[D'sP] Deities Chatting - Chapter 484

And all of the mushrooms on floor ten are a lead-up to the myconid boss. A head and a half taller than the other myconids, the troop lord and is a striking shade of orange as compared to the shades of brown all the others sport.

More than just height and color though, this Lord has a cape and crown to really set the scene! Admittedly, the cape is literally growing off of their back, a sheet of mycelium. But the diadem of red mushroom cap material is an actual piece of equipment. Doyle isn’t certain if it actually does anything for the boss, well, except for making them look a lot cooler and more regal. But seeing as it was created through the process of the myconid turning into a boss. Well. It can’t be hurting them.

Doyle shakes his core and refocuses. With that, he is halfway through his current floors. So on to 11!

Which is a big spherical room of sorts. The center is a pool of water, at the bottom of which hides some sea cattle. More just so people can’t freely use the water to escape the floor’s primary threat. More myconids!

Well, okay, the primary threat isn’t the myconids themselves. There are too many sprouts compared to everything else for that to be the case. Rather, it is their spores that cause problems for any delvers. And the walls of this place, which through Doyle’s conceptual skill, make it so the myconids release even more spores than they would naturally. Worse, those spores don’t spread out, but actually stick around and make an even denser cloud.

Doyle chuckles as he remembers the town’s first experience with this. It actually managed to affect them despite having protections against the spores. Because sometimes, quantity has a quality all its own! Admittedly, there was also quality involved as well. Most of their supply of preventatives and cures had been made with spores from a much earlier floor.

In fact, Doyle doubts they would succumb to it anymore. The Barrais have not only gotten better at making medicine, but they’re using spores from floor 14. So yeah, quality on top of quality.

And besides the massive swarm of swarms this floor has to attack, the rest of the monsters are pretty far in-between. Their threat comes more from disrupting delvers while handling the sprouts. Because honestly? If the delvers can’t handle them, they aren’t going to be able to handle the swarm of sprouts either. Barring, of course, specialization. Though to get this far makes such a thing unlikely in the first place.

Doyle takes one last look at the aesthetics of the floor. More mushroom trees to block the line of sight. Giant stone brick walls with carvings that point towards the difficulty of the floor. The pool of water, at the center of which is a giant mushroom stalk, with the ceiling being designed to look like the cap of said mushroom. All leading to a bridge over the water and into the stalk where the portal to 12 is. Not the toughest floor, but looks good!

And so Doyle shifts over to 12 and his core glows even brighter. Currently, 12 isn’t that much for a challenge. Everyone in town knows how to get through. Yet it was this very floor that stopped Ace and Jim dead in their tracks for so long!

The basic design of the floor starts simple enough. An enormous field of grass with paths cut through it to form a maze. Except those paths aren’t permanent. Winds whip through the field, carving fresh paths as old ones fill back in. Above all that , willowisps float in seemingly straight lines and yet move randomly through the floor, causing purposefully odd interplays of light and shadow.

Then there are the stone staircases, seemingly in the middle of nowhere. Except when you climb them and get to the top, you're at a new place in the maze. And of course there are stands of wheat, which was the secret at one point. You have to do a few things to actually get to the floors exit and one of them is cut your way through some wheat to find the hidden path.

It took Ace so long to figure that out! Doyle chuckles to himself, they probably had a better chance of finding this early on because they were poking everything instead of just rapidly exploring the paths.

Whatever the case, that is in the past and unimportant now. Seeing as they did eventually discover things and whatnot. Which leaves the monsters to still cause trouble.

Those willowisps up there giving the lesser shadow wolves the chance to ambush the delvers. Every new shadow a place from which they can jump! The floor is still a challenge too many for exactly that one reason.

All it takes is for the light to shift in an unexpected way and suddenly there are wolves attacking you from a direction you weren’t ready for. Sure, the inner circle may be stronger now, but a surprise attack is still effective. Well, as long as the team doesn’t have one of the Barrais with them. Doyle considers the presence basically cheating on this floor.

He shakes his core and moves onto 13, Bird Mountain. This was the floor where the Hexcu and hexape golems were first introduced. One because of their minimum level and the other because this is when Doyle originally got them.

More importantly, to the town though, this is also the first floor with Mithril. Climb down at the start and you find the kobold camp where they smelt the mithril ore. A challenging encounter even now. And Doyle is certain of this, given the fact that those from the inner circle are hitting the camp for their mithril daily. Then they go and hit up the vein to clear it out.

This was a fun little side area for delvers to explore instead of the main path. Which Doyle turns and sighs. There isn’t anything wrong with it.

Rather, it is one of those instances like at a theme park where from the public side it looks amazing. Then, when you get a peek at the employees-only area, you find out things are quite a mess.

Because Doyle didn’t have enough space on the floor to make a proper mountain. So instead, the center is hollow. The entire mountain being just a facade over nothing. Doyle shakes himself, 21 would be where he starts making proper mountains. Though that floor is also likely going to require a little hollowing out.

Whatever, this floor works just fine for the delvers. Though part of that is there are a lot of trees for Doyle to replace. There are basically two paths spiraling up the mountain. The actual path and the forest path.

On the forest path, the trees are so big; they rise above the edge of the regular path, and in the canopy of those trees are a bunch of the hexcu, the four-winged bird monsters. And as delvers make their way up the path, only a certain number of them will attack at once. The quantity grows the further you advance.

Yeah, this entire floor was meant to be one giant slog and a battle of attrition. Something it does very well.

And you can’t forget the golems! Another monster with two sets of arms, the hexape golems. Tough little monsters that look like apes with an extra pair of arms stuck in them. No need to worry how that would work biologically or anything, seeing as they’re made of clay and quartz. Not bones and meat. Oh, and you can’t forget that they’re resistant to magic!

That makes them not just an annoyance that tries to distract you while being dived by the hexcu. They’re legitimate threats. Especially since while that magic resistance isn’t a perfect cover for other supernatural energies, it does provide a bit more pushback than not. Which makes sense to Doyle. After all, every supernatural power eventually comes from quintessence. No matter how separated it might be at this point.

While Doyle is focused on that and Ally is doing her thing, Moota is off testing the ideas she just came upon by way of Ally.

It actually takes her a while to find an unaligned minotaur. You would think that with all the kin and folk out there, plus the various magical beasts and animal-headed deities, there would be a lot of animal-headed creatures. Maybe even a number of animal-headed sapients.

And while there are a decent number of monsters where they have a head that doesn’t match the body. Such a thing actually isn’t that common in this universe. This is one of the side effects of the universe originally not having magic at all. Beings that mix animal and human, the kin and folk, are uncommon enough because they evolved from animal to humanoid.

It is simply much rarer for an animal to evolve into a humanoid while keeping their animal head. And even rarer once you include the pressure from the universe’s basic laws that push things towards the human form. It is actually more common to find monsters like the sphinx where they have an animal body and the head of a human.

As for those deities? Well, some aren’t originally native to this universe. As simple as that. Those that are native? Well, either they don’t actually have an animal head, instead they’re wearing an animal-themed headdress and a game of telephone through the ages “simplified” things. Or there are those who didn’t have an animal head, but took it on when they reached apotheosis. Mostly because their culture believed that was how things were supposed to work.

Moota remembers the minotaur myth from Doyle’s world and sighs. They got that closer to right than it ever should be. Most animal-headed monsters tend to be the result of other deities screwing around. Either in the one way or through stuff like curses.

Not that you can’t have a population of minotaurs. It is just much harder when they tend to be one-off creations. And of course, a mad alchemists or doctor’s creation is generally sterile and if not, won’t result in more of them. After all, putting the parts together doesn’t magically mix their DNA.

Well, it can? But that is generally not the desired result. Magic likes to screw with people trying to shackle life.

Moota laughs, remembering that one movie she watched with Ally. “Life finds a way”, especially with some magic behind it to give that final push.

Though thinking of Ally, that reminds her of something and she flips open a system chat.

{

Moota: Hey Jess! Sounds like you might be able to pick up your wolves now.

}

And of course Jess doesn’t get back right away, but soon enough Moota hears the ding.

{

Jess: I could have picked them up at any time. He has had them ready for a while now. I just don’t have a good way to do so.

Moota: Yeah, I know that. What I mean is he now has a way for you to pick them up. There’s a second entrance portal and it is in the middle of the wilderness. He can grab you wolves and put them out there. Then, depending on the situation , you can either just grab them or let them settle in that spot to begin with.

Moota: Maybe I should get him to set down some cattle of my own? Oh wait! Right, the other thing I’m working on. You have more knowledge of how beast deities work. Would minotaurs be able to worship me properly? After all, they do have cattle heads and not human heads . I haven’t been able to test it yet since they’re kind of rare to find unaligned. Most get created through divine nonsense and so are already locked down.

Jess: Calm down. Let me try and remember. Oh, and I’ll have to talk to Ally about my wolves then.

Moota: I know, right?

Jess: Shh! I’m thinking.

}

An MMO Classic - Chapter 483

An Aside About Coins - Chapter 485