My Dungeon Daddy System: Raising Monsters and Waifus Underground-Chapter 100 - All Eyes On Reed

The dwarves packed up shortly after noon, leaving behind a pristine, flat stage of stone on top of the mountain.

It was time.

Reed didn’t go to the surface. Instead, he descended. He went past the Casino floor, all the way to the heart of the dungeon.

The Core Room.

It was a spherical chamber of natural crystal, humming with a low, violet thrum. In the center, the Dungeon Core, a massive, floating diamond the size of a carriage, pulsed with light. This was his heart. This was his brain.

"Are you sure about this, Master?" Maira asked. She was standing by the control console, her hand hovering over the ’Emergency Stop’ rune. "Relocating the Core Room is... unprecedented. It is usually the most hidden part of the dungeon for a reason. Protection."

"We’re hiding in plain sight, Maira," Reed said, stepping onto the central dais directly beneath the Core. "If we want to be a legitimate business, we can’t hide the management in the basement. We put the Core for all those who can see it. We make it the centerpiece."

"It is a security risk," Seraphine hissed from the doorway, her tail lashing anxiously.

"It’s a power move," Reed corrected. He placed his hand on the Core. It was warm. It vibrated against his palm like a purring cat. "System. Initiate [Vertical Integration]."

[SYSTEM: ARCHITECT MODE ENGAGED.] [RESOURCE: VOID MANA.]

[OBJECTIVE: CREATE SPIRE ANCHOR.]

Reed opened his eyes. They were glowing with a violent, amethyst light.

The room shuddered.

He raised his hands, and the shadows in the pit began to move. They didn’t just shift; they liquified. The darkness pooled at his feet, thick and viscous like oil. Reed pushed his mana into the walls.

"Hang on," Reed said.

The grey mountain stone groaned. Veins of purple light shot through the rock, cracking it open. But instead of rubble, black crystal began to grow from the fissures. It rose up like jagged teeth, fusing together into a solid, obsidian block in the center of the pit.

With a deep, grinding groan of stone-on-stone, the Core Room began to rise. It moved upward through the dungeon and rock layers like a bubble rising in water. Rock flowed around it like liquid, sealing the path behind them.

They breached the surface.

Reed opened his eyes. The stone ceiling of the Core Room dissolved, replaced by the open sky. They were sitting on the newly leveled plateau.

Higher, a voice whispered.

Reed froze. The voice hadn’t come from Elara. It hadn’t come from the System. It had come from the crystal itself. It sounded like a thousand people whispering in a library, overlapping, eager.

Make it tall, the voice murmured, sliding through his thoughts like cold water. Let the gods see us.

Reed gritted his teeth, sweat beading on his forehead despite the cold. "Elara," he choked out. "Did you hear that this time?"

Inside his chest, the banshee was curled into a tight ball. I hear nothing, Reed. But it feels... loud. It feels like you just turned on a siren.

Black stone erupted from the edges of the plateau. It didn’t look like natural rock; it looked like spun glass and hardened shadow. Walls rose, twisting into Gothic arches. Flying buttresses snapped into place to support the weight.

Reed floated up, the Core floating with him. He was the conductor of a symphony of stone.

He built the First Floor.

A Grand Suite. High vaulted ceilings. A floor of polished obsidian. And in the center, suspended in a cage of wrought-iron vines and crystal, was the Dungeon Core. It cast a soft, purple light over the entire room, making it look like an upscale, magical nightclub.

But as the walls locked into place, a screeching sound tore through the air.

SCREEEEEEE.

It sounded like metal being tortured.

"What is that?" Seraphine shouted, covering her ears.

Reed looked up. Floating near them, bolted to the side of the Core, was a device made of silver and brass. It was the Authority Mana Siphon. The tax meter. It was a ugly, bureaucratic parasite that had been draining 40% of his mana for weeks.

It was vibrating.

"It can’t handle the ascent!" Maira yelled, checking her ledger. "The Siphon is calibrated for Subterranean Depth! The rapid elevation change, plus the Void Mana density of the new walls, it’s overloading the intake valve!"

"Fix it!" Reed yelled. "If that thing breaks, the IRS is going to send a SWAT team!"

"I can’t!" Maira cried. "It’s locked by the Federal System!"

The screeching hit a pitch that shattered the glass in Reed’s hand.

CRACK.

The silver bands of the Siphon snapped. The brass gears exploded outward, raining shrapnel down onto the new obsidian floor. A plume of blue smoke erupted from the device as the magical connection severed.

[SYSTEM ALERT: AUTHORITY SIPHON DESTROYED.]

[TAX LINK: SEVERED.]

[CURRENT TAX RATE: 0%.]

[WARNING: AUDIT IMMINENT.]

Silence fell over the lobby.

Reed floated down to the floor, his boots clicking on the polished stone. He looked at the smoking wreckage of the Siphon. He looked at his full mana bar, which was no longer draining away.

"Oops," Reed said, though he didn’t sound very sorry.

"That," Seraphine said, staring at the broken machine, "is going to be a problem."

"We have a Permit," Reed said, kicking a brass gear under a rug. "We’ll say it was a construction accident."

Stonebridge (The Town)

Miles away, in the bustling town of Stonebridge, the sun was shinning.

Mayor Bumble was locking up his office. He stepped out onto the balcony to smoke his evening pipe, looking toward the forest. He liked the view. It was peaceful.

Then, he dropped his pipe.

"Sweet Mother of Mercy," he whispered.

In the distance, atop the mountain that loomed over the Whisperwood, a silhouette had appeared. It hadn’t been there this morning.

It was a tower. A single, massive, jagged story of black stone, crowned with spikes. But it wasn’t the building that terrified him.

It was the light.

A beam of pure, violet energy was pulsing from the center of the structure, shooting straight up into the clouds. It was a beacon. It was a heartbeat.

The town bells began to ring. Dogs started barking. People ran into the streets, pointing at the purple star that had just ignited on the horizon.

"The Dungeon," the Mayor muttered, his hands shaking. "It’s... it’s come out of the ground."

Adventurers looked in awe and fear. Normally a Dungeon would never reveal itself in such a way.

The Dwarves walking back to the village looked up, not in fear, but in shock and awe of the glory to come out of their work. They didn’t fear the Dungeon Lord, hell, he gave them plenty of work and boost these last few weeks, they were neutral on the whole thing.

From a far distance in another direction, figures from different openings, doorways and holes looked up towards the light in the sky.

Back in the Spire, Reed stood by the massive front doors he had just conjured that led to the new spiral stairs down to the dungeon. He looked out at the view. He could see the lights of the town flickering in the distance.

He knew they were watching.

[SYSTEM: FLOOR 1 COMPLETE.]

[REMAINING FUNDS: CRITICAL.]

[OBJECTIVE UPDATE: SURVIVE THE ATTENTION.]

"Well," Reed said, turning back to his harem, who were looking around the opulent, dark lobby with wide eyes.

"Look at the beautiful light" Luma cheered as she looked through the windows of the room. "Why don’t dungeons build up from the beginning?"

"It’s magnificent," Maira said as she walked around the new boundaries of the core room.

A sigil lit on each member’s hand. From the distance a circle appeared on the floor.

[Dungeon Core room teleportation activated]

[All Dungeon Monsters Now Have Quick Access to the Core Room]

Everyone cheered with the new upgrade to their home.

Reed walked up to a window overlooking the town. He could sense all eyes were on him, he could sense in the distance, the Authority was alerted, he would have to explain to Kaelen what happened eventually, he hoped she wouldn’t get any backlash from this.

The core pulsed and from inside he could feel it. He sensed something different. He closed his eyes and he could see it. Other crystal core around him. They stayed hidden but he sensed them vibrating. Where they always there? Where they just hiding? He had a feeling he would find out soon enough. And from a distance, he felt it again, he felt HIM... Malakor. He was awake and he was watching.

All eyes were on him. But he had the high ground now, he had acres of land around him to mold and shift as he pleased, or have workers come and build for him to save on mana, which he wouldn’t have to worry too much about now. Let the Authority challenge him. He felt a new sense of strength and confidence that he never felt before.

He smiled, a tired, sharp smile.

"Maira, I think for once, we are finally on top. We’ll need to fortify the dungeon, I feel like we’ll be having a lot of new threats coming our way."