Torian had claimed a corner of the palace's library as his office. His desk stood hidden in the shadow of a bookshelf that touched the ceiling, and he had even hung a dividing curtain to dim the light further. The twilight wasn't ideal for reading or working, but it did make the images within his crystal ball easier to see.
Seated in his looming chair, the warlock waved pale fingers over the glowing orb as he zoomed in on a particularly fluffy and plump youma. "And the fuzzball menace to carpets everywhere over there is the Ambassador."
Ami, seated across from him, nodded. Using the image in the scrying device as a reference, she sought out the transformed fairy with her Keeper sight for a closer look. With two fur-covered wings emerging from beneath her long, blonde mane like floppy ears, she reminded Ami of a well-fed rabbit. The young Keeper briefly pondered running her fingers through the soft, inviting-looking fur, and then sighed. Not only would doing so be inappropriate, it would also be completely mortifying if Camilla remembered it once cured.
When she focused on Torian again, he seemed to be studying her face with a knowing look. "Be advised that the fluff she sheds paralyzes on touch," he said.
"R-Right, I'll warn Jadeite," she said quickly and faced away from him, mildly embarrassed. Like the overwhelming majority of the new youma, Camilla had a minion link, which was likely to cause both her and Ami a lot of trouble in the future. In the meantime, it meant that transporting her into one of the waiting rooms for the high-priority patients took only a moment of concentration. Scribbling a warning on the door with a telekinetically controlled piece of chalk didn't take much longer.
As soon as the fairy disappeared from Torian's view, he started waving his fingers over the crystal ball again. "Ah, here we go, your Majesty. Our healers will need a larger tub for that one."
Ami focused on the amethyst-coloured figure visible in the orb. Crystalline carapace formed an exoskeleton around a female figure who towered over the surrounding youma as she walked in a hunched position, her head scraping against the ceiling. Her right arm was much larger and thicker than the left, easily reaching the ground.
"That one can change her size, fully or in part," Torian explained. "Your Majesty, I recommend putting her in a sealed room with sturdy walls, because she can shrink down and squeeze through any small gap."
"Indeed?" Ami had a better idea and transported the mutated fairy into a regular jail cell with a barred door instead.
The confused youma turned her head to look at her new surroundings for a moment before walking towards the bars, losing height with every step.
Ami hit her with a sleeping spell when she was about the size of a doll. The healers would be grateful for not having to haul around a creature that, in her estimation, weighed about as much as a fully-grown cow.
"The next one makes me a little dizzy," Torian confessed.
It took Ami a split-second to notice that his crystal ball wasn't showing an empty corridor. There was one spot where the brickwork distorted and curved. She squinted, trying to make sense of the strange way light and shadows failed to outline contours properly.
A quick inspection with Keeper sight revealed that she was looking at a purely optical phenomenon, rather than some patch of twisted space. A faceless youma with smooth, reflective skin sat in the exact centre of an equally reflective disc-shaped patch of ground.
"She's surrounded by a field that makes every surface inside act like a mirror," Torian elaborated. "It doesn't seem to interfere with friction, but everyone inside is blind until-"
Ami jerked upright, prompting the warlock to stop talking and look at her in surprise. She held up her palm, signalling him to wait for a moment while she investigated the sudden alert she had received from her dungeon.
Some of her underlings were fighting. Given their nature, brawls and violence weren't uncommon, but this time, she sensed that someone without a minion link was involved.
She willed her Keeper Sight towards the source of the alert, and it jumped to a district of the city she hadn't personally visited yet. She found herself looking at a corridor junction where three residential alleys merged into a larger shopping district.
On the ground, three prone trolls flailed around in an oily bluish puddle. A fourth held onto a tall statue, his green arms wrapped around its waist. Sculpted granite armour pressed uncomfortably into his skin as he tried to remain upright, his kicking feet failing to find purchase on the stained cobblestones.
A bit ahead of the slippery puddle, the leader of the team was lying on his back, a footprint-shaped bruise on his face slowly turning a deeper shade of green.
The culprits hadn't gotten far yet. A blur consisting of two female figures was racing down the street. The youma in the lead had yellowed, wrinkled skin and obviously some kind of speed-related magic. Her partner in crime trailed behind her like a banner fluttering in the wind, one elongated, stretchy arm trapped in the faster youma's grip.
"Don't let them get you!" the former yelled. "They are melting people into goo!"
Ami suddenly flinched as a façade covered in figurine-holding alcoves entered her field of view. With her Keeper Sight, it felt like the equivalent of the sun suddenly shining into her eyes without warning. She was looking at holy ground.
The sensation was more startling than unpleasant, but it distracted her long enough for the door to slam shut behind the two fleeing youma.
Opening her eyes, Ami lowered her arm. "The team supposed to retrieve the first two fairies failed. They have taken refuge in a small shrine." She could detect a minion link to the rubbery youma, but her sane sister's grip on her arm prevented Ami from just transporting the "prisoner" away.
"I'm sure a number of bored minions would be happy to drag them back out for you," Torian suggested with an eager grin.
"Better to just send their sisters once they are cured," Ami replied absently while she telekinetically pushed the fallen trolls onto less slippery terrain. Looking at Torian she asked, "Who's next?"
The scrying orb fogged up briefly underneath the warlock's touch before it focused on the next fairy.
Ami's eyebrows rose. "I thought you wanted to keep the odd one for last?"
She was looking at an emaciated being with enough branching limbs to look like a cross between a skeleton, a spider, and a leafless bush. Series of holes ran down the thin, bone-coloured appendages, giving them a flute-like appearance.
Ami shifted uncomfortably when she noted that similar holes in the youma's forehead let her see right into the bald skull. It seemed to be as hollow as the rest of the limbs. She wondered how the mutated fairy was even alive, though her functional minion link left no doubt that she was.
Torian looked up at her and blinked. "That isn't the oddity," he said in a surprised tone.
Ami was dreading to learn what the warlock considered odd if he took that kind of weirdness in stride. Wait, no, she had seen six mutated fairies so far, so the last could only be the dragon-like one she had briefly encountered in the casting chamber.
"All right." Ami took a deep breath and considered the flailing flute-spider thing again. "I think we better hold off on trying to heal that one before we are completely confident that the slime method will work on her."
"Very well, your Majesty." Torian made his crystal ball change perspective again. "On to the one I figured you might take a personal interest in."
The image in the sphere changed to show a treasure chamber with the chequered floor common to those constructed by Ami. It was otherwise unremarkable, aside from not containing any treasure.
Ami didn't need to verify its coordinates to recognise it as the treasury she had created near her railway station to temporarily stash the wealth arriving by train from her abandoned Whitemountain dungeon.
Right now, the room should have been empty. Instead, it contained a crowd of youma and a large, snoring dragon, who had curled up like a dog sleeping in its basket. Aside from the dragon, everyone was looking at the red-scaled figure resting in the crook formed by the dragon's body as if it was her own personal armchair.
Blinking, Ami took a closer look at the transformed fairy leaning her back against the fire-breathing lizard's flank and using his tail as a footrest. Had she sought out dragons when reminded of her siblings? It made a little sense, but it didn't even begin to explain what Ami was looking at here.
There were several things wrong with the situation, and not just because dragons generally didn't cuddle or sleep in empty treasuries. Youma shuffling towards the fairy in a small procession to offer their hard-won shards of crystallised black mana as tribute went against everything Ami knew about their behaviour.
An imp joining them with her own contribution for the pile pushed the situation from strange to outright alarming.
"You were right to bring this to my attention," Ami said, instinctively lowering her voice as if the creatures in the treasury could overhear her.
Torian lowered his head in a shallow bow, a self-satisfied smile on his face. "Glad I could be of service, your Majesty."
Ami nodded absently as she considered the situation. The transformed fairy, whom she tentatively assumed to be Anise due to her red colour, had gained a minion link since she met her, most likely when Salthalls had become Ami's territory. While diplomatically problematic, it was good news in this particular situation. Someone outside of the dungeon's chain of command being able to influence her imps to such a degree could be disastrous.
Wanting to see how much her control over the imp was compromised, she ordered the crystal-carrying worker to leave.
Without hesitation, the imp turned around and started running towards the chamber's exit.
The horned fairy's half-lidded expression changed into a wide-eyed look of surprise before turning into a frown. Staring at the imp's back, she leaned forward to reach into the pile of mana shards on the floor in front of her.
For a moment, the imp looked confused, and then turned around again to take a spot at the back of the procession.
Ami positioned her Keeper sight for a better look, frowning as she thought about what she had observed. Whatever magical ability Anise was using to control her entourage wasn't registering as an attack to the dungeon heart. She hadn't tried to use it when she had briefly confronted Ami in the casting chamber, so perhaps it was something she had only recently learned.
With a repeated order from Ami, the imp turned around once again and ran towards the exit.
Now visibly irritated, the fairy-youma reached into the pile of black crystals again, giving Ami's zoomed-in Keeper Sight a great view of what she was doing. Her hand didn't just close randomly around one of the shards. Instead, she aimed straight for one specific crystal at the bottom of the pile that looked very different from the others. Bright, clear and elongated, it looked perfectly symmetrical and intact, unlike the uneven shards surrounding it.
Within the transparent material, a faint pattern lit up briefly when Anise placed two fingers on one of the crystal's sides.
The imp returned to the back of the file of youma once again, and the circuit-like designs flickering within the clear gem winked out.
Ami considered the strange crystal. Was it something Anise had created herself? With its clean lines and almost technological look, it didn't fit the mutated fairy's dragon theme. She could have taken it from some other youma or even found it in the city. In any case, its origin was less important than stopping it from affecting Ami's employees. She could just ask the fairy where she got it later, once she was back to normal.
Being currently unattended, the mysterious gem could simply be picked up with Keeper Transport, which Ami did. She felt a little resistance from the crystal sticking to the ground somehow, but it came loose with a sharp popping noise nevertheless. Anise gasped the instant the gem disappeared into storage. With a cry of despair, she launched herself into the pile of black crystals, only to collide face-first with the chitin-armoured chest of another youma who had been diving for the mana shards.
Crystals went flying every way as more youma landed on top of the two as they jumped at the pile of delicious food. The smarter ones stayed on the side lines to scavenge whatever shards were kicked and flung their way.
As Torian's roaring laughter echoed through the library, Ami hung her head and watched the chaos. Well, at least this proved that the crystal's control didn't linger.
Duke Libasheshtan sat at his desk, a quill in his hand as he concentrated on his penmanship.
Cathy's voice came from the direction of the door to his office. "Just another dwarf without a minion link setting off an alarm trap, nothing to worry about."
The Duke grunted an acknowledgement, not taking his eyes off his work. The occasional false alerts were annoying, but Mercury considered infiltration, poison, and sabotage the greatest credible danger to Salthalls. It was an assessment he agreed with.
The ink in his inkwell vibrated from Cathy's footstep as she approached. "Isn't Mercury here to help with the planning?" she asked, casting a shadow over his work as she peered down at the immaculately drawn characters.
The Duke snorted. "I hardly need her assistance to give orders to my own people." He placed a final dot, and, satisfied, finally looked up at the human woman, only to boggle in surprise. His eyes widened as he took in her form-hugging leather outfit that wouldn't have looked too out of place on one of those horrible dark mistresses the empress employed.
Cathy tilted her head to the side upon seeing his raised eyebrows. "What's with that reaction? It doesn't even show any skin."
"But- no, that's not it," the Duke said, blinking. "I could have sworn you were wearing armour."
"Right, dwarven senses," Cathy muttered to herself. She clapped her hands, producing a metallic clang before they touched each other. "I am," she explained. "I just had a warlock turn it invisible for aesthetical reasons," she explained, sounding irritated. "Not a bad solution, but I keep accidentally bumping into things I thought I was clear off."
"The effect is rather unpleasant, Commander," the Duke said, "I recommend you not to use it around dwarfs."
"Noted," Cathy said. "So where is Mercury?"
"She mentioned something about revisiting an old experiment."
"... and then I realised that I don't actually need a completely sealed, hollow adamantine container," Ami told Snyder as she excitedly gesticulated with the glass tube she held in her left hand. The noise of her lab coat swishing echoed faintly in the bare, white-tiled lab that she had designed to be easy to clean, not unlike a modern bathroom.
The red-haired acolyte standing behind a stainless steel pedestal looked up from the notes before him, his pale face betraying a certain lack of enthusiasm.
"Question," he said, interrupting her explanations. "Correct me if I am wrong, but this spell you are having me study," he met her eyes. "Isn't this the summoning spell with its safety features stripped out?"
"Yes, exactly," Ami nodded with a pleased smile.
"Oh dear. I was hoping I was mistaken," Snyder said, his eyes darting towards the exit from the lab. "I cannot conceive of any safe, let alone constructive application for summoning something into occupied space."
"Filtering," Ami replied.
The acolyte paused for a moment, raising his hand to his smooth chin before shaking his head. "How does flinging mashed-together bits at insane speeds in every direction make things less intermingled?"
Far from discouraged, Ami held the metal-capped glass tube closer for him to see. "We are going to teleport pure magical energy, so there's no need to worry about explosions," she said as she put one finger on the glass. "Watch, it passes right through solid objects."
To demonstrate, she pushed a bit of mana through the digit, producing a small glowing sphere attached to her fingertip that passed through the glass without resistance.
"I even made this container so I could pump all the air out first so that nothing but mana will be teleported," she continued.
Snyder pondered this for a moment. "Ah, well, that does sound like it could work," he said. "If there is no interaction between- wait a moment, what does this have to do with filtering? Don't tell me..." he looked up in alarm, his gaze wandering to the only table in the room.
An anvil-like block of stone covered in white tiles protruded from the ground, topped by a metal plate. From its centre rose a light blue hilt like a tiny flagpole, the rest of the dagger buried deep within the thick steel.
"And suddenly, I am worried again," Snyder said. He started massaging his temples. "That's an adamantine weapon, isn't it?"
Ami simply nodded.
"Of course it is. Naturally, you want to teleport something that can pass through solid matter safely into the one thing it cannot. Why am I even surprised?"
"That isn't entirely correct," Ami said, her confidence audible in her voice. "In the absence of wards, uncontaminated mana will pass through adamantine easily enough."
"Meaning yours won't," the acolyte pointed out immediately.
"Which is why it will be filtered if it's teleported inside," Ami replied. "With the adamantine being indestructible, the contaminants will either get crushed into some harmless form or just stay stuck inside, leaving only uncontaminated mana to trickle out."
Snyder sighed and walked around the table, eyeing the steel keeping the dagger in place critically. "I don't know. Are you absolutely sure this is not going to end with an indestructible dagger being hurled in a random direction at speeds that would make lightning seem slow?"
"Yes, Snyder. You wouldn't be here if I hadn't already run a few tests myself," Ami said as she placed the glass tube onto a circular depression on the table. It locked into place with an audible click. "Nothing bad or violent happened using either mana, pure dark energy, or life energy."
The acolyte relaxed. "Oh, yes, that makes sense. You are obviously able to cast the spell yourself, possibly even at safe range." Now looking more interested, he approached within touching range of the dagger. "So what happened?"
"In order, the experiments produced mana, mana, and life energy," she reported. "I was a little worried about the adamantine gobbling up the latter, but apparently, it doesn't do that unless activated first."
"That sounds like it is working according to your predictions," he said, looking over at her questioningly. "So why are we both here- oh. Oh no."
Ami had just transported an unconscious chicken into the room and was holding it in her arms. While she had expected Snyder's reluctance, the whine in his voice that implied she had failed to learn from previous experience still felt a little irritating.
"I remember that experiment," the acolyte said, backing away from the table, "and I have no desire to end up covered in chicken guts again!"
"That only happened after we tried to heal the chicken with synthetic holy power," she protested, running her fingers gently over the sleeping bird's feathers. "You are only here to evaluate the results and to figure out a warding scheme for collecting the filtered energy."
"I see. You need someone who can make it work without interfering with the summoning spell," Snyder said with a nod.
"Yes, but in a first step, I'll need you to just cast the spell. I'll be too busy manipulating the life energy to do it myself. Don't worry, with both circle and distance being so tiny, it won't tax you much." Ami petted the chicken once again before cancelling her possession spell.
In a streak of darkness, she popped up next to her glamoured golem twin. Though they both wore identical lab coats, nobody would confuse them standing side by side. Ami's eyes were glowing red while the golems' had reverted to aquamarine, and the chicken remained firmly in the animated statue's grasp.
Ami plunged her index finger into the animal's feather coat, touching skin, and cautiously drained a harmless amount of life energy. With the white glow trailing her digit like a misty thread, she touched it to the glass of her vacuum tube and pushed the faint wisp inside. Snyder shot her a bemused look, glancing first at her and then at the golem.
"I only have enough control for this in my original body, especially when working through glass," Ami explained even as her visor expanded out over her eyes. The golems' ice just didn't conduct Metallia's dark energy with enough precision for the complicated fine manipulation needed to weave life energy into off-brand holy power.
"Very well." The redhead watched intently as Ami placed her hands left and right of the standing tube. Threads of black lightning darted from her fingertips into the mote of life energy floating within the container, dragging the glowing sphere into its centre. "I only have to get the ball, correct?"
"Yes," Ami confirmed. "You can start already; I should be finished before you."
The acolyte got to work, carefully evaluating the distance between the light energy and the dagger stuck in the table. As he started chanting, tiny counter-rotating circles of flame appeared around the weapon's thickest part, a section of the grip near the crossguard. Matching circles appeared within the glass tube, burning brightly despite the lack of air.
Ami only spared them enough attention to verify that their positions were correct before concentrating fully on her own part of the work. She felt a bead of sweat run down her forehead as she concentrated on twisting the energies into the right patterns. She doubted she would have managed to produce the delicate, complex structures required without the dungeon heart aiding with stabilisation, control, and memorisation. Perhaps some of the dwarfs might be able to do it though, given the intricateness of the artwork she had seen. Oh no, don't get distracted now.
The minutes passed faster than Ami had expected, and she barely managed to finish before Snyder's voice rose to a crescendo. The spinning circles flared up a final time before they disappeared along with the sphere of synthetic light power at their centre. In an instant, the vacuum tube was completely empty, and a terrible sensation washed over Ami.
"Eeeep!"
Snyder flinched at the startled cry and looked up from the pulse of white light emanating from dagger. Spotting only the statue-still golem, he blinked at the empty spot where the blue-haired Keeper had just been standing, and then shrugged. "Success, I guess?"
Using Keeper transport to escape from danger was usually a great idea. Doing so on reflex, without a predetermined destination in mind, was considerably less so. As a Keeper, Ami couldn't keep herself stashed away in her own storage, after all.
She found herself at a new location, still staggering backwards from her leap away from the holy-infused dagger. Waving her arms to recover her balance, she caught a glimpse of Cathy's and Duke Libasheshtan's widening eyes as she stumbled past his desk. Oh, so she had appeared in his office -- which was the last spot she had observed with her Keeper Sight, she quickly deduced.
Her back slammed into something hard before she could congratulate herself for learning something useful. She had run out of space and collided with a tall bookcase near the wall, which wobbled and buried her under an avalanche of books. A crystal chandelier above rung from the force of the impact.
"Mercury?" Cathy's voice called. The thick carpet muffled the clanging of her boots as she approached with rapid steps.
"Your Majesty?" Duke Libasheshtan reacted only a moment later, rising half from his seat to better peer over his desk.
"Ow," Ami complained, rubbing her head where a particularly heavy tome had struck her. She sat upright, causing some of the books to slide off her, and looked up. "I'm fine, just startled," she said and held a hand out for Cathy to grab unto.
With a deft pull, the swordswoman helped the teenager back on her feet.
The Duke blinked rapidly at Ami as he inspected her more closely. "You are actually here in the flesh, your Majesty!" he exclaimed before he let himself fall back into his seat with a heavy thud. Kneading his nose bridge between thumb and index finger, he added in a wry tone, "Should I take it as an indictment of my work as your Regent that you are trying to kill yourself barely a day after I took the job?"
Ami stopped straightening out her lab coat to look at him. "I wasn't actually doing anything dangerous. Unpleasant, yes," she didn't try to suppress the large smile that was forcing its way onto her face, "but that means it was a success! Yes!" She pumped her fist in the air with an elated hop.
The dwarf raised an eyebrow. "Enthusiasm aside, please be careful. It would be exceedingly awkward if I had to explain that you tripped and broke your neck shortly after becoming my ward. That said," his voice became less dry, "what were you doing that has you in such a good mood?"
"Creating artificial holy power using adamantine!" she answered clapping her hands.
The Duke's jaw dropped as he stared at her, at a loss for words.
"You actually got it to work this time?" Cathy asked with barely any hint of disbelief.
"Yes!" Ami clapped her hands together, barely able to contain her excitement. "We'll finally have enough power to break the curses on the blinded citizens' eyes! Or to brute-force heal transformed dwarfs when the slime method seems unsafe!" she cheered.
"That sounds amazing," Cathy said with a smile. "And it works just like that?"
Ami's elation faded a little. "Well, I may have skipped a few steps. The holy power needs to be captured and stored in batteries." She shook her head, thinking. "No, make it wands instead. They can be brought into light temples and directly handed to priests." She paused. "Oh, I should inform Abbot Durval that he can focus entirely on healing now."
"I'm sure he'll be so disappointed about no longer needing to handle that creepy dark energy gauntlet you made for him," Cathy commented.
The abbot's training with the Metallia-energy infused gauntlet was redundant now that Ami had a way to produce holy energy without the dungeon heart ruining it.
She inclined her head, touching her chin as she thought out aloud, "Actually, it might be worth investing some time into developing a spell that can automatically transform the life energy for me." Her own contributions were the bottleneck here, as she had to treat the life force personally with Metallia's power.
"It sounds like the only thing stopping you here is minor details, your Majesty, surprising as this may be considering the topic." The Duke shook his head in disbelief before settling on a neutral expression. "However, it's fortunate that you are here. In light of the upcoming gala, there is a topic I need to discuss with you."
Hearing the seriousness in the dwarf's voice, Ami turned to give him her full attention. "Yes?"
"As your Regent, I have no choice but to point out that your..." he slowed down as if thinking about his phrasing, "preferences... concerning your redecoration efforts and sense of style are highly, well, inappropriate." To illustrate his point, he held up an empty envelope made from high-quality parchment.
With a sinking feeling, Ami focused on the white and golden rectangle clearly meant for official correspondence. Given his opening words, she could already guess what the problem was before she spotted it.
Hair-thin golden threads emblazoned the envelope, gathering into denser geometric patterns at its four corners. Tightly layered and overlapping, they formed decorative but abstract angular patterns. At least they would have, without a number of minimal distortions to the intricate web. They tricked the eye into composing the image of two bat-shaped women without a stitch of clothing between them framing the centre of the envelope.
Ami felt a blush creep up her cheeks and hung her head. "I see, this-" a jolt of alarm went through her as the Duke's exact words sank in, and her blush intensified. "Wait, you think I'm doing this on purpose?!" she shouted, staring at him wide-eyed.
At her sudden outburst, the Duke retreated deeper into his chair and looked her in the eyes inquisitively. "You mean you are not?"
So embarrassing, but she had failed to inform him about the details of her dungeon's Corruption, hadn't she? With everything else that was going on, it had never crossed her mind...
Looking apologetic, the dwarf continued, "I thought you were at an age where humans-"
"NO!" At this point, Ami's ears felt so hot as if they were about to combust, and Cathy's snickering wasn't helping. "It's a side effect of preventing the dark gods from using my dungeon heart to kill us all!" she elaborated.
"That's not exactly reassuring," Duke Libasheshtan said. "I almost prefer my previous assumption, your Majesty."
"They can't do anything now," Ami hurriedly assured him. "I fixed the weakness in the dungeon heart's design. It worked through the Corruption it pumps into the environment. The problem is that the more I control one of the Corruption's aspects, the less control I have over others. To fix the issue, I had to permit cosmetic alterations within my dungeon." In a small voice she added, "Of which Salthalls is now a part."
The Duke hummed as he took in the information. "I see. So the more scandalous elements of your wardrobe are due to the influence of this Corruption?"
"Yes!" Ami confirmed, nodding rapidly.
"Actually, some cultural differences remain, your Grace," Cathy warned. "She sees absolutely nothing wrong with wearing skirts about this short." She brought her hand down to her thigh, indicating where the hem of Mercury's sailor skirt ended.
The Duke grimaced. "Cultural differences. Very well. On the bright side, that's still more modest than those fairy uniforms." He sighed. "Is there some way to mitigate or eliminate the effects of this Corruption? I can't bear thinking about what it will do to the ancient and priceless works of art in the city." His expression darkened. "Especially to the pieces with artistic nudity..."
Ami clasped her hands guiltily. "Well, dealing with it hasn't been a priority so far. I can think of some options, but they all have considerable drawbacks. For example, before the fighting started, I asked the dwarfs of Sirith Anlur to come up with acceptable designs that incorporate the Corruption's themes so it won't make further changes. I never heard back from them, though."
"Imagine that, with this war thing going on," Cathy deadpanned.
"You commissioned work from the exiles?" Duke Libasheshtan asked with sudden interest. "Intriguing. I will have to invite them to the gala. Still, that approach won't work for preserving the city."
"The other option is releasing control on the surface to impose harsher limits within the dungeon," Ami said. "However, that may render the surface uninhabitable."
"What kind of effects are we talking about?" the Duke asked.
Ami mentally estimated how much control she could maintain while still achieving her goals. "Inundations, lethal cold, crushing glaciers. Brittleness, decay, random magical effects. Insect plagues and poisonous, strangling thorn thickets," she listed. "All three themes supplemented by an undercurrent of generic evil."
Duke Libaheshtan was frowning when she finished. "... might be tolerable..." he muttered to himself.
Ami couldn't believe her ears. "Um, I think you might be underestimating the lethality of those effects."
The Duke gave her a grave look. "Your Majesty, I believe you may be underestimating how much value we dwarfs put on protecting our irreplaceable historical treasures."
"But-"
"Consider the structures on the surface expendable," the Duke instructed. "Once you do, how much can you limit the collateral damage?"
Ami blinked. She didn't have a scenario ready that just gave up on the surface buildings, but once she permitted herself to consider that option, a new possibility presented itself. "Oh! I can cycle the effects!" she exclaimed. "Start with the rampant growth, kill it off with frost, then switch back," she said. "This way, the effects can't build up and spread into the surrounding regions."
Duke Libasheshtan nodded with grim acceptance. "Do it. That should tide us over until you come up with a better solution, or at least long enough to get the gala over while avoiding complete mortification."