What if I just carve out the floors myself? That's what I thought when determining how to actually get away from this cave entrance. From all of the fantasy novels I have read, even dungeon core novels, they can usually just change the terrain through mana.
I feel like my situation could be similar. I already have a full view of the cave due to the mana I'm projecting. What if I can manipulate the environment through that, like it's my domain.
I try to focus on the mana permeating through the entire cave. Focusing on the area behind me, I attempt to manipulate the mana in the rocks so that it starts to spread. I start to strain. Nothing ends up happening.
FAH
I should start to be more realistic. I'm a newly formed dungeon core with a tiny bit of mana. Of course I don't have the capacity or experience to start doing that now.
I think if I were to get some sort of monster that was capable of digging, then I can use it to start terraforming the area. I just have to get some monsters to enter here.
Ever since I've woken up, there hasn't been any type of monster that has entered here. Although I haven't been here long, I still need to progress. I think for now I will start building my army of monsters.
For the next day, I continuously spawned flying rats and cave bats in a ratio of three to one. While cave bats are powerful in one on one scenarios. I think the flying rat's bulk will be important for large battles.
By the time the next day rolled around, I had made an overwhelming amount of monsters. To the point where I was soft-locked because of the amount of space available in my cave.
I stopped making monsters when I had around one hundred cave bats and three hundred flying rats, otherwise they would not be able to fit inside of this cave.
I sent twenty teams out consisting of one flying rat and one cave bat to attract beasts into the cave, leaving the majority in the cave for when the inevitable horde of enemies arrived.
It wasn't long before they arrived. Packs of very large dogs followed a couple of teams, all leading straight towards the entrance of the cave.
As soon as they entered, the dogs were slaughtered. Hundreds of flying rats swooping in from above slicing through the dogs easily, the ones that didn't get killed in the initial attack were cleaned up by the agile bats.
Kill after kill, I felt my mana capacity rise. I already gained the essence of the assault dog, now allowing me to add it to my arsenal of monsters.
I started to get giddy.
I already have an army of monsters, and with each new monster killed I get a permanent increase to my mana.
Now this is a cheat!
I had a nice celebration until I started to feel mana flowing back to me. Different from usual because I didn't feel the usual permanent increase to my capacity. Rather, it just felt like I had gained mana back that I had already spent.
Meaning, I think some of my monster teams died.
One by one, I could feel as each monster was slain by whatever bigger monster was out there. Eventually the stream of mana stopped.
Hopefully that was it, a couple of losses was fine since I could just reform them. But this haul was pretty nice already.
I looked out at my army of monsters, they were already tearing apart and eating the assault dogs.
Satisfied, I started to produce some dogs, they would be a nice addition as an infantry unit. However, before I could even start, the ground started to shake.
Looking outwards, I realized we might be cooked. A lone flying rat was booking it inside of the cave with multiple bipedal boar-looking monsters with four arms.
They were huge, easily towering over a normal human. If that wasn't enough, it looks like they brought more assault dogs with them too.
Looking at the trouble that rat brought me, I got a little worried. I got even more worried when one of the boar-looking monsters chucked a rock at the rat.
Bro got annihilated.
Blood and guts rained all over the cave.
Using the connection I had with my monsters, since I made them, I nudged them to start attacking. I had the bats attack the boars while the rats picked off the dogs.
I'm hoping the bats will be able to stall the boars by harassing them and slowly whittle them down before getting support from the flying rats. I watched as the bats swarmed around each boar. Dodging the swings of the boars and slowly damaging them. Although the were able to dodge well, some of them still got hit.
Every swing there would be mists of blood from the bats that couldn't dodge, but their sacrifices were not in vain.
The flying rats are making quick work of the dogs. Combining their large number and flight advantage, the flying rats were decimating their enemies. Minutes flew by as the fight continued.
Eventually the flying rats were able to finish off most of the dogs, so I sent a mental command to start focusing on the boars.
The number of bats were looking thin, but now the bulk of the force was free to support them.
From there it was a waiting game. While the boars were strong, they weren't strong enough to defeat overwhelming numbers. The boars swung, looking like they were trying to swat away a swarm of bees. Unfortunately for them, the rats and bats left more than just a sting.
Finally, the last boar dropped dead. I could finally relax.
A majority of my army was wiped out, but the gains were more than worth it. I can produce even more in a day than I had before.
Especially killing the boars, it seems like they added ten times the amount the rats added to my capacity. Although, that means they take ten times more mana to produce.
But that wasn't everything. The most important thing was the boar essence I had received. I think with this, I could start to expand my dungeon. The boars were bipedal, had immense strength, and had hands.
Which means they should be pretty efficient at digging, if I make a bunch of boars, it shouldn't be long before I have another floor away from the entrance.