After Izo was done with the simple marriage ceremony, Izo departs from the loving couple’s apartment. As it would turn out, when Cthulhu’s temple came into existence, the system automatically made Izo an officially licensed marriage officiator. As long as Izo married the couple, the marriage would automatically be registered and licensed in the place of the marriage. However, for this particular marriage, Izo asked the system, that the marriage is to be lost in the paperwork of the court for exactly a year, before magically being found in the court filing system, that said marriage had taken place a year ago and had tragically been misfiled.

With a spring in her step, Izo teleports back to the dungeon and heads towards the 20th floor. Squishy happily slobbers all over Izo as Izo shudders but allows Squishy to do so. Having shown the owner her love, Squishy rolls onto her back to have her tummy petted.

Izo shivers as she touches the strange moist, smooth skin of Squishy. Having lasted long enough, Izo withdraws her hand as Squishy lets out a happy yelp and trots back to the fake temple core to guard it. Izo checks the real temple core strategically hidden among the mana sunflowers. The core was safe as ever, when a message pops up before Izo.

Temple core minimum upgrade requirements have been met!

Dungeon minimum of 20 Levels.

Upgraded Temple to level 2.

Captain Knight of S-Class level assigned.

Bishop has been assigned.

Would you like to start the upgrade?

Warning: Upgrade will take 1 hour to be completed.

Izo clicks the yes option and her temple core begins to glow. The minutes trickle by as Izo lines down on the mana sunflowers to see the sky filled with energy snakes. Squishy will reach out to chase or eat an energy snake but mostly remains to guard her post.

After an hour, a message pops up before Izo.

Temple Core has evolved to stage 2.

The dungeon may now host a maximum of 45 dungeon levels.

Captain of the Knights will have an automatic steed assigned for his use inside the dungeon.

Captain of the Knights may test his skills against dungeon creatures and destroy them. [Said destruction is only temporary as monsters will automatically respawn once the Captain of the Knights has passed onto the next level. This extra feature will not cost the dungeon owner extra God Coins per month.]

Boss Monsters such as the Bone Dragon have received added stats and new skills.

This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

Lower level monsters have received bonus stats.

The 8th dungeon floor has automatically gained the following buildings filled with necessary accommodations and workers: an inn with hot springs, a brothel filled with willing succubus’s and incubuses, a city hall, a 3-star-hotel, a large grocery store, and now available for adventurers to rent is a new housing development area with its own apartment manager to manage and collect the rent.

Izo wasn’t surprised about most of the added features except for the brothel. Why was a brothel added? Well, no matter, as long as she made money, she really didn’t care. In fact, Izo quickly became a fan once she saw the pricing for the services provided.

Seeing as the temple core had given her new building, Izo could tell the system was subtlety trying to tell her something. Taking a hint, Izo begins to purchase buildings for the rapidly growing town. A skyscraper filled with luxury apartments for rent, mana drones that delivered or carried purchases for an adventurer, R-snails that are actually quite fast and deliver a person promptly to their next location, and a few more things for the locals such as a theatre, a wine shop, etc.

Finished, Izo yawns and glances at her watch, it was rather late, and it was too late to set out for a dungeon. With that in mind, Izo teleports back to her room to sleep. After all, she could always get to it tomorrow.

*

Elsewhere at Marchen Inc. Auction House, Flora Fauna and Thomas Vladimir sleepily emerge from the vault. Utterly exhausted, the two have somehow managed to register everything into the inventory and finally be done. Mr. Smith happily waves goodbye to the two managers as he locks up after them. Wolfe happily trots next to Mr. Smith before dashing away to patrol the auction house. Because at night, that was when Wolfe’s true monster nature came alive and woe the person that came crossed him.

Flora sleepily yawns as Thomas walks Flora to her car. Before Flora can get into her car, Thomas hastily says, “So, do you want to go out for dinner?”

Flora frowns and says, “Dinner? Isn’t it a little late for that?”

“Yeah, you’re right. My bad,” Thomas instantly said, regretting having opened his mouth.

“But I guess it can’t hurt,” Flora relented after a second.

Thomas perks up and says, “How about we go to Gia’s?”

Flora shrugs and says, “That’s fine, do you want to go in my car?”

Thomas happily gets into the passenger seat as Thomas gets in and Flora starts the car. The two chat all the way there, before arriving at the still open late diner. In an uncharacteristic gesture, Thomas holds the restaurant door open for Flora as she politely thanks him for the kind gesture.

After ordering, the two chat about work until Thomas awkwardly says, “So do you want to do something this weekend?” Thomas curses himself at his stupid words. He’d asked hundreds of women out before, but this was the first time he tripped over his tongue. He wasn’t even this nervous the first time he asked a woman out!

Flora blinks and disbelieving says, “Like a date?”

Thomas' face reddens with embarrassment as he wished he could really be staked through the heart right now.

“Do you like me, Thomas?” Flora seriously asked.

“Oh god, please kill me,” Thomas silently pleaded with the heavens, before saying out loud, “Yeah.” Then Thomas proceeds to berate himself for answering to stupidly!

“Oh,” Flora blinked in reply.

To their relief, the waiter arrives with their meal and the two busily begin to eat. After a while, Flora says, “You’ve always been my friend, Thomas, but you’re a bit of player. But nevertheless, I guess we can go on a date, but I choose what we do, okay?”

Thomas eyes fill with hope at Flora’s words as he smoothly replies, “Of course.”

The two smiled at each other rather awkwardly, because no matter what happened, this would change the nature of their very relationship forever. Either, they would continue to see each other, or they would be less than friends. Regardless, of tonight, time would only tell if that was a good thing or not.