“Fine, whatever!” I decided to stop wasting time.

Although the girls relaxed significantly, it wasn’t like Calypso had been defeated. She was weakened, and seemed to be under Salicia’s restraint, but how long would that last? I reached out and began to pull the miasma from her once again. She didn’t even fight the restraints. Other than a small shiver, she made no reaction. Her eyes bore into me with a mixture of hate and disgust.

I quickly found the bond within her body, and then I slowly pulled it away. This was done instinctively. I honestly didn’t know what I was doing. I just felt like this was somehow the source of her power. As the bond left her, her eyes never left mine. Slowly, I sunk that bond into my own body. It was at this point that the text popped up, and I realized what I had just done.

{You have conquered the Dungeon, Bandit’s Respite. You are now the Dungeon Master.}

With that text, information flowed into my head. The Bandits who had been attacking immediately stopped. I felt like through the bond, I could absorb miasma, but also repel it. Was this the connection a Dungeon Master had to their dungeon? I suddenly felt extremely powerful, and also I felt an awareness as if I could kind of feel what was going on anywhere in the dungeon.

As for Calypso, once the bond was severed and her connection to the dungeon ended, so did the stream between our bodies. She collapsed like her kite-string had just been cut, slumping down in front of me. She had been overtaxing herself during this battle, using quantity over quality to send out an endless stream of Bandits. Every time we killed one, she lost a little bit of miasma. Add to that the amount of miasma I stole directly from her, and both she and the dungeon had reached their limit.

For the dungeon, it felt dry and desiccated. It felt like it was on the verge of collapse. I was vaguely aware that the trees spread out on top of the dungeon were all dead now. During this battle, to maintain the fight, the dungeon had sucked the life out of the world around it. The rate that dungeons sucked mana out of the earth differed based on the dungeon.

Those in cities were often covered in protective runes by Priests to keep them from being able to pull from people. Instead, these dungeons could only grow by sucking energy from mana veins deep within the earth. Those that were too destructive, like Mina’s Dungeon or Karr’s Dungeon, often ended up being destroyed.

Yet, in a moment of extreme need, the dungeon could suck upon all the life force nearby. Humans and other creatures had a lot of resistance. They wouldn’t die easily, especially if the dungeon wasn’t that large or powerful. Trees, on the other hand, were a ripe means of acquiring mana. It left me a lot to think about for my path to being a Dungeon Builder.

As I was casually thinking about this, my attention had slipped. I never expected that Calypso had only been playing dead. She suddenly leaped up at me, and there was the flash of a blade. The girls all let out cries as the miasmic blade that had once almost killed me headed right for my body a second time. Just as I was going to resist, someone shoved me aside.

The blade slammed into Salicia, cutting into her stomach and causing severe damage!