Dungeon of Niflheim

“Thank you master, I promise I won’t let such a disgrace happen on my watch ever again.” Findlay clenched his fists, his mind drifting back to his battle against the Sanguine Snakes and the man that still remain in the 3rd section of the Dungeon.

‘Barren was it hahaha, I’ll make sure to make you regret ever entering my master’s domain.’

“Nanna, Loki this is Findlay, the strongest monster under my command and my right hand in managing the dungeon.” He called over Nanna and Loki who were nervously watching next to the Santa like frost dwarf.

“Nice to meet you Findlay.” The kids both greeted the large ice troll as best they could. Findlay’s aura was still in effect after all, pressuring them.

“It’s nice to meet you Nanna, Loki. I hope we can serve the master to the best of our abilities.” Findlay tried to retain his aura as best he could, while kneeling down to roughly their height and smiling. He understood that the two phoenix kin before him were very important to his master, they even had a little more authority than him, so he greeted them with respect.

With their introductions done, Findlay moved back as did Nanna and Loki, they retreated next to Maya, by her side Findlay’s aura was neutralised.

“Findlay I’ll leave you to manage things here, teach the new monsters the ropes. I’ll likely be expanding the Dungeon by another floor, so there could be a few tremors.”

“Got it master, I’ll get them in line.” Findlay saluted before getting back to work.

.....

“And Findlay”

“Yes master”

“Leave that dying adventurer alone, I want to ring out the maximum amount of DP possible, can’t have you ending him by accident.” Frost wasn’t na?ve enough to not notice Findlay’s desire for revenge.

Findlay’s eyes twitched slightly in disappointment before he sighed and nodded in response, agreeing not to mess with Barren.

“Let’s head back to the private space and check out your new rooms” Frost turned around and spoke to Nanna and Loki, his work here was done, Findlay would take care of the rest.

Frost’s words brought a spark to their eyes, their curiosity enkindled.

“Let’s go,” with those words, Frost, Loki, Nanna, and Maya vanished from the glade, returning to the private space. This time the change in locations didn’t affect the two kids as bad, just making them a little dizzy.

The Private space had changed from ten minutes ago, another large bedroom was present, opposite Frost’s and Maya’s. Two large twin beds, along with a couple empty bookshelves and wardrobes filled the room. Simple but high quality far more than Loki and Nanna ever had access to.

The moment they saw the room, they shivered, unable to believe what they were seeing. They’d only been gone for a matter of minutes, yet a new room was there, and it was theirs. Their lips started to quiver as they looked on unsure how to react.

“Well go on, take a look around, jump on the bed, have a pillow fight this room is yours, do with what you wish.” Frost spoke with a fatherly tone giving them the permission they needed.

Nervously Nanna and Loki entered the room, checking around all the furniture, feeling the soft mattress and comfy bedding. Their hands still quivering as they looked at one another in shock. Eventually however they smiled, and tears started to flow down their cheeks, they’d never felt so blessed. And with that they let loose, taking up Frost’s suggestion they started jumping on their beds having fun, something they hadn’t been able to do in a long time.

Maya wiped a few tears from the side of her eyes as she watched on.

“Help them settle in, place their new clothes in their wardrobes, pick out who’s bed is who’s etc.... I’ll get to work on expanding the Dungeon.” Frost handed Maya the storage rings that held hers and the kids’ stuff before sitting down on the couch. There’s was a lot he could do with 13,500DP plus he had over ten gold coins in storage that he planned to use, effectively giving another 10,000DP if converted. Maya accepted the rings and moved into the kids room, joining in on the fun.

“Let’s get started then shall we.” Frost activated the dungeon core and started building.

“First things first lets build a second floor.” A second floor cost 10,000DP and would come with three empty small rooms the same as what he started with. He decided to split his purchases up into sections to prevent a loss of consciousness. Immediately confirming his purchase of a second floor.

In the private space they didn’t feel any change but in the Dungeon all the monsters felt the ground shake for 30 seconds or so before everything returned to normal. The Dungeon core room that was still protected by that barrier was thus relocated to the last room on the second floor. Its original location was replaced by a staircase that led deeper into the mountain.

“Let’s convert some gold next to undue that major cost.” Frost removed ten gold coins and dropped them into the core converting items for the very first time. The floating orb absorbed the gold coins and his DP soared back up to 13,500. The process was smooth, but he didn’t get a rush like he normally did from absorbing DP, it felt as though it had no flavour, merely providing sustenance.

He needed at least another 10000DP to fully outfit the second floor as he desired. Frost planned to outfit all three rooms with environments and expand them to the same size as the first floor rooms. Nothing too fancy same bracket of environments going no higher than 2500DP. The remaining DP, depending on how much, would be spent on possibly another spawner, monsters, traps as well as a few treasures to serve as lures for adventurers. There was a treasure chest that he could purchase that acted like a spawner. It would reappear with new random treasure a day after being opened. The lowest one cost 500DP and it very rarely spawned steel weapons or armour, sort of a luck based lottery. Unfortunately, Dark had put a restriction on it, making it that only adventurers/intruders could open the thing, to prevent abuse.

“First room will be a continuation of the artic castle ruins with random layout, 2000DP for that. The second and third rooms will be ice cavern labyrinths with simple difficulty 2000DP per room bringing the total to 6000DP.” For the last two rooms he really wanted to keep his future guest within the Dungeon for an extended period of time. The labyrinths weren’t that complicated, but it did have annoying dead ends, the larger the room the more annoying they’d become. Higher costing labyrinths would have shifting walls, built in traps, riddles etc.... this one was fairly basic and could eventually be mapped out with frequent visits. He did plan to add a catch to make it more interesting however, he’d need to design a new trap for that.

Adding a random layout with a few special areas with personal design changes Frost added them to his cart bringing the total to 6000DP. “That leaves 7500DP, 4500DP to expand each room to middle size hmmmm lets leave that for now and just expand the second room to middle size for 1500DP, leaving 6000DP for adding monsters, traps etc...” Frost didn’t think it’d be wise to spent all his current DP especially considering that only one party had ever made it to the final room.

“Let’s purchase all that.” He clicked confirm and felt once again the divine power flowing through his body, getting more and more comfortable with it after each use.

The second floor’s second room was arranged directly underneath the second room of the first floor. Magic helped to link the different rooms in space otherwise there’d be 4km long hallways to the next area, not very practical. It being directly underneath the winter forest was a key part of one of his ideas.

“Monsters next,” Frost couldn’t help but smile brightly at this point. Earlier he discovered that he had a few more additions to his roster of monsters. Probably due to his increase in strength and knowledge gained from exploring the nearby territory. He also now had access to 3 star materials and items like weapons and armour.

“Let’s take a look at these new additions.” There were a total of 4 new monsters to choose from.

· Lagombi, D-rank monster, 500DP: large, fanged wombat creature with powerful leg strength, thick skin and pelt that helps defend it from weaker weapons.

· Large frost spider, E-rank, 130DP: great ambusher and hunter, can scale any surface and fire skin freezing webs at its opponents. Its bites and stinger contain a cold poison that slows the victims organs and blood, freezing them internally if weak enough. Very afraid of fire.

· Artic stag, F-rank, 90DP: a deer monster with strong and sharp antlers. Quick on its feet with a devastating charge attack. Larger and far more aggressive than their beast counterparts.

· Frost spirit (form-wisp), F-rank, 65DP: lowest rank of ice spirit, little to no physical strength, fully a magical entity. Can cast the ice bolt spell and moves through floating. Very kind and friendly entity that prefers to run than fight.

“The Lagombi’s clearly been unlocked because I ate part of one for lunch.” Frost smiled as he remembered the glorious meal, he ate at the phoenix fledgling restaurant. Out of all the monsters only the frost spirit seemed useless but would most likely would evolve into something impressive.