Chapter 63 - Spartan Monk

Chapter 63

Red Sands Desert, Principality of Rebirth.

Dungeon Factory, Command Center.

"They're not doing that bad." Said Emilia, before grabbing a chips from the bowl and popping it into her mouth, chewing pensively.

"No, they're not. Surprisingly well for steel ranked. Well, with a copper ranked, but still." Answered Alexandra as she grabbed a snack of her own and ate it.

"Yeah."

They looked at the screens, where the adventuring party was currently busy fighting their way through the second floor. They'd made it through the first floor without that many issues, although the first challenge room had almost costed them their dwarf mage. Despite being old and well mapped, it still remained surprisingly lethal, perhaps because it was so old and well known people didn't think it was as hard as the 'old timers' made it out to be.

The spider tank had been handled competently. Not perfectly, but...competently. Their fighter was going to need a new shield once this was over -the scorpio bolts were crude, but a bolt the size of Alexandra's forearm made out entirely of wrought iron still packed a hell of a punch-, but they hadn't taken a single fatality, and their healer had distributed some potions which had gotten them back into shape for the second floor.

Which they were right now scouring. Albeit much, much more cautiously than they had the first floor. The bouncing betties might not claim as many kills as they used to, but they had instilled some serious respect into the adventurers. She'd even seen some disarm them and bring them back to the surface to sell them off!

"Wait, are they heading for one of the pillars?" Said Emilia, and Alexandra leaned forward slightly.

"They are...must have seen the quest."

"Well, if they think it's one of your usual ones, they're in for a surprise."

Alexandra nodded. One of the key characteristics of her quests is that although they were tough, the rewards were always very much worth it. This one however...well, technically the elemental monks weren't that much more lethal than everything else on this floor, but they were new, and that made them very, very dangerous for adventurers. There was a reason they paid the assault guild the big bucks after all.

"Well, I suppose we'll see. Here they go." The adventurers started climbing the collapsed pillar -collapsed against another, forming a ramp-, towards the ceiling.

It only took the adventurers around 3 minutes to finish climbing and regain their breaths, before they finally entered the ceiling chamber, and penetrate into the monk's lair.

"What...the hell is that?" Asked the ranger as he lifted his bow.

"It's a golem genius." Answered the healer acidly as she slowly stepped to the side, trying to get into a flanking position.

"I can see that, I just never saw one like tha-"

The ranger's sentence ended in a rather unmanly scream as the monk golem surged forward, and attempted to break his skull with a two handed staff blow. Fortunately, the fighter had been paying attention, and she interposed herself between the monk and the ranger, and took the blow on her shield.

The shield was good...but not take a mini-ballista bolt and suffer through 2 dungeon floors good. The staff hit right on the fracture like caused by the scorpio bolt, and the shield split, causing the fighter to stagger back. She had a second to toss the remains of her shield, get into a guard position...and then the monk pointed its staff at her, and triggered it's flame breath spell.

The screen dissolved into fire and screaming, and Alexandra winced. No matter how many times she saw those kind of things happen, it never made it any easier. And honestly, given what she'd done the one time she'd grown innured with human death, she really, really didn't want it to ever become easier.

The party leapt into action, adrenaline and terror snapping them out of their stupor and making them throw everything they had at the monk. But they'd never fought a monk golem before, and their carefully calibrated tactics were just slightly off. The monk dodged the arrow fired by the ranger, and the shortsword thrown by the healer, but still took a glancing hit from the lightning spell the dwarf threw at it...but it still came on. And it leapt to finish what it had started. The ranger dropped his bow, drew his shortsword, and blocked the downward strike from the monk's staff...and never saw the kick coming.

He flew backward...straight into the hall that lead to the rest of the floor. His screaming faded into the distance, before abruptly ending in a meaty, echoing 'splat'.

Maybe I should name them 'spartan monks', thought Alexandra as she contemplated the...explosive impact of the ranger through another screen.

The monk turned back towards the two remaining adventurers, who took a step back as the golem started moving forward...before crashing down to the ground as the fighter, severely burned but somehow still in the fight, cut his legs off at the knees.

The golem somehow managed to roll around, bringing it's staff back up...but this time it couldn't dodge as fast, and another thrown short sword and a full on lightning bolt nailed it.

The party just stood there, panting, for a second, before the healer went to the fighter's side, starting to patch her up, and the mage leaned over the edge of the opening, before coming back and shaking his head.

"Well....That was a conclusive fight I'd say." Said Alexandra as she leaned back on her stool, and triggered the resurrection orb's teleport. "A good test for the monk golem's combat prowess, and secured the ingredients pouch." She said as she absorbed the pouch. And then almost froze as her interface got swamped in notifications. "Which I severely underestimated the contents of. Dear Gods what is all this stuff?"

Emilia blinked.

"What? What did you get?"

"Algente grain oil, Narlan herbs, Helkitor flowers..." Alexandra shook her head as she continue listing off ingredients, each with a more outlandish or esotheric than the last. "And...lavander?" She shook her head. "Never mind, I don't want to know. So...yeah, that's the list."

"That's....a pretty impressive list. Honestly if I'd known we'd be getting this quantity of stuff I wouldn't have protested as much as I did."

Alexandra blinked, and tilted her head.

"Oh? How so?"

"Well, we can do a lot of stuff with this for starters. And they'll make for fantastic loot! Well, some of them anyway."

"Make what? Teas?"

"No genius, potions!"

Alexandra opened her mouth, and closed it. Now that she thought about it, what exactly prevented her from making alchemy or more mundane chemistry? Fabricating her own potions? Making her own explosives?

"Emilia....you're a genius!" Alexandra got up, and grabbed her advisor into a crushing hug.

"Ow ow ow! Alex! Put me down! Put me doooown!"

Alexandra chuckled, and let Emilia go, patently ignoring Ella at the back of the room, who had gone for one of her daggers, before being stopped by her fellow maid.

"What was that for?" Said Emilia slightly plaintively as she rearranged her dress and weird detached sleeves.

"The alchemy! I...hadn't thought about it, at all. Or rather, I think I did, but just dismissed it. But you have books on it, right? And most potions don't require enchantments and all that kind of magic stuff, correct?"

"Uh, yes? And no, regular potions don't need enchantments. Elixirs do. And philters....philters are complicated."

Alexandra nodded. She'd remembered as much from her old discussion with Fernand, the alchemist that had been part of her adventuring party.

"Right. Then there's no reason you can't teach me...and I can't have the golems replicate the process, right?"

"Well....no. I don't think so. Lots of alchemy shops use golem labour for low grade potions. Or slave labour. Less costly when accidents happen."

Alexandra frowned at the mention of slaves. It still felt...odd to her. Yes, this world had backwards technology, and even outright medieval kingdoms, but...well, humanity had been fighting slavery on Earth, pushing it to the brink of outright extinction during her lifetime. There were still some slaver scum of course, but only on criminal havens like Vesta station, or on some backwater colonies, far from the light of Sol and humanity's homeworld. But for her, and everyone she'd known and work for, it was an abomination to be eradicated, not a casually accepted fact of life.

"...Right. In any case, we can make them. Come on, let's go see what we can make."

"Uh, Alex, you do know we're going to need specialized tools, right?"

Alexandra smiled.

"It might not have been my specialty, but I did chemistry class, and believe me it was very thorough. Particularly with the basics tools of the trade and the safety procedures." The latter which she intended to step all over for her golem production lines, at least so far as skin and eye exposure was concerned, her golems had neither after all. "I believe I can make a basic kit from memory. And I'm fairly sure you'll have a book for the rest. Come on, to the workshop!"

*****

"You're joking, right?"

"Well....no." Said Pyn, squirming under Allya's gaze. "Look, she's an old...friend. But she keeps her word. And if she tells us she can get us a clean airship docking tower, or at least the parts for one, she can."

Allya shook her head, and leaned back into her seat.

"So you want me to trust a...pirate captain friend of yours, not only to deliver us a airship docking tower's parts, presumably stolen from someone might I add, but also that it will all somehow be perfectly legal and aboveboard?"

'Disbelieving' wouldn't quite describe Allya's look and tone, but it was close, and Pyn shrugged.

"Put it like that, it sounds weird, but yeah. And it would be legal, as long as the proprietor can't report the theft -and if they're a...less than legal organization, who are they going to report it to?-, it's legal salvage. Which you can freely acquire, without the need for intermediaries...or the long bureaucratic bullshit the suppliers would usually make you go through."

Allya sighed, and nodded. Of course getting something stolen from a criminal organization came with it's own set of risks...but Pyn was aware of them. They had both been part of those criminal underworld elements until a few months ago. And she was right, they'd managed to find some architects to build the damned tower, but they required a set of specialty parts very few companies produced...and they were being rather obtrusive to say the least.

"Alright, point taken. Do you trust this pirate captain of yours?"

"I literally trusted her with my life several times." Said Pyn earnestly. There was no need to precise that when she'd trusted said captain with her life, they'd been sharing the same bed. That was a bridge she'd cross when it came up. She didn't think Allya was jealous enough to reject that kind of offer, but...she'd seen the looks her girlfriend at been throwing at people oggling her when Ally thought she wasn't looking.

Allya sighed once more, and nodded.

"Alright. If you trust her that much, then yes. Send her a message, that payment will be waiting when she arrives, and will be paid in full on delivery. And I'll get a hold of Melia to section a portion of the treasury vault to stockpile it until your pirate friend gets there." Allya chuckled. "If nothing else, at least we have the funds, and we have them in cash."

Pyn nodded, as after all one of the more...advantageous aspects of running a dungeon town when you wanted to deal with the underworld is that a lot of your money came in through loot or straight up mana crystals paid by the adventurers, and thus didn't need to go through all the hoops of the banking system.

"Yep. I'll pass by the communication tent immediately." Pyn hesitated. "Uh...should we tell the rest of the council?"

Allya chuckled.

"As much as I would prefer to set them before a 'fait accompli', I don't think it would be a particularly good idea. Don't worry, I'll take care of them. Just make sure your pirate friend delivers."

Pyn nodded, and left the room. Allya shook her head -after having had her attention grabbed by her girlfriend's exit, notably the lower parts-, and leaned back into her seat. Even after spending some months together, her girlfriend still managed to surprise her. She wasn't exactly the person Allya would have pegged as having pirate friends out of all people, but...well, apparently she did.

The baroness sighed, and straightened back into her chair. She'd probably need to start making some notes, selling this idea to the council was going to require some...careful spinning, to say the least. After all, they were supposed to suppress piracy, not fund it!