“Well, that’s not a pretty sight…,” said Rami.

“I mean… it has its charm,” responded Alice.

“It’s a piece of garbage,” added Bonetta.

“If you squint your eyes, and ignore all the broken windows and collapsed walls, it’s not that bad,” insisted Alice.

“This will do just fine,” finally added Grimmy, “It’s a good location and it has plenty of acreage to expand if needed.”

The party was looking at their new property, given by the mayor as a reward for getting rid of Jax and his bandits. It was a big piece of land with a small mansion in the middle. The land could easily fit two or three more buildings the same size as the currently erected one. The property looked as if the previous owner abandoned it and neglected it for a couple of decades. Walls were collapsing and all the windows were broken.

“How much will this cost to make it livable?” asked Alice.

“A couple of thousand gold pieces at least,” replied Rami.

“That’s not that bad then.”

Bonetta and Rami looked at Alice in confusion.

“Alice, two thousand gold is a lot of money,” said Bonneta.

“Yeah Alice, it’s not easy to come by that amount of money,” said Rami.

“Don’t worry about it. I have a way to get that money and more if we want to upgrade the property.”

Bonetta and Rami looked at each other and shrugged.

--

“I can’t believe we were able to get that much money out of selling those blue flowers,” said Rami still in awe.

“I told you I had a way,” Alice grinned.

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“No complaints here,” said Bonetta.

“Alright, let’s head off to the market to buy all the materials we need to start fixing the house. We should have 2 more days before our dinner with the mayor,” said Grimmy, “We should be able to hire a worker with building magic with the amount of money that we have.”

The party made their way to the market, bought the materials, hired the worker and brought them back to the property.

The party had discussed the layout of the property on their way to the property with the worker and once they got there, it took him a couple of hours to finish the renovations.

“It is done,” said the worker.

“Thank you very much!” said Alice.

“It looks amazing!” added Rami.

“No problem mam, if you need any other renovations feel free to come fetch me. I’m always willing to work for paying customers. Oh, one more thing, while I was doing the renovations I found a cellar door in the kitchen. Didn’t get a chance to see what was under there, but you might want to check that out eventually.”

The worker tipped his head and left the property.

The party entered the now renovated mansion. Each party member, including Grimmy, had their own room according to their own specifications. It was a two-floor mansion with all the bedrooms on the second floor. On the first floor, you could find a living area, a kitchen and a library, which was basically the same layout the mansion had already. The library was full of old books, some too old to be read, but most of them were in relatively good condition.

“Well, this turned out better than I expected,” said Rami.

“I agree. This looks pretty good,” added Bonetta.

“Told you this would do just fine,” said Grimmy.

“You also said that about Rami, and look how he turned out,” said Bonetta.

“Can’t argue with that,” nodded Grimmy.

“Hey! Next time you’re about to be eaten by a cyclops, let’s see who saves you!” said Rami.

“It was your fault for getting stuck under a boulder to begin with,” replied Bonetta.

“Alright, that’s enough. Let’s go take a tour,” said Alice.

The party made their way through the different rooms starting on the second floor talking about the different type of furniture they would each add to their respective rooms, until they finally made it to the library. They spread out and started going through the books that were in reasonable condition.

“Whoever owned this house was a creepy dude,” said Rami, “All these books are about experimenting with monsters.”

“Yeah, same here. These ones are all about anatomy of different types of monsters,” said Bonetta.

“Interesting…” added Grimmy, “Seems like he was making experimenting with chimeras.”

“Chimeras?” asked Alice.

“Yeah, when you experiment with different monsters and make hybrids out of two or more species. Brutal practice. It was banned almost a century ago if I remember correctly,” responded Grimmy.

“That’s horrible!” said Alice, “Hope whoever that was is dead.”

“Let’s go check out that cellar door the worker mentioned,” said Bonetta, “maybe we will find more about who this sicko was.”

The party made their way to the kitchen where the cellar door was. It was a rustic wooden cellar door that looked as if nobody had opened in decades. Bonetta grabbed the handle and pulled it. The door hinges, being rusted, broke and the door pulled right out. The party peeked inside but couldn't see anything. The room below was pitch dark.

“You’re paying for that,” said Rami.

“Rami, it’s okay we have plenty of money left to fix it,” said Alice.

“Fine… So, who’s going down first?” asked Rami, “Grimmy?”

“Me? Why me?”

“Don’t tell me you’re scared? Are you scared of the dark?”

“No, it’s just…”

“Just admit it, you’re scared.”

“I am not scared…”

Before Grimmy could finish his sentence, Bonetta pushed Rami into the cellar.

“Hey! What gives! I’m starting to feel a little unappreciated here.”

“How is it down there? Can we go down?” asked Alice.

“I can’t see anything! It’s really dark.”

“Here,” said Bonetta as she threw down a lit torch that she took out of her bag.

“Hey, you almost burned me! Who keeps a lit torch in a bag.”

“It’s a magic bag. Immune to fire. Stop complaining,” said Bonetta.

“What can you see?” asked Alice again, “is it safe to go down there?”

“Give me a second,” said Rami as he lifted the torch and started to look around.