Message from Stojan Tasi to Serenity
I fear I must apologize, my Lord; I am not accustomed to reporting to a higher authority and have failed to keep you informed as is my duty.
The Shining Caverns have mostly recovered from the attack, though the Healer’s Hall in particular is still damaged. Guildmaster Hollis is working hard to attract new Healers, but he has had to pull many who would prefer other tasks to aid at the Hall.
A recently discovered dungeon has been instrumental in covering the gap; it’s called A Rest from Death and is the only truly safe dungeon anyone has ever seen. It appears to reward habitation with a limited selection of items; we have been using them to cover some of the gaps the missing healers can no longer cover. It’s not as good as more healers, but it’s enough.
Unfortunately, the damage to the Healer’s Hall has meant that I have had to call off the exploration effort. Maintaining the current area without any dungeon breaks is more important than reclaiming barren land, and people cannot travel as deep into a dungeon if they do not have a healer either with them or stationed outside the dungeon. This has led to an increase in injuries, which means that it is taking nearly twice as many people to keep the dungeons near the Shining Caverns under control as it normally does, and people are bringing out only slightly higher rewards than the usual total. It is a significant loss to the Caverns.
The Necropolis, on the other hand, is suffering even worse issues, both infrastructure and dungeon-related.
Stojan Aith apparently did not care about any city services outside the areas where she traveled; I will not bore you with the details that are my duty to handle, but I will say that only your authority has allowed me to keep some of the personalities involved working. The fact that I am a Stojan has helped, as well, but it is clear that many have no respect for me. I do not believe that any have realized that I am the City Lord of the Shining Caverns, but they do not wish to obey a City Manager; anyone but the City Lord himself is simply too far below them, or so they say.
I have had to remove two from their posts; one attempted to kill me afterwards. I am pleased to report that he is no longer among the living-adjacent.
In addition to the city services, there is a post that Stojan Aith left completely unfilled: Dungeon Management. She appears to have simply assumed that people would take out dungeons before they became dangerous to the city. If that is so, she was completely incorrect.
About half of the city’s area is routinely attacked by dungeon breaks. They are usually handled by the inhabitants, but there are pockets around seven dungeons that are never cleared out. The largest of the pockets is over a square mile in area.
If I had known this back before you conquered the city, it would have opened up so many options!
Unfortunately, it’s at least as bad for me as it was for the previous City Lord. I refuse to allow more of the city to be overrun if I can avoid it, but the Necropolis Mercenaries’ Guild is surprisingly weak and the Shining Caverns …
Well, we might be able to spare some people, but it’s very hard to trust anyone who picked the Shining Caverns to have the interests of the Necropolis in mind. It is also very difficult to recruit from the outside.
In that light, if you have people that you believe would be willing to swear loyalty to you, I would welcome them to either the Shining Caverns or the Necropolis. I would prefer the Necropolis but I will not stop people from settling in the Caverns instead; not everyone can handle the deathly atmosphere of the Necropolis.
If they will not swear to follow you I have my doubts as to whether they are worth the effort to resettle. I will not gainsay you if you decide to send them, but I will warn you that I do not have the resources to watch over those who will not help nor the people to watch them should they prove a danger.
World Manager Stojan Tasi
Serenity read the note from Stojan Tasi and found that he could only shake his head at the man’s confidence. The problems he’d listed were not small at all; they were problems that a city in good shape might have trouble dealing with, and the Necropolis was not in good shape.
He really needed to hire a contingent of the Mercenaries Guild, at least a company and maybe two or three, to go in and clean out those occupied areas. He probably also needed to completely remap the Necropolis; the level of neglect Stojan Tasi indicated told Serenity that they probably didn’t even know what many of the problems were.
Come to think of it, all that wasn’t really the World Manager’s job. It was really Serenity’s.
Serenity sighed to himself and checked his Etherium balance. It was healthy, but he was getting more from Earth than he was from Tzintkra. That was not what he should have expected; Tzintkra had a generally higher tax and was higher Tier. Earth had more people and was far healthier as a planet, which seemed to more than make up the difference.
Serenity snorted and put together a message. He couldn’t really deal with this until he was done with Lyka and Aeon, but he could get some of the wheels moving.
Message from Serenity to Ynsarac Hale
Hale,
I know you aren’t happy about the Necropolis, but are you and your company willing to take on a challenge there? I promise that it’s one that won’t damage the Shining Caverns; indeed, if it’s not taken care of, it could potentially threaten the Caverns someday. Not any day soon, but someday.
If you’re willing to talk about a job there, let me know and we can find somewhere to meet up. I’m a bit busy on Lyka right now, but I expect to be finishing up here in the next few weeks.
Serenity
With that handled, Serenity could consider the next piece: the people who followed Evan. He had a place to send them now, but their reception would clearly depend on what they decided to do.
It was time to pay attention to the discussion raging around him again. Denise and Aaron were discussing something but Serenity had been paying more attention to his letters.
There were also half a dozen people Serenity didn’t recognize in the room, but they seemed to be following the argument and were also apparently pretty evenly split on the question. Serenity wasn’t sure when they’d all come into the room where he’d been working alone; he’d vaguely noticed them coming in but it hadn’t registered past the fact that they weren’t threatening.
They’d probably been sent by Ekari when they wouldn’t shut up; that seemed like the kind of thing she’d do to both ease the load on herself and force him to learn something about dealing with people.
“...together. It means we only have to take the risk once.” Denise slapped her hand on the table to emphasize the word “once”.
“You just want to leave as soon as you can,” Aaron shot back. “Small groups mean that the fighters can guard them more effectively and once we clear out a route, it should be safer. Sure, it’ll take longer and we’ll have to take several trips but we have some time.”
“The plan you’re proposing will take days! There’s no way one group of fighters can escort everyone without running back and forth a dozen times.” Denise raised her voice slowly; by the end, she was almost shouting.
Serenity blinked. This was what they were concerned about? “Stop arguing, it’s not a problem.”
Denise and Aaron didn’t seem to notice; they flung variations on the same complaints back and forth several more times until Serenity lost patience and shouted. “SHUT UP.”
That got their attention.
Serenity had an incredulous look on his face. “Do you really think we didn’t think of how we were going to get everyone back to the portal node? We came here expecting to move a lot of people.”
Denise and Aaron exchanged a glance that almost looked guilty. Of course they hadn’t thought about it.
Serenity sighed. “Ekari’s told you that you can only bring what you can carry, right?”
He waited for everyone in the room to nod before he continued. “That’s because Ita can make some specialized planetary portals. We set up a portal receiver near the portal node; we’ll use it to hop everyone there.” He couldn’t manage anything approaching the distance to the nearest portal node, but it didn’t even increase the cost of Ita’s spell all that much. “Before you ask, she can’t establish a portal that goes between planets. She’s tried. So yes, we have to use the portal node.”
Aarom closed his mouth. Serenity was glad to see that he’d guessed correctly about one question, at least.
“If we’re going by portal, why can’t we take more than we can carry? We could use a cart, or come back for it.” Denise had already moved on to the next option.
Serenity shook his head. She hadn’t thought that one through. Or perhaps she simply didn’t know that much about portals? “Portals and carts don’t get along well unless they’re specifically made for them; people are much, much cheaper even when they’re lighter. You’re going to be heading through another portal right afterwards, at the Portal Node. I’m going to be paying for that, so unless you can convince me that the freight charges are worth it, we’re not doing it.”
There was essentially nothing that Serenity was willing to pay the additional cost for to ship directly to Earth right now. To Tzintkra might be a different story, but it would still have to be justified.
Before they knew that, though, he needed to let them know what their options were. He didn’t think they’d be entirely happy about it; they probably assumed he’d send them to Earth, which was a far more comfortable planet. Tzintkra was the better option under the circumstances, so he was going to try to push for that one for anyone who didn’t have a place to go on Earth.
Serenity glanced around the room. “Excuse me, I need to go find Evan.”
“Why? We have all of the leaders for the people from Earth here,” One of the men Serenity didn’t know objected. He was clearly from Earth; India or Pakistan, at a guess, with his accent and appearance. Serenity knew there were differences between the two, but he’d never been good at picking them out. “What aren’t you telling us?”
Serenity stopped. He could afford a quick explanation. “You’re from Earth. Unless you want to know about the chance to settle elsewhere, I doubt you’re interested. You can follow if you want.” He paused, then nodded at the only non-Earthling present. “You probably should, Aaron. This will probably affect you.”
Aaron seemed startled. “You mean I can’t go to Earth?”
Serenity knew his face revealed his emotions at that moment; he was conflicted. “Not exactly but basically yes? Earth is going through some upheavals and I can’t guarantee you a safe place to get your feet under you.”
Aaron looked at Denise.
Serenity hoped he was misreading that situation. The way they argued was certainly something that could happen between people who were courting, but it could also happen between people who were simply friends.
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