My Dungeon Life: Rise of the Slave Harem - My Dungeon Life – Chapter 1403-1405

Chapter 1403

“L-lapis, what are you saying?”

“You asked me for my judgment,” Lapis responded shortly. “I gave it.”

Looking slightly taken aback, Gabbro leaned forward. “I know she’s your daughter, but of all people, I didn’t think that you would act so willful.”

“You dare call me willful?” Lapis’s eyes appeared to ignite with lightning, and Gabbro immediately put up his hands.

“M-maybe… if you explain your thought process…”

“Hmph…” Lapis crossed her arms angrily. “Next time, just say you want an explanation rather than accusing me of dishonesty.”

I perked up as well. I had worried when Terra had selected Gabbro. I had thought we might lose. I was glad Lapis chose my blade, but I was curious if she had seen what I hoped she had seen.

“G-go on…” Gabbro responded, clearly just as curious.

“It’s true that your blade does contain a better balance. The skill placed into its construction is superior to the other. Overall, it’s a better knife.”

“Then-”

“However, the point of the competition was not to create a well-rounded and all-purpose item.” Lapis cut in before he could interrupt her. “When it comes to weapons, the other blade is superior.”

“Wh-what?”

“Look at this blade, it’s designed specifically for quick, jagged movements.” She moved the blade in her hand swiftly and smoothly. “Each strike intending to cause the maximum damage. While your knife could be used to stab a man or open a letter, this blade only has one function, destruction.”

“Th-that… that’s…” Gabbro found himself unable to come up with a reply.

“Your blade is practiced, but how could it not be? It’s just like every typical dagger ever produced by the dwarves. There is nothing to it, no ingenuity, no creativity, no thought…” Each word she spoke caused Gabbro to grunt like he was being hit brutally. “Meanwhile, this blade took into consideration the monster it had to fight. Weightless wraiths, shadow creatures with rapid attacks and no mercy. You don’t need to block such an enemy, you need to destroy it before it attacks you!”

“Lapis?”

She closed her eyes, and as she did so she squeezed the dagger in her hand. “I can feel the lore of this blade. It has a purpose. It has a story. This is the kind of blade from which legends are formed.”

“How did I never see it?” Terra asked, looking very unhappy.

Her judgment on it had been extremely surface value. Although she was the appraiser, she had seen only the most surface-level features of the blades and judged them on that.

“What are you saying? Show me that…” Gabbro stepped forward, and Lapis put the blade down for him to see.

He picked it up and then moved it slightly. As he looked down at it, his frown intensified.

“Well, it seems like I’ll be needed after all.” Pait declared, standing up.

“I don’t get it. This isn’t a magical blade. It’s not a soul blade either. Yet, she’s right… there is lore in this blade, baked into its very essence. All these years… I thought I reached the pinnacle of blacksmithing, but all I was doing was shaping metal. Purpose? Goals? I had long forgotten that the most convenient wasn’t always the best.” He seemed to be muttering to himself now.

“Um… well… anyway, I can see that this blade is quite good…” Pait picked up Gabbro’s blade.

“I concede.” Gabbro suddenly declared, causing all the dwarves to burst out in cries of shock.

“You can’t concede!”

“The treasure!”

“Gabbro,” I interjected, causing his eyes to focus on me. “How about I offer an alternative proposal.”

“What is that?’ He asked suspiciously.

“One judge has voted for one of us, and one for the other…”

“I can’t change my vote?” Terra asked tearfully.

“No!” I cleared my throat. “I mean, how about we draw.”

“Draw?”

“We both have our demands met,” I responded with a smile. “We’ll cut the treasure in half. Dwarves get half, and Chalm gets the other half. The dwarf’s debt to me will be considered done with that. You won’t owe me anything. Finally, you will take on Sapphire as your apprentice!”

“You would sacrifice the dwarf’s debt to you?” He frowned.

“I don’t want to force you to work with me.” I shrugged. “I’d much rather be allies. Let’s work together from here on out, okay?”

He watched me for a few more careful moments, and then he put out his hand. “Deal.”

Chapter 1404

“The dwarves cannot be bullied or forced. They may feel some obligation to you, but if you just try to force them, they will resent you for it.”

Those had been the words of advice given to me by Lapis. Lapis had only given me that advice because of her attachment to Sapphire, but it had ultimately lead me to go this length to bring the dwarves by my side. Once Gabbro conceded to my conditions, the entire atmosphere of the dungeon changed. They had build ten additional forges just in case, and immediately began production of weapons and armor, lead by Gabbro himself.

“I won’t take any slacking.” Gabbro walked up to Sapphire and declared. “If you’re going to learn, you can be wasting time playing around in some dungeon. Every blacksmith level earned by leveling is a blacksmith level wasted.”

“S-seriously?” I couldn’t help but cry out.

“Hmm…” His eyes narrowed on me. “You were sloppy! As an apprentice, your work was subpar!”

“Geh… but I kept the temperature perfect, and I did everything she asked…”

“And you were also a distraction! A good apprentice is a wallflower who only appears when needed. Her eyes kept darting to you like a schoolgirl in love.”

“L-l-love!” Sapphire cried out, her face turning red.

“A proper assistance doesn’t overshadow their blacksmith, especially when you lack the experience to do so!” He ignored the fidgeting Sapphire.

“I understand,” I responded stiffly, not sure how I felt about that.

I was well aware that experience beat levels. My method of rapidly gaining jobs and lore without building it off my own experience was a problem. Unless I could learn to do what King Diorite suggested and merge with my lore, making it mine, I would always have that inherent weakness. I understood the principles behind it, but having them exposed so suddenly by this blacksmith didn’t feel great either. The last thing I wanted to do was hold Sapphire back from success.

“Since you understand,” He suddenly brought his hand up and gave my shoulder a single pat. “Then, how about you focus on what you’re best at for now, and let me worry about the blacksmithing.”

I looked up, a bit surprised at his words that had started out sounding harsh becoming so calm and encouraging.

“Uncle…” Sapphire was also looking at Gabbro with a bit of surprise.

“I’m interested in seeing this city you built, Chalm. It sounds like you’re in desperate need of smith production.” Gabbro stiffened as he noticed us looking at him with shock. “I may be a stubborn old drunk, but I’m not unreasonable! Girl! Let’s go!”

“Y-yes!” Sapphire shot me a smile, perhaps the most genuine smile I had ever seen on her face, and then she raced after Gabbro, who moved away like an unstoppable train.

I stared after them, still a bit stunned at the direction of events. I had hoped that through Sapphire, that I would have slowly tied Gabbro to Chalm, but even if I failed, at least I’d get the skilled Sapphire out of it. However, at that moment, he had all but admitted his intention to join Chalm, and that likely meant that would be the decision of the rest of the deep dwarves too.

“Congratulations.” Lapis’s light voice came from behind me. “You have managed to gain brother’s approval. That is the most you could ever hope from him.”

I nodded, feeling a bit relieved. “I see…”

“However.” She added. “If you plan to have further intentions with my daughter, you still have yet to earn my approval!”

“Geh!”

It looked like I had only defeated the miniboss, and I had still the dungeon master to face.

Chapter 1405

As their forge was filled with hammering, I began the next part of my plan. I placed the three bosses we had gathered so far into strategic places in the dungeon. After that, I found Terra and explained to her my plan. We chose our location to be the room with the plant. I had given up a lot of my soul world’s vitality to quickly heal the plant, also using waters of life to feed it. It ended up growing substantially, and despite only just being placed in the room it already looked like it had been there for weeks.

My soul world was now brown and dying, and the once luscious location was barely better a wasteland than I had seen in the visions of Twilight. It would take some time to restore the life and energy pulled from it, but I believed that what I was about to do would be worth it. We picked a side room and then barricaded it off.

“Here are some powerful metals, I want to control the path completely. Can you work with it without a blacksmith?” I asked.

“A blacksmith’s work would be better, and I wouldn’t be able to refine things to the level of a blade, but if it’s just armor plating, I can create something durable.”

“Are we sure we want to do this, Master?” Alysia asked. “We don’t know what will happen.”

“It’s a risk, but we have to try something. We won’t have the strength to defend against Twilight in just a few days without this. We may have spread out the range by three territories, but it’s requiring a lot of mana and I’ve already used my reserves. If I could connect with my surface dungeon down here, I would have already done so. This is the most important thing right now.”

“I… understand.”

“Can you make the change again?”

“Y-yes…”

I pulled out Alysia, but her form changed once again, this time turning back into the drill I had used to first get here. Terra looked at the item as I started drilling up.

“That’s very interesting, Master.”

“Th-thank you,” Alysia responded.

Terra had always had an interest in contraptions. Compared to Sapphire, who specifically enjoyed metalwork, her interests included any mechanical contraption of any type, magically run or with physics. After going to my world, I had bought her several physics toys I thought she might enjoy, but I hadn’t found a time to give them to her yet. Once we were out of this, I would show her some of the engineering marvels from my world.

Speaking of contraptions, that was exactly what we were building. We ended up building a pit with a thirty-foot drop. At the bottom of the pit was a series of jagged spikes made of powerful alloy. There was an adjacent door that led into the room of the plant monster, who was already starting to send vines into the pit trap.

While Terra was lining the sides with metal far more valuable than what we were wasting it on, we drilled a long path. In this hallway, I used mana from my dungeon to create a series of traps, all aimed at causing damage. By the time we were done, Terra finished reinforcing the bit, and we had come out into a small alcove situated at the very edge of our domain. If the lore left to me by King Diorite were correct, we should be in the right spot.

“Are we ready?” I asked.

The two of us prepared ourselves. I started to drill up, and then I struck something hard. I exploded up with all of my force, using a Create Step to try to force myself through.

“Can you make it?” I asked.

“I’ll do it!”

Terra rose to the ground, giving my feet someplace to land, but then she began to force the rock up, shoving me into the ceiling. With the barrier on one side and Terra’s raising platform on the other, the only choice was to break through or be squashed. My entire body turned red, and I pushed as powerfully as I could, and ever so slowly we began to breakthrough.

Finally, the barrier gave way and we rose into an inferno.

{You have entered the dungeon, Infernal Hell. Destroy the lore to break the curse, or complete the lore for extra dungeon points and a blessing!}