The Mad Rat’s Lab

This chapter is from two POV and alternates between them. The first is Andreu’s POV and the second is A Lil’ Demoness's progress in third person.

 

**Andreu**

“Ok, so what did she change…”

I look at the rules that she changed. She changed only three of them.

“Fuuuuuuck! It had to be this rules!? She clearly knows about my dungeon and units, and set it in the worst possible way for me! It was supposed to be a fair challenge and she dares to do something like this!? How nasty! Wicked!”

The first rule is the maximum cp cost of units, which is set to 300 cp. This means I can’t use the strongest unit in my dungeon: the Lab Assistant. Because the cost is already over the limit, and the level ups make it cost even more...

The second rule is regarding the environment hazards, which are disabled. So no mushrooms in the Dungeon Battle.

And the last and third rule is that Critters are prohibited. So I can’t even make use of the most situational and unexpected unit that my dungeon has: the Death Butterfly.

“Oooh, come on! Wasn’t this supposed to be a match to show you are better than me!? How can you dare to say this is a fair match when the rules are clearly set so that you can have an easy win!!!!”

Doesn’t she have any shame? I understand the demon’s philosophy of lying and deceiving, but did she have to go so far into the roleplay? She clearly incensed me with the messages so that she could humiliate me later with the rules…

“And I fell for her trap. Aaaaah!” I pull my head’s fur. I don’t have hair, so I can’t pull my hair as a normal person would. But I can pull my fur.

“Now, what am I going to do? Can I still win this match? I don’t know… it’s clear she knows how my dungeon works, so I can’t use surprise elements… the tunnels or the freezer zones won’t be able to stop her if she remembers the dungeon’s path, and instead will only obstruct my mobs from finding her…”

“There’s no other way. I can only use the cave part of the dungeon for this match, and fill it with the Demonic Swarmers. I hope they can crush her in numbers.”

It’s true that I still have the laboratory zones, but they are a single room and are too small to be eligible for the Dungeon Battles. So they aren’t an option here.

“So the Mad Rat’s cp value is 300, which leaves 700 cp for the rest of the dungeon units. The 8 Demonic Swarmers cost a total of 440 cp, leaving me with 260 cp for traps or more mobs. I can’t use the Lightning Rods because they aren’t effective in such a big open space… and the same for the falling and exploding corpses.”

“The only thing I can do with those 260 cp is adding some stitched… up to 8 or them.” So I choose 8 stitched and divide them in two squads of four.

“This is the best I can prepare with the rules she chose, designed to cripple me… I don’t know how it’s going to go, but I hope she gets pummeled to death by a swarm of Demonic Swarmers. Yeah, let’s hope it goes well…”

I press the confirmation button and the Dungeon Battle starts immediately. It seems she already prepared everything before I did.

“...Which doesn't surprise me, given that she already knew what I can and can’t use after crippling me…”

After the battle starts, I find myself in a luxurious and extremely presumptuous… banquet?? There are lots of appetizing meals on top of a central table. The walls are adorned with paintings and statues, the floor is covered by an expensive carpet, and a huge chandelier hangs on top of everything.

“Wow…” My mouth is hanging open. “Is this really a dungeon battle? It looks more like a dream you would have…”

First of all, I take a look around for enemies. But I don’t find anything in the room, except a few doors here and there. Then, one of the doors opens and a waiter holding a tray with more food comes inside.

“...A waiter!?”

 

 

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**A Lil’ Demoness**

 

Meanwhile, inside The Mad Rat’s Lab, A Lil’ Demoness is steadily moving forward. It looks like she already knows where to go.

“Heh, this is going to be easy! What a fool to let me choose all the dungeon battle rules after knowing I already went to his dungeon to investigate. I’m sure he was crying after seeing the limits I put to prevent him from using his best units! Hahaha!”

A feminine and glamorous laughter echoes through the giant cave. Following her lead, two more voices can be heard laughing.

They come from the two Imps that are following the player: nasty and treacherous creatures specialized in magic combat. Even if they are weak, they can get pretty annoying with their high numbers and hit and run tactics. They are the core unit of the Wicked Legion faction, also called the ‘demons’.

“Oho! Here comes the first enemy!”

A weird humanoid with two heads, which looks as if somebody put together half an elf and half a dwarf comes attacking.

*AaAaAAa!* The creature releases a disgusting loud cry before running towards the invader. It does so at a very fast speed.

“Hahaha! It’s funny the way they walk and run, because they seem like they are going to fall to the ground all the time! But that’s the only fun thing about them... I must take care to not be surrounded by too many of them. Just in case.”

Talking to herself, she prepares for combat. She is wielding a whip. Covered by small bladed metal plates, the whip is clearly designed to annihilate whoever it touches.

The whip is released towards the enemy at a frightening speed, and forces the charging enemy to momentarily stop. It’s clearly not the effect of the whip strike, something else must be at work.

“Fufufu! What’s up, little guy? Are you afraid of coming closer? Don’t worry, I’ll keep you company with my whip. Are you enjoying my whipping?” She says while continuing to strike the deformed creature again and again. A nasty smile adorns her face.

It doesn’t take too much time until one of the halves is killed. Then, the other half gets covered in a dark fog and its stats increase a lot. The whip is no longer enough to keep the enemy at bay, and it gets closer to the invader.

At this moment, her eyes start glowing pink, and the enemy stops again.

“Yes, that’s it! Happy dreams! Fufufu!” She says.

This is the effect of the Charming Eyes skill, an innate skill exclusive to a very specific kind of demonic creature.

 

After a few seconds of being charmed by the intruder, the weird enemy falls to the ground, dead. The dark aura not only increased its stats, but also consumed his life.

“Now it’s two of them, huh…”

While the fight was going on, some time has passed, and two more of those half-and-half enemies have appeared. They are running towards the place where they were fighting until now.

*AaAaAAa!* *AaAaAaAa!* Each creature releases its own cry when it gets close enough, and then they rush towards the invader at maximum speed.

Needless to say, the same scene as before repeats again. Only that this time, the two Imps also join the fry.

 

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**Andreu**

 

“...a waiter!?”

No, something’s amiss. It has the same proportions as a normal human, but its skin is charred and instead of normal veins it’s covered in a web of red strings that resemble magma.

The ‘waiter?’ doesn’t waste any time and comes to attack me, still holding the tray full of food.

“This’s no waiter! It’s a Hellspawn!” I shout in surprise. I didn’t expect to see a waiter in a dungeon, even less a hellspawn dressed as one.

Hellspawns are units that take a similar role in the demon faction as the one the Demonic Swarmers: units that are better than the basic unit (in the demon’s faction, the Imps) but can still be considered somewhat weak.

It’s weird for a single Hellspawn to come attacking alone… I’m sure there are more of them nearby.

“Where are you hiding!? Come and show yourselves! I need to assess your potential usefulness before deciding if I want to capture you!” Not that I can, since this is a Dungeon Battle.

I don’t have to wait too much. After just two seconds, another door opens and a new waiter-hellspawn shows up.

“Aha! I knew it!”

The combat starts, and since only one hellspawn has reached me, I decide to kill it with my staff. Meanwhile, the other hellspawn is getting close.

I have just killed the first one when I hear something falling from behind me. But the second hellspawn is now in melee range, so I don’t waste time looking at what it is. One Cold Blast and two staff attacks are enough to kill the newcomer.

Just as I want to celebrate my victory. At exactly that time, as if it was all planned to ruin my mood, something strikes me from behind. I wasn’t expecting an attack, so I am surprised and turn around.

What I see is… one of the portraits has fallen to the ground. Where it was previously hanging is now a hole in the wall and an Imp is casting spells from there in my direction.

“You sneaky shit! How dare you attack me from behind!”

I quickly start casting Cold Blasts to kill the Imp. But as soon as I turn around to face it, I hear the sound of more objects falling to the ground.

“...don’t tell me…” And sure, I look around the room and several more portraits have fallen to the ground. And more imps hiding in holes start casting spells in my direction. What’s even worse, the remaining doors are also open and more waiter-hellspawns come into the room.

“So you decided to come all at the same time, huh!? Fine by me! You made a mistake there, Lil’ Demoness! If you investigated me so much, you should already know that I’m actually stronger against multiple weak enemies than if they come in waves!”

I start trying to kill as many imps as possible until the hellspawns get close to one another. Luckily, the huge banquet table is obstructing them from coming at me from all sides at the same time.

“Hah, hah…” I am out of breath after the battle. After seeing that I neutralized the hellspawns, the nasty imps were playing a hide and seek game with me, waiting for me to expose myself to start casting again, and hiding from my spells when I was facing them…

“I’m gonna take a short break. Luckily, there are luxurious chairs around the table, so I can be comfortable!”

I sit on the closest chair. But suddenly, from the chair I’ve just sat on, I hear a *Click!* sound.

“Shit! A trap!?” Immediately after the trap is triggered, sleeping gas comes from the chair and I’m put to sleep for some time. It says for 20 seconds.

“I wasn’t expecting gimmicks or traps since the environmental hazards are prohibited… but it’s true that the traps were allowed… I am stupid! Stupid, stupid, STUPID!” I say while pulling on my fur again. Mentally, because I can’t actually move my Champion while asleep.

Well, the damage is done, so I have no other option than to wait for the sleep to end… Let’s take a look at the progress from the other player meanwhile!”

I open the screen to show the other player’s progress.

“Holly cow! Her name is A Lil’ Demoness but I don’t find anything that’s small! Definitely not her chest!”

My enemy is playing as a Succubus. She is decently tall, has huge horns on her head, nicely grabbable buttocks and Oh my god…! Those breasts that jiggle with every movement she makes…!

I am mesmerized by those jiggly masses for a short while until I manage to snap myself awake from those hypnotic movements.

“Don’t lie to the people!! Don’t call you ‘little’ when you have nothing little!”

“It seems she has already killed most of the Demonic Swarmers… Of course, why should it be different from what I’ve seen until now…! Even her champion is designed to counter my dungeon! With the Charming Eyes she can neutralize the Demonic Revenge skill… She only needs to time it right and they will self-destruct after the skill’s buff expires! Shiiiiiit!”

As soon as the sleeping effect disappears, I continue with the dungeon exploration. I must reach the end before she does or I’m going to cry… This match isn’t fair…

 

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**A Lil’ Demoness**

 

A Lil’ Demoness continues her dungeon invasion while Andreu is sleeping (and hypnotized with some jiggling movements). 

“What a fool to fall for the sleeping trap. He went and actually sat on a clearly suspiciously placed chair… What is he, a little kid!? Hehehe!”

She, too, has been taking peeks at the other player’s progress during her dungeon invasion.

“But I’m surprised we didn’t find any traps… Oh, of course! How silly of me! All the traps that he currently has aren’t suitable for big areas like this one! So he must have spent everything on mobs.”

“And talking about mobs, here come some more. Ugh… disgusting. Do you really like these gross mobs? Because if it were me, I wouldn’t use them even if I had no other option!”

A group of stitched is approaching the invader, trying to defend the dungeon.

“I don’t ever want to get close to something like that… Hellfire!” She uses a skill exclusive to the Wicked Legion faction called Hellfire. It’s similar to the Fireball spell, but it attacks in a wider area, and can be kept active for as long as you want to deal continuous damage after the initial burst damage.

Shortly after, the area where the stitched are is engulfed in dark flames that consume everything, and the stitched are immediately killed… without being able to enter combat mode.

“I must be close to the dungeon core already. Maybe one or two more minutes maximum. Oh, there it is!”

She has reached the end of the cave, and sees the dungeon core at the furthest point from the entrance to the dungeon.

“How easy it was! I didn’t expect it to be so easy even with the crippling rules I set for him! Hehehe! A piece of cake! Hehehe!”

While laughing, her chest goes up and down a lot. If Andrew were watching this scene, he would surely be hypnotized again.

She then grabs the dungeon core and immediately shatters it on her hand.

 

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**Andreu**

“Fuuuuuck! She won!” I am ashamed of this loss… “Even if she crippled me, it was too easy! Am I really that bad at Dungeon Battles? Though it's true that I’m skilled towards normal Dungeon Invasions instead of Dungeon Battles with those no-killing skills…”

“Shit! This can’t end like this! I must have another match, this time a fair one! And I’m going to show her I’m actually better than her!”

 

[Disguised Koala]

‘You may have won this match, but it was clearly to your advantage! How can you claim to have won a fair match against me? Are you proud of winning a match where you clearly put the rules to your advantage!?

I demand another match, this time with all rules set with default values so that no one has a clear advantage! That is, unless you are a shameless succubus that only fights when the win is already decided!’

 

[A Lil’ Demoness]

‘And what if I’m a shameless succubus? Would you like to come play with me tonight? Fufufu! You should have taken into account your own limits and not be playing the ‘gentleman’ if you can’t face the consequences!

But I can’t leave my client unsatisfied, so if you want a rematch, a rematch you’ll have! How about tomorrow at the same time?’

 

I send a message saying that ok, that we will have the rematch tomorrow at the same time. At least this time, it’s going to be a fair match… I hope so.

“Or maybe not… how about I ast Ricard, and maybe even Laura about tips and ideas to make her have the nastiest experience ever…? Fufufu! Hahaha! Yes, let’s do it…! Hahaha!” Evil laughter escapes from my mouth.

It’s a shame that it went so bad… Though not absolutely everything is bad. At least I can save the battle replay and keep those hypnotic pattern movements for later private use… Yeah, for private use. You know what I mean, right?

 

“There’s one status effect that clearly beats all other status effects in terms of usefulness: the charm status.

It’s easy to understand why: it makes the enemy absolutely unable to do anything. But it also isn’t broken by taking damage like the sleep status, doesn't make the enemy run away like the fear status, is easier to apply than the stunned status, and in some cases, you can even make the enemy attack its own allies while charmed.

The only problem is that there are only a few skills that can apply the charm status. This is what makes incubus and succubus two of the most dangerous units to look out for when playing against the Wicked Legion. They innately can apply the charm status with their Charming Eyes skill.”

- A tip from a professional DMA player to newer players.