusty dagger and practically no clothes let alone armour, but the frost dwarves should be able to fix that.'
So far, they've created several bunkers and simple fortifications in the winter forest as well as attaching the second section goblin's daggers to wooden staffs making makeshift spears. Resulting in them being able to counter the size difference when fighting adventurers.
There wasn't anything that Frost particularly needed at the moment. His defences were strong enough and a single polar bear was sufficient to guard his core room, at least in the early stages. The [Artic Warband] weren't even able to make it into the second section before being forced back. To make it into the final area the party would have to be at least D-rank otherwise they'd struggle against the frost wolves and frost dwarves living there.
"Sounds good young master do it." Maya gave a thumbs up in approval before stuffing her cheeks with snacks, resembling a squirrel.
Frost immediately added 10 goblins all to be summoned in the first section along with 2 ice spike pitfalls and a bear trap for a grand total of 620DP. The moment he clicked confirm the dungeon core whirled into action, lighting up and spinning as it started its task.
Frost instantly felt energy passing through his body before vanishing, leaving him slightly numb. Buying over ten things at once allowed him to feel the strain of using the core albeit being much easier than the first time, no signs of him being short of breath let alone passing out.
"Tsk" Frost subconsciously clicked his tongue in disappointment.
'Looks like no lap pillow.' His gaze wandered towards Maya and then to her shapely legs that were partially exposed through her dress.
The next day was uneventful, not a single adventurer passed by the only thing that did was a random deer beast. It entered the dungeon and was quickly killed by a group of frost goblins releasing a dose of 50DP. The goblins devoured the edible meat whereas Frost used the dungeon core to collect the hide and other useful materials before absorbing its corpse.
It wasn't until late into third day that things changed
A few hundred metres from the dungeon's entrance a couple of severely injured adventurers were limping forward. Their bodies were covered in dried blood and grewsome gashes and wounds could be seen through their torn clothes.
A man and a woman or to be more accurate a boy and a girl, they appeared to be just teenagers no more than 16 or 17 years old. The boy had bright blond hair and underneath the blood and dirt was a rather handsome and brave looking face.
The girl although not curvy like Maya was quite a catch. She had long black hair that reached to her lower back and black eyes that stood out from her pale skin, a cute young beauty in the making.
Thump!
The young girl tripped crashing into the ground, she tried to use her staff to stand but was too weak. Her knees were shaking unable to take her own weight, she was too exhausted and injured.
"Luna!" The boy turned around to help his companion almost immediately making him clench his teeth as his sudden movements agitated his wounds.
"leave me Leo… I'll only slow you down." The girl yelled as loud as she could, but her voice was no more than a whisper. She couldn't carry on; she'd already passed her limit long ago.
"Not a chance in hell!" The boy Leo angrily retorted, his face full of determination and fury. Leo took a deep breath and summoned the most strength he could muster.
"Ah!" Luna screamed as Leo forcefully lifted her and placed her on his back, refusing to let her die here.
"If you can't walk then, I'll just carry you, it shouldn't be too far now, just hang on for a little longer." Leo forcefully spoke through the pain. Blood starting to drip from his back and down his legs, he too was far past his limits.
"Idiot…. Moron …. stupid head." Luna writhed around trying to push herself from Leo's back, but she lacked the strength, all she could do was call him names while crying into his shoulders. This shouldn't have happened, why is this happening was all she could think as she was carried against her will towards the dungeon.
"Young master looks like we've got a new intruder." Frost and Maya were currently in the training room. Maya comfortably sitting at the side relaxing while Frost practised his glaive arts against an ice golem. Unfortunately, he hadn't been able to make any more substantial progress with his glaive still being at basic mastery.
"Finally!" In response he struck the ice golem hard, sending it shuffling backwards. He smiled and started to walk in Maya's direction while bringing up the dungeon menu. Maya undid her summoning magic causing the golem to return to mana particles, vanishing into dust almost instantly.
Frost took a quick look at the map outside the dungeon.
"Eh! Just two," his happiness was quickly squashed. The map only showed two red dots slowly heading towards the dungeon.
"They shouldn't have just sent two people for the monster lair inspection, right?" Plus isn't too soon for them to have reached us already.
"Not likely, they're probably just some regular adventurers but I'll need a closer look to make sure." At this point they weren't considered within the dungeon's purview, so their daily DP income wasn't shown yet.
"Let's head back into the private space then." Frost quickly scrolled through the menu before teleporting him and Maya.
Once they arrived and Maya had gotten comfy, he brought up the dungeon video screen.
"Eh!" Frost was shocked, the two adventurers slowly making their way to his dungeon looked to be half dead already. They left a substantial trail of blood with every step they took and the number of wounds on their bodies were beyond counting. Their equipment albeit significantly damaged appeared to be rather high class, however.
The boy was garbed in a mix of high-quality leather and an iron chainmail vest whereas the girl wore a long blue robe that covered most of her body likely made from some sort of monster silk to provide some durable resistance.
Weapons wise the boy was simply armed with a regular 3ft sword probably steel and a black shield of unknown material easily half his size. The girl simply had a wooden staff with a white crystal embedded at the top.
"Hoh! She's a healer." Maya chimed in after seeing the white crystal on the girl's staff.
"A healer? So, she can use healing spells?" Frost remembered receiving Maya's first healing spell and having most of his injuries instantly vanish, a feeling of respect started to grow as he viewed this girl.
"Not just healing, she can probably use defensive and light-based offensive magic based on the quality of her staff but…." Maya's brow was frowning, and she appeared confused.
"Even though they've got good equipment they're just rookies, E-rank at best, her spells will be relatively weak even with the staff's addition."
'Ah! So, they only look strong.' The little bit of respect was quickly snuffed out, a bunch of rich kids albeit with some fierce determination.
Frost smiled as he watched the focused and pained face the young boy made as he slowly carried his companion towards the dungeon, he liked his attitude.
"Could you explain more about defensive and light-based magic?"
"Of course, young master; defensive magic helps to strengthen weapons, armour or even the body for example [bless] is a low-level spell that applies magic attacks to weapons allowing them to strike ethereal targets. Offensive light-based magic was created by the Light God and uses light to attack, for example the [light beam] spell fires a focused beam of light that decimates undead and other darkness-based monsters however it's rather weak against everything else." Maya gave another few examples of higher-level spells, but the young girl wouldn't be able use them with her current abilities.
"Wait if the girl can use healing magic, then how did they end up so injured?" Couldn't the young girl easily cast a healing spell at any time as they walked onward.
"Simple she's out of mana." Maya answered back bluntly, she looked over at Frost as though he asked a dumb question.
Frost grew embarrassed under Maya's gaze; he should have noticed something so obvious. With the girl's mana capacity, she'd not be like Frost who could constantly cast spells for hours without rest. In fact, his mana capacity was almost as much as Maya's, and he was still in his growing phase.