Dungeon Status:

  Unnamed Dungeon.

  Level: 5

  Floors: 7 (Residential (Industrial) (Agricultural) (TBCx4)

  Rooms: 11

  Sprite level: 1

  Minions: 11/30

  Hoard: 10004 gold

  I sighed happily as my scaly chin rested once more upon my golden hoard.

  “Stop that,” Kat ordered from her stool of coins. “It’s distracting.”

  I sighed again.

  “Heaven's Fury! It’s like living with a love-sick teenager! Just because a girl gave you a smooch, Bob. Man up!”

  The hatch slammed open before I could reply to my guide, and Salnia did her best to storm in. Unfortunately, she was waddling painfully, so most of the effect was lost.

  “It’s too much!” she yelled angrily.

  “I wasn’t going to sigh again,” I grumbled as I turned to look at her. She did not look well. She was dripping. Long trails of slime oozed out from under her armour, and she left a slug trail behind her as she stomped into the lair. “What happened to you? You’re all… glisteny?”

  “The floor went fine. Undead Cantaloups, so it was a cake walk. Then the boss nicks me just before it goes down, and the Gland is on me like, like, like a fucking crazy, disgusting healer, and now I’m going to leak for a week!” she barked. “I’m not doing that shit again until you’ve got a proper healer.” I rose up from my shiny bed and looked down on her. “Sir,” she added hastily.

  “And it was just for a nick? A tiny cut?” I asked. I glanced at Kat, who upped her efforts to fight down a giggling fit. She plastered on a serious expression and looked at the poor woman with faux-sympathy.

  “Yeah! And now I’m oozing out of my skin. My glands are all swollen, can’t even put my arms against my sides-” she demonstrated why she was holding herself like a saddle-sore gunslinger, raising one arm painfully to reveal a lymph node the size of a grape sticking out of her armpit, “-I’m not working with that crazy bitch again! I’m Salnia Saint-Slayer! I’m not an experiment for bio-weirdoes to play with!”

  “Firstly, thanks for clearing the floor. Believe me, I know they can suck. Kat, how much for a healer from the Core market?” I asked. She hopped up and went over to inspect Salnia, walking a loop around her. She prodded the slime on the woman's leg and shook off her hand with a disgusted expression.

  “Depends on the species, level, and magic type. Gimme a sec,” Kat muttered, her eyes going out of focus as she scanned her menus. “Ok. Totally-Sane Simeon. He’s a mod doc from the Orlic tribe of Hungtonhunted. Thirty-five gold a week. Minus food and lodgings, of course. So call it twenty.”

  “Oh no, no! Not one of those bastards! They’re even worse than Gledna! Filthy beasts! It will be bad enough when people realise there’s a dungeon, any news of an Orlic presence and the Empire will come down on this place like a bag of hammers!” Salnia blurted out. I raised an eyebrow. “Sir.”

  “What’s wrong with the Orlics?” I asked Kat.

  “Nothing really. Humans don’t like them. They’re big, strong, and usually not very bright, but their mod docs are genius. For an Orlic, anyway.”

  “Sounds perfect. Hire him.” Salnia winced at my words and, without saying anything more, but with a very grim expression, she turned and began waddling towards the hatch. “Oh, and I suppose that means Gledna is back on cooking duty.” I finished loudly. Salnia flinched, her shoulders sagged, and she hobbled out of sight.

  “That’ll teach her to complain.” I let out a draconic chuckle. “Seriously, though, I’m not that cruel. In a few days, hire a proper cook. Just give her time for the lesson to sink in.”

  “What are we going to do with Gledna then? We can’t send her back, she’s system-generated, so we’re stuck with her.”

  “What can she do?”

  “Gross healing magic, terrible cooking, some alchemy. That’s about it. We could just set her to work as a farm hand?” Kat said thoughtfully.

  “Alchemy? Like pills and potions and stuff?” I asked. That sounded profitable to me if I could get the produce to the city.

  “It’s gonna cost you another floor. Alchemy is too specialised to do on the industrial floor. That won’t be cheap either.” She winced. “Another five hundred.”

  “Fine. I’m sure we can make that back soon, between my stake in the Cod, the payout for the Arkendrite, and the rest of the loot. I’ll be rich beyond my wildest dreams!” I gave a super-villain-tier cackle, and Kat just looked at me blankly.

  You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.

  “I preferred you when you were miserable. Righto, one mad doc, coming up.”

  Totally-Sane Simeon appeared on one side of the tiny pixie and looked around in confusion. He was green, seven feet tall at least, and I suspected we were going to need to buy a larger bunk bed for him.

  He focused his gaze on me, lenses clicking into place on the strange eyeglasses he wore, remarkably similar to the ones the mad barber had used, and he dropped to one knee.

  “Lazy plaster! Who needs dangling suffixing? Gots me some right good mods to patch grunts up with!” Over large canines flashed as he spoke, his cheeks flushed a deeper shade of green. His voice was guttural, and for some reason, he had a cockney accent.

  “Wot needs patchin’ up, boss?” he asked again. He brought his right arm up, and the thick iron bracer folded out a nightmarish array of metallic arms tipped with blades, needles, clamps… it looked like the torture droid from Star Wars. Other than the bracer, he only wore a pair of armoured, fur-lined Y-fronts.

  “Is that how you mod people back to health?” I asked.

  “Nah, you old collar and cuff. Thas just a penny-come-quick fer da real easy ones. Need to use me brass bands in a workshop fer the robin hood stuff.” I looked over at Kat and raised an eyebrow. She shrugged. No help there.

  “Could you speak without using rhyming slang?” I asked.

  “Apple pie?” he replied, a confused look on his face. This one was going to be more annoying than the Dwelvers.

  “What can you do with access to a workshop?”

  “Oh, lemon squeezy, guvnor. Some right proper gimbles and gargants. Ticks and lice ‘em right in.” I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. I considered simply dousing the Orlic in acid or dragonfire and trying to find a more normal medic. That would be bad karma, Bob. You can get through this!

  “I think Mr.Totally-Sane means he can create implants and graft them to your minions,” Kat offered hesitantly. “I’m honestly not one-hundred percent sure, though.” He nodded frantically, perhaps sensing how close he was to being fired, in a very hot and literal sense.

  “These implants, what are we talking about?” I asked, and held my breath, expecting another torrent of incomprehensible gibberish.

  “Eye lasers, prosthetic limbs, sub-dermal and dermal armour, drug injectors, neural lacing. I ain’t no paper hat, guvnor.” He nodded his head in a slight bow.

  “Can they be sold?” I asked. Some of them sounded highly marketable.

  “Sure, other docs’ll gamble and nick ‘em up. Hoomies can’t put ‘em in.” I sighed. Well, at least I’d have cyborg minions, and maybe a trip north to the Orlic Fuderation could be planned for after I got done with my visit to Ankmapak.

  I’d have cyborg minions… that sounded pretty cool to me, but I immediately realised the problem. We’d have to convince the others to go under the knife of a being who needed to stress that he wasn’t crazy in his name. Tricky.

  “Will an industrial floor work for you to craft your mods?” He nodded, possibly not trusting himself to speak in a way that didn’t make my mince pies flare. Shit, rhyming slang is infectious in this world. “Ok. See if you can do anything about Salnia’s glandular issues, then get crafting. It’s the second floor down for the industrial area. And I hope I don’t need to mention this, but I will anyway: volunteers only. No sneaking in during the night and splicing robot arms to people who didn’t ask for it. Understood?” Another frantic nod. “Ok. Run along?” He turned and loped to the hatch, pulling it closed quickly behind him.

  “Nice to see you haven’t gone totally soft in your lovey-dovey phase. I’ll be here, a tiny shoulder to cry on when she breaks your heart. Don’t worry, big guy.” Kat walked back to her golden stool and sat down before giving me a hard look. “So what’s next for the Mill?”

  I laid my chin back down on my comfy hoard and sighed, causing her to glare at me.

  “I’m going to sink a few hundred gold into the Cod to get the refurbishments started. Then I’ll hunt and get enough biomass for a few evolutions before flying south to meet Tex and investigate the big city.”

  “Big dragon in little Ankmapak. You’ll need to be careful; some of the residents might see right through the shapeshift.” She crossed her arms under her breasts and pouted. “I suppose there’s no chance-”

  “None! I need you here, staying on top of things. I should only be away for a couple of weeks. A few days to fly down, do some, yuck, shopping, then fly back with the loot.” My forked tongue flicked out to taste my gold. I’d miss that.

  She snorted. “Fine, but I want a souvenir!” I blinked.

  “What, like a postcard? A commemorative mug?” I asked in confusion.

  “Just pick me up something nice! It’s not too much to ask, is it?” I weighed the issues. It would mean more shopping, which was bad, but keeping Kat on side and motivated definitely outweighed that hardship.

  “Sure. I’ll find you something nice. I’ll need to get something for Esme as well-” Kat blurred across the room and kicked me in the snout with her tiny foot.

  “Idiot! How will you explain where you got it from? And how you got it back so quickly? Stop thinking with the saddest sausage in the shop and start using your brain!”

  “Ah.” That was a fair point. Not about the appearance of my privates, but the other part. “I’ve already told her I’ll be bringing back some wines and whiskeys. And that I wouldn’t be gone long. Shit.”

  “Wrath of the Tribulation! What the fuck am I going to do with you? Right, here’s the tangled web of lies that you’re going to have to weave. First of all, spatial mage usually means teleporting. I know you can’t, but you can say you can. Just tell them your range isn’t good. The locals aren’t likely to question you too much. It will be a problem if you ever have to fight seriously with witnesses around. Spatial mages usually just appear behind their target and stick a knife in their back, which you can’t do, but that’s a problem for future Bob. You gonna have a problem lying to Lady Titsalot?”

  “I’m already lying about what species I am. I think I can manage one more,” I chuckled.

  “It’s bad mojo, Bob. Lying to lovers, breaking young girls' hearts.

  “I won’t do that!” I snapped, my head rising up so I could glare down at the tiny psychotic.

  “What about when she wants to marry you? Have you thought about the future? You’re going to be here for a long time, assuming you dodge the Hunters, you’ve got a couple of thousand years to go. I watched everyone I loved from when I was young grow old, wither, and die of old age, Bob. It isn’t fun,” she said bitterly. “The only ones who didn’t get old became rivals, friends to enemies. It’s you and me for the long haul, lizard. Do you really want to get attached to someone who’s going to fade long before you do?”