“Put your weapons down!”, said the King, “And repent! Thinking of hurting such as a beautiful creature is a sin”. All the Goblins kneeled and kept their heads low, “We’re deeply ashamed, your majesty”;

“You’re all pardoned”. His blue eyes fixed on Charles, “What is your name, o’ fair youth?”;

“Charles Stanford III, His Majesty”;

The King looked at him in admiration, “Are you a noble by chance?”;

“Well, my great-grandmother was on traveling in first class on Titanic”.

“Interesting”, he caressed his long beard, “Tell me about that”.

Charles cleared his voice. He told him that she fell in love with a young blonde guy who won a third-class ticket at poker, but sadly he died during the sinking because his stupid grandma couldn’t realize that there was enough space for two people on that door. All the Goblins listened carefully to the eleven-oscars winning tale with a high-degree of zeal.

“Truly a tragic story”, said the King, “I’m impressed. You seem truly a truly well-mannered young man worthy of admiration and respect”;

“You flatter me, His Majesty”;

“Call me King Louis, please. My kingdom isn’t comparable to the ones of the past, but we’re ambitious people. One day, we’ll avenge our ancestors from the Overlord”;

“The Overlord?”. The Bow-goblin, who now was standing at the right of the throne, started to speak: “Our ancestors were once beautiful and proud people such as you, but the Overlord, envious of their success, turned them into the wretched creatures we are now and confined them into the depths of the dungeon”;

“This Overlord doesn’t seem much of a nice guy”;

“No nice guy ever held the power for long”, said the King, “But please, let's talk about more pleasing matters. You will sure like our art gallery”, he turned towards the Bow-Goblin, “My son Desmond will show it to you”

Desmond showed him each of the main tents. In the first, there were three Goblins writing over clay tablets with small hammers and chisels. “Here is the library”, he said, “We’ve plenty of books left by our ancestors, from the Iliad to Dickens”. The next tent was full of perfect copies of famous sculptures, from a thinking guy on a rock to a Greek old man and his two young sons having a bad time with long snakes, inventing that kind of thing millennia before the Japanese.

“Can I ask you something, Desmond?”;

“Sure”, said the Goblin;

“I mean no harm, but… why there are no sculptures of women?”;

“Have you seen one of them around? That's what happens with an all-male population”;

“But how do you reproduce?”;

“It won’t be pleasant to know”.

They stopped to the entrance of an intricate system of caves, full of worker-Goblins pushing wheelbarrows in and out. A glow came from the rocks they were transporting.

“This is our gold mine”, said Desmond;

“Gold mine?”;

This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it

“The Overlord didn’t know about it when he sent us here”. Charles rubbed his hands. There may be something to gain from all of this if he played well his cards. Who said that you needed to by good at fighting if you wanted to get rich in a dungeon?

“The King will surely ask you to dine with him”, said Desmond;

“Tell him that it will be a pleasure”.

Charles knocked on the door of the safe-room, and Matthew’s face appeared on the porthole. He rolled the wheel and made him enter.

“What happened?”, he said, “You’ve been outside for a whole day!”. Charles moved in the middle of the room and dropped the bag on the ground. Andrea and Lucy, who were still playing videogames, turned towards the noise.

“What’s this?”, said Andrea. In the time she was looking at the sack, Lucy tried to attack her, but without even looking at the game, she pushed some buttons and sent her character off screen again.

Charles stood with a grin on his face, waiting to know their reaction as Matthew opened the bag. His eyes widened at the sight of the gold nugget, “Jesus fucking Christ”. Lucy took it off from Matthew’s hand and gave a bite to it, “God, it’s pure!”.

“Did I pass the initiation?”, said Charles;

“What are you talking about?”, said Lucy. The glowing light of the gold was reflecting on her eyes, and on her wide grin.

“The one to join the group?”;

“Who cares”, she said, brushing the matter aside, “How did you find it?”;

“It’s a secret”. He couldn’t tell them that he had to cuddle with a Goblin to have it.

“Well, I think you should put it in your account”, she said, giving it back to Charles, “Go to the machine”.

Charles deposited the golden nugget inside the slot of the machine, and a notification appeared on the screen after a happy sound.

500$ has been added to your balance!

He opened the SHOP section:

WEAPONS ARMOR POWER-UPS ITEMS

“What should I buy?”, said Charles;

“Why don’t we throw a small party?”, said Andrea, “It’s important to have fun sometimes”. Lucy nodded, “Wonderful idea”;

“Excuse me”, said Matthew, “But you two have been playing videogames for the whole time-”;

“Shut up”, said Lucy, “Buy us some beer, Charlie. It's in the items section”;

“Shouldn’t we invest them into equipment?”, he said;

“Later”, she said, “We’re rich now! We can do everything we want”. But the gold was his.

Four glass bottles of beer and a bottle opener came out from the vending side of the power-o-matic. Their bottles made a ringing noise as they touched, “Cheers!”, they said.

They spent the time playing videogames, and after a small tournament—won without any surprise by Andrea—they took another round of beers. After the third round, nobody could control the characters anymore and they mashed the buttons until something happened—this time Matthew won by pure luck.

“Stay put”, said Lucy. Drool was coming out from her mouth as she put the apple over Charles’ head. He was now a like a passenger on a ride, or the spectator of a movie at the theatre, and he just moved along the current without reacting.

After the apple fell from his head for three time, she taped it, and after finishing, she smacked his forehead.

“Done!”, she said, and Andrea raised her revolver. The shot hit Lucy in the chest, making her collapse to the ground with a groan.

“I’ve hit it!”, said Andrea, raising the scarf covering her eyes, and she high-fived Matthew.

After what happened, they decided to put the gun in the crate and lock it. Unable to stand anymore, they spent of the rest of the time lying on the ground.

“Now it’s your turn to tell a secret”, said Andrea, rolling on top of him, and Charles would have been surprised to have her rather large chest on his face, but sadly he wasn’t aware of it.

“My parents don’t pay any taxes”, he said;

“Who cares! Nobody will pay them anymore”, and Matthew burst into a laugh. “Hey, Lucy. It’s your turn”, he said, “Did you know that they invented something called shoes? Why do you never wear them?”;

“My family couldn’t afford to buy them for thirty children”, she said, and laughed, until her lips started shaking, and tears came out from her eyes. She sobbed until everyone fell asleep.

Charles opened his eyes to a rather cheap comedy scene of a girl lying on top of him, sleeping. He could see her black bra, while her head was on his shoulder. The other two were still sleeping. He needed to move without waking her up, or he’d trigger the next cheap comedy scene, in which the girl would slap him yelling “Pervert!”.

Her eyes opened.

“Oh”, Andrea said, “My fault, sorry”, and she rose from the ground;

“Are you OK?”, she said. He coughed, and turned his head to puke on the ground, “No”, he said;

“Maybe I can buy you something at the machine”, she said. She started to press some buttons, but then she stopped, “We don’t have any money left”.