DC

I smile and giggle as I watch a group of adventurers arrive with a group of 2 miners or so, and then they leave, and they repeat that until they have a group of 14 or so miners there. They quickly set up camp.

I turn my attention away from the humans, and to the goblins on the evolution floor with the rats, and moles.

Oh shoot. They’re actually doing it! One of the goblins figured out how to ride a stallhorn. The goblin climbs onto the back of the goat, and grips its horns like handles, and it directs it by pointing its head wherever it wants to go, and kicking it.

The whole while the stallhorn seems pretty pissed, but it works nonetheless, and it's very helpful for them, getting over ravines, or up steep hillsides, and surely if they come into contact with those rats, or moles they will be useful for combat.

Speaking of the rats, Talon is currently making a powdered version of the blood stone. He mixes it into a pipe with one side sealed, and compacts it against the sealed side. Above the sealed side is a small hole, for a hammer, or a nail of some sort.

A hammer is then attached to a spring which you pull back, and release, causing it to fly forward, strike the compacted powder, and generate a small scale explosion, and the production of a very toxic gas. It's toxic to the rats but it would surely be very toxic to everyone else.

Basically he made a musket. He loads a small copper ball into the end, compacting it down with a rod, and tests it on one of his slaves.

The pop rings loudly, and the ball pierces the slaves chest, who falls, the wet sounds of blood filling his lungs fill the room, overhauled by Talons maniacal laughter.

They also test it on a metal sheet, but the copper bullets they use aren't very dense, and so, are unable to pierce anything but the thinnest armor. This upsets Talon, but he produces more anyway, and is left with a small pile of ten or so muskets. “Yes! Talon's genius huge! Pop pops so strong! Kill-kill meat!”

He quickly orders his slaves to carry his muskets.

All the while back in the home of the mole people, they have produced a full set of strong iron armor for the Battle Queen. It covers almost every inch of her body, even extending out to cover her extended snout.

It leaves her claws revealed, and has a small opening near her pits, and groin area, for flexibility, but is still very effective at stopping blows.

She shuffles around in it, and it decreases her speed, and freedom of movement slightly, but only slightly, and will do much good to protect her from harm.

They return to their defenses, and set the corpses of the rats alight to free up the open space.

Milo

I gather a group of 30 or so people from the Oats guild, as well as a young woman from the necromancers guild, and I take them to Gertrudes office, where we register them as official guards, and we give them badges to declare their authority.

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I quickly go over most of the things they are going to have to enforce as guards being the basic stuff like, no murder, sexual assault, regular assault, theft, or stuff like that but also about not allowing bribes, and enforcing taxes.

I also speak with Gertrude about getting Auditors. “I don't trust all of those guys not to be corrupt or take bribes, so I want to hire auditors, basically police for the police. They will run investigations on the guards to make sure they aren't being bribed by criminals.”

Gertrude nods. “Good idea, I'll contact some people.”

As I walk to show them to their posts throughout the small encampment I remind them not to take any bribes as It is a crime, and could result in jail time.

As I bring them to their posts Ivan jogs up to me. “Milo! I'm gonna have to talk to you!”

I turn, and dismiss the rest of the guard to their posts before speaking with Ivan. “Yeah?”

He nods, and waves for him to come with. They quickly walk to the tower, in the center of the still forming small town. They climb the stairs, pass through the tavern near the top, and just below the bell tower is Ivans housing, as well as an office. Ivan guides me to the stairs up to the bell tower. Up at the very top next to the railing is a small two person table with a view of the entire town.

Ivan sits down, and gestures for Milo as well.

Milo obliges, and sits down.

Ivan pours them both a cup of tea, and begins to speak.

He sighs. “I don't know how much this means to you, or how important it actually is, but the Orcs have been gathering lately. Nothing incredibly out of the ordinary, usually every couple decades a really smart, or strong one steps up, and they start having more unified raids on towns, on the outskirts, until a hero, or an army comes, and wipes them out.”

I nod, and agree. “Yes, but we have such a high concentration of adventurers, and we have the natural protection of the mountains. They wouldn’t… Would they?”

Ivan wrings his hands, and puts them up in the universal gesture of so-so. “I don't know. But, it's probably a good time to start increasing your armed forces. The Oats guild will support you in any defenses you need mounting, and we have a presence here of a hundred, and fifty or so, but only one of them is another A ranker, and the rest are in the D ranks, or a couple C rankers. And the A ranker I speak of is only low A ranks, A new born really.”

I nod along. “I understand. Well, we have recently tapped into a new source of wealth inside the dungeon, so hopefully we can divert some of that into armed forces. I just finished hiring some city guards, we have 32 in total, but they are all D, and C ranks as well. I'm sure the Dark knights guild would support us as well.”

Ivan nods. “True, Alistair is quite the force to be reckoned with. I doubt I could beat him in head to head combat. Maybe in melee but he would never allow me to get that close.”

I tilt my head. “What rank is Alistair? I never asked.”

He tilts his head down, and says. “He is the closest thing to a saint most people will ever see, and if anyone is to ascend in this generation…”

I nod my head. “Understood. Then what is there to worry about?”

He sighs again. “Many things… Oh so many things. Those Orcs are tricky bastards, and there's a reason they've been a plague on the Vorraky for so long. Not many species can say they've been on the receiving end of the wrath of their army, and survived. Much less their army led by King Albrick, the horrifying bastard.”

I tilt my head to the side. “What is horrifying about him?”

Ivan waves his hand. “Don't even worry about it. He's been alive longer than the kingdom itself, and he will probably live far after it falls.”

I nod, still confused, but I keep it to myself. “Ok…”

I turn, and leave, dropping down the stairs two at a time. I quickly rush to Gertrude, and share the news. She sighs, and quickly responds. “I think we should divert some more of the money from your mining project into defenses.”

I nod in agreement. “Yeah, totally.”