Master of the Hoard - Chapter 28 (Patreon)

In the end, that amounted to three hours of hard work. Transporting the corpses was hard enough in itself. They were heavy, cumbersome and I had to move them by myself for the first half mile. That's how long it took until the water started to recede to a level where the Crawls and Talpi could start to help. Five hundred feet further down the tunnel, the water started trickling down a side tunnel, allowing me to leave the bodies for the others to take over. At long last, I allowed myself to slump down on the hard floor with a satisfied sigh and check over my notifications. There were no surprises this time – but even so, the experience gain was substantial.

A single one of the creatures had been worth 1900 xp – more than half of the Clenchers, and - whaddayaknowit - I had managed to tag every single one of them with one of my attacks, meaning I got the full reward. That meant that I gained levels 11 and 12 at once. I decided that I needed to alter my approach, and increased my Agility, Mental Control and Mental Power. That would gain me some much needed Mental Power, while still allowing me to run fast and regenerate my mana within a single day.

I took in the massive pile of the gathered bodies before me. Even with me doing my part of the carrying, we would probably have several round trips. With luck, this should go part ways toward the end goal of self-sufficiency. I closed my eyes, letting my senses rove over the working creatures. There was an undercurrent of an emotion I'd come to associate with business - the half-satisfied sensation of somebody engrossed in their work. Beyond that, my minions were spilling over with satisfaction, celebration and, especially from the Crawls, awe. Oh, and trepidation from a certain nearby shaman apprentice who was glancing at me every other second from the other side of the tunnel.

I let him stew for a while, calling over one of the Crawls. He moved closer with clear reluctance. This one was... average. Plenty of ugly folds, but not more than the average. No hair, like the rest of them. An oft-broken flat nose was the only thing to set him apart. "Your name?" I asked.

"Tul." The mental voice came across lighter than Erks.

I wondered about that and spoke. "Are you a female?"

"Yes."

Huh. I could see not a single thing that set her apart from the males. Thank God they wore clothes, though. Some things weren't meant for human - or dragon - eyes. I asked, curious to see if I could get her to talking. "Did you gain any levels?"

"Yes." There was a pause, while she looked to struggle with something. Eventually, she settled on, "more."

Amazing. Another follower of the Erk school of conversation. "Good. Tell me. How was the fight?"

I watched her go through several emotions, every one of them writ as clear on her face as it was to my senses. Elation. Awe. Bloodthirst. Frustration? "Good. But not good."

Heh. At least she could always find a job as an oracle or something. "Not good how?"

"No real fight. Need weapon." The words were accompanied by what could only be sincerity. Well, that and a double dose of bloodthirst.

That was an eye-opener. I wanted to make sure of this. "So you wanted to fight too? Did all of you want to join the fight? The Salamanders were a lot bigger than you."

"Yes."

I let the silence stretch until I realized that was all I was going to get. So Crawls weren't just good scrappers - they actually liked battle. Heh. And apparently had no sense of self-preservation. "Alright. Next time we have a battle, I will try to see if I can include you."

"Crawls fight good."

"Yes. Now, back to work with you."

As she ambled back to her mound of meat, I turned towards Creziel. "So. I was owed an explanation, I believe."

The tiny Talpus flinched but held his back straight.

Interesting. I was pushing him a little, to see whether he would find a backbone. It seemed we were getting there. Now I only hoped that he actually had a good explanation.

"I guessed wrong." The explanation came simply and without preamble. "I am not quite used to working with water and I had to guess at how much would come out and how fast. I was wrong. When I delved into the layer of rock to open access to the stream, I sensed that any further movement in the layers could bring everything down on our heads. In short, I dared not risk it."

"That... is a good explanation. Better than what I had expected, really. And taking on the Salamander?"

He flinched. "Initially, we just wanted to run away. But Aelis watched how you weakened the beast - and since it was smaller than the Clenchers and I knew I had the strength to trap it, we decided to risk it."

I fixed him with a heavy stare. "What would've happened if it had broken free?"

"I stayed hidden inside our hole the whole time. Aelis was outside, camouflaged and would have led the animal away, giving me time to escape." He bowed his head. "She insisted that she would be able to escape it without any issues."

Annoyed, I tapped my claws on the ground. "That is... good thinking. And you did well, defending yourself. Still, I don't like you taking chances. Next time, you should both run away instead of putting yourself in such an exposed position."

"Of course, Onyx." The sensations emanating from him said something different, though. Not quite a middle finger, but there was no doubt that he wasn't going to listen to me here. I didn't entirely mind either. As long as he didn't go straight from scaredycat to reckless. At least this was him showing some backbone, which I could appreciate.

I wasn't wrong in my assumptions about the food. It took not two, but three trips, with additional people thrown in the mix to bring home all of the meat, nice claws, skins and teeth we'd managed to harvest from the Salamanders. That part, however, attested to one of the few perks I absolutely loved about being in charge - you get to unload all the braindead manual labor on the shoulders of the poor sods below you in the pecking order. I only made the arrangements with Aelis and then I was able to relax, confident in the knowledge that things were being taken care of.