Dungeon Master (Karma System)

Golden Axe entered the defense dungeon carrying less timber than it had on the previous attempt.

Hizon noticed immediately.

The guild’s first serious plan had relied on three increasingly smaller fortifications. That approach carried them past thirty-one hours. Their next attempt improved the record to thirty-four hours and fifty-six minutes, but the final position became a trap. Once the attackers opened a path to the merchant wagons, every adventurer inside the shrinking circle had to respond to the same breach.

Seventeen of the twenty-five participants were still alive when the merchants died.

Golden Axe did not need more survivors. It needed more space.

Matthew stood on the starting field while the guild unloaded short beams, canvas screens, rope, water, and boxes of metal fittings. Six merchant wagons formed the center of the position. The merchants climbed down and watched the adventurers work without offering to help.

Their survival was the objective. Their cooperation was not included.

”Four positions.” Matthew said. ”No final circle.”

The guild divided the field into connected sections. Two low barricades controlled the eastern and western approaches. A firebreak surrounded the wagons, but the wagons did not remain side by side. Golden Axe moved them into three pairs with covered lanes between them.

If one section failed, the entire attacking force would not gain sight of all six merchants at once.

The twenty-five adventurers formed five teams. Four defended the outer positions and rotated through rest periods. The fifth remained mobile. Its members carried repair tools, medical supplies, and weapons suitable for closing whichever breach appeared first.

Each team had a commander authorized to order a retreat without waiting for Matthew.

That was the largest change.

During the previous failures, too many people had looked toward the guild leader when two problems happened at once. Matthew could not see every wall, track every merchant, and direct twenty-four other adventurers through forty-eight hours without rest.

This time, he did not try.

Hizon watched from the control chamber beneath the field.

The defense dungeon still operated only once each week. He had converted far more goblins into eternal souls since Golden Axe’s early attempts, but thousands of creatures remained outside the system. Until every force needed by the scenario could reset safely, Hizon would not allow parties to run it like an ordinary instance.

That made each reservation valuable.

It also gave him a week to prepare for the guild most likely to become his first successful customer.

”They separated the merchants.” One hobgoblin assistant said.

”Good,” Hizon replied.

”Good for them?”

”Good for me. Six targets are more interesting when they are not standing in one pile.”

He selected the first wave.

The horn sounded above.

[Defense Challenge begun.]

[Participants: 25]

[Protected merchants: 6]

[Completion requirement: Protect every merchant for 48 hours.]

[Loss condition: Death of any protected merchant.]

The first goblins crossed the field beneath mismatched shields.

Golden Axe did not waste enchanted ammunition or advanced skills. The outer teams held the controlled approaches while the mobile team watched for goblins crawling through the grass. When the wave ended, the guild repaired only the damage that affected the next defense.

They left three broken planks where they were.

Matthew’s previous roster would have fixed them because unfinished work felt dangerous. This roster understood that timber, nails, strength, and time were all limited supplies.

The second wave approached from the north instead of the expected west.

One team changed position without asking permission. The others remained where they were. Hizon’s goblins found the northern lane defended and no empty wall waiting behind a pointless full-guild movement.

”Better.” Hizon said.

He sent scouts during the rest period.

Golden Axe caught four. The fifth reached the wagons and returned before an archer found him.

The next wave attacked the widest gap between two merchant pairs.

By the sixth hour, the guild understood that Hizon had studied its layout.

That did not make the layout useless. It made the defense a contest again.

The merchants opened their inventories after the third completed wave. Their prices remained unreasonable, their quantities limited, and the sale window short.

Golden Axe sent one buyer.

He carried bags already divided by priority. He purchased nails, bowstrings, bandages, lamp oil, two water barrels, and every shovel the merchants offered. He ignored an enchanted spear, three improved shields, and a box of explosive bolts.

The merchants closed their wagons with dungeon coins still in the guild’s bags.

Hizon frowned.

”Raise the price of shovels next time.”

His assistant made a note.

Golden Axe used them to deepen the lanes between the merchant positions. Excavated earth became low banks. Water barrels sat beside the canvas screens, and nothing flammable remained within the central firebreak except the wagons themselves.

Darkness arrived during the ninth hour.

Goblins lit torches at the edge of the field. Some carried bows. Others moved low beneath hides soaked in mud. Golden Axe extinguished most of its own lights rather than providing clear targets.

The attack began on the western barricade.

Burning arrows crossed the field. The western team stopped the first rush while the mobile team smothered flames. Then a second horn sounded from the east.

Matthew remained west.

The eastern commander released two colored flares. One indicated pressure. The second asked for ranged support instead of the full reserve. Archers near the wagons changed direction while the repair members stayed beside the fire.

Both walls held.

At twelve hours, Golden Axe still had all twenty-five participants and six merchants.

It also had tired people beginning their second rotation.

The dungeon did not stop because someone needed sleep. Five adventurers rested at a time inside shallow shelters beside the wagons. They removed armor, ate, and closed their eyes while horns and impacts continued outside.

Most did not truly sleep during the first rotation.

By the second, exhaustion accomplished what discipline could not.

Matthew slept for ninety minutes while his assistant commanded the field. He woke to discover that two waves had passed, one barricade had been abandoned, and nobody had needed him.

He considered that success.

Hizon considered it inconvenient.

At sixteen hours, he sent hobgoblins beneath heavy shields against the damaged western lane. Golden Axe’s reserve moved to meet them. Once the blue lights gathered on his control panel, Hizon released goblin fire carriers toward the eastern canvas.

That tactic had helped destroy the guild before.

This time, the eastern commander cut down his own screen before the carriers reached it. Wet canvas collapsed into the lane. The fire spread across mud instead of climbing above the defenders.

The commander abandoned the position before the hobgoblins arrived from the side.

He lost the wall and saved every person assigned to it.

Golden Axe moved into the second phase with twenty-four participants. One adventurer had died while holding the retreat lane, but her team reached the central positions without being followed.

At twenty-one hours, the merchants opened again. The buyer arrived with an updated list. Hizon had reduced the supply of nails and increased the price of shovels.

Golden Axe bought neither.

They purchased food that restored stamina, replacement straps, healing mixtures, and two coils of wire. The buyer spent the remaining seconds comparing a barrel of alchemical foam with a bundle of arrows.

He chose the foam.

Hizon approved the transaction with a sharp smile.

”That one is overpriced even for us.”

The barrel became useful three hours later.

Daylight revealed giant bullet ants moving through the grass. The insects did not approach the controlled lanes. They climbed over broken timber and crossed shallow earthworks that stopped ordinary feet.

Golden Axe used the wire to change their routes.

The repair team strung it between buried stakes. The first bullet ant broke through. The second became entangled long enough for the defenders to force it sideways. Two more followed the easier route around the obstruction and entered the lane covered by Golden Axe’s strongest team.

The insects damaged two merchant wagons without reaching the people inside.

One spray of burning fluid struck the southern pair. The overpriced foam smothered it.

At twenty-six hours, twenty-two adventurers remained.

All six merchants lived.

The guild no longer possessed a complete outer barricade. It controlled separate patches of ground connected by covered paths. Attackers could enter the abandoned spaces, but doing so exposed them to defenders on more than one side.

Hizon stopped trying to break a wall.

He began trying to force movement.

One wave threatened the northern wagons without committing. Another sent noisy groups around the field while a smaller force waited beyond the southern grass. Goblin archers targeted anyone carrying tools. Hobgoblin officers withdrew before Golden Axe could destroy them.

The guild spent energy even when no large assault arrived.

At thirty hours, two horns sounded from opposite directions.

The same signal had preceded the attack that destroyed Golden Axe’s earlier attempt. Nobody assumed the same forces followed it.

The northern commander held his team in place. The southern commander requested the reserve. Matthew sent only three members and kept two beside the wagons.

Shield-bearing hobgoblins struck north.

Fire carriers appeared south.

Then giant bullet ants emerged from holes inside the abandoned western position.

The attack had three parts, not two.

Golden Axe’s remaining reserve moved west. The merchants drove their paired wagons along the prepared lanes without waiting for Matthew. One pair shifted north, one east, and one remained behind the central earth bank.

The ants reached an empty patch of ground where six targets had stood minutes earlier.

Golden Axe lost four adventurers during the wave.

It did not lose a merchant.

At thirty-four hours, the field contained more broken defenses than standing ones. Nineteen guild members remained. The survivors had gone beyond ordinary exhaustion. They spoke in short words, ate while walking, and slept whenever a rest period lasted longer than a few minutes.

Matthew checked the six gold markers on his command slate.

All remained lit.

Thirty-four hours and fifty-six minutes passed. The old record ended.

No notice distracted the defenders. Matthew had instructed them not to watch the clock until the challenge ended.

Hizon watched it for them.

He leaned toward the control panels as the timer crossed thirty-five hours.

”Now they are buying new time.” He said.

His assistant looked at the forces remaining in the later-wave reserve. ”Do you think they can reach forty-eight?”

Hizon selected the next attack.

The ground above began to shake beneath something much larger than a bullet ant.

On the battlefield, the merchants heard it too. One climbed onto a wagon seat and looked toward the trembling western field.

”Is that included in the protection contract?” He asked.

Matthew checked the position of every team before answering. ”Everything that tries to kill you is included.”

”I meant the damage to my wagon.”

”Damn greedy merchant.” An adventure mumbled while moving further away.

The merchant climbed down and began fastening the shutters from inside. He was not brave, obedient, or helpful because Golden Axe needed him to be. He was a difficult customer trapped in a terrible situation, exactly like the other five.

Protecting them for thirteen more hours would require the guild to work around that fact rather than wish it away.