Dungeon Diver: Stealing A Monster's Power C.516

The craftsmen teams have used up nearly half of the materials I delivered to them last week, and the impressive new apartment complexes rising up 5-10 stories for future residents are completed. There's enough room to increase the population of this city tenfold if needed.

The new streets are built, and dozens of new storefronts line the roads, ready for businesses to move in.

Two small grocery stores are built, and I task a body double to buy supplies from large chains in Vice City and Solara. This will have to do until I can barter some deals with Sector 3 to buy fresh produce in large quantities directly from them.

Some of the villagers take positions as managers, and the teens and villagers in their early 20s take jobs to stock the shelves and work registers.

Many of the small shops and businesses that were set up during the first construction wave hire people to work in them too, and with the influx of new money to villagers from my weekly aid packages and the increase in coin supply from the guildhall's farming requests, the economy begins to move along on its own.

Less than 10% of people are now unemployed. Many don't fully rely on my aid packages, but the reassurance that they will be taken care of gives them trust to take risks in their business and have fun in their personal lives too.

Dan Striker's mercenary bar mostly sells drinks and food, but there have been a few private trading requests for materials in the dungeons that can be farmed that the guildhall isn't offering to buy.

I'm sure my requests for goods will fluctuate every month; it won't always be the same items. So it's great to see if people have usual dungeons they like to farm or special requests, there will always be other places to sell that loot if it's not on the guildhall list.

Back in the guildhall itself, the entirety of the structure has been renovated.

The base that is open to the public at ground level has a new glossy floor, imported tables and comfortable furniture for people to relax in, professional signs with pricing for goods being sold that can be controlled by a device from inside the octagonal center room, and even a new board on the wall that shows the pricing for basic gear and potions for hunters to buy at cheap prices so they can be fully protected and prepared to hunt in the dungeons.

I hire a few people to work inside the room. One woman buys loot from the hunters that bring it in. Another young man sells the basic E to C grade crafted gear like health and mana potions, swords and daggers, as well as amulets and armor that I've crafted to fit the hunters' needs based on the level scans I've been doing these past days. Then, another woman greets people at the door and answers questions in the lobby.

An extra floor is built to make the guildhall four stories high. It has been renovated to be my personal office with a large glass wall at the back in front of the same throne I built after the war overlooking the city.

The growing community gets into quite the rhythm.

With two weeks left until Ember's pod opens up, I head back to the mainland to check out the B-Class exams. I call the construction team to have a meeting with me right near the barrier of the Crimson Soul energy shield far outside the city, facing in the direction of Sector 1.

It's early in the morning, and I've given the elemental elites the morning off again before we train.

The team of construction workers look up at me with wide smiles while the prisoners eye the red barrier with a dazed look in their eyes due to the elixir they're under the influence of.

I speak up.

"Alright. Today, we'll be starting phase 3 of the building project. We'll be expanding this city outward to begin making connections with other settlements in this Sector and connect The Crimson City with many major trade and travel routes all over the Dark Continent."

While making contact with the outer barrier of the red Soul Energy forcefield, I'm able to manipulate it by connecting the red energy to my own supplies.

The construction workers all walk through without any resistance. Their gear and building supplies are all in item boxes around their waists.

The prisoners all carefully walk through a small hole that I create in the Soul energy shielding. Once the last one makes it through, I release my contact from the barrier. The hole shrinks until it's gone, converting right back into its natural solid barrier state and we get to work.

I use earth magic to begin the base structure of a trail out into the desert.

Earlier last week, I surveyed the lands and found nearby towns that I see as great routes to make the road near. I won't be making the main trade route within 10km of any settlement, because I don't want to bring any unwanted foot traffic to them. However, once we're out there, I'll be greeting every town with my Flame Emperor's appearance and give them options.

They can come and live in the Crimson City while listing the benefits, or for those that aren't interested in staying in my settlement, I'm giving them the option to come and be trade partners with us instead. If no one in the villages that we make contact with wants anything to do with us, we just won't make connecting roads to their town from the main trade route.

If they want their privacy and isolation, they can keep it. It's as simple as that.

While I head off into the empty desert, slowly forming a long winding path, a small group of workers follow to add fine details, lighting fixtures for nighttime, and signs that show the distance to the surrounding landmarks in place.

A larger group stays behind and works on building up another village outside of the Crimson Barrier.

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This consists of many trading posts that will be filled with workers who want to sell and trade their personal gear to outsiders, along with another guildhall that will accept trades buying and selling my crafts and gear directly.

Nearby, outside the barrier, there are also plans to have inns, bars, and even a small short-term stay residential area for people to spend the night if they've traveled a long way.

It is another large-scale project to work on, and we have two weeks to get everything in motion and automated before I leave out of town to attend the B-Class exams.

We get to work.

—

7 days pass.

—

I make two roads, about 200km each in two directions spreading throughout Sector 2.

One of them stretches toward Sector 3 and the other goes off in the direction of Sector 1.

The trading posts and visitors inns have been completed, and the infrastructure is almost as large as the residential area inside the Crimson Barrier.

It's definitely going to be necessary too.

Making my search diameter over 400km, I've made contact with 7 villages ranging from populations of 25-200. Not a single one declines my offer to connect them to the main trade route via smaller off-shooting roads.

There are 117 new links of loyalty created through my Rising Emperor's Domain, and I've given these individuals transport back to the Crimson City as promised along with weekly aid and a free place to live in the newest residential housing areas.

Most of these new citizens are hunters that are looking for work.

The remaining 40% of the guildhall's orders are filled before these 7 days are even up.

I deliver them to Bri and she tells me she'll have everything ready for me days before the final deadline. She also received word back from Rodrigo and managed to get our two false identities registered for the B-Class exams.

There will be a pickup point assigned in the Bedrock Region one day before the exams start.

Bri says she can source transport crystals linked to a public hub in the Bedrock Region for me to use before then, so i let her work out the logistics.

The start date of the exams is exactly 3 days after the 30-day deadline for these trade deals. That means once Ember awakes and I've delivered the goods, I have 2 days to get all of my affairs in order before then.

It's all working out perfectly.

Actually, everything has fallen into place even better than my expectations, but I'm happy to see the orders will be fulfilled now with time to spare.

I post new guild offers for the most common items that will most likely be needed for next month's orders, and always accept buying mana crystals, but leave out a lot of the obscure item drops.

The mercenary bars order quantity rises drastically once the guildhall stops accepting certain goods because thanks to my ventures out in the desert, there have been over 500 visitors from the surrounding towns to trade new items.

For now, I accept any coin, marked with the Flame Emperor's emblem or not. However, once its processed through the guildhall, I keep any unmarked currency for myself and always payout hunters with my own marked coins.

Traders from other towns accept that these coins are still made of bronze, silver, and gold. Many return back to their villages with the mark of the Flame Emperor in hand after selling their goods to villagers here.

However, far more wealth is being brought into the town than the amount of coins that are leaving.

It's not only magical gear, lots of items from the grocery stores that are only found in Solara and the Vice region are being resold to travelers that come by at high prices because of their rarity in this portion of the Dark Continent.

The inns outside the barrier need maintenance and attendance, so I appoint managers and workers from the new arrivals that aren't hunters and they find their place in the city very quickly.

A few of the empty storefronts are contracted out to new businesses like pawn shops and cafes, but a majority of them are still empty. There is still far more room to grow.

—

As these days go on, I keep training the elemental elites for about 8-10 hours every day.

They've gotten to the point where they're able to defeat the 39th floor boss in teams of 3-4, and everyone has made it to level 998-999.

Some talented fighters are even capable of defeating the boss monster solo, but I still don't permit this without my direct supervision.

They're all extremely close to ranking up again.

—

Every night after training I continue to farm the containment stones to collapse dungeons, and fill my inventory with another 29 luminite fragments.

Using over 2 trillion more MP from the leftover containment stones, I bring the B-Grade dungeon's monsters up to level 915-930. The boss monster reaches level 945. It feels like I'm getting closer to the double-ranked-up monster goal for this experiment, but the rate at which the dungeons levels increase is slowing down even more.

In addition to this, I drain my Soul Energy Core down to near zero every singel day, making the Crimson Barrier far stronger.

The reformation of Soul Energy gets faster every time, and the volume and potency of energy within me continues to rise.

Since the first day I started doing this 2 weeks ago, it feels as if my capacity to wield Soul energy has risen in strength by over 50%. My flames are burning hotter, denser, and more deadly than ever. I haven't had any opponents to test it out on yet, but it feels as if I would have probably stood a chance against the 43rd floor boss in a one on one fight without even using my lifesteal or equivalent exchange. My strength is rising at a steady rate.

I stop by Valor City to pick up another 100 Qi pills once I've burned through the entire supply Monk gave me before.

He's surprised at the rate I'm using them, but doesn't question it and gives me another 100, showing that his rate of farming is still faster than the rate at which I'm using them; but I don't think that will be the case for long.

The mine is producing between 350-400 Qi pills per week. 200 is going straight to isolated storage, while the remaining is being used to find a cure for the Lich King's aftermath, and training materials for myself and others within the monastery.

It is sufficient for now.

Every time my Soul Energy capacity rises, I need more Qi and more Mana to reform the entirety of the newly grown base. This shouldn't be an issue in the near future, but at some point, I will need even more Qi than this if I want to get stronger.

To attain exponential growth, this rate of production will not be enough.

That aside, I get to witness Monk's treatment of his master again today, and when his eyes open, he manages to sit up and turn his head toward us.

The old man is awake for almost a full minute, but doesn't speak more than a few words to preserve his energy.

As he rests his head back down and closes his eyes, I nod and turn to Monk.

"That is definitely progress... Maybe he'll be up and walking on his own in a few weeks."

He smiles.

"I believe so too. When this works, I can have my students in the monastery perform the treatment on the fighters you rescued too."

I nod.

"Perfect."

__

Once back in the Crimson City, I make my way down to the Bunker beneath the guildhall to check on Ember in the isolation pod.

It's been 3 weeks since he entered that pod. Meaning over 240 days have passed inside. Less than 9 days remain on the timer at the top of the pod, meaning about 100 more days are left inside.

It hums very lightly, and no excess or unique energy signatures come off of it at all.

I expected something odd to happen, but no clues at all are shown to the outside.

His status shows in my Rising Emperor's Domain interface, and even it is unmoving.

There aren't even irregular mana, Qi, or soul energy fluctuations inside the pod.

Whatever Ember is doing in there is a complete mystery to me, and undetectable to all of my senses.

With just 9 days left until the trade deals meetings start, and 12 before the B-Class exams begin, I still have a lot of work to do to get the Crimson City in a stable position before I go.