Chapter 57: The Big Mistake

As far as questing went throughout the week, it also went extremely well. After the nearly botched Brood Wolf quest the three of us decided that I shouldn’t be coming along as much even though we now have the Return Gate to add an extra layer of safety. With Slimes and Living Fungi it’s not an issue, but the girls were both feeling a bit more confident in their fighting ability after that event and for once they wanted to take on a slightly more challenging foe without me being there to help.

We settled on another kill quest for a low level local monster known as the Pineman. A very odd plant creature that has the body of a very thin, very needly man with long limbs and a long neck that becomes a small sized pine tree at its head. They’re docile unless attacked, but they bring in a lot more gold when hunting them because of how valuable their sap and wood is.

Only problem is that once a Pineman is properly pissed off they get very aggressive and run towards you looking like some sort of arboreal horror, stretching out their limbs to attack and shooting sharp pinecones or sticky sap all over their prey. As far as beginner level monsters go, Pinemen will be their greatest challenge yet. They’re even more dangerous than teenaged Brood Wolves but I’m allowing my girls to undertake the quest for several reasons.

They have the advantage. When I said these things are docile, you can pretty much just walk up to them before they turn violent. Sure, they might react quickly after the fact but the knowledge that Sam and Zutiria will all but certainly get the first move in each encounter is more than enough to trust them with the quest. More importantly than even that though is that Pinemen don’t go around in packs like the wolves do.

I mean, who’s ever heard of a herd of pine trees? That would be outright nonsensical and just plain silly.

I prepped Sam and Zutiria with all the knowledge I had about these prickly pines but really, this was a good quest for them to try out on their own.

There’s not much advice I had to give on how to kill a tree.

You chop it up, or bind it so that it can be chopped up. Sam’s got the chopping covered, and Zutiria’s got her covered as far as binding the needly bastards goes. I did mention the incredibly obvious elemental weakness to fire as a last resort, though warned against it since we’re trying to harvest the Pinemen. Even Sam knows that burning the stuff we’re trying to collect isn’t a smart move. Not to mention running the risk of accidentally starting a full fledged forest fire.

Charcoal isn’t going to bring in nearly as much as their other by products since any asshole with access to wood and a fire can make their own.

I don’t know much about separating the sap from a tree. Shocking I know, but believe it or not there are some books I just haven’t read. Albernald Witherwocky’s Treatise on Trees and their Many Merits, while likely useful, always looked much more suited to sending me to sleep whenever I was looking for some reading material. Zutiria says that she’ll be able to ‘magic it out of them’, whatever that means.

All in all, on top of the rewards for this kill quest, which amount to 500G per severed Pineman hand, we’ll have three products to sell to the local market.

Strong lumber, magical pine sap, and the chopped off heads of the Pinemen which can be stripped of their needles and used in soaps, oils, teas and incense. Zutiria cryptically mentions how she could probably come up with more ways to streamline this process, but it’ll take her some time to think on it. She’s run out of inspiration ever since inventing the Return Gate and Returners.

Considering the extremely useful applications of those devices, I’d say she’s more than earned a break from thinking too hard for a while.

As I watch Sam and Zutiria go, I can’t help but laugh at the sheer insanity of what I’m doing here. Guilds don’t do this. They don’t get involved in their adventurer’s plans, and they certainly don’t craft elaborate dismantling plans for all of their adventurer’s kills to maximize profits.

By my early calculations I believe that we can transform a single kill that we’d get paid 500G for by the Association of Adventurers into something worth 1500-2000G per kill.

Not too long after they left for their first Pineman quest, the mana pressure builds up again and suddenly a chopped up tree monster appears within the magic circle. I don’t want my arm in the way in case they send another, so I head into the storage room and grab a rake to pull it out of the Return Gate.

This damn thing is heavy, though as a living pine tree I can’t say I didn’t expect it. I drag it to a dirty storage room nearby and as soon as I’m done with it, another one appears. This process repeats itself an agonizing fifteen times, leaving my middle aged body a broken, aching mess. I’m grateful for it, though.

I said I wanted more exercise to improve my stamina, and this more than qualifies in my opinion.

Thankfully after the 15th, Sam and Zutiria appear in the Return Gate with a five second delay between them. They’re both covered in sticky pine sap and pine needles, and Sam has a number of welts from where the branches must have hit her. They’re a mess, but they’re home and mostly safe. After a quick bath, some salves applied to the nastier scrapes and bruises, as well as a change of clothes, they both headed out to work on smaller targets like Slimes and Living Fungi again. I admire their dedication to the daily Guild life grind.

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Everything went amazingly well and once this was all processed we would make an absurd killing! Somewhere in the ballpark of 30,000G for a single day’s work. And to think we were celebrating back when Zutiria first joined us and we started making around 4,000G a day. This is also a bonus to the Guild as a whole, because Sam and Zutiria are sending these monsters back for me to dismantle and it has nothing to do with the kill quest. This is income that the Association of Adventurers can’t claim a percentage of whether they like it or not. There’s no need to report it to them.

The questing this week went smoothly after this groove was established. I would remain on standby at the Guild, the girls would send me Pinemen, I’d move them to storage for processing and then they’d come home with less and less damage every day, take a quick and soapy bath and help me process them for selling. The three of us would then make a trip to the least shady item shop I know, Buy and Sell Easy Mart, carrying bundles of wood and jars of pine sap. The prices are fairer than I’d get anywhere else, and I don’t push my luck intimidating the owner. No use when he’s friendly enough as long as I have something that’ll bring him a profit.

The three of us decided to save a large portion of each day’s lumber, hoping that renovations will eventually be cheaper if we can provide some of the raw materials. Later on in the week, I had Opalina introduce me to that contractor she mentioned. I went there alone one evening when the girls were having their daily bath to scrub off all the pine residue, and it turns out this contractor did a lot more than just fixing up buildings.

The building was completely out of place with the rest of Dewhurst, much like Opalina’s clinic. Shatterbrew and His Sons and Their Sons and Their Sons, typically just shortened to Shatterbrew’s, looked like an impressive, if small, wooden fortress of ornate Dwarven design. While typically known for their stone and metal work, Dwarves are masters at any craft they damn well want to be, and a talent for woodworking apparently ran in the blood of this generational father and son (and son and son) business.

I’m not here for complete renovations, they’d all but certainly turn me down if the place wasn’t clean. Instead I just wanted to get the front door fixed... at least, that was my intention before entering and seeing the showroom floor. The entire building was dedicated to all sorts of wooden crafts and creations all carved with typical Dwarven perfection. 

At first I thought it was odd how four generations of Dwarves all lived in a building like this, yet I saw a flight of stairs in the back leading to a lower level. That makes a lot more sense, this building probably has multiple levels below ground where the Dwarves work and live. They prefer to dwell beneath the earth after all, only venturing to the surface where extra gold is involved.

There were multiple dwarven women- stout, angry looking and grumpy, showing shady Dewhurstians different types of furniture. Contrary to certain racist stereotypes, the womenfolk did not have beards to match their male counterparts. They did however have extremely long hair each styled a bit differently. Some had long ponytails, some younger looking ones had twintails, others braids, and beyond that some even had impressive dreadlocks.

An astonishing wooden bed caught my eyes immediately and a saleswoman by the name of Daegith Shatterbrew was quick to notice and began laying on the charm to get me to buy it. Instead, I asked how much it would cost to have a custom one built in the same style if I were to provide the lumber.

Customers usually don’t ask this I take it, as she was unsure and went to fetch her husband. I later learned that in Shatterbrew’s, many of the wives of this family work the top floor and their husbands get a commission when they get they successfully make a sale to go build something. It’s a very competitive environment.

Daegith’s husband is a typical dwarf man wearing ornate dwarven artisan clothing and with a magnificent copper beard. He introduced himself as Thadmar Shatterbrew, 3rd generation artisan. If he knew who I was or what the rest of the town said about me, he didn’t let it show. Dwarves are a very professional race and a paying customer is a paying customer.

We had to haggle a little but I was able to convince the Dwarf to come over to the Guild later that day and carve the bed onsite for 50,000G and would sell me an Elvish mattress for only 12,000G. At first I thought the idea of crafting a bed on site was ridiculous, but then I remembered I was speaking to a dwarf.

Thadmar was generous with his discounts when I made it apparent that I was seeking LOTS of renovations in the future and if suitably impressed I would rely solely on the Shatterbrew family. He promised not to worry about the cleanliness of the Guild if he’s only doing work in one room, but acknowledged that like I thought we would need the entire guild to be fully cleaned if I wanted them to perform sweeping renovations.

Funnily enough at the end of our pleasant conversation he remarked on the expert craftsmanship of my glasses, and asked to see them. I want to be on good terms with this Dwarf so I quickly explain my condition and close my eyes before shortly handing the shades to him. I can’t see, but it’s not like he’s going to steal them or anything. Dwarven thieves are practically unheard of, they care much too much about honor and manliness and stealing things is seen as quite ‘unmanly’ in their culture.

We agreed on the deal with a powerful handshake.

I know I was there for a door repair, but I was too excited about the prospect of a new, much larger bed that would hold a greater number of people on it... I’ve been working really hard too, moving the Pinemen and filling out the quest paperwork and so on. The door can wait another week, I deserved a treat. plus Sam and Zutiria would love it too, right? Sam got to spend a night with Opalina, but the four of us have yet to be in one bed together... Yes, this was a guilty pleasure purchase but it was a very, very sweet one. My reward for working hard.

No, OUR reward. 

That’s all how I rationalized it at least, even though it was the big mistake of the week.

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