Dungeons Are Bad Business

The next morning, Vee returned to Crestheart bright and early and finished zipping the rest of the ectoplasmic slimes to his helmet mockups. The work was monotonous but not tedious, and after he finished up, the [Ghost Maestro] went ahead and installed his new minions in the dungeon. Thankfully, that was quick work too, requiring little more than removing the old ghosts and tweaking the floor orders in the relevant rooms to accommodate his new creations. A few tests confirmed that they behaved the way he wanted them to, swooping down from the ceiling along awkward arcs.

With that done and nearly half an hour until business started for the day, Vee scurried up to his workshop and did three tests of [Mold Ectoplasm] for his mini armorsoul ghosts.

Unfortunately, none of them produced results he deemed satisfactory – the poured ectoplasm was oddly weak; even Vee’s meager strength was more than enough to tear through it like paper – and he mentally prepared himself for the possibility of not having the other ghosts ready in time for the circuit. He simply wasn’t sure that he’d be able to troubleshoot the issue quickly enough. Beyond that, he was confident in Crestheart’s layout, and wholeheartedly believed that the dungeon would perform well against the adventurers coming from out of town.

Trying the skill one last time, Vee set his work down and headed up to the office.

After pouring the day’s first dose of aqua magia into Dheart’s side, Vee sat down at his desk and made sure all his switches and dials were in their proper position. A consultation of the day’s applications revealed a somewhat familiar level 22 [Zapmancer], so Vee went ahead and activated [Boost Drops]. Most of the spindly salamander’s skills were area of effect, so Vee was confident that all his marked minions would get destroyed. He still went ahead and rearranged some of his packs, though, to make sure that the marked minions would be the first to attack; there was no reason to leave things to chance if he didn’t have to.

Pleased with the way things were set up, Vee looked over at Reginald and gave his [Majordomo] a thumbs up. “Go ahead and get the day started whenever you’re ready.”

The hat grinned wickedly and activated his magnifying crystal. One of his yellow arms reached over and opened the dungeon’s front door.

“Welcome to Crestheart, adventurer. Do you feel…a chill?”

About halfway through the day, Vee had to issue a temporary pause to give his [Dungeon Maintainers] a chance to repair some of the damage done by overly enthusiastic challengers in the rooms where Vee tended to activate [Ectoplasmic Surge].

It didn’t take long for Do and the rest of the fiends to replace the broken tiles, damaged trap assemblies, and other things, but when they were done Do came up to the office and bowed deeply.

“Master, it occurs to me that our supply of replacement tiles, traps, and decorations is lower than it probably should be. We have plenty of raw materials, but lack finished inventory. Do you want us to halt our work on the spectator area to remedy this shortfall?”

Vee rubbed his chin. “How close to complete is the spectator area?”

“Approximately three quarters. My [Estimate Job] skill says that we have approximately two solid days left of work before it’s finished.”

Vee knew all too well how inaccurate [Estimate Job] could be; plenty of the [Contractors], [Handy Men], [Carpenters], and other laborers his father had hired to complete work around the manor back in Bardis had used it only to miss their deadlines by hilarious amounts.

So, he mentally budgeted three days of solid work for the spectator arena – maybe a bit less, since the fiends didn’t need to sleep – and decided not to worry about replacing the dungeon elements just yet. His [Big Picture]-enhanced sense of the situation was that it wasn’t critical right now. At worst, they could make replacements for tiles, traps, and everything else inside Crestheart as the circuit went on. That’d be unpleasant, but was definitely doable.

Actually, now that he thought about it, Vee wondered if he could make tiles himself with [Mold Ectoplasm]. His creations would be substantially more fragile than the ones made by his orchestra, but he could produce such large quantities of them that it might not actually end up mattering all that much. Quantity had a quality all its own, after all.

He filed that thought away for later.

“Focus on the spectator arena until it’s done,” Vee said, flipping a switch and sending an adventurer tumbling down into a pit filled with frost-armored slimes and plenty of traps.. “That’s a higher priority right now.”

Do bowed, but Vee caught sight of the fiend’s displeased expression. “As you say, master.”

Standing up, Vee’s [Dungeon Maintainer] straightened back up to leave, but before he did so, Vee held up a hand and said, “Wait a moment.”

The fiend froze.

“Is there something else, master?”

Vee leaned back. “Do you disagree with my decision? Perhaps something that I missed?”

He looked at the fiend and waited, doing his best to avoid seeming upset or intimidating. His father had always insisted that it was important to genuinely seek out and listen to the concerns of workers, as their perspective was inherently different from an executive’s.

“I believe that keeping the dungeon in good working order is always the highest priority,” Do finally said. “There won’t be anything for spectators to watch if we have to shut down unexpectedly.”

“That’s a fair point,” Vee conceded. “Would it ease your mind to have one or two of your crew work on replenishing traps and decoration stocks, then?”

Do visibly relaxed, and it nodded its head. “It would.”

“Perfect. Let’s do that then.”

“Of course, master. Thank you.”

With the fiend gone, Vee returned his attention to the dungeon below, falling into the familiar rhythm of knobs, switches, and letting the hours fly by.

After counting up the day’s earnings of a dozen gold fleurs and three shards of chaos, Vee grabbed another handful of coins from the vault before sealing it completely shut. He nodded in thanks to Reginald, whose regained [Core Spirit] levels made such a thing possible.

“We’ll deposit these in the bank once I finish my experiment, okay?”

Reginald nodded. “Sure thing, boss. Me and the big guy will stay up here.”

Alforde plopped down on the ground and drew out his book, Steps of Burning Fate Volume 6. Vee thought that name was familiar…oh right, it was one of the armorsoul’s favorite [Martial Artist] tales – the kind filled with [Young Masters] and [Jade Beauties] and skills with names that took up entire pages. Vee didn’t see the appeal himself, but he’d spent enough time with Alforde to know that such things were extremely popular and highly regarded in voracious reader circles.

Freed from his friends and feeling the ever-shrinking weight of his remaining time before the circuit started, Vee hurried down to his workshop in order to test his [Mold Ectoplasm] tile-making idea. He took a few of the dungeon’s damaged tiles and used them as templates for his own, then activated his skill and waited.

As he’d expected, his creations were thinner and flimsier than the versions made by his [Dungeon Maintainers], but they were also substantially easier to modify. It was barely any effort to add or change their floor orders, and Vee thought that alone might be worth the decrease in durability.

Before committing to making more though, Vee wanted to test them out. Taking his stack, Vee headed down to the dungeon and swapped out his new creations for some of the existing tiles. They didn’t quite sit flush with the current ones, but they were close enough to not be obnoxious and future batches would be more carefully measured.

As a last step, Vee went ahead and tested the rooms to make sure that his tiles functioned properly and didn’t interfere with the floor orders. After that was done, he gave the tiles one last once-over to make sure that they hadn’t degraded at all, and when he was satisfied with his efforts he returned to the office.

Alforde was sitting on the floor reading a book, and Reginald was staring out the window. They both looked over when Vee walked inside.

“You good to head home, boss? I was starting to worry that we might end up spending the night here again.”

Vee shook his head. “I didn’t take that long, but yeah. I’m all done for the day. Let’s get out of here, eh? I’m starving.”

While Vee would have loved to sit down and really savor his meal, there was too much to be done and he didn’t have time for such things. After wiping the last crumbs from his chin, he mustered up his courage and headed over to the bank, reminding himself that setting up an account was a far easier task than securing a loan.

Thankfully, the bank was nearly empty when he opened the door, and he didn’t have to wait in any lines to talk to a [Teller].

“I’d like to open a business account,” he said. “Who do I talk to in order to do that?”

The [Teller], a friendly woman with short black hair, pointed over to the mass of desks on the far side of the room. “You’ll want to talk to our [Account Representatives] about that.”

Vee looked over, and as if they were stirred to life by his attention, the four well-dressed men and women over there looked at him with near-unified focus. It was more than a little unsettling, and Vee felt Reginald’s brim tighten around his forehead.

Thanking the [Teller], Vee walked over and struck up a conversation with the least-wolfish of the quartet, following her to a desk and a comfortable leather chair. For just a second, Vee felt a little bit like he was back in Bardis, waiting for his father to finish up a meeting with an important customer or supplier. There’d been many such times throughout his childhood, but Vee didn’t dwell on any of them for long as he started slogging through the mass of paperwork necessary to open an account.

It went relatively smoothly, though there was a slight hiccup due to the fact that the dungeon lacked a “proper” city address. Worse was that Vee’s bag of fleurs apparently didn’t meet the minimum balance threshold to avoid so-called “service fees” – as if the [Bankers] or [Tellers] needed to take his money for daily walks or something – and so Vee made a mental note to bring more fleurs by every day until he reached the necessary amount.

After twenty minutes or so, Vee signed the last form and was the proud owner of an Oar’s Crest bank account. It wasn’t really that big of a deal in the grand scheme of things, but the [Dungeon Master] couldn’t help but feel a flicker of pride all the same. Like the dungeon itself, this was his. Perhaps it was silly, but Vee felt as if his own fate and the fate of Oar’s Crest had grown slightly closer together too.

The Expectation around his shoulders tightened.

[Citizenship +1]

With their tasks for the day done, Vee and his friends returned to the boarding house and went to sleep.

Main Character Sheets:

Main Character Sheets

Vee Vales:

Primary Class: Ghost Maestro (Locksmagister University), Level 32

Secondary Class: Dungeon Master (Oar’s Crest), Level 23

Tertiary Class: Guy-Who-Takes-Things-WAY-Too-Far (Self), Level 6

Might: 15

Wit: 39

Faith: 26

Adventurousness: 7

Ambition: 16

Plotting: 19

Charisma: 16

Devious Mind: 28

Leadership: 21

Guts: 14

Intimidating Presence: 11

Citizenship: 24 (+1)

Public Relations: 8

Determination: 6

Persuasiveness: 6

Bargaining: 4

Patience: 3

Competitive Spirit: 1

Pragmatism: 1

<3<3 Infatuation <3<3

Alforde Armorsoul:

Primary Class: Hammer Specialist (Self), Level 6

Secondary Class: Right-hand man (Vee Vales), Level 18

Tertiary Class: Dungeon Champion (Oar’s Crest), Level 18

Additional Class: Glaciernaut (Sacha Silverblade), Level 11

Might: 58

Wit: 15

Faith: 28

Adventurousness (Bound – Vee Vales): 9

Endurance: 33 (+1)

Intimidating Presence: 15

Heart of a Champion: 14

Citizenship (Bound – Vee Vales): 9

Vigilance: 11

Vanity: 2

Single-Mindedness: 1

Reginald:

Primary Class: Core Spirit (Unknown), Level ??? (+1)

#$&Q#$)(@#$#@#$%!@#$##%#%()@#$**@@##

Secondary Class: Loudmouth (Self), Level 43

Tertiary Class: Majordomo (Vee Vales), Level 20

Additional Class: Announcer (Vee Vales), Level 13

Additional Class: Hyperthymesiac (Self), Level 5

Might: 1

Wit: 37

Faith: 18

Ambition: 28

Greed: 24

Deceptiveness: 27

Manipulativeness: 42

$#&*!@!!: !!!

Loyalty: 46

Patience: 11

Irritability: 24

Remorsefulness: 17

Expository Prowess: 23

#%$Pragmatism*#$: @#61$5

Hop@#!! @#$@!@#

@#$@%%^

#4^5#*&_!+++#(@$#

Citizenship (Bound – Vee Vales): 9