[DCI] Chapter 78 - Rank Up (Patreon)

Thankfully, things under the shower were fairly tame. Levia joined me and Aisha soon after the two of us had arrived, slipping under the stream with a blissful sigh. As we kindly washed each other, they still paid quite some attention to my condition, just in case I was holding back again, but their joint efforts had exhausted the powerful effects of the stimulants. Therefore, I was back to my usual state when in front of these two gorgeous beauties.

Drying ourselves up, we strolled back into the apartment, careful not to run into our new friend who might have come out of hiding after noticing the silence. Well, at least I was. Aisha didn’t care in the slightest, parading her lean nude figure for all to see, though mostly for me. She never missed an opportunity to put on a show while watching over her shoulder as my eyes drifted to her feminine charms, which seemed to bring her great entertainment and joy.

Chastised by the lithe Witch, she jumped into tight shorts and a tank top while Levia slipped on a set of white underwear and one of my oversized hoodies. No matter how many clothes we got her, that choice practically never changed from her favorites. There were even times I had caught her nuzzling her cheeks into the fluffy sleeves but I made no effort to point it out, afraid that she might stop being so cute after being caught.

As for me, I barely had enough time to cover myself with some underwear before the eager drakan rushed towards the entrance to our forge. I didn’t want her to spook Shuri, so I caught her charming tail and stopped my mischievous mate just in time, additionally evoking a surprised moan out of her, which brought out a quiet chuckle from Levia. 

With my hands full of the tender appendage, I approached the door with both of the ladies and gently tilted the knob. A little bit of heated-up air hit us in the faces, but it was nothing that would immediately trigger a warning light in our heads. Everything seemed to be fine, at first glance, the oni princess kneeling on the floor in the middle of the room.

At least until my eyes stopped focusing just on her small red frame.

“What the…?” I furrowed my brows in shock and confusion.

“Damn.” Aisha whistled in an impressed tone. “Girl has been almost as busy as we were.”

The entire workshop was covered in sigils, symbols, numbers, words, charts, equations, calculations, and everything else you could possibly imagine. Using white chalk as a pen, someone had turned every surface into a blackboard, including the ceiling. Even the damn ceiling.

How in hell had she reached so far up?

Regardless, the culprit rested on the floor while slumped over another sketch, actively erasing and remaking it, completely unaware of anything happening around them. The warmth was coming from one furnace lazily sizzling in the corner of the workshop. Shuri hadn’t turned on anything else, leaving the hearths lined up through the middle inactive.

All in all, it felt as if we had stepped into the cell of an insane patient in some mental asylum.

Taking a step forward, I tried calling out to the offender. “Shuri? You good?”

The author of the scribbles flinched, paused, and snapped her head up to look at me. Her amber eyes cleared up a bit, then glimmered charmingly with pure ferocity. She launched herself onto her feet and straight at me, briefly making me wonder if I hadn’t accidentally ruined some important part by setting my bare foot over it.

But, no, the wild humanoid projectile halted a hair’s breadth of me and directed those sparkling irises up at my face, a look of euphoric wonder taking over her face and pouty lips.

“You didn’t say you had Darksteel Ore in your stash! Not to mention this much!” Shuri bounced up and down on the balls of her feet. “I can do so much with it! I can throw away this ugly blue thing and make something magnificent instead of focusing on mundane repairs!”

Aisha snorted to the side, crossing her arms under her chest. “Find something slightly better and suddenly gratitude flies out of the window. Typical.”

Our Armorer frowned at that, glancing her way. Then, her eyes widened to the brim and she lost quite some of her infectious energy, looking at me guiltily, starting to knead her t-shirt nervously.

“N-No… I didn’t mean to say that I hate the armor I received as a gift or anything… Or that it’s bad… I just…” Shuri struggled to find the right words to respond.

“Hey. It’s alright.” I rested my palm on top of her black hair and ruffled through it gently with a faint smile. “We all get excited over new toys fairly often, and that includes her too. I understand how you feel in front of an exciting prospect. Don’t let her get to you too much.”

“Thank you…” She ducked her head, looking at the ground as I patted her softly.

“However, would you mind letting us know what those are all about?” I asked curiously and she raised her gaze.

Shuri looked around while blinking mindlessly. Her red skin then turned more like pink as she blanched heavily.

“I’m so, so sorry…” The distressed oni apologized honestly. “I have no idea when this happened… I just came here and noticed the bars of Darksteel near the furnace like—”

“Four hours ago.” Aisha snickered.

“FOUR?!” Shuri’s voice cracked as she shouted in disbelief. “Elders… I must have made you worry… I’m so sorry about that…”

Levia rested a hand on the girl’s shoulder. “We have been busy too so do not blame yourself for it. If it did not take us that long, we would have checked on you much earlier.”

“Ah. Right. The issue with the stimulants.” The oni princess nodded to herself. “How is it?”

“It’s been… resolved.” I cleared my throat.

Turning to me again, she finally noticed my state of undress, and her bright eyes roamed over my front as her cheeks darkened slightly. “Good… Yes, very good… Anyway, I’m still sorry for ruining your workshop. I should have controlled myself better.”

“Eh, at least it’s not as boring as before.” My drakan mate shrugged. “I bet you couldn’t have done many other things in this almost barren chamber.”

“This forge might be very simple, but the ventilation technology is amazing,” Shuri commented. “I threw a bit of ore into that furnace to check how fast it can melt and it’s been really quick. It would be more than enough if only I had my old equipment with me. That’s why I got lost in recalculating everything with what is currently available…”

“Master?” Levia looked up at me with an unspoken question in her wise eyes.

Smiling warmly, I nodded. “We’ll make a list of things you need and get them in a bit. It might also be time to expand this little excuse of a forge into something more proper. I’m not going to force you to work on scraps and substitutes.”

Shuri’s face snapped up to mine in a blink. “Truly? But that would be so expensive.”

Aisha snickered, throwing an arm over my shoulders. “With your rich sugar daddy here, all you should worry about is how to repay him properly for all the incredible gifts he is going to shower you with.”

I swatted her away for the fairly inappropriate joke, evoking a pout from the muscular lady.

“Thank you so much!” Shuri jumped at me, wrapping her arms around my chest with an affectionate hug, completely not caring about the undertone of my mate’s offer. “I will be sure to pay my debts off however I can! I swear!”

We spun around for a while with me having to tilt my head back due to how dangerously close the black tips of her sharp horns came to the level of my eyes. I had to be much more careful with her than with Aisha due to our height difference. With the top of her head barely reaching to the line of my shoulders, those two enchanting spikes extended pretty much right into my forehead.

She took note of that after a while and hastily hopped off me, a bit more nervous about them now.

“Let’s first check all the notifications we have gotten since the battle,” I suggested. “We might have gotten some more tickets or other stuff that could help us make Shuri feel more at home, and there should be at least a few levels waiting for us to check on them too.”

“Notifications?” The person in question tilted her head curiously.

“You shall see.” Levia offered her a delicate smile. “Lucas has impressive means to access information about anything related to the System. He can check plenty of things the very moment they happen.”

We doused the furnace and left the forge. As Aisha and Levia brought Shuri to the PC, I threw some more clothes onto myself to make this less awkward. Looking towards the desk, I found only two additional chairs around mine. There still were more in the kitchen so I wondered about it briefly.

As I approached the trio to ask about it, Levia patted my seat in invitation so I sat down to see what she had in mind. Right away, the dainty Witch hopped into my lap and wiggled her soft butt into a comfortable position, leaning back to rest against me. The other two took the chairs to my left and right respectively.

This quiet minx and her shrewd schemes.

But, I guess it was starting to get crowded in front of the monitor. I would need to figure something out so that we didn’t need to squeeze in the future. Perhaps I should get us a nice TV and hang it on the wall opposite the bed so we would be able to lie down together and operate it with a wireless keyboard and mouse.

I kept forgetting I was now doing well enough to afford extra stuff like that.

“Okay. Let’s go at it chronologically. Any objections?” I glanced between my mates and our new companion.

“None!” Aisha grinned excitedly. “It makes the suspense and surprise even greater like that so show us the goods!”

Shaking my head, I navigated to the oldest one.

★━━━━━━━━━━★

Congratulations!

You have managed to defeat the Blighted Wolfen Alpha and its pack, gathering enough experience to strengthen yourself.

Lucas King: Level 15 -> Level 16

Gained Attribute Points: 12

★━━━━━━━━━━★

“Well, one level is always something,” I said. “This was an Assignment below our current power grading.”

“And we still have the stat points that have accumulated during the previous clear,” Levia pointed out. “If I am not misremembering, this should bring you up to about thirty-two just waiting to be distributed.”

“You are right,” I replied and checked the next one. “Aisha’s message is the same, obviously. We’ve been together since day one.”

“You know it.” The draconic woman nudged me with her elbow. “We’ll be together until the very end too.”

“That is not something that will be unique only to you,” the smart elf pointed out. “I shall be by our master’s side till the end of time as well.”

“Details.” Aisha showed her tongue at Levia. “Next!”

★━━━━━━━━━━★

Congratulations!

As you push through adversity together, your Subordinate has gathered enough experience to strengthen themselves.

Levia: Level 11 -> Level 13

Gained Attribute Points: 20

★━━━━━━━━━━★

“Nice! You got two!” She patted the blue-skinned girl on the thigh. “Maybe we should do as Lucas suggested and let you catch up during the next delve.”

“Catch up?” Shuri asked.

“As an owner of this party, I can change the distribution of experience all of us gain from slaying monsters and finishing tasks,” I explained. “We have previously power-leveled Levia a bit at the start of her journey with us, but maybe the upcoming Assignment will let us do as Aisha said. And, of course, we’ll boost you too.”

“That’s such a useful ability,” she replied. “I don’t think I’ve heard of a similar one before.”

“It’s most likely thanks to me being an Overlord,” I added. “Classes like Guide have a buff to experience they could give to others, but nothing like direct management of the flow, if I’m not mistaken.”

“As Lucas said, he owns us, so it’s only natural he can decide how much we receive.” Aisha smirked at me impishly. “It’s a great tool to help him reward obedient subordinates and to punish brats who cause trouble.”

The quarrelsome duo was at it again as they squinted at each other threateningly. I wondered which one would be considered the brat here since quite a few of the squabbles had come from her provocations.

“You are my Subordinates, not slaves,” I clarified. “Some of you my Bonded. We are companions if you recall.”

“Well, yeah, because you are so kind and caring, but the System—”

“Sounds like someone wants to have her experience reduced for the upcoming raid.” I raised a brow after cutting her off.

“Sorry…” she whispered as her cheeks gained a trace of rosiness.

The look of triumph on Shuri’s face was quite apparent as she watched me utilize the tools the Berserker had brought up to put the smartass in her place.

With that bit after us, I brought up the final leveling message.

★━━━━━━━━━━★

Congratulations!

As you push through adversity together, your Subordinate has gathered enough experience to strengthen themselves.

Shuri Blackcrest: Level 1 -> Level 4

Gained Attribute Points: 15

New Class-Related Skill Learned: Impact Deflection (F)

★━━━━━━━━━━★

“Not that bad for a quick run,” the oni princess stated. “It was technically above my level.”

“And it looks like you have gained a skill.” I navigated to bring up the description. “Only one for now, though.”

“My Class gets few skills due to its reliance on the magical armor,” Shuri commented. “This one is pretty great. It will help with stronger and bigger enemies who rely on physical power.”

“So, almost everyone considering your stature.” Aisha chuckled, earning herself another glare from the short girl.

★━━━━━━━━━━★

Impact Deflection (F)

By absorbing the brunt force of the blow, you can guide it through your armor and choose a specific point as an outlet for all the accumulated energy. With enough practice, you might be able to redirect that energy back to the attacker.

Available Uses: 5Recharge Time: 4h

※ ※ ※

Primary Scaling Attribute: FortitudeSecondary Scaling Attribute: Constitution

★━━━━━━━━━━★

“That sounds great.” I smiled at the crimson princess. “It makes you more tanky and gives you another option to fight back at the same time.”

“Yeah, though it needs some time to get used to.” She let out a quiet snicker. “Thankfully, I have enough experience with it not to be a complete amateur.”

“What is the difficulty with this ability, then?” Levia asked ponderingly.

“It mostly depends on the type of armor you wear.” Shuri rapped her fingers on the desk. “With leather or such, the shock simply travels to your boots and then into the ground, making it very hard to manage it to any extent. With chainmail or reinforced gear, it gets a bit easier. Plate armor is the best, but alongside the other metal options, it makes things much less comfortable.”

“How so?” Even Aisha seemed interested in the answer.

“What happens to your hands when you take that giant axe of yours and smack it against a wall with all your strength, or cross weapons with an equally powerful opponent?” The armorer turned to her.

“Oh.” The Berserker cocked her head back in understanding. “It can hurt a little.”

“Now imagine that you experience this over your entire body and not just your palms.” The oni winced faintly. “Sure, most gear has padding and other stuff to make things more comfortable, but you are still technically wearing the weapon. When you want to utilize the force of the impact, you need not only to focus while experiencing the blow but also to lead it around your armor in a way that doesn’t interrupt the flow until you point it to a proper exit. Unskilled Armorers sometimes need to circle the energy three to five times before they find the right angle.”

“And they are experiencing the tremors the entire time, right?” I rubbed my chin.

“Exactly.” Shuri nodded with appreciation at me getting it on the first try. “But, as the description says, it can be powerful when used by a skilled individual. Depending on the strength of the blow, I need up to one or two additional laps. Most of the time I don’t bother aiming the energy straight at my enemy and just release it somewhere to the side, still inconveniencing them along the way.”

“Smart. I can’t wait to see it in action. Your use of Immovable Fortress and Reinforce Armor was excellent,” I complimented our new friend.

“Thank you…” She ducked her head briefly, a hint of a smile curling up her scarlet lips.

“What’s next?” Aisha urged us forward.

“The clear announcement, most likely,” Levia answered.

And she was right.

★━━━━━━━━━━★

Congratulations!

You have carried out all assigned tasks and successfully conquered the Beginner Dungeon 03!

Your performance is being calculated. Due to the complexity of the sudden Assignment, the processing time might be longer than usual.

The rewards connected to the Emergency incident have to be verified by your supervisor’s superior and the block manager so we ask you to have patience and not blame your agent for any possible delays.

Time left before rewards are announced: 00:00:00

The connection to this Dungeon will be severed in: 00:25:37

Use that time to finish all your business inside the current Dungeon and rest before your next assignment!

★━━━━━━━━━━★

“Aurora wasn’t wrong. It’s only been like four hours or so and the Dungeon is already closing.” I hummed thoughtfully. “It’s a bit too late to try and look for her in that swamp.”

“And she might have already returned home,” Aisha said. “But, hey, at least the rewards are already here! Let’s see what we get for this rushed job!”

“Don’t rush me.” I laughed and she rolled her eyes at me.

★━━━━━━━━━━★

Your clear rewards have been fully calculated and approved by your supervisor!

Thank you for your hard work, Lucas King!

★━━━━━━━━━━★

Clear Reward: 250 D$

Emergency Assignment Bonus: 2000 D$

Total Currency Earned: 2250 D$

Current Account Balance: 41337 D$

★━━━━━━━━━━★

“Holy hells! You guys are stacked!” Shuri thrust her face forward to read the numbers from up close and make sure she wasn’t seeing stuff. “How?”

I snickered and pulled her back into her seat. “We had one or two side hustles along the way. The last one is still ongoing, though at a slower pace. You can think of it as a passive income.”

“Now you get it?” My drakan mate preened at her. “But this payout is kinda meh. Chump change.”

The oni looked at her incredulously as if simply calling over two thousand Dungeon Dollars a chump change had offended her very soul.

“I would not compare this to the Betrayer compensation. We did our job here. In that other case, we received some more cash as an apology for the incident,” Levia shared her thoughts calmly. “Besides, this is not the end of our payment.”

I scrolled further to reveal the next part.

★━━━━━━━━━━★

ADDITIONAL REWARDS

★━━━━━━━━━━★

Free Community Meal Ticket x01 [BONUS]

Dungeon Shop Discount Coupon -25% OFF x01

Dungeon Shop Discount Coupon -50% OFF x01 [BONUS]

Lesser Recovery Potion x05

Lesser Mana Potion x05

Lesser Energy Potion x05

Ornamental Weapon Box: Unique Rarity x01 [BONUS]

★━━━━━━━━━━★

“Okay, there are a few things we have to process here.” I clasped my hands together in front of my face. “What the fuck is a ticket for a free community meal? Do we look like we need free meals? Or any kind of nutritional support?”

“I have no fucking clue.” Aisha shook her head. “First time hearing about that one.”

“Levia?” I glanced at my wise Witch.

“I apologize, but I am unfamiliar with this reward too.” She eyed the rewards attentively, picking at her memory for any hints. “I do not think your supervisors would choose to mock us with it, though. Perhaps it is a mistake?”

“Before you ask, I know nothing about it too.” Shuri sighed dejectedly. “But, the thing at the very bottom is making it hard to sit still…”

My eyes locked on that line. “It does look different from the usual. What’s so special about an ornamental weapon? Isn’t it a trophy to be displayed on the wall?”

“Oh man, you don’t know a fucking thing…” She sighed dreamily, then realized the tone she’d used and bit into her bottom lip. “Uh, I didn’t mean to sound rude, it’s just a bit of a big deal for someone into artifacts and such...”

Snickering, I offered her a few pats. “Don’t sweat it. You don’t need to watch your words with me. There are things I know, and there are things I don’t. Teach me?”

“Okay.” The oni princess showed an awkward smile. “As I said, ornamental gear is just another term for artifacts and items with magical properties. I don’t know how often these are given out by the guilds, but they are a fairly big deal, depending on their rarity, which can be Common, Uncommon, Rare, Epic, Unique, Legendary, Mythic, or Divine. Even the most common artifact weapons are worth so much more than normal gear. I’ve seen maybe two in the hands of Defenders during my career.”

“I see. What about your armor? It’s kind of an artifact too, no?” I inquired.

“Yes, albeit it’s part of my Class and abilities, and therefore its rarity would depend on how much work I put into it and what materials are used in its creation,” she replied. “I guess you could compare my armor near the end of my first life to an artifact of a Rare grade. The one I received from you is Common and only thanks to the influence of my skills. Not that it’s not enough or anything…”

“We’ve already talked about it.” I chuckled and took my hand away. “Thanks for letting me know about this. It looked a tad different during my initiation, but the tiers are quite close. We’ll push your armor to the highest tier in no time, I promise you.”

She snorted cutely. “Like that’s even possible.”

“There’s no such thing as impossible around this incredible guy.” Aisha directed her loving gaze at me. “Well, are we going to check that package or the rest of the notifications first?”

“Let’s finish here before that.” I moved further down.

★━━━━━━━━━━★

TIME OFF

★━━━━━━━━━━★

Clear Rewards: 2 hours

Emergency Assignment Bonus: 12 hours

Promotion Bonus: 12 hours

Currently Available Time Off: 36 hours 52 minutes 22 seconds

★━━━━━━━━━━★

“Mmmm, yes, it’s stacking up nicely.” My drakan mate rubbed her hands together. “Soon we’ll have enough to make a nice trip into your realm.”

“We received over a day’s worth of time,” I noted with an impressed tone. “But a promotion bonus?”

“You were promised a new position for resolving this emergency, were you not?” Levia glanced up at my face from below.

“Oh, shit. I forgot about that part.” I smacked my forehead. “Still, that didn’t happen during the last one. I wonder what changed.”

“Check lower. The bar can still go further south.” Aisha pointed at the screen.

Realizing she was right, I continued scrolling.

★━━━━━━━━━━★

Congratulations!

Your dedication to the cause and magnificent performance pleased the management greatly! You have been hereby promoted!

Position: Junior Representative -> Senior Representative

★━━━━━━━━━━★

Congratulations!

You have reached a high enough rank to receive the invitation to participate in the social aspects of your work for Dungeon Cleaners Inc.!

We wish you luck in forging unforgettable relationships with your colleagues!

Would you like to visit the Community Hub right now?

Y / N

★━━━━━━━━━━★

I blinked stupidly at the message. “Girls? You cleared way more than four Dungeons in your lives, right?”

“Yeah?” The draconic beauty sounded just as stunned and confused.

“Care to explain why none of you has ever brought up the social aspect of working as a Defender?” I added

“I have no memory of such a thing…” Levia whispered under her breath. “What does this mean?”

I reread the passages a few more times before moving the mouse. “I guess we are going to find out.”

After tapping the confirmation, a loud thud echoed somewhere on the side, muffled heavily as if coming from past the walls of my apartment. Our heads swiveled towards the entrance, and a metallic clang followed, similar to that of a massive cog snapping into place. Then, the lock clicked open and my door opened a little, warm yellow light sneaking in through the crack. Some kind of a jumbled noise leaked through too, which I soon recognized as speech and laughter mixed together.

As if enchanted, the four of us stood up and approached the door. The girls held themselves behind me as I widened the gap, peering outside my apartment. What greeted us wasn’t the sight of a familiar staircase, nor was it the stench of an acidic swamp. 

No, we stood in front of a long corridor of caramel wood spanning to the sides. Emerald, onyx-edged rug covered the floorboards, and the walls were decorated with tapestries of the same shade, bearing an eerily familiar crest.

The game’s icon.

Dungeon Cleaner’s Inc.

A cat-eared girl in a short-skirted maid uniform of the same palette passed before our eyes while carrying a silver tray full of empty wine glasses and beer mugs, politely curtsying our way with a lovely smile.

What the hell was going on?