Chapter 22 - Preparing for war - Part Two

I am not a good liar. A life spent desperately seeking the approval of others had seen to that. So when the Captain and Lieutenant made it known that they were aware of my knowledge and ability to unlock Classes, I was more disappointed than surprised.

The Colonel had not given me a reason to doubt his word, nor had the Captain and Lieutenant. In fact, they had demonstrated a willingness to incur losses to establish a relationship, and a willingness to incur further losses in order to maintain it. Unfortunately, the fact that these actions were taken by a formal military somewhat lessened their significance for me. After all, the decision-makers were not the ones being presented as ‘sacrifice’, it was their subordinates.

What little I knew of military hierarchies and their core motivations from Earth, I could only assume their rationale was something along the lines of ends justifying means. Rank and file soldiers, even the junior officers, were resources to be expended in achieving objectives. With that thought in mind, it was difficult to gauge just how objectively valuable a resource my knowledge and Abilities were.

Thankfully, I had some previous frames of reference from Nadine and Clarice’s reactions to unlocking new and Advanced Classes. Assuming the Military lacked access to unlocking certain Classes outright and only had a tenuous or otherwise limited ability to unlock or recruit others, I couldn’t afford to price my unique services too cheaply.

In contrast to selling Exp to the Colonel through scheduled and pre-approved quests, which was an arrangement capable of being perpetuated indefinitely. Selling the methods to unlock the desired Classes would be a once off transaction that would more than likely drive down my importance and potential influence. Simply put, the army would have far fewer reasons to treat me and my people favourably once they possessed the means for unlocking so many Classes for themselves. That is, of course, assuming that a form of Class knowledge scarcity was the driving factor behind their request in the first place.

With that in mind, I figured I might as well use the opportunity to better determine their motives.

“How many, and which Classes does the Asrus kingdom military know how to unlock already?” I asked forthrightly, unwilling to leave any excuse for wiggle room in their answer.

The Captain flinched in what seemed to be a genuine reflexive response to the question, his lips tightened and jaw set determinedly to avoid spilling what must be considered state secrets. “F-Four...” He replied dryly.

“Five, if we count the chartered contract,” Lt. Rooke added helpfully.

The Captain nodded, a somewhat pained expression in his eyes.

“What are the classes?” I asked, “And what is that chartered contract?” My intuition suspected a similar situation to the Adventurers Guild, where a private third party was providing training under a strict non-disclosure contract, but I would rather be certain.

Lt. Rooke pointedly cleared her throat while giving her superior an almost apologetic glance. “Well, the Basic four are Swordsman, Spearman, Archer and Scout, although I am sure you may have guessed that already. The Asrus kingdom also has a chartered contract with an organisation to receive training to unlock the Ranger Advanced Class in exchange for payment and special services.”

The Captain frowned a little. He seemed incredibly uncomfortable with the seeming openness of the Lieutenant in answering my questions.

“So you pay for each soldier that is to be trained?” More or less what I had figured, it was not an alien concept. Modern militaries on Earth often paid private sector specialists to provide niche training to their advanced units, so it made sense that the Asrus kingdom was doing something similar.

The Captain nodded, “Yes. In exchange for compensation, the soldiers we put forward for training are given the opportunity to attempt learning the Ranger Advanced Class.”

“Wait a moment...Attempt?” All my observations on learning the Classes so far had been very cut and dry. So long as you met the required criteria, you unlocked the Class. It was a matter of when, not if, you would unlock it. That is, unless they had a similar problem as me?

“Ranger training has a high mortality rate...” Lt. Rooke replied quietly, “I am sorry, but I am unable to disclose more on the subject. Not because I want to withhold information from you, but because an oath binds me to silence. I hope you understand,” she apologised.

I nodded in understanding. It made perfect sense really. Whoever was teaching them the Ranger Class was using a binding oath on the participants in order to maintain a monopoly over the teaching method.

“Oh...” I felt like slapping my head as I realised a potential reason for prospective Rangers to fail at unlocking the Class. If the Ranger Class was supposed to be an advanced form of the Scout, then it probably had a heavy emphasis on survival and self-sufficiency in the wild, as well as tracking potential threats. I had seen enough reality T.V. to understand how brutal and unforgiving living like that for any prolonged period of time could be. I think it was even a staple of most military dramas to emphasise how the elite forces were required to go through training like that too.

Lt. Rooke narrowed her eyes slightly at me as if she had read my thoughts.

“What do they charge per participant?” I asked hurriedly, trying to divert Lt. Rooke’s suspicions.

The Captain looked to his subordinate expectantly.

“Ten gold coins worth of high-level manastones,” Lt. Rooke replied without missing a beat or breaking eye contact, “I don’t know the other details, but we might be able to ask command if you insist.”

I wanted to put a pin in that for now, the subject and my minor outburst had made her suspicious and far more alert than earlier. It actually creeped me out a little bit. “What about the other Classes? Does everyone know how to unlock them? Or do you put soldiers under contracts like the Guilds?”

The Captain slowly shook his head, “Knowledge of unlocking the core martial Classes is restricted knowledge. Only the nobles are capable of teaching the methods to others, and Scouts are as much recruited as trained. It is not just the Asrus kingdom, all other nations follow similar practices.”

“And they all have the same Classes?” I asked curiously.

The Captain shook his head again, but Lt. Rooke answered first, “No. Most have at least one or two other Classes in sufficient numbers to be a credible threat, although not enough to achieve a decisive advantage over their neighbours.”

“How does the Adventurers Guild have so many Classes then?” I demanded. It just didn’t make sense that a Guild would have such a seemingly diverse array of Classes while powerful nations only had four or five at most.

Lt. Rooke frowned and the Captain scowled, “Power and influence,” The Captain spat, “Each time a new Class is discovered, or the means of unlocking an existing one is made evident, the adventurers Guild will make every possible attempt at acquiring it. With their vast wealth and insidiously pervasive political connections, it is almost always a matter of when and not if they get what they want.”

That made sense. It wouldn’t be hard to maintain a Class monopoly if you made sure there was no competition. “Why do you even have an Adventuring Guild at all though? If you want manastones and other resources, why not just have your soldiers do it?”

The Captain and Lt. Rooke shared a telling look with one another. After a few moments, the Captain nodded and looked away.

“It’s somewhat complicated,” Lt. Rooke started to explain with a grimace, her fists tightening in anger, “But near the end of the continental war a couple hundred years ago, the kingdom was severely low on funds and manpower. So the council made a deal with representatives from the Adventurers Guild. In exchange for a higher rate of taxation, the Guild would be allowed near-complete autonomy in the Labyrinths.”

That didn’t sound all that far fetched conceptually. Essentially a private company had bought out a government company or resource while it was desperate for money and in a weak bargaining position. Although it was interesting to hear that it wasn’t an immediate exchanging of goods but rather an agreement to higher taxation as payment. On paper, the Asrus kingdom was probably getting a decent remuneration from taxes. However, the lack of any form of governmental oversight left me with the impression that the Labyrinth was much more like America’s old west. With no real government presence, the Guilds could do just about anything they wanted.

“The Adventurers Guild, does it operate in other countries?” I asked warily, “Or is it mostly limited to Asrus?” I figured that if their continental war was anything like the great wars of Europe, then there would be no shortage of desperate countries looking to line their pockets with quick easy cash to funnel towards reconstruction efforts.

As I expected, both officers nodded with dark expressions on their faces.

“Although they claim otherwise, and are operated by different boards of directors and stakeholders, it is a well known secret that almost every Guild for adventurers is part of a larger alliance,” the Captain’s disgusted tone made his opinion on the matter quite clear.

It was now painfully obvious how the Guild had managed to keep a stranglehold on unlocking Classes. With close to zero oversight, they could seize just about anything they wanted without anyone knowing the details or being able to cause a fuss. After all, they had almost succeeded in stealing away myself and Toofy without any real expenditure of resources or effort. With so many eager young men and women toiling away to earn their own fortunes, the Guild just had to patiently wait for something to catch its eye and then snatch it away. A small amount of compensation or a well-phrased threat would be all it takes to secure the adventurer’s silence, and no one would be the wiser.

Probing the officers with more questions, I got a better idea of the geography of what they both kept referring to as ‘The Continent’. Somewhat like medieval europe, Asrus was a landlocked kingdom surrounded by other countries. More specifically, Asrus was stuck between the Werrian Empire to the northeast and the Confederation of city-states to the south and west.

I had the distinct impression that Asrusians held no great love for their neighbours. In fact, Lt. Rooke and the Captain seemed to go to great lengths to point out exactly how many Variant slaves were bought and sold within the Werrian Empire on a daily basis, and how poor their living conditions were. Although the manipulation was crude and incredibly obvious, I still had to admit that it had the desired effect. Even though I had never knowingly so much as seen a Werrian, I already felt an intense dislike for them.

Although neither officer had anything nearly so damning to attribute to the Confederacy, they made it clear that their respective governments were not on speaking terms with one another. Apparently a reasonably high ranking noble had seceded from the Asrus kingdom and joined the Confederacy to avoid retribution. So in one fell swoop, Asrus kingdom lost a fifth of its total land and influence.

On the whole, their position seemed pretty grim. Although Asrus was currently at peace, it seemed like it was only a matter of time before the Empire or Confederacy had finished sufficient preparations and open war would break out again, inevitably dragging the Asrus kingdom in along with them.

Near as I could tell from their somewhat disjointed descriptions, the economies of this world were more than a little strange. Rather than seeking out mineral veins and establishing mines in the territories controlled by the country, they would form expeditions and search for monsters in the Labyrinths, like the Clay Dolls that drop pre-processed resources.

The open land of each nation was largely dedicated to forestry and agriculture. With so much meat readily available from the Labyrinths, city centres were far larger than they otherwise would be on earth. Each city that housed a Labyrinth had thousands of workers that processed monster parts and other harvested resources to make everyday goods and necessities. Even the coins each country used for currency were actually looted from the Labyrinths.

Since the wealth of a nation could more or less be determined by the number of Labyrinths it controlled, the cities were almost always the highest priority targets for occupation in wartime. As a result, the cities were all described as being heavily fortified. Without visual references to go off of, I just imagined cities with towering outer walls and multiple inner walls leading to the Labyrinth at the centre.

The more they tried to explain things though, the more depressing the military’s situation seemed to be. They had no portal mages, or Nexus Binders, of their own, and had to hire their services from the Adventurers Guild for exorbitant prices. Making things worse, it also meant that at least some members of the Guild knew the general movements of the military and could make certain guesses as to their motives and operations based on the equipment and personnel being transported.

While the Captain and Lt. Rooke did their best to assure me that they had taken a more expensive and secure route, using expensive and painfully rare teleportation items, It still left an uncomfortable feeling in the back of my mind all the same. The sheer degree to which the Adventurers Guild had ingrained itself into the kingdom’s military was very likely mirrored in the other countries to varying degrees as well. In effect, the Hurst Labyrinth was somewhat ironically the safest place I could expect to find.

While they both had made attempts at massaging the truth here and there, I found it a little strange that neither the Captain nor Lt. Rooke attempted outright lying to me, at least so far as I was able to tell. Whether it was because they respected me, figured I was too ignorant to truly understand the context for what they were saying, feared some sort of violent outburst if discovered, or some combination of the above, was unclear.

There was one interesting point of discussion though. Every country knew how to unlock the Taskmaster and Slaver Classes, but only the Empire and a few countries sharing its borders recognised it as a core military Class. The best explanation Lt. Rooke could provide was along the lines that the Classes were useless without monsters to serve as slaves. Apparently, most of the Slaver’s higher level Class Abilities did not work well on humans, or worse, proved fundamentally fatal. So barring extenuating circumstances, such as penal units being deployed for manual labour or serving as shock troops, there was almost no legitimate military use for the Classes. Although the Captain did admit that certain prisons did use them to control more dangerous criminals while they served their sentences.

What interested me was that apparently, no one else had figured out how to break the slavery mechanic as I had done with the girls. Or at least it wasn’t common knowledge. It was somewhat strange though, considering just how powerful a buff it was for regular humans. Since humans lacked any Racial Abilities of their own, gaining even the Blood Sense of a Vrabbit could situationally prove incredibly beneficial. If humans had figured out how to gain the Abilities of Orcs and more powerful monsters, I felt confident that it would have made Slaver a much more important Class, even to the point of ignoring the others outright.

Still ruminating over everything they had told me, I noticed that the Captain, whose name I finally remembered, Kristof, and Lt. Rooke were giving me expectant looks. After regaining my bearings, I realised that they expected to negotiate ‘the deal’ right now, or perhaps at least the groundwork for it.

Doing my best to project more confidence than I felt, I straightened my back and squared my shoulders, easily gaining at least a few more inches of height in the process. “What Classes do you want?” I asked simply. I figured that it would give me a better idea of what they already knew or suspected, which would allow me to avoid lying or fudging the truth unnecessarily.

Cpt. Kristof and Lt. Rooke shared a brief but determined look with one another before returning their intense focus to me, “We want all of them!” They replied in unison.

The corner of my right eye twitched a little. I honestly should have expected that answer. “And if you had to choose?” I asked, refusing to give up so easily after my blunder.

Cpt. Kristof furrowed his brow slightly, but Lt. Rooke didn’t skip a beat. “The Surgeon Classes,” she insisted. “And the Druid too!”

I shook my head, “I can’t teach you how to be Druids. You need the racial synergy to unlock it,” I explained, carefully omitting that I knew how to secure the synergy through the Enslavement mechanic.

“Then what about the Monster Tamer?” Lt. Rooke asked pointedly, “I have seen Serpent-Kin and Deep Orcs both wandering your Settlement with...domesticated Swamp Lurkers.”

I nodded and took a moment to consider it. I actually had no intentions of teaching them the Monster Tamer Class. It was far too dangerous and open to abuse against my people. The Beast Trainer Advanced Class was much safer in that it was limited to enslaving beast type monsters only. “I won’t teach you that one-” Lt. Rooke’s expression become somewhat frustrated for a second before hastily recovering, “-but I could teach an Advanced equivalent instead.” If I was going to teach them to unlock anything, there was definitely going to be a rigid contract forbidding the enslavement of Variants and passing along the unlock information to others. It was honestly just a given at this point. All of the Classes they had asked for were objectively incredibly valuable.

“A-An Advanced equivalent?!” Cpt. Kristof sputtered incredulously, looking to Lt. Rooke for confirmation.

Lt. Rooke seemed just as surprised as the Captain. However, clearly not willing to look a gift-horse in the mouth, she nodded eagerly in agreement, “Okay!”

“Before I agree to anything, I want to know what exactly you are exchanging for the Ranger Advanced class training,” I insisted, feeling no real qualms about using the prospect of Advanced Classes as bait to get more detailed information to better approximate their market value.

Cpt. Kristof and Lt. Rooke’s enthusiasm waned considerably and their expressions grew strained as they shared a knowing look with one another.

“We can’t tell you that,” Cpt. Kristof admitted somewhat dejectedly, “Discretion is part of the agreement.”

Lt. Rooke was already working away at her communication device, no doubt attempting to request some form of permission or confirm the available Classes on offer.

While this wasn’t a deal-breaker, it did raise the issue that I was unsure of what exactly I wanted in exchange. Ultimately, I wanted my people to be safe and for the most part, left alone to live their lives. Col. Klive had already agreed to enforce protective measures for Sanctuary against potential troublemakers, but perhaps I could take that further? What if I asked for complete authority over this floor of the Labyrinth? Or what about authority over the Labyrinth itself in its entirety? Technically, all it would really amount to would be a king or queen’s signature on a document and their word. Beyond that, nothing would really change all that much. The more I thought about it, the less appealing the idea became. ‘Conquering the Hurst Labyrinth’ sounded good on paper, but the reality was almost definitely far bloodier in reality.

Besides the wild monsters, there would be higher level Adventurers and more powerful Variants to deal with. While the Variants could probably be negotiated with, there was no way I would be so trusting towards the Adventurers Guild again without compelling evidence to convince me otherwise. Even the Variants couldn’t be blindly trusted. The only real reason the Forest Goblins, Serpent-Kin and Deep Orcs had all joined me so readily was because they were desperate and had no other options. So unless I was going to start playing geopolitics and deliberately destabilise the higher floors, aggressive expansion just wasn’t a good idea.

However, establishing smaller outposts on each floor might not be so bad. The Adventurers Guild would continue to be a threat so long as their members were capable of out levelling the dangers posed on this floor of the Labyrinth. If I secured the means to bring Sanctuary’s own defence force up to a comparative level, then that would give us the ability to retaliate against any potential threats. I already felt like I had gotten incredibly lucky with how the Adventurers Guild had seemingly underestimated me so completely as to allow us all to escape as we had. It was only further good fortune, relatively speaking, that the other Awakened running around had caused such chaos and very likely prevented or at least delayed any sort of further attempts in the meantime.

I realized that I had more or less derailed the negotiations, so decided to make my minimum expectations clear. I vastly preferred retaining all knowledge for the unlocking process, so the Hurst kingdom's army would be expected to pay for each soldier’s training on an individual basis and swear binding oaths of discretion and loyalty.

Despite initial counter offers of tens of thousands of gold coins in compensation for each Class, I firmly refused. It honestly wouldn’t take long at all to realistically generate the same amount of money from running a training program. So there was no justifiable reason I could see for surrendering such powerful bargaining chips.

After tracking down Clarice, she more or less confirmed everything the Captain and Lieutenant had told me, as well as a few things I had overlooked.

“The kingdom is under a...uh...” Clarice scratched her head for a moment with an equally determined and irritated expression on her face, “Damnit! What’s that word?!” She looked at me expectantly, “You know, when a senior advisor takes the throne because the next king is too young?”

“A regency?” I suggested.

“Yes!” Clarice exclaimed in relief, “Thank you!” She let out a deep sigh, “Well, from what I heard, the old king and queen died during the last war. So the old King’s brother is filling the role as regent till his nephew is old enough to take the throne.”

“And the uncle isn’t just seizing control and keeping his nephew locked away to stay in power?” I asked somewhat jokingly, a sizable collection of books and movies already casting the uncle in a poor light despite the fact I knew next to nothing about him.

Clarice shook her head, “I don’t think so. I mean, from what I heard, he passed up the crown the first time around and let his younger brother inherit instead.” She shrugged apologetically, “Nadine or Emelia could tell you more, being natives and all.”

“Wait, what?” I stared at Clarice in surprise for a moment, “You aren’t from Asrus kingdom?” I asked curiously.

Clarice snorted and shook her head, “Do I look like-” Her smirk slipped and was replaced with an expression of realisation, “-Oh...right...you did say something about lots of different looking people all living together where you are from huh?”

I nodded and motioned for her to elaborate a little.

“Well. I guess you could say I technically belong to the Werrian Empire,” Clarice stated dourly, a sour expression fixed on her face, “You remember how I told you about the fighting pits and arenas for exhibition fights?”

I nodded again and winced a little as I realised where her explanation was headed.

“Well, slaves have no citizenship, no rights. My mom and dad were both slaves. But my mom was a house slave and my dad a pit slave,” Clarice explained somewhat woodenly, “Apparently dad was quite the fighter and the family that owned them decided it would be a waste not to try and breed a bloodline of champions...” Her mood darkened still further, “I have two older brothers I never had a chance to know...They were sold before I was even born...I would have been sold too, but I was a girl!” Clarice snorted derisively and shook her head in contempt, amusement and disgust, “Anyway, the family let my mom and me go after my dad died...He took a dive and made the family a lot of money...mom said letting us go was one of his conditions for going through with it, but I think the fat sack of shit that made him do it just couldn’t stand to look at us anymore.”

I didn’t know what to say, so I just tried my best to process everything.

“You probably think I’m a hypocrite huh?” Clarice asked dryly and chuckled. “I guess I am. First chance I had at bossing around a slave of my own and I didn’t even think twice...” A pained and guilty expression darkened her face, “I...I know it doesn’t forgive what I did, but where I grew up, almost everyone I knew was a slave...I...I pretty much figured that since you were just a monster that it didn’t matter...like we were taking in a sort of pet...I’m such a piece of shit,” Clarice got to her feet and aggressively kicked a chunk of charcoal into the pond.

“Well...It wasn’t entirely your fault,” I let out a deep sigh and thought back to how I had behaved upon first arriving in the Labyrinth. I was so shell shocked and depressed that I had pretty much decided to just do whatever they told me to. Of course, knowing what I know now, I could have broken free at any time, or at least demonstrated significant resistance. But I didn’t. “A pet huh? It doesn’t seem that far off the mark from what I remember,” I agreed wryly and chuckled.

Clarice gave me a long hard look, her fiery red hair matching the intensity of her eyes as she stared at me for a short while. Shaking her head, Clarice smirked, “A stray dog really. You were just glad for the attention.”

I shrugged, that was actually not a bad comparison.

“Speaking of which...” Clarice nodded her head towards a trio of new arrivals that seemed intent on having a few words with me themselves.

Resembling a cross between the werewolves seen in horror or action movies and a hyena, the trio of Gnolls had been amongst the slaves the army freed from the Slaver’s imprisonment. They had been recruited by Lash, so I hadn’t gotten a particularly good look at them at the time. The smallest, a male, was wearing hide armour that although crudely sewn together, was surprisingly well made.

Similarly, the two larger Gnolls trailing slightly farther behind, which I was somewhat surprised were female, as this was the first instance of significant sexual dimorphism I had witnessed so far in the humanoid species of monsters. Both females were wearing belts packed with bone and stone tools as well as wearing the same mass-produced loincloths and chest bindings we had provided for all the refugees.

“Heeheehee, Lord?” The slightly larger female asked, her nervous giggling far easier to read than the Gnoll’s dog-like facial expressions. The other female and the male echoed the nervous giggling as well, although somewhat quieter.

“Yes? Is there a problem?” I asked, getting to my feet to buy some time while I searched for their names. Now standing up, the Gnolls appearance was even stranger.

Their hunched backs and large thick necks bowed down and left their heads roughly on level with their chests. So rather than standing at roughly the same height as myself or Lash, the Gnolls were almost a couple of feet shorter.

“Heeheehee,” The three Gnolls giggled nervously again and the male took a half step back before tentatively stepping forward again.

“No Lord!” The larger female, Shakti or perhaps Yona, excitedly raised her large clawed hands placatingly, “Heehee, we have skill in crafting armour, can help, yes?” She and the other female gave the smaller male a shove, prompting him to move about and showcase their handiwork.

Already rather impressed with what they had managed in such a short period of time, and after apparently making their own tools as well, I was surprised even further when I noticed the male Gnoll, Gharn, drew a sizable saw bladed club off his back.

A strange cross between a bludgeoning and slashing weapon, the Gnolls had anchored sharp teeth into one side of the club, creating a sort of saw-bladed sword.

Gharn seemed to have a large handled stone knife in his belt as well, although he didn’t seem nearly so eager to show it off.

“Impressive,” I took a closer look and tested some of the seams on the hide armour. Despite the relatively loose corded stitching, the armour had deceptively high durability. It wasn’t until I leveraged close to my full strength at trying to draw opposing sides of a seam apart that I finally felt the hide fibres begin to give. I made sure to stop before doing any real permanent damage and tested another seam. “Have you asked the smiths for metal tools?” I asked curiously, already very impressed with what they had accomplished with such primitive tools.

“Heeheehee, no, Lord,” The largest female nervously and excitedly shook her head. “Wanted to show skill first, heehee, earn place in tribe!”

While I couldn’t fault her logic, I still felt a little awkward at the prospect of requiring the refugees to prove their value to me personally before being accepted. As far as I was concerned, so long as they were willing to pull their own weight, it was more than enough. “Well, we can certainly use your skills,” I agreed, “You should talk to the smiths about making you some iron tools to make the work more efficient, and if anyone asks to learn from you, I would appreciate it if you did your best to teach them. We don’t have nearly enough iron to make armour for everyone, so producing hide armour of this quality is a high priority.”

“Heeheehee!” The trio of Gnolls giggled excitedly with one another before the larger female bowed her head slightly, “We will do!” The gnolls then energetically loped off towards the distant clamour of the smithy. To my surprise, they proved perfectly capable of accelerating and raising their running speed by running on all fours. I made a point of remembering that for later.

Even though the Deep orcs were capable of making crude hide armour, it was nothing compared to what the Gnolls had managed to piece together. This seemed to suggest that the Gnolls had a knack or wealth of pre-encoded knowledge for crafting primitive weapons and hide armour. Although there was the possibility that perhaps the Slaver had acquired them specifically because they were the craftsmen of their tribe, I found that possibility unlikely, although it did raise other questions. “Clarice?”

“Mmm?” Clarice had been just as distracted by the loping sprint of the Gnolls as I was.

“What did you think?” I asked.

“About the quality of the gear they made?” Clarie was thoughtful for a moment and then shrugged a little, “Seemed pretty good I guess. If you could get higher tier monster hides, I wouldn’t mind a custom-fitted set of armour.”

“Not an iron breastplate or something like that?” I asked curiously.

Clarice gave me a bemused look and shook her head, “Low tier iron is fine and all Tim, but it’s heavy. Most monster hides are really strong though, depending on what it belonged to originally. It’s one of the reasons why hide and leather armour gets more common as you progress through the Labyrinth.”

“Wait a sec. Tier of iron?” I asked sceptically.

“Yeah,” Clarice gave me the same bemused look again, “The metals from the Labyrinths have innate magical properties that make them more durable, and of course, more valuable. I don’t really know much more about it, but the iron the Deep orcs are working with has gotta be low tier given we are only on the third floor,” she shrugged, ”It’s still better than regular iron though. I think the army has equipment made from tier three iron made into steel? Or maybe it was tier two? I dunno, I wasn’t really paying attention when someone was telling me about it.”

“Huh...” It made sense that stronger monsters would have stronger skins, making for more effective armour. But I hadn’t really considered the possibility of a mundane resource like iron being made stronger by the Labyrinths. If I was being brutally honest with myself, it was not welcome news at all. It only made the prospect of facing high-level adventurers even more daunting.

The real disadvantage of humans was their lack of Racial Abilities. But A high level adventurer wearing impenetrable steel armour would still pose a significant threat if they knew how to capitalize on their advantages. Then there was the prospect of razor-sharp high tier steel arrows and crossbow bolts. I slowly realised that my hopes for fortifying and remaining in Sanctuary indefinitely were doomed from the start.

There was a silver lining though. No matter how well the humans could adapt and turn the resources of the Labyrinths to their advantage, there were still evidently very real limits on how far they could go. The girls had all stated as much before. No one had ever reached the end of the Labyrinths. That meant that at a certain point, adaptation and ingenuity simply weren’t enough, and that if you wanted to survive you would need the natural advantages of monsters to go further.

Hypothetically, that meant that so long as I could progress to that level, then the humans would become a non-threat. Similarly, I could only hope that it would make dealing with hostile psychos like the Awakened an incredibly rare occurrence as well.

Right...the Awakened...

My expression soured even further, “What do you think we should do about the undead?” I asked dourly.

Clarice sighed and took a seat by the cooking fire again, “I dunno. Usually, the army gets called in when something like this happens. Have you tried asking them what they plan on doing about it?” She asked and vaguely pointed towards the army’s camp.

I shook my head and felt a surge of embarrassment, “ I had other things on my mind,” I sighed.

“Oh?” Clarice raised an eyebrow curiously.

“They want to buy some of the Classes I know how to unlock,” I explained. “Which is why I was asking you those other questions earlier.

“Huh...” Clarice looked a little surprised, “I honestly didn’t think you would be interested in selling off your secrets,” she commented glibly.

“Well...I’m not a huge fan of the idea, but Sanctuary needs an ally to keep the adventurers Guild in check,” I explained a little tiredly.

Clarice nodded in understanding, “Right, that makes sense,” She agreed, “But you aren’t just going to give that information to them right?”

“Yeah. I was going to do something like what I assume the Adventurers Guild does,” It had been a while since the girls had vaguely explained some of the processes to me, so I was making an educated guess really.

Clarice nodded again and seemed more at ease, “Which Classes were they after? Or did you approach them first?” She asked curiously.

“They wanted the Surgeon Classes and the Monster Tamer-” I began to explain but was cut off by an outburst from Clarice.

“Wait a minute! You know how to unlock the Monster Tamer Class?! Since when?!” Clarice demanded.

I tried to remember when exactly, but shrugged, “Not too long after you guys left, I guess?” I replied somewhat lamely, “Why? Were you thinking about changing Classes?” I joked.

Clarice’s expression became complicated and let out a deep sigh, “Maybe? I dunno...” She frowned somewhat and stared into the fire for a bit.

“There are others too,” I prompted, trying to lure Clarice out of her unexpected funk, “There was an Advanced Class for it too, the Beast Tamer, and another Advanced Class called the Wrangler, although I am not really sure what it does.”

Clarice’s expression lightened somewhat and she seemed as curious as she was incredulous by what I had claimed, “Really?” Clarice asked, “I don’t think I have heard of the Wrangler either. What did you do to unlock them?” She demanded jokingly.

I grinned and scratched a little awkwardly at the back of my head, “I wrestled with a Swamp Lurker,” I chuckled.

Clarice choked a little on her own saliva, “What?!” She coughed incredulously.

“Well, I was thinking about how exactly they could teach someone like Emelia how to unlock the Monster Tamer Class. So I figured since Emelia isn’t all that big on reading, or doing anything overly time consuming or focus intensive, that it had to be relatively simple-”

“So you just decided to wrestle a Swamp Lurker?!” Clarice demanded incredulously and punched me in the arm for emphasis, “Bloody hell Tim...”

“It’s not as dangerous as you think,” I complained defensively, “Their jaw strength is all about keeping their mouth closed and clamped down tight on whatever is in their mouth. It’s actually really bad at opening its mouth once you pin it shut-”

“But how in the hell did you know that before doing it?!” Clarice demanded angrily.

I raised both hands placatingly, “People used to do stuff like this all the time back in my world. Since the Swamp Lurkers were so similar, I kinda figured they would have the same weakness.”

Clarice had raised her fist to strike again, but stopped, “Really?” Her incredulous and baffled expression more or less mirrored the same as those worn by tourists and bystanders receiving the prep talk before a reptile show.

“Yup. It seems crazy, I know. But once you see it in action, it makes a lot of sense, hehe,” I explained with an amused chuckle.

“So you just need to wrestle a Swamp Lurker?” Clarice asked incredulously.

“Well, you need to put a slave collar on it too,” I clarified, “But yeah, that’s pretty much it.”

“Is THAT why there are some of those Swamp Lurkers lazing around the camp?!” Clarice demanded, pointing over at one such Swamp Lurker sunbathing by the pond.

“Well...kind of...I taught Lash and some of the Serpent-Kin how to unlock the Classes too. The Monster Tamer turned out to be a good alternative to the Slaver and Taskmaster Classes for providing a Leadership Class qualification.”

“What?...Leadership Class qualification?” Clarice gave me a confused look.

“Right...” I had forgotten that I didn’t get a chance to talk this through with Clarice and the others before they left. “It’s one of the requirements for the Leadership Master Classes,” I explained somewhat sheepishly.

Clarice let out a prolonged sigh and gave me a semi-defeated look, “AAAARGH! Really?!...”

I nodded.

Clarice took a minute to calm down, “Okay...What is a Leadership Master Class?! Cause I’ll be honest Tim, it sounds like some bullshit Nadine would come up with.”

I spent close to half an hour more or less repeating everything Gric had told me, adding some of my own observations here and there to contextualize things a bit.

“So...It’s like A Master Tier Class that focuses on leadership then?” Clarice summed up somewhat dismissively.

I shrugged, “Basically? I guess that’s just about it.”

“And you can’t make any more right now?” Clarice added.

I nodded, “Sanctuary’s population would need to grow larger,” I clarified.

A long silence passed between us.

“Do you think I could get one of those fancy Underlord promotions down the line?” Clarice asked semi-jokingly, the intense light of the fire reflected in her eyes betraying a deeper expectation and need.

I took a few moments to think about it and couldn’t really see a reason why not. Clarice had proven herself as much, or more, than anyone else I had already promoted. I was also curious to see what would happen if I promoted a human, or if the Labyrinth would even allow it.

“Okay,” I agreed seriously, “I am not sure it’s even possible, but after two positions open up, I will try to give you a promotion. How about that?”

“Two?” Clarice asked, clearly confused.

I grinned and chuckled a little to myself, “Yeah, two. I already promised Wraithe the next promotion.”

“Wraithe is?...The rat Daemon?” Clarice asked uncertainly.

“Yeah,” I smiled proudly, “She’s earned it.”

“Oh?” Clarice gave me a curious look and motioned for me to elaborate, “What did the Daemon do that impressed you so much?”

I grinned, “She stood up to Gric.”

Clarice looked confused, “Seriously? Is that all?”

I gave Clarice a weighty look, “I don’t think you understand how significant that is.”

Clarice shrugged, “She didn’t blindly do what the other Daemon told her to, what's the big deal?”

“I know you haven’t spent as much time with the Daemons as I have, but do you remember ANY of the other Daemons disobeying Gric?” I asked pointedly.

Clarice furrowed her brows for a moment and then shook her head, “I don’t think so.”

“You should go talk to Wraithe about it,” I suggested, “She was at her wits end over it. Disobeying orders goes against Daemons inbuilt hierarchy.”

Clarice frowned, “So why are you rewarding Wraithe for ignoring Gric?” She demanded incredulously, “Seems pretty arbitrary Tim.”

“Because,” I stared pointedly into Clarice’s eyes, “I would rather have people willing to stand up and do what is hard, rather than a mess of ineffectual sycophants.”

Contrary to what I expected, Clarice smiled and nodded thoughtfully. “I think I get what you mean,” she agreed. “I think I have a few ideas for how we can fight off the undead,” Clarice added after a short pause, “But you are definitely going to have to get the Asrusian army on board for it to work.”

A little surprised, I couldn’t help but wonder if Wraithe’s promotion was bearing unexpected fruit. While I had intended for it to be a kick in the pants for the Daemons, I hadn’t given much thought to how Nadine, Emelia, or Clarice would react. “All right Clarice, I’m all ears, what’s the plan?”

*****

Jacque impassively considered the buzzing crowd of the tavern. The sheer number of people present discouraged her from rifling through any one person's thoughts for fear of getting a headache from the ‘background noise’. All the same, she kept a careful eye out for her contact.

After close to a half-hour of nursing her second glass of wine, Jacque felt a familiar presence approaching her from behind. “You took your time,” Jacque hissed irritably and downed the remaining contents of her glass in one gulp.

A short man with dark greasy hair tied back in a loose ponytail sat himself down next to her and smiled, “Pleasant as ever,” he chortled, his breath carrying the strong scent of peppermint.

Jacque made a point of not reading his thoughts. She had made that mistake before and it had taken days to drink away the worst parts from her memory. “Do you have the letter or not?” Jacque asked tiredly, glaring at the short man from the corner of her eye.

Her disdain only caused the man to grin wider, “Don’t be like that. We can share a few drinks together, whaddya say?”

“That if you don’t give me the damned letter in the next ten seconds, I’ll ram this glass somewhere particularly unpleasant,” Jacque replied coldly.

The dark haired man flinched involuntarily before regaining his composure, “You know,” he said somewhat bitterly, “Master Barrus says I show real promise you know! So you would do well to be nicer to me!” He sneered.

Jacque didn’t doubt him. Dale was a contemptible human being with borderline non-existent morals. Naturally, it would only be a matter of time before her handlers elevated him from errand boy to junior member. Even so, Jacque could just as easily work with his contempt as the alternative, so she would continue taking the less repugnant route. “The letter?” Jacque repeated contemptuously, deliberately aggravating Dale further.

Dale smiled stiffly and removed a card envelope from his chest pocket.

Without waiting for him to hand it over, Jacque snatched the envelope, got to her feet and headed towards the door. Without looking back, she could tell Dale was no doubt ogling her even as he tried to think of some form of cutting remark. Jacque pushed him from her mind and focused on the envelope as she briskly walked down the street.

Near as she could tell, there were at least three men and one woman tailing her, and unlike the thieves and beggars she was used to dealing with, these people were professionals. Secretly, Jacque hoped that one or more of her pursuers would break off and chase down Dale instead. Unfortunately, she knew there would be no such luck. After all, Dale almost certainly already had a dedicated tail of his own.

The prospect of being a spy had once been exciting, but as the years wore on, Jacque had come to hate it with a deep burning passion. For the most part, it was being required to follow orders that irked her. To make things worse, working for genuinely vile people and furthering their agendas was like bathing her soul in raw sewage.

Even though Jacque knew she was not a good person by any realistic degree, she had limits, standards. Her handlers did not.

Ducking into an alley, Jacque felt her pursuers pause for only a moment before continuing to trail her from the nearby rooftops. They were hastily putting together a plan to ambush and capture her, as much for the contents of the envelope as Jacque’s mind.

To their credit, they were difficult to read. Their minds were hard, determined and focused solely on her and their underlying objective. Unfortunately, that was all Jacque needed.

Drawing a concealed dagger from her leather jacket, Jacque spun on the spot and drove it hilt deep into the neck of a tall man that was two steps behind her. He had been silent as a cat, and Jacque hadn’t even heard so much as a single footfall. If it hadn’t been for his methodical internal monologue, she wouldn’t have dared let him get so close.

Watching the man fall to his knees, Jacque released her dagger, leaving it in his throat in order to give him a slim chance at survival. Pulling a cudgel from her belt, Jacque hopped to the side just in time for an arrow to thrum past her thigh and skitter down the cobbled alleyway.

Just like his companion, the archer was narrating his actions in his mind, like a checklist. It was a habit shared by almost every human Jacque had encountered since coming to this world. As far as she was concerned, it represented a relatively healthy mind. The only ones who didn’t engage in the ephemeral monologuing were more than a little unhinged or not all there.

Knowing her pursuers were still aiming to capture her alive, Jacque saw no real need to take unnecessary risks, content to simply counter their efforts for the time being as she slowly backed away down the alley.

The wounded man was now holding a wad of bandages to his throat and was laying on his back. Judging by the sudden shift in his thoughts and how relatively erratic they had become, Jacque doubted he would survive.

Jacque hesitated. With the man's composure compromised, she had unwittingly glimpsed deeper into his mind than she intended and seen far more than she wanted to. Jacque limited herself to surface level thoughts not only because going deeper was often difficult, but because going deeper touched upon true memories and emotions.

Bitterly pulling a small vial from her jacket, Jacque nimbly dodged another pair of arrows and uncorked the vial with her teeth. True healing potions like this one were extremely rare. You couldn’t buy them with money, you could only earn them by completing dangerous quests.

Jacque deftly knelt down beside the dying man and upended the contents of the vial into his mouth. When he stubbornly tried to spit it out, she smacked him over the head with her cudgel, knocking him out cold. There was no real risk of drowning, the healing potion would be absorbed into his bloodstream long before then.

Somersaulting backwards, Jacque narrowly missed the skull splitting strike of a two handed blow from the female pursuer's own much larger cudgel.

Just like the first man, she was tall and well-muscled, though not to the point of being bulky. Despite her momentary confusion over Jacque’s seemingly miraculous dodging ability, she was otherwise unperturbed.

Breaking into a run, Jacque maintained a steady reliable pace. With only two of the original four pursuers still on her tail, she was confident in her ability to lose them without too much more effort. In fact, just to make absolutely sure, Jacque drastically altered her appearance and ran back out onto the main street again. Then, just like she had done so many times before, she began casually wandering around and waited for her former pursuers to catch up.

It was a relatively bad habit Jacque had picked up in her early years after being reborn as an Awakened. Even though there was rarely anything to be gained by so recklessly taunting her opponents like this, she couldn’t help it.

As Jacque expected, less than a minute later, a cloaked man and the woman from earlier rushed out onto the street, their heads quickly swivelling one way and then another as they tried to pick up her trail.

Casually leaning by the window of a bakery, Jacque picked under her nails with a spare dagger, her narrowed eyes trailing the pair from beneath her eyelashes with practised ease and nonchalance.

Even though Jacque had not changed her clothing, the pursuers had no way of knowing that the tall dark skinned tomboy with fiery red hair was in any way related to the pale-skinned dainty looking blonde they had been trailing only moments before.

All the same, they did not leave. This was a common enough occurrence as well that Jacque didn’t really think much of it. Sometimes, the people sent to tail her had strong instincts and knew she was toying with them, watching them from somewhere close by. For these occasions, Jacque had another trick up her sleeve.

Acting as if to draw the envelope from her chest pocket, Jacque almost immediately regained the attention of both pursuers, if only for the apparent familiarity of her choice in clothing. Remaining calm, Jacque withdrew a small battered pipe and pressed it to her lips. Pulling out a small pinch of dried herbs from another pocket, she deftly packed them down into the bowl of the pipe and lit them by magnifying the sun through a copper sized piece of glass.

Despite smelling similar to a popular narcotic, the dried herbs in Jacque's pipe were benign. Taking a deep pull, she let out a cloud of the sweet smelling smoke and slowly began walking in the direction of the city gates, pretending not to notice the man and woman beelining for her from across the street. Replacing her lighting glass in her pocket, Jacque felt the anticipated tug and lightening of her belt.

Careful not to react too quickly, Jacque looked pointedly towards a nearby food cart and reached for her belt. Only, her fingers closed around only empty air. Feigning surprise, she looked down and patted her belt. The pick pocket had cleanly cut away her belt pouch, strap and all. It was little more than a decoy, containing only a few copper coins, but Jacque played it up all the same before storming off down the street again.

To their credit, Jacque's pursuers followed her as far as the southern gate before finally seeming to give up.

Far too experienced to make a mistake, Jacque continued walking for well over another hour until she surreptitiously removed the envelope from her jacket pocket. She broke the wax seal and mangled both pieces until they were unrecognisable and stowed them away in her pants pocket. Scanning the diaphanous paper within the card envelope, Jacque rolled her eyes as she caught a whiff of the sender's signature perfume.

With the amount of effort Jacque was expected to perform on their behalf, it aggravated her to no end that her ‘handler’ was so narcissistically careless. Anyone with half a brain would immediately be able to identify the idiot by taking a short sniff of the envelope. But it would still be considered Jacque’s fault if they were ‘unmasked’. They were so cocky at this point that Jacque seriously wondered why they were bothering with all the secrecy. The fact that Dale had a tail of his own made it abundantly clear that they already knew who Jacque’s handler was. So the best they could hope for was fishing for information.

“Fucking shit heads!” Jacque cursed as she crumpled the paper and envelope into a ball then set it alight with the ash from her pipe. Lobbing the small fireball off into the road, Jacque seethed. A killer she may be, but Jacque had standards! If it weren’t for the leverage they held over her, Jacque would have gutted each of those bastards for even considering what they had just demanded of her.

Turning back to look at the distant walls of Hurst for only a moment, Jacque considered going back. Despite knowing very little about him, she knew that if she explained her situation, he would at least hear her out. Hell, the prospect of her preposed suicide mission might even work in her favour.

However, as quickly as she considered it, Jacque knew she was only fooling herself. She had only one choice, and that was to do as her handlers wanted. Even if it meant murdering a child. After all, what help could one Ogre be against an entire army?