The rest of the day moved forward from there. Sarah said it would be best not to take a class until a little more information was available on them so I did not look at my class options yet. Obviously we did not open the bar that day. I had texted the other employees of the bar telling them they got the day off.

I would need to decide what I wanted to do about them. Keeping the bar open for the time being might be a good idea. I would have to stay out of sight because I don't want people identifying me as the dungeon handler but being able to see how people are reacting to what is happening could give me a good deal of information in itself. Me and Sarah decided it would be best if she moved in with me for the time being. So I closed up the building and grabbed my truck from out back. Which by some miracle did not get damaged from the giant tree and dungeon that made its home next to my house.

It was weird driving down the road. It was both extremely quiet but busy at the same time. I don't know how to describe it. But one thing I could tell for sure I could already see some of the local gang members walking around looking at the different buildings scouting out the area. This could get ugly fast. Maybe we will open the bar tomorrow. Stacking my claim now rather than later might be best.

###

The next day rolled around and I was sleeping on the couch. I had given Sarah my bed. She vehemently refused at first but I convinced her that it was best to have any dumb ass who tried to break in meet me first instead of her. After that she conceited and let me sleep on the couch. I was making breakfast when Sarah walked in the kitchen groggy eyed in her pajamas and with a head of hair that would impress a mad scientist.

“How’d you sleep? By the way you look it was either great or terrible.”

“Terrible, I couldn't fall asleep to save my life. I would be surprised if I got more than four hours of sleep. My mind was racing too much.” she said after yawning.

“That's bad huh. Well if it makes you feel any better I did not sleep at all.” I said while mixing the pancake batter

“No it does not, it looks like you are posing for some cooking photo shoot right now!” she exclaimed. I shrugged.

“What can I say? I'm just that damn perfect.” To be fair to her, I was able to stay up for the better part of a week before I started to feel the lack of sleep but there was nothing I could do about that. Sarah sat herself on one of the bar stools I keep in the kitchen, leaned on the counter and asked. “So what is the plan today then? I can keep looking over forms, the government website and such but at some point the information will start becoming repetitive and frankly useless. All we really need to know right now are the basics of how the system functions. Anything else will not really be useful until later. If there is such information it will most likely be slow coming.”

Pouring the batter on the skillet I spoke.

“I think I want to open the bar tonight.”

“Why?” She asked

“For a couple of reasons. The first of which I want to see is how many people come to the bar and how they act and interact. I want to see what people are thinking. Having peoples thoughts from online forms is nice but being able to see what the average person is thinking in person can tell a lot.

I would also like to see if our employees are willing to keep working or will we need to work by ourselves.

The next reason is to invite any gangs to the door. I don't know how long it will take but sooner or later some of the local gangs will start to stack claims. They will be emboldened by the powers the system grants them, and unlike the average person they will be more than willing to use force and violence to get what they want. With how safe our part of the world is, not many have ever really seen real violence or large scale fighting. In turn they are soft. That means the people who are willing to use violence will be able to take control of the situation.

I have already seen some of the local gangs out and about more. Seeing that the dungeon is right behind our building and the building is still in good condition they will want to take control of it. Well once they find out that the tree is the dungeon at least. I'm sure that the gang leaders are at least partly informed of what could come from a dungeon basics on the online forms you have been using to inform me or just their own personal knowledge.

They will see it as a key recourse to gain more power and control. Just like I do.”

Sarah seemed a little bit shocked at my explanation.

“I can understand the first reason. Getting a better idea of the local opinion and sentiment would be really useful. Also I can't imagine many places like ours would be open so it will be more likely to have people come.

But what I can't get behind is the intentional invitation of the gangs to our front door. There has to be more to your thought process. Right?”

Nodding, I confirm her suspicion.

“Once again there are multiple reasons for this. First once they find out what the dungeon is, it will only be a matter of time before they come to our doors, and to be honest I would rather them not break down the doors in the process.

Next I want to make a show out of it.”

“A show?” Sarah questioned

“Yes, a show. I want to in a way lay my claim to the area. Not only have a show of force for the gangs but a way to show the people that are in the bar at the time that I won’t allow shit to happen in my domain. In a way I will make a safe place for people to gather. This will not only show who is in charge but will also let people think there is a place of somewhat normality within these walls. In doing this people will have a favorable view of me and will be more likely to align themselves with me in the future.

Right now is the most important time for us. We need the local population to have a favorable view of us. It will pay dividends in the future.”

Sarah nodded along with what I said. She seemed to understand what I was thinking. But she had her own thoughts to add.

“There is one problem with this.”

“Oh what is that?”

“Your title, I don't believe it will be good to show people your title yet. I think it would be best that people don’t know you are the dungeon handler. We don't want the gangs to come to the bar on the second day or something like that. We want a couple of days for people to get comfortable here again. We need it to seem normal. But you having that title with the whole town being informed that there is a dungeon handler will not only confirm the location of the dungeon if the giant tree did not already give it away but it might take away from the normal atmosphere we are trying to achieve.”

“You make a valid point. I think it would be best if I stay in the background for now. I will still keep watch over the bar.”

“Ok let me get in contact with the employees. I will see who is willing to come in and we can get the bar ready. I will also see if I can get the word out that the bar will be open. It might be an idea to see if we can get a band to play too.” Sarah started going off into her manager mode going down the list of things that needed to be done. She was born for the position, and her skills will be helpful in the future. I can feel it.

I made my way down stairs with Sarah. I went to prep the floor while she made her way to the office on the first floor. For all intents and purposes it was her office. But she would never let me call it that. The bottom floor was fairly large. It was approximately a 30 by 50 foot room. The back wall was the longer side and had a full 30 foot bar with the doors to the kitten on one side and the restrooms on the other. On the right side of the room were 2 pool tables. The front wall outside of the area around the entrance area was booths. The left wall had a small stage for bands. The area right in front of the stage was open and the rest of the middle of the floor was tables.

This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.

The day went on with me cleaning and prepping with Sarah making calls and talking to people. It was 3 pm when Sarah finally made her way out of the office. I was playing pool, seeing as I had finished everything an hour before. She came up to me and started talking.

“Of our 12 normal employees 9 are willing to come in. One did not answer and the other two asked if they could not come in. We are going to be short 2 servers and a bartender. I can fill in for a server if needed but I don't think we are going to get many people in today. I asked the employees to pass the word that we were going to be open and call a handful of regulars to pass the word as well. If the next two days go well I tentatively booked a band for Friday. I went with a jazz band. I felt it would be the best for the current atmosphere.”

God, I loved her. She makes everything so much easier. When we first started it was a bit ruff but after our initial stumbles she took off running. I would not be surprised if she ended up with a good class for management. But I am surprised she only got higher tiered skill related to management. ‘Shrug” well all seems to be going well.

“So do you think I should interact with the employees or would it be best for them to not know as well?” I asked Sarah. I already had my opinion on the topic but I was curious on her thoughts.

“Hmm, that is a tough question. They would be curious about you. It's not like you don't make yourself known. Heck you even fill in as a bartender sometimes. So it would be odd if you did not make yourself known. But at the same time if they know you are the handler that could make things complicated.” she pondered on the question for a moment more before finishing her thought.

“I think it would be best for you to not be involved until we do our reveal. Or at least wait a couple of days for them to be a bit more settled before we have them in the know. So my suggestion is as long as all things go well we could have them meet up with you on Friday.”

She put a lot more thought into this than I had and to be honest I liked her idea much better than mine. I was planning to just stay out of it until something happened.

My last worry is with people with powers and being drunk. I hope I don't have to step in early. Hopefully the bartenders can deal with anything without me getting involved. Good thing we have a reputation of taking no shit so I don't see people getting too bold.

“Oh seeing we are going to be open, did you by chance see if we could get restocked?”

“It was surprisingly easy. Though a lot of places were closed today and yesterday it looks like some of them are opening up tomorrow. So I over ordered alcohol and other drinks just in case and topped off the food stores. Hopefully we don't have to throw away much of the food.”

I nodded and got back to my game of pool. I kept playing for another 15 minutes then I told Sarah I would be heading up stairs. I sat in my office and watched the security feed. 15 mins after I went to my office our employees started to make their way here. Of the 9 that came in 4 were girls and 5 were guys. They talked to Sarah and after a short discussion they got to work getting the kitchen ready. Lucky for them I already did most of the prep for the rest of the restaurant. They ended up shooting the shit with Sarah. I could only imagine they were talking about recent events and the giant tree in our parking lot. Luckily there was street parking so we were not shit out of luck with parking.

The rest of the night was a bit on the slow side. But considering recent events I would call it a success. It was a slow trickle of people at first but it started to get a few more people around 6. Nothing of note happened as far as I could see. Last call was at 12:30 and they closed up at 1.

Sarah came up to talk to me after the last employee left. She told me things from her perspective. The employees were definitely curious about me but she told them that I was not feeling well. They bought the lie. They also wanted to know about the tree. Sarah did not lie to them on this and said she believed it was the dungeon. They were quite curious about that but she said she didn't know much about it, which was not really a lie. As for the night itself it went better than Sarah expected. She did however notice that most of the people seemed more reserved than normal. In other words the bar was not as lively as normal.

The next day came around and it went about the same. Around 1 the delivery truck came in. Because of the tree it made it a bit harder to get the things in but we managed. I avoided the delivery driver. We did not want anyone to know that I was the handler yet.

When the employees came to work one of the ones that did not come in yesterday came. She was one of the servers. When it came to opening there was a noticeable increase in the number of customers. I did notice a few odd individuals in the bar. My guess was gang members scouting out the place but I could be wrong.

After we closed up Sarah gave me her run down. She told me that people were talking a bit more. There were more people playing pool and such. It looked like our plan was working so far. She did not however notice the people I did but that was fine.

Sarah between today and yesterday had quite the talk about the system with the employees. They did not have anything new to add but Sarah gave them her suggestions from her research. All of them had been identified by the second day. As for their levels they were all around 10 the lowest of them being level 8 and the highest being 11. Only one of them had their class and it was called bar slinger. Sarah was told it's just a basic bartender class. It improves his hand eye coordination when making drinks, gives him better memory of customers and how to make drinks. He did give us a little bit of first hand knowledge on classes but nothing that was not already online but it was still nice to confirm what we read online.

Classes have the same tiers as skills and in turn tend to give skills around the same tier as the class. Though he only got offered one skill that was higher than his class. His class tier was moderate and he was only offered one intermediate skill. He also mentioned that his class was rank one, what that meant no one seems to know. There are guesses but no concrete answers.

Classes also give stats per level excluding wisdom. It seems that the higher tier classes gave higher average stat totals but even between same tiers there was a range in stats given. The last bit of information that was useful was that classes could pull skills from your general skill list. In doing so it frees up a slot of your general skills.

Classes also seem to level up mostly by doing things related to the class. For example Trevor. Came in today with the class at level 1 and at the end of the day he was level 2 this also boosted his overall level form 9 to 10.

With him gaining levels fast it might be enough to scare off anyone who wants to start anything funny, hopefully.

###

It was now Friday and it was time for me to be a bit more involved. The band was going to be here today and we expected a much bigger crowd because of it. We still weren’t sure if it would be a full house but I should be more lively then the last 2 days.

I was playing pool when the first of our employees came in the front door. It was Trevor. He saw me and waved. I nodded to him as he went over to the bar. Trevor was a stocky man with darker blond hair, clean shaven and has a kind face. He was a good man. Next in was Ana. She was one of the cooks. She was a darker skinned beauty and to be honest probably the best looking lady that worked here outside of myself. She did not notice me as she went into the kitchen. Cameron walked in next and she was one of the servers. She was a shorter girl who was tastefully curvy but only had an average face. She noticed me playing pool and walked over only to pause as she got close. I could only assume she was using identify so I did the same to her.

Level: 9

Race: Human

Highest class: N/A level: N/A

She had not picked a class yet. Not too surprising, I bet she is waiting to see what comes next. We are all still waiting for the other shoe to drop after all.

Cameron started to mouth the word handler. Shaking my head I shushed her and spoke softly “I will tell you all later.”

She nodded but was still wide eyed and she got to work. The forth one to walk in was Edward. He was a recently graduated college student who used to work part time and now works full time. He is the unofficial 3rd in charge. Should both me and Sarah be unavailable he was the one that dealt with it. He was a tall skinny lad, he was very clean and carried himself well. He also had a killer English accent. He noticed me and gave me a nod before joining Trevor behind the bar.

A few minutes later a short man who was built like a brick wall walked in already in his cooking gear. He was Steward, the man had a heart of gold but you would not be able to tell from his resting bitch face, but he would also not take anyone's shit. He was the unofficial bouncer when I did not deal with it. He did not notice me as I scratched on the 8 ball and cursed under my breath.

Walking in the door just behind Steward was our next cook. If you could ever imagine the most basic white guy ever he would be who you pictured. On top of that his name was Todd. Even to this day it makes me laugh how he is the living white stereotype when it comes to looks and name. He noticed me resetting the pool table and said. “Hi boss, you feeling better?” I smiled at him and nodded. He smiled back and followed Steward into the kitchen.

A little later 2 women came in. They were the last of the servers we had coming in. They were twins Grace and Angie. They were the sweetest girls and they were so cute. Both of them are blond with the most heart warming smile. That is also not to discount their figures. They had an athletic build with middle of the road feminine features. They were kinda like the place's mascots. All the regular customers loved them and some of the regulars even did their best to look out for the twins. The girls noticed me and excitedly waved at me as they went into the back room to change.

Next to come in was our bus boy carl. He was a fairly average ginger. Lots of freckles and was a bit timid at times. He went straight for the kitchen looking like he was on a mission.

Lastly was our final cook Maria. She was a Hispanic lady who knew what she wanted. She was above average in looks but nothing too noteworthy. She was a bit of a go getter and damn did she make some good food.