The Dungeon Inn - English

B1C09 - Another companion

What would be best to summon. It must be able to help me defend myself. However, this time the priority is not on physical strength, as it will remain in the cave with me. I still have no way, of getting my hands on wooden furniture and I don't know of any creatures with saw-like abilities. Mimics could possibly disguise themselves as furniture. But when I think about the fact, that I might have somewhat rough adventurers visiting, who bang on the table or stick their knives into the table, I'm not sure, how well the mimics can ignore that. In the worst case scenario, all of the furniture suddenly devours the guests, as soon as one of them defends himself. I'd rather not risk that.

So I won't be able to solve my furniture problem with that. But if it's with me all the time, it will have to be humanoid again, which limits the choice. A ninja could hide, but he can't always stay close to me and intervene in time like in the situation yesterday and then everyone can see it at the latest. So I can't avoid the humanoid. But what could it get as a second task?

When I think back to the labyrinth, I need a lot of mana. However, I also solve the supply problem with mana. Maybe I should then find an alternative solution, so that I can tackle the labyrinth creation more quickly. What makes things last longer? If I could freeze it, it would last longer. So something with ice skills. A human with ice magic? The crystal says, there isn't enough mana for that. What other creatures are there, that are weak enough for me to summon and can use ice magic? I don't know of a Demi. What about a snow woman?

I touched the crystal and imagined a snow woman. A woman with long white hair emerged from the summoning circle. She wore a long light blue almost white dress. When she opened her eyes, deep red eyes looked at me. She lifted her skirt slightly with her hands and curtsied.

"It is an honor to serve you, Master."

"Welcome. Your name is Sarah and you are responsible for my personal defense. Your other function is supposed to be freezing our food, do you think that's possible?"

"Hmm, I can certainly freeze it, but the problem lies in leaving it in this state. I'm afraid, I can only keep it in this state for a short time and I have to keep in touch with it."

"I see... Do you have the ability to cool down a room."

"I can summon an ice cube, it should cool down the area until it melts."

The summoning had cost a lot of mana, more than Bruno's, according to the crystal. But there was still enough left, to add a room. So I used the remaining mana to start the labyrinth. It would still take a lot of planning, but the first rooms should be more functional. A small, narrow passage led from the crystal cave deeper into the earth. If the labyrinth is too high up, someone from above could easily dig their way to any part of the labyrinth, which I wanted to avoid, so I made it deeper than the cave already was. I then created a small room below. The passage left me without enough mana, to create a larger one. I then asked Sarah to summon a block of ice in the middle of the room. As soon as this happened, I noticed how the room got cooler. Another advantage of the lower position was, that the cold air does not penetrate into the other rooms, but on the contrary the warm air is pushed upwards.

Bruno brought the wolves into the cold room and I brought the leftover berries and grasses. The crystal announced itself, as I walked past it. He seemed uncomfortable. So I took it downstairs and put it in a corner. Apparently the cold didn't bother him, because as soon as he was on the ground, the feeling of discomfort disappeared. Sarah stayed down by the ice block for a while until the room had cooled down enough for her to be able to move away for longer. Every now and then she always had to go back to replace the ice block. But the longer we continued like this, the less frequent it would become, so she could do her defense duty.

The use of her mana was obviously draining her strength and she was already a little paler, than her almost white skin already was. So I decided to prepare something for her. When I showed her the options, she told me she wasn't interested in meat and would prefer the salads. Since it would take less time, it wasn't even a bad thing in the current situation and I had a second buyer in addition to Bruno. However, her way of eating was very different from ours. While we chopped up the salad with the improvised fork and knife and ate it. She quickly froze her food and smashed it into small pieces with her knife. She threw the now small ice cubes into her mouth and ate them with relish. Apparently snow women prefer icy food. Eating food helped her, regaining her strength and soon she was no longer so pale. While I was interested in her capabilities, I let her get the cooling chamber fully functional first. Once that's done and she still has mana left, she can still show me, what she's capable of.

Even though I still had to verify her combat skills, there was still one little thing, I had overlooked. The white hair and red eyes didn't exactly make her seem like a harmless person. At first glance she would probably come across as a monster. Aron hadn't met Bruno yet either, what was the probability, that I accidentally met two new companions in his absence. I could say that she was always there, but I kept her hidden because of her appearance. Although I can't be sure how good the adventurers' skills are and whether they should have felt their presence during their visit. But maybe I can just bend the story slightly so that she came with Bruno.

Bruno was next and he apparently had something in mind for me too.