Dungeon of Niflheim

Frost couldn’t help himself from smiling as he overlooked the five options, the rune mage and priest especially grabbed his interest. Both powerful magic users which he currently lacked, all without the usual weakness of casters. Plus, a priest, someone that could heal his forces was something he really wanted. Arm them with the dungeon’s natural recovery methods and his forces would see a significant drop in deaths. Only three had reached max level at the moment so he had to be careful with his choices. The first two were ideally going to the rune mage and priest, the last one however he was unsure on.

“Maya what do you think?” He turned towards his guardian looking for answers.

“Ah...um....sorry what?” Maya was still unnerved by their close encounter and was startled by him suddenly looking her way and missed what he asked.

Frost smiled gently finding Maya incredibly cute, he had to resist the urge to pat her head. “The evolution choices, what do you think?” He asked again while showing her the five options.

Still rather disturbed by Frost’s presence she awkwardly looked at the dungeon menu, her eyes inadvertently glancing his way before swiftly returning to the menu. Frost looked on with patience, not willing to tease her any further less he sent her running. But he did secretly take a few discreet photos, for posterity.

“....Five options, all pretty good and would help strengthen your overall battle power, leaving very few weaknesses.” Eventually Maya regained her focus and gave her true thoughts as his senior. “Like Gobuske and his goblins it seems you’ll have quite a varied amount of options in regards to frost dwarves and eventually their ice dwarf evolution paths. The rune mage and priest would be my first choices given that they would allow for a different set of skills to your current forces. The warrior and quarreller would just be an advanced version of your current fighting style....the frost dwarf smith however is interesting and now that you’ve summoned an iron mine its almost fate....the problem being however that frost dwarf smiths are not that skilled. Sure, they’d be better than your current regular frost dwarves, but they’d be limited, not expanding the forging capabilities of your forces by much. It’d be best if you got an ice dwarf smith, but that option isn’t available and....” Maya frowned as she ran through her knowledge of the frost dwarves and their ice dwarf superiors.

This was a very accomplished race of monsters that had carved its place in Nova, establishing their own towns, cities, and even small countries, all within areas with high levels of ice element, the Glacial mountains being one of them. The danger zone that was the Glacial mountain was massive and covered far more than the Northrend empire, more than enough for several of such empires to exist. Frost dwarves were the lowest level of this archetype with the main powerhouse being ice dwarves which were ranked between D and C rank depending on their type. Above them would be the ice dwarven King and ancients which were both B-rank monsters but at this level the term ‘monster’ wasn’t very accurate for at the ice dwarf stage and higher there was very little difference between ice dwarves and their regular sapient dwarf counterparts. Only their red eyes and imbedded magic crystal made the difference. Intelligence and over all temperament were pretty much the same -using the term overall because they can still be very aggressive and vicious if they give in to their instincts.

Maya knew of a few ice dwarven communities, her Fenrir tribe was quite close to one of the major ice dwarven countries that were led by an ice dwarven king. Their elder ice dwarf smiths were quite capable, rivalling that of the smiths present in the sapient empires and kingdoms. Frost dwarves however were barely apprentices but in order for one to become an ice dwarf smith they must practise and train as one before evolving- of course this doesn’t involve those born as one but can include for example an ice dwarven warrior that had had a passion for smith work, once he reached his limit and could evolve, he may in fact become a smith. As in the wild their evolutions depend on how they lived as well as little bit of randomness. Maya wasn’t sure that Frost would get the ice dwarf smith option in the future if he didn’t first level up a frost dwarf smith......so she was torn.

.....

“You don’t know if I’ll be able to unlock the ice dwarf smith class without first using a frost dwarf smith?” Frost had the same worry; he really didn’t want to waste an evolution chance but whether it would actually be a waste in the long term was the gamble.

“Ummm yeah,” Maya nodded her head in agreement. The two of them then stared at the five options again in silence for the next couple minutes. Leaving the three frost dwarves to feel rather awkward.

“Ggggrunt ggrunt grnttt” one of the braver or rather more impatient ones spoke up with its usual grunt language that only Frost, and other frost dwarves seemed to understand.

“Ah no nothing’s wrong, just trying to work out what evolution path would be best.” Frost replied quickly, knowing the frost dwarves tendency to get quite emotional, he didn’t want to have to deal with that.

“Grunttt grnnnt grunttt” the frost dwarf then asked another question.

“Hmmm you want to see what the choices are......ok.” Frost rubbed his chin before displaying the options on a big screen so the frost dwarves could see. He then read out what was displayed since they couldn’t read. His three frost dwarves listened to him intently with smiles on their faces, their expressions changing in response to each option. At first, he thought the idea was quite novel but the more he realised what was happening the more shocked he became. His frost dwarves asked to see their own possibilities and wished to be involved in the decision and for the first time he felt incredibly foolish. He never even thought to ask for his monster’s opinions, in the wild they would evolve based on their own tendencies yet here he was not even taking that into account, making a decision that suited only him.

He smiled gently towards the three frost dwarves, his eyes narrowing as he felt pride fill his chest. He then spoke from his heart, not caring which option would be ‘best’ but what would make them happy. “What path do you wish to take, I’ll leave the choice to the three of you.” Maya for the first time in a while turned to look at his face, as though asking if he was an idiot. He lightly shook his head while smiling. He took his position as their creator quite seriously, not wishing to be a dictator that constantly gave orders and restricted freewill. Dark didn’t do that for him so why should he do that to his monsters. Of course, he wouldn’t be completely lenient, their job was to protect him after all.

The three frost dwarves looked up towards their creator with a moment of shock before quickly displaying excitement. Their father asked for their opinion, and they couldn’t be happier.

The group then discussed in their own way amongst one another what to choose, knowing the importance of the decision they took their time. Frost, Maya, and the other monsters waited in silence as their curiosity continued to build.

Around 5 minutes later the three made their choices and turned to face Frost with determination in their eyes.

“Grunt grrrunnt grrrrunnnt” the one of the right spoke up, he was the impromptu representative.

“Hoh! Are you sure that’s what you want....once you choose you can’t go back.” Frost replied gently, but his eyes sparkled with joy.

“Grunt” The frost dwarf replied by saluting with his hand over his chest, the other two did the same, showing their determination.

Frost smiled widely in response and gave a curt nod before laughing. His monsters didn’t let him down and chose good options. Thankfully the three didn’t decide to choose the exact same path otherwise he would have had to revoke their choices. Having three frost dwarven warriors would still be strong but he really wouldn’t have gained much, not a worthwhile trade for the first frost dwarves to evolve. Though three rune mages would be quite interesting.

“What’d they choose?” Maya quickly asked from the side, eager to know.

Frost looked at her beautiful face, his eyes subconsciously narrowing as he enjoyed the sight.

“He chose the rune mage path since he admires my magic.” Frost pointed to the dwarves individually and relayed their choices to her and the other monsters. “The middle one chose to become a smith since he enjoyed building the defensive bunkers around the winter forest.” Each of the frost dwarves had their own interests, hobbies and aspirations and made their choices based on not only what they enjoyed but what their were good at. For example, the one who chose to become a smith not only volunteered to work on the defensive bunkers he was faster in building them than his colleagues. “And finally, this one chose to become a quarreller because of how well the goblin archers performed in the dungeon war.” Findlay was correct in his assumption that ranged firepower would greatly improve his dungeon’s battle power. This dwarf would be able to become the commander of his ranged forces and he was more than pleased with his choice. Though he would have liked a priest it wasn’t necessary at the moment and could be chosen with the next round of evolutions.