Chapter 16

  It was less than a week since Omnus had come to be. During that time, Jack came to a conclusion about the sentinel. THAT SON OF A BITCH WAS A MENACE WHEN LEFT ALONE FOR TOO LONG!!!

  Within a day, A FUCKING DAY, of coming into existence Omnus claimed a building for himself to start his experiments and research. Within an hour of doing so, the damn building blew up with him flying out with smoke trailing behind him. Like some kind of silvery gold bastardized version of a comet only to crash into ANOTHER building make a sizable dent in the wall. Then there was the time he started to experiment with monster corpses. Jack was still unsure how or when he got those. He would just disappear one day then came back with five of them. Even recruiting Aegisthal to help bring them back before the juggernaut returned to his work of breaking into the vault.

  In order to make safeguards, Jack had to get involved by making a large dome of iron in a secluded area that was fifteen feet tall, fourteen feet in radius, and half a foot thick. It wasn’t a perfect solution but it would keep any potential explosion well contained. At least for now… Jack hoped.

  Despite being a menace, Omnus actually did a good job. He was meticulous with his notes, very detailed in his study and tirelessly contributed information to the book shelves in Jack’s workshop. He already had a book written about the anatomy of a troll he dissected as well as how each part worked and developed a healing spell based on his findings. Not to mention the gremlins loved the nutty scholar.

  For all his madness and quirks, Omnus proved himself to be a fine teacher.

  Gremlins young and old would often come to him with questions and he would not only answer them, but teach them how to find an answer on their own. a few times Jack caught Omnus teaching mathematics to some of the gremlins while mis metallic wrappings seemed to work with minds of their own to write notes for one of his experiments.

  That information proved to be invaluable since it also allowed him to better understand how troll anatomy worked. Once he absorbed the book and resummoned it of course. Once he reabsorbed the roll though he found he had the option to summon it bronze boned zombie versions of it. but once he studied the properties of that kind of zombie, he found there wasn’t much benefit to it. Maybe for heavy lifting of things though ultimately, he didn’t see much use in them. especially since the zombie version didn’t have that healing factor.

  Instead, he chose to focus on his next dungeon layer. His dungeon might not be at layer two yet but that didn’t mean that he couldn’t make preparations.

  Jack was actually part way though setting up the boss areas of the layer. Working on the finer details the same joy that he had with the first layer. The second layer was made to look like a residential district. Going into detail to make some parks along with fountains and even a few large and small markets. It was mildly disheartening when he had to make them all into ruins. He made scorch marks, cracked and shattered stone what used to be a really nice area. He could only sigh with mild disappointment at what had to be done.

  The next layer will I’ll keep in a nicer state. Jack promised himself while still working on some final touches.

  Just as he was about done with the boss areas being made to look like guard postings, a notification appeared in his vision. And boy was he grateful to figure out how to turn off the number listing options. That was really annoying.

  When Jack looked over the notifications not once or twice but three times… well, it was a good thing he was as skeleton otherwise he’d make a small puddle of drool. He wanted to buy a lot of them as soon as he saw them until he remembered that though he had a lot of upgrade points, it was hard to get more.

  Putting his point poverty aside, Jack refocused himself as he excitedly set to work setting up his mobs throughout the second layer. First he summoned the tin constructs to see what they were and was delighted to see they were basic automatons. Simple humanoid constructs that stood three and a half feet tall, with two fingers and a thumb on each hand with two eyes on a simplistic face. After testing to see that they were fairly strong he decided to make them a fairly uncommon unless someone went looking for them. He made sure that their outer shell looked beaten up but left their joints untouched. They were faster than the crabs though that wasn’t saying much. The comparison would have been like comparing a snail to an old lazy turtle.

  Once they were summoned, and idea struck Jack like lightening.

  Taking it a step further, Jack summoned unanimated skeletons into the piles of rubble and set the tin constructs to try and dig them out. When the adventurers saw Jack seriously doubted that there would be a dry eye at the sight.

  With that done, Jack spawned animated skeletons with wither a missing limb, with arrows sticking out of them in placed, and a few with a cracked or broken skull. All to look like they have been attacked. Making sure to use elven, and dwarven skeletons alike. Placing the skeletons around the layer with some that were buried like their prop version cousins while others just laid in wait on the streets or buildings.

  When he spawned a Gorehound though…

  “Fucking… ew.” Jack muttered as he started at the half-rotted wolf… or dog.

  “Teacher… what is that?” Frizzy asked from behind him while holding her nose. “That has to be one of the worst smells I have ever smelled.”

  “Hey Frizzy.” Jack said, briefly looking aware from the nasty little monster. “I just leveled up my dungeon and was seeing what some of the new mobs are like. So far, I really don’t like this one.”

  “imagine how the adventurers are going to feel seeing that thing.” Frizzy replied while trying not to gag. “Please, Herp! Get rid of it.” She begged.

  Reabsorbing the mob, Jack quickly replaced it with the coper spider instead.

  What appeared was a rather meticulous construct of coper. It was a spider with quartz eyes, sharp needle fangs, and a glass vile on its abdomen filled with a clear fluid. It stood at a foot tall and when he ordered it to move, he quickly discovered that it was fast. The rapid tinking of its pointed feet propelled it in quick bursts of speed while it pounded on the hammer across the room. curling its legs around the target to grab hold before trying to bite it with those needle fangs.

  “That one is astounding!” Frizzy declared as she ran to the construct that still attacked the hammer to inspect it. “The way it moves! How it can jump and us it legs like that!” she shrieked in delight.

  “Teacher! Can I have one too study please? There is so much I can learn about this construct!” She continued on, fawning over the mechanical spider like a child shown a very shiny new toy.

  “Yeah, I’m fine with that.” Jack shrugged. “it will be good practice for you. But there are more things with the dungeon. I can make safe zones that take the form of inns and a healing springs. Can also make an alchemy shop if I want. But I am more curious about what a life essence collection chamber is.”

  Frizzy for her part seemed to have stop paying attention once she got permission to study the spider. A clue he was made very aware of as she was currently running away with the freaking thing in her arms.

  “… did I just accidentally give her a pet?”

  Before he could ponder the idea any further, Jack went back setting the spawns for the mobs and giving them a look drop. Most of the layer had skeletons in it but he made a few of the gorehounds to act as harassers while the spiders with do rush attacks. Then is sets some inns at the half way mark and a couple alchemy shops. He also hid a few vaults with some store of tin and copper inside. As for the life essences collection chamber, he spawned that near his tower so Omnus can study it. he didn’t want to use it for real until he had a full understanding of what it was and how it worked. Though he made sure it was well away from his dungeon residents and ordered Aegisthal to keep the residents away from it. even if it frustrated him to no end to further delay his vault being opened. That just left one final problem. what was he going to use for the boss?

  Just as he was about to break down possible candidates and think about what kind of lore he could make for the boss to be, something appeared at the edge of his awareness.

  “For fucks sake!” Jack cursed. “What the devil is it now!? Do the pains in my shiny ass never end?!”

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