Wax Collectors

## Introduction

Although many types of people who find themselves in the Dungeon eventually settle into their new home-prison and attempt to make a decent life for themselves and their descendants, others simply cannot let go of the adventurer’s path that brought them there in the first place.

The Wax Collectors are hopeful optimists who believe (or at least tell themselves) that this is all a game - all an adventure - just another dungeon to be conquered in their lifetime of conquering dungeons. From their point of view, the Dungeon has an ‘end', it can be ‘completed’, and on that day every intelligent being\* inside will be released to the outside world to be celebrated as heroes forever. To ‘win’ the Dungeon, they just have to give it what it wants.

The problem being, of course, that no one knows what it is the Dungeon wants. The only requirement that veteran Wax Collectors assign to their juniors is that they try literally everything. If the Dungeon was created by a mad and powerful wizard or malicious deity as some sort of test or joke, it's possible that they key to “solving” it will not make sense to mere rational mortals. Hence, for those who are not in on the “game”, the behaviour of the Wax Collectors may seem very erratic and hoarder-ish.

\*In a way, the Wax Collectors are another bigoted group along the lines of The Church. The “monsters” in Dungeon 26 were here first, so technically speaking there is no reason that they shouldn't be released if and when the Dungeon is ‘complete’. If some of the more apocalyptically horrible creatures in the depths of the Dungeon were released - those that have evolved into embodiments of nightmare after thousands of years - it may not exactly be a cause for celebration on the outside world.

## Practices

The term “Wax Collector” at first may be misleading, as primarily what this society is collecting are treasures, tokens, and especially pieces of rare and terrible beasts. Any physical thing which can prove accomplishment within the Dungeon is sacred and treasured, as no one quite knows exactly what - or how much - the Dungeon requires them to collect.

Along with monster parts, young and able-bodied Collectors also solve lethal puzzle-traps, search for secret rooms and passages, and do anything else they can think of which may produce a physical thing to be brought back to The Apiary (see below) to be preserved forever in the wax of Giantkiller Bees.

Yes: giant, killer beeswax.

As the optimistic and high-spirited Wax Collectors begin to get on in years - for the very few that survive so long in what is essentially Hell - their days of adventuring draw to a close and they instead take up the screened mask of an apiarist. These frail or injured Wax Collectors are in no less danger than their younger peers, however: in order to protect the precious objects and monster trophies gathered by the Collectors over the hundreds of years of their existence, the items are stored in any kind of container which has been filled with the wax produced by Giantkiller Bees for their hives. This variety of translucent wax is for all intents and purposes indestructible once dried: it is immune to vandalism, rockslides, and even magical assault. To retrieve the stored object for use or for experimentation, the wax simply needs to be heated until viscous enough to be penetrated by a gloved hand.

Unfortunately for the Collectors, the Giantkiller Bees which infest the upper reaches of the Dungeon are the only creatures which can produce a substance suitable for their purposes. For this reason, Wax Collector society has ingrained into their culture the tradition that all older or injured members will commit the remainder of their difficult lives raising, nurturing, and harvesting from the deadly insects.

## Relationships

The Church: although typically too arrogant to respect the views of any other group, members of the Church and Wac Collectors bond over their mutual goal of destroying powerful monsters.

Red-Netters: as Wax Collectors primarily live close to the very top of the Dungeon, and Red-Netters close to the very bottom, they have little to no interaction. Still, in their own ways both groups are the farmers of livestock.

Trapsetters Guild: a mutually beneficial arrangement wherein the Trapsetters prepare elaborate death-traps and the Wax Collectors attempt to ‘solve’ them. This results in a significant amount of suffering and death (to the delight of the Trapsetters) and the occasional reward of treasure (to the delight of the Wax Collectors).

## Home

In the upper reaches of the Dungeon - above even the dark void of the Black Atrium - hundreds of generation of Giantkiller Bees have built then subsequently abandoned a city-sized labyrinth of hive upon hive upon hive. This monolithic construction of what is essentially ruins is now known as The Apiary. With the bulk of the bees contained (to the extent that they can be contained) in a central area for care by the apiarists, the Wax Collectors have been free to make their homes in the empty shells of former hives. Although constructed primarily out of saliva and plant fibres, the dead hives are dry, sturdy, and vaguely safe - except for the occasional crumbling old chamber which may result in a Wax Collector falling through the floor to their doom some dozens of miles below.

Of course, anything which offers a semblance of safety attracts more than just humanoids, and all shapes and sizes of “monster” are known to have been seen wandering, hunting in, or sleeping in the quieter tunnels of The Apiary.