It was an idyllic afternoon in the small enclave that was the secret urban demesne of the Queen-in-Exile of four of the nine realms. If it were not for a couple "little" problems. The usual gang was gathered in the solar, enjoying some time off from the constant struggle of delving the Dungeon.
"Shouldn't we be packing to depart?" Kurt the serpentine Lamiak asked. "We are going to miss the auction if we don't make haste."
"I can't go," the Queen languidly answered from her chaise lounge. "I have vampires in my basement."
Cless stretched, enjoying one of the few moments she could expose a lot of skin without the judgment of others. She wasn't bothered by the stares but she didn't want to drive people away. Fortunately, in that motley crew of outcasts and misfits that was her guild, nobody cared about how the human girl looked like.
"That's not like you," Venaris the gnome quipped. "Are you still overloaded by the notifications from the Que... that place?"
Cless' Skill, [Absolute Contract (S-rank)] was the engine behind the Quest Hall. All the quest requests, enrollment, sales, were ratified and enforced by her Skill. In a way, she WAS the Quest Hall. And every single transaction generated one or more notifications for her. Especially true for the flow of Experience.
She shook her head and smiled back, "Not at all, Venaris. It was bad at the beginning but I organized everything now and compartmentalized the data. I have to thank that gangster from the Property Registry. His Skill, [Perfect Accounting], was... perfect for that," She laughed at her own bad pun.
"I was curious, are you making any Exp from the Q... that place?" Venaris continued. "Because even that signup bonus multiplied by everyone lining up outside is bound to take a toll."
"No. I'm actually in the negatives for my current level," The human girl shook her head. "But it doesn't matter in the long run. I can always go on an adventure or a delve and earn more Exp. What really matters, is the flow of Exp."
"Because when you lose Exp, you lose it from your main level total. But when you earn, you tally it into your Class and Profession levels," Vic smugly explained.
"Yes, but if I stay a month in the negative, I lose a level," Cless added. "But honestly, even if I do lose a level, it is only a temporary setback. Because the adventurers are bound to die and pay the Exp in the insurance policy. And there are people desperate enough for the coin to sacrifice their Exp. In fact, twenty percent of all new recruits convert their thousand-Exp signup bonuses into coin. And more and more of them are using the quest Exp bonuses like an extra source of cash. Some lowlifes are even paying their booze with Exp."
The Quest Hall system was rigged in her benefit. She would retrieve the Exp an adventurer earned in the Hall if they betrayed her, resigned their membership, or died. If Cless outlived the adventurers, she was bound to profit. And if she died, she wouldn't miss the Exp anyway.
"So, how many asked to see the insurance policy?" Vic asked.
"Less than two percent," Cless answered after checking the reports her Skill calculated in her mind after tallying all the notifications. "I guess adventurers don't want to think of themselves as mortals."
That last sentence hit them right where it hurt, making the entire guild pause. They too were too young to think about their mortality. However, each one of them had a traumatic experience in the past. Scorned and raped by her own classmates, an escaped slave that became feral, the last survivor of her tribe and host to orc parasites, and two good-natured travelers rescued from the Orc King's pantry. Not to mention Jason, an orphan rejected and expelled from the brothel where her mother sold flesh for a livelihood and turned into an undead killing machine against his will.
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A hissing broke the pregnant silence.
"So. Vampires in the basement," Vic tried to put the conversation back on track. "What are we doing about them?"
"It's in the catacombs to be precise," Kurt the Mawarpy completed in perfect synch with his serpentine friend.
"No. She has one in the basement," Silverfang the Lycan grunted. "I suggest we kill all of them starting with that weakling."
"Oh, not again!" Cless whined. Even though she was a queen and the leader, her companions were not her subject and treated the fledgling Queen-in-exile without any deference. "We are not killing Jason. He is one of us. Seriously, Silverfang, why do you keep being such an idiot when it's about Jason?"
"I don't like him," The wolf-boy growled and snarled, showing his inhumanly sharp teeth. "And I like even less that he drinks your blood."
Cless jumped from the chaise lounge and pounced the Lycan. Silverfang could've avoided easily but he wasn't worried. She held his cheeks and planted a kiss on his cold nose.
"It is only a goblet a week. It doesn't even do enough damage to require a lesser healing spell. If you want, you can drink my blood too. You'll always be my number one, silly wolf."
Cless hummed and tenderly caressed his soft fur, wondering how it could be that soft if it was tougher than steel. After she had her fill of fluffiness, she stretched, snapped a few joints and steeled her face. "Okay. Let's clean up the basement!" She interjected and then stared at the Lycan. "Starting from the second floor."
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They geared up as if they were going on a delve and gathered in the kitchen. Cless looked at the head maid and gave some orders.
"Lock the basement doors, Helga. We are going to fight some monsters in the catacombs, it would be problematic if some of them escaped."
"Good hunt!" The young girl waved.
Cless wondered why the System even bothered to slap the title of Queen on her Status. She did a final check and descended the stairs from the kitchen into the basement. She went down one side of the U-shaped corridor that led to all the rooms underneath her mansion and into the biggest one in the back that was being used as stables.
"Kate? Shad? Time to hunt, my darlings!" She cooed her pets.
A thousand dots of light sparkled in the dimly lit basement as the Glittering Crystalback Mole merrily left its burrow to meet his master. After his latest evolution, Shad was the size of a fat pig and had crystals on both his claws and back bristles. They were as long and sharp as daggers. They generated their own light if he wanted or if he was too excited.
*SQUEEE*
And at that moment, it was the latter. The giant mole jumped on Cless and she held his paws without fear of the sharp claws. Shad reached with his long tongue and licked Cless' cheek.
"Yes, yes. We are going to delve the catacombs. Happy?" She talked to the mole. It was questionable how much Shad understood. "Kate, wake up. Time to bash some undead."
*RUMBLE*
The ceiling-high ball of fur stirred and groaned. a striped and long stretch of fur split from the ball and swayed around before the rest of the ball also moved and split into limbs and finally revealed a slightly humanoid head with a stubby snout. The far edges of her eyes were slanted downwards, giving the deadly monster a deceiving lazy outlook. Kate in her last evolution grew a soft and long fur coat, in a blatant attempt to get more attention from her mistress by imitating a certain canine shapechanger.
She stretched her front limbs, disproportionate from the rear ones. Kate's walking gait was like a gorilla, supporting the massive weight of her upper body on her knuckles. She too had long and deadly claws on her limbs but differently from the smaller and fancier monster, she was built to endure, not to hurt. Kate was the group's "tank", an old term lost in time that meant the resilient frontline fighter that demanded the enemy's attention and suffered the brunt of the damage.
"Aww, she's all grown up," Venaris cooed behind Cless. Kate could shelter a dozen gnomes in her lap if she tried to act like some living fur yurt.
The two monsters finished evolving only a few days before. They didn't have a chance to delve and test their newfound powers because Cless was too busy working the kinks out of the Quest Hall's system. Fortunately, she had everything under control now.
"Onward!" Cless pointed in the direction of the stairs leading down into the catacombs.
"About time," Jason nodded. "Auntie will have her reckoning!"
The anger and grief in his voice were tangible. Reluctantly, Silverfang nodded. "Yes. Let's kill some leeches."
And down they went, with Shad lighting up the way with his bristles. They descended four levels of catacombs, admiring the tunnels Cless renovated and expanded when she dug for stone to build the mansion. They finally reached the untouched lower catacombs and paused.
Before them, the light from the glittering Drillmole reflected below and drew mesmerizing and wavy patterns on the walls and roof. But the way forward was blocked.
"Oh, right. I forgot about that," Cless remarked. "The catacombs are still flooded."