Well, it looked like I wasn't going to get any more answers right now. At least the issue of the edict was firmly put to bed; it was safe, and I was free to use it however I pleased. I was a bit concerned that it was even a chance I could make edicts that could be 'failed', or whatever, by the Devas. But considering how shocked Etar had been with this one, actually failing something had to be extremely rare if something could surprise him this much and still receive the sign of approval. And even the outsiders had reacted with more surprised curiosity than anything else. Nothing in the behavior of the departing party suggested to me they would do something drastic, like banning Challenges, though judging by how careful they were they might do yet another investigation before they started back up. But that was fine. In fact that was better than fine, since that wasn't really something I felt I needed to pay any attention to. If they weren't going to be interfacing with the story much but rather the mechanics and looking for changes that weren't there, I could focus on working on the sixth Floor finally.

  ..Which reminded me; I still had to check with Morrígan if she knew what was wrong with my forest. I sent her a message, quickly going over everything that had happened since we'd last spoken a few minutes ago. …It felt so much longer than that… She was if anything more relieved than I'd been to hear I hadn't done anything wrong in making my edict. Or maybe it was the fact that the Deva had left us alone for now.

  "...You need more plants than just trees and grass. A forest without lots of bushes, vines, mosses and mushrooms looks way too barren. And make sure to make them many different sizes and shapes. Some flowers and berries as well. Not to mention the fauna a forest typically has." She explained, then furrowed her brows. "I'm not sure if that last is even possible in a Dungeon. Can you create living things that don't count as 'Creatures'?"

  The answer to that was unfortunately no, or no-ish at least. I could make plants, and even mushrooms which counted as something different for some reason, but any animals I made would be a type of Creature, and therefore take up space on the Floor. I could still make anything I'd claimed before the same as if they’d been given to me through the system like the ones I got from my Guardians. Though they'd have to be both dead and already in my Dungeon before I could do that, so my list of 'claimed’ creatures was horrifically low. It wasn't zero though, much to my own surprise. I hadn't ever claimed any consciously, so it must have happened during one of my [Swift Descents]'s, but regardless of where it came from it was there. Three templates, two for different kinds of ants and one for a type of earthworm. It was a bit confounding that I'd never even noticed I knew how to make these until now, though I supposed that had always been a bit of a trend. The system, and my instincts, did a lot of stuff automatically and without conscious input from me. Often it was useful, such as the respawning system being automatic rather than manual, meaning I didn't have to waste any mental thought towards remaking every single creature that died. But as a consequence of that background automation I did miss things occasionally, which was something I was less enthused by. Though I also wasn't sure what I could even do about it. Just saying I'd 'pay more close attention' might be helpful in some instances, but really, the things I was missing I missed because I didn't know I needed to be on the lookout for something. And being vigilant for anything and everything at all times was both impossible and bound to be utterly exhausting. And it wasn't as if the information was hidden maliciously or even deliberately. Whenever I looked around I found it straight away, so in most situations it shouldn't be a big deal. It might lead to some confusion or delay me depending on what I wanted to do, but that was something I could live with.

  Three species weren't really enough to make any type of realistic biosphere, I didn't think, but it was much better than starting with nothing at all. And using them as a base I should be able to make new custom creatures to fill out the rest of the niches to at least have an appearance of realism. It wouldn't actually ever be truly representative of a forest; being Creatures made of mana they wouldn't have to eat or sleep or have a natural instinct to do really anything at all a biological animal would do. In fact I'd probably need to give special instructions to make their behavior distinct and different from the Creatures I'd make the Challengers actually fight. More akin to critters than creatures. It probably wouldn’t be a hundred percent accurate, but for something meant to only operate in the background it should be fine.

  I spent some time experimenting with various designs until I came up with enough good ones to fill out the various spaces the forest would need. Some that flew, some that crawled, and some that slithered. All were small enough to easily fit on a Challengers hand, and would be completely useless in a fight. Which was fine with me since they wouldn’t be the ones doing that anyway. Once the small section I was working with was populated I got to work adding in a much more varied landscape of flora as well. Small shrubberies soon grew around the roots of the trees, and moss began covering specks on the ground. On a whim, I also dotted the landscape with boulders and rocks, which improved the overall feel of the place considerably.

  After a few hours the section was finished, and I took a step back to inspect it. It was definitely better. Almost perfect, actually, but there was still something missing…

  Ah, I got it.

  A few minutes later a modified trap within some of the trees gave birth to a soft gust of wind that gently rustled the leaves and plants as it blew through the small grove. I smiled.

  Now it felt right. The movements were there, of creatures and animals alike. That was what had been missing. Without that buzzing the place didn’t feel alive, the way a true forest was.

  Now I was really getting somewhere. I quickly tried to mentally gauge how much of my Creature availability I’d used to make my critters for this section. Which turned out to be around a tenth of a thousandth of my total capacity, a pittance considering how many of them I’d made, but still much more than I’d like considering that was just about how large this region was compared to the full area of the Floor. If I made the whole Floor be as crowded as here I’d have little to no room left for actual Creatures. I’d have to come up with a different strategy. Maybe I could focus the creatures around the path itself, and leave the deeper areas of forest empty apart from vegetation?

  No, that wouldn’t make much sense. If anything the path should be where the density of critters was the lowest. Though that probably still wouldn’t be enough for me to be able to make a decent amount of enemies. Even though I had already decided this Floor was going to be more puzzle themed, focused on exploration and discovery. With different points of interest providing different pieces of a final puzzle the Challengers needed to solve before being able to fight the Guardian. But each of those sites needed to be protected at least a little bit, or else every Challenger after the first would just beat the Floor automatically through outside help. Either that or if there was some kind of way for me to make the riddles and puzzles change every time, make them be dependent on something within the Floor itself. I might do that actually, at least a bit. Make each site have different solutions that pair up differently for a unique final answer every time. That would at least make the Challengers have to travel to the locations every time, rather than just go straight to the end, even if they did use outside help. Which to be fair I wasn’t a hundred percent sure if they’d do; they weren’t as serious about the integrity of the Challenge as I was, but they did at least have some sense that the Challenge needed to be fair. Still it was probably better to have some defenses set up, otherwise the Floor might get boring if it was just walking around from place to place solving riddles.

  Stolen story; please report.

  Which brought me back to the issue of the critters. I needed them to make the forest feel alive, but if I used them everywhere I would use up all the slots I had left and leave the Floor bereft of any defenders save the Guardian, whatever that ended up being.

  …Actually thinking of that I should probably finish the layout and choose a Guardian first, before I made any final decisions regarding what the Creature lineup should be. Since the Guardian would give me additional options that fit the forest theme better than the ones I already have. Apart from maybe the Dire Vampiric Wolf, that one could probably be used here just fine. Maybe with some tweaks to make a variant that wasn’t vampire-themed, but even as it was it was probably good enough. Apart from that though the creature selection was pretty limited, due to how different this theming was from my previous Floors. Underground, damp and dark, and dead. None were words usually associated with an elven forest.

  Alright, so Guardian first. Actually no, making the overall layout and the flora first. Then the Guardian. Then once I see what all my options are I can decide how to solve the critter problem.

  With a plan decided I went to work, focusing on extending the path from the portal and making the forest around it. It would meander all around, with several off-shoots and intersections along the way, but it would almost certainly be the main thing the Challengers would use as a guide through the forest, so it was best to make it the starting point for the construction, and have the rest of the Floor branch out in different directions. In the end the Floor’d be made up of a network of paths connecting six major ‘points of interest’, as I called them, as well as some minor ones. Trees and shrubs grew along the sides, and hills and rocks were erected and tossed around respectively all over the place. The occasional stream cut through the grassy landscape, all eventually converging in the singular river running all around the perimeter of the Floor. Once that was all done I got to work filling in everything that was left. The holes in the map the paths never reached. Most of that was just filled with trees and other plants, but I did make one additional major point of interest be off of the path. It just felt right to have something that the Challengers couldn’t just walk up to along a road, to encourage some more exploration. I did hint at its location though, through symbols carved in the stone archway around the portal, as well as where the entrance to the Guardians arena was. Hopefully that was enough, but I’d have to see once someone made it here and tried it for the first time.

  After that I made the Guardian’s arena itself. A large circle completely surrounded by an impenetrable wall of trees at the northern edge of the Floor, with the singular exception of a door made from vines, with seven symbols in an arc across its top. The inside was just a meadow of grass, with the occasional tree and bush dotted across the otherwise empty arena.

  I spent a long time working on the design of the symbols, as they would have to serve as the themes for each of the seven major points of interest. Ideally they would also be connected to the elves in some way, but even Morrígan didn’t have much knowledge of common, yet abstractable, elven symbolism. She knew some official sigils and some of the old coats of arms for their noble houses, but I wanted something a bit further away than that for most of them. One symbol though I felt could have a closer connection, and for that one old heraldry was just right. A silver eagle holding a single star in its talons was at the same time a representation of the sigil of the old royal house of Randor while still being vague enough to not be too overt in its connection to that house. Once made I also realized it could serve as a solid theme for the remaining symbols; animals together with a set of stars. Both felt suitably elven, though Morrígan hadn’t heard of any other specific examples existing apart from the Randorian eagle. That was still fine in my opinion. The eagle symbol should be enough to show a connection, if I put some other hints in its location.

  I got to work designing, carving out a green snake with two stars for eyes to the left of the Eagle. Beside that came a three-tailed fox, each of its tails glowing with the light of a star. The white wolf, with a star on each paw, followed the fox, and was followed by the blue butterfly in turn. The black panther was sixth, and the starlight unicorn, with a line of seven stars all up its horn, as the final one representing the major locations.

  The eight-star symbol would be placed on the door and would be representing the Guardian itself, once everything else was finalized and I actually knew for sure what that’d be. First though I was eager to get started making the seven main points of interest.

  It took almost two days of constant work, but I finally got the base layout of the various points of interest done, and I even gave them suitably dramatic seeming names - such as the Watchtower of the Silver Eagle or the Canopy of the Emerald Serpent. Functionally they could almost be said to be miniature Floors in their own right, each one giving out one or more ‘stars’ which could be used to unlock the Guardian door as a reward. Which stars were given would vary each Challenge, apart from the one from the Watchtower, since that only had the single one. The total number of stars required would always be eight, one for each star in the final door, but where they’d come from would vary as well. It being eight total though would mean there would always be at least one location that would require more than one trial to get every star, which I liked as it would provide some variety to each Challenge. Sometimes a location might even not be required at all if the others gave more than one star. That would make sure each and every group of Challengers had to think, participate, and not just rely on the answers provided by the ones that came before. Something much more important now in a more puzzle-heavy Floor.

  I sat back and thought for a moment. Every star in each of the locations needed a different trial. That meant I had twenty-eight separate and distinct tests to design. Having each and every one of them work together with all the other ones regardless of which ones were active was probably impossible, unfortunately. I’d have to make specific sets that were designed to fit together and provide a connection and cohesive introduction to the elven narrative. Each set could also be made to introduce a different aspect of the story, and focus mainly on a different one of the major locations, to try and get the Challengers curious about what was truly going on. I’d learned that not providing the full story was a good way to rather counterintuitively make everyone more invested in it. When the Challengers didn’t know something, that’s when they tried their hardest. Like when my Edicts were made, or when one of the parties wiped. That had been more directly linked to the practicals of the Challenge itself, but hopefully the concept would work for the narrative as well.

  Making each trial be primarily centered around one of the locations meant seven different sets. Though now that I thought of it every single trial in that set didn’t need to be connected narratively, that might just make it cluttered and overwhelming. Better to focus the narrative down to two or three trials per set. That also had the benefit that those that didn’t have that connection could be swapped out between Challenges for more variety. Yeah, the more I thought about it the more I liked the way this was going. It’d be a lot of work, but definitely worth it.

  Twenty-eight trials split into seven sets, with let’s say two per set being locked to that set only and narratively connected to the elven storyline. That left fourteen ‘free’ trials that could be used interchangeably between the different sets regardless of which narrative ones were active. That should be plenty to provide variety, while keeping the narrative connected enough to create curiosity and a sense of mystery.

  …I really had jumped straight back into the deep end, hadn’t I? No simple Floor designs here, nope straight into complicated math problems. Who knew if the Challengers would even get even half of what I was going for? Despite that I felt more determined than I’d felt in a long time. Eager, even.

  Man, I'd been stagnant for far too long.