CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN

The Art of Negotiation

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“Are they pretending to be carpenters?” Lil’ Joss asked.

“Well,” Bram looked uncomfortable, “yes…”

“Then they’re not doing a good job pretending,” Josslyn weighed in.

Clearly, Bram’s attempt to disguise his household’s soldiers wasn’t faring as well as he’d hoped, at least not in the eyes of the bandit siblings who seemed talented at spotting and avoiding them.

“Were they that obvious?”

Josslyn laughed.

It was nothing like Rowan’s girlish giggle, but one that was unabashedly full, hearty, and quite pleasant to hear.

“Real carpenters use their hands less. They’ve got magic tailored for the job. But it’s more than that,” she asserted. “I could tell they were soldiers from a league away.”

“You’d be a piss-poor bandit if you couldn’t,” Lil’ Joss guffawed.

He and his sister laughed at their inside joke, while Bram, leaning on his experience as an expert in disguise, pushed the cogs in his brain to think as they might so that he could observe his troops with the shifty eye of a criminal.

“Hurry it up, Recruit!”

“I’m here, Sir!”

The middle-aged, cleanly shaven man barking orders at Chris from the pavilion’s second-floor landing did look like a typical worker, but his rigid posture and loud voice easily gave him away as a leader of soldiers.

Bram groaned.

I should invite the Delightful Troupe to Reise and have them do an acting class…

That thought made him frown.

Assuming they aren’t here already, which I highly doubt… They’ll make their presence known to me when they’re ready.

Imagining his former teachers showing up unannounced caused his frown to turn upside down. Because, despite the grueling training he’d suffered under their watchful eye, the masters of the Delightful Troupe had been a more fun bunch to be around than the nobles of the Sovereign’s court.

“What’re you smirking for?”

Bram turned his head to the side and discovered Josslyn eyeing him curiously.

“Your boys are working hard. Doesn’t look like you’re abusing them.”

“Abusing one’s workers won’t get the job done any faster.”

Bram had learned that tip from Hajime who’d been sharing tales of his time leading his old game design team, including some best practice ideas Hajime had for ensuring his team could operate efficiently despite overworking in a high-stress environment.

“You paying them enough?” Lil’ Joss asked.

“More than enough,” Bram answered, adding, “Including incentives like bonuses for speedy but quality work.”

“In…cen…tives?” Lil’ Joss began, to which Josslyn added, “Bonuses…?”

Bram grinned.

Incentives and bonuses were terms he’d learned from Chris, the former executive producer of a triple-A gaming company.

A few weeks ago, once they’d decided to begin construction of the players’ campus, Chris had advised Bram about offering incentives to his soldiers similar to what he and Bridget had fought for in their contracts. Nothing so grand as a ‘mental health day’ or ‘paid vacation,’ but at least ‘sick days’ and ‘bonuses’ should be provided to ensure the new workers were motivated to work in tasks different from their duties as soldiers.

Certainly, the innovative idea of incentives was a more costly approach compared to the way nobles usually motivated their workers—flogging, threatening, and blackmailing among many others—but to this day, neither Bram nor Ser Anthony had heard a single complaint from the men and women who toiled day and night on their construction site.

The prince explained his otherworldly tactic with a smug look—for which noble other than he would ever choose to part with their wealth just to increase their underlings’ motivation for work—and the bandit siblings couldn’t help but look at him like he was mad.

“That’s how bloody rich you are?” Lil’ Joss asked incredulously.

“It’s not what I hoped you’d take away from my explanation, but yes, I have enough to fund all this…”

His hand swept the nearby surroundings and all the construction occurring on this plot of land on the outskirts of Reise that he’d recently acquired.

“This is only the beginning though,” Bram revealed.

He saw it in his mind’s eye; a bustling street full of colorful shops teeming with colorful people who would help Reise truly deserve its title as the rainbow town.

Lil’ Joss sighed. “Should’ve robbed you when we had the chance.”

“Wouldn’t have worked.” Bram shrugged. “I don’t carry money on me.”

This was a lie.

The prince always made sure to have a bag of griffins on hand wherever he went, because, as Ser Anthony had taught him, “A man without coin must sleep out in the cold, but a man with a pouch of griffins will have many doors open for him to rest in.”

“Hey, Recruit!” yelled a worker waiting by the pavilion’s bottom step. “Bring us some rope for the pulley!”

“Got it, Sir!” Chris yelled back.

The Texan was already climbing down the steps, and he’d already traded in his pack of lumber for the thick roll of hemp rope slung over his shoulder.

Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.

Speaking of the pavilion’s bottom steps, the ground around it was barren and unappealing, but Bram hoped that this space would one day be filled with many colorful banners representing the experts who would come to call the Master’s Pavilion home.

Again, he could see it in his mind’s eye; the experts’ coat of arms fluttering from poles rising from the pavilion’s front grounds like those one might find outside the gates of the capital’s Colosseum.

“I knew you weren’t just a bard when we met,” Josslyn commented.

Bram glanced sideways at her. “What gave me away?”

“The way you pillow was too gentle…too polished. We commoners tend to get rough when we lay together,” she said offhandedly, causing Bram and Lil’ Joss to blush. “I should’ve guessed you were a noble…and a high noble at that.”

Bram didn’t refute her deductions, though he didn’t admit to her just how high a noble he truly was. The bandit siblings might still work with an eorl or margrave, but an ‘Imp’ might be too much trouble, especially one with a target on his back.

Josslyn’s gaze drifted from one construction site to the other, landing on the four-story building on the opposite side of the road and the contraption being carefully raised on its roof, not by the typical cranes and riggings that were common in such work, but by a group of sorcerers in fancy emerald cloaks who used magic to complete their task.

“That’s a stargazing mirror, isn’t it?” Josslyn confirmed.

Bram nodded.

The stargazing mirror in question was a large bronze cylinder about fifteen feet in length and seven feet in circumference was capped by two round mirrors with the one facing the heavens being the larger of the two.

“Those fancy robes look like a coven’s getup,” Josslyn guessed, and rightly too.

These sorcerers were members of the Coven of Stargazers who’d been assigned to help with the building of Rowan’s new summoning hall. Once completed, the four-story structure would also house the new players’ immigration center which Hajime had stressed should be as inviting as possible—so it would include a bar and a spa when it was finished, two services Bridget swore could easily calm an otherworlder’s nerves when they needed a break from the harshness of Aarde.

Josslyn’s gaze took in the other construction sites—an unfinished tower, a row of small buildings meant to become the shops that’ll cater to new players, and even a fancy-looking garden complete with fancy-looking flower beds and trees—before her eyes snapped back to Bram.

“How’re you paying for all this?”

“Spoils.”

Specifically, the spoils his party had earned from their exploration of the Red Ruin which Bram had mostly sold off through the shops in Bastille’s Hightown. The rare items, such as the bottles of Nymph Sap and logs of Heartwood they’d found inside Loveless’ corpse, along with treasures they’d discovered among the Red Ruin’s lost horde, were sold through auction. All that wealth allowed the prince to fill his Lotharin Investment Fund with more than enough griffins for the players’ campus construction, with enough left over for future RMT transactions.

Of course, not all the heartwood had been sold, and there were other rare materials the prince was loathe to part with.

Heartwood was a material excellent for creating light but durable armor which Bram had planned to give soldiers who earned merit in the coming conflict. As for the Nymph’s Taproot, he’d already handed it over to the chief alchemist in Hightown’s apothecary in the hopes that their facility could create the status-raising potions the system had hinted was possible to create using this rare ingredient as the base.

Thinking about it again, Bram couldn’t help but sigh.

The Loom did warn him that such a task would require a high-ranking alchemist’s skills, but it didn’t look like the chief alchemist of Hightown’s apothecary was up to the task. According to the system’s job rating, he was only an intermediate rank in alchemy.

“Perhaps I should have offered him the Loom to fuel his growth,” Bram whispered.

“What was that?” Lil’ Joss asked.

“Nothing.” Bram shook his head. “So, how about I show you the task I need you for.”

With a nod at Chris who’d winked back at him, Bram led the bandit siblings into the unfinished summoning hall. However, instead of entering its spacious main atrium which they glimpsed beyond intricately carved stone doors, the prince led them down a series of steps found to the side of the hall’s foyer.

“I don’t like this,” Lil’ Joss complained.

Bram easily guessed why.

Bandits tended not to like closed spaces. They hated going underground even more because there were fewer possible escape routes when you were trapped beneath the earth. This would’ve been doubly true for the leaders of the Mighty Greenwood Gang who had yet to be caught on the open road whenever they plied their trade.

“Be at ease, Friend,” Bram emphasized the last word, “the bond we forged in one glorious night of merrymaking isn’t so easily broken with a faithless trap.”

Lil’ Joss glanced at his sister. “A little too merry, if you ask me.”

Josslyn stuck her tongue out in response.

“You’re just pissed because he chose me to pillow instead of an ugly shit like you,” she teased.

Lil’ Joss frowned. “I told you not to call me ugly!”

They elbowed each other, and Bram watched their roughhousing with a smile…and a slightly envious eye. It was obvious to him that they were close in a way he and his siblings never were… Well, there was Camilla, but he hadn’t seen her since she’d become Governor of Nevarra, and apart from Camilla, the others had treated Bram like he was, as they loved to proclaim, an ill-fated prince.

Bram cleared his throat, drawing the bandit siblings’ gazes back on him.

“You trusted me enough to come to Reise… Trust me just a bit more.”

Usually, bandits like Lil’ Joss and his sister would’ve been wary of him after discovering Bram was a noble. However, Bram had made such a strong first impression on them that they couldn’t help but give him the benefit of the doubt. Their faith would be rewarded, of course, though some misunderstandings were bound to occur after they saw what he had prepared down in the basement. Through a series of thick steel doors—the kind one might find in a dungeon that was meant to lock things inside it—they arrived at a low-ceilinged room of thick stone that was filled with dozens of large cages.

“What the bloody hell is this?!” Lil’ Joss demanded.

His hand flew to the axe handle strapped to his back, but before he could pull it out, his sister stopped him.

“Wait, Joss,” she insisted.

Bram understood their wary looks because he could glimpse the thought that was in their minds. The empty cages were large enough that one could easily misinterpret what a perverted noble might want to lock inside them.

“You remember our talk?” Josslyn asked Bram.

“You don’t deal in slavery. It’s the reason I liked you,” he answered.

Bram strode over to the nearest cage, opened its door, and then walked inside it to demonstrate how the cage seemed much too big for a man even as tall as he.

“These aren’t meant for people,” he promised.

“What then?” Lil’ Joss pressed, though it was his sister who answered, “Monsters…they’re meant for beasts. Live ones…”

“Yes.”

Bram didn’t bother explaining the summoning ritual to the bandit siblings. They didn’t need to know why he needed a constant supply of fel beasts, which, as he emphasized, needed to be breathing when they were transported here. Instead, the prince brought the Mighty Greenwood Gang on board to the great undertaking with the promise of incentives which he was beginning to suspect was possibly Earth’s version of an incantation, because surely, offering a prospective employee incentives could be considered a powerful spell of coercion.

“I’ll make sure to provide you with a hefty bonus so long as you fill the monthly quota and guarantee the supply of beasts isn’t ever disrupted,” the prince promised, adding, “To ensure that your work isn’t disturbed…”

Bram pressed a token into Lil’ Joss’ large palm that was like the one he’d tried to give Chris.

“I can give you legitimacy so long as you promise to stop thieving. Work for me instead. It’s honest work for honest pay.”

That last bit was a line he’d learned from Chris who’d been tutoring him in the school of human resources.

Lil’ Joss and Josslyn eyed each other.

They laughed.

“Keep your legitimacy.” Lil’ Joss tossed Bram’s token back into his hand. “We’ll not change our ways. Not for anyone.”

Bram’s smile faltered. He didn’t expect them to reject his offer, and so quickly too.

Seeing the prince’s crestfallen face, Josslyn chuckled some more.

“Don’t get us wrong. We’ll do the job and take your money,” she explained.

“And those bonuses,” Lil’ Joss weighed in.

“Yes, that too,” Josslyn agreed, adding, “But we’ll do it our way. Not yours. We bandits have our own honor to protect.”

“If you’re fine with that, Bard,” Lil Joss offered Bram his hand, “then let’s get to business.”

“I can live with that.”

The prince took the bandit leader’s hand and shook it.

“Good, now…” Josslyn shoved her brother aside so she could take Bram’s hand. “Let’s seal this deal the old way.”

She began dragging him toward the open cage, and Bram didn’t resist. He knew better than to disrupt negotiations when they were at the end of it.

“Bloody hell, Lyn,” Lil’ Joss sighed, “at least wait until I’m out of the room…or maybe ask him his name first before you pillow him again!”

Neither Josslyn nor Bram answered. They were too busy getting reacquainted.

Lil' Joss sighed again.

“I need a drink…”

The last thing Lil’ Joss heard as he ran toward the basement’s exit was the sound of a metal door banging shut and clothes being ripped apart.