Matthias was distracted when someone he didn't recognize marched up to the training camp, blasting mana outward to make their presence known. It was a severe-looking elven woman, dressed in clothes he had only ever seen nobles wear. She walked with an air of self-importance and conviction. Her blonde hair hardly moved as she advanced, as though she were actively using magic to suppress the wind around her.

  “Dungeon, I demand an audience!” she announced as she came to a stop, a hard look in her green eyes.

  “Bold of you to make a demand of a dungeon,” Rey said as she appeared in a beam of light. Sylt seemed content to let Rey handle this one.

  “So there really are elves here,” the woman said in an accusatory tone.

  Rey could not help but chuckle. Then she let her presence fully manifest and smothered the other woman’s aura of power.

  “I am no mere elf,” Rey corrected. “Calling me an elf would be like calling a dragon a mere lizard. Or an elder earth elemental a mere rock. The discrepancy in scale you fail to comprehend is almost staggering. But I would expect nothing less from a woman with your bearing.”

  “I am an inspector with—” the woman began.

  “If you are about to say the Department of Dungeon Diplomacy, I will be disappointed,” Rey interrupted.

  “I am also a representative of the Elven Nation of Rogarth,” the woman finished, her eyes narrowing further. “And I demand a full tour of this dungeon!”

  “That will not happen,” Rey replied immediately. “The last member of your organization walked in with an army and decided he did not want to walk back out.”

  “Is that a threat?” the woman accused.

  “Ma’am, you march up to a dungeon,” Rey said calmly, “the only dungeon not currently at war. You do not give your name. You offer no proof of station. You simply blast out mana like a child who was never taught restraint, and then you make demands.”

  “I will have you know I am level one hundred and twenty-five,” the woman said arrogantly.

  “And we have turtles roaming the swamp that killed a level one hundred and fifty cleric with a single bite,” Rey replied. “That is our first floor. We have trainees who are nearly that level from farming our opening zone.”

  “Maybe your dungeon is too young to understand,” the woman said haughtily. “Either it obeys my demands, or an elven army will arrive at the behest of the king to carry out a full inspection. As we elves were once enslaved by a dungeon, we demand that no race be enslaved by dungeons. If we find slaves, we will seed another core to kill yours.”

  “While they are at war?” Rey asked incredulously. “You claim to work for a diplomatic agency, and yet I see no diplomacy.”

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  “Diplomacy is about power,” the woman sneered. “If you had real power apart from the dungeon, you would understand that. The strong have no reason to negotiate with the weak. We simply make demands.”

  “Right,” Rey sighed. “I see there is no talking to you. You came here in a self-righteous fury, with no understanding of what is actually happening. You never came for diplomacy. If you are certain you want your nation’s army to suffer catastrophic losses while other dungeons are already fighting, that is your choice.”

  The woman scoffed. “The dungeon war is between them. They are not targeting civilians or cities. They are aiming for each other. We will be fine.”

  “And what about when those marching monsters need food?” Sylt asked, melting out of a nearby shadow. “Or when two dragons clash mid-transit over a city? What happens when an undead army decides it wants a few more meat shields?”

  “We already received assurances that the dungeons would minimize collateral damage,” the woman said smugly.

  “And what is the collateral range for two legendary monsters fighting?” Sylt asked.

  The woman paled.

  “If memory serves,” Sylt continued, “an ancient dragon is the benchmark for Legendary dungeon cores. Their fear aura spans miles. Their breath weapons are city-scale cone attacks. Our dungeon recently received a crash course on the others, and every single one of them has an ancient dragon.”

  That was when Matthias felt it—a surge of power from the ocean. An immense wave of magical energy was racing toward the coast. He had only minutes to decide on a countermeasure.

  Then the aura hit.

  Everyone froze. Most of the newer delvers failed to resist it outright. The cutoff seemed to be around level one hundred.

  The elven woman sneered. “Looks like you just jinxed yourself. Let’s see how your dungeon handles one.”

  Moments later, a massive sea dragon burst from the depths and surged toward the bay, roaring as it entered the shallows.

  The creature resembled a colossal sea serpent, complete with catfish-like whiskers and multiple sets of webbed appendages that functioned as both fins and legs. Its scales bore a chromatic blue sheen, and steam hissed from its jaws.

  Sylt was about to move when a thunderous impact echoed across the coast.

  The dragon lurched in midair, panic flashing through its movements as something massive rose beneath it.

  Bone-encased skulls latched onto the dragon along its length. Scales cracked. Flesh tore where scales failed. The bite force alone was catastrophic.

  The dragon fought back viciously, clawing and thrashing. Bone chips and gore flew—but every wound it inflicted only worsened its situation. The attacker’s blood sizzled on contact, corroding the dragon’s magically reinforced body. Then the wounds calcified, erupting into jagged bone spikes.

  In desperation, the dragon unleashed its breath weapon, and the battlefield vanished beneath a roiling cloud of steam.

  The sounds of titanic struggle continued beneath the haze as massive waves battered the shoreline. Then the water turned red—and began to boil.

  Matthias winced as he felt nearly every creature along the coast die. Even the turtles were fleeing inland now.

  A battered form burst from the steam and slammed onto the shore. The sea dragon lay broken, half the flesh missing from its face, deep gashes carving its body. Acidic seawater continued to eat away at it. It was alive—but barely.

  Then another shape emerged from the steam.

  With a thunderous bellow, the Primeval Hydra revealed itself. It loomed over the fallen dragon, roaring in triumph. Its body was nearly fully encased in bone, much of it cracking and shedding with every movement. Long spikes jutted from its frame, giving it a porcupine-like silhouette. Its many eyes burned with a hatred beyond words.

  With a satisfied roar, it raised its massive forelimbs and brought them down.

  The dragon’s head was reduced to red paste.

  “I think my dungeon has it handled,” Sylt said cheerfully.

  The elven woman turned pale—and ran as if her life depended on it.