Chapter 195 Dungeon Core: “The Eternal Training Ground”

While all of the undead stuff happened, I was expanding the 40th floor, and I decided to shrink both the length and width so I could make the height 14 kilometers. While the volume remained the same, the length of this floor was now 70,000 kilometers and the width 60,000.

I also knew what playroom I wanted to make, and for that reason, 10 kilometers of this playroom would be underground, as I wanted to see what the ants could do if they could truly delve into the depths.

I wasn’t going to make a new ant civilization; instead, I was going to give both the Ant Nations and the United Ants access to this floor. The United Ants were what they called themselves after having freed all the ant species on the 30th-floor playroom, where I had created the scenario where all the ant patterns I had collected would have a chance to form a civilization.

It worked out a lot better than I expected, and they even got off the large island and started to colonize the rest of that playroom. It was so interesting to see so many different ants working together, especially because they seemed to fall into different roles best suited for them. Fortunately, it seemed that all queens were good at leading, so they formed a sort of council where every ant species was represented.

It will be interesting to see them interact and find out about the Ant Nations and how they run things. It was also always interesting to watch how they colonize a new floor, especially because I was going to make this a bit more difficult, closer to a rank one floor than the regular ones I created where civilizations were made.

What was significant about the ant species in the United Ants was that it gave me a good representation of how fast they ranked up. There were, of course, outliers and geniuses among every species, but in the greater population, the ants that have the rank 1 body are on average 1.2 ranks ahead of the other ant species.

No wonder they’re so feared, and they also have a larger percentage of ants who have reached the highest ranks. It seems like they truly have a great advantage thanks to their more powerful bodies.

Fortunately, while I was making the 40th floor, I also had one of the most interesting playrooms to watch as I wanted to see what this small pattern would eventually accomplish. Honestly, I thought that I might need multiple starts before the small pattern truly got a foothold, but I’ve never been happier to be wrong.

The undead eventually triumphed over the army sent to destroy them, with a large portion of soldiers running away from the undead horde while a decent number of them were still infected.

Some bodies the small pattern had taken over belonged to important people, and because of that, it now had some undead that had been gold rank. They were truly powerful, but more importantly, while their minds were twisted beyond recognition, I would still call them sapient. This meant that this undead horde now had leaders who could control and direct the mindless ones.

I didn’t think this kingdom stood a chance, but I guess I will need to wait and see what other kingdoms could pull off or if this continent will fall to this small pattern in just a few years.

There were also a lot of tombs to be discovered, and I wondered what kind of undead would be born, as I already saw some zombies that weren’t regular. That meant that the undead had the possibility of evolving into something new, and well, wasn't that the cherry on top of a wonderful pile of cherries.

The undead horde mostly stayed together, but many of the animals and some of the more mindless corpses—and in one case, someone with a mind—went their own ways. Villages were swallowed up, and while towns gave some resistance, they fell quickly enough.

The horde was finally stopped at one of the cities. It still couldn’t get past the walls easily, but some of the undead were smart enough that even to my complete surprise, they actually managed to build catapults.

They didn’t try to take down the walls or break down the gates—no, they just loaded up undead and then catapulted them over the walls. The city was able to handle the outbreak for a little while, but eventually, the small pattern broke free.

The city still managed another week of resistance, but then it fell entirely, and because of the undead horde surrounding the city, no one escaped, which meant that the horde was now twice as big as it used to be.

This was also no longer the only horde, as the animals had four of their own going ever deeper into the wilderness, and the other undead that had a mind of their own had also gathered a smaller horde heading towards the mountain tribes.

While this particular undead still had a mind, it was twisted like all the others. It took me a bit of digging, but I found the backstory for this particular monster, and it turned out that his brother and mother were killed by one of the mountain tribe raids. It seems like he was out for revenge, and I didn’t think those tribes would be able to stop him.

Time continued to go by, and while the horde grew, the other kingdoms bordering this one were finally notified. When the gravity of the situation sank in, three armies were raised by each of the kingdoms and sent towards the capital of the kingdom that was currently having the undead problem.

It will take some time before the armies arrive, so I think that the biggest undead horde will reach the capital first. It would be interesting to see if they could conquer it before the armies reached it.

What was also curious was how the land had changed where I first introduced the small pattern. While the creatures it turned undead had long ago left, it had also taken over a large portion of the plants, and it seems that it will continue to spread.

This isn't the only spot that is turning like this, but it is the biggest, and because of that, an interesting phenomenon happened. Sort of like a miasma was low to the ground, but I suspect as the undead energy continued to build up, this miasma would also get thicker and larger.

What it did was carry the small pattern into the air, fixing its one problem of needing touch to spread. Although it still couldn't spread through the air, and everyone who had eyes would know not to go into this miasma, it was still a new way to infect others. I wonder if in the future the entire land would be under a thick purplish fog that would turn anything that wasn’t undead into an undead?

Eventually, the largest undead horde reached the capital. It was able to do so two weeks ahead of the other armies coming to the rescue of this kingdom. It had now been nearly a year and a half since I introduced the small pattern, and things have changed a lot in that time. For one thing, the undead were starting to develop skills suited for them. It was truly terrifying to watch how fast they were evolving.

They no longer needed to use catapults, although they still did, but now a number of their smarter members could use skills to combine other zombies into truly large monstrosities that would just ram through smaller cities' gates.

This, however, was the capital, and they put up a fierce fight even while they were half-starved. They were able to hold out nearly to the end, but as the other armies were only about three days away, one of the gates finally broke.

They still managed to hold the gateway, but they needed to pull fighters away from the other gates and from the walls. Another gate broke before they let a single undead enter the city, but they couldn’t hold two broken gateways. The horde that had been surrounding the entire capital started to pour in. It was at this point the hoard finally figured out that there were armies heading towards them.

What I expected them to do was start to move towards those armies, but it seems like even if they are intelligent, they can make bad strategic decisions. Instead of going out to meet the army, the undead flooded into the city. Now, the city wasn't completely fallen; the palace, the barracks, and a few other noble houses that had fortified their positions still held out, and of course, there were a lot of people still hidden in the city.

The undead fortified the broken gates, but when the generals of the three armies were informed about the situation, they didn’t decide to retake the city. They still built their trebuchets while the undead kept fortifying. The first strike happened during the day when the undead were a bit weaker. Their mages attacked the gates, but not to tear them down—rather to set what was behind them alight.

While the capital had a lot of stone buildings, every roof was still made from wood, and more than half of the buildings were also made of wood. Now, the undead didn’t have many weaknesses, but fire was one of them. They trapped themselves in a perfect place where they could all be wiped out. The catapults fired, setting fires further into the city. The undead did try to break through, but the fires were too hot.

While these fires would destroy every human that was still alive—and there were still many—the generals from the other kingdoms didn’t care; this was just too good of an opportunity.

It didn’t take long for the undead leadership to figure out their mistake, and oh boy, were they angry. Most of them rushed out, and some even managed to break out of the capital, but it didn’t matter. There were too many strong fighters on the other side, and they were killed quickly enough.

One of the leaders, however, didn’t leave. Instead, it sat down and ordered the undead to keep the flames away for as long as possible. It was a futile effort, but they still managed somewhat. During that time, it just sat there, doing nothing, until finally, it opened its eyes, and I saw determination in them. Then it started to cast a spell, something I hadn’t seen before. It was fascinating to watch as the spell somehow started to resonate with the small pattern.

The flames burned up the small pattern quite effectively, destroying it completely. But when the spell finished, things changed. The small pattern was no longer completely destroyed, and some of it still carried with the smoke without being completely destroyed. The undead needed to hold the spell, but it was destroying its body slowly, although it seemed like it didn’t care. Why was he doing that?

It didn't take me long to understand as the smoke carried out from the capital and towards the army outside. While the city burned and the undead burned with it, the small pattern—at least some of it—survived long enough inside the smoke to be breathed in by the soldiers outside. It wasn’t going to be incredibly effective, but the soldiers had marched a long way, some of them had injuries every soldier had experienced.

The undead mage held the spell for longer than I expected. It was already half-destroyed when the fire finally got to it. There was pain from the fire, but it still died with a smile on its face. While they had messed up by going into the city, approximately two days after the burning of the capital, the small pattern turned a decent number of soldiers into undead, who then started to scratch and bite other soldiers.

Pandemonium followed as the armies scattered in fright. The generals still managed to hold on to parts of their armies, but they quickly left, trying to escape this disaster. Now they would even think that fire wouldn't work, when it most certainly did.

Now there were a lot more smaller hordes, but they all had enough intelligent undead to start the cycle all over again. The biggest horde was now in the mountains, as almost all of those tribes were wiped out and turned into undead. I suspected that this continent wouldn’t be able to hold out against the small pattern for too much longer.