Vee had no idea what to do. Did he go over and say hi? Was that weird? Or would it be weirder if he just got up and left without saying anything? Probably weirder to say something, right? There were so many rules about the proper protocol in situations like this.

Maybe it was the wine, or maybe it was the fact that he really had no idea how to talk to girls. During his time at the academy, he’d spent most of his time with his books and scrolls, and had only gone to a few parties. Even then, he’d always gone home alone.

“Relax,” Reginald told him. “You look like you’re about to explode. Just take a few deep breaths. You'll be fine."

"He's right," Alforde said. “She’s all the way on the other side of the restaurant, so you don’t have to worry about it. Let’s go ahead and pay and then we’ll just go. Okay?”

Vee rocked back and forth in his chair. To his absolute, abject horror, when he looked up and tried to sneak a covert glance at Luna, he saw that she was staring at him. There was eye contact! Eye contact!

She waved! The horror! The sweet, aching horror!

Vee’s mouth went dry, and he almost knocked over his empty wine glass as he tried to stand up. Now he had to go talk to her, right? Or at least, go say hi. Right?!

Feeling like his legs were made out of water, Vee picked up Reginald, put the top hat back on, and steeled himself to walk over to her table and say hello.

He was going to do to this, he was going to be brave and go say hi. It was just one word, after all. Hi. He’d said it a million times and never run into trouble. How hard could it be? He was going to –

He was outside, having marched straight to the door as if his feet had a mind of their own. His hand had turned traitor as he did so, reaching up in a half completed wave – really just a wiggling of his fingers – as he inclined his head towards Luna on his way out.

Maybe next time.

[Adventurousness – 1]

[Guts – 1]

[Charisma -2]

Yeah, okay. Fair enough. Looking through the window, Vee saw that Simon had brought Luna her food, as well as a bag that looked like a to-go order. He wondered who she was bringing food to. A relative? Something to eat later? A significant other? Oh please, not that!

It wasn’t important. It was extremely important! Shaking his head and growling at himself to get it together, Vee stuffed his hands into his pockets and slouched as he stalked back to Sculla’s. Alforde knew his friend well enough to recognize that posture. It meant that Vee didn’t want to talk, but Reginald apparently couldn’t read the mood – or didn’t care to try – and so he spent the entire trek mocking Vee.

“She was right there! She waved at you! And what did you do? You did the wave-nod and scurried out as fast as your feet could carry you! That’s like, the ultimate loser move! Could you blow it any harder if you were trying? She smiled at you!”

“Shut up,” Vee hissed as Reginald cackled all the way up the stairs to their room. When Reginald didn’t, Vee tossed him into the bathroom and closed the door.

“Hey, that’s not cool! It was just jokes,” Reginald protested as Vee flopped down on his bed and laced his fingers behind his head. The hat kept calling and begging to be freed until he finally realized that Vee wasn’t going to open the door anytime soon and fell quiet.

Alforde set Hammy next to the wall and sat down at the table. Vee looked over at him and raised an eyebrow.

Alforde shrugged. He knew what the look meant. “What’s done is done, right? You can’t go back and change things now, so there’s no point in worrying about it. Besides, don’t you have other things to do tonight? You said something earlier about a letter.”

“Yeah. You’re right. No point in beating myself up about it anymore. I should write a letter to the academy about the changes in the orchestra. Having a fiend take a name is a pretty big deal.”

Vee rolled over and reached down to the small chest next to his bed where he kept his writing materials. Scooping out a notepad and one of his favorite fountain pens – the one with the red cap, no actually the one with the blue cap better suited his mood just then – Vee began to work on his letter to the academy. He thought about his old teachers, wondering which would be the most interested in his discovery. There were three that seemed like good bets: old Magister Rortenferry, who’d taught him [Shape Ectoplasm], Magister Wing, who knew the history of [Ghost Maestros] like the back of her hand, and Magister Satin, who’d been interested in the dynamics of orchestras. None of them were a perfect fit, and so Vee wrote three copies of the same letter. It’d been a while since he’d written so much and by the time he was done, his left hand was cramped and aching.

He put the letters on the table and told Alforde to remind him to mail them tomorrow, and then it was time to fill out the order form for the slimes and the fog machines. He’d make the purchase via Dheart in the morning, and summoned Cecil to update the dungeon’s finances in order to reflect the purchases. Then, it was time to sleep. Maybe it was a parting gift from the emberberry wine, but Vee was out almost as soon as he closed his eyes.

***

The next morning, Vee was woken up by Reginald howling about how he wanted out of the bathroom. Vee got up and freed him, not feeling the least bit guilty about having left the hat there all night. Served Reginald right. After a quick bagel for breakfast, the trio headed for the post office.

It was a big brick building next to the carriage station. A statue of a woman riding a horse with a bag of letters slung over her shoulder was out front, but like the other statues Vee had seen in Oar’s Crest, it was in need of a good cleaning. He couldn’t make out even a single word on the plaque for all the gunk covering it.

The door was surprisingly heavy, and Alforde had to lean on it to get it to open up. Vee smoothed his coat and walked up to the [Receptionist]. “How much does it cost to send a couple letters to Bardis?”

“Bronze fleur apiece. Pretty lucky timing, I’ve got to say. Our long distance carrier is leaving this afternoon and it’ll be another week before we send another batch to Bardis.”

Vee paid the fee and turned to leave as the door swung open again.

“Okay Horace, I’m done for the day so I’m going to turn in my bag and get out of here. I’ve got to go clear a few blocks in Eastown for the guild.”

Luna walked into the post office. Her heavy boots clunked against the floor and she carried the burly mail bag on the opposite side as her purse.

Vee really didn’t believe in fate, but he was starting to have doubts. He kicked his toe into the ground but this time he was determined to at least say hello.

She looked at him and grinned and Reginald tightened his brim around Vee’s head. Whatever you do, do NOT do the wave nod, the hat said into Vee’s thoughts.

She returned his wave. “Fancy running into you here,” she said. “How’ve you been, Vee?”

She remembers my name, Vee thought as he used all of his strength not to start babbling. She remembers my name!

“Good. I’ve been good,” he said, perhaps a bit mechanically. “How about you?”

“Busy,” she said as she took off the mailbag and tossed it into a bin on the far side of the room. Vee wasn’t entirely sure he’d have been able to make such a throw. “With the new dungeon opening up in town, there’s been a lot more letters coming in and out of the city these past few days. I thought that it’d slow down now that the dungeon’s good and open, but the amount of letters has only gotten worse. It’s making it tough for me to keep up with my second job.”

“Oh? You have a second job? Doing what?”

Luna tapped her hat. “I complete a bunch of bounties for the adventurer’s guild. That’s where I’m off to right now, actually.”

Vee looked up at the ceiling and squinted. Was that a sign? Was there some [Divine Being] up there having a laugh at his expense?

Alforde took a step forward and filled the silence. He really was a good [Right Hand Man]. “You’re an adventurer? That’s pretty cool! Are you planning to run the dungeon anytime soon? Maybe have a fight with the mighty [Dungeon Champion]? You know, he’s won almost every match he’s had!”

Luna shook her head. “I wasn’t planning to. Doing jobs for the guild pays better. But maybe someday! I’d love to be a high ranked adventurer who travels around challenging all the dungeons on the continent. But for now, I just need as many fleurs as I can get.”

“Don’t we all,” said Alforde. Luna laughed and Vee wished he’d said it. He glowered a little bit at Alforde. Maybe there was a such thing as being too good of a [Right Hand Man].

“That was better,” Reginald said once Luna was gone. “You sounded like someone was squeezing the air out of your lungs, but you had a conversation. I’d call that a win, for now.”

The trio left and headed to Westown. Vee replayed every bit of the conversation in his mind until he’d picked out the dozen ways he could have handled things better. That was how he’d always been. Useless in the moment and then full of things he could have done better once everything was said and done.

Well, that wasn’t how he was always going to be. Filled with nothing but the determination of a man who’s settled on a course of action but hasn’t yet taken any tangible steps towards accomplishing whatever goal he’s set for himself, Vee stomped up the stairs to the top of his tower and fed his order form into Dheart.

“Your delivery of one batch of slimes and two fog machines will take approximately three weeks. Would you like to expedite the process for an additional five gold fleurs?”

Vee looked at Reginald. “I think we can get by as we are for now, right?”

“How much faster will the stuff get here if we pay?” Reginald asked. “Not much point in paying a few gold fleurs extra if it’s only going to cut our delivery time down to two and a half weeks instead of three.”

Dheart made a few popping noises. “With expedited delivery, your order will arrive in approximately eight days.”

“You should do it,” Reginald said. “That’s a pretty big improvement, and frankly, I think Crestheart needs a little spicing up. There’s a lot of stuff Casys suggested we could start putting to use right away.”

And so, though Vee grumbled, he held up his money bag up to the dungeon heart and scooped in the required fleurs. They made a clinking sound as they slid down into Dheart’s depths, and then there was a flash of blue light as they were teleported to the union. Vee had to admit, having Dheart around definitely streamlined the ordering process and made his life a lot easier.

The first adventurer for the day wasn’t scheduled to arrive for another hour or so, and that meant Vee had some time to work on designing his ghost hands and refine some more ectoplasm for the orchestra.

He sat down on the ground with his legs crossed and scooped some ectoplasm out of the air. He’d never tried to make a hand before, and found himself getting tangled up, so to speak, with trying to make sure that the fingers were properly spaced and functional. Most of his attempts failed to form a working fist, or if they did, their fingers shattered at the first hint of pressure.

It was harder than he thought to actually keep the ectoplasm pliable and easy to work there in the office. He found himself wishing that he had a dedicated space for shaping and crafting ectoplasm. Someplace with plenty of tables and tools. Like a lab, or a workshop.

Well, why didn’t he make one? He could already hear Future Vee’s grumbling, but he didn’t care. Tough luck, bucko. After all, the tower was huge and he was only using the single room at the top as his office. Why not start building all sorts of ancillary service rooms for Crestheart inside? He had thirteen stories to work with! Imagine the possibilities!

Ultimately, even without proper tools and resources, he managed to make a decent glove out of ectoplasm that could flex without shattering. From there he was able to animate it so that it’d grab and pull of its own accord. That was progress, but more work was definitely needed. The glove was wispy and frail, and it didn’t have much in the way of grip strength.

Some of that was fixed with just practice, as he got better at forming the ectoplasm, but the rest would require design improvements. How he wished he had a workbench that could hold it for him while he worked!

[Congratulations! You are now a Dungeon Master, Level 7!]

[You can now use the Walking Walls skill!]

[Devious Mind + 1]

[Plotting + 1]

[Congratulations! You are now a Ghost Maestro, Level 19!]

[Your Shape Ectoplasm skill is now more powerful!]

[Your Refine Ectoplasm is now more powerful! You can now passively refine a small amount of ectoplasm each day.]

Vee blinked in surprise. That sounded pretty useful. Closing his eyes to open his soul’s mirror, he investigated the specifics of his new prowess.

[Refine Ectoplasm]: Condense ectoplasm into a potent, crystalized form. Ectoplasm can be refined in different ways, which creates different effects if consumed by a spirit. Human ectoplasm consumption is not recommended.

(Passive): Refine ectoplasm while you sleep at a rate of one cube every three hours.

Vee opened his eyes. As it turned out, his new ability wasn’t really all that great. Free refined ectoplasm was free refined ectoplasm and all, but at such a low rate, it wouldn’t make much difference for his daily routine. Hopefully it’d increase as he kept leveling up.

Reginald let him know that the first adventurer for the day was outside, and so Vee put his ghost hand prototype on the ground and went over to his station manning the doors. Reginald had done such a good job on the voices yesterday that Vee was going to let him do it again today. Taking out another piece of paper and unscrewing the lid on his daily carry fountain pen, Vee began to sketch.

At the top, because it made the doodles seem more formal, he stuck his tongue between his lips and titled the image “Vee’s Lab!”. He drew a few desks and some of the basic [Ghost Maestro] shop equipment that he’d had access to back at the academy, and then drew a makeshift ghost hand on the table.

Closing his eyes once more, Vee gave the medium section of his orchestra an order. Instead of cleaning the trash on the street tonight, go and start collecting workshop materials. Usable pieces of wood and scrap metal, that sort of thing. Store them behind the tower.

Reginald invited the first adventurer of the day into the dungeon and Vee was momentarily distracted as the [Swordsman] carved his way through the first room. The hat turned to him and grinned.

“Think he’ll make it to Alforde?”

Character Sheets:

Vee Vales:

Primary Class: Ghost Maestro (Locksmagister University), Level 19 (+1)

Secondary Class: Dungeon Master (Oar’s Crest), Level 7 (+1)

Tertiary Class: Guy-Who-Takes-Things-WAY-Too-Far (Self), Level 1

Might: 6

Wit: 26

Faith: 15

Adventurousness: 7 (-1)

Ambition: 7

Plotting: 8 (+1)

Charisma: 2 (-2)

Devious Mind: 10 (+1)

Leadership: 7

Guts: 3 (-1)

Intimidating Presence: 3

Citizenship: 3

Alforde Armorsoul:

Primary Class: Hammer Afficionado (Self), Level 14

Secondary Class: Right-hand man (Vee Vales), Level 9 (+1)

Tertiary Class: Dungeon Champion (Oar’s Crest), Level 8

Additional Class: Clunker (Vee Vales), Level 4

Might: 27

Wit: 10

Faith: 24

Adventurousness (Bound – Vee Vales): 6

Endurance: 8

Intimidating Presence: 7

Heart of a Champion: 2

Citizenship (Bound – Vee Vales): 1

Reginald:

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

Secondary Class: Loudmouth (Self), Level 30 (+1)

Tertiary Class: Majordomo (Vee Vales), Level 4

Might: 1

Wit: 25

Faith: 3

Ambition: 23

Greed: 18

Deceptiveness: 32

[email protected]$: $%

[-------------------------]

Citizenship (Bound – Vee Vales): 1