Chapter 118

AN: Unedited. Sorry for the delay!

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The Creator, Atlantis, The Kalenic Sea

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Switching out the rabbits from their old experimental evolution system to the new one was fairly easy, though it necessitated a change in lifestyle. Before, they'd live in their burrows until they reached maturity, then rise to the surface as one of their three evolutions. Now, the ability to evolve was imbued in their cores, and they could roam the grasslands of the tenth however much they wanted. We were getting a bit of an overpopulation problem, though. But that was easily fixed! I had around half the population moved to the Eleventh, spread across the more hospitable islands, and reduced the fertility of the monsters by a huge amount.

The remaining rabbits had plenty of space to roam, and from what I was seeing their evolved forms were doing well. The older jackalopes were reaching double the size of the largest Flemish Giant, the oldest made the ground quake with each hop she took. I named this newly-appointed miniboss Eostre, for an old fertility goddess from Earth. Though still having the least population, with access to all the tier two magics, the Unihares were the most powerful they'd ever been. A more rigid ranking system emerged from the duelling chaos of their early days, with powerful Unihares having courts of lesser Unihares to attend and learn from them. The Archhare, the rabbit with the most magical spells and power, I named Merlin. It only felt appropriate.

Outwardly, not much had changed for the Winged Hares. They still thrived in the canopy of the forests, enjoying a peaceful and relaxed lifestyle. The only real notable change was a few discovering how to enhance the speed of their flight with Air Magic. They were blurs, barely making any noise as they darted about the canopies. The fastest, who barely made a blur and could disappear like he was teleporting, I named Notos.

The Minotaur, who shared the Tenth with the rabbits, were likewise thriving, trading extensively with every species of Children. The milk from the unaltered cows they herded was a hot commodity, especially in Ice-cream form. The Steel Wool from their sheep was woven into something they called Weavemail, an incredibly flexible and tough alternative to chainmail. The Sheep were easy, evolution-wise. Each sheep would only birth an ordinary lamb, and when it evolved it would choose what kind of wool it wished to grow.

I'd previously skipped over the Minotaur when it came to Evolutions, because I was a little stuck. They were already large, strong and capable; I wasn't sure on how to give them a new form without taking away something. A more Centaur-like form would be a hinderance. Doubling their size would be lazy. I didn't just want a palate-swap and vague cosmetic changes either. I had a similar problem with the Capriccio, to be honest.

Once again, I left them be. I'm was sure I'd come up with something eventually. I spent a few more hours going over previous floors, and made sure to properly integrate the Ants into the Evolution Framework. After all that, and determining there wasn't much for me to do or change at the moment, I decided to focus on the Eleventh again. Since the Oceanids were still settling into their new homes, I decided to focus on Olympus and the Cloudlands. I wasn't a hundred percent certain on the name yet, but it worked for now.

First things first, I gathered the dozen Wyvern-kin who'd taken the evolution already -More than I expected, certainly- and had them brought down to the Eleventh. The journey was far swifter when all parties could fly, a feat much aided by the instincts given on evolution. Turns out, the kind of Kobold, Snowbold and Drake-kin who take the Side/Evolution into a Wyvern-kin are those who felt restricted in their tunnels, or envious of flying monsters.

The result was a flock of Wyvern-kin ecstatic to be flying, diving, doing barrel rolls, aileron rolls, and a dozen other stunts throughout their flight. The majority were Drake-kin and Kobolds in their previous forms, leading to grey, brown, green and metallic colours in their scales. While not a hundred-percent indicative, there was some correlation between scale colour and their primary mana affinity. Surprisingly, the spread of elements was rather even amongst the group of flying reptilians.

One with Red and another orange scales were strong with Fire, An off-white grey and light blue were Air. A Deep browns and greys for Earth, while deep blues and navy were for Water. There were only three second-tier elements represented; Lightning, Ice and Light. The Lightning Wyvern-kin was an electric blue, with white hightlights. Ice was a pure white, like driven snow. Unlike an albino, however, her eyes were black voids. Light was a soft yellow, and his scales gleamed in the midday light of the manasuns as they flew.

I checked in on Wave and Taura again, and thankfully they were just hanging out in the cloudlands. After informing the Wyverns of the impending arrival of their new neighbours, the two rushed off to meet them. The resulting dance of wings and scales was awesome to witness. Though far smaller than the full Wyverns, the Wyvern-kin were quick to pick up all the tricks of flight their larger cousins showed off.

I left them to get acquainted and moved back up to the Seventh, and the Experimental Chambers. I needed to figure out how to give monsters the capability to transform between at least two different forms somehow, after all.

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The Third Floor, The Dungeon, Atlantis

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Jerrard wrung out his cloak as the rest of the raid group emerged from the water. It'd been a long time since they'd struggled on the Third Floor, and he had to admit he wasn't enjoying a return.

"By all the gods, why did it have to make the Guardian harder?"  Harald complained from his spot on the floor as he ran his hands down his face.

"Because it's insane, Harald." Duncan answer, perhaps unfairly. it wasn't human, and they couldn't exactly judge it by their standards. "A better question, how has no one died to this thing yet?"

"It tailors it's strength to the group fighting it, obviously." Isid answered, wringing out her hair and retying it into a bun.

"What, so weaker groups have an easier fight? That's not fair!" Bertram said, frowning.

"Since when has life been fair, Bertram?" Haythem answered sardonically, to a thoughtful look and a, "Good Point," from his party member.

"I wish I could have just zapped the thing with lightning. It would have be so easy!" ____ insisted, slightly childishly, in Jerrard's opinion.

"We'll let you have a go at the Fifth Guardian, it's fairly weak to your lightning," Paetor answered. 

"If everyone's done complaining?" Jerrard interjected, redonning his damp cloak. "Lets do a quick overview of the changes we saw in the Second, since the first seems unchanged."

"Like the First, the Second now matches the strength of the delving party," Isid began, walking over to join Jerrard. He smiled down at his wife as she stood beside him. "It's much more effective than on the First, mostly because of the disadvantage we face in the water, and the speed and strength of the new fish monsters."

"The new fish are all-around better at what they do than the old ones," Harald continued, bringing a journal out of a waterproof bag. "The Arrowfish's 'evolution' is faster, uses water magic to speed itself up, and though it's lost the blade it's actually more damaging. Something to do with all that force concentrated at the tip of the point..." Harald trailed off, rubbing his side where one of said fish had scored a glancing blow. 

"The Sharpscale's evolution's shed scales seem to be entirely made of metal, rather than normal scales with metallic edges. It's... far more conductive than before," ___ continued, Not a problem for me, obviously, but still annoying." 

"What did the dungeon call it, the Brutefish?" Haythem asked, to a nod from Isid. "Well, nothing really stands out about it. it's bigger, tougher, faster and stronger than it's old form."

"The boss is ridiculous," Jerrard finally contributed, "A combination of the best traits from the other fish monsters. I'm also wondering just how intelligent it is, to know how much force to use to make sure it's a challenge, but not an insurmountable one. For the rest of the floor, all the dungeon has to do is put in the old fish, and keep it's new ones in reserve for stronger guilders."

There was a moment of silence, before Isid broke it.

"Alright everyone, Time to move on. It's going to take a couple of days to reach the Eighth, as always, and every second counts. Keep your guard up, who knows what the dungeon has done to the monsters on the Third." Nods all around, and they moved on.

The dungeon did, indeed, mess with the monsters on the Third.

Worse than just being larger and more dangerous, the Tiger's evolution gave the previously physically-focused monsters a talent with mana. Going from four legs to six, doubled in mass, and with their chromatic coats becoming indicative of the mana they used. Not just in colour either, their patterning was also dependent on mana type. Water-using Tigers had swirling stripes, Air Tigers got whirls, and so on. Their hides would fetch a good price, though, so they made sure to skin at least one of every new kind they came across.

The birds, Phoenix, the dungeon had called them, had also gained an evolution. The previous form was a relatively ordinary bird, with a fire affinity. This new form was bigger, and seemed to be constantly on fire, in a combination of how the light hit their gleaming feathers and a literal fire aura they gave off. In both cases it was still rare to find one. Either it hadn't been long enough since the monsters became capable of this new evolution thing, or the dungeon was still holding some back.

In regards to the rest of the floor, the old Kobold Trial Guardians had all moved deeper, leaving their replacements behind. The young Kobolds were a fair challenge for Silver and Gold tier guilders, but just couldn't match up to the far more experienced Platinums. The various giant insects spread throughout the floor were still easily avoided. The plant-based monsters, like the Pitcher traps and vines, were also easily identifiable and avoided.

After fighting Mushu and his attendants, who largely remained the same apart from the beastmasters directing the evolved form of the Tiger, they moved on to the Fourth with grim determination.

The rats were always a threat, and they couldn't afford to underestimate them.

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Unnamed Beach, The East Coast, Theona

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Tamesou Akio luxuriated in the shining sun and the sea breeze. It'd taken ages to get here, but they were finally on the East Coast! Jinasa had insisted on a quick detour off the main road, and boy was he happy they'd agreed.

Bruce was having fun with a makeshift surfboard, something about 'finally being able to surf, because I control the waves now.' Sophie was sitting in the shade of their tent, which had been easily modifiable into a marquee. Something about sun on her pale skin. Elize was with her, and they had to be talking about something funny, because every so often they'd giggle. Akio didn't even know Sophie could giggle like that. It reminded him of how the girls at his school would do that sometimes.

Akio himself was training, as his Sensei had declared this was the perfect opportunity to show him the differences between fighting on sand and in water compared to solid earth. After the last two hours, he could confidently say he hated sand. It's coarse, rough, irritating and it gets everywhere! He knew this, because he'd been thrown entirely by how unstable his stance was on sand. It was even worse in the shallow surf, where waves would crash into him and throw off his balance entirely if he wasn't paying attention.

Eventually, Sensei Heliat declared that he'd improved enough for today, and Akio was allowed to actually enjoy the beach.

"Oh, can you do giant water tentacles?" Akio asked Bruce, who'd stopped surfing and was diving through waves with him. The Australian boy frowned, then raised his hands. Like a puppeteer, every movement of his fingers influenced the three tentacles that rose from the ocean. Akio cheered, though stopped abruptly when one of the tentacles reached down and wrapped around his waist, pulling him out of the water.

"What the hell!" Akio cried, "Bruce!" he looked around, only to find Bruce being held up by a tentacle with him.

"Sharks!" Bruce replied, and Akio could see he was entirely serious. He looked down at the water to see three fins poking from the surf, the dark shapes around them making it obvious what they were. They were deeper into the ocean, but were headed in their direction.

"Surely we're too shallow!" Akio insisted, not taking his eyes off the sharks.

"Don't call me Shirley. And no, we're not. Ocean Monsters are much, much worse than land monsters," Bruce explained. "The locals have been able to keep a lid on the monster population on the surface, but they can't do anything about the ocean."

Bruce's caution was soon proven warranted. The sharks leapt from the ocean at the two boys, propelled by some magic. Trails of water followed the sharks, and Bruce could barely move Akio and himself out of the way. "Some help would be nice! I can't move us and fight back!"

"Right!" Akio answered, watching the shadows as they came around for another go. He briefly closed his eyes and took a deep breath. It was true he'd started relying on his sword and shield as crutches, but he was the source of his magic, not his tools. Inspired, he brought his mana up from his core and into his eyes, including some very specific magical programming. 

When he next opened his eyes yellow beams erupted from them, scything down into the water. Barely able to see, Akio managed to intercept a leaping shark and cut it in two. He stopped the spell as soon as he could, alarmed by how drained he felt. The halves fell to the waves sizzling and cauterized. Over the next ten minutes, the other two sharks fought over the corpse of the first, the winner ate the corpses of both, then disappeared off to sea again.

It was the most tense ten minutes of Akio's life. Bruce was flagging by the end, and it was taking all his concentration to keep them up out of the water.

Once the shadow had fully disappeared, Bruce lowered them down and they rushed back to shore. The others had apparently been watching, and rushed to meet the boys.

After making sure they were alright, the group moved further up the beach, the chill mood thoroughly ruined.

"So, did you feel like superman?" Sophie eventually asked, later that night.

Akio shrugged. "I mean, I could barely see a thing while the spell was going. Might try focusing the beams from my fingers next time."

"Probably a good idea," Sophie responded. "Who knows what shoving that much mana through your eyes over and over will do to them, anyway."

They were sat around the campfire, enjoying some quickly-cooked rations. Just some soup and bread, really. 

"It must have been terrifying for you," Elize spoke up from across the fire. "I'd never been to the ocean before today. Is it really full of monsters like that?"

"Indeed, young lady," Sensei Heliat answered. "They normally keep to the depths and currents, though. Seeing such monsters by the shore is concerning..."

Akio shared a glance with Sophie and Bruce. A lot of things had been concerning Heliat recently. The monsters in cities, now these ocean monsters were acting strangely.. Maybe it had something to do with the necromancer? Were they messing with the world on a bigger scale, somehow?

It was nothing more than speculation within his mind at the moment, but Akio could only wonder... If they'd been summoned to deal with a necromancer... why had there been no reports of undead or zombies of any kind? 

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