Dungeons Are Bad Business

In addition to a pile of debris that was nearly as tall as Vee himself, there were two boxes waiting for the [Dungeon Master] when he returned to Westown. The first was long and rectangular, made of black wood and covered in shifting symbols. It was wrapped tightly with glowing ropes, and the word 'DANGER' had been painted on both of the faces that Vee could see as he approached.

The other box was smaller, but it was also strange. There were no seams between the boards that Vee could see, the entire thing was one smooth gray piece. Beyond that, it seemed to shift back and forth in the ethereal, which Vee found slightly unsettling.

Or at least, that was until he read the tag that had been attached to its top:

This package complies with all relevant continental shipping regulations with regards to powerful ghosts as defined by law.

Vee tilted his head to the side. A powerful ghost?

Oh! Right, he'd ordered that ghost armoire thing at the end of the circuit. This must be it. Reaching up, Vee ran his hand over the side of the box, surprised by how gritty the material was. However, the sensation was familiar too, and Vee realized after a moment that it was ectoplasm. That was interesting, Vee had never seen ectoplasm all sealed up like that before.

For the next minute or so, Vee examined the box more closely, marveling at how neat the seams holding it together were. It was an impressive bit of work, and the [Ghost Smith] took no small amount of inspiration for his own future efforts.

From there, he turned his attention to the other box, which was filled – according to the warnings plastered all around – with his trap skeletons. Unlike most skeletons, which weren't too much of a problem so long as they were disassembled, these minions were a threat because they assembled themselves and attacked as soon as anyone got too close.

Well, it was good to have more minions. He'd have some of his [Dungeon Maintainers] take the skeletons over to the menagerie, where Kai would store them, and would have the ghost armoire delivered to his workshop so that he could examine it properly. It could summon weapons, and the [Dungeon Master] wanted to do some testing to figure out if he could give the weapons to his other ghosts. If not, the new addition might not be worth all that much.

Straightening up, Vee looked around. He didn't see any of his fiends working nearby, nor did he hear the sounds of demolition. Frowning, Vee wandered to the first of the buildings that they'd been working on clearing out that day and found it empty.

The same was true of the next building, but when Vee entered the third and final one he found Alforde, Reginald, and the entirety of his orchestra – minus Dandelion – sitting around inside.

Reginald turned toward him and smiled. "Hey boss! What do you think? Looks nice in here, right? We just got done a few minutes ago."

Vee turned his head left, then right. His [Majordomo] was telling the truth: the building was spotless, with towering arched ceilings and several decorative pillars evenly spaced along its floor.

He nodded. "Yeah, it looks great. Good job, everybody! The first part of our project is done. Now we have the much tougher task of filling them all up, but I'll be taking care of that."

Vee made eye contact with Do. "Would you and your crew please take care of the boxes in the street for me? The one wrapped with ropes goes to the menagerie, and the other goes to my workshop."

"It shall be done, master."

"Thanks," Vee said. "I'm grateful for all of your hard work, and your entire crew will be receiving some additional refined ectoplasm for your efforts."

Do bowed, as did the rest of Vee minions.

"Grateful, master," they all said in chaotic unison.

After the fiends left, Vee filled Alforde and Reginald in on his errands.

"Makes sense that Brice wouldn't want to have his entire shop move over here," Reginald said. "But it's good that he's willing to come and work with us on expanding the dunpla production. I think trying to get the other [Dungeon Masters] from the Dungeons of the Future circuit is a good idea too."

"And I'm sure Torres will eventually come around," said Alforde, standing back up and rolling his pauldrons. "That basically sounds like an agreement to me. So that's two buildings filled and a lot to go. We've only got a little bit more than two weeks left before Sacre's offer expires so it looks like we might be cutting it close for getting people in and set up."

Vee nodded. "Yeah, that's somewhat undesirable but it can't be helped. I thought about it a little bit on the way over and decided that I'm going to go ahead and hit up the adventurer's guild tomorrow. See if I can find a few prospective owners there or something. I'll also talk to Juniper and a few of the other people we've met; maybe they'll know some people who are looking for space. That worked for getting someone to come and help out at the lobby. Besides, it's not like we can really afford to be picky. We'll take almost anyone who seems reasonable."

His friends agreed, and the trio went outside to watch the fiends dragging away the dungeon's new minions and the last of their trash for the day. When that was done, they turned and stared at the freshly cleared strip.

There was no denying that it still had a long way to go before it reached the splendor that Vee saw it having in his mind's eye. The interiors were nice enough, but the exteriors needed some care and attention, and beyond the buildings themselves the street was still bare. The street itself was also bare and looking for proper decoration, but Vee figured that Kai and Dandelion could take care of that. The treant would make the place look like a park; all Vee had to do was ask.

Not wanting to waste any time, Vee gestured for his friends to follow and headed to the menagerie to get that process started.

"Of course, of course!" Kai trilled when Vee asked if he'd be able to prettify the street between the gate and the dungeon. The little treant's face was all smiles, and he was so excited by the prospect that he'd even gone ahead and bloomed a tiny little white flower just above his eyes.

For the next few minutes, he showed Vee some of the flowers he had ready to plant. There were big ones and little ones, red ones and blue ones, and every other color that Vee could imagine. Some grew in clusters, others remained by themselves.

Support creative writers by reading their stories on Royal Road, not stolen versions.

Beyond flowers, Kai also had a small collection of trees, bushes and shrubs. He walked Vee through them, describing the way that they'd all look upon maturity and extolling their other virtues. Unfortunately, though Vee did his best to pay attention, all the terminology started blending together inside his head and he defaulted to making vaguely affirmative sounds every few seconds to show that he was listening.

Luckily, Kai didn't seem to notice, although when it came time for him to ask Vee for his thoughts the [Dungeon Master] had no choice but put on his most solemn expression, look over at the treant, and say, "I'll leave it to your expert judgement, of course."

Kai blinked, his branches rustling. "What? I asked what you thought of how much the hedge hounds have grown."

[Leadership -1!]

Oh. Crud. He'd deserved that. Vee flashed Kai a sheepish grin. "Sorry, that's a little bit embarrassing, isn't it? I'm afraid my mind was somewhere else."

He looked over where Kai was pointing, and saw Dandelion walking beside the hedge hounds. It hadn't been that long since he'd last seen them, but they'd already doubled in size. One in particular looked like it had almost tripled.

Beyond getting bigger, the creatures were more developed in other ways too. In addition to being thicker, the vines that made up their limbs were coiled together, and something that Vee thought looked a bit like ivy was starting to sprout along their lengths.

Additionally, tiny yellow flowers ran down their backs, with buds interspersed along their spines that promised more to come.

"Wow, that's incredible," Vee said.

Dandelion nodded, looking decidedly proud as it led its charges over to a big, flat patch of grass to pay. The fiend threw a handful of knotted root balls into the air, and the hedge hounds raced after them, their raspy little barks full of joy.

Vee watched for a few moments, then turned back to Kai. "How long do you think it'll take before you can start doing the landscaping for the strip?"

"A day or two at the most. I'll head over there later today to get a better idea of what I'm working with and make some decisions about what I think will look best. We'll get started on the actual installation tomorrow, and if I had to guess I'd say it'll take a couple days."

"Perfect," said Vee. He looked around the menagerie and saw a trio of ghost slimes bobbing up and down nearby. An idea struck him then, and he asked Kai if the treant could help him rig up some harnesses for a dozen of the pale creatures so that he could bring them back to the strip.

"What do you have in mind?" Reginald asked, giving Vee a peculiar look.

"Well, I was thinking we could use these little guys to help clean the exteriors of the buildings off," Vee said, taking the strings his [Menagerie Caretaker] had collected for the ghost slimes and holding them together like they were balloons. "Let them float up and eat all the gunk off, you know? Come on, let's go see if it works."

As it turned out, the ghost slimes proved to be wonderful building cleaners. They happily munched on all the dirt, grime, and other bits of nastiness that covered the building's walls, though they were oddly easy to satiate as far as slimes went. Since he wasn't entirely sure how long it would take for them to digest all of their eating, Vee sent Alforde back to the menagerie to get some more minions to speed up the process.

The biggest problem for managing them, Vee found, was keeping the ectoplasmic string that prevented them from floating away long enough to let them reach the upper sections of each building. For reasons he didn't understand, his creations tended to get brittle when they got that long, as Vee discovered to his chagrin when one of his ropes snapped after the first half hour. Thankfully the slime it had been holding was nice and full, so it floated back down to the ground instead of bobbing up into the sky above.

The [Ghost Smith] reinforced the strings with more ectoplasm, and pulled the slimes down every few minutes after that to make sure that none were at risk of breaking.

When it came time for Vee and his friends to call it a night, the [Dungeon Master] left the ectoplasmic slimes tethered next to one of the buildings so that they'd be easy to get working the next morning. The monsters bobbed back and forth happily, their bodies lumpier than they'd been when Vee had taken them from the menagerie.

With the satisfaction of another day done and their job progressing smoothly, Vee led Alforde and Reginald back toward the boarding house.

Main Character Sheets:

Vee Vales:

Primary Class: Ghost Smith (Self), Level 10

Secondary Class: Dungeon Master (Oar's Crest), Level 25

Tertiary Class: Guy-Who-Takes-Things-WAY-Too-Far (Self), Level 8

Might: 18

Wit: 42

Faith: 25

Adventurousness: 7

Ambition: 16

Plotting: 22

Charisma: 18

Devious Mind: 30

Leadership: 21 (-1)

Guts: 16

Intimidating Presence: 11

Citizenship: 25

Public Relations: 8

Determination: 7

Persuasiveness: 6

Bargaining: 6

Patience: 4

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 20

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

Additional Class: Glaciernaut (Sacha Silverblade), Level 13

Might: 62 (+1)

Wit: 16

Faith: 27

Adventurousness (Bound – Vee Vales): 9

Endurance: 36

Intimidating Presence: 16

Heart of a Champion: 15

Citizenship (Bound – Vee Vales): 10

Vigilance: 11

Vanity: 2

Single-Mindedness: 1

Reginald:

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

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

Secondary Class: Loudmouth (Self), Level 43

Tertiary Class: Majordomo (Vee Vales), Level 21

Additional Class: Announcer (Vee Vales), Level 14

Additional Class: Hyperthymesiac (Self), Level 5

Might: 3 (+1)

Wit: 38

Faith: 17

Ambition: 29

Greed: 24

Deceptiveness: 28

Manipulativeness: 42

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

Loyalty: 48

Patience: 11

Irritability: 27

Remorsefulness: 17

Expository Prowess: 23

Pragmatism: #@$%@$

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

@#$@%%^

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

Citizenship (Bound – Vee Vales): 10