Ozzy came to with a pounding headache. No, scratch that, everything including his head ached! His mouth tasted horrible, like something foul had crawled into it and died. His eyesight was hazy and he felt weak and achy. It took a few seconds to realize what else was wrong. It was quiet.

He sat up and looked around. Two alchemical lights were glowing in the room, probably provided by Aleister. The alchemist was sitting with his back to the wall, lightly dozing. Zephyr was stretched out next to him. One leg was splinted and wrapped in bandages. The trap that had broken her leg was disassembled and broken.

In front of Ozzy were several potions with labels next to some empties. He picked up a thick white potion that smelled bad. It had 'Drink me first' on the label. He drank it down and found out why his mouth tasted so bad, they must have poured one down him earlier. The other two potions were standard health potions. Downing these, he immediately felt better. Checking his status, he saw that he was now at 657/657 health. A lot better than he had been at the end of the fight. He'd been worried the life drain effects might have been permanent.

Aleister woke as Ozzy stood up, "Good, you look better. Before you complain, yes, the Restorative potions taste horrible. But they are one of the only ways to quickly restore your lost vitality. The draining spell these creatures used was quite potent. They steal not only your current health but also lower your maximum."

"How's Zephyr?"

Aleister put his hand on her forehead, "No fever, and with the treatment I gave her, I'm fairly certain she will heal without contracting a fever or rot. She mainly has a broken leg and torn muscles around the wound. Magic and Alchemy can take care of the worst of it, but she won't be walking for a week or two. But potions have restored her health. Getting a great deal of rest and good food helps with the healing process, so it would be best to get her home soon. I think this is quite enough adventure for today."

Ozzy could only agree. They did a quick search of the area and came up with several handfuls of copper, along with finding a lever behind the throne that they assumed would raise the portcullis. Aleister put the green crystal rod in his backpack for later. Ozzy grabbed the boss’s skull. He should be able to patch it up from where the last hit split it. It made an impressive-looking trophy with the rune-carved horns.

Before they could leave, though, they had some undead that needed to be handled. The skeletons couldn't get in, but two dozen was too much to fight with just two of them, injured as they were.

Ozzy picked up his polearm and walked over to the gate. The undead nearby immediately pressed up against the gate again. Ozzy thrust the heavy billhook through the vertical bars and broke ribs on one of the skeletons. After three thrusts, he decided to try vertical chops like an axe. This worked much better. He fell into a rhythm. Chop, chop, chop...crunch! Then repeat and take out the next one. Eventually, the hallway was clear. He also got a notification.

[You have diligently practiced with a billhook, killing foes and learning its ways. You have learned the weapon skill: Billhook at level 0. This is a tertiary STR skill for you.

Having the weapon skill: Billhook allows you to attune to the Ancient Billhook of Entwined Fates. Y/N?]

Ozzy accepted, and immediately the weapon felt lighter and more balanced in his hands. He also had a feeling he could cast spells through it...if he ever got a spell, that is.

When the hallway was clear, they pulled the lever and raised the portcullis. Ozzy went to carry Zephyr, but her father lifted her. "I can handle her weight. That leaves you to handle anything we encounter and I can set her down if needed." Zephyr stirred and saw they were heading back.

"This is embarrassing being packed out of my first dungeon."

Aleister disagreed, "Far better to be packed out with a broken leg than descending to Hades and enduring a long walk back. Your mother would be furious with you. But to save your wounded pride, maybe you could hobble through the last door on your own?"

The trip back was uneventful, except for a stop at the rat-kin in a trap. Zephyr looked at him. She knew how horrible that trap felt. "Can we free him? They are nasty creatures, but it seems wrong to just leave him to suffer."

Neither Aleister nor Ozzy felt bloodthirsty enough to kill the trapped creature. Ozzy broke the trap with his hands, and they poured a poison cure and healing potion on him. The rat-kin awoke and scuttled into a corner with a frightened squeak. Ozzy noticed his emaciated state. Who knew how long he was in that trap? Ozzy tossed down a water flask and a bag filled with barbequed sedge beast.

"There you go, fella. You're healed up, and you can eat my lunch. But after that, you're on your own."

The ratkin nodded. He grabbed the food and water and quickly started to eat. Zephyr and her party made it back to the entrance, where her father let her hop through the door on her own.

----------------------------------------

Suzette looked at the man in front of her, who, after making his accusations, calmly went back to sipping his beer. "Well, that does sound serious, but I'm sure we can work things out."

She stuck out her hand and smiled, "Hi, I'm Suzette; I just purchased half the tavern about an hour ago."

"Walgird, Thaddeus Walgird, connoisseur of fine, and not so fine brewed drinks, and inspector for Bludgeon Brew." He took her hand and smiled back. He had taken one look at her and assumed she was some piece of fluff hired to bring up sales of beer. Nothing wrong with that, and with her smile, he assumed that this little tavern had some very good sales.

A fact that the two dozen adventurers in the tavern seemed to prove. He noted they had all asked for Blud Dark and were about to start their third round. He didn't blame them; it was the best beer in the tavern.

"We shall have to see about that. First of all, I need to know if this is just a label you attached to a fine homebrew, or did you indeed alter the recipe for official Bludgeon Brew?"

Suzette couldn't see an advantage in lying. "Oh, it's the Blud recipe. I added a bit to it." She saw Ben walking in the door, waving to her. "Oh look, Ben is here. He can spell me at the bar while we go look at how I brew it. Right, Ben? Thanks."

Ben shrugged and put on an apron. At least it meant his beer was free. "Ok, who needs what?"

Twenty-four voices yelled, "Blud Dark!"

Suzette took Thaddeus into her brewing room. "I'm using some local plants in the mix. This is sedge grass seeds. It grows wild all over the place. I use a mix of 50/50 sedge seeds to groats, also grown locally. Let me get a batch germinating, I put in extra mana to make them grow quickly. " Thaddeus was taking notes in his journal as she worked. This was an interesting malt mixture. He timed her cantrip; it seemed like an excessive amount of mana. "How much mana are you putting into that spell, may I ask?"

"I use 100 mana to germinate the malt. That's about four times normal. Sedge grass tends to soak up mana easily. The seeds are already soaking in a lot of dark mana and will absorb more, so the cantrip needs a lot of power to it."

"How long will this take to grow? Tomorrow morning, I assume?"

Suzette laughed. "Oh no, this is quick. I'll be ready to roast the malt in about 20 minutes. Can you keep a watch on it? I have to check the storage area."

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

Running to the sub-basement, she found it unchanged, except for the glowing crystal about the door. Touching it, she got a message.

[This dungeon is now 85% full and in no danger of bursting. As an owner of the establishment it is connected to, do you wish to claim this dungeon and take control of it? You will control access to this dungeon as long as it remains under 95% full. You will be held responsible for a Dungeon Burst if such an event happens.

Do you wish to claim this dungeon? Y/N

This dungeon is currently denoted as Lair of the Under-Rodent

Do you wish to rename this dungeon?]

Oh, very interesting. She needed to think a bit first. She kept the notification but moved it to the side.

Running back to the brewery, she saw the germinated grains were ready to roast. She transferred them to a metal canister and placed them on a runic heating pad made for her by Aleister. "This just takes 10 minutes, shaking often. I want a golden-brown coloring, but if a few are fully roasted and dark, that helps with the flavor. "

After roasting and grinding the malt, she added it to the standard setup for Bludgeon Brew and started on the brewing cantrip. "I use 200 mana for brewing. This barrel will be done tomorrow."

Thaddeus closed his book. "Quite a bit of mana. That's going to be beyond the average brewer. I take it you can only do one barrel a day."

Suzette laughed. "Hah! With how popular it is? No, I can do four kegs in the morning and another four at night if needed. It's ready to drink less than a day later. It's got three times the kick of normal Blud. The extra mana ups the alcohol content."

They went back upstairs. Ben was quite happy to see her. She grabbed half a dozen tankards in each hand and started refilling empty hands and gathering in the copper. She handed Thaddeus a full Blud Dark and poured one for herself. "So, what are your thoughts?"

Thaddeus considered his options. The first was to levy a fine on the tavern, forbid the making of Bludgeon Brew, and toss a hefty fine at ACME. This wasn't ideal for many reasons. Firstly, the tavern keeper had simply modified the recipe, not just misused the name. Secondly, because of TimmytheWonderboy54 raving about the brew on his videocast, he had several hundred bars wanting to carry the new recipe. BludCorp was getting a lot of free advertising.

Thirdly, it was a good beer! He had to drink a lot of Blud in his travels, but that didn't mean that he actually liked it.

And finally, he just didn't want to punish them. The tavern keeper may not have even known about the problems with copyright. From the story he'd gotten, neither of her bosses had said a word when she made the beer and named it. Timmy had assumed it was official. And since Bludcorp was one of his sponsors, people everywhere assumed it was official as well.

The problem was, he couldn't just let this pass. "My thoughts are you screwed up badly, but I can help you fix it. Are you willing to train a team of my brewers on your methods, both magical and mundane? " Suzette told him she had no problem with that.

"But I need a bit more. My bosses will claim your tavern is gaining a vast amount of advertising from being able to claim the original recipe. They will want compensation for that. They spend a fortune sponsoring adventuring groups like Sir Timothy over there to gain for exposure. Can you guarantee ACME will put forth that sum?"

Suzette finished her beer. She was pretty damned sure it was guaranteed that ACME wouldn't spend a dime to get her out of this mess. "How about a trade? I get Timmy over there, and a lot of other groups, to sponsor your brand for free, plus give you a unique form of sponsorship that at this time, no one else can match?"

Thaddeus looked at the smiling barmaid/tavernkeeper. What the hell was she up to? "That is a mighty tall order. But, in general and non-binding terms, I will say that we might have a deal. When will you be able to give me details?"

"How about later tonight? Sit and drink beer on the house. Ben, pour Mr. Walgird whatever he wants, and mark it down as on the house. We have to be fair and make sure ACME gets its 20%. Be right back."

Moving back downstairs for some privacy, she brought up the window and claimed the dungeon, followed by changing how the notifications were set up and giving it a new name.

----------------------------------------

Vern, Billy, and Layla were sitting at a small table in Billy's hut, trying to come up with some way to outwit the spells on the standing stones. They'd 'experimented' until they'd used up all of Layla's crew twice over in the past two days. People had crawled, been thrown, charged together, and tried to tunnel in, all with no success. Layla suggested a deeper tunnel, and Vern was talking about finding some players or NPCs with magic knowledge. All three had their screens light up at once, as did all other corporation managers inside GENESIS.

[Congratulations to ACME corporation. One of its employees has laid claim to a dungeon in the village of Sedgewick earning ACME corporation 100 Building Points for claiming a dungeon, and 100 Building Points for being one of the first 10 dungeons discovered.

Claim more Building Points to enhance your Corporate Holdings by constructing more public works or taking responsibility for managing dangerous parts of the world.]

Vern was ecstatic. "Billy! My boy! You had another present for Uncle Vern? I should tan your hide for keeping it a secret, but I'm just too happy with you. 200 Building Points?!! That will give us a small office in the capital or a merchant stand in one of the Dukal cities. Where have you been hiding this dungeon?"

Billy wished he knew himself. Time to stall. "Let’s grab a beer, Vern, and I'll tell you all about it." Layla followed along, fuming. How the hell was Billy pulling this shit out of his ass without her catching wind of it?

The tavern was in full swing. Timmy had intended to come in and start some shit, get a bar fight going, and maybe have it spill into the town for a bit of looting and pillaging. Standard procedure for when Famco sent a gang into a small town to teach it a lesson. And he wanted to get a bit of revenge on whoever stole that Daemon kill from him. Dying was bad enough, but not getting a second chance at HIS Daemon? Unforgivable.

But that plan was delayed when he saw an official Bludgeon Brew quality expert in town. He liked the money he got from being sponsored by Blud; it let him have a longer leash from Grandmother. So tonight, they would drink, maybe tomorrow, go on a rampage. Besides a comely little barmaid, there wasn't anything in this town he needed, and Famco wanted to start causing ACME some problems.

The Bludgeon guy was getting awfully chummy with 'Suzette the Lonely Barmaid’; working on some deal about Blud Dark from what he overheard. He was about to grab another Blud when his screen lit up with a message - as did everyone else’s who was in or near the tavern.

[Raise a glass of Blud to Zephyr, Ozzy, and Aleister who have slain the vile Snik'Tik the Rat-kin Necromancer. (Level 5 Elite Boss.) Who will be the next adventurers to venture into the dark dungeons depths of:

The Lair of the Under-Rodent, sponsored by Blud Dark!]