Ch 15 – Preparations over a bowl of soup

What do I do with this...?

I feel like a child when given its first allowance... What do I even do with this much EP?

<< You know you don't have much time, right? >>

Gloria's words woke me up from my dazing.

Sure, what do I do...? If they have 30 people, they can just storm through anything I throw at them... I need to separate them first.

What followed were hours of massive changes to the dungeon.

After the Safe Zone, the cave now branched into 3 similar ones. Those each had various small rooms, smaller than the Core Room, and a single larger one at the end, from which a single corridor led nowhere. I made the corridor going into one of them too small for a human to pass without crawling. That should make it easier to set something up. I expanded the main path to have some bifurcations and added a small-ish anteroom before the Core Room. Although the changes were massive, the cost was only around 50 EP. Expanding a single floor was pretty cheap, but I had not added any monsters yet... Well... Adding them now would be a waste of time, I can always cherry pick them whenever I need. I should probably save some EP for the traps as well...

The most time-consuming part was arranging all of this in the 3-dimensional area of the dungeon... Since I was still a small one, the area I could encompass was only a 100x100 square, and since the single floor was not that big, I had to manage everything to fit withing a 10m height.

<< You know you are not supposed to intertwine tunnels and have one over the other in a single floor, right? >>

I mean... I do but what else should I do? Also, since the system didn't stop me It should be fine, I guess... Oh, Hey, Can I define hardness of flooring and everything?

<< Yes, but ceilings and floors are indestructible, you know? >>

I do, but check this out, if we...

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While this all took place, I was also sat near the fire with Mihara.

She was eating the stew heartily. Me? I was standing there, with an empty bowl in my hands, completely hypnotized by her cuteness...

Poor fox was starving. YEET I forgot to get something to drink.

"Mihara, Should I get you some water or beer?"

"Eh? You have that here? I'd appreciate some alcohol... I may die today for all I know..."

"I won't let that happen; I promise you."

I reached towards the bag where the cooking stuffs was, I asked for it because of course there was no such thing there.

System, give me a witbier leather canteen.

Why wheat? you ask, well, because it's more common in undeveloped areas. Also, much cheaper.

< A Small Canteen costs 1EP, the requested contents also cost 1EP (Light Wheat Beer) >

There we go then.

The small canteen materialized in my hand, inside the bag. It was heavier than I expected, weighing almost a full kilo. Anyhow, I opened the bag just a bit and pulled it out. First things first, I need to try this one out. I pulled off the cork plug and took a good swig. The cold beer spread a nice, burly taste though my mouth. I hadn't expected the system beer to be this good... It was as good as the one from my original world I used to drink. As I passed the canteen to Mihara, I could see her blush...

Well, I think it's a bit too late to be embarrassed over indirect kissing after literally swallowing my dick whole, don't you agree? Anyhow, her cuteness really is surprising, even at moments like these.

"Waaahh~... This was refreshing... Where do you even get this stuff? Everything tastes like it was made by a first-class cook! You even got salt!"

Is salt even supposed to be uncommon?

"I mean... I know at least the basics and carry some spices on me... But is salt even that expensive?"

"Yeah? Like, sea-salt tastes like dirt! Good salt is worth more than its weight in gold!

Hoooo.... The Jew inside me awakened. Rock salt was an extremely cheap dungeon resource... I could use it to make almost infinite money and attract more adventurers.

It's good having a normal human around... Knowledge is power, am I right?

"Didn't realize that, thanks..."

"I already knew you were rich, but didn't know it was this much..."

She said while eating the soup. Now in a far more gracious manner.

"Huh? How so?"

"The materials of the tent are outrageously expensive and so is the clothes you gave me... There was also that sweet bun that must have costed a fortune! I can't even start to imagine the price of all the stuff you have been giving me..."

Oops... For a princess to tell me that I really must've gone overboard.

"Oh... Sorry... I hadn't even realized. I just gave you whatever I had on hand that I thought you'd enjoy." Hope I haven't made it worse...

"Hmm... Why did you have a full set of luxurious lace lingerie at hand?" She asked confusedly, with a spoon hanging from her mouth.

"Ah... Good question... Maybe I was searching around for a wife and that's why I had it?"

My bet paid off. She was now flushed red and silently eating her soup while swigging the beer violently... Please don't make any more hard questions. I really can't answer those.

The whole cave started to rumble violently as I started to change the dungeon layout with Gloria.

A scared Mihara asked me, trembling

"This cave isn't gonna collapse from the earthquakes, right? I don't wanna die stuck in here forever..."

"Nah, relax... It's all fine. It could've been easier if that happened though... At least we wouldn't be facing the mercenaries just yet."

The girl, who had just finished her plate cowered a little hearing about the mercenaries. She was already scared senseless from the "earthquake"... I might've been too hard on her.

I stood up and walked towards her. She had a sheepish expression in her eyes. I then hugged her tightly and she loosened herself in my embrace. At least she was an easy-to-understand girl. Being this straightforward is probably a nightmare for her enemies and those plotting in the shadows... That's probably why her uncle decided to get rid of her. Poor thing... She must feel very lonely.

We remained there, hugging, for at least half an hour.

"Do you want to get some more sleep?"

"You mean going in the tent? I do but... I don't wanna be alone... Can you come with me?"

Aw... How can I refuse such a cute girl?

"I'll go there with you. However, we are only going to sleep ok?"

"Okay..." She made a dejected face... Come on? You really wanted to do more? Do you have no sense of impending danger? Well, anyhow, let's get going.

"Let's go, leave the stuff there, I'll clean it up later." I said, looking at the already dying fire.

"Oki!" She said happily, skipping towards the tent. She took off her t-shirt as she entered the tent. "Are you not gonna strip?"

"If you insist..." She stared at me curiously as I started to strip down. I was gonna keep my underwear at least but... Once I started taking my clothes off, Mihara jumped at me, stripping me stark naked, while kissing my whole body.

"You said we were only going to sleep..."

"Yeah, but we haven't entered the tent yet so I can do whatever I want!"

"Well... I can afford to spoil you at least a little bit."

"Yay!" *chuu*

She kissed my lips softly. How did I fall for her this quickly, again? Anyhow... I guess I wouldn't be able to sleep with the renovations going on anyways...