Stew realized he had been trusting the contracts a little too much. Maybe Garrik had agreed to not harm the dungeon, but Garrik had assumed his "father's friend who owed him money" wouldn't be a big threat to the dungeon, nevermind that this friend was Julius Caesar.

Now Stew was facing down the guy all of the other dictators wanted to be when they grew up. There was an entire Roman legion parked outside with their flying ships and battlemages, and Ceasar had pretty much just asked Stew for one reason they shouldn't just conquer his tiny dungeon like he was a playground obstacle course.

He had mana and actions idling at high speed now, he was pretty sure he could just send infinite waves of low level golems at them, even above ground. It might slow them down. The only problem was they might just like it – free training with low risk. Then again, that's what he had to offer, wasn't it? How to get that across to Caesar?

It gave him an idea. He sent a new contract to Garrik, and saw the young fighter's eyebrow raise, but he accepted.

"I think a demonstration will help answer the question." He clapped Femur's hands for effect, calling the martial arts golems back to form-up on the opposite side of the hall from the conference table.

None of the Romans seemed concerned, which told Stew that they must have something like [Stat-o-Vision™] working for them, and also that they weren't concerned about level 10 golems. That confirmed his guess that waves of level-ones probably wouldn't impress them either.

The golems paired off and started fighting. He set M.C.P. to fight them down to the last standing golem.

He watched the Romans and caught a few startled looks, quickly suppressed when they saw how the big stone monsters moved. After that, they all kept their expressions under control, so no one even twitched when the last golem used one opponent like a pole to swing around and decapitate another with a spinning kick straight out of a Jackie Chan movie. The battle finished with a fist straight through the chest of its dance partner.

Stew was careful not to repair any of the golems until the end to conserve his false core, even though he had made sure to have several in range, just in case.

With a bored look, he flicked Femur's finger and respawned all of the golems where they stood. He had them each pick-up their old mana core and carry it, single-file, to drop them on the table between Femur and Caesar before returning to line-up again.

Caesar's face was still unreadable, but he raised a hand in a gesture that invited Stew to explain the display.

"It didn't take me ten years to create all of those mana cores, and ambrosia, if you want to call it that. It didn't take me ten days." He nodded toward the perfectly still golems. "I made everything you're seeing this evening. You saw us raise the building itself." He turned to Garrik. "Ready to join the demonstration?"

Garrik hesitated, then rose. "Should I get my sword?"

"Why not get some unarmed practice?" Stew said, hoping he sounded confident. "Let's show our guests just what we have to offer."

Garrik looked to Theus who nodded, a thoughtful expression on his face.

The golems formed a circle and waited for Garrik to step in the middle. Each attacked in turn, and Garrik, to his credit, did a good job blocking and dodging although it was clear that the stone shins and forearms hurt when he intercepted them.

The pace picked-up. The golems just attacked faster, but Garrik seemed to get his second wind and started to fight on an entirely new level, attacking as much as defending. Stew realized Garrik's experience in battle gave him the edge, even though he was technically outmatched by so many tenth level opponents.

Stew let it go long enough to make the point that Garrik was good. He watched Caesar's face.

He signaled M.C.P. to stop holding back.

The golems all attacked at once. Two sacrificed themselves to distract Garrik while another grappled him from behind and pinned his arms. The others crunched through the rubble of their fallen comrades to pummel him until he hung limp in his captor's arms.

Stew checked the golems and found the one that had the experience notice for the kill. He gave the command and M.C.P. sent all of the golems remaining to stand in a line again, unmoving.

Garrik's body lay on the ground surrounded by stone rubble, his curly-haired head supported by a dropped mana core.

Stew switched back to Femur and continued to watch the Romans. They didn't move or change expressions, but there was a new tension in the room. Caesar stared at Femur. The only danger sign was that the consul had stopped blinking.

Right, Garrik's a family friend and the son of a guy he owes money. Better move quick, or I'll send the wrong message. "Garrik signed a temporary contract with me just a few moments ago." He waved Femur's hand.

Garrik appeared, stark naked like the guard before, standing next to his own corpse. He didn't miss a beat, adding his own sales pitch. "With dungeon contracts, we can train more rapidly than we have ever been able to before. With no fear of death, we can push fighters to their maximum potential."

Caius stood and walked over, inspecting the corpse and looking Garrik over, making passes with his hands over the fighter's chest and eyes. He turned back to Caesar and nodded.

If you come across this story on Amazon, it's taken without permission from the author. Report it.

Caesar, who had never broken his stare at Femur, blinked. Then he smiled again. "If what you say about your resources is true, then we have much to discuss." He waved a hand at Garrik, "But Training in a dungeon is nothing new, and even resurrection contracts are not unheard of. It seems to me that someone must have explained to you how I earned my title, 'Pacificator.' The Palatine Dungeon offers a contract every year to the arena champion. Some make better use of it than others. When Spartacus left that dungeon, certainly he was a force to be reckoned with, and who's to say, without that training, he and his supporters might still be slaves today."

Spartacus? What? Stew had only heard the name Spartacus from the title of an old movie he hadn't watched. First Merlin, now Spartacus? If Spartacus was real, was he even supposed to be alive right now? He tried to take a lesson from the Romans and not show any of his confusion on Femur's face, but apparently he did a lousy job.

Caesar's brow creased. "I seem to have overestimated how well-informed you might be. No matter. Do not think because I have made deals before, that I do so from a place of weakness. Rome is stronger for the Spartacus Accord. Rome has magic and ingenuity. We need strong, free citizens, not slaves. And those same strong fighters now form my Second Minerva legion." Caesar leaned forward. "So tell me, goblin. Can you really offer Spartacus," he nodded toward Officer Chuckles from before, "and six thousand legionnaires the same sort of contract you offered young Garrik just now?"

Can I? Stew did some quick mental math, and swapped back to his core to pull up his stats for a moment.

01:11

[Unnamed Core] - Category 1 Gray Core

[Levels: 5]

[Minions: 6]

[Monsters: 244]

[Mana: 32,123 / 36,100]

[Average Reaction Efficiency: 0.065]

[Cumulative Mana Recharge: 540 / hr]

[Actions Remaining: 5,622]

[Action Fonts: 14]

[Action Recovery: 3,370 / day]

[1. Generate Mana]

[2. Monsters And Minions]

[3. Build]

[4. Customization]

[5. Inventory]

[6. Consume Mana Cores]

[7. Press The Button]

Beryl had convinced him to restack the mana cubes in groups of six and that was already starting to pay off. Stew had to admit things seemed fine. Beryl had wanted to go ahead and go all the way to ten cubes with just one stack as an experiment. Seeing the results of the first change, Stew sent a quick mental message to Beryl to go ahead and give it a try but to wait until the meeting was over. Stew wanted to be able to focus in case something went wrong.

Resurrecting a minion cost mana, but looking at these numbers, if they didn't all die in groups bigger than 500 an hour, he could do this forever, and he could handle thousands once or twice, even an entire legion, and in a day or two, especially with Beryl's help, power leveling the whole legion would be no problem at all.

He swapped back to Femur's body, hoping his absence hadn't been too apparent, but he was sitting across the table from a world famous tactician.

Caesar waited patiently for him to get back to Femur's head. "That scale of assault worries you?" The consul asked, mildly.

"I just had to check some things, and check my schedule, but I'm sure we could accommodate them this evening, unless you were hoping to wait until morning?"

Caesar blinked again. "I believe we would all prefer to resume this discussion in the morning, but no need to plan to host a legion this evening." Caesar made sure his double meaning was clear, then nodded and rose. "Until we speak again."

"Until then." Stew stood. He noticed Spartacus's earlier joviality had vanished. He looked grim, Stew wanted to ask him why, but realized, with the Stoic olympics he had been watching in the room before, the officer's expression was probably intentional, and probably meant for him to see. It was a message, but what could it mean?

They were on the steps outside, when Stew felt a tremendous rumble under his feet. A loud crash came with it from the direction the trolls had gone to look at the origins for the aqueduct.

Spartacus nodded as if he had been waiting for the sound and Stew had a terrible feeling. Had this all been a distraction while the Romans sprung some trap?

Instead, Caius turned to Caesar and said, "trolls." His tone was like someone looking at a broken floorboard and saying "termites."

Caesar glanced up at the meeting hall. "At least this didn't fall on our heads."

Stew looked up at the building and realized he may have made an impression on the Romans, but not in the way he had hoped. The facade of the building was a hollow shell, not solid stone. The shapes weren't even closed or finished on the inward side. Half the window panes were empty, only a scattering of them contained the mana glass he had supplied. Where was the rest of it?

He had just glanced over everything before and taken it for granted that the trolls knew what they were doing. They had claimed to have built this whole world, afterall, "ahead of schedule and 11% under budget."

The rumbling subsided, but a rushing sound came from beyond the trees.

Caesar nodded at Caius who touched a brooch on his shoulder.

Black ropes dropped from a seemingly empty sky and legionnaires slid down. They quickly guided Caesar's foot into a loop, then yanked the rope. He rose rapidly into the air. The others followed with the new soldiers returning back up in the sky last. It all took only seconds and they seemed to vanish completely.

Stew called a golem out at a sprint, and even its eyes saw nothing in the sky.

Of course they have stealth, Stew thought. He sent Femur and the golem's running for the dungeon,

then swapped into the mind of Amethyst who was still carrying a false core.

"What's going on!" Stew shouted into the troll's mind.

If the mental shout phased the lumbering architect at all, it didn't show. Amethyst responded, "It would have taken all night to clear the trees. We're just letting the river do the job, with a little help from a stone funnel."

Stew swapped back to his core room to get a look from a higher vantage.

In the forest, in the darkness, trees were toppling in a long curved line that bulged directly toward newly dug foundations of the town, the workers, and the legion.