Chapter 47 – Home is Where the Gold’s at

A lot can be said about that fight, but at least we won. My remaining underlings gather around me, and I wince when I realise how low their health points are. I lost half my underlings, and the rest of them look like they are a weak fart away from keeling over. The only solace I find in this outcome is that since I managed to win the fight, I get to loot all my dead underlings’ gear. It’s a small comfort, but a comfort nonetheless.

Before all that though, I need to take care of the reinforcements. They didn’t despawn when Alzahr died, and his death seemed to only have further pissed them off as the loud banging noises only seem to have intensified. I split my underlings into two groups of two, ordering them to further reinforce the barricades to try and buy us some time to restore some health. I would have offered to help, but I’m just too damn tired. I just plop down on my ass and take a deep breath.

It’s a bit worrisome that I haven’t received a quest completed notification yet, but I can only guess it’s because I need to return to Ulf to claim my rewards. This is technically the first quest I have completed in this game so far, so I’m not too certain how things work. The jobs I’ve performed are slightly different, and they are more like personal challenges than a mission given to me by others.

After taking a minute or five to rest, I force myself to start being productive. I’m still on the clock, and I have a lot of work to do. I’m still in enemy territory, and there are enemies only a few meters away that are aware of my position after all. I throw a quick glance towards my underlings who keep stacking more crates behind the doors before I head straight over towards Alzahr’s body. Rifling through his pockets, I can finally release a wide grin as I see a few select pieces of gear that will definitely come in handy.

[Noble’s Rapier. Rare. 32-35 Piercing Damage, +6 Charisma, +4 Agility, +2 Dexterity. Requires: Level 10.]

[Padded Heavy Leather Armor of Nimbleness Set. Rare. +35% Physical Resistance, Per level gain: +2,5 Strength, +2,5 Endurance, +2,5 Agility, +0,5 Dexterity. Requires: NPC, Fighter Classification. Level 10.]

[Tavern Master Key. Soulbound.]

[16 Gold, 5 Silver, 9 Copper.]

My exhaustion is quite figuratively washed away as I see the two items. Holy crap. Two rare class items? Yes, please. It seems like Christmas came early for both Cobra and me this year, and not a moment too soon. I could use an upgrade, and I’ve been relying a lot on my Lieutenant as of late. It’s only fitting that he gets an upgrade.

This loot is great though. There aren’t many bosses around the world, and they are difficult to come by. Killing a boss usually requires at least a full party of adventurers, and the gear the boss drops isn’t even guaranteed to be anything useful for the ones who actually killed it. The exception in my case is that this boss is part of a special class quest, which means the loot will always be relevant to my class. It’s a pity there is a finite amount of these types of quests, and I’m really happy that I managed to pull through to the end. Hell, I haven’t even received my class-unique item yet! I can’t wait to see what it is.

I equip my new sword and set aside the armor for Cobra. Pocketing the gold coins, I make note of the total amount of coins in my inventory. Three hundred and twenty-two gold coins, four silver, and five copper coins. It’s by no means a low number, but if I consider the huge cash influx I got from Anna, Greg, and Kevin, then the numbers paint a completely different picture. If I had only relied on my own ability to gather gold, then I should have struggled way more than I already am. Subtracting the gold given to me, I’m left with little over two gold to my name. Two gold coins. That’s two euros. Not a very good payoff after over a week with constant gaming, is it?

This puts me in a really awkward predicament. My dream is to try and live off of this game, but it’s not a very cheap thing to do. Everything I do ingame costs gold, and there are limited ways to earn gold without needing to add money from the real world. Being a Thief Lord, I naturally gain gold easier than regular players, but my underlings have a really steep upkeep associated with them. Granted, I have managed to accumulate a lot of ingame wealth through items, but ingame items won’t put food on the table.

Back in the real world, I live a pretty spartan lifestyle. The game subscription alone costs about three hundred euros per month. Adding that to my monthly rent and appliances of around three hundred euros, as well as another hundred euros set aside for food and other necessities, my monthly budget is around seven hundred euros per month. That means I need to gather at least seven hundred gold ingame per month plus taxes to afford to live off this game. When I’ve only managed to scrounge together two euro after an entire week, I’m really starting to worry. I only have enough savings in my bank account to pay for this month’s upkeep until I run out, and I’m starting to fear I won’t reach my own deadline if I don’t make any drastic changes to my gaming style.

The good thing is that my underlings are all fully geared, and I have a decent stockpile of spare weapons and armor now. This should limit my expenses in the near future, but it’s not enough. I also haven’t forgotten about the large stash of crafting materials my Necromancer hid deep inside the forest, but I’m in no condition to venture out and retrieve it yet. Those items alone should be enough to keep me going for at least a month. I also have my rainy day fund, which is the skill book I found, but I’d rather not sell it. Skill books are valuable, and I look upon it more like an investment into the future rather than an immediate source of income.

I sigh. I have a lot of problems hanging above me, but there isn’t much I can do about it right now. My main priority should be to grow stronger, and I won’t do that if I spend all my time worrying. I should just wrap things up here and go see Ulf. But first of all, I need to finish killing the reinforcements and check the area for any more hidden loot. I’m strapped for cash, so I should pillage anything that isn’t nailed to the ground.

I get back on my feet and head over to loot the two dead elite Thugs. I’m pleased to see they both dropped a set of armor each as well as a single shortsword, but the four gold coins they dropped probably brings me the most amount of joy for some odd reason. I chuckle a little at the thought that I’m a very economically responsible thief.

I’m about to head over to the room the boss appeared from when a thought of caution strikes me. This is a thieves den after all. I should probably be cautious about traps. Also, I’m a bit unwilling to head deeper into the compound without first clearing out the enemies behind us.

Therefore, I get to work preparing to root out the remaining enemies. I decide to place a triple charged GoD trap above the rightmost door. I estimate there are about three enemies on the other side of the door based on the amount of yelling and cursing I hear. The problem is that I have no idea if the enemies are of the regular kind, the elite kind, or a mixture between the two. I only have four of my underlings left alive, so I can’t afford to take any chances. These traps aren’t that expensive, but they still take a fair amount of time to create.

After securing the trap above the door, I have my underlings start removing the crates. After the final crate is moved away, the door bursts open and three enemies run into an inferno of pain. The lead Thug takes a full blast of oil enhanced fire to the face, quickly reducing him to a screaming mess on the floor. The two Cutthroats that follow fare little better as my underlings descend upon them. The enemies were all of the normal types, so they aren’t able to put up much of a fight against my underlings. I take particular note of Cobra. After donning his new gear, I notice a remarkable boost to his performance during combat. His movements are noticeably faster, and his blows shave off a decent chunk of the enemy’s health pool with every hit. The whole encounter ends in an overwhelming victory after only half a minute.

The battle at the leftmost door goes about in a very similar way as the first. This door holds a regular Thug and two Prowlers behind it, and the three falls even quicker than the three former. This is not only because of my cautious use of GoD traps, but also because Prowlers are ludicrously weak when you engage them in close quarters. The two battles are a resounding success, and I grin with satisfaction as I gain another two gold coins, as well as a set of Light and Shadowed armor on top of another crossbow and dagger. Not a bad haul at all.

I have to say though. Even though the reinforcements weren’t exactly powerful, they would still have slaughtered us if they had shown up during the main battle with the boss. No matter how you look at it, the sheer number of enemies would have made that fight unbeatable, no matter how good my gear would have been. There is little to suggest that anyone else would have had the foresight to block off the side passages, and it was only dumb luck that I decided to play it extra cautiously this time around. I suppose this quest set me up to fail, possibly to teach me some sort of lesson or something. I could always have respawned my underlings and tried again, but that would definitely cost me a whole lot of gold I don’t have. I may have gotten lucky this time, but I’ll make sure to take the lesson to heart.

It is what it is though, and I won’t turn down the spoils of war even if I technically weren’t supposed to survive. I’ve already gained an incredible amount of powerful and valuable loot, and I don’t consider myself done quite yet either.

Scouting deeper into both of the side passages, I don’t come upon any more enemies. The entire complex appears to be a fully equipped thieves den which should be capable of supporting an entire organisation of evildoers.

The passage to the left contains a rather large hall with a bunch of dummies, bales of hay with a red target painted on them, as well as what looks like an obstacle course. It doesn’t take a genius to figure out that this is a training hall, and I find a small room at the back with a sturdy door which I can only assume is an armory. I have my underlings go over the two rooms, but sadly, there isn’t any loot to procure.

Heading back to the first hall, I quickly make my way over to the door on the right. It opens up into a small hallway with half a dozen mid-sized rooms attached to it. One is a kitchen, while another is an empty storage room. The remaining four rooms appear to be different types of crafting stations, the types of equipment and furniture giving their functions away. I ponder for a moment on why they would need this many crafting stations, but doing some quick mental calculations informs me that it really makes sense.

I’ve been wondering about the purpose of this exact quest for a while and how it seems to coincide with the whole subject of being a Villain. This place is a perfectly created secret base, which is something any self-respecting Villain ought to have. Hell, every Villain has an ability that addresses this issue.

One of the things that make Villains unique is the possibility of establishing a [Hideout] or a [Lair], depending on their class. Reading online, I already know that each Villain can create a single Hideout or Lair every fifty levels. Hideouts are areas that are considered safe zones for my underlings which grants a few local buffs and offers a few customizable options. When I played as a Necromancer, I made a Lair inside a cave I found deep inside a forest. This offered me the possibility of customizing the cave, like creating a sturdy door as well as furniture, but nothing truly massive. The cave also offered a few basic buffs for my summoned minions, like a small boost to restoration and their combat abilities.

The ability was nice to have, but I never really considered it too powerful as the gains were really small compared to my needs. That was before I came upon this quest though. I always suspected I was missing something, and since no Villain to my knowledge ever stumbled upon any class-quests, then I think I just managed to break the mystery wide open. This quest is pretty much handing me a fully-equipped location for me to use as a Hideout. It fits like a hand in a glove. This place is supposed to be my new base of operations. The fact that Alzahr dropped a soulbound master key only further cements my suspicions.

Looking around the different rooms, I notice a few pieces of equipment that only confirms my thoughts. There’s an alchemy lab in one of the rooms, a workshop fit for an engineer in another, the third has a whole bunch of magical contraptions I understand nothing about, while the fourth is completely empty. Remembering the different types of Specialists I can recruit, I can only imagine three of the crafting stations are for the Poisoner, the Enchanter, and the Tinkerer, while the storage room is probably for my Fence. The final crafting station puzzles me for a moment, until I facepalm. That one is obviously for me.

This is awesome though. The place is perfect for me to settle down. The building itself is very inconspicuous, and the hidden entrance to this hideout was masterfully concealed. It would take a miracle for any players to find me down here unless I really fuck up, and I can finally have a place where I can store my ill-begotten gains without risking losing everything due to some overly curious player randomly stumbling upon my hidden cache. With this place, I wouldn’t have to worry about my character every time I log out of the game for a few hours, and I will save a small fortune when it comes to renting rooms at various inns.

Oh, god. The grief I could have saved myself if I managed to find the equivalent class quest for my Necromancer. Hell, I would probably still be playing on him if I knew about this back then. Finding out about these quests and this place alone justifies my decision to reroll into a new character.

Walking back to the main hall, or should I say prancing, I set my eyes upon the final door. I consciously saved the best room for last, and I can only imagine the final room is just for me. A place for me to rest, and hopefully, some sort of secret vault stashed with all kinds of goodies. I’m starting to drool at just the thought alone.

As with both the side passages, I first send my two Cutthroats ahead to scout and locate any potential traps. They quickly return, giving me the thumbs up that it’s safe to enter. I quickly make my way through the door and I soon find myself inside a rather spacious living quarters.

The room is perfectly square, with more furniture than I think I have ever seen in a randomly generated building. There’s a large and luxurious bed propped up against the back wall with a nightstand decorated with a golden candlelight holder beside it. At the center of the room, a large oak desk is placed facing the door. An equally luxurious padded oak chair is resting behind it, and the walls are covered with either tall closets or expensive-looking paintings. The floor is covered by a thick rug, and there are two rather large golden oil lamps hanging on either side of the room. One could say that this room is fit for a king. A rather poor king. Or maybe a merchant? A merchant of mediocre standing perhaps... Anyway, that’s beside the point. I can really picture myself at home here.

Grinning, I open up my status page and locate the one ability I never thought I’d be so happy to use.

“Establish Hideout!”