[I do apologise if you find the trip dull. There isn’t really any other way to bring you to me.]
Ah, the gruff voice of the grey one himself. It’s seriously uncanny how much they sound alike. Is this some form of cosmic accident?
Yes, well. It is what it is, I suppose. How’ve you been, Gandalf?
A deep chuckle resounded around my free-floating mind.
[This name you have for me is amusing. You continue to insist on using it?]
It’s not as if I know your real name, now is it?
[And if I told you my real name, would you change your way of speaking?]
No…
[You’ve certainly kept up your fast pace,] the voice says, changing the subject. [I didn’t expect to see you here so soon after the last time. I suppose your circumstances can be somewhat to blame.]
You can tell what’s going on up there? I’m a bit shocked.
[It shouldn’t be that surprising, surely. Everything touched by the System is within my grasp. It’s only natural I could track the progress of so many monsters as they barrel your way.]
Yeah well… Any chance we could get some help out of you? It doesn’t seem entirely fair. How are they controlling all those monsters anyway? Isn’t that infringing on your role?
[Not really. Certain monsters have that authority. It’s all part of the design.]
Right…
[You should have died, you know,] Gandalf says. [You weren’t made to push your core that hard at your current level of evolution. Your core should have cracked, killing you. That’s how the System was designed.]
Well… what can I say? Sorry to disappoint you?
[Oh, I’m not disappointed. Quite the opposite. You’re a promising specimen. It would have been a shame to lose you so soon.]
I guess I’m annoyingly good at surviving when I shouldn’t. You said the System was designed, was it you who designed it?
[Oh, think you’re going to ask the questions, do you?]
I try to roll my eyes, until it occurs to me, I don’t have a body… or eyes, that can be rolled.
You brought me down here just to talk at me? A little dialogue isn’t such a bad thing.
[You know, it’s been a long time since I was able to talk to someone like you. As I mentioned before, those that I’ve brought into the Dungeon tend to be on the broken side, and being let loose in that environment tends to warp them even further.]
There’s a pause before the voice continues mildly.
[…Like that Garralosh, for example.]
Well that stops me cold.
Garralosh is an outsider like me?
[Of course. She’s from your world. I can’t say if the timeline was close to yours. Temporal vectors tend to get very fuzzy with this sort of summoning. But yes, she was like you. Unleashed on the Dungeon, alone, and had to rely on her wits and savagery to survive. She’s been here for hundreds of years now. She did very well at first,] Gandalf muses. [Perhaps too well. She threw away every piece of herself that inhibited her survival until there was almost nothing left.]
Yeah, who would have thought that someone would make desperate choices when thrown into a murder pit and forced to fight for their life.
[Are you being sarcastic?]
Not at all.
[I had high hopes for her, you know. She was much like you, rose up quickly. But in terms of long-term impact, you’ve already surpassed her in a lot of ways.]
Like how? By creating a new species?
[By creating such a successful species. She made her own species also. Inadequate, inefficient things.]
Gandalf sounds very dismissive of the croca-beasts. Almost as if they’re insulting in some way.
I’m not a big fan of the crocs, for obvious reasons, but they seem pretty killy?
[Bah. Without the support of their parent, the species would have been wiped out by normal Dungeon spawns within ten years. They provide no value.]
How are monsters supposed to provide value anyway? As long as they’re killing things, they’re serving their purpose, aren’t they?
[In some ways, yes. But in others, no.]
Alright then, stay cryptic.
[I’m curious. Does knowing that your enemy shares so much in common with you change anything for you? Are you still willing to fight against a fellow human?]
Who’s a human? She’s a giant crocodile and I’m a massive ant. Of course, it doesn’t change anything.
[Oh? I expected a little more sentiment from you.]
I’m a big believer in loving the skin/carapace you’re in. Had a human life, and it was fine…
[You starved yourself to death, remember…]
I feel like you’re never going to get over that. It’s fine and over now. New life, new family, and I’m not about to let someone destroy it just because they happened to be a human before they were brought here.
[I find your commitment toward your second life admirable. Not many in your position have been able to say the same. I hope you wake up in time to defend your home.]
Wait… What do you mean? I should have heaps of time, right?
[Well, this evolution is a bit special. You did have a lot of energy in your core to expend. It’s going to take a bit longer than usual.]
I’m suddenly frantic at this news. I have to wake up in time. What would be the point of my struggles otherwise? My mind starts fading into nothing as my consciousness returns to my body.
Dammit, Gandalf…
121. The Soldier’s Life
It was a busy time for the soldiers. Grant had been run off her six legs over the last week. In some ways, it was a relief to have the enemy finally arrive on the doorstep. Now she’d have the chance to rip into them directly with her mandibles and not have to stress about extraneous matters.
“Make sure you watch over the eldest carefully,” she commanded the guards who remained in the chamber where the eldest was undergoing their evolution.
The soldiers would hardly have done any different, but they saluted the council member with an antenna anyway, continuing their careful observation of the chamber walls. The eldest lay close to the centre of the chamber undergoing the process of evolution. The two guardians sat nearby, watching over their master, and Grant was careful to give them their space. The two creatures were quite revered in the colony, and their unending loyalty to the eldest was firmly to their credit.
Grant stepped out of the chamber and made her way farther down into the newest section of the nest. The Carvers had been excited to have an excuse to expand the nest in a new way, and the queen’s evolution had been the perfect opportunity. She’d needed more space and to be deeper in the Dungeon, which required an extensive expansion to the lower reaches of the nest.
“Nice work, soldiers. Keep up the hard work,” Grant nodded to the many soldiers she passed.
She came across a general patrolling with five soldiers trailing behind her moving in the opposite direction.
“How goes things, General?”
“The extra patrols are putting a strain on resources, senior,” the smaller soldier variant replied. “The Dungeon wall spawns have been faster than usual over the last day. It feels as though something has changed.”
Grant swiped her antennae in a concerned gesture. “Have any other patrol groups reported this issue?”
“All of them,” confirmed the patrol leader.
Grant pondered for a moment. There were a few implications of increased Dungeon spawn rates, and she didn’t like any of them.
“I’ll speak to the council,” she assured the patrol. “If we can spare any more soldiers, they’ll be sent down as soon as we can manage.”