I didn’t shout. Shows a lot of emotional maturity, I think. I’d say that I’m on a really positive path as a leader and human being. I just closed my eyes and visualized the Principal versus Deer running gag from Nichijou. Haha, the bullet-proof vest does nothing, Principle-San. Deer-San is too strong.

When I opened my eyes again, my two Six Stars were waiting. Were they getting closer? That’s nice.

“Alright. Development Counselor, when I connect my Sky Realm to a resource site, do I need to connect to my Tower, or to the site where the piece of my realm came from? Like, if I wanted to send workers from Gradden March to work in the quarry, do they have to pass through here, or can I link the two sites directly?

“Everything runs through the Tower.” Carousel smiled. I think the word to describe it would be “languorously.” She smiled like a cat stretching.

“I can see that being a ferocious waste of resources but… anyway. Work Squad! Build roads connecting the Tower to every location we have discovered except the Armored Tiger Den!”

That got me some curious looks. “Tower Master?”

“What, you aren’t curious about what’s going to happen when those pond fairies can sell their magic berries to the very safe, very normal alchemists of the Floating Quarter?”

That got some slow nods. “That’s right, those… whatever they were berries. They increased speed, right?” Versai asked.

“Bulwilp berries. It made people move faster and gave them a two percent miss chance if they were attacked in a forest. Actually, that would be really useful in the Hidden Moon Mountain raid. Hmm. I’ll have to get some.” I rapped my head.

The berries hadn’t seemed very useful when I tried the free sample, but it was a situational thing. The raid was a situation where having a high level of mobility would be important, and having one in fifty attacks just whiff would be a whole lot better than having that attack land.

“Right, next item. Carousel, I need a list of every item you know of that can be manufactured in Gradden March and used outside of the Sky Realm. Everything. Every potion, ointment, lotion, weapon, spell, thug, thug with a spell, talisman, weapon, talisman weapon, a thug with a spell that is also a talisman weapon, everything.”

“Does that list include things that we can eventually build up to? I should also mention that there are things we can manufacture and export that I don’t know about yet, as we have not connected the relevant resources.”

“Everything that we can currently manufacture and export. Dear God, how much stuff can there be?”

“Err. Several thousand items at least?”

I blinked at her.

“Do what now?”

“Well, after you asked about making-” I gave her a hard look and she rolled her eyes “Ballista, which remains a ridiculous word, Sebastian and I talked it over. The means of importation, production and exportation are… interesting.”

Wait. Wait, Sebastian, you mad lad. You’ve been out of your little dungeon for two days and you are already figuring out exploits? AND you are roping Carousel into it? She’s had the least amount of ‘awake’ time of any of you.

Did… did the Marquis leave his incompetent wife in charge out of the very reasonable fear that Sebastian would be running the fife if he didn’t?

“Interesting how?”

“Well, it starts off very proscriptive- certain buildings make certain things and only those things. A Tannery will only produce tanned hides, although which tanned hides it produces depends on which hides it is supplied with. Horse hide, cow hide, buffalo hide, pig hide, and so on.”

“With you so far.”

“Except that’s not everything a tannery can produce. There is an awful lot of residue left behind by the tanning process, various crystals of chemicals useful to alchemists, waste that can be reduced to sulfur, and more.”

“Ah! The ‘ole ‘the System ignores trash’ exploit! You love to see it.”

“Indeed. Especially when you consider that ammonia and sulfur are chemicals that we, in theory, need to import or manufacture.” Carousel’s smile was a touch eerie. The cat had finished stretching, and was now up to no good.

“Oh? Nice!”

“It gets better. What’s the import on that?”

“Eh?”

“What is the source of all that waste?”

“Oh… it’s sewage, right?” Suddenly grossed out.

“No, it’s hides.” Her smile deepened. “You can only send hides into the tannery. Nothing else, except at higher levels of development when you can add dyes and alchemical reagents.”

“Wait. The usual byproducts of the tanning process are produced, but the raw materials needed for the tanning process are just…”

“Yes, my Lord. You have it now. There are similar restrictions. I started considering what other siege weaponry we could produce, and in every instance, I knew, unshakably, that a siege engineering workshop would be required to create them, along with specialized workers to oversee the construction.”

“Alright?”

“My Lord, on a campaign, Trebuchets and other siege equipment are built on site, not hauled along with the supply train. The throwing arm is more or less an entire tree trunk.”

Versai agreed, saying “You use green timber for it. Whatever is handy, really. If you can loot dried wood, so much the better, but most of the time, you have to harvest trees and things to build them.”

“Still not following.”

“That means that a few basic woodworkers, and some not-at-all-basic math, is enough to build a trebuchet. Well, and rope makers and some basic metal parts and the like. No special workshop required.” Versai half smiled.

“Ah. Annoying, but not unexpected at this point. So how do we take advantage of that?”

“No idea.” Versai shrugged. Carousel rolled her eyes.

“What I mean, my Lord, is that with some care, you could build advanced siege equipment here in the Tower, even if it wasn’t officially “a trebuchet.” It could just be an oddly shaped heap of trash that, by strange coincidence, demonstrates the incredible power of leverage.” Yes, that is one eerie smile right there.

I’m still deeply creeped out by what happened to Carousel. But I have to admit, the new Carousel is winning prizes as a flexible thinker.

Did you know this text is from a different site? Read the official version to support the creator.

“I’m liking where this is going. Do you have anything for me that will let me stab ghosts? These are cheating ghosts, where they can stab us, but we can’t stab them.”

Carousel slowly blinked in surprise, then narrowed her charming eyes. “Hmm. Actually, my spell Glass Arrow works on spirits. Not that I’ve ever had the opportunity to fight one. I just know it works.”

Ahah. Thank you game systems for that one.

“Is there a particular word that leaps to mind in connection with your ability to hit ghosts?” I asked, not even hiding the way I was crossing my fingers.

“Hmm? Arcane, I suppose. It’s a bolt of arcane energy.”

“Fantastic. And is that the same sort of energy that is in the ointment that gets smeared on weapons to let them bypass armor?” I said, trying to figure out how to cross my toes.

“No, that is Cyffyrddiad Ysbryd potion, and highly illegal. It distills certain graveyard remnants-”

“Hang on, hang on, I want to hear more about that but what is it called again?”

“Cyffyrddiad Ysbryd potion. Aptly named, if horrible in contents. There was talk of mass producing it using our war dead but that was quickly quashed. It works even better with monster corpses, so mass production keeps being proposed. Still, it’s nasty work and there is justifiable fear about where that potion will end up. Or in whose back.” Carousel shrugged one shoulder.

“Just… one more time. I’m sure I’ll get it this time.”

“Cyffyrddiad Ysbryd. Are you alright, Tower Master?”

“I’m wondering about that more and more these days. I give up. What does it do, exactly?”

“Not my area of magical speciality, but as I understand it, it transmutates powerful life energy into a force of un-life, bypassing the material to annihilate life energies directly. As a consequence of this, any weapon it’s on can also reach, and damage, un-life beings.”

“Ghost Touch Potion, got it, thanks.”

“Ghost… touch?” She tasted the words cautiously. Versai shook her head and looked away.

“Yep. Ghost Touch potion. That’s what it’s called now. Ghost Touch potion.” I had to be firm on this immediately, or we’d be straight back to that ballista nonsense.

“What a strange name.” Carousel murmured.

“Sure, strange, you bet. So how much of this Ghost Touch potion can we lay hands on today? Or anything doing arcane damage?”

“Not a lot, my Lord. Of either. Arcane magic, and everything related to it, was strictly regulated by the Crown. And while Cyffyrddiad Ysbryd potion-”

“Sorry, the WHAT NOW potion?”

She rolled her eyes. “The Ghost Touch potion was known widely, and was equally widely forbidden. Mere possession saw the owner hung in a gibbet and all his possessions were forfeit to the local secular authorities. Actually making such a potion carried a much more serious punishment.”

“More serious than being hung?”

Versai jumped in. “Being slowly boiled into The Soup of Bitter Wisdom. Which involves, ultimately, being dissolved into a sort of broth in a superheated glass pot in the middle of a major public plaza. It is a particularly nasty process that takes about… ten hours?”

“Ten hours. You need the time for some of the toxins to cook out.” Carousel nodded.

“Ten hours. And they are awful hours. The brain and nerves are the last to go. Horrible, watching them float in all that reddish acid.”

Okay, that’s pure-

“Actually, by that point it’s become mildly caustic. All the town’s official alchemists have to sit and watch, without food or water, until the process is complete. When the soup is ready, they have to drink it all up. The chemicals used to sustain the transformation of a man into soup are, after all that cooking, quite bitter. A good reminder of what can happen when Alchemists break the law, and a good reminder of the need for self regulation. Or so I was told, anyhow.” Carousel mildly corrected her. It got Carousel a nasty little look from Versai. Seems like there was still bad blood.

“AND ONCE AGAIN I’m cutting this off. Dear God and his many little fishes, just what the Hell was going on in your country?”

“We did have a reputation for being soft on alchemical crimes. It’s just, we were all so focused on the war effort.” Versai tried to explain.

“Right. You always hear about cases like Bolsingolin of Voh, who was refined in the Iron Sepulcher for nine hundred and ninety nine days, with every member of his family within three degrees of consanguinity refined in the fires with him, their souls bound with his into a single pellet of inescapable torment. That’s pretty standard punishment for Illegal or Heretical Alchemy in most countries.” Carousel sounded a little helpless.

“Okay! Noted! People didn’t keep this stuff lying around, and would presumably only brew some up when there was someone they really, really, really needed dead. And I’d assume that, not coincidentally, it would cost several year’s wages to get an alchemist to work on it?”

“No, but only because any black market alchemist capable of preparing it would be working for an organization, and not open to public commissions.” Versai and Carousel shared a look.

“Working for an…” I sighed and rubbed the spot between my eyebrows. “Sebastian.”

“He’s never said anything. But then, I’ve never asked.” Versai’s smile was quite brittle. I hadn’t really considered the impact of discovering her uncle ran a major criminal syndicate might have on her. Which… was dumb of me. Or… rude? Selfish? Thoughtless? I don’t know what it was. She’d had an awful long time to think about it in the frozen order time when we created our exploits. It shouldn’t hit her that bad, right?

I feel like I’m missing something obvious.

Oh, damn.

“STOP HARVESTING THE MONSTERS! EVERYONE, NOBODY TOUCH THE MONSTERS!”

“Tower Master?”

“What do you want to bet that Sebastian has someone on hand who can do the work, but needs an ungodly amount of bodies?”

“While I do know a gentleman who can brew Cyffyrddiad Ysbryd,-” Sebastian had joined me in my Throne Room.

“Do you mean the well known potion Ghost Touch?”

“What a bizarre name. Anyhow, we don’t keep any on hand. It’s simply too dangerous.”

“You were worried about getting raided?” I raised a disbelieving eyebrow.The old devil countered with a perfectly arched eyebrow of his own. Did you know an eyebrow could be patronizing? I didn’t. Oh, the things I learn in this game.

“Because they are notoriously unstable and begin to emit an unbearably noxious smell after a week in storage. This is when they are sealed in a glass jar, and then sealed again with lead. I speak from deeply unhappy experience here- such vile things are best made to order. Regrettably, just as even a thrifty housewife can’t cook without barley, an alchemist requires ingredients. And we would need dozens, if not in excess of a hundred, monster corpses to create enough potion to coat the weapons of five people.”

I allowed myself a few seconds of smug. Sometimes, you just know how the universe will set you up.

“The good news is that we do have a frankly awful amount of monsters in the killing fields around the Tower. The bad news is that my summons can’t touch them without the monsters disintegrating and leaving a remnant of loot behind. So they can’t haul the bodies over to the Sky Realm.”

“Mmm. I’m afraid I’m far too old for such work.” The remarkably fit looking Sebastian spread his hands helplessly.

“I wasn’t going to ask you to. We can dispatch Gradden March workers to connected resource sites. We harvested timber from around the Tower, and now we want to collect the resource called “bodies.”

He stroked his beard thoughtfully. “I see. I instinctively want to say that the Tower is not a resource site and the workers cannot be deployed here, but I see the logic. I suppose the only way to find out is to try.”

“Yep. How many can I deploy, do you know?”

“General laborers, without disrupting any of the existing industries we have going? Eight hundred.”

I had to make sure my ears were working correctly. “Eight hundred workers.”

“Well. Eight hundred laborers. They aren’t Awakened Souls. You shouldn’t expect the same kind of capability.” He hedged.

“Eight hundred.”

“Currently, yes.”

I called up the interface and started hunting around for resource sites to deploy to. It kept wanting to snap over to the stone mine, but I was able to, by dint of very fine positioning and an unnaturally steady hand, just barely get it to lock onto the area just beyond the Tower.

“Deploy. Resource- monster bodies.” I waved my scepter as I did it. Time to see what that efficiency bonus looked like. I heard a rumble of footsteps from downstairs. We rushed out of the room, and quickly found a stream of filthy, foul smelling laborers pouring out from the Sky Realm door next to the map room. They rushed down the stairs… then stopped. Mobbing up. They completely packed the stairwell.

“Stop, stop! Back up everyone, single file on the right! Shove all the way over to the right, backs to the wall!” I shouted as Sebastian and I ran down the stairs. At the bottom of the steps, we found the workers blobbed up in front of the sealed-shut door. My ‘back door.’ The one I had covered with many tons of dirt.

“Oh God damn it. Guys! Workers! There is a completely open door right over there. Look. I am pointing at it. The door. Is open. And it’s right behind you. Just turn around, and walk forward.”

There were blank looks repeated eight hundred times. The sheer concentrated animal smell of it, mixing with the gormless staring. Like chihuahuas fed enough valium to dampen the psychopathy and leave only the lentil-sized remainder of their brain.

“Way’s blocked.”

“Can’t go.”

“Can’t do it.”

“Roadblock. Time for lunch.”

“Can’t do it.”

“Way’s blocked.”

There were less than a dozen variations of the same thing. The path was blocked, and they couldn’t go. Even if I grabbed one and forcibly turned them around, they turned right back.

“Maybe you need to open the door?” Sebastian asked with carefully restrained amusement.

“Like hell. That gate doesn’t open until I have a full blown gatehouse and wall complex set up. You know what? We are going to do it the hard way. Come on. You grab one arm, I’ll take the other. We are going to drag this guy out through the front door. I’m not putting up with this level of stupid.”

They were bumping off the door. Like roombas. Actually, roombas could navigate around obstacles. This was sub-roomba intelligence on display. Horrifying.

Sebastian and I grabbed one of the humanoid robots and hauled them towards the front door. We got him through and had barely reached the first step up to the top of the wall when the sky turned blood red.

There was a throbbing, thick veins of something pulsing, irregular and fast, there were things crawling along the veins, monstrous, unspeakable things. The infested the sky, clinging to the web of arteries filling the dome of the sky.

10.

9.

8.

Nothing needed to be said. We hauled the worker back in. “RETURN TO THE SKY REALM! I AM ORDERING ALL OF YOU TO RETURN TO THE SKY REALM. RIKKA, RACHE, ALL HANDS, KILL ANY SURVIVING MONSTERS RIGHT THIS INSTANT, NOW NOW NOW!”

The countdown reached two before it stopped. The sun rose over a bloody field. And I, once again, wished I could puke. Not because of the battlefield. Just as a way to release the stress.

The nose. The throbbing irregular beat of that bloody sky. The rubbing of the veins and the endless chittering, squeaking noises of those monsters on the other side of the sky. I thought before that we were trapped in an eyeball. Now? The lungs? Some mockery of a heart? I don’t know anymore. Maybe we are moving. Maybe we are seeing different pieces of the same thing. I don’t know.

I sat on the steps and hung onto my knees. Sebastian didn’t have a single damned thing to say about it either.