Samantha said, when I awoke from a brief sleep the next day. Ryker and Ethan had offered to both be “on call” for four hours so I could catch some sleep.

I feel energized, I shot back, smothering a yawn. I can do this.

Samantha said.

And? I have the money. And they are loans, so I’ll get the money back.

Even though dawn was just starting to break, the Merchant’s Faction Store in Reed City was bustling and crowded.

Fortunately, for gold-ranked customers such as myself, I was able to proceed directly past the counter towards one of the building’s private rooms.

The room had a hologram display and an information crystal. I called Mrinda, and after a few minutes of waiting, his hologram appeared in front of me, the fey blinking sleep away from his eyes.

“Ah, yes, Jarek, my favorite customer. Unfortunately, if you are asking about Mana Shards, my answer remains the same. Regulations state that for the next week, you must pay the same price as everyone else—Mana Shards are currently considered a “non-discountable item, under statute 491b. I do wish I could help you, but my hands are tied.”

“That’s not why I’m here,” I said. “I would like to purchase development options for a city.”

Mrinda hummed thoughtfully, clasping his hands behind his back tightly. “Of course! Seeing as you are a Region Lord, and a gold-ranked customer of the Merchant’s Faction, I can certainly assist you in accessing some of the more valuable developmental paths for Reed City. I imagine you’re looking for a more defensive path? Or, perhaps, heavy weaponry for when you are not around?”

“No,” I said, flatly. “I want a mining path.”

Mrinda’s eyes widened in surprise, and then he forcibly relaxed. I could see the muscles in his arms clench tightly, as he continued to hold his hands behind his back, out of my sight.

“Of course,” he said, after a moment’s pause. “Although I wouldn’t recommend such a purchase for Reed City. With my limited knowledge of the city, I don’t believe there are any nearby mines, and it would be something of a waste for a city like this.”

“Let’s leave the city name blank on the forms,” I said, immediately.

“Of course,” Mrinda said, with a smile. “I could just fill in ‘The Crucible,’ though? Save some time?”

I kept my face neutral. “Just leave it blank.”

“Yes, yes,” Mrinda said again. He flicked his fingers in the air a few times, and then said, “Check the Information Crystal in front of you. I sent you the list of available Mining Development Paths. It seems only three default paths are available to you. This restriction is likely due to the earliness of your request. Give it just a few more days, and more advanced options will likely open up.”

The three options were a generic Mining Development Path, a Gem Processing Development Path, and an Ore Processing Development Path.

“I want the Gem path,” I said, immediately.

“Yes, yes,” Mrinda said, his head and neck twitching slightly. “Standard procedure is to pass the development option directly to your Schema menu, but you need to be standing in the city you are developing for the Schema. Shall I meet you in your city and we can finalize the trade there?”

“No need,” I said, thanks to Samantha’s prompting. “Just convert it to a Gem Processing Development Path City Token.”

“That is of course an option,” Mrinda’s smile was beginning to crack. “It will cost you extra, though.”

“Just do it,” I said, waiting.

Mrinda twitched his head and neck again. “Yes, Yes, of course. The total payment will be…40 million coins. For someone of your stature, we are of course able to arrange a down payment and low-interest loan—”

I transferred the 40 million coins through the information crystal.

Mrinda coughed again. His hands made quick, flying gestures in front of me, almost as if he were typing. The movements were terse, tense. “Wonderful, wonderful. Your token should arrive any moment in the deposit box built into the wall. Is there anything else I can help you with?”

“I’d also like to purchase one ton of Steel Ingots, a hundred liters of Jiin oil, and one ton of Standard Bricks.”

Mrinda’s eyes widened slightly. I only had a vague idea why Samantha was telling me to buy all these things, but it seemed Mrinda knew what Samantha was planning.

“Not a problem,” Mrinda said. “Is there anything else I can help you with?” His grinned forcefully at me.

“Yes,” I added. “I’d like to invoke my right to client privacy as a gold-ranked customer.”

“That…won’t be a problem,” Mrinda said, through gritted teeth. “Have a nice day.”

Why’d he push so hard to learn the location? I asked, as I headed towards the Teleportation Circle.

But there is already a Merchant’s Faction store in Nova City. Wouldn’t that already clue them in?

Clever.

Even during my sleep, I had been bleeding money. The attacks on Nova City had never ended, and the 5-million-dollar Mana Crystal was almost depleted. Fortunately, I had Samantha, who didn’t need to sleep, who could let me know if the situation was too drastic.

Upgrading a city meant that the city’s defenses would be temporarily deactivated. So the first thing I had to do was clear the area.

Looking at the thousands of monsters attacking my city put into perspective the size of the Veyrier mines. Every creature around level 55 was most likely a District Lord. And there were five District Lords that I could easily find currently attacking my city. For every District Lord that attacked my city, there was another unexplored cave in the mines.

There were some new, unfamiliar creatures in the mix today, and I didn’t like the looks of them. There was an octopus-like creature that was spewing thick clouds of poisonous, green gas. All the other monsters were giving the octopus a wide berth.

Then there was a thirty-foot-tall humanoid giant to the north of the city. But the strange thing about it, was that it was completely modular.

The giant was made of tens of thousands of grey linked metallic rods and spheres. The rods were about the length of a finger, and the spheres were the size of a grape. It reminded me of the toy magnets I used to play with as a kid. Except that it was giant and probably deadly, like everything else in these godforsaken caves.

Looking closely, I could see that the giant was actually hollow—it was made up of thousands of pyramids formed from rods and spheres, leaving some space and air in between each rod.

Samantha supplied, helpfully.

That sounded like a nightmare to fight. And on top of that, there were the usual monsters—Golems, spirits, Crystal King Crabs, and the goddamn roaches.

Okay, how do I fight it?