" … and, that's how I applied Charisma during a battle to protect from the fear effect the summoned creature had been radiating," I said, finishing the explanation of all the tricks I had discovered, which also worked as a summary of my activities. This time, I didn't hide anything, Toross and his transformation, the full details of the casino, the infiltration of the casino and my secret assassin protege, even the organization I had created as a distraction to disguise the fake mysterious organization I had created.

"You have been quite busy for a geriatric, haven't you?" Zolast said once I finished, pouring another drink while I took a bite from one of the dishes he prepared while listening to me. Keeping his hands busy seemed to help him process the shock … and I was more than happy to enjoy the gourmet meal he had prepared.

Just because we were discussing things that would potentially affect the fate of an entire planet didn't mean I couldn't savor a nice meal at the same time.

"If you're finished with insulting my fragile ego, let's focus on our strategy."

Before answering, Zolast took a deep breath, letting his shock wash away. "Let's do it," Zolast said, still looking a little rattled, but mostly recovered. Impressive, considering he had received a bunch of surprises in rapid succession.

I knew that from the experience, and he didn't have a convenient mortal threat to distract him from the existential aspects.

"Okay. The first step is to discuss our priorities," he commented, then paused, subtly deferring to my opinion.

Or trying to understand my real objectives. It was harder to read him under the circumstances. Luckily, with our objective already aligned, that didn't matter.

"That's simple, the safety of all the young strays we managed to pick up," I said.

"Yes, though, we don't have any urgent issues there. We have enough mana stones and silver to build the strongest wards I could build without raising any suspicion. Other than that, the best we could do is to keep our eyes open and do our best to predict the dangers."

"That's true. I'm just curious whether we'll be hit by a political crisis or gang warfare first," I said. "Things will get fun once we launch the dungeon."

"My bet is on the crazy cultists to be our first big problem."

I shook my head. "I don't think so. I feel like they are planning something big, and while the accident with me forced them to the surface faster than they expected, they still look like they are gathering their strength."

"I still can't believe the military is infiltrated to that extent," Zolast commented. I shrugged. Corruption was only to be expected in any large organization, whether ordinary or magical.

"That's life," I said. "Now, the next priority: Experience."

"That should be easier without Gods stealing most of it with their greedy little paws," Zolast answered. "Even without your Charisma trick, the outpost is giving you enough to compete with a successful dungeon run, without any of the risk. And, we can put some wards to increase the number of monsters attacking once we implement some more reliable security measures, so it should be doubled even without your intervention. You'll level up with an incredible rate … or at least, you would have if it wasn't for the different experience requirements."

"For all the advantages, there has to be some drawbacks," I said.

"Pity we can't risk joining dungeons with that living skill connected to a chaos god. Are you sure you don't want to destroy it?"

"Not yet. The advantage it provides against the cultists is too big to discard it so casually," I said. "More importantly, he seems to be happy waiting without taking any overt action. I don't want to act hastily and trigger a god to act prematurely."

"I can't blame you," Zolast answered. "Not with my own experiences with an irate god. And, unlike you, I was just an afterthought." I nodded, and he continued. "So, what's the strategy? Just you staying at the outpost, leveling?"

"That's not enough," I answered. "The moment the dungeon opens officially, things will get heated, and I need to be even stronger if I am to block everyone trying to use the town for their benefit. The underworld will get heated."

"Should we delay the opening of the dungeon further, then? That wouldn't be hard," Zolast offered. "I can come up with some excuses to delay it a month, assuming Duke Yoentia even manages to gather the necessary materials in the first place. He seems to be struggling."

"No, that only gives the people behind the Greens the opportunity to establish themselves once more. Not to mention the growing foothold of the cultists, and the strength of the other gods. The earlier we officially open the dungeon, the better. The political boons our noble masters would receive in the process is just a bonus."

"The stronger he is, the thicker his shadow becomes, allowing us to stay out of sight," Zolast said, confirming my train of thought.

"Exactly," I said, not bothering to suppress my laughter. "We'll make a decent criminal out of you."

"What a weird compliment," he said, responding in kind. "Although, it feels very close to my previous career. Not in scale, but the process is not that different."

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I shrugged. "Anyone with any amount of power is a criminal one way or another," I said. "But, back to the topic. Experience is important, so I'll probably increase the attacks the outpost receives with Charisma, and maybe even hire some extra security as an excuse by acting like those attacks are an enemy action."

"Believable," Zolast said. "Pity you can't come to the dungeon without risking intervention. With your stats, it would have been a breeze…"

"Too risky," I said. "It's a bigger pity that I can't just recruit Jertann and the rest to the party without angering the gods behind them."

"Yeah. They don't have any convenient curses to block the senses of their patron gods," he said, and I chuckled, enjoying the irony. "And, picking random people below level ten is not a good idea unless you meet with another one like that young man. Otherwise, not only will they be too young to properly fight, but also, without a unique class, their help would be limited. Not worth the Experience it would take them to level up, while we could use the same for your leveling."

"True," I said. "We might change our strategy once I reach sixty, but for now, it doesn't make much sense to let anyone join unless I discover another stray with a rare class."

"Well, you managed to find an assassin, so anything is possible," Zolast answered. "Either way, I should be able to grant you a lot of experience during my dungeon runs. Now that the curse is gone, I will be able to handle some solo runs. At least until we manage to upgrade the dungeon."

"Which will be our next priority," I said. "Don't forget to prepare the list of materials that we need to create a second floor for the dungeon. The sooner I start collecting them, the better. Black market availability is problematic at the best of times, and the more time we have to collect rare items, the better."

"Good point," he said, and started writing as we discussed. "At least we have enough resources. Those Vitality stones should fetch a nice price." For a while he said nothing, just writing the meeting notes. "That makes a nice list of priorities," he continued once he finished. "One, security; two, leveling you to level sixty; and three, the black market purchases. Anything else?"

"Well, there's also the little team of blacksmiths. Maybe you should bring them to the dungeon to level them up as well. We're growing fast enough that having a bunch of level sixty blacksmiths will be handy."

"Yes, your team of all-female blacksmiths that, if revealed, would anger every single blacksmith guild in the world. You're troublesome enough that I have actually forgotten them."

I chuckled. "Think about it like this, we should have at least one goddess on our side if we can support a bunch of her worshippers."

"A goddess that's standing alone against a horde of gods that treats her existence as a deadly insult."

"Hey, that way, she'll be even more grateful. We're not in a position to turn any allies, and I don't care about angering the other gods. We're going to anger all of them eventually."

"Good point," Zolast answered. "I doubt they will appreciate it when we start interfering with the calamities."

"Can you teach them how to use mana so they can forge magic weapons?" I asked.

"Teaching magic is easy. Finding the necessary stats, not so much."

"Maybe we could Awaken the required stats naturally," I suggested.

Zolast sighed. "Yes, for a moment, I forgot your habit of turning the impossible possible, but even if we manage that, they are still blacksmiths, with no stat points to assign. We need a lot of Attunement stat stones to support their casting, preferably with some Wisdom and Intelligence to support their learning speed. And, that still leaves blacksmithing secrets."

"I can always steal the smithing secrets. And stat stones are doable with the black market, now that we have a lot of mana stones to bargain and the price is still high. It won't stay that way for long, but by the time the prices increase, we should be able to start producing magic weapons."

"It'll be very expensive. Attunement stones are ruinously expensive even in the best of times, and I doubt the new dungeon rush is helping any."

"There's no point in having money without spending," I countered, then sighed. "Pity not many creatures drop ability stones."

"Speaking of it, how the hell did you manage to take down a Lord Beast," he asked.

"By Lord Beast, I'm guessing you're referring to huge beasts that drop Ability Stones," I said.

Zolast chuckled as he nodded. "Sometimes, I forget just how spotty your knowledge is. You know the secret of natural stat awakenings and can purchase anything from the Black market, but you don't know what a Lord Beast is."

"Well, I can kill it, so it should count for something, right?"

"Yes, but how did you do it? When you claimed to have this mysterious organization behind you, I assumed that you created a hunting team, but now that I know that was fiction as well, I'm having trouble. Did you manage to stumble on a hunt in progress and steal the stone?" As he asked that, I realized I had ignored mentioning my encounter with the ambushing river beast while focusing on the more strategically relevant aspects of my journey.

"Of course not, I hunted it."

"With whom?"

"Alone, of course," I answered. "I don't exactly have an army I can call."

"How?" Zolast asked, once again surprised, but he wasn't as shocked as the time I revealed my naturally awakened stats. "Alright, I need to update my perception of your combat capabilities. For a hunt, you're more devastating than a team."

That was understandable, as my unique combination of Stats gave me a lot of strategic options. "Pity these so-called Lord Beasts are hard to find. That much money would make things a lot easier."

"Yeah—" Zolast started, only to freeze. "Actually, not exactly," he corrected himself.

"Oh," I said simply, but didn't question further, letting him explain.

"Well, they are very difficult to find … on land. In the sea, on the other hand, it's a very different matter. Normally, I would say it's madness to try and hunt the sea beasts, but with your unique skill set, it should be far more achievable, especially if we can manage to push you near level sixty in a reasonable time frame, and maybe manage to purchase some more appropriate weaponry for hunting than a sword."

"Oh, that sounds like a nice objective to strive for," I said. "And, once we set up a nice undersea hunting operation, we'll have a lot of abilities to choose from." As he listened to my explanation, Zolast smirked, showing he was very much on board with the idea.

"A steady supply of Ability stones will be a game changer. Pity we have some work to do before I can risk it," I said. The river had been dangerous enough, and the sea would be much worse, and even with the Speed giving me a decisive advantage, I wanted to wait until my leveling slowed down.

One could never have too many advantages.

"Alright," he said as he stood up. "We have a lot of things to do. But before splitting, let's go and have a talk with our blacksmiths."

"Yes, let's go. Though, it's a pity. It was fun watching them trying to hide the same secret from each other, especially since one of them actually discovered two of her coworkers also have the same secret, and got even more skittish as a result. I wanted to see if she would gather the courage to actually talk. Pity."

"You're a mean old man," Zolast said, but that didn't prevent him from laughing with me.