Yolston let his opening question sink in. It was a bizarre question, one that would only leave more questions. Like he guessed, the guild master’s mouth seemed to become unhinged as it dropped and refused to close. He swore he could hear the screech of water wheels twisting in the man’s mind as he slowly pulled apart the question.

“What do you mean?” the guild master asked.

“There has been a report from one of the edge villages. Apparently there was a mysterious and magical cave that appeared one day, a place full of strange monsters and madness. There were quite a number of stories.”

“PHAA! So what? Don’t tell me you believe this farce?”

Yolston smiled and said, “Of course I don’t, but I have reason to believe that something weird - something profitable - may be happening in this village. Tell you what, I am willing to pay for the entirety of this trip with my own money. If something is found, then you can pay me back half. However, I will own eighty percent.”

“Eighty! Eighty Percent! That’s fucking shit!”

“I am taking the biggest risk here,” Yolston said, calm and smiling. “Of course I should own the largest share.”

“What will I get out of this!”

“Don’t worry, I understand that you aren’t young enough to do much. Twenty percent, not even shielding the costs, this is the most charitable I can be to a weak, old fart like you.”

“Weak! Old! You fucking fox, your more of scrooge than I am! You barely spend money on alcohol! Which village is this! Are you pulling some sort of prank!”

“No, of course not. This is something that I am doing for the benefit of my noble family. Dungeons aren’t worth that much, it will be too costly of an endeavor for you!”

“Dungeons aren’t…take those words back. Tell you what, I will find this information myself and monopolize it all. I will get a hundred percent ownership!”

“Oh, and how is this going to go over with the duchy?” At Yolston’s words, the room went cold. His grin grew even bigger. “If you were so interested, I would have negotiated with you. Well, if you can deal with this dungeon for me, that will be great. I hate dealing with the duke family.”

“...What do you want? What are you after?” asked the guild master in a quiet voice. In the end, he couldn’t pursue the dungeon. Yolston could rat him out at any moment. If he did do anything, he would become the fallen noble’s puppet. He would bear the full price and lose any profit.

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“Dungeons are valuable things. If this turns out to be a dungeon, then the duchy will be very interested. However, this could make it difficult for us to get our share.”

The main noble family of this part of the kingdom were bastards. Inept, stupid, foolish, there have been many revolts in the past few years, though all of them have failed. The family treated this as evidence of their superiority. Yolston felt that repeatedly gambling the future of the dukedom was insanity; after all, they only needed to lose once.

“What needs to happen is to make the two of us invaluable as we will be among the first to explore this potential dungeon. I will manage things with the nobles, through me you will be able to be the king of adventurers for this dungeon. Think about it, your family name hung up over the ruling adventurer’s guild for this dungeon, like the ones at the capitals.”

The old man seemed to falter, his eyes closing as he was seduced by the fantasy. He woke up and demanded, “What do you want out of all this?”

Yolston replied, “All I want is to become the Viscount or Count of this new dungeon.” This was little more than half-truths, but it managed to sway the guild master to his side. There wasn’t much he himself could do in this situation, his servants either already were spies or had little loyalty to him.

The guild master could see the benefits of having a friend in high places, higher than the nowhere “Millpond.” The old man probably wouldn’t last that much longer, a decade if he was lucky. He was getting desperate, desperate for luxury, desperate to leave something for the world to remember him after he passed.

Yolston had made himself invaluable to the guild master, now he needed to start scheming for his family.

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The old mug carried the stale, cheap beer into his mouth - the foam soaking in his beard. His life was full of mistakes and regrets, his only respite was to drown these emotions and memories in alcohol.

The canals of this small place were completely ancient, they were so old that no one knew where they came from. They were among the few ways to reach through the dangerous forests full of monsters and reach the northern parts of the continent. It was a grueling, boring, thankless work killing the monsters that have inhabited the canals.

The canals were the safest path, but that didn’t mean they were safe. Monsters from the north and monsters from the dangerous forests infested these canals. The cargo was valuable, but that value didn’t mean much for mercenaries and adventurers like them.

Dangerous places like dungeons or these forests were full of ingredients, but there weren’t many that lived in the canals. The market for their ingredients is stuffed to the brink; making a decent living is difficult. People only came to Millpond if they had nowhere else to go.

Andres was one of those people. He was an adventurer and dungeon delver, but all of that was taken from him and burned. It didn’t matter how good of an adventurer you were, it was suicide without provisions, weapons, and tools. He didn’t have the money to reach a different dungeon, so he ended up here.

“Andres, I have something for you,” said the guild master, though Andres felt like calling this shabby joint a guild was sacrilegious.

“Alright,” he replied, praying to the gods that this time he could actually make some money.