The first issue I had to solve was the creature limit problem caused by my critters. Before I could design anything else I needed to know exactly how many creature slots I’d have left to work with. Lucky for me I’d had an idea for how to solve the issue while making the layouts. Because each of the locations could almost be said to be its own small Floor, the Challengers wouldn’t ever be in more than a single one at a time. Which meant that even if the rest of the Floor didn’t have any critters at all, they’d never know the difference. I’d know unfortunately, but the experience of the Challengers was more important than mine, and this way I could provide them with some actual Creatures to fight.

  I could make a small floating stone up near the ceiling to anchor the enchantment to, and have it follow the Challenger party as they moved around the floor. Meaning as the Challengers meandered about the Forest the critters would do the same. I just had to make the ones on the far edge move faster than the ones close by so that it wasn't noticeable to the Challengers that they were being followed. If the zone was large enough, that shouldn’t be too difficult to manage.

  What I’d made so far definitely wasn’t large enough, but even if I made the radius ten times bigger that would still make the total impact of the whole critter population around a single percent of my total creature capacity, which was barely worth mentioning. I still might struggle to get all the trials populated the way I wanted them, but in that case it wouldn’t be the critters fault. Ten times the radius might also be more than I actually needed. Right now the area I’d populated was around ten meters around the entry portal, not large at all. A hundred meters around the portal though… that was a much larger zone to say the least. The problem was that I had no real way of knowing how far Challengers of this Tier could ‘sense’, for lack of a better term. I knew that those on my first Floor had trouble ‘sensing’ anything beyond what their eyes and ears told them further than a few meters at most. That distance was sure to have increased, but to what extent I didn’t know. And detecting critters and detecting traps wasn’t exactly comparable, even when both were made from mana. All that taken into consideration I wanted to play it safe with the size of the zone, since it’d be annoying to have to redo all of my trials because it turned out the zone of critters wasn’t large enough. Better to make it larger than I absolutely had to.

  …Actually, in that case I'd better make it two hundred meters in radius. That was still less than five percent of my total creature budget, and was almost certainly enough to make sure even the most eagle-eyed of Challengers didn’t think anything was amiss with the local bug population.

  After that came the real issue; what I was actually going to do in each of the locations. That would have to wait until I’d picked my Guardian and knew what creatures I had to work with though. So for the first time in what felt like forever, I opened the system notifications once again, to see what options I had available for the first Guardian of my second story.

  Alright, there was plenty to work with here, even though I unfortunately would have to cut both the [Mindsong Dryad] and the [High Elf Magus] from consideration right from the start since I wanted to stick to the animal theme I’d made with the symbols. Too bad for the Dryad, it sounded interesting, but I wouldn’t have picked an elf for this Floor regardless; I wanted to build that connection across several Floors rather than shove it in straight away. The same way the boss of my first wasn’t a literal vampire even if it was connected to the vampire storyline. In that instance that had happened accidentally where this would be intentional, still I liked how it had turned out the first time.

  That instantly removed the first two options, luckily for me though both of the remaining ones were very interesting. The stag was almost exactly what I’d pictured the final symbol to be. An animal, closely tied together with the other symbols, while feeling connected to the elves as well. Ordinarily seeing that would have invalidated the other three choices instantly. This time though, the Chimera made things much more difficult. Compared to the stag, it felt much more like a Guardian. Like something designed to be a proper final fight for a Challenge. It would also probably ensure that the Floor had more interesting creatures that could serve as enemies than the stag would. At least if I changed some of the symbols to line up better with the creature types the Chimera was made from, since they were almost certainly the templates I was going to get.

  So there were downsides and upsides to both. I had to decide if I wanted the more boss-like feeling Chimera that’d also give me some more interesting creatures to work with, or the Stag that was more thematically tied to the rest of the Floor and to the elven story.

  …No, as much as I’d hate to give up the creature variety, it had to be the stag. The narrative tie-in was just too important to just give up on for what could almost be said to be a cosmetic benefit. I could deal with having creatures that were less tied to the different areas if I had to. Even as it was I should be able to make some custom creatures to fill out some of the gaps at least. Making creature templates from scratch was still too complicated to do in any reasonable length of time, but if I got anything remotely close to use as a base I could do some major revisions on them pretty easily. The vampiric wolf for example was something I could almost use as it was, but even something as the leatherwing could be useful, if I could find a way to combine it with other creatures to make some form of bird out of it, for the eagle location. That one was a bit more of a stretch, but my instincts said it was possible, so even if I couldn’t do it right away I was absolutely certain I’d be able to get it done eventually. Hopefully before any Challengers reach this far down, but even if I can’t I could deal with showing a pre-released version of the creatures, so long as the narrative and overall structure was complete. And that was something I could do regardless, no need to pick the Chimera for that alone. It was still a more menacing encounter, though now that I thought about it for the kind of Floor I was making that might be a bit of a downside. I was going for a much more… not peaceful exactly… but something more serene and natural than any of my earlier Floors. Showing the before, and the effects of the aberrant coming in later to provide an atmospheric contrast. And while the Chimera could be said to be natural, it definitely wasn’t serene.

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  With that thought I’d made up my mind, and made my selection.

  For the first time in what felt like ages my mana rushed out of me in the now familiar way only a Guardian creation could do. It quickly coalesced into the physical form of a giant stag, standing over five meters off the ground at the shoulder, with its head and antlers reaching further still towards the ceiling. I grinned mentally. It was twice as tall as Obelisk, who up until now had stood as my largest Guardian by far. Definitely suitable for an arena this open, too. Plenty of space for it to run around and cause havoc.

  Salutations, young Shaper of Forms. A deep, soothing voice entered my mind. It felt… old. Filled with a wisdom acquired after years and years of quiet contemplation and experiences. Definitely a good sign. Unlike the [Corrupted Vampire] I’d put as the Guardian for the fifth, this one seemed more than smart enough to hold a proper conversation.

  Hello. I sent. Do you have any memories of a life lived before this one?

  …That might have been a bit of a strange way to ask that, but I couldn’t think of a better way of the top of my head, and I really wanted to know.

  ...That is certainly an interesting quandary, was the reply, I’ll have to think on that for a moment…

  I waited for a few seconds while my new Guardian gathered his thoughts, trotting slowly around on top of the grass as he did.

  I have a… collection of impressions, he said eventually, of walking the forest, of fighting off invaders, of guiding lost travelers. A series of moments, scattered about without a set order or direction to view them in. Are these the memories of some creature that lived at some point in the past? Perhaps. Maybe even probably. More likely than a single one though is that it’s an amalgamation of several lives. A collage of moments and flashes of memory, stitched together to create the essence of personality and instincts needed for a Celestial Stag that is to serve as a Dungeon’s Guardian.

  He paused.

  So no, I do not believe I have memories of a life before this one. Not in the way you meant it, at least. I was built from blocks that have a story of their own, but my own started at the moment of your summoning.

  …I see. I answered back after a few seconds. That was a bit disappointing. The new Guardian wasn’t like Morrígan, but more like myself and my other Guardians. I suppose that made sense; he wasn’t a [special] option after all. Still I had hoped, especially after noticing how intelligent the stag seemed.

  It wasn’t that big of a deal in the grand scheme of things, but I would have wanted some guidance on what the proper history of the elves and the aberrant was.

  Though he might not had known that even if he did have memories of a past life, considering he was a Celestial stag and not connected to the elves directly, so maybe that had been a bit too much to hope for for the very first Floor of the story.

  There was also something else he said that resonated with me. About him not having a story until right now, yet his mind was filled with memories and instincts that weren’t his own. Weren’t anyone's really. The memory part might be different, but at least in terms of instincts that felt very similar to how I’d been when I’d first woken up. And the very first thing I’d done back then was name myself. Something to mark me as me, and the start of my own story.

  It suddenly made a bit more sense why I’d always felt so strongly that my Guardians should all have names as quickly as possible. Quicker even than what was safe for me to do, considering the consequences of my first few namings.

  I felt I’d be fine this time though, since it had taken so long to finish my Quest I'd had to make both Floor 4 and Floor 5 Tier 4. Meaning this Floor had to be Tier 5 to make a continous Challenge possible. But I was already Tier 6, meaning this time I had plenty of extra mana.

  I will grant you a name. I sent. Do you have a specific one you wish to be called?

  I do not, the Guardian replied almost instantly. I am at the starting line, yet not without my own biases from the things not truly myself. Biases you do not have. You have only ever known me. And as my creator, naming is also your privilege.

  Alright, I sent back, then your name shall be… I pondered for a moment, trying to think of a proper wise, old, yet nature sounding name. Something profound and powerful, yet not too threatening, like Obelisk or Stalker. Something like…

  Myrhael. I sent. Your name will be Myrhael.

  Thank you. Myrhael sent back as a storm of mana flooded from me and into my Guardian, strengthening it even further beyond the already powerful stats it had had upon its initial creation.

  Once the naming was finished and the deluge of notifications from the system had ceased, I took my first look at the Guardian which would serve as the first barrier on the road towards uncovering the story of the elves.

  And what a sight to behold it was.