Wilona lowered herself until her feet were firmly planted on top of the newly repaired gate. It had only been a day since she managed to talk Rottie into talking with this town, and people were already moving to make it look lively.

  The polished gate before her was just one such example. Walking past the non-rusted, non-creaking gate, she saw that the streets now had been filled. The planks placed on top of them were gone, and the ground was as flat as it would have been if the people here still believed that they could prosper. Windows—the ones that only had stains on them, at least—had been wiped and were now crystal clear, while the ones which were broken had been removed entirely and replaced with crude but functional wooden windows that opened and closed through hinges.

  A general feeling of hope was also visible throughout the populace. Where before everyone was all doom and gloom, now they walked with purpose. And cleaner clothes.

  The change was so drastic, honestly, it got to the point that even though the time was basically early morning—and thus dark—Wilona could still see the changes that had happened inside the town compared to her first visit. And that, to her, spoke quite a lot when it comes to the kind of benefits a dungeon core brings to a human settlement.

  Wilona had already expected something when she saw Phocles' shocked reaction yesterday, but now she was seeing it in full force. The town would improve just because people's morale turned high. That, and the promise of resources from the nearby core, spurred them to start moving again.

  It was kind of interesting to see, honestly.

  The road leading to Phocles' house was basically cleaned out, and Wilona didn’t spot a single piece of trash on the way there. The house of the lord himself seemed to have been cleaned overnight. The buildup of gunk on the side of his walls was now gone, the warring colonies of ants and termites went with them. The windows, once broken, had been replaced with new ones, and the vines which had once grown abundantly through the roof and across the walls had been pruned, leaving behind still ruined but slightly repaired walls.

  Wilona made her way over to the door and knocked. She looked at her state of dress and concluded that there was nothing wrong with it—she was just anxious for no reason. She could definitely use some makeup, though.

  Phocles opened the door and smiled at her. "What you said was correct, the storm did stop coming last night." He gestured for her to come in and led Wilona to the kitchen, where a young man was already cooking. "It might not be much, but we hunted down geese last evening with the expectation that we wouldn't be attacked, and that's what we're having for breakfast."

  "How do you hunt geese?" Wilona tilted her head.

  "With bows and arrows," Phocles replied casually.

  "Wait, seriously?" Wilona sat down. People can aim a bow and arrow and shoot a fucking goose using it? That's news to her! "I didn’t know that. Damn."

  Phocles chuckled. "Well, I suppose you don’t. Care to eat? This is all I can do to aid you in your efforts in talking with the local core. We were not made aware that something like that had spawned inside the bog. Though looking back, it does make sense."

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  "What did you expect was happening then?" Wilona was genuinely curious about the answer—like, they were dealing with storms and zombies!

  "A curse." The old man shrugged. "I suppose we were being a bit too paranoid. Perhaps a bit of an investigation may have been needed."

  "Didn’t you guys already do that?" Wilona remembered Phocles mentioning something about sending some men to investigate the cause of the storm. "That didn’t turn out so well."

  "Yes..." Phocles nodded, resigned. "You are correct. I should have done better still. All I did in the end was pray to whatever god would listen to aid us and cleanse the curse. I could not have been any more wrong about the source of our plights, however."

  Phocles thanked the young man cooking for them as he dropped by two bowls of soup. "Then again, it would not have mattered whether or not I knew of the problem in the end, as the dungeon core would have killed us regardless."

  "I guess." Wilona poked at the meat. Geese meat looked like chicken, didn’t it? Weird. "I’ll be eating now, by the way. Just, uh, I’m going to say that you don’t need to worry about anything after this. Rottie said he's gonna be improving the swamp and stuff. I hope we’ll be able to build a bridge before you guys, like, come visit to make it easier for you."

  "Of course," Phocles nodded. "Eat away."

  The conversation lulled, and Wilona's thoughts went back to the practice she did last night. Discounting her easily gained plant magic which allowed her to make trees grow in an instant, she had also connected it to her bioluminescence spell and turned it into a large area of effect. She was all set, really. The only problem was that she didn’t know what the spell would do to the moss carpeting the surface of the peat. Would those things grow into grass? Die out? She honestly wasn’t sure.

  It was also going to be expected that plants, parasites, and insects were going to be everywhere after she grew a forest. It wasn’t a problem for her, but she warned Phocles of it regardless. "There’s plenty of diseases which can be gotten from them, you know?"

  "I’ll make sure to be careful." The old man thankfully agreed to her warnings.

  After the meal, Wilona got up and thanked both Phocles and the boy who cooked for them. Before she left, she told them one last thing. "I’m gonna bring you guys some zombies later, okay? You said that those things can be used to patrol the outskirts of the town and turn them into defenders from bandits, right?"

  "Yes, their help would be greatly appreciated. As not only do we not have the funds to keep a proper group of guards, but also because bandits have been running amok around these parts, ruining trade."

  With Phocles’ confirmation and a, quite frankly, too-long tangent she didn’t need to learn about, Wilona walked out of the door and flew off. From her vantage point, the town below her looked a lot better, but either this was because she didn’t see the finer details or because of the fact that everyone began cleaning—she wasn’t sure.

  The zombies were much more bold as Wilona flew in Rottie's direction. They no longer bothered to hide and were outright working out in the open. They were constructing the bridge she suggested Rottie should build. Their progress was slow and would probably become straight-up abysmal when the sun popped out, but with how tireless they were, it wouldn’t take them long to finish building it.

  Wilona soon reached Rottie’s tree, and as they discussed yesterday, the dungeon core had already planted several saplings of various trees on the lands surrounding his moat. The moat itself had been covered up by peat as well, leaving no trace of its existence.

  "Rottie!" Wilona greeted happily as she landed next to the tree. "How’s it going?! I hope you weren’t lonely!"

  "I wasn’t," the core denied bluntly. "But you said that you will grow these trees and begin protecting me?"

  "Ah, straight to business already? Dude, a girl would be disappointed with your lack of foreplay!" Wilona grinned. She made a show of looking around. "But you did pretty well with planting the saplings, though! That’s kinda neat!"

  "Yes, I believed that it was in my best interest to start planting immediately so that when you’re here, no time is wasted planting them and we can start working on covering me," Rottie replied. He paused. "Thank you. For the help, truly. I would have taken a lot of time in putting up defenses if not for your aid, dear sister."

  "Yeah, yeah." Wilona waved off the core. Guess it’s her time to act professional. "I’m gonna do my job now."

  Wilona flew off and did as she said. She floated above the saplings, stationary and with her eyes closed. She tapped into her magic—first her new spell, growth, then bioluminescence. The plant life around her began to glow as her magic took effect, then they slowly sprouted, becoming more mature as they turned from mere saplings into tiny trees that got taller, thicker, and greener with every passing second. The moss too had the same effect—they expanded into thick clumps of plant life that covered the underside of the canopy. A mini-wall, essentially.

  When she was done, a lush forest grew below her.

  Rottie was nowhere to be seen.