The city of Oar’s Crest slept beneath a fresh blanket of snow. Without any clouds in the sky and the sun little more than a sliver of orange over the horizon, it promised to be a clear, albeit cold day.

Since it was so early in the morning, there were barely any people out and about as Vee Vales, his best friend Alforde Amorsoul – an animated suit of armor almost eight feet tall – and his talking blue top hat, Reginald, made their way across the snowy streets to the dilapidated and piecemeal gate of scrap metal that separated Westown from Northtown.

Today, like always, the gate was guarded by a pair of [City Guards]. One of them – a salamander named Wureini – smiled at Vee as he asked for them to open the gate, while the other – a ginger kitrekin with big ears and scraggly whiskers – simply frowned at the trio and waved them through.

Crestheart Tower, a building thirteen stories tall, loomed in the middle of a mostly cleared street. It was old, having been built during the better days of Oar’s Crest, and like many of the other buildings nearby, was a constant reminder of what had once been. And what would be again if Vee had anything to say about it.

He’d not given much thought to his quest to rebuild the city for the last few days, having arrived at the conclusion with Alforde and Reginald that the best course of action for the time being was to keep on doing what they were already working on: building the dungeon and finding ways to improve the daily lives of the citizens when the opportunities presented themselves.

Next to the tower was the key to that plan: Crestheart proper. It was a shoddy warehouse that looked like it’d been hastily constructed by a group of people who barely knew what they were doing, which of course was exactly the case. However, despite its humble appearance, it was in fact a dungeon, and Vee was its master.

“Well,” Vee said with a smile. “Today’s the day, huh?”

“Sure is, boss,” Reginald said with a motion that Vee recognized as his [Majordomo] cracking a grin of his own.

“Yeah! It’s expansion day! Let’s go, let’s go, let’s go,” cried Alforde as he threw open the door to the tower. The trio made their way all the way up to the office at the very top of an accursedly large number of steps and set down their belongings.

There, in the center of the room, was Dheart, the slightly eldritch-looking purple and orange dungeon heart that provided power to Crestheart’s doors, floors, and minions, in addition to serving as the liaison between Vee and the Union of [Dungeon Masters].

It was that latter purpose for which Vee was interested in Dheart that morning. After two weeks of aggressive practice of his [Boost Drops] skill – which had finally culminated in a proper fourth cast the previous friarsday – and months of casual earning before that, Vee had finally accrued the two hundred and fifty shards of chaos necessary to add another floor to the dungeon.

The dungeon heart whirred to life before Vee could reach down and touch it, and Dheart’s stilted voice filled the office.

“Good morning, Master. How may I be of assistance?”

“Good morning, Dheart. Open the vault, please.”

There was a groaning sound as the walls on the far side of the room shifted and shimmered for a moment before revealing a small door. Inside it was a space that Vee didn’t want to think about too hard, because he wasn’t entirely sure how pocket dimensions worked. With Alforde’s help*, the [Dungeon Master] brought out two small chests. He opened the first, which was filled with glimmering stones.

Shards of chaos didn’t look particularly chaotic, to be honest. They were all roughly the same size and shape. However, the mirror-coated stones vibrated ever so slightly in Vee’s palm, and the force of their vibration increased as he brought them over to Dheart.

“How exactly does this work?” Vee asked.

“Question unclear. How exactly does what work?” Dheart answered.

Vee sighed. The dungeon heart could be a real pain in the rear sometimes.

“How do we use these shards of chaos to add a floor to Crestheart?”

The dungeon heart rumbled and spluttered for a few moments, and then a drawer that didn’t look at all like a gaping maw – no sir, why would you even think such a thing? – popped open on its side.

“In a controlled manner, pour the shards of chaos into the newly opened drawer and I will take care of the rest,” Dheart said.

Feeling a little bit like he was a kid again putting fleurs into those stupid coin games that darkened the corner of almost every game parlor of his childhood, Vee reached into the box and scooped out a handful of shards. He slowly poured them into the drawer until they were all gone.

It was a little unsettling, Vee thought, the way that the engine burped after the last shard was swallowed. Shaking his head, Vee returned the now-empty chest to the vault and waited with Alforde and Reginald while Dheart trembled and shook.

The trio was silent for the next fifteen minutes while the dungeon heart did whatever it was doing, and were all more than a little relieved when Dheart made a noise that sounded satisfied and spoke up once more.

“Calibrating new energy reserves,” it said in its strangely staccato voice, “preparing fourth floor for addition. Estimated time until completion: seventy-two hours. Warning: normal dungeon functions will be unavailable until the new floor is complete. Are you sure that you would like to proceed?”

Vee grimaced and looked down at the other chest he’d taken out of the vault. Opening it, he looked down at the pile of fleurs stacked inside and shook his head. Losing three days of business was never anywhere close to ideal, but it was especially painful today, when he was due to make his next payment to Sacre. Still, it wasn’t like this was a real decision to make. Adding another floor to the dungeon was too important to even consider not doing.

“Fine,” he said. “Go ahead and get started, Dheart. I’ll make sure all the runs that were scheduled for today get cancelled and rescheduled for after the floor is done and ready.”

“You should make sure that Do and the rest of the [Dungeon Maintainers] are on hand as well,” Reginald said. “Just in case anything pops up that needs their attention as the floor expansion happens.”

“Good call,” said Vee. Though he wasn’t sure what sort of problems could arise – the union’s handbook had been surprisingly short on details regarding dungeon expansions beyond a summary of what to expect – it didn’t hurt to make sure he was as ready for them as he could be.

Closing his eyes, the [Ghost Maestro] reached through his bonds to get in touch with the fiends that made up the heavy section of his orchestra. They were the [Dungeon Maintainers], responsible for making sure that Crestheart stayed in good repair, and handling all of the construction details that needed to be taken care of. With every week that passed, they grew more competent and confident, and Vee sometimes found it hard to remember that only a few short months ago they’d been little more than raging spirits made of hatred and violence like the rest of their kind.

Still have to deal with the implications of that, he thought as Do acknowledged the order.

“Well, we’ll leave you to it, then,” Vee said to Dheart. The dungeon heart chirped and got to work on expanding, making all manner of horrible sounds that sent shivers down Vee’s spine. In order to distract himself, lest he focus on it to the expense of all else, Vee got to writing a letter that would apologize to the adventurers soon to be coming that the day’s runs were canceled due to dungeon maintenance.

After that was finished, he found himself pacing back and forth in the office. He had to wait until Walnut came to collect the week’s fleurs, but what was he going to do with his time after that?

As it turned out, the answer to that question for the next few hours was: wait for Walnut to actually show up. Vee paced back and forth in the office, staring out at the snowy afternoon until finally, he caught the sight of a figure dressed in a long black jacket sauntering towards the tower.

Walnut walked into the office a few minutes later, rubbing his hands together and smiling in a way that reminded Vee of a scary book he’d once read.

“Another week, another collection, eh Shortstack?”

Vee nodded and did everything he could to keep his expression neutral. He hated the nickname, but knew from previous experience with bullies that letting them see that they were getting to you was an easy way to ensure that they never left you alone. What’d he care what Walnut thought, anyways?

His ploy seemed to work after a minute or so, though that might have had more than a little to do with the fact that Walnut was obviously uneasy at the sight and sound of Dheart’s…whatever it was doing. The gangster warily eyed the dungeon heart and tightened his gloves no fewer than three times. Vee filed that particular tick away for later.

“You, uh, got something goin’ on?” he asked, nodding at the dungeon heart.

Vee shrugged and turned around. He had to admit, Walnut’s dedication to trying to make small talk each week – even though Vee hadn’t yet indulged him beyond common courtesy – was impressive.

“Money’s all there,” Vee said, pointing at the pile of thirty-five gold fleurs on the table.

Walnut walked over, cast another suspicious glance at Dheart, and then picked the coins up to count them. He flipped each fleur over his fingers once, and then like a [Stage Magician] made them all vanish into the front pocket of his coat, despite the fact that such a thing shouldn’t have been possible.

“Pleasure as always, Shortstack. See you next week,” he said as he pocketed the last coin.

Vee grunted as the door slammed shut.

*Also known as “Standing still and watching Alforde do all the work”

The more Vee thought about it, the more of a blessing it was that Dheart’s new addition was going to take three days. After all, the dungeon was starting to run out of minions. Well, not all minions – there was a steady influx of slimes, thanks to Pretzel and technically, Vee could cobble together low level ghosts if it came down to it – but the elementals and skeletons were both almost completely depleted. He’d been having to remix his packs every couple runs to get the ever dwindling creatures into something that vaguely resembled a threat.

Despite letters from the union assuring him that the “frustrating bandit problem which has inhibited our ability to make deliveries as we’re used to will soon be dealt with”, there was no sign of relief for any non-food trade goods around the continent. Heck, if anything, the problem seemed to be getting worse.

According to the daily newspapers, which Vee had taken to reading, the leader of the criminals, a man known as the “Cowled Thrush”, was apparently too canny to be trapped and too powerful to defeat in normal combat. Even with the major guilds and parties of the continent working together, he remained elusive, seemingly capable of vanishing into thin air.

Under different circumstances, Vee might have thought that was amusing, but with his replacement minions delayed, he had started taking a rather dim view of the bandits.

Mostly because the lack of replacements to stock the dungeon meant that he had to try his hand at other means of delaying adventurers, and that meant trying to come up with poems and riddles.

Neither of those were his forte.

With a heavy sigh, Vee picked up his fountain pen, stuck his tongue between his teeth, and started covering the page in angrily crossed out snippets of verse.

Curse those bandits!

Main Character Stat Sheets (Initial Values for Volume 2)

Vee Vales

Primary Class: Ghost Maestro (Locksmagister University), Level 28

Secondary Class: Dungeon Master (Oar’s Crest), Level 17

Tertiary Class: Guy-Who-Takes-Things-WAY-Too-Far (Self), Level 5

Might: 11

Wit: 31

Faith: 20

Adventurousness: 7

Ambition: 13

Plotting: 15

Charisma: 12

Devious Mind: 20

Leadership: 15

Guts: 11

Intimidating Presence: 9

Citizenship: 20

Public Relations: 4

Alforde Armorsoul:

Primary Class: Hammer Afficionado (Self), Level 21

Secondary Class: Right-hand man (Vee Vales), Level 12

Tertiary Class: Dungeon Champion (Oar’s Crest), Level 14

Additional Class: Glaciernaut (Sacha Silverblade), Level 3

Might: 36

Wit: 11

Faith: 25

Adventurousness (Bound – Vee Vales): 8

Endurance: 16

Intimidating Presence: 13

Heart of a Champion: 7

Citizenship (Bound – Vee Vales): 8

Vigilance: 5

Reginald:

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

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Secondary Class: Loudmouth (Self), Level 40

Tertiary Class: Majordomo (Vee Vales), Level 13

Additional Class: Announcer (Vee Vales), Level 6

Might: 1

Wit: 32

Faith: 10

Ambition: 26

Greed: 22

Deceptiveness: 28

Manipulativeness: 35

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Loyalty: 45

Patience: 10

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Citizenship (Bound – Vee Vales): 7