Invent ~ 7!

“Bauen, sorry to say, I have another request to make.” Joe skid to a stop atop some rubble, his leap over here having him landing on some shattered roofing. “I need to find someone that can help me design a building. You have any architects in your entourage?”

“No…” Bauen paused, hesitant to speak further, but finally couldn’t hold back his words. “Joe, that is… Major-General, I need to explain something that is a bit of a difficult conversation. We’re here and doing various projects based on an amount of reputation offered by the Legion before this place became yours. That amount is beginning to run dry, and if we aren’t given proper payment for future projects… the vast majority of my team will need to leave. I plan to stay and attempt to get Havoc to teach me some tricks, but there’s only so useful a single Dwarf can be to you.”

“I see. It’s just a money thing?” Joe was disappointed, but that wasn’t fair to the Dwarf. It was likely that he had a well-paying career as an engineer that he was considering giving up for a chance to learn from a Grandmaster. “I guess I’ll need to figure out how to earn some serious reputation.”

“Will… how much do you spend every day?” Bauen tapped at the railing he was holding onto, eyeing Joe as if the human were making a joke in poor taste. “Will taxes not be enough?”

“Taxes? Oh, snap! I’ll get the taxes from this place?” Joe almost smacked himself for acting the fool. “Of course I will. I own the town. I’m guessing there’s a tax that the Oligarchy takes as a whole, but I’m a landowner with a large amount of land, and I don’t even need to hire other people to build or invest in the buildings?”

He walked away from the Dwarf slightly as he muttered to himself, but his eyes snapped back to Bauen in the next instant. “If you had an unlimited budget… what improvements would you make to this place?”

The Dwarf shrugged as he looked around. “I mean. This could be an amazing fortress, completely impenetrable. A sanctum for all of Dwarvenkind if the buildings were a high enough tier. Problem with impenetrable fortresses, no way in, means no way out. If you wanna go that route, you’d need to make this place entirely self-sufficient. Food, greenspaces, workshops… mines, cropland, air and water purification.”

Joe interrupted as politely as possible. “I can’t make it a fortress; I need to build it up through being a town. It needs defenses, of course, but…”

“Yikes… that’s gonna be tough, so close to Elven territory.” Bauen waved Joe off. “I need to work; you need to find ways to build things and hire people.”

“Understood. Let’s have a conversation later, though? Have a good one.” Joe called distractedly. “I need to get resources and scan Common buildings. I have a ton of interesting blueprints, but I had specifically gone after Rare or better, and I can’t think of anything in there that would be helpful here.”

“Can I make a suggestion?” Major Cleave offered, her unexpected words causing Joe to shout and vault fourteen feet away before whirling to look at her with surprise etched onto his face. “You forgot that I was here… sir?”

“Did you take a stealth skill recently?” Joe grabbedf at his wildly beating heart and frowned. He flexed his mana, collapsing his active skills, then pulling Exquisite Shell and Neutrality Aura back and into full power. Now more comfortable in his own skin, and secure in his defenses, he nodded at Cleave. “Pardon my rudeness. Please, go ahead?”

“The city planner almost certainly has connections with architects.” Cleave’s voice had just a hint of a begrudging tone. “I’m certain that you could get introduced faster by going through him. Beyond that, someone like you should absolutely hire an administrator that can make day to day choices for this place, as well as promoting it and handing you a schedule of tasks that need your personal attention.”

Joe watched her in amazement. She had never spoken this much to him, and he realized that he had a very weak grasp on her abilities. “I suppose they wouldn’t have promoted you to Major if all you could do was hit things. Thank you. Please let me know how I can be doing better, and… I hope we can have a cordial relationship going forward.”

A corner of her mustache was twitching, either in rage or mirth, but Major Cleave merely nodded at him. Joe thanked her again, then moved to find the city planner. He found Ciril glaring at his workshop with bloodshot eyes. “Hello, Ciril! I was hoping-”

“This is in the wrong spot, Joe.” Ciril the city planner spat at him, his unblinking eyes zeroing in on the Reductionist. “It’s six centimeters too far left, and the angle of the foundation is thirty-eight degrees off. Do you know what this means?”

“That… the plan you had drawn up needs to be altered?” Joe shrugged at that but couldn’t feel too bad. “I’m sorry, I thought it was correct. I must have missed my-”

A bark of anger cut him off. “No. It means that the roads planned through this area will not be wide enough to move large projects. That means fewer buildings will be able to be placed, and-”

“It means,” Joe growled at the Dwarf in turn, “That the plan will need to be altered. I’m sorry, these things happen. I apologize, putting this here without double checking was an accident, and I will endeavor to ensure that future projects align properly.”

Ciril stared at Joe, only eventually looking away with a sneer. “What do you want?”

Awkwardly clearing his throat, Joe mumbled a few words, then looked up at Ciril. “I was hoping for a favor-”

“Ha!” The Dwarf looked back at the building and started walking away.

“Oh, that’s fine.” Joe spoke nonchalantly, turning and walking away. “I was hoping to use your recommendations for building design, material selection, and so on. I guess I’ll figure it out on my own and slap the building down as soon as I’m ready.”

“Let’s not be all hasty.” Ciril was at Joe’s elbow in the same instant. “Accidents happen, and tempers flare at odd times. We can always work for the betterment of the Dwarven nation. Together, like. See?”

“I sure do. Let’s be friends.” Joe aggressively asserted as they got down to discussing details. A few minutes later, Ciril had written out a letter of recommendation and told him how to find the ‘best construction company in Svaltarheim’. They wrapped up, and went their separate ways, but Joe mentioned one small thing just before he hustled to the tunnels leading to the surface. “As soon as I get back, I’ll try to raise some apartments and a barracks. Make sure you know where you want me to put them. Also, get a few work crews to start combining all the rubble! I’ll clean that all up!”

“Yeah, yeah.” came the grumbling reply. “I got one more week here, then someone is gonna be payin’ through the nose.”

Joe and Major Cleave were once more on their way to the city, but as they weren’t being chased by an unknown murder-golem, they were able to step into the command tent and teleport directly to the Capital by paying a hefty sum of reputation.

By the time they got through the teleportation customs check -something he noted that Havoc had never been bothered with—twilight was approaching. Joe paused for a moment, realizing that he hadn’t slept in days. He had died once in that timeframe, but that hadn’t exactly been restful. “Major, do we need less sleep as we gain a higher Constitution?”

“Yup. I sleep only about once a month for about four hours at a time.” She replied instantly. “That’s how we can work long hours and not complain about no free time.”

“I see.” He inspected himself, realizing that he didn’t even feel tired. “Status.”

Name: Joe ‘Tatum’s Chosen Legend’ Class: Reductionist

Profession I: Arcanologist (Max)

Profession II: Ritualistic Alchemist (1/20)

Profession III: None

Character Level: 21 Exp: 236,309 Exp to next level: 16,691

Rituarchitect Level: 10 Exp: 45,000 Exp to next level: 10,000

Reductionist Level: 2 Exp: 4,636 Exp to next level: 1,364

Hit Points: 1,864/1,864

Mana: 4,955/6,788

Mana regen: 52.7/sec

Stamina: 1,524/1,524

Stamina regen: 6.46/sec

Characteristic: Raw score

Strength: 146

Dexterity: 146

Constitution: 142

Intelligence: 152

Wisdom: 133

Dark Charisma: 100

Perception: 137

Luck: 79

Karmic Luck: 15

Nothing wildly different from previous, but his eyes lingered on his massive mana pool. Even though he had a solid fifteen hundred mana reserved at all times for his three almost-always-on spells, he had more mana than he knew what to do with. “I gotta get some huge cores and make a few utterly massive Mana Batteries.”

They soon found their way into the city and to the recommended construction group, which was open despite the hour; further proving Major Cleave’s point about higher Constitution. It took a solid hour of discussion, and a hefty cost of a thousand reputation with the Dwarven Oligarchy, but they were given a limited license for Joe to scan any of the buildings on a list they provided, so long as they were only ever built in his own area.

Joe, finding that he appreciated the group, hired them to design a Rare or Uncommon building, whichever would work best. After describing the garbage-to-aspect building design he had made during his last stint in the dump below the city, and paying another five hundred reputation as a down payment for their work, he wandered out into the street.

“Back to the Shoe?” Cleave inquired with a tiny groan.

“No, not quite yet.” Joe looked toward the city center, which was well-lit and full of life still. “Haven’t hired someone I can shuffle all my work onto yet. Let’s go find ourselves an administrator so I can get back to being neck deep in magic. Mate, two coffees, please. It’s gonna be a long night.”

*Burble!* came the happy reply from the stain on his sleeve. Joe was pleased to see Cleave jump back in shock, then less pleased when he needed to dive out of the way of a great axe aimed at cutting off his arm.

“Something’s on you!” The swings were coming rapid-fire, and only Joe’s Exquisite Shell kept her from disarming him.

“Whaa! Wait! It’s just my coffee elemental!”