The world inverted, then stretched, then compressed into a pinprick before exploding. Zaltis Vorn, a man whose most strenuous daily activity typically involved calculating the optimal angle for sunlight to warm his favorite napping spot, found himself plummeting through what felt like a cosmic drain. The air, or lack thereof, whipped at his threadbare tunic. Below, a distant, glistening expanse of volcanic soil seemed to rush upwards, an unwelcome meeting. Most people might scream. Zaltis, however, merely sighed. Such an inconvenience. He’d just managed to get comfortable in his bespoke, gravity-defying recliner before that damned spatial rift had torn open beneath him. Typical. He braced himself, not with any particular martial skill – those were long since repurposed for calculating crop yields – but with the vague hope that falling from the pinnacle of the Morvun Ziggurat wouldn't *immediately* kill him. The impact was unexpectedly soft, a gentle thud into rich, warm earth that smelled faintly of sulfur and wild vitality. He rolled onto his back, limbs splayed, and stared up. Above, instead of the expected rock ceiling of the vault's highest tier, was a false open sky. A vast, cerulean dome, crisscrossed with faint, glittering motes of stray aether, bathed the hidden cavern in a perpetual, gentle twilight. “Well, would you look at that,” Zaltis murmured, his voice raspy from the sudden descent. He wiggled his toes in the unusually fine, black soil. It was warm, almost comforting. Ideal for a nap, really. He closed his eyes, deciding that any immediate panic could wait until after he’d caught a few hours of sleep. After all, if he was going to die, he might as well be well-rested for it. His rest, however, was short-lived. A low, gurgling sound dragged him back from the precipice of slumber. He opened one eye. A translucent, gelatinous mass, roughly the size of a wagon and a lurid shade of corrosive green, was oozing towards him. It pulsed with a malevolent light, leaving sizzling trails in the soil. An apex-tier corrosive slime, by the looks of it. Most delvers would empty their entire arsenal just to slow one down. Zaltis, true to form, merely grumbled. “Oh, come on. Can’t a man get some peace?” he drawled, pushing himself up onto an elbow. The slime, which he mentally dubbed ‘Puddle’ due to its rather uninspired, amoebic shape, rippled closer, a bulbous pseudopod extending towards his boot. A faint hiss rose from the ground where its trail touched. Zaltis’s tactical mind, though currently focused on avoiding effort, kicked into gear. Direct combat was out. Running was anathema. But redirection… He flicked a finger, summoning a whisper of elemental earth magic – a mere fraction of what he once wielded. A thin, brittle ridge of soil erupted directly in Puddle’s path. The slime, unperturbed, simply flowed over it, dissolving the earth with a wet, bubbling sound. Zaltis sighed again. “Too direct. Too much effort.” He tried again, this time with a series of quick, shallow furrows, a lazy, intricate pattern that snaked across the ground. Puddle, drawn by the path of least resistance and perhaps a touch of elemental compulsion from Zaltis’s subtle manipulation, began to follow the nascent channels. Its corrosive body, rather than dissolving the entire area, simply deepened and smoothed the furrows, creating clean, self-carved irrigation ditches. He watched, fascinated, as Puddle efficiently carved a network of small channels around him, its acidic nature proving remarkably useful for precision landscaping. When it completed a neat circle, Zaltis extended a hand, palm open. A single drop of water, condensed from the humid air, formed and fell directly into Puddle’s core. The slime shuddered, then pulsed with a soft, pleased glow. It had been thirsty, perhaps, or appreciative of the subtle energy transfer. Either way, it seemed content to simply sit there, a docile, gurgling pool in the freshly carved trench. “Right,” Zaltis said, nodding. “New plan. You’re a watering can now. Don’t get any ideas about dissolving me.” Puddle gurgled in response, a bubbly, cheerful sound. Zaltis, with his watering can acquired, finally sat up properly. His eyes scanned the freakishly fertile, dark soil. The drifting magic of Floor 100 hung thick here, coating the tongue like sugar. It was the unbreachable safe zone he’d heard whispers of – a myth among myths. And it was all his. He just needed something to plant. His gaze fell upon a small, pulsating lump of silver-leafed vegetation just at the edge of his newly claimed plot. It was a common brassica head, albeit one that seemed to be absorbing the subterranean energy with alarming efficiency. He reached for it, and as his fingers brushed its waxy leaves, a silent, unseen interface flared in his mind’s eye. [Loom of Morvun — Crop Identified: Oakharrow Cabbage (Mutated)] [Ambient Magic Saturation: 98%] [Unique Trait: Lux-Flux Growth – Accelerates growth cycle by 400% in high magical saturation. Causes bioluminescent mutations.] [Estimated Market Value: 7,500 Glimmer per head (Base)] [Catastrophic Market Impact Potential: HIGH] Zaltis’s eyes narrowed. Seven thousand five hundred Glimmer? For a single head of greens? That was enough to feed a small guild for a week. The Loom of Morvun, the silent system that governed the Ziggurat’s economy, rarely made such bold predictions. Catastrophic exchange impact. His lips curved into a slow, predatory smile. His betrayers – the vaunted ‘Iron Concord’ guild, who had left him for dead in a collapsing shaft – thrived on controlling the Ziggurat’s resource flow. What better way to utterly ruin them than to flood their trade posts with vastly valuable, magically enhanced produce? And all without ever having to stand up or fight directly. He spent the next three days in a flurry of intensely focused, albeit incredibly lazy, activity. His first priority was comfort. He gathered sturdy, petrified vines and warped them with whispers of earth magic into a complex frame. Puddle, now a dedicated irrigation assistant, helped carve intricate channels that diverted a small, subterranean spring. He then integrated a series of waterwheels and counterweights, creating a system that gently rocked a large, cushioned chair he’d fashioned from enchanted moss and fallen branch-wood. The entire contraption was designed to move him, slowly and rhythmically, across his growing fields, allowing him to plant and harvest without ever having to exert more than a twitch of his finger. He even rigged a small, enchanted trowel to extend from his chair, operated by a series of delicate, magically controlled levers. His first crop, the Lux-Flux heads, ripened in mere hours, glowing with an ethereal, soft light. With a contented sigh, Zaltis maneuvered his rocking chair towards a particularly vibrant head, extending his mechanical trowel. This was the life. This was spite farming. He was about to pluck his first, glorious, exchange-crashing vegetable when the ground beside his porch *heaved*. Dirt erupted with the force of a geyser, showering his meticulously crafted rocking chair in black soil. A sound like grinding stone and tearing sinews echoed through the cavern. Then, from the newly formed crater, a truly colossal, leathery claw, flayed and raw, scaled and ending in talons like obsidian shards, slowly extended. It was easily twice the size of Zaltis himself. It paused, hovering just inches from his face. Clutched delicately between its monstrous digits, like a peace offering, was a sword of dark, mirror-polished metal, its hilt adorned with a single, flawlessly cut void-diamond that pulsed with ancient power. It was undoubtedly a legendary artifact, a weapon capable of sundering mountains. And its owner, Vorgath the Flayed, the terrifying, supposedly mindless Floor 100 zone tyrant, was offering it to him.

The Spiteful Sprout