Inside City Hall, Mayor Kana is trembling as she waits for Abi, Ali and Lord Aldor to arrive. She isn't fearful of the dungeon's latest guest, but instead she's afraid of messing up the important conversation that her master wishes her to hold.

"Why me? Why did I have to be chosen as the Mayor?" She slides the paperwork that's in front of her out of the way and slumps down on the desk.

It was just your time. What else can I say?

"Oh! Sorry, Me. That question was more rhetorical if anything," she laughs.

In that case, nevermind.

"I don't actually mind being the Mayor. It is a tough gig, but complaining about it let's me blow off a bit of steam. Thank you though, Me. I appreciate your words regardless," she says whilst lifting her head up from solid oak. "Sadly though, they don't seem to be helping my courage. I just don't want to mess up the meeting for Master."

There is a knock at the door and Deputy-Mayor Sacha enters, lifting her superior's mood tenfold with what she carries in her hands.

"Is that..."

"Yes, Madam Mayor," Sacha smiles and adjusts her glasses. She knows exactly how to work her boss up and get her to perform to the best of her abilities.

"Can I try a little piece now?" Mayor Kana's eyes are sparkling at the delicious treat that's pulling on her heart strings and she clutches her desk so hard it threatens to break.

"Nope. This is for after your meeting. If you do a good job, you can have the whole thing." Kana's eyes are now watering at the thought of eating the entire heavenly dessert after her meeting.

"The whole thing? That's awesome! But can't I just have like a little slice now? You know, to get me ready for my meeting?"

"I'm sorry madam Mayor, but it's for afterwards. When we have finished however, I may treat you to something extra, if you're still hungry."

"I love you, Sacha. You're the best."

Sacha disappears and Mayor Kana assumes she's gone to store the delicious dessert so it doesn't spoil. She can barely contain her anticipation for the sweet treat she's to receive after she's done.

As thoughts of forks filled with frivolous delicacies flicker through Mayor Kana's mind, there's a second knock at the door and Deputy Mayor Sacha enters once again.

"Why didn't you just teleport back?" she asks her treat-less deputy.

"I would have but the Master is almost here with Lord Aldor. They will arrive in less than a minute." Deputy Mayor Sacha answers and watches as her superior's face drops into despair.

"Already! I'm not ready! What am I going to do, Sacha?" Kana begins to tidy up her office at light speed in a futile attempt to make the cluttered room more presentable. It wouldn't matter if she had an hour, however, as clusters of invoices and other varying notices are stacked all around her office.

"All you have to do is speak for the Master. That's it. She isn't expecting anything else from you so calm down and take your seat." Deputy Mayor Sacha places her hand on the handle and waits for Mayor Kana to take her seat. Begrudgingly, she does as she's told and sits down.

"Are you ready?" Sacha asks her not-so-fearless leader, once she has taken her seat.

All she can do is shake her head in response and Sacha rolls her eyes. Sacha believes that her Master must have imbued her with a ridiculous amount of patience to be able to cope with her superior.

"Good. Let's begin then!"

As Deputy Mayor Sacha opens the door for myself and my small entourage, I'm feeling extremely confident. Sacha has the capability, and more, to run this place if I ever needed her to.

If she would have been born genuinely, through childbirth, it's safe to say that Sacha would have excelled in whatever career path she chose.

How lucky am I!

After seeing Mayor Kana, however, the confidence I earned from her deputy has taken a little bit of a dive. Quivering slightly behind her desk she almost jumps up to greet us, banging into the wooden object in the process. I'm hoping that the reason she looks so pale and clammy is to do with all the paperwork laying around, not the pressure of this meeting that I inconveniently dropped in her lap.

I know I'm 'The Master', but I can't help but feel sorry for doing it to her. I know that it's my fault that she's in this situation, but I'd be furious if someone tried to palm all their work off on me and scheduled meetings out of the blue like this. Not that I could have said 'It's a bit short on notice, how about next week?' Is it?

I inwardly apologise to Kana and leave Ali behind at the door. I'm quite shocked that the appearance of the Gourmet didn't lift the Mayor's spirits. Everyone knows how infatuated she is with Ali's delicacies.

It's definitely gotta be the pressure.

She was in a state of sorts before you arrived. She is constantly relying on Deputy Mayor Sacha for aid also.

Really? It's a good job Sacha's here then. I'm dreading to think how the town would have coped without her.

As more problems weigh down on me, I greet a sweaty Kana and she greets us back. Lord Aldor also seems to be coping better than my Mayor as he introduces himself. Usually he would have someone do this for him, but I set strict stipulations for our meeting. He did, after all, come to me. He's doing especially well when you consider the fact that he is inside, what most people consider to be, a dangerous monster.

He must really need my help!

"OK, let's get straight to business. Please ask him what he needs from us, Kana." I smile in her direction trying to lighten the mood. It doesn't seem to work, however, as she robotically monotones my question to our guest. I've seen zombies with more gusto than that!

I feel a twinge on my cheek as my earlier confidence is sinking like a ship crossing the seas with no protection. Lord Aldor on the other hand, only seemed to hear what he wanted to.

"Please, I beg of you." He drops to his knees. "There are quite a few... Problems that I have come to seek aid with. Your help in any of them would be greatly appreciated." Lord Aldor doesn't come across as one of those pompous and pretentious nobles. The high and mighty, we're better than you type, money can buy us anything and we've got more of it than sense. Instead, he seems genuine and if we're being honest, desperate. A far cry from how he acted in front of his men in the Colliseum.

Now that he's separated from the people that came with him, Lord Aldor has broken down into an emotional wreck and he certainly isn't portraying the composure a Lord of his stature should.

Once again, I find myself caught off-guard by yet another stupidly-awkward scenario. Why the Lord of an entire region is prostrating himself, before my robotically-voiced Mayor no less, is something I'd rather not deal with. But, as it's more than likely to benefit me in the future, and after I swore to stop sweeping problems under the rug, I suppose I can at least see what he needs from us.

As I look back at Mayor Kana to give her the next set of lines, the sight of her almost compares to that of the kow-towing Lord Aldor. Stiff faced, with sweat profusely-dripping down her brow, Kana's eyes have rolled to the back of her skull and she appears to have developed an extremely-bad twitch.

Is she dying?

She appears to be going through some... Sort of crisis.

I don't know what to say to that!

"Ahem. Deputy Mayor Sacha! Please ask Lord Aldor why he feels the need to act so... So... Not noble? Struggling to find my own words after seeing Kana's compromised state, I struggle through the meeting.

Not noble? Seriously, Abi?

I... Couldn't think of anything else to say, sorry.

Anything? Anything at all? There are a great multitude of words that would have fit better than not nobly. Non Aristocratic! Undignified! Even unnoble would have been acceptable.

OK. OK. I'll remember those smart-ass words for the next time a foreign dignitary comes knocking on our door.

Deputy Mayor Sacha steps up to the task of filling in for her poor-performing senior and she performs fantastically. Pronouncing every word with charm and grace, she even adds in extra words that I didn't know to make it sound more elegant. She has Lord Aldor's complete attention and mine. He hasn't even noticed the malfunctioning Mayor in the background since he lifted his head from the floor.

"M-My Daughter! Please, if you can help with anything, please let it be this. She's been kidnapped and is being held for ransom. It happened two days ago. My best trackers have been unable to locate any sign of her. Please! I'm willing to pay the ransom, but I'm scared that they'll kill her anyway! I don't want my baby to die! Please! Please!" Breaking down into a blubbering mess, the Lord of Ishda begins a wailing session that could almost match for own.

Holy shit! Why does everything have to be crazy as fuck for a Dungeon Core?

You would think that being a dungeon would be a relatively-peaceful existence. Secluded away in some mountainous region away from would be murderers and categorisers. Why is mine not going that way? Did all my luck get sucked up by my exponential growth? Dooming me to have strangely-awkward encounters everytime I meet someone new?

I hope not.

"OK. What else? You're clearly better at this than I am, Sacha. You have full permission to speak about whatever you need to with the lord." I encourage the superstar deputy-mayor to continue questioning Lord Aldor on his other problems.

"I'm sure that more than half of my ministers are embezzling money from the city treasury. We have excellent commerce in the capital and the treasurer has had his position since I took power. He's close to a lot of the senior officials and I'm beginning to suspect major corruption."

More than half of his Ministers? Seriously!? How is Ishda still functioning as a region? Those are two pretty-fucking-hefty problems that he has. Wouldn't you agree, Me? Would the Syndicate even be up for a large-scale mission like that?

Probably. From what we have seen so far, your monsters are leagues above the average capabilities of humans already.

That's true, but what have I said about calling them monsters? Our family sounds much better than your monsters, don't you agree?

Before I can consider the number of Assassins to send out, or argue semantics with Me, Lord Aldor drops another bomb in my lap.

"I'm pretty sure the other half of my ministers are planning a Coup as well!" He says l, nodding away like it's common knowledge.

A Coup, as well as a kidnapping, on top of the multiple light-fingered ministers. What the fuck? He doesn't need a lot does he?

I'm taking that as sarcasm.

You would be correct.

God damn! I thought I had problems. This poor bastard has it even harder than I do. Not that I have kids, but some parents properly dote on theirs. Lord Aldor seems to be that type of man. It's obvious when you look at the tears running down his face. His daughter is obviously his priority. The actual problem is that he's got so much shady shit going on under his nose, his daughter's kidnapping has just toppled the mountain.

I can only see my help turning into a problem, if I'm being honest. This sounds like a lot of rather large jobs opposed to one big one.

Let's summon some Assassins then, shall we?