All three of them were pretty good.
Two of them were buildings that being the Hut of Concoctions and Totem of Unrest, while the last was a monster.
Why did they grab his attention?
Well the Hut of Concoctions, had great potential in his eyes. It was a small wooden hut that housed a sinister-looking black cauldron. Skulls and figures of phantoms were engraved onto the cauldron.
Within its depths churned a swirling, enigmatic purple mixture, stirred endlessly by a ladle that moved on its own. Adding more to the evil and mysterious charm of the hut.
Above the cauldron, purple fumes and bubbles rose in rhythmic bursts, occasionally forming ghostly shapes.
If Hale could rate it from 1 to 10, he would give it a perfect 10. This was the perfect prop for any low-budget horror movie. He could already picture it in his mind, an evil witch, was swirling the cauldron with a ladle, and occasionally sipping from it. While a tied-up woman was staring at her in horror.
Actually, that might already have been made into a movie, would he get sued?
Anyways the Hut of Concoctions' function was to create throwable potions. These potions could create toxic and corrosive fumes that could eat through the insides of any unfortunate victims. By the time the potion's effects subsided, all that remained was a skinless, lifeless husk. A bone-chilling effect.
Although it sounded quite good, the question is, who would use the potions?
He highly doubted that the alligators or the leeches would be able to use the potions, because the alligators had short and stubby arms, while the leeches... they, unfortunately, had no arms.
So that had already eliminated most of the monsters that he had.
While swamp hags, he highly doubted that they would need the potions. They were already strong enough by themselves, and not only that, Swamp Hags were monsters that relied on magic. Expecting them to risk themselves for close combat was an extremely stupid move in his eyes.
If any rogue got close to a swamp hag, it wouldn't be surprising for the rogue to swiftly take out the swamp hag.
But, he did see one way for the swamp hags to use the potions. They could launch it with their magic, but it seemed quite redundant, and the accuracy wouldn't be that good. Why would he go throw all that trouble when he can just buy something else?
This was why Hale, considered it an item with potential. It looked great, but it didn't have much usage for him currently and what he needed were goods that could boost his strength.
He wanted to maintain an undefeated reputation, something that would not only catch the attention of players but the NPCs too.
The next item was the Totem of Unrest.
Its design resembled a Native American totem pole, yet its carvings carried an unsettling aura. At the base stood an abstract wooden figure of a human, its hands pressed tightly over its eyes as if shielding itself from some unspeakable terror. Above it, the second carving depicted another human figure, this one unable to resist its curiosity—one eye peeking nervously through parted fingers.
At the pinnacle of the totem loomed the most disturbing figure of all. Fully exposed and unrestrained, its carved features twisted into a demonic visage. Its wide, unblinking eyes radiated madness, and its frozen expression seemed to echo maniacal, otherworldly laughter.
The totem seemed to tell a haunting tale of fear, temptation, and ultimate descent into chaos.
The totem was just outright creepy, but luckily for Hale, the effects of the totem overrode its creepiness. So he stared at it with a look of appreciation rather than one of fear.
The Totem of Unrest's reach extended to a 50-meter radius. Those in its area would first seem to have mild feelings of discomfort and unrest. As time passed, this feeling would then transform into cursed whispers and temptations from otherworldly entities. Those who failed to resist or escape its grasp succumbed to its power, their minds overtaken by possession.
Victims transformed into fanatical servants of the totem, they would worship it with a deranged fervor, driven by an uncontrollable urge to attack intruders and drag them into the totem's accursed range, continuing the cycle of madness and doom.
Through this item, Hale was starting to get a grasp of the system that he got. Plagues, poison, and diseases didn't just have to be physical illnesses. It seemed to range into mental illnesses, just like how Alzheimer's was considered a disease, what was wrong with considering a totem that corrupted victim's minds as a disease?
He just didn't know how it would work on players, but he had a hypothesis.
If players got corrupted, then they would usually be considered dead. So their corrupted bodies would continue to worship the totem. While a new body of the player would reform somewhere else because they were considered dead, the system would just create a new body for them to respawn into, while leaving the corrupted body alone.
It was quite a powerful effect.
The only issue?
It was inflexible and the range wasn't really that big. Especially for players, because of their annoying systems. The moment they walked into its area of effect, they would be immediately notified of it. Unless they were extremely stupid, no one would stay in its area of effect.
So this was basically an item that only had hope of working against NPCs.
So here comes the next problem.
It was extremely rare for NPCs to go inside a dungeon. NPCs considered dungeons as extremely dangerous planes of existence. Not only that, they didn't even call dungeons as dungeons, they called them as realms.
Only a specific few NPCs would go into a dungeon.
Like adventurers who had an insatiable curiosity and a thirst for riches. The other case would be the suppression of the dungeons for fear of a dungeon outbreak.
When a dungeon goes unchecked for too long, it can cause a dungeon outbreak. This means monsters can escape from the dungeon and cause immeasurable amounts of damage. So kingdoms, churches, and local powers would hire or send their people to clear the dungeon.
Doing this will damage the dungeon, eliminating the threat of a dungeon outbreak for the time being.
In other words, there was a very low chance of an NPC going into his dungeon.
The last item, which was a monster was the Swamp Slimes.
They were not the adorable slimes, that one would think of, bouncing around and being showered with head pats. These were heinous creatures, because of their one specific ability; they could eat through metal.
Not only that, they were large, measuring up to heights of 8 meters with their body consisting of water and gelatinous materials from the swamp they resided in. So physical attacks barely had any effects on them, as they could easily regenerate the damage, as long as they were in the swamp water.
The only way to defeat them was to destroy their slime cores. A small sphere located in their body, it acted as their heart, brain, lungs, and any other organs that you can think of.
The only problem?
They can easily move it around, unlike those inflexible organs, slimes can move their slime cores around so that they can easily dodge fatal damage.
While these creatures possessed the terrifying ability to dissolve metal, they couldn't dissolve flesh. This meant their only method of killing players was to suffocate them by engulfing them entirely. The inability to dissolve flesh was a small mercy for players.
However, players would rather it eat flesh than metals because it can destroy their armor, equipment, and weapons!
A single encounter could reduce their hard-earned loot to nothing but memories!
He could almost see the looks of despair etched on their faces as the weapon they had poured so much time, effort, and money into was devoured before their eyes. He wondered if such shock would cause them to question their will to live.
They were truly terrifying creatures that deserved to be called devils.
In the end, between the three items, Hale made a tough decision.
[Purchase Swamp Slimes x3?]
Hitting 'yes' he soon got the notification.
[-300 Dungeon Points]
Checking his dungeon page, he soon found the adorable slimes (in his eyes at least) laying rest there. But, this time instead of placing them around the starting island. He placed them around the dungeon boss, Noxious's Corruption.
The slime cores were dropped into the murky water as a terrifying whirlpool formed around the slime cores.
Absorbing the murky water and turning it into gelatinous materials, the shape of the slimes slowly took form.
'What adorable creatures. I'm sure the players will love it.'
He thought with a grin on his nonexistent face.