There is No Epic Loot Here, Only Puns

89: Split Opinions on Banned Books

In Delta's honest opinion, when one troll is good... two must surely be great. It was... sort of. Delta watched as the second troll appeared. This one smaller but wider. The cave troll finished materialising and Delta was confused when she thought she saw sea weed clumped together on the top of the troll's head.

Jeb peered in with wide and excited eyes. The troll turned and grumbled.

"What you staring at?" the troll growled. Jeb moved in closer.

"Sister! You are in Ma's Dungeon!" Jeb proclaimed. Sister?

Sister?

Delta tried not to stare but there was nothing that would be considered human femininity in the troll. Then again, Delta was using human eyes. Maybe to a troll, this new monster was a bomb shell?

"I know that, rockhead. I know where I am, innit? I ain't dumb, eh?!" the troll roared and Jeb smiled as if this was a great joke. He reached forward to pet the troll's head and there was a crunch as the troll buried her fist into Jeb's grinning face.

"You stink of troll soup. Don't mess my hair!" she warned. Jeb said something but his nose being flat made it harder to understand him. The troll wore a large shoulder-to-knee cloth thing that might have been a sheet but for the dirt and mushrooms growing on it. The twin shoulder straps and thick pockets made it seem almost... homemade.

The troll finally noticed Delta and her bravado and anger turned to silent blinking.

"Hello..." Delta said slowly.

"...Hey, Ma," the troll mumbled. There was a long pause.

"I dun wanna share a cave with this idiot. Can you make another cave?" the troll asked and Jeb blinked.

"I can sleep outside!" he offered.

"I'll wake up to find your big butt blocking the cave entrance," came the retort.

"I'll work on it but you need a name. Anything you wanna be called or-" Delta began and the troll crossed her arms.

"Skull-crusher."

Delta closed her mouth and she could almost feel Nu's smug amusement hovering nearby.

"That name is a bit... misleading," Delta tried as the female troll went to inspect the troll room, noticing the old furnace and anvil.

"Man-eater," came the next grunted suggestion.

"How about Daisy? Or Rose or...Terra or Gaia?" Delta walked around so the troll was looking at her. Again, the troll looked away as if she didn't want to look at Delta.

"Heart-Gnasher!" she suddenly exclaimed. That seemed to make the troll happy and Delta knew she would have to be clever here... well, just a little clever.

"Sure..." she began and Cois nearby made a choking noise of protest.

"But we'll shorten it uh... Gnashly because nicknames are good too," Delta nodded. The troll thought this over.

"I like it. It's like a secret...I'm Gnashly," the troll bobbed her head and the seaweed like hair bobbed.

"Gnashly and Jebediah!" Jeb crowed and he almost got another punch for his efforts.

Gnashly grabbed a very old rusty knife from the blacksmith table, which had become a part of the room now and cut her long hair shorter.

"Getting in ma eyes," she complained.

The action actually was interesting and Delta watched as her hair began to bubble and grow almost straight away.

Troll regen was a bitch it seemed when you had a bad hair style.

The chopped parts wilted but Delta noticed they hadn't faded. Gnashly chopped and chopped but the hair kept growing like weeds.

"Hey, you mind not shedding everywhere?" Cois yelled. Gnashly glared down at the gob.

"Shut it before I sit on you," she snarled. Cois scampered up her back and tisked at the messy growing hair.

"You never heard of maintenance? Watch," he commanded and gathered the hair with firm hands and began to tie it into a ratty knot with one overlapping strand acting like a hairband.

"Saw that human woman in leather pants that came with Kemy the good-doer. She had her hair up like this?" Cois said and admired his work.

Delta smiled but didn't say anything as Gnashly slowly felt her knotted hair. It held up but it did look like she had stuck her head into a blender.

"It's good. You live for now," Gnashly complimented Cois.

"Yeah yeah, growl at the gob who can control fire," Cois waved this off. Billy snorted from the shadows.

"'Control' is a strong word," he mocked. Delta was already summoning some cloth long enough for Gnashly to learn to tie her own hair up.

Jeb watched the scene and rubbed his own bald rocky head sadly.

Delta sadly did not have a toupee to conjure. Unless she could make something from boar hair and mushroom fibres...

Best not think about it before Sis did just that.

"So, you know what to expect? The Third Floor isn't safe yet," Delta began to explain. Gnashly retreated to the cave to experiment with tying her hair up without being seen but her voice flooded out like a swarm of bats.

"Undead eedjits and some quiet bugger. Just smash anyone that comes from that side unless they talk or something... if they come from the stairs... ignore them or rob them," Gnashly responded, sounding bored.

"Well, don't rob them unless they're asses but, basically. So... uh...welcome to the Dungeon!" Delta called. This was one of the awkward summons. The breaking-down of the monster creation system and her own general weirdness was enough to either make smooth summons or awkward ones.

There was the third type that resulted in Delta babbling at the bottom of her pond.

Delta did her best not think of those summons.

"Thanks... I'll find something to do... I hear ya like us monsters being busy or something," Gnashly's voice toned down to a quiet thoughtful sound.

"Just take your time... I'll let you settle in with Jeb and come back later," Delta could feel the almost unsaid request to give the new troll some space.

This was an awkward one alright.

She'd come around. Delta suspected having her, Jeb, the gobs, and Nu around was a lot of pressure to have a calling moments after being created. Gnashly needed time to just think.

Delta could appreciate that and even encouraged her monsters to think.

She stood in the map room with a serious expression.

Far too serious. Delta looked around the room and could almost see the shadows waiting for Delta to forget to have fun or to be too grim. That was no good.

She pondered her options.

Her Mana was soaking into the garden beyond, where it would slow down even more to absorb the 7 rooms beyond as she cleared them out one by one.

Still, the garden was getting absorbed rather quickly and cleanly.

---

A terrible foe. A great monster.

It rose about them and towered like a demon to their light. Still, not one of them broke formation or turned tail. They were the mighty Mana. They would fear no demon, no monster and certainly... not this... gazebo!

They took the arches together and a few of the men fell through the gaps below. Several screams for fallen comrades that were absorbed by the Mana legion below but onwards they climbed this demonic garden accessory.

It began to twitch and tried to run, finally revealing its true form but the magically enchanted furniture was still... just an object. It lacked lifeforce and thus... was prey!

All for the Dungeon! All FOR DELTA!

---

Delta was kinda glad she wasn't forced to watch the process, it would drive her to tears with the boredom of things just... being converted. Best to make the most of her time.

She opened the Map Menu and smirked at the Guardian option.

It was almost unhealthy how close she was to doing these two options together, but the security of the third floor and preventing assholes from accessing the map was... just that important.

She purchased the guardian option and the light flashed in the room before it rocketed down the hall and into the library. Delta blinked, not sure why another room was being involved but she followed it, actually running in her excitement.

The connection between the map and the library grew tighter and every book on the library shelves were shaking as Delta phased into the room.

Then it all went still. Delta narrowed her eyes.

"As the Dungeon Master, I command you to reveal yourself!" she flung a hand forward, giddy and nervous.

If she got another mimic, that would be a bit of a let down.

Like a switch had been flipped, the books began to rocket off the shelves and swirl in the air. The actual damn bookcases themselves sunk into the floor to create a wide open space as more and more books mashed together to form a blocky humanoid figure.

It stood about eight feet tall and the blocky multicolored covers that made up its form were constantly shifting and being replaced except for the lone book at the head which laid open.

The pages were blank and then two black ink dots seeped from inside the pages and became visible.

Delta stared up at the giant book thing.

"Libraries...book-transformers in disguise?" she guessed.

The menu appeared.