After dinner Kit headed back to the boarding house with weary steps. All the excitement at finding new spices had worn him out. As he walked inside, he noticed a large black panther guarding the door just inside the entrance.
He jumped in fright and felt his adrenalin spike. Then he recognised the large cat. Holy green beans the midnight guardians really had moved in!
Kit eyed the large cat warily. The large cat opened its jaws wide in a yawn. Sharp white teeth entered Kit’s vision. The pearly white fangs woke him up instantly.
“Why are you here?” Kit received a lazy blink from the cat in reply. Kit didn’t really need to ask that question because he already knew the answer. It was here to protect Snowball.
He looked around to see if the other midnight guardians had taken over the boarding house or it was just one. He could only see the one from where he was standing. This didn’t relieve his anxiety at all though. He was sure he would find the others somewhere inside the building.
Kit walked past the large black panther and headed to his room. He had a feeling Snowball was already home. He didn’t think the large cat would be here otherwise. He pushed open his bedroom door to see a ghastly sight.
Four black panthers were taking up all the space in his bedroom. Snowball was gnawing happily on a rock on top of his bed. Kit sucked in a breath. How was he supposed to sleep in a room filled with the giant cats!
One had even occupied his bed and was staring intently at Snowball eating his rock. Kit could see large muddy cat prints on his blanket. This absolutely couldn’t be allowed to happen! He wasn’t going to share his personal space with these giant cats!
Snowball noticed him standing in the doorway and let out a happy yip. The four cats ignored him completely. Was he invisible to them? This was his room, God damn it!
“Right, you four cats out!” Kit made his voice as stern as he could and pointed outside the room for extra emphasis. His anger had completely gotten rid of his caution towards the cats.
Four pairs of eyes turned towards him, Kit felt his scalp tingle at their sharp gazes. Luckily the cats didn’t make a fuss and slinked out of the room. Kit didn’t honestly mind the large panthers taking up residence inside the boarding house. It could just not be inside his room!
With the large panthers here, he felt that the cats would provide extra security to the boarding house. He had seen Meow Meow in action, and was impressed with the large cats’ skills. If trouble came to the boarding house in the future, he would have five guardians to protect the residents.
Kit decided to have a talk with the animals so there would be no misunderstandings in the future about entrance into his room.
Kit looked at the large cats making themselves at home in the hall outside his room. “From now on you can’t go into the bedrooms unless you are invited in by the inhabitant of the room. This is our own personal space.”
Kit eyed each cat to make sure they were listening. “Now that you five have moved in, I will allocate a bedroom for the five of you. You will have to share one room though.”
Kit thought it was fair to give them their own bedroom. If they were going to live here, then he wanted them to feel a part of the large family. He felt this would help them integrate better into the community. He just hoped that they were the only animals Snowball brought home with him.
He didn’t want Mars’ premonition of Snowball collecting a Zoo to come true. This house wasn’t big enough to fit more inside now that it had five big cats and a dog living here as well as nine people.
He wasn’t silly enough to even contemplate kicking them out. He was 100% positive he would be ignored.
Kit picked up Snowball and headed to the kitchen. It would be the best place to listen for the other residents return.
He would need to wait for the others so he could introduce them to the large panthers. He didn’t want them freaking out when they came through the door and were met with the sight of a large black panther without some warning why they were here.
Kit placed Snowball on his lap and then started patting the soft fur. He watched as four cats started to make themselves at home in the kitchen around Snowball and himself. Kit snorted, they cats were super sticky animals. Who would have thought such ferocious cats acted like clingy koalas?
After a while of waiting, he started to get bored. He decided to have a look at the boarding house menu while he waited.
He opened the boarding house tab to see that it was similar to his restaurant’s menu. One side had a 3D image of the boarding house and the other had a list of tabs to click on offering different information under each heading.
The 3D boarding house had the occupants name written over each bedroom. Kit could see where each person lived at a glance. The boarding house was only just built, and it was already full. The midnight guardians had taken up the last free bedroom.
If he wanted to hire more employees for his restaurant, he would need to upgrade the boarding house first or else he might need to make the rooms shared. He didn’t want to do that though. He felt that each person needed their own space they could retreat to.
Kit looked at the tabs over on the side of the 3D boarding house. The first one he opened was the boarding house general information tab.
Boarding house general information.
Boarding house funds: 0
Bedrooms: 10 basic single bedrooms
Occupied bedrooms: 10/10
Residents 15
Employees: 0
There was not much to look at under general section. He then switched tabs to the facilities information.
Boarding house Facilities
Basic kitchen
Basic dinning area
This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.
Basic lounge area
Special facilities:
Small evergreen garden: 20% chance to entice a magical clean sprite to live in the garden.
Kit’s eyes settled on the special facilities. He was surprised to see he already had one built. The small evergreen garden even had a chance to bring a magical creature to the boarding house. Kit’s eyes lit up, he hoped one moved in. He wanted to see what the magical clean sprite would look like.
Kit had a smile on his face as he moved to the last tab. It was the promotion requirements. He hoped it wouldn’t be too difficult. The boarding house was just for employees not a business. So, he really didn’t want to have to have to spend too much time or money on its upgrade.
Promotion requirements
0/1 promotion token
0/1 boarding house manager
0/1 cleaner
15/10 residents.
0/1 House welcoming party for new residents.
(Unavailable until Spartan Fire size: village)
Kit looked at the promotion requirements with a frown. He had already filled all the rooms in the boarding house where would he place the manager and cleaner. He assumed they would live inside the boarding house.
He pondered over the dilemma. The only rooms he could give up were Mars, Twix’s or his own. He had been looking forwards to them all living together. Kit sighed, at least they could stay together until he had to hire a manager and cleaner.
They wouldn’t have to do that until his restaurant was ready to promote. He would have to inform Twix and Mars that they would all have to move out for a while when it was time to promote the boarding house. At least they could move straight back in after.
Kit looked at the last requirement with a big grin. He hadn’t even thought about throwing a welcoming party for everyone. It sounded like a great idea, he couldn’t wait to tell the others about throwing a party.
Kit decided to start making plans for the welcoming party while he waited for the others to return. As he was making a list of ideas the front door opened and a loud scream filled the house. He had been distracted by making plans and hadn’t been listening to the front door.
Snowball jumped off his lap and headed towards the door. Kit quickly followed. He rounded the corner to see Chamomile pushing the others back out the door.
“Head back quick before it attacks.”
“Cam, what is it?”
“GO.” Chamomile was trying her hardest to push Mud back through the front door. Kit watched as Mud was trying to see around her body that was blocking his sight.
“Wait Chamomile it’s ok. This is one of the new residents to the boarding house. There will be five of the midnight guardians living with us from now on.”
Chamomile stopped struggling to get out the front door and turned to Kit with a look of horror on her delicate face. “What did you just call it?”
“Midnight guardian.” Kit was a little surprised at Chamomile’s reaction. He thought because she fawned all over Snowball, she would like the large black panthers.
“Are you insane Kit. Why would you let them stay here? They are wild creatures, not house trained cats.”
The other residents were slowly making their way inside the entrance. All eyes went to the large panther standing guard at the front door. Mars and Twix were the only ones not fazed by the animal.
“Haha, they moved in. Kit wait, this will just be the start, you are soon going to have a Zoo.” Mars seemed very happy about Kit inheriting the cats through Snowball.
“Hey Kit, you could use the spare room to build a play area for the cats.” Twix went over to the large cat and started to pat it. He then started talking to the panther. “You would like a play area right?”
To Kit’s surprise the panther nodded its head. He thought that might not actually be a bad idea. He could move the cats into the spare room to free up a bedroom ahead of time for hiring a manager.
“That’s a great idea Twix I’ll leave the decoration of the room up to you.” Kit was even more happy about his delegation skills.
“No problem. I always wanted a pet cat, now I have five.” Twix grinned wide.
“No absolutely not! Kit you don’t understand, these really can’t be kept as pets. They might seem nice and tame now, but it can change at the drop of a hat. Especially if they find a hoarder of precious things to protect.”
How did everyone know more about hoarder of precious things than he did? He was the one who had one as a companion!
“You don’t have to worry about that Chamomile, they already have a hoarder of precious thing to protect.” Kit tried to reassure her that they would be harmless.
“Damn it, that’s even worse. You need to get them out now. If we somehow offend the hoarder of precious things they will kill us.” Chamomile visible shivered as she spoke. “Please Kit listen to me, hoarder of precious things are well known to hate people.”
Kit frowned at Chamomiles words then stared down at his super friendly companion. “Umm Chamomile are you sure you’re talking about hoarder of precious things, and not some other creature?”
“No Kit, I know what I’m talking about. Hoarder of precious things were almost made extinct in the past because they were fiercely hunted by human because of their skills. Around the time that they were almost wiped out, the midnight guardians stepped up to protect the remain few.” Chamomile’s eyes were rounded in fright as she spoke.
“Hoarder of precious things hate humans because of being hunted to near extinction. This hate is also mirrored by the midnight guardians as well. They will tear people apart if they get too close to their charge. They will show absolutely no mercy. It is a very bad idea to let them stay here.” Chamomile hit Kit with her pleading eyes. He could see tears welling up ready to fall.
Kit could tell she was very upset at having the midnight guardians inside the boarding house. “Chamomile, I can see you are very concerned. I can assure you the panthers will behave. They will not risk being thrown out of the boarding house.”
Kit was very certain about this. The cats wouldn’t jeopardize being separated from Snowball. You just had to look at how sticky they were towards Snowball. Plus, the cats knew Snowball was his companion, so they knew they had to be nice to the people inside the house if they wanted to stay.
Snickers had told him a little about the midnight guardians on their return from collecting ingredients this morning. The cats had cancelled their contract with her as soon as they found Snowball.
With Snickers help in communication, Kit and the cats had come to an agreement. As long as the cats behaved, they could stay with Snowball and himself. He hadn’t realized at the time it meant living with them as well.
He was now very glad the panthers and he had already sorted things out previously. Now he could speak with authority about the matter of the midnight guardians moving in.
“Kit how can you say that. I just told you how protective they are of their charge.” A few tears dropped from her lashes. He could see she was getting frustrated with him for not listening.
“Chamomile their charge is Snowball.” Chamomile blinked a few more tears fell on her delicate face.
“What? No Kit, Snowball is not a hoarder of precious things. He is not their charge.” Chamomile spoke with authority in her voice.
Now it was Kit’s turn to be confused. What did she mean Snowball was not a hoarder of precious things. Kit had read Snowballs information, he had his own menu! He was positive he hadn’t gotten it wrong.
“Chamomile, he really is a hoarder of precious things. Why would you say he is not?”
“Kit, everyone knows hoarder of precious things are snow white in color. Snowball is clearly black with a dusting of white flecks.”
Charlotte cleared her throat to interrupt the two. “Kit in all the stories we are told as children hoarder of precious things is a snow white. I think that’s what Chamomile is trying to convey.”
Kit blinked, then looked at Mars for help. He didn’t know how to convince them that Snowball really was a hoarder of precious things.
“I got this Kit.” Mars winked at him then took out a purple and gold stone from his pouch. He bent down and placed it in front of Snowball. “All yours buddy.”
Snowball sniffed the stone and started to yip happily. Snowball then glanced at Kit as if to ask was it ok to devour the stone. Kit nodded at the cute fluff ball. Snowball then picked up the stone then bit down hard.
Kit watched as the stone turned to dust and was inhaled by the small dog. Snowballs white flecks glowed brightly then faded back to normal. Kit heard gasp resound in the quiet room.
“K-Kit d-did he just eat that?”
Kit chuckled at the look of surprise on Chamomiles face. “Mmm, see, Snowball is a hoarder of precious things.”
“Ohh I see.” Chamomile just continued to stare at Snowball in a daze.
“Well, I guess that is settled. Welcome to the house my new friend.” Mud greeted the black panther with a hug. The large cat blew out a grunt but didn’t avoid the small arms wrapping around her.
Cupcake walked over to the cat and thumped his chest. “Cupcake!”
Kit burst out laughing at the large man’s self introduction to the panther. Cupcake had eased all the tension with his actions and soon everyone came to greet one of the newest members of the boarding house.