Draconic Karma Dungeon

Chapter 28: The Order of The Broken Goddess

6 people came running into my Dungeon, none of whom I recognised. Their Auras were layered for some odd reason. The Auras closest to their bodies were all some shade of gray. All over 35% and under 75%. Pretty normal. But the second Aura, the one covering the first Aura, was the same color for all of them. That being the darkest possible black. The one meaning a karma level of 0%.

The identity tags helped clear things up a bit, but also added several more questions.

Calorose [Hypnotized] [Dungeon Weakness] Siren Charmer Level 40

Phoebolis Sagitta [Charmed] [Dungeon Weakness] Centaur Archer Level 35

Celtina Truefall [Charmed] [Dungeon Weakness] Gnome Crafter Level 26

Sotor [Charmed] [Dungeon Weakness] Giant Labourer Level 28

Todalus Crater [Charmed] [Dungeon Weakness] Centaur Toughness Level 19

Glubos [Charmed] [Dungeon Weakness] Giant Fighter Level 23

Oh, no…

My karmic creatures chose to react to the outer Aura rather than the inner, and attacked with a ferocity I had never before seen. Not that it helped my level 1 creatures.

"The infection has sensed we're a threat to it and has taken back control in response! We must not let the infection stop us!" The siren shouted as she let her Party take care of the fighting. "For the goddess!"

"For the goddess!" Her Party replied. Ignoring the loot, the 6 of them started to go through my Dungeon while killing everything in sight. My 1st tier Boss felt their deaths immediately.

Okay, System. First things first. Why do they have two Auras? Is the second one the Aura of the hypnotist or something?

Sapients gain a massive amount of negative karma when they attempt to or succeed in getting complete control of the mind of another being or in affecting another's mind for selfish reasons. As the affected sapient is no longer in control of themselves, their actions count as that of the mindbender until they regain control of themselves.

System Alert

The sapient known as Luvenia Mein is responsible for the death of 692 Dungeon Cores through the usage of various forms of mind manipulation. This led to her getting a permanent karma level of 0%. Through her Brainwashing of 22 sapients the cult known as 'The Order of The Broken Goddess' was created. The members of the cult use the Skills 'Charm', 'Enthrall', 'Hypnotize' and 'Brainwash', as well as spells meant to have the same effects, to gain more members, and no one is considered a member unless they are affected by one. As both 'Hypnotize', 'Brainwash' and their respective spell variants are in effect until dispelled, whether or not the caster still lives, the cult has continued to function and grow even after the death of Luvenia Mein.

In order to minimize future deaths of Dungeon Cores all members of the cult known as 'The Order of The Broken Goddess' are given 'Dungeon Weakness', which causes all attacks from a Dungeon to deal 150% damage to them.

… The 'Dungeon Weakness' thing was gonna be my next question…

The 150% damage is really nice, but… I can't help but feel like this is a massive problem. Not so much for me personally, but for all Dungeon Cores! And 692 have already died!

…

Uhm… How rare are Dungeon Cores, and how long has the cult been active?

There are currently 9,863 Dungeon Cores. On average 1-3 new Dungeon Cores get created each year.

The cult known as 'The Order of The Broken Goddess' has been active for 47 years.

That means an average of 14.7 dead Dungeon Cores per year!

Emerald's Party, with Chief Nerok and Lionheart replacing Morghar and Sprout, stepped into the Dungeon. Once more carrying weapons. Good to know I have backup.

Calculating…

'Dungeon Weakness' is extended to include damage from the 'family' of a Dungeon Core.

Awesome!

The new arrivals stopped and stared into the air, clearly having received a message from the System. Likely to inform them that the Weakness now included them.

The message wasn't received well, though. Probably due to now knowing for sure that my 'guests' want to kill me.

And then Lionheart felt the slaughter like my Boss had and was visually filled with desire to avenge the fallen.

When the tribal group located the cult members, while the latter group searched for the entrance to The Trap Corridor, the former group almost attacked them immediately. Luckily, - Wait, did I do that? - Thenac reminded the others that the cult members likely had a much higher level than them and it would be stupid to attack them now. Better to wait till my creatures had tired them out first.

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My karma creatures' hatred of these people with effective karma levels of 0% meant that every creature in a room was summoned to the location of the cult members regardless of distance and line of sight. As such, all 41 creatures in The Forest of Territories headed towards them the moment the first one stepped a foot into the room, completely disregarding that they weren't supposed to leave their territories.

System? How can I undo mind control?

'Charm' and its spell variant is in effect until 1 day has passed, it has been dispelled, or the caster dies.

'Enthrall' and its spell variant is in effect until 1 week has passed, it has been dispelled, or the caster dies.

'Hypnotize', 'Brainwash' and their respective spell variants are in effect until dispelled, whether or not the caster still lives

I don’t have time to wait a whole day for Charm to go away on its own. Not while my creatures are so aggressive. They’ll be killed long before the day’s up!

And this siren Charmer will simply reapply the Charm anyway, won’t she?

So, I’ll have to deal with the Charmer first then. Which means I have to dispel the Hypnosis or kill the caster. But I don’t know who the caster is. I only know he isn’t here, which means I can’t kill him anyway!

My creatures didn't arrive at the same time, but the higher number of creatures meant that the bird-like siren had to start throwing spells around. Beforehand she had let the rest of her Party do all the fighting. And there really hadn't been any need for her to do anything, as my creatures had been both low in level and few in numbers.

I have to kill them to defend myself, don’t I?

The siren's spell of choice was an ice shard spell. The 5th of which got wonky and turned into a self-aging spell. One that aged her 4 years.

Uhhh… Not quite what I was hoping for…

The next wonky spell, two rooms later, caused all the siren's hair to fall off. Not quite it either…

The cult had no interest in loot and so, no interest in treasure chests. Even through the strong desire to kill them my level 4 small dumb mimic had stayed in the form of a chest. The cult had shown a desire to try and solve the puzzles, while also valuing speed a lot. This meant they used a couple of minutes to try and solve any puzzle they came across before deciding to simply brute forcing through it. Having killed the fake dragonet before realizing it was a puzzle and having collected zero keys at all, meant that they had had to break all the doors they came across.

I don't feel all that bad about people breaking my doors down anymore. I thought as I enjoyed the boost to my creatures' Toughness. Now if only I could increase the rest of my creatures' Ability Scores!

… Hmm… I'll have to think about that…

While looking for the 4 keys to open the door in The Griffins' Treasure Room the giant Labourer tried to look in the treasure chest.

This naturally got him bitten. He survived it, though.

After this they quickly gave up on figuring out how to open the door, and instead rammed it open.

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The two phoenixes kept ambushing the cult and while fighting The Kobold Flight one of the siren's ice spells got wonky and made her blind in the left eye. Now that's more like it!

At this point the cult was starting to have some problems and the only 2nd tier in the Party seemed like he was at the end of his rope. The centaur Archer and the siren were 4th and 5th tier, though, and thus barely looked hurt.

The Greedy Pacifist kobold clan of the 6th Floor had gotten the task of making oil out of olives. First and foremost so it could replace the water in the kobold controlled water trough trap with oil. After all, oil is both stickier and can get hotter than water. The Greedy Pacifists had successfully made some olive oil but it wasn't the best quality oil. After a couple of tests it had been deemed good enough for frying but not for salads.

Which was still more than good enough for pouring over one's enemies while boiling hot!

But as the Archer had successfully shot down the kobolds meant to tilt the now oil-filled stone trough, it would have to get tested another day.

The cult didn't know of my Room of Rust trap and while they only entered the room once, it still didn't take long before all their metal had turned to rust. Most of their gear had been leather, though, so it was mostly their weapons which rusted. For me the most exciting part was the Archer's loss of arrows.

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The mist pixie in the first room of the 4th Floor was located and killed by the Archer, who had improvised and thrown a rock at it, before the pixie could trick anyone into falling off the Cliffside trap. This inspired the other cult members to pick up choice rocks as makeshift weapons.

The fledgling feathered serpents, on the other hand, successfully lowered the Intelligence of the one 2nd tier so much that he started thinking it was a good idea to walk into my traps.

He took a nap in The Flower Bed.

His Party wasn't quite ready to leave him behind, though. Only after several minutes of trying to wake the centaur did he wake up again.

They really shouldn't have bothered. The feathered serpents of the next room once again lowered his Intelligence. The unnaturally low Intelligence of Todalus Crater made the wounded level 19 Toughness Class decide it would be fun to jump over the low stonewall and into my wheat field.

Everyone knows it's rude to step on someone else's growing field! It can ruin their harvest!

These fields were not actual wheat fields. The fields were traps that turned into sharp, wheat-looking blades that spun around and cut everything in its path. They would activate once someone entered a field.

The Karma Traps' damage bonus plus his Dungeon Weakness meant that the poor Charmed guy took a lot of damage. It took some time before any of the feathered serpents was killed and his Intelligence stopped being lowered. And at that point, the guy had already died from blood loss, all while being too stupid to realize what was happening.

Calculating…

New Achievement: Weeding the World: Rarely does a being ever validate getting a karma level of 0%. But if they do, they represent a danger to the world and need to be killed immediately. Condition: Kill or help kill at least 1 being with a karma level of 0%. Reward: 1% extra lifespan per being of karma level 0% you have killed and the Ability to see the Karma Auras of beings with karma levels of 0%. [You do not have a lifespan. 1% extra lifespan per being of karma level 0% you have killed changed to 1% more EXP gained per being of karma level 0% you have killed.] [You already have the Ability 'Karma Aura Sight'. '0% Karma Aura Sight' changed to '0% Karma Sense'. You can now sense when a being of karma level 0% is within 1 km of your Dungeon Portal.]

Weeding the World: 1 being of karma level 0% killed.

As 'Weeding the World' would give the same reward whether it is active or passive, the Achievement automatically turns passive.

You have gotten a new Achievement while having 3 passive Achievements. Do you wish to change which Achievements are passive?

No thank you…

Okay… I take it, it took a while to figure out what 'lifespan' would translate to for a Dungeon Core. Gaining more EXP doesn't entirely seem like the same thing.

It also seems a bit weak for an Achievement… And the System even acknowledges that and turns it passive immediately!

…

… Maybe it's like my 'Blood Shed, Blood Room' Rule and only meant to inform people of one's wishes. That would make sense! While I already knew the System wanted bad people killed due to my mission, non-Dungeon Cores wouldn't know that.

"Todalus Crater died for the goddess!" The siren had shouted before she began walking on the dirt route between the wheat fields and thus avoiding the traps. Her Party followed in her footsteps, having decided that, while watching the centaur get killed was scary and gruesome, he had been an idiot to jump into a field in a Dungeon like that.

The group then arrived at The Door of Speciesism and The Blobfish Totem trap. Said trap didn't work as well as intended. It was meant to stop people from successfully sweet talking The Door of Speciesism by lowering their Charisma by half - rounded up and with a maximum point loss of 8. After having their Charisma reduced, only the siren was able to convince The Door of her species' good nature.

"We are called sirens because our naturally high Charisma makes us brilliant singers. When a siren goes off everyone near and far will hear it. Likewise all will stop to listen to a siren's song. Though, we are, of course, not as loud!" She ended with a grin.

The Door of Speciesism then asked about her species' thoughts on making others do things they don't want to do, like I had originally instructed it to do. It was my not-quite-subtle way of asking them about slavery.

"No, no, no! No siren would ever do that! The System has gifted us all with free will! To disregard someone's free will is to disregard all the System has done!" The siren declared in response.

So, you weren't the one to Charm your Party into coming with you? Despite having 'Charmer' as your Class you have never actually Charmed anyone into doing something they don't want to do and the very thought of doing so disgusts you? You are clearly lying, girl!

The Door didn't see the lie, though, and let her through. She hadn't learned the intended lesson, however, so the puzzle had still been failed. This confused her, but didn't slow her down. When The Door had opened for her, the other 4 decided to walk through as well and thus officially skipping the puzzle.

I still got EXP for the puzzle, even if they skipped it.

A puzzle was attempted!

You have gained 8 EXP.

First of Your Kind rewards you 2 EXP.

11 level 8 creatures have died.

You have gained 44 EXP.

First of Your Kind rewards you 9 EXP.

Creature Designer rewards you 7 EXP.

1 level 19 sapient has been killed in your Dungeon.

You have gained 950 EXP.

First of Your Kind rewards you 190 EXP.

Weeding the World rewards you 10 EXP.

The cult members were quickly in a fight with the creatures of The Kobold Training Camp.

They appear to be completely immune to my Do The Dishes trap. I thought soon afterwards. The Chicken Totem trap was meant to lower their Awareness and make them more susceptible to it. The Do The Dishes trap was meant to curse anyone seeing the wooden wash basin filled with dirty dishes into doing them. And when cleaned, the dishes would magically become dirty again and you could be forced to clean them once more!

I think their Charmed states and the Hypnotisment are overriding my trap… Luckily for me, it seemed to be the only one they were immune to. Unfortunately for me, the remaining centaur was able to point out all my traps except my Totem traps - which simply gave some form of debuff to whoever was within a 10 meters radius of it.

While said centaur Archer could locate my traps she didn't notice the dumb mimic in the middle of The Kobold Traning Camp. The mimic was disguised as a statue of… well… me… my Core that is… and was located right behind an altar and in between the two totem traps of the room. Said totems being The Snail Totem, lowering Dexterity, and The Chicken Totem, lowering Awareness.

The mimic ate the first person to come near it, which happened to be the gnome Crafter. Two big gulps later and the gnome lady was gone.

Weeding the World: 2 beings of karma level 0% killed.

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The feathered serpents with their innate passive Skill 'Aura of Morons' - which gave any enemy in the Aura a -1 to Intelligence per 4th level of the serpent, but could be resisted by those with a high Awareness Score - had had some success in the form of the dead centaur. But the fledgling neurotoxic dragons had fangs that were too weak to inject venom with - due to still being fledglings - and had to resort to spitting their venom. This method of delivery - in addition to their young age tier - made their venom much less effective unless it hit a weak spot, like an eye, an open mouth or a fresh wound. If this happened it would cause great pain and potentially nausea and vertigo as well, depending on the amount that ends up inside the person's body.

Several times a cult member had flinched in pain from the venom, but - even with their 'Dungeon Weakness' - it didn't seem to slow them down much. I don't think I'll make any more of those before I can make them as 'young' rather than as 'fledgling'.

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The first spell the siren cast in The Geyser Path decided it didn't want to do ice. Instead it took the form of a lightning bolt, which hit all three of the siren's remaining allies as well as the feathered serpent the siren had aimed the spell at. The centaur Archer was a 4th tier and took the hit quite well, but the two giants fell to the ground and went into 3 minutes and 16 seconds long seizures. During this, the Archer and siren had to defend the rest against the other 20 creatures in the room using only ice shards and the crossbow with matching bolts they had gotten as loot from a kobold in the previous room.

See that's more like it!

Normally an attack like that from a 5th tier to two already wounded 3rd tiers would at least have needed immediate medical attention - that is, if they didn't outright die from it - but the 'Almost Random Wonky Magic' Rule used some of the used mana to change the spell's effect, thus lowering its power.

Having been made from the Charmer's mana it also didn't trigger 'Dungeon Weakness'.

The Tribesmen had considered attacking the cult members while half of them were down, but they had long since seen the 'Level 40' above the siren's head and chose caution instead.

"We attack when the Boss has them distracted." Nerok commanded.

When the room had been cleared and the siren could take a break from spellcasting and think things through, she decided that since something was clearly wrong with her spells she should cast as few as possible.

Urh! But that was the fun part!

The Geyser Path ended with a puzzle door but one I was less satisfied with than my other puzzles. The door was covered with pictures of all the different kinds of creatures of my first 4 Floors. Except my mimics that is. Each picture could be pressed down, and to open the door the 8 correct pictures had to be pressed down. If one had picked even just one picture wrong, once 8 images had been pressed, all selected buttons would simply pop up again.

The answer was the 8 different kinds of creatures of the 4th Floor.

Should I replace this one? Definitely someday. But, you know. When I no longer have any new Floors to make.

It took a couple of minutes, but the cult got there in the end.

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To see a longma one had to have a karma level of 90% or above. But in return they would and could only attack people with a karma level of 10% or lower or when aiding a sapient of 90% or above. Like the kirin, the longma was both horse and dragon. Where kirins were a mixture of dragon, horse, lion and giraffe, longmas were simply dragon horses. The horse body was covered in brightly colored dragon scales, it had big draconic wings, a pair of horns that curved backwards on its forehead and a pair of long whiskers by its nose. Its teeth were split equally between that of a horse and that of a dragon with the 12 back teeth being flat molars and the 12 in the front being sharp canines.

As the main creature of the 5th Floor - when not counting the Boss or it's healer - was the longma and the entire cult had effective karma levels of 0%, well… the two 3rd tier giants were soon killed by razor sharp teeth from a creature they couldn't see. When the siren noticed that a comrade had died she would shout out their name and declare that they had died fighting for the goddess, like she had done every time someone from her party had died.

…

And then carry on like nothing happened.

The rest of her Party hadn't been as careless about seeing their friends die and had become more and more nervous and frightened. As the least harmed and the two with the highest levels remaining centaur and the siren hadn't been as affected by the death of their weaker members as the others had been.

The Archer had, however, become mighty paranoid.

The Charmer and the Archer only survived the three Memory Lanes and all its longmas due to the Archer's paranoia and ability to hear the longmas. Must be a Skill or an Ability or something. Too bad Identify Identity won't give me a full status on people.

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It came as a bit of a surprise to me when the siren quickly solved The Door of Humility.

"I am Calorose, priestess of the broken goddess. I seek nothing more in life than to serve the System and its soulmate by bringing the pieces of the goddess back together." The Archer then repeated it but with her own name and calling herself an acolyte.

In The Room of The Peacemaker the couple first waited for an attack. When nothing happened, they went to read the clue under the knight statue. After thinking and discussing it for a couple of minutes without finding any obvious solution, they then proceeded to explore the room.

"Priestess Calorose? The door has a handle." The centaur Archer stated out loud before making to grab the ring handle. Said handle was placed at eyeheight to the centaur and jumped from the door as she tried to grab it. Having been taken by surprise the Archer had no chance to defend herself as the mini mimic turned itself into a sharp cone midjump and pushed itself through her eye and into her brain. The naturally higher Toughness of centaurs having been overcome by the mimic's Ability giving its ambush extra attack power.

Weeding the World: 5 beings of karma level 0% killed.

With the mimic's cover having been blown, it was soon killed by the siren.

Getting frustrated, the priestess decided to simply grab the nearest weapon and put it in the statue's hand. This caused the knight statue to animate and attack the siren with the sword she had given it. It only got a single attack in - slicing her left shoulder open - before getting blasted by an ice shard and breaking into pieces. This was actually a legit way to… well not really solve the puzzle but to overcome the puzzle. Defeating the statue would yield no EXP but would open the door to the next room. Additionally, the 'Cheaters Only Cheat Themselves' Rule wouldn't react to this.

So, the lone 5th tier siren priestess began preparing herself before she would walk into The Field of Fallen Heroes to meet my 1st tier kirin Boss and its assistants. Blind in one eye and bleeding from one shoulder, but otherwise unharmed.