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    The giant underworld snake couldn''t hear the dungeon music. It slammed its tail against the wooden barrier again, trying to sweep across and break the spears. One of the spears cut into the tail and broke off, but the rest pulled back in time without breaking. The snake hissed loudly and thrashed in pain. It couldn''t hear the music.


    The snake rammed its head into the last remaining dirt wall, attempting to dig out of the cavern. The bandits waited until the snake was fully committed to the dig, then opened the nearest entrances and rushed out to spear the snake just behind the head. The snake pulled its head out of the hole to try and snap at the bandits, but only succeeded in driving the spears deeper. The snake''s motion ripped the spears out of the bandits hands as it writhed in blinding agony. It couldn''t hear the music.


    The snake couldn''t dislodge the spears. Eventually, the snake''s body gave in to exhaustion and it went limp. As the snake bled out, it could see more bandits exit the barricades to install a final section of wall, covering the last avenue of escape. The snake died.


    A vine root tuber dropped from the cavern ceiling. The tuber glanced off the edge of a sturdy wooden lattice and fell to the wooden floor. As the fruit swelled and split to release the newly spawned giant snake, the bandits finished dragging the snake''s carcass from the cavern and slammed the barricade back in place.


    The giant snake slammed its head against the barricade once, twice. The third blow sent the snake reeling back in rage and pain. Firmly braced spears had extended from the barrier and the snake''s own strength drove the flint points deep into the bone of the snake''s skull. As the snake thrashed, blinded by blood, the wooden prison shook but didn''t fail. The snake curled up away from the barricades, trying to hear the dungeon music.


    The bandits didn''t allow the snake to rest in the middle of the cavern. Spears flew from behind cover to draw blood and force the snake to react. The snake fought ineffectually against the bandits--breaking occasional spears but unable to hard the fighters. The snake died again. It couldn''t hear the music.


    ----


    "Request, communicate"


    Violet looked up at the talky-thinky-thinky-talky mechanism that sat next to the dungeon core. He set down his drink, untouched, and jumped over to the machine. "Hello! Are you going to help now?" He said. The last conversation with the dungeon core had been extremely discouraging, but Violet didn''t have anyone else to beg for assistance until the Hill Lord returned from whatever was distracting him or a sympathetic trade caravan showed up with a lot of guards.


    "Curiosity, assistance" The voice always spoke in basic, contracted phrases, and Violet had to guess the meaning more than once in the previous conversations.


    Violet felt pretty sure that the dungeon core was asking what assistance would look like. "Please, spawn dungeon creatures again." He said. Without new creatures, the only creatures to spawn were the boss creatures. Yrryth had avoided death, and the boss bat was too fast to catch underwater, but the poor underworld snake was stuck in a deathtrap--continuously respawning in an underworld cavern and being slaughtered by the bandits.


    "No, treasure good, spawn treasure." The voice spoke without inflection.


    Violet heart felt like it was being squeezed with iron bands. Every delay was more torture for the giant snake. "I don''t believe this." He said. "Stop spawning treasure!" He shouted at the dungeon core.


    "No." The response sounded final, but Violet couldn''t accept that. The dungeon fairy had worked on the communication mechanisms for three days straight after seeing the snake''s torture at the hands of the bandits.If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the violation.


    "The treasure is making everything worse!" Violet fought down a sob. The volume of the thinky-talky background noise increased several fold, so Violet waited before speaking again.


    The voice spoke. "Contradiction, treasure good, treasure bad."


    Violet shook his head. This wasn''t going anywhere useful. "Please start spawning dungeon creatures." He tried again. The background sound continued, and Violet caught a few random words.


    "Spawn dungeon creatures, curiosity" The dungeon core asked.


    "Please fight the bandits." Violet said quietly. The dungeon fairy felt so tired. He considered just walking away.


    "Fight other bandits, curiosity" The dungeon core again asked a question.


    Violet pulled over his chair and answered. "The bandits are killing your creatures." The background noise was unchanged, but this time Violet didn''t wait for a response. "It''s horrible." His voice came out in a croak as he heard the words "creature death" in the background noise.


    "Curiosity." The dungeon core spoke again in a flat voice.


    Violet threw his chair, missing the dungeon core by a few inches. "Creature''s dying is bad!" Violet clenched his teeth and bent the truth. "Creature death is dangerous to you."


    The background noise cut out so suddenly that Violet worried that the communication mechanisms had broken. A soft hum of random words resumed and Violet waited with increasing anxiety. The background noise suddenly shot up before the dungeon core said, very loudly, "CREATURE DEATH, DANGER."


    As Violet listened to the random word background noise, he could no longer hold back a sob of released frustration as he heard "alarm", "defense", and "fight".


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    Outside the main dungeon vine body, Chaney held tight to the employment talisman that marked him as a not-intruder. Vine fruit fell all over the worldlet and the creatures were beginning to crowd around him. The tree spider moon cat wrapped itself around Chaney''s legs, blocking the tide of creatures. The dungeon fairy blinked next to Chaney, red eyes and pale skin made it look like the fairy had been crying. Chaney was beginning to have doubts about the fairy''s relationship to the dungeon, but now wasn''t the time to bring it up.


    "Looks like you convinced it." Chaney said.


    "Yeah. I guess." The fairy said. He looked around at the creatures. "The creatures won''t listen to me, though. We need a boss to order them down into the tunnels.


    Chaney tapped his chin. "With Yrryth in hiding and the snake trapped, should we go ask the boss bat?" Yrryth and the snake both respawned down in the tunnels. When the bandits discovered and conquered the underworld, Yrryth used her stone magic to seal herself off, but the snake only had its size and strength to deter the bandits. Size and strength couldn''t last forever against spears and shields. "Do you think-" Chaney was interrupted by the rough caw of a raven.


    The dungeon fairy looked up in surprise. A raven flew down and landed on top of a nearby frog''s head. The raven croaked and cawed a bit as though speaking to the dungeon fairy.


    "Huh?" The dungeon fairy said. "What do you mean?" The fairy made a big show of listening to the raven, which Chaney felt was a foolish waste of time. "Ok, there are bandits down in the tunnels. Do you know what bandits are?" The raven bobbed its head and made a small sound. "great, and do you know about the tunnels?" The fairy asked. Chaney began to feel less sure that the discussion with the raven was a waste of time.


    "There are lots of tunnels. You have probably seen Yrryth climb out of the ground, right? Well there is a tunnel or door in every worldlet, like that one." The fairy pointed at the tunnel opening near the main vine body. The raven flew over and around the opening once, then returned to the frog. The frog croaked grumpily.


    "We need to get all the creatures into the tunnels to fight the bandits. They are torturing the giant snake and if they keep breaking walls, we will all die." The fairy said.


    The raven leapt into the air and began cawing loudly. It circled overhead and continued to caw and croak at all the dungeon creatures. The raven flew over to the tunnel entrance, drawing the attention of every living thing in the worldlet. After a final caw, the dungeon creatures all dashed towards the tunnel entrance.


    Chaney realized his mouth was hanging open in shock. He closed it as the raven returned and perched on his shoulder. It croaked at the dungeon fairy, who looked like a small child, fawning over a returning hero.


    "That was perfect!" The fairy said. "Can you go around to the other worldlets and send them down to? Take this big guy with you, he knows where all the tunnel entrances are." The fairy patted Chaney on the arm. "You go with the raven, I''ll do what I can for the snake." The fairy joined the stream of creatures descending into the underworld.


    The raven tweaked Chaney''s hair and flew off towards the delta worldlet. Chaney and the moon cat followed at a run.