Chapter 32: The Event Ends, and... a Slime-Monster?

Three days flew by. Because of the trade agreement with Sharlock, the caravan's members couldn't wander around, couldn't make contact with the players, and couldn't ask any questions. When they left, they hauled off gold-essence ore worth more than five thousand magic stones — three whole wagons packed full — plus bellies full of unanswered questions, and departed the Eternal Kingdom dungeon to Sharlock's enthusiastic send-off.

"Count Nicholas, you are always welcome back at our Eternal Kingdom dungeon. As long as you honor our trade agreement, you will forever be our guest."

Sharlock escorted Nicholas and company, brimming with warmth, all the way to the entrance on the Frostlake City side, and said exactly that to Nicholas.

Plenty of players were still gathered around gawking, and just like Sharlock, they sent the caravan off with friendly farewells:

"Hope the next event hands out more stuff."

"The cloth sacks were gone in ONE day. Didn't have the materials for a short bow, so I just grabbed an event weapon. Ugh..."

"That abomination is genuinely too ugly to look at!"

"Three days is way too short for an event. Ten days, I say. That's reasonable."

"This event's on a cycle, right? Like monthly, or at special times?"

The players around them chattered away like always, and Nicholas had, more or less, gotten somewhat used to these goblins and their borderline "deranged" behavior.

In Nicholas's view, the players were a bunch of lunatics spouting madness, sleeping wherever they dropped, utterly without fear of their betters, and obsessed with metal coins worth about as much as scrap copper and rusty iron. Calling them lunatics was, if anything, letting them off easy.

This was probably just the special hobby of a high-tier demon at Sharlock's level: summon a batch of lunatic goblins to build your dungeon.

"I am also deeply grateful for Your Lordship Sharlock's hospitality these past three days. If you have the time, please allow me to invite you to visit my estate in Frostlake City once I'm back from this trade run." Nicholas said it most sincerely.

"If I have the time, I'll come." Sharlock answered with a smile.

Nicholas then produced a basic-materials manifest, a card, and a teleport scroll, handed them over to Sharlock, and said:

"Then I'll leave the matter of delivering the basic materials to Frostlake City in your hands, Lord Sharlock. I've already contacted my butler — he'll be waiting for you outside the portal reception hall with his people. Just leave the hauling to them."

Sharlock blinked, puzzled. Hadn't they agreed at the start that his players — the "labor force" — would be hauling these materials? Sharlock had even pocketed a fifteen-magic-stone labor fee for it.

As for how to haul it all, Sharlock had it planned out: the basic materials were bulky, but with fifty players on the job, his lordly intimidation plus lavishly rewarded quests to keep them lined up and hauling — there shouldn't be any big problems.

He'd just have to work a little hard himself — like a teacher on a field trip, keeping an eye on the kids so they didn't run off and cause chaos. And that thought sent Sharlock drifting back to the good old days of his school years...

"Then this card..."

Sharlock looked again at the card in his hand. Written on it were the words "Gift Card."

Nicholas broke out a knowing smile, then said:

"This card is a small token of my appreciation for the care Your Lordship Sharlock has shown me these past days. It's a gift card with a value of one thousand magic stones, spendable at any Merchant Alliance member shop. Of course, if nothing in our Merchant Alliance's shops appeals to Your Lordship, it can also be converted to eight hundred magic stones, usable anywhere else."

A quiet provenance marker: the chapter was copied from where the author publishes without approval; their official posting supports the writer.

Sharlock understood the moment he heard it, but for form's sake he put on a conflicted face:

"Ah, now, this hardly seems proper. If word got back that I'd accepted something like this, the people behind me would make me go through the whole song and dance of explaining again."

Though his mouth said all that, the card in his hand had already, amid all the polite back-and-forth with Nicholas, found its way into his own pocket.

"Your Lordship's concerns — I understand them completely. But a thousand magic stones is no great sum. Some afternoon teas alone run several hundred. This is merely a gift between friends, nothing more. Being able to call a high-tier demon as distinguished as Your Lordship a friend is my honor."

Hearing Nicholas put it that sincerely, Sharlock went ahead and accepted the thousand-magic-stone gift card, wearing a "fine, fine, you're impossible" expression.

Nicholas departed, growing smaller and smaller amid the players' send-off cries of "Jackson, come back soon!"

The three-day "CBT1 event" had finally wrapped up in rousing success. The players picked up goods the Eternal Kingdom dungeon didn't yet stock, and Sharlock pocketed five thousand magic stones plus a thousand-magic-stone gift card — suddenly flush again.

Best of all, Sharlock's workload shrank considerably. He'd originally planned to lead the players on a hauling field trip like a tour guide, but as it turned out, Nicholas had thoughtfully solved that problem himself — hiring his own people at his own expense, no less.

After waving off the players still clustered around him waiting for a "cutscene," Sharlock had Bru issue a "server-wide announcement": the resurrection system would be temporarily shut down for somewhere between one and three hours, because Sharlock needed to make a trip to Frostlake City. First, to deliver the massive quantity of basic materials for Nicholas's butler to receive; second, to shop for supplies the dungeon needed — topping the list, beds for the dorm, followed by arrows for the short bows.

The players had redeemed short bows from Nicholas, but each one came with only thirty arrows — and no quiver, to boot. Luckily, pretty much everyone who could afford a short bow already had a Little Cloth Sack.

Sharlock had already seen forum posts complaining about the arrow shortage, and when the players raise an issue, a lord's obviously gotta fix and improve things at once.

With Nicholas's caravan gone, the site originally earmarked for the players' dorm could go back to being excavated. It was at eighty percent completion — another two or three days should finish it.

At that point, the hundred CBT1 players wouldn't have to log off just anywhere on the street anymore — they'd get to log off inside their very own dorm.

As for how to make sure the players would voluntarily head to the dorm to log off? Simple: sweeten the pot a little. It had been twenty days since the beta started — if Sharlock still didn't know how to steer these players by now, he'd have to be a pretty useless Dungeon Lord.

Throw in Bru's advice, and it was no big problem at all. In Bru's words:

"If you add a housing system, these players from another world will go absolutely feral. Their happiness index will shoot straight up. They have an unimaginable mania for personal property and personal land. Selling them a bed works exactly the same way."

Before long, Bru had published the server-wide announcement.

"Shit! Why is it down for maintenance NOW?!"

"LMAO, the guys farming materials at the Spider Nest entrance are probably losing their heads right now."

"Screwed! Was there seriously ZERO warning before maintenance? I JUST put a group together for the Spider Nest!"

"What kind of devs are these? What kind of scummy game company just does whatever it wants?"

"Damn, the forums are gonna blow up tonight! The devs had better give us an answer!"

"Back to work, back to work — grind that coin."

"Anyone selling spider silk?! I'm just a little short on materials for my gear enhancement!"

"By the way, did anyone redeem the short bow yet? How is it? Can I borrow it for a spin?!"

"Hurry it up — Moros is about to start class!"

"Nothing, nothing! I didn't say anything just now."

Watching the players brimming with enthusiasm — a harmonious scene without a single complaint — Sharlock relaxed.

Teleport scroll in hand, Sharlock came to the spot where the dungeon had stacked the basic materials. He'd already zoned the area off-limits to the players, so naturally there was no worry about anyone sneaking off with materials.

He opened the teleport scroll, and a halo of magic wrapped around Sharlock. Sharlock fed mana in, steadily expanding the magic halo until it engulfed the entire small-mountain pile of basic materials beside him — and then, bathed in the glow and the players' watchful stares, he vanished from the spot.

The next second, Sharlock arrived — along with one enormous pile of stuff — at the Frostlake City portal reception hall.

Since Sharlock had massively amplified the mana poured into the teleport scroll, he'd been routed to a different, cargo-only portal reception hall.

Compared to the portal hall from before, this one looked plainer, but the space was far bigger. The portals themselves were larger and set farther apart, though there were far fewer of them.

This was Frostlake City's receiving warehouse.

Standing beside the portal was a bespectacled gnome, holding a ledger, reading the data off the magical weighing instrument next to him — clearly weighing the cargo Sharlock had brought in.

The gnome then wrote out a slip and a form, and handed them to Sharlock:

"Based on the weight of the goods you've brought, we charge a total handling fee of ten magic stones. Here's the manifest."

Sharlock stared at the gnome's slip, dumbfounded. It was his first time shipping bulk cargo to Frostlake City, and the first he'd ever heard of a "handling fee."

"Please wait just a moment — would you be Lord Sharlock?"

Just as Sharlock was hesitating over whether to pay up, or to furiously swallow the entire shipment for himself, a wobbly, jelly-like something came scooting over and said, in a great hurry:

It was a slime-monster in a soggy tailcoat.