My second life as a dungeon

I woke up the next day feeling incredibly rested so after spending an hour practising my mana sight with Val, I decided to start my third and final, for now, evolution trial. After sending a message to the system the same notification that had appeared the past two times popped up in front of me. I quickly paid the 10k DP expecting the system to take me to the trial but instead the screen added a bit of text.

I wasn't expecting unlocking the hobgoblin pattern by myself to decrease the difficulty of the trial, but I was still happy about it. It was also a good thing to keep in mind for the future in case I came across a particularly difficult trial. Although I would prefer to know exactly how I had made the trial easier. Unfortunately, I didn’t get to think about it for too long as, after it had recalibrated the trial, the world went black, and I was transported to the trial.

Even after reading the notification in front of me I struggled to concentrate on what it meant as I felt like something strange had happened to me. Like it mentioned all my memories were still there, but it felt like something else was missing. Before I could spend too long on what I was feeling a goblin came rushing into the room clearly out of breath. She was just under four feet tall so had to tilt her head upwards slightly to look at me as she gave me a salute.

‘At ease scout,’ I said in what I assumed was a commanding yet kind voice, I could tell that she was a scout as she still had her crude bow slung over her shoulder and was wearing a simple green uniform that was designed to help her blend into the tall grass that surrounded our encampment. ‘What has you in such a rush?’

‘As my scouting party were patrolling the area to the north we came across a horde of ogres coming our way.’ The scout quickly reported, I should have pretended to be surprised by this but I was still not fully there so I didn’t react, luckily she didn’t notice that and just kept reporting the situation. ‘Early estimates have them at around a hundred strong and at their pace they will arrive around midday tomorrow.’

Once she finished her report I thanked her and dismissed her so that she could go rest now that her shift had finished. I had a lot to think about and not a lot of time to do it, looking at the sun’s position, it was already the afternoon and nearly the evening, so I had about 18 hours to prepare. I was never particularly interested in warfare so I didn’t know any strategies in particular but I did still have all the information given to me from when I was turned into a dungeon core.

Using that information I quickly wrote down everything I knew about ogres on a scrap piece of paper to help get my thoughts in order. First they were usually two goblin’s tall and weighed slightly less than ten goblins so they would be hard to take down and would pack a punch if they got close enough to the target. Luckily they were simple creatures that mostly used huge logs they had punched into the shape of a crude club.

Since they didn’t have the dexterity to make, or use, bows they didn’t have many options when it came to ranged combat, usually defaulting to any rocks or trees that were close at hand. Luckily there were no trees or rocks anywhere near the encampment to throw so I didn’t have to worry about that. As I was writing this I started to come up with a plan on how to attack them.

There were only roughly 300 goblins in my command so a frontal assault would be suicide. However, if we used the terrain to our advantage and split up the ogres while hiding beneath the grass before taking out a few at the time then we could probably slowly whittle them down. With any luck they wouldn’t notice what we were doing before it was too late. With this plan in mind I then spent the next hour refining it into something that I felt could work and had plenty of backup plans if something went wrong.

The day had just started turning into dusk as I left my tent and sent out an order for my troops to assemble. It took fifteen minutes for everyone to turn up and they were incredibly disorganised, but I didn’t expect much more from a group of soldiers that were never sent through official training. I internally sighed to myself at the mess in front of me but there was nothing I could do about it so I just started with my speech.

‘Earlier today I received a report that a group of a hundred ogres were on track to clash with us midday tomorrow.’ I hoped that I was being commanding but all I could feel was embarrassment and terror that I always felt when talking in front of more than three people. ‘If I let them just attack us then I have no doubt we would lose miserably.’

At this a few murmurs started popping up, clearly unhappy that I was doubting their abilities. I just ignored them and kept on speaking, ‘With that in mind I came up with a strategy that will use our strengths to the best that will no doubt see us victorious in this trial. You will be placed into six different squadrons, each containing fifty of your fellow soldiers. Once you are dismissed I will discuss my plan in further detail and as long as you follow their orders then victory will be ours.’

‘Until then you are all ordered to rest so that you are able to fight at your best tomorrow, dismissed.’ With that a cheer went up and the soldiers quickly dispersed around the camp, although I doubted they would be able to get much sleep tonight due to the excitement of a battle being on the horizon. Once the majority of my soldiers had left the area only six goblins remained, these were my aforementioned officers.

I turned around and walked back to my tent and they all followed me without me even needing to give them an order. Over the next half hour I went through my plan with them and once I was sure that they fully understood their roles I dismissed them before finding my bed and falling into it, and subsequently into a deep sleep. Whatever may come tomorrow I felt like I was sufficiently prepared for it.