DD 204 Ch 35

The Orkai Guildhall was as lively as the last time I had visited. Orkai were arguing in hushed tones, with a few of the arguments spilling out into louder confrontations. 

Crimson took a deep breath next to me. "This feels right. This is how adventurers should live."

Our entrance caught quite a bit of attention, as our presence in Star City seemed to bring us attention everywhere we went. It was no surprise when Mel squealed and jumped to her feet, four Orkai falling in rank behind her.

"You brought more of these cuties? Is this one for me?" The petite succubus jumped up to Crimson, who put a hand on her head and then pinned her in place. 

"Can you even drink?" Crimson squinted. 

Mel scoffed. "Can I even drink? I'll have you know I am 38 years old." The pig-tailed succubus narrowed her eyes.

"38 and you're what? Level 42?" Crimson clicked her tongue. "You really do have stunted growth."

Mel gasped, "Take that back." The succubus's eyes became fiery, and the four Orkai behind her squared up like they were ready for a fight. 

"Cut it out, Crimson. And you too," I glared at Mel. "She is not yours. In fact, she's mine." I put a possessive arm around Crimson's waist. 

"Sharing is caring," Mel intoned, batting her lashes at me and Crimson. 

"Not in this particular case." I gave Mel a look to let her know I was serious.

"But she looks so tasty," Mel whined, sighing as she finally accepted my statement. "Fine, fine. Keep all the goodies for yourself. One of these days, I am going to have a goody you want. And I can't wait for you to beg for me to do the same." She stuck her nose up and walked back to the table.

I followed with my group behind me. "Look, Mel, we were just talking to some Orkai. They were talking about the Trials, and perhaps the search for them." 

Mel blinked. "Of course they're searching for them. Everyone is trying to find them. Don’t tell me you ran into the Melon Crushers, I warned you about them." She looked at me like I was an idiot. "But for you and me, it's a waste of time. The Trials are almost always situated between the 75th and 85th floors. It's too deep for either of us. Don't even think about trying it." 

I wrapped my knuckles on the table, as purple sparks jumped up my arms. "But I managed to pass a Trial.”

“Every now and then, one of the trial challenges supposedly escapes. Everyone knows that. The fact that you are lucky enough to catch it and beat it is disgusting." She made a face. "How lucky can you get? First you seem to find these gorgeous ladies behind you. Tame them to your big fat D. And then you also have a trial. I'm so jealous I could pitch a fit right here. Though, if I'm honest, I don't think I could take a trial as I am right now.”

“I've got two, and I was hoping maybe to collect the other five." I chuckled as Crimson displayed her red lightning.

Mel scoffed again. "It's not so easy. You don't think everyone wants to have a whole party of people who have trial skills? Look, if you have a full party like that, you're the kind of person who will go past level 100. After all, most people say you need a trial skill to survive past the hundreds."

I nodded. "That's very interesting." I tried not to go into too many details, for fear that Mel would realize I wasn’t an actual demon and stop being quite so helpful in what she told us.

Candice looked between the two of us, a sudden innocence in her expression. "I knew there were those two, but what are the other five?" she asked, her attention set on Mel.

I suppose as a human she could get away with not being as knowledgable.

The petite succubus let her eyes rake over Candice before a giant, friendly smile blossomed on her face. "Well, well, well. If you're curious, you can come back to my room and we can talk more." 

Candice stayed rooted at the table. "Somehow I feel if I go back to your room, there won't be a whole lot of talking." 

The succubus threw her head back, laughing. "I like you. Of course, there are the other five. It's pretty simple to divide them up. You've got red, her power there, and her lovely red bodysuit. By the way, I use the whip, too." She winked at Crimson. "And then there’s the other end of the spectrum, Mr. Violet or Purple here. But the abilities themselves aren't really a spectrum."

Candace was nearly vibrating.

"Green is the favorite for the Orkai. The ability is called Absolute Reflect, and it's the Trial of Thorns. Blue is for healers. It's the Trial of Mana. Some casters like it too. But that's all you get for now," she tapped the table. "I promise. I'll use my mouth more if we go back to my room."

I chuckled and put a hand on Candace's forearm. "I'll happily tell you the rest without the cost." It was a lie and we all knew it, but I had to pretend to be a real demon in front of Mel and this all seemed like common information to them.

"Spoil sport," Mel pouted and spat to the side. "Regardless, it doesn't matter. I don't think any of them have been found since the shuffle. And that area of the dungeon is going to be stupid dangerous. Not just monsters, but plenty of other teams trying to be the first to find them and report back. And once found, some of the races might try and monopolize one of them."

"Well, the trials aren't easy," I said.

"Of course not. Only about one in ten people survive the trial," Mel said. "So like I said before, getting a trial power is pretty much a requirement to go in a team that's going to go down past floor 100. You've either got a trial, or you're some sort of big shot with either a class like the kitty girl's shaman, some of those Naga matriarchs, or one of those infernal demons." She shuddered. "But it doesn't matter. Right now, you and I have to level up rather than hunt for the trials."

I turned to look at Crimson out of the side of my eye to see if she was having the same thought I was.

Almost in unison, both of us activated [Eyes of Wisdom]. A blue trail going off into the distance told me that [Eyes of Wisdom] was actively working to tell me where the closest trial was when I had asked. I blinked away [Eyes of Wisdom] and turned back to Mel.

"Freaky, was that a telepathic ability between you two?" The succubus smiled, and at that moment, drinks were placed down in front of everyone. The succubus cheered, "I'm going to get all of these lovely ladies drunk, and then I'm going to steal them away from you, Ken," she giggled.

"You can try, but I don't think that'll work," Penny said, taking a sip. "I'm afraid to inform you, Ken has me wrapped around that big fat digit of his." Penny looked at me with the sort of fervor that I hadn’t seen since the bedroom with her.

I coughed into my hand. "Anyway…” I tried to move us on.

“Big? How big," Mel leaned across the table.

"The reason he's not interested in you is because he'd probably have to tear you in half," Penny said, taking another sip.

Mel cackled, turned back at me, "There's nothing I can't handle, after all, I'm a succubus. If you feel so confident about it, why don't you come up and give me a try?"

"Can't. You're too short," I said, searching for a polite excuse.

Mel's tail swished back and forth behind her. "We'll see about that."

She could wait as long as she wanted, I had no interest in the petite succubus.

"Anyway, you look like you just came back from training gravity chambers," Mel changed the subject. She must have read my expression and realized that pushing was not in either of our favors.

"Yeah, I think we even met one of the groups you talked about previously” I told her.

“The Fizzy Hammers, the Melon Smashers, or the Frothy Axes?" she offered.

"Yeah, yeah, the Melon Smashers," I nodded along. "Karnak, I think was his name.”

One of the Orkai behind Mel grunted. "He's a piece of work."

"Now, now," Mel chided him. "The correct response is that he's a fucking tool. You better watch your ladies around him; he has a bad reputation. Despite that, he won't even touch me," she grumbled into her drink.

***

I wobbled my way back to my place in Star City with the rest of the group, our heads a little heavier. Mel had, true to her word, tried to get us all drunk with varied success.

"Do you mind if I crash on that couch?" Candice asked. 

I pointed to Felin who groggily sat up from said couch at our arrival. "You're gonna have to ask her. She rules the couch." 

Candice turned to the Nekorian with a raised eyebrow, only for Felin to wave a hand negligently. "Sure, sure. Whatever you want.” Before she flopped back down into her piles of clothes.

“Thank you. And I'm still curious about what other trials there are," Candice muttered. 

I could tell by the several attempts she made to get more information from Mel that she was dying to know what all seven trials entailed. We only managed to get red, purple, green, and blue out of her in the end and the barest of information at that. Mel was surprisingly wily when it came to conversation, even while the small succubus was slugging back two drinks for our one.

"We'll just have to find them," Crimson grabbed me from behind and put her chin on my shoulder. "After all, what you missed there, Candice, was me and Ken confirming that we can, in fact, use Eyes of Wisdom to locate the trials." 

"Really? That's incredible. But why isn't anyone else using something like that?" Candice asked with a frown on her face. 

I'd had the same thought. "Crimson, I think Eyes of Wisdom might make you more special than your completion of the trial. It seems to be an incredibly rare ability. So rare that no one else seems to know of it." 

Her expression became hard briefly. "I hear you loud and clear, Ken. We won't advertise it. The ability is far too useful. The last thing I need is more people using me as a hunting dog." 

"More work from the UG?" I asked. 

"As always, they don't really ever let up. There's always something they want to find, and given the shuffle, the amount of people they sent me to go find in the depths of the dungeon was extravagant." She grumbled.

After that thought, my mind went to Tish and Miriam, the two lost Elven royal censors. The two of them were incredibly capable on their own, so I hadn't really been very worried about them. But now that the dust had settled, I would feel better knowing they were okay.

While Crimson was leaning on me from behind, Des pounced on the two of us. "You two look so tired, why don't you both come back to bed?" Des grabbed our arms and tried to lead us over. To my surprise, Crimson went along with her game, while Charlotte turned to the sleepy Felin. 

"You think you have room on the couch?" 

"No, join us," Des insisted. 

"I like my Ken time to be private. Besides, I think I'm too tired to stay up late with you, Des." Charlotte replied.

The warlock pouted. 

"I think between the workout today and drinking at the guild hall, it's probably best if we go right to sleep." I replied.

"Wow, Mel didn't rile you up at all, did she?" Des asked. 

"Pigtails are not my thing. At all." I answered.

"Duly noted," Des mimed crossing something off a list, "it's one kink we don't need to explore." 

Before we could settle in, however, my CID began beeping and flashing with a call from the UG. Crimson glanced at my CID. 

"You don't need to take that." She told me.

"I kind of do, Crimson," I argued and tapped on it, only to get a simple text message from Director Ametto. She wanted to meet me for a mission request. 

Crimson read over my shoulder. "They've got you finding people too?"

"They've got me finding people they want dead," I corrected her. "It's far more entertaining.”

“It really is.” Crimson frowned. "Perhaps you can get me on that track as well." She teased.

"I'll try, Crimson. But I think I need to go see what she wants. It could be time-sensitive." I told her, although my body protested that statement.

Crimson waved a hand and immediately stripped out of her clothes before flopping down in bed.

There was a small tug of regret that I was going to go off to work when Crimson just laid there, practically begging me to do something about it. I ripped open a portal and stepped through before the other part of my mind could start making very rational arguments as to why I should wait.

“Come back soon.” Des sing-sang behind me.

I stepped out of the portal and closed it behind me into the main UG headquarters where I had already been several times. 

"Excuse me, Director Ametto requested me," I said. 

The Secretary looked up and jumped to attention when she recognized me. "Ah, Ken Nagato. Please, right this way." She hurried, her heels clicking as she led me down the lobby and into a hall before opening the door into a swanky waiting room. 

"Is there anything you need?" she asked as she motioned for me to sit on a plush leather couch and immediately walked over to a snack and drink bar as if to pick me out an assortment before I even replied.

"No, it's fine," I shook my hand. 

"Are you sure, Mr. Negato? I must inform you that you are a VIP here. Anything you see is free for your taking." She gestured at the bar but her hand went a little too far, almost as if she was including herself in the offer. 

"Please, nothing. Just bring the Director. I would like to get back to what we were doing." I told her. Truthfully, I needed sleep.

"Of course, right away, sir." She bowed and ducked herself out, her heels clicking down the hall, fading as the door closed. 

But I wasn't completely immune to the offer of food. My stomach was still having aftershocks from all the rumbling it had done this afternoon while training. I couldn't help but notice some of Crimson's favorite chips were amongst the offerings and plucked two bags before heading back to my couch. 

The Director popped in just as soon as I had sat down and I felt almost guilty for taking two bags. 

"Ken, welcome," she said as I quickly noticed that she was not alone. The president of the UG had come in behind her as well. 

"Ken," he nodded. "Pleasure to see you as always."

"Is it though?" I asked, opening one of the bags of chips and helping myself. "I feel like half the time you're meeting Crimson as well."

He chuckled. "Crimson is her own creature. Thankfully, she's not too hard to manage," he said, sitting down on the other couch. He seemed surprisingly more confident in front of me without Crimson present.

"The UG has done a thorough sweep of the SJS financial group, as well as the Albar family and their outlying allies," Director Ametto pulled a sheet of paper out and laid it in front of me. On the page was a spider web of connections with multiple clusters. There were some names I recognized from Kaiming, as well as names like Prince Albar, who had his name crossed out with a single, poignant red slash. 

"Through our investigation methods, this is what we have built. Those with green circles around them, we determined had no connection. Red lines are confirmed to be dead," she said, before her finger trailed around the list to several names that had not been crossed off. 

"It would be a little crass of me to call this a hit list, but..." she hesitated. 

"When the word fits, it fits. So you haven't been able to deal with these? Are they high level?" I asked, wondering what I was getting myself into. 

"No, not at all," Director Ametto chuckled. "They simply scurried from their nest before we could collapse on them.”

“That, or they were never present to begin with," the president of the UG spoke over her. "It's our request that you hunt them down and deal with them so we can put this matter to rest as quickly as possible."

"Harsh," I muttered. "Then again, this is my business."

"And we appreciate it," the director said.

"Though something about all of this bothers me. Perhaps you could explain it to me. Why are you going so far as to dig out everyone related?" I pushed.

Director Ametto smiled as if she'd expected this question. However, it was the President who spoke. "Ken, why do you think the UG exists?"

"Well, the UG is named the United Guilds because once upon a time, a large number of merchant guilds organized themselves into what the UG is today." I offered. “So, making money?”

The President nodded. "That's the textbook answer and, frankly, what we happily let everyone accept. After all, merchants being merchants is expected from everyone. However, I would say that is not the UG's purpose," the President said. "Instead, I would say the UG has discovered that as long as we maintain stability and promote diving the dungeon, then profits will flow naturally. So while our express purpose might be a group of merchants facilitating people to run the dungeon, our guiding principle is to maintain stability for those diving the dungeon and those outside. Ken, what do you think would happen if a dozen guilds that were in their 40s and 50s suddenly discovered that a corrupt financial institute had cheated them out of possibly billions of Ren?"

"I don't think it would end well at all," I said, coming to realize what the UG was really working towards. "I think those people would likely look for retribution of some sort." A guild of level 50’s could probably wreck countries if they wanted to.

The President of the UG nodded. "I would agree. However, what do you think their response would be if anyone potentially responsible had already been scoured from this Earth?”

“They'd have no choice but to accept it." I closed my eyes. “After all, their anger has already been vented.”

Both of the high-level members of the UG smiled at me. "You must understand, Ken, we respect every adventurer that dives the dungeon, but it is a blatant reality that the top level of individual adventurers and guilds could quite literally kick up a storm that destabilizes everything. Heck, if somebody pissed off Crimson enough she could go destroy entire countries on her own.

“So in that instance, if we want stability and the market to keep churning, we have to ensure that no one has a reason to kick up too big of a storm. If we can all play by the rules. Then life is great. But the experience of the UG is that there will always be those who decide to make their own rules. And as such, the best option is to remove them from the game entirely. That way, those still playing don't become so upset that they don’t flip the table."

"What about Crimson, though?" I said after a moment. "Isn't she quite disruptive still on a day to day basis?"

The President of the UG shrugged. "She steps on a lot of people's pride, that's for sure. However, actual damage?" He glanced over at Director Ametto. 

"Quite minimal," she said. "Perhaps she's killed some in the dungeon. Most at her level have." There was a sharp glint from Ametto’s glasses as she turned to me with a knowing look before turning back to answer the President's question. "However, actual property mass destruction is fairly limited. There are a few instances of small buildings being destroyed. But her point was made effectively, and no one continued to bother her."

The President of the UG gestured at Ametto’s analysis. "As you can see, Ken. While Crimson might be given a wide berth, she still plays by the rules.”

“Why are you both telling me this?" I asked, looking between them. 

"This is a talk we give most adventurers when they reach a certain level," the President of the UG folded his scarred hands into his lap. "We've had this conversation with the Renards, the DuVells, Crimson, and yes, even SJS. However, we all come to the understanding at some point that we've agreed to the ruleset and won't break those rules. This clear infraction must be met with overwhelming force. That is the only way to show everyone that the rules are still in play. Otherwise, civilization becomes a lawless mess that benefits no one. Understood?" The President raised an eyebrow. 

"And you are assuming one of these days I will be at the top as well." I filled in the final piece of the puzzle.

Both of them grinned at me, and I knew I was probably having this conversation a little earlier than most because they knew the truth that my rise was inevitable.