This Dungeon Grew Mushrooms

[Idiot! You must use red-gold stone together with mana-conducting stone powder here, and draw a double-layered rune circuit!]

[Let me ask you—where did the red-gold stone listed on the configuration sheet go?!]

Holding the Yellow Book, Xīnghuǒ explained, “The red-gold stone is only used to amplify the effect of the mana-conducting stone powder. I replaced it with silver-calendar stone—the effect is about the same.”

[About the same?! The mana conduction efficiency is down by a full thirty percent!]

[If something goes wrong with the city defense formation, I’m the one who’ll be held responsible!]

Xīnghuǒ was also in a bind. “But our territory doesn’t produce red-gold stone at all. This stuff only has veins in the empire and the mountain regions. Buying small amounts is one thing, but enough to support the entire Puji Fort city defense formation… where am I supposed to get that?”

[Trade! Smuggling! Do I need to teach you even that?! How are you dumber than Norris—what use does the boss have keeping you?!]

…

Glancing at the Yellow Book, which was getting along well with its coworkers and genuinely doing its job, Lin Jun didn’t interrupt.

He wasn’t worried about the demon race sending people to look for the Yellow Book.

That positioning method had far too many flaws. It could only locate a vague direction, and was completely helpless against passages like rifts.

If they really relied on that, all they’d get was the Sacred Codex appearing in the northern frontier one moment, the kingdom the next, then the Elven Forest, and sometimes even drifting toward the dwarven mountains.

Not to mention—Lin Jun still had Little Xi as an informant.

Unless he wanted it otherwise, there was no way those demons were finding the Sacred Codex.

Compared to the Yellow Book, three other matters concerned Lin Jun far more.

The most pressing was the excavation progress of the berserk spirit.

This thing had altered the climate of the entire northern frontier. With that precedent in mind, Lin Jun hadn’t dared touch abyssal magic lately, for fear of giving the north a delightful blend of fire and ice.

As the excavation depth increased, the temperature of the rock layers had dropped to a terrifying degree.

Even giant drilling puji had to spend massive amounts of time using high heat to soften the frozen soil, making efficiency far lower than expected.

Still, after so much time, they were gradually getting close.

But some unexpected situations had arisen.

Just yesterday, the excavation team had unearthed some anomalous hollow structures, with artificial buildings inside.

Several stone pillars formed arched gateways, carved with ancient patterns, their surfaces covered in runes that had never been seen before.

This was clearly only the tip of the iceberg. A much larger ruin complex was likely buried deeper underground.

A ruin deeply buried beneath the northern frontier?

The berserk spirit descending into that region might not have been a coincidence.

Lin Jun continued to keep a close watch on this.

Another matter that concerned him was the situation along the kingdom’s western coast.

The kingdom was now fully focused on constructing a new defensive line, with no time to reclaim that region, yet it also didn’t want the demon race to truly occupy it. As a result, it issued numerous bounties for demon heads.

At the same time, scattered demon squads wandered that scorched land, attempting to abduct human adventurers as slaves.

Thus, small-scale skirmishes in that area never really stopped.

But that wasn’t what Lin Jun was paying attention to.

What caught his eye was that traces of a cult had recently appeared there.

No cult members had been directly spotted, but from time to time, he could decompose corpses with no souls.

Both human and demon—clearly the cult that worshiped the God of Death was taking advantage of the chaos.

This kind of behavior—reaching into Lin Jun’s mouth to steal food—naturally demanded a harsh crackdown. Unfortunately, the other side hadn’t yet revealed their trail, so Lin Jun could only wait patiently.

As for the last matter…

He simply found it absurd.

…

At the edge of Mordu’s central square, a cloaked man stood atop a makeshift platform of stacked wooden crates, loudly proclaiming to the surrounding crowd.

“The war has temporarily ended, but the ones who saved us were not elves or dwarves, not those foreign races, nor were they the dukes who can barely save themselves—and certainly not that so-called supreme God of Light!”

He suddenly threw back his hood, revealing a face covered in mycelium. “It was puji!”

The crowd gradually gathered—three parts curiosity, seven parts gawking for entertainment. Of course, there were also those who cursed him as a heretic, but the man ignored them all.

“The demon race destroyed our fertile fields, and the mycelium carpet granted us endless mushrooms! The enemy slaughtered our compatriots, and puji rose from the scorched earth to become new guardians! Why kneel before those illusory gods? True miracles lie beneath our feet! He watches us! He loves us! Everything is the will of the God of puji!”

Tears streamed down his face as he grew more impassioned. “Yet ignorant people turn a blind eye to all this! But it’s not too late to change! We should piously kiss every inch of the mycelium carpet, offer tribute to the mushroom race’s envoys, and present our belated faith to the God of puji!”

“As long as we devote body and soul to the mycelium carpet, we will surely receive the God of puji’s eternal blessing!”

At the height of his fervor, the man jumped down from the crates and knelt before a mushroom by the roadside.

The sound of cast-iron boots splashing through a puddle interrupted this somewhat comical sermon.

“It’s you again, you mushroom lunatic!” The leading guard tore off his cloak. “Third time already! Do you really need to starve a few days in the dungeon before you’re satisfied?”

The man obediently extended his hands. Even as the hemp rope bit into his flesh, he continued shouting “God of puji.” Only after his mouth was stuffed shut did he finally fall silent.

As two young guards escorted him across the square, they couldn’t help whispering to each other. “Spreading heretical nonsense—this time they’ll definitely execute him, right?”

“Hard to say. This guy’s an old soldier who survived the Battle of Dragonroar Valley. I heard he took a hit here,” the guard tapped his own head. “The first two times, his comrades and superiors came to plead for him. Probably the same this time.”

“Poor guy.” Toward a warrior who had just fought for the kingdom, the guards still felt a measure of respect. Seeing him like this, they couldn’t help feeling some sympathy. “But a God of puji or something… that imagination’s really something…”

Aside from the onlookers in Mordu, the “God of puji” was also paying attention to this farce.

Lin Jun swore that he really hadn’t done anything at all.

It was probably that this guy had heard No. 4 preaching about the “great mushroom race” and the “will of puji,” then proceeded to fill in the blanks himself with some God of puji nonsense.

Lin Jun personally had zero intention of starting a religion.

He had always ruled his subordinates with sheer mushroom charisma and kingly aura—never with religious brainwashing.

If he were going to do something like that, it would start from Puji Fort. There was no way he’d openly preach in Mordu’s central square.

Yet despite Lin Jun having no involvement, after several sermons by the man, some people actually believed.

Julia was a farmer who had fled to Mordu and now worked as a mushroom grower. Her husband was a soldier who had barely survived the Battle of Dragonroar Valley thanks to mycelium symbiosis.

She should have starved to death, yet she found a job in Mordu that allowed her to eat her fill.

Her husband should have died in battle, yet he survived a situation that was almost certainly fatal.

She had always thought it was just good luck—but after hearing the man’s preaching, she suddenly “awoke.”

There was no such thing as luck. Everything was the blessing of the God of puji.

What that man said was right. People should repay the God of puji with devotion. She should go spread the glory of the God of puji!

But she had also seen the man get arrested by the guards. The kingdom forbade belief in the God of puji.

Then… she’d do it quietly.

She thought of the other mushroom farmers with experiences similar to hers, of her husband’s comrades and their families.

Even atop the mycelium carpet, Lin Jun was not an omniscient, omnipotent god.

He noticed the absurd man loudly preaching the “God of puji” in the square—but he didn’t immediately notice the ordinary farm woman who listened and believed.

And so, a group that believed in the God of puji quietly emerged within Mordu.