CH.280 Luncheon with Baron Bloggs
<span style="font-weight:400">“Sir, there is a messenger sent by the Lord waiting for you.” The inn''s proprietress informed me, as she came to wake me up.
<span style="font-weight:400">It was now our third day in town, and it was also going to be ourst full day here. Today, Mariina would hold that exam thing and she had again asked for Lua’s help with that. I hope she is paying Lua for her part.
<span style="font-weight:400">I was nning on taking another trip to HomeBase, so I could make a few things for Cailie, but apparently, the world has different ns. And as long as I deal with this quickly, I can still make the trip to HomeBase.
<span style="font-weight:400">I’ll need to elerate the n to have HomeBase lift off from the ground. But my spellcasters, Laura and Tahlia all say we don’t have the mana for that yet. Even with Spell Counters each counting as 1000 mana, floating an entire dungeon will take way too much of it for us to sustain it. I need another card besides Magical Citadel of Endymion making the counters, but I just don’t yet know what it is. Spell Power Grasp is something we are experimenting with, but even that isn’t enough, because there was a time limit on how often one could be activated.
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<span style="font-weight:400">Because of that, Laura has been testing out differentbinations of cards, trying to make something that can make even more Spell Counters. Safely, so the Tower of Babel is still banned.
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<span style="font-weight:400">In theory, Tahlia calcted that we’d need around five Spell Counters per Spell Power Grasps activation to be able to lift HomeBase off the ground, and that is with only it floating, so we would actually need more. In short, I need either a better field spell, more spells that generate Spell Counters each time a spell card is activated or I have to force my Guardians to loop Butterfly Dagger - Elma even more. But I really don’t want to do that, as it relies on my Guardians, and they already feed my Pack token factory. It will be nice for emergency extra mana, but I don’t want it to be my main source of mana.
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<span style="font-weight:400">I did consider a loop using Banisher of the Radiance, either ck Luster Soldier - Envoy of the Beginning or Chaos Emperor Dragon - Envoy of the End and Primal Seed, but that is just a bit too convoluted and requires the control of at least two monsters, as well as the factor with Banisher of the Radiance banishing all of the cards I activate while he is out.
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<span style="font-weight:400">It honestly is not a bad loop or anything, but again, because of Banisher of the Radiance banishing every card I’d use, it isn’t quite usable long term. But another great short term option. But I’m sure we cane up with something, if just given a bit more time.
<span style="font-weight:400">And honestly speaking, because this will be something that won’t take ce in the factory, but will instead take ce in the real world, I have to be able to do this all with installs, so that limits options as well. If I have to be there summoning the monsters, and giving them cards from Pack Opener’s Collection, what is the point? I need something else.
<span style="font-weight:400">… did I get sidetracked? Again? Probably, but who cares?
<span style="font-weight:400">Oh right. I have a messenger from the town’s Lord waiting for me, so yeah. He might care.
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<span style="font-weight:400">The town’s Lord invited me to a luncheon. I was asked to meet him so he could personally thank me for solving the fishing problem, so why not? I only took Agunan with me. He was ying the part of my attendant. I had to leave Alice to take care of Cailie, so I hope they will be fine. I trust Alice, but the two of them cannotmunicate, so I just hope it will work out. Lua and Ria went with Mariina to hold that magic exam thing, in case you were wondering.
<span style="font-weight:400">… speaking with a mermaid… my Mermaid monsters, Enchanting Mermaid, Cure Mermaid and Mermaid Knight all speak thenguage Alice and Lua understand… So can they speak both? If they can, they could act as trantors.
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<span style="font-weight:400">Sure I could also have Laura trante to Alice and Lua, but that won’t work if I’m not there. Well it would, but it would be a convoluted process of Mia or Kekri sending Laura a message with what Cailie said, Laura tranting it using my Language Comprehension (humanoid) and then answering with the trantion. And it wouldn’t allow Alice or Lua to speak merfolk. Maybe I should just ask the Goddess and/or Aulis if Alice and Lua can have Language Comprehension (humanoid). Considering all the favors I’m doing to them, they might agree.
<span style="font-weight:400">Well, I’ll ask about thatter.
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<span style="font-weight:400">“I thank you for your invitation, Lord Bloggs.”
<span style="font-weight:400">“Yes. Thank you foring, Sir Wood. You as well, Sir Dragon.” The current Baron Bloggs greeted us as we arrived. “Please, take a seat.”
<span style="font-weight:400">The current Baron was someone I had met before, as he was with his father at the birthday celebration, so I am at least acquainted with him. Also, him calling me ‘Sir’ and me calling him ‘Lord’ is just etiquette and all of that. While we are both Barons in rank, I’m an honorary Baron, so permanent nobles do out rank me.
<span style="font-weight:400">“First, allow me to offer an apology for what my father did to you. What he said, what he did, the way he acted. I apologize for all of it.”
<span style="font-weight:400">“Don’t worry. I’m not the type of person to punish someone for the actions of their parents.” I answered, as if I had the bigger power out of the two of us. Well, I kind of do, but I try not to abuse my connections too much. And still, the fact stands. As long as he is reasonable, I have no reason to punish him for what happened with his father.
<span style="font-weight:400">“Thank you. Also, let me thank you for your service to the town. I was already under scrutiny for my … abnormal nomination to take over, so when the town soon ran into trouble, I was under quite a lot of pressure to solve the issue. So thank you for taking care of it.”
<span style="font-weight:400">“Yeah. That was no trouble, and you really should be thanking Lady Mariina. She is the only reason I even came into town, and I may have not taken part in the quest had it not been in the way of her work.” I answered almost honestly. Of course there was that entire System Mission thing, but that is a secret.
<span style="font-weight:400">“Yes. I understand. I shall extend my thanks to her, as well as the rest of your party. It is a shame the others couldn’te.”
<span style="font-weight:400">“Well, they are busy helping Lady Mariina, so it cannot be helped.” They definitely didn’t say they wouldn’te, even if they could. Well, one of them might have. Alice didn’t exactly enjoy the fact that this guy tried to take her for the first dance at the BD party.
<span style="font-weight:400">“I hope you will be willing to take some of the food to them, just so they can really take in the great fish of this town.” The Baron said, before he gave the sign to the servants to bring in some food.
<span style="font-weight:400">“Yes. I’m sure they will enjoy it.”
<span style="font-weight:400">Our spread of meals wasn’t too bad, but it wasn’t amazing either. It was… so-so. Good, but not amazing. Though Agunan seemed to quite enjoy himself, so at least that is good.
<span style="font-weight:400">As our luncheon came to an end, I handed Baron Bloggs a quick gift my monsters had made after the invitation. It was nothing special, just a filet knife. It was made from leftover blood iron with a grip of ever wood, so it basically cost nothing to make. It did look fine, but basic. But at least with the metal''s tendency to draw in blood, it would be good for that.
<span style="font-weight:400">Baron Bloggs thanked me for the gift, and apologized that he didn’t have a full apology gift for me, but I just epted his apology before I left. No reason to hold him responsible for his father’s actions.
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<span style="font-weight:400">After our luncheon, I asked for some of the best dishes to be put aside for me to take back and the Baron agreed to give us some, as he didck the apology gift. Then Agunan and I returned to the inn.
<span style="font-weight:400">“Hi, you two. How did you do?”
<span style="font-weight:400">“Wee back. How was the lunch?” Alice asked.
<span style="font-weight:400">“... it was alright, I guess. I think my Dragonmaids make better food, as do the chefs at your home and your grandpa’s ce, so… it wasn’t bad, just not quite what I hoped for. I do have some of it in my Storage, so you can have a tasteter.”
<span style="font-weight:400">“Thanks.”
<span style="font-weight:400">“So, how was Cailie?” I asked.
<span style="font-weight:400">“Well, she is napping now, but she was a bit… not so calm. I think she had some… issues because I couldn’t speak with her at first, but then I made a spell to trante the speech, so we managed.”
<span style="font-weight:400">“Oh? Wow. Nice call.” I honestly forgot that Alice can do that type of stuff with her unique-racial skill. Great call by her on that.
<span style="font-weight:400">“... But…”
<span style="font-weight:400">“It takes a lot of mana, right?”
<span style="font-weight:400">“Not that bad actually, just not something I can keep active all the time. My efficiency did go up a bit because the skill leveled up. I can use that trantion spell for about two, two and a half hours with it before I run out.” Oh yeah. I think I forgot to mention that part. Alice’s reward for the mission to solve the fishing problem was a level up to her Magical Girl skill.
<span style="font-weight:400">“That’s really not that bad. You have like little over 4000 mana at the moment, right? So that divided by 150 minutes… is like … 30-ish mana per minute?”
<span style="font-weight:400">“A bit more. You don’t factor in mana recovery speeds.”
<span style="font-weight:400">“Yeah. I guess that is just a bit much then. But still, I wonder if using it will eventually give you the Language Comprehension title. Because I feel like it might. And getting that title on both you and Lua would be useful. But still, a great spell to have in your arsenal. … does it work with draconic?”
<span style="font-weight:400">“We could try.” Alice agreed. “... just… alright. Agunan, can you say something in draconic?”
<span style="font-weight:400">I heard Agunan and Alice begin a conversation in draconic, so it seemed to work. I have to say, full points to Alice on that one. Great call using her unique skill that way.
<span style="font-weight:400">I decided to focus on my own things so I pulled out the Dungeon Founder’s item developer and began working on the WDBDD. I still need a better name for it. My current goal is to make a Dimensional Barrier Observer, a DBO. It will just make me a baseline on how the barriers are and when I have that, I can use that data to hopefully make the full WDBDD.
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<span style="font-weight:400">Cailie woke up from her nap a bitter, so I spoke with her a bit. I also spoke to her about what she would need for daily life. This resulted in a small list of stuff that I’d need to get her, and I was nning on doing that tomorrow. I could likely buy most of it, but I can also just visit HomeBase and get the stuff from there for free, so why not? I also had a few things I should get for my own use.
<span style="font-weight:400">The biggest thing Cailie really needed was a water bracelet, or simr magic tool. This is something merfolk use to keep their skin moist while out of water. Lua, Alice and I had all been doing it with magic, me with the help of the water spirits and Alice with her Racial-Unique skill, but a more permanent solution would be better. The device itself was nothing special, just some sort of holder for a low ranking water attributed magic stone, with the spell carved into it, which would spread water across the skin of the wearer. HomeBase catalog had well over 100 of them in different designs, so I just opened the skill up and asked Cailie which one she’d like.
<span style="font-weight:400">Other than that, I was nning on getting her a wheelchair, just so Agunan or I didn’t have to carry her. Cailie was a bit against Agunan carrying her in the first ce, so it was mostly me doing it. I did y around with making a floating wheelchair, but mana consumption got in the way. I should ask my Spellcasters to min-max these levitation spells better. They just really aren’t that mana efficient. Telekinesis is more mana efficient, than the levitation magic circles that these magic tools use. That might also help with the flying dungeon project.
<span style="font-weight:400">Last thing Cailie would need is some clothes. Ones that won’t be so susceptible to water. So for that, I again searched the catalog for water-proof clothing and found a long list. From there, it was fill up the ‘shopping cart’ and go pick them up tomorrow for 50% off,pared to getting them delivered right now.
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<span style="font-weight:400">In the early evening, Lua, Ria and Mariina returned from the adventurer’s guild, so we enjoyed dinner together. It was from the dishes I got from Baron Bloggs, as well as a few other local dishes I picked up on my way back to the inn from the Bloggs’ manor.
<span style="font-weight:400">We also went over tomorrow''s schedule, just so we would be on the same page, before we called it a night and headed to bed.