《Level One Chef》


 Ch1: A Hovel, by any Other Name

    ¡°It ain''t much but it''ll do ya.¡±


    The portly landlord''s words were accurate, and yet somehow still managed to undersell the current state of the building we stood in.


    I wasn''t even sure if it could be called a building. It had four walls, a roof, and a floor. But it was maybe two people wide by three people deep. I could touch the ceiling with the palm of my hand, if I stood on my tip toes.


    The size might have meant it could be classified as a shack. But were shacks buildings? And if they were, what about buildings that were worse than shacks?


    Hovels? This place sort of qualified as a hovel. It certainly smelled like one.


    The building¡¯s four walls were shoddy wood-and-plaster things that only counted as walls because they stood mostly upright and had holes that could, technically, be windows. They were irregularly shaped and placed, however, and stood open to the elements.There was no denying that they were just holes, though.


    I assumed that, if questioned, the landlord would say something about natural sunlight (even though the place was scrunched in between two other buildings and you could barely see the sky from the alleyway between them, nevertheless from the actual window) or cozy atmosphere, so I didn¡¯t bother asking.


    The wooden floor that spanned the single room was covered in a film of old, soiled dirt and hay, almost like this place had been used as a chicken coop. There were no signs of droppings from any kind of bird, but interspersed between the clumps of hay were piles of what could have been rat pellets.


    And something smelled... musty? Like the smell of the ground after a rain, if it were only raining on a mangy dog that had eaten nothing but mushrooms for four weeks and had shat them across his haunches. I didn''t quite know where it was coming from, but I really didn¡¯t want to find out either.


    The landlord was absolutely no help. When I asked about the state of the place, he told me I couldn''t find a better place in town. Like I didn''t already know that.


    The town of Mystic Falls had been disappointing from the moment I stepped through the lopsided gates. Between guards that searched a little too vigorously, the beggars in the street that wouldn''t take no for an answer, and the putrid, rubbish filled roads that were lined with dirty houses and dirtier people, I had decided instantly that I didn¡¯t like this place.


    But when you¡¯re broke, you have very little choice.


    Especially when you''re only a level one chef. Trying to open a restaurant.


    While being in debt to some of the world¡¯s most notorious creditors.


    I was screwed.


    With a heavy groan I stepped forward to get a better perspective of the place.


    The floor groaned too.


    It had a nice, deep baritone to it, one that spoke of rotten beams and termites. And likely some storage room below us that would be full of spiders and spoiled food.Stolen novel; please report.


    I¡¯d seen enough. Honestly. It was pretty apparent I was going to die in this place if I didn¡¯t leave now.


    Which meant that it was perfect.


    There was no way this place would be out of my price range. You know. What limited price range I had.


    I''d visited other places in town. The ones that were willing to host an eatery were way far and above what I could afford to pay. And some of them had honestly been worse than this.


    ¡°I¡¯ll take it,¡± I said without turning around to address the dumpy little fat man behind me.


    ¡°Dontcha wanna see the property before you make a decision?" There was a pregnant pause. "Wait¡­ what?¡± The landlord sounded shocked as if he were expecting me to walk away instead of make an offer. It took him a moment to really grasp what I said. ¡°That¡¯s¡­ there¡¯s¡­¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ll take it,¡± I said again, now turning around.


    God, he was ugly.


    He was even uglier when his eyes were bulging out of their sockets.


    The landlord, a Mister Roger Phelps, was about a foot and a half shorter than I was, and I wasn¡¯t exactly a tall man. He had a round face that was dominated by large lips like two dead carp vying for the best place to bleach in the sun. His unmoisturized, overly sun-exposed skin seemed to be somewhere between the texture of molded leather and pickled horse anus. And he wore the most ridiculous open throat shirt I¡¯d ever seen on a man. It looked like something one would see at a burlesque show, with leather laces strapped across his chest, binding together two tiny flaps of white cloth at the shoulders. It traveled in a deep V shape down his torso, ending just before the navel.


    And every inch of that exposed skin was covered in tiny curly hair that was the color of uncooked carrots.


    Phelps was bald, but his chest hair gave a clear view of what he¡¯d looked like in his younger days.


    I was staring at this man¡¯s chest.


    But I couldn¡¯t stop. The little red hairs were hypnotizing.


    Enchanting.


    ¡°Now there, Mister Emerson,¡± he started, and I shook myself out of my stare. When he tried to speak again, I held up a hand to stop him.


    ¡°Please. Call me Harper. My father was Mister Emerson and he¡¯s dead now.¡±


    He wasn¡¯t. My old man was still alive and kicking. But I greatly enjoyed the pause that gave people.


    ¡°Er, sure. So, now, Mister Harper¡­¡±


    ¡°Just Harper. Well, not ¡®Just¡¯. Harper. Period. Singular word. No honorifics before or after. I¡¯m a very simple man, after all.¡± I spread my arms and gestured at myself.


    He didn¡¯t seem impressed.


    I didn¡¯t blame him.


    It had been weeks since I¡¯d seen bath water. Between the walking and occasional pitty carriage rides, I¡¯d seen plenty of rain, however.


    Oh god, was I what smelled that bad?


    I sniffed at my armpit, and instantly regretted it.


    Have you ever licked the underside of a raccoon? Well, I have. And it smelled about as pleasant as that tasted.


    (And, in case you¡¯re wondering, that was for a quest. A really shitty quest that I did not get enough reward for completing, but when life gives you quests you fucking do the quests. Something, anything, was better than nothing.)


    Phelps was staring at me, and I realized he had been for some time. ¡°Er, sorry. Did you say something?¡±


    ¡°Are you sure you¡¯ll be wanting to buy this property? I don¡¯t mean to discourage a man of your obvious taste, but Mystic Falls ain¡¯t exactly hurting for eateries.¡±


    I''d only seen a handful in my time around town, but he wasn''t wrong. The town wasn''t huge, but I''d been to so many towns before it. Mystic Falls was the furthest I could get from Duncan without crawling into the ocean and trying to see if I could float my way to a new land that wasn''t full of lenders trying to take every bit of coin in the world all for themselves.


    ¡°I¡¯m certain,¡± I said, firmly. ¡°It was the place my grandfather immigrated from, and now that he¡¯s gone from this world I want to do right by him and settle down in his hometown. Make something of myself.¡±


    ¡°Ain¡¯t you said it was your father who died?¡±


    ¡°Makes no difference, my good man. One dead relative is as good as any other.¡± Before he could think too hard on that, I barrelled forward. ¡°So, do we have a deal?¡±

 Ch2: An Absolute Bargain, Really

    "Deal?" Phelps squinted at me with the world''s squintiest eyes. "Did I miss some offer in all that blathering?"


    At least he wasn''t as stupid as he looked. Or was he? "Yep. Sorry. I forget that sometimes I say things in my head without saying them aloud."


    Phelps stared at me. I batted my eyes back at him.


    He didn''t seem phased. "Well?"


    So much for my high Charisma skill. "Oh! Right. The offer. Yes, sorry. So, my grandfather''s dying wish was that he wanted me to own this exact building. It''s where, ah..." I looked around, frowning. In for a penny, in for a pound. "He grew up."


    "In my building?"


    "Yep. Many a moon ago."


    The landlord laughed thinly. "I just built this place ''bout five years ago."


    I bit my tongue. If this place was built five years ago, I was my own grandfather. This building had seen as many sunrises as I did, and maybe even a few more dozen.


    It had also seen a lot of shit. Like, maybe not figuratively, but this was definitely one of those places that fit the ''if walls could talk'' phrase. I was actually super curious what they would say. Maybe someone got murdered here. Was I okay with owning the murder restaurant?


    "Look now, Mister Emerson -"


    "Sorry, sorry. Still just Harper."


    "Right you are. But ain''t believing for one minute that your grandfather is dead. Nor do I think he done grown up in this building. What I do know is that your fancy little stories ain''t gonna work on me." Phelps literally grabbed his pants by the waistband and hoisted them up as he spoke. I''d never seen a real person do that. It was... disturbing. I wished he never did it again. "Now the price per month for this building is 20 gold. Take it or leave it."


    If I''d have had a drink, I would have done a spit take.


    Economics aren''t my thing. Maybe that was why I''d gotten into my previously mentioned load of debt. But I knew a deal when I saw it, or knew when I was being swindled.


    In Kinon, the big city about six leagues to the north that I''d, mm, ''escaped from'' (no, I didn''t sneak out under the cover of darkness, who told you that?), 20 gold a month could get you a two bedroom house, a courtesan at least once a week, and mostly enough food to eat twice a day. Maybe only once, if you wanted something a little nicer. Or some booze to wash it all down with. I''d completed many quests in my life that were worth well less than 20 gold and most of them had risked bodyparts.


    What the hell kind of backwoods bullshit was this?


    "Do you have other buyers lined up, Mister Phelps?"


    He glared at me, as if I were asking some sort of trick question. So of course I played into it. I smiled eerily, and tipped him a wink.


    "Why yes I do."


    "I think you''re bullshitting me, Mister Phelps."


    "It don''t matter if I am or if I ain''t. Twenty gold pieces a month is the offer, and that''s either what you''re gonna give me, or you can go back to wherever it is you came from and find something there."


    He was decidedly uglier when he was angry, but I didn''t tell him that. Things were already going way the wrong way here. "I believe we got off on the wrong foot, Mister Phelps..."This content has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.


    "Pah. There was no right foot to start on. I know yer type, alright. Here I am, running myself a legitimate business, and some adventurer comes a calling looking for the same accommodations he gets in the bigger cities. Well we don''t accommodate nothing here. We don''t have thousands of gold pouring into our lives each day, making things easier. We''ve gotta supply our own and make our way. Things get more expensive out here. If you wanna be here, you gotta adjust your expectations."


    I waited for a long moment after he stopped speaking. He was breathing really heavy. I hoped his heart wasn''t going to explode. Or, maybe I did? If he just keeled over right now, could I convince someone he bequeathed me the building before he breathed his last?


    But my dreams didn''t come true. The color fled from his face after his tirade, and eventually his breathing returned to normal.


    "You feel better now?"


    "A might bit."


    "Good. Now, before you started insulting me, without even knowing if what you were accusing me of was true, I had wanted to make you an offer on this place. Maybe not twenty gold, but still a fair value. But... well... if you''ve got other offers, and you obviously don''t like me so much, perhaps I''ll just find another place to look."


    Phelps didn''t bite. Instead he just shrugged and started walking for the door. "Suit yourself, Mister Emerson."


    "Harper."


    "Does it matter?"


    Shit. He had me there. And while I absolutely thought this was a ripoff, and I couldn''t imagine things being so much more expensive so far from the capital, I also couldn''t afford to let this go. If I had to walk to another town I would die.


    "Fine. Twenty gold a month."


    He stopped, halfway to the door, but he didn''t turn around. "Money is due upfront."


    Shit.


    I don''t know why, but I was hoping he''d let me get a month under my belt first. Be able to make a name for myself, get the restaurant up and running. Because otherwise...


    "Fine," I said, even though I didn''t know how the hell I was going to pay for it. "I''ll need a day, however."


    "And the building might be here when ya return. As you said, I got other offers and I don''t put holds on good paying Mystic Falls folks for some out-of-town adventurer who''s just gonna slip off into the night when things don''t go his way."


    Did I have ''debt evader'' tattooed across my forehead? Was there some debuff I couldn''t see? I would have asked, but Phelps would have known he was right, if there wasn''t. And I really didn''t want to give this asshole any satisfaction for being right.


    When I didn''t say anything in return, Phelps tossed me a little wave over his shoulder and left the building.


    Out of curiosity, I opened the building''s menu. It was all grayed out with a "you don''t have ownership rights for this property" in diagonal text, just like I''d expected. Phelps wasn''t going to give an inch.


    "Well, shit," I said a loud. How the hell was I going to get this done now?


    "That didn''t go exactly great," a small voice said from my collar. Mel emerged, looking as perfect as ever, even though she''d been crouching under cloth for the last twenty or so odd minutes. Not a strand of her golden hair was out of place, and she looked well rested.


    I wondered if she got any sleep or if she just listened to me catastrophically fail that entire encounter.


    "Yeah, well, he''s an ass."


    "And a swindler. What smells so bad?"


    "I think it might be me."


    The little pixie laughed. "Don''t get me wrong - you smell like absolute ass. But I think it''s something in here." She flitted around on tiny golden wings, and then returned back to me to hover a few inches away from my face. Just close enough that I had to go cross eyed to look at her. "We could do better than this."


    "Mel, I''m broke. Hell, I''m beyond broke. I don''t think we can do better. It just goes downhill from here."


    "Alright then, smart guy, how are you going to pay 20 gold up front?"


    I looked away from her. Both because I didn''t want to face her building anger, and because I didn''t want her to see what I did next.


    I opened my inventory.


    Not much stared back at me. A few lumps of some sort of bark I''d foraged that hadn''t been the worst thing to eat. A bedroll that was more patches than padding.


    And a set of gleaming armor, a beautifully made sword, and a buckler that had saved my ass more times than I could count.


    Duncan might have been a lot of things (most of them being an asshole) but he supplied his little peons well.


    In Kinon, this whole get up set me back a few hundred gold, and just put me more in debt to Duncan than I was already. But out here? If the economy was such shit that I could get this tiny little place for 20 gold a month, it was bound to get me something good. As long as I had a buyer.


    "I think I have an idea," I finally said aloud, closing my inventory and turning back to Mel. "But you aren''t going to like it."

 Ch3: A Place to Call Home

    As I predicted, Mel wasn''t happy. But she also didn''t really have the right to complain. It wasn''t her life''s savings (or lack thereof) being thrown away on a whim. She really didn''t have any stake in the whole bargain.


    Except, I guess, for having to get a new shoulder to ride on. She did seem to enjoy mine.


    As it was, we were able to find a buyer pretty easy. There was an adventurer''s guild in Mystic Falls, and they were more than happy to buy such a lovely set of armor.


    I kept the buckler and the sword for myself. The armor more than covered my needs.


    Or, you know, would until I could get this place up and running.


    It felt weird to have money on my character sheet. Every cent I''d ever earned went right back to Duncan and his little empire of adventurer slaves. I got mere pennies for every gold I sent his way, and it felt real bad. Real bad indeed.


    But this felt great! I wanted to do this more! Having money felt like I had everything.


    Shame I was going to have to spend it, though.


    And my first stop after the adventurer''s guild was to Phelps'' dingy little office. He took my twenty gold without even a blink, and I got notification that I was now the proud (temporary) owner of 5 Monroe.


    That was it. No street or road or whatever. Just Monroe.


    Maybe I''d call it Monroe''s Place.


    Better than Harper''s Eatery, which was my original plan.


    Phelps was more than happy to shoo me out of his office as soon as he had my money. He told me I had to pay him on the first of every month or he''d reclaim the place. And that if I needed anything, I wasn''t allowed to call on him for help. And any upgrades I made to the building would be his, provided they were permanent changes.


    And then I was shoved out the door.


    Standing on the side of the road, as the door closed behind me, I felt as if I''d just been absolutely taken. Just manhandled and spent upon. I felt dirty.


    He at least could have bought me dinner if he was going to fuck me so hard.


    I sighed and rubbed at my face.


    "Well, that''s step one of my master plan done," I said as Mel fluttered out of my collar once again.


    "I wouldn''t necessarily call it a ''master'' plan."


    "Good point. Magnum opus."


    "Mmm, more like ''dumbass idea of cobbled together dreams''."


    "Ouch," I said with a laugh. We started back towards... uh... home. Monroe''s Place. Harper''s Eatery. Whichever. "We do really need a plan, though."


    "Oh, so you don''t have one?"


    "I have... an outline," I said, weakly. "It''s included getting away from Duncan, finding a place to set up a restaurant, and then opening the restaurant."


    "Of which you''ve never done and have no applicable skills for." She was using her nagging voice, but it was really hard to take her seriously when she was still so small.


    I shrugged instead of teasing her about her minuscule height. "Mmm correct."


    "You know I can''t help you with this, right Harps?"


    "I know." I sighed as the building came into view. The building menu lit up, like it wanted me to know I absolutely owned this place. You know, temporarily. Like Phelps said. "One of these days you are actually going to be able to help me with something, right? I''m not just totally screwed for sacrificing so much to help you?"If you spot this narrative on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.


    "Pft. As if I literally don''t help you all the time. What''s boosting your stats there, buddy? Who''s given you so much good luck you were able to get out from under Duncan''s thumb long enough to crawl away?"


    "I don''t know if I''d call that ''good luck'', Mel. I nearly died."


    "Semantics." Mel stopped talking and swung around to look at the building. "You know you are absolutely screwed though, right?"


    "Big time."


    "Well, as long as you know. So, what''s part a of the next part of the plan?"


    Without answering, I entered the building. It was somehow more depressing than I remembered. It might have been because the sun was going down, or because I''d actually paid real money for this. But it looked like the physical manifestation of the word depression itself. It was one finger of whiskey and argument away from a divorce. Or maybe a half finger. It didn''t look like it could afford a full one.


    "Step one: we''ve got to get this place cleaned up."


    "Oh, I''m sorry. What''s this ''we'' shit?"


    "Are you seriously going to just sit here and watch me clean for the next three hours?"


    Mel laughed, a sound like twigs against a glass pane. In a flash of light, she became a human-sized woman. Her pixie features were mostly gone - she still had pointed ears and sharp facial features, but her golden hair was a much more muted blonde and her wings had become a sheer shawl around her bare shoulders. The dress she wore was iridescent and seemed to change color whenever you looked at it.


    She was stunning. Not literally. There was no debuff. But Mel cut a gorgeous figure, even surrounded by so much filth.


    I found myself staring, like I always did.


    Mel was unphased. Instead, she just held out a hand, ignoring my slack-jawed ogling. "C''mon Harps. Give me a handful of coins. I''ll go get you some cleaning supplies and a few building materials from the market. And then you can clean this place up and give me something fun to watch in repayment for making me sleep here."


    "Uh-huh," I said, not really watching as I opened my inventory and withdrew a handful of coins. I didn''t even really stop to see how much there was.


    "I swear, Harper, you are hopeless." She snatched the coins away and counted them. "Five? Seriously? Ugh." She deposited the coins in her own inventory and fluffed out her hair. "I bet I can make it work." She turned towards the door, then stopped and turned back. "Don''t just stand there and do nothing while I''m gone, okay? Figure out an actual plan. We need to get moving on this."


    "Of course," I said, shaking my head. "I''m on it."


    Mel muttered something under her breath, but I didn''t really hear her. Instead, I watched her leave. In a totally non-creepy way, honest.


    And once the walking distraction was out the door, I focused on my task.


    Figuring out what the hell to do with this place.


    There was a lot that had to happen. First of all, it was way too small. I needed to expand the building.


    Opening the building menu, I could see the plot of land I ''owned'' was longer than it was wide. I didn''t have much room to go to the sides, but I could expand out into the street quite a ways. I would be able to match the other buildings, at least, and make a nice unified front. Or I could build out only a little bit and then make the front area an outdoor eatery. It would save me on building materials, since I''d only need to do a roof and a fence there. But it would make it harder to defend.


    There was also an option to build up. I had to replace the roof anyway (it was barely holding back the elements as it was) and so it wasn''t a bad option, but it was one I''d need to inspect later. Maybe Mel could fly up and give me an idea of what it looked like.


    And then, there was the cellar. It wasn''t worth even investigating. Likely some hole someone dug to put supplies to keep them from going back too fast. But it didn''t seem to have any actual foundation or walls, so the system told me I could make as many changes as I wanted.


    I knew I needed a kitchen area, and a dining room area. Both had to be decently sized. I needed food storage and clean up space in the back, and tables for patrons with maybe a nice fireplace or something eventually out front. Perhaps a bar?


    Mmm, maybe not a bar. That was pushing it a little. But the rest sounded just fine.


    As I dug into the menus, I found a few options for prebuilts. They were way outside my cost range, and none of them fit on my lot size. But they gave me a few options and ideas, at least. The one (called a ''fancy eatery'') had basically everything I wanted. And a lot of things I didn''t. But it had the right vibe. I wanted people to feel like they were treating themselves when they came here. Like they could forget their mediocre lives and get something really great.


    My cooking skill would get there eventually.


    With the ''fancy eatery'' prebuilt as a guide, I started to draw up my own plans. I used the hay-and-dirt coating on the floor as a drawing board. Even as the sunlight around me faded, I kept drawing. Instead of scratching things out, I just scuffed them over with my foot.


    By the time Mel returned (not only with an armful of cleaning supplies and some other essentials, like a lit lantern, but also with dinner), I had my blueprints. Or, well, dirt prints. Look, I had an idea, okay? And that idea was that I might not have been completely screwed. Sure, it wasn''t going to be easy. Or cheap. But there was enough determination left in my ex-adventurer body that I was feeling pretty good about things.


    Mel''s dinner consisted of some sort of poultry, a handful of rice, and a few thin beans that looked like they had been tortured with fire instead of cooked. The meal was filling, but completely unsatisfying.


    I could do better than this, right?

 Ch4: A Quest to Fetch

    I don''t recommend sleeping on the floor of a barely-constructed hovel your first night in it.


    Mel seemed to sleep like a newborn kitten, just lightly snoring the whole time through.


    I, on the other hand, was awake for basically every moment of the night. If it wasn''t the floor randomly creaking, it was the howling wind through the not-quite-a-window-yet holes. Or the roof threatening to collapse in under the weight of a little early morning rain.


    At one point I swore I saw a rat picking at our garbage from dinner.


    I paid twenty gold for this.


    Twenty whole gold.


    For a shit-show operation of a building that I somehow had to turn into an eatery before I ran out of money.


    Most of the night was spent panicking. I''m not going to try to hide that. I''d had really bad anxiety as a kid, and so I had some good ways of dealing with it, but none of them were working.


    Eventually I just got up and started working.


    Mel slept right through it all, bless her heart. But I swept up the dirt and hay (I was sure to copy my design to one of the design scrolls the building designer gave me for this sort of thing before I swept it up), cleaned out our trash, and set about investigating the floor for soft spots. I thought about checking out the cellar, but there was a lot of squeaking coming from that general area, and I really didn''t want to have to fight rats in some commoner''s clothes. I''d just hire some adventurer to take care of it later.


    That''s what I was now.


    A potential quest giver.


    If only my folks could see me now. Would likely result in a lot of screaming and some swift kicks to the ass (not to mention the "why haven''t you settled down to have kids yet" bullshit my mother was always good for), but maybe eventually they''d think I was rising up in the world.


    You know. Or not.


    By the time Mel woke up after the sun rose, I''d actually done a pretty decent job of getting the place functional. The floors were no longer a fire hazard, and I was able to formulate a plan from the design menu for the building.


    "We need 50 [Cut Stone], 40 [Cut Timber], and 12 [Iron Bars]," I said after consulting the menu a final time.


    "And I need breakfast."


    "Mel. I''m serious. If we want to get this place up and running, we need basic materials. And they''ll take time to get ordered and brought here, so we need to start on it right away."


    "Harps. I''m serious. You want to play chef and that''s lovely. I''m here for you. Absolutely supportive. But if I don''t get some eggs and perhaps a nip of brandy in a big ol'' cup of coffee, I''m going to murder someone." She looked at me from under a halo of wild blonde hair. "You look like someone who''s ripe for murdering."


    Normally I would have teased her. Egged her on, if you will. Perhaps I would have shelled out for some big digs, going as far to peck at her with some pretty cunning puns.


    But there was something in her glare that told me not to fuck with her this morning. This book''s true home is on another platform. Check it out there for the real experience.


    Perhaps it was because she slept on the floor.


    But she was a pixie. She didn''t have to sleep on the floor. So this wasn''t my fault.


    I sighed and collected my things.


    And by my things, I meant I dusted my hands on my pants. "Fine. I''ll get you some fucking eggs."


    "Aww, you gonna cook for me, Harps?"


    I didn''t say anything, but I glared daggers at her as well. "While I''m gone, attempt to do something productive, okay?"


    "Tch." Mel sat upright, crossing one leg over the other. She ran her fingers through her hair to smooth the rambunctious locks. "I''ll give it some thought."


    I didn¡¯t stay to push the matter. Wouldn¡¯t have helped any.


    The outside air felt nice to breathe in. For a place with so many holes in the wall, the ventilation was absolute crap. Either that, or the storage area downstairs was hiding some particularly smelly corpses. I should have told Mel to check it out. But if I were going to be that mean, I''d want to be there for it. Witness the screaming and carrying on for myself.


    Drink in her misery.


    After about fifty or so steps towards the market, I was done with this. I wanted to go back and force myself to curl up on the floor and just sleep. Or maybe I could just take some of this coin and rent a room at a local inn until I was too broke to do anything else.


    But I''d sold my armor. I wasn''t going to get that back. So I''d just need to suck it up and finish this quest.


    Quest.


    I dropped my head into my hands.


    I blamed my forgetfulness on my lack of sleep. But as an adventurer, I''d always relied on quest givers to tell me what to do. Sometimes those quests would give me interesting skill ups. And while I wasn''t looking to become a builder, by having property I was, technically, a quest giver.


    I stopped in the middle of the road and opened the appropriate menu on my character sheet.


    "Let''s see here... generate a quest. Good, good. Target, well, uh, me. Reward... well I''m not going to pay myself, so just experience... fetch 50 [Cut Stone], 40 [Cut Timber], and 12 [Iron Bars] from the [Mystic Falls Market]... good, good..."


    Standing in the middle of the road, talking to yourself, gets you a lot of weird looks. But at least it kept the beggars away. I''d had enough of them the day before. But by the time I was done, I had a quest that would reward 200 [Builder] experience, and that was better than nothing. When I got back to the hovel with the materials, I could actually generate a quest to build up the damn place too. Maybe when I needed to do repairs, it would be worth it for me to do them on my own, just so I could keep skilling up. Sure, it wasn''t going to be my primary profession, but it would save me a hell of a lot of professional fees.


    The Mystic Falls Market was... quaint. Like the rest of the damn town. There were a lot of people selling livestock, and I really wished I had the space for even a few birds. Or a cow. Just something that would be able to produce a constant supply of materials. If I even cared for the bugger, I knew it would produce high quality materials, and those would make my dishes even nicer.


    But, alas, there was no space for that. Eventually I might be able to afford to buy out my neighbors, and then make a real thing of it. Or just purchase someone''s farm on the outskirts of town and make Mel work there. I''m sure she''d appreciate being around the cute little animals... up until she realized she''d have to kill them.


    Would I be so mean? Nooooo.


    Never.


    At all.


    Absolutely I was going to do that.


    I was already forming the master plan. This would be my true magnum opus. Torment Mel for everything she''d done to me since I saved her from that raven.


    Sounded like a great idea.


    Eventually I was able to find a woman selling building supplies. She didn''t have everything I needed on hand, but she took the order and I paid the fee, and I got a little quest update with a ticking countdown that told me she''d have everything by the next morning. I arranged to have it all delivered, and then bought a set of [Simple Tools], which included an array of items I''d need to get the place prepared for the materials.


    Before I left the market, I even bought Mel some breakfast. The eatery looked to be about as nice as my place was now, and the old woman who ran it was none too happy to hear that I was opening a restaurant in town. At least until I told her I was only a level one chef. Then she was delighted to have me.


    I wonder why.

 Ch5: An Unwelcome Complication

    Mel and I spent the rest of the day fixing the place up. We didn''t do too bad of a job, all things considered. And we barely considered murder-suicide more than three times over the whole twelve hours of daylight. A new record!


    We focused on clearing out the front of the property, since I knew we''d be expanding that. It meant a lot of pulling up weeds and brambles and breaking up the ground to make it a lot better for construction. Mel was sure to point out that I shouldn''t be using my sword for this, but since I forgot to get a rake or hoe or something, it was what we had.


    The sword wasn''t going to break, anyway. It was made of finer stuff than this godforsaken sun-baked and arid dirt.


    She was almost right, though. I was doing perfectly fine, until I wasn¡¯t. There was a particularly nasty bit of buried stone that the sword got snagged on, and I almost snapped it in two.


    After that, I went back to just using my hands. Wasn¡¯t worth losing my sword over.


    Mel''s smug smiles behind my back were just something I''d need to learn to live with.


    The stone showed up first, and so we set about expanding out the front of the building. It meant I got to use a sledgehammer. I''d never used one before. Sure, others had made it look a lot easier, but it was quite a rush anyway. We first laid our new brick where we wanted it, getting it lined up in two straight-ish rows about my height away from the current wall. I wasn''t sure if the roof would be able to take that expansion, but we''d find out.


    When the walls were in place, I used the building''s menu to finalize them.


    It was so cool to watch them go from haphazard stacks of crumbling stone to actual walls. The roof expanded out over them, although it creaked loudly as it did. A few more holes showed up, but nothing that couldn''t be patched later.


    "Simple as that," I told Mel, to which she answered by handing me the sledgehammer.


    I focused on knocking out the old front walls while she reconfigured the door.


    The heavy two-handed hammer felt a lot like the first weapon I''d picked up when I started adventuring. I thought I would be able to wield a massive fuck-off hammer and smash my foes to little bits... but those things were heavy. It took a lot out of a person to swing it around hard enough to damage someone, and I was constantly winded. That''s when I decided to go to swords. Or, well, Duncan decided for me. He''d humored my attempts with the hammer, but it became obvious I was a liability. And liabilities weren''t allowed in Duncan''s operation.


    Thinking of Duncan warmed up my blood, and smashing the wall down became a lot easier. I almost enjoyed it, truth be told. Wished it was really his smarmy little face I was bringing a giant weapon to bear against, but I could settle for a little imagination for now.


    Once I had a bunch of money from my successful eatery, I could just hire an adventurer to go kill his ass.


    When the old wall was down and the door moved, Mel and I both worked on patching up the holes in the walls. I wasn''t opposed to having windows, but without a considerable amount of money, we weren''t getting glass. Even shitty second-hand glass was expensive. And so, having open holes would just let in vermin and beggars, and we didn''t want either of them in our restaurant if we could avoid it.


    Patching the walls was even easier than making new ones. As I approached a section that needed repairing, with the appropriate menu window open, it just told me how many [Cut Stone] to deposit. I''d relay that to Mel, she''d help me ferry them over, and then the menu would let us know when it was enough. Accepting the repair was even more fantastic than building the front wall.If you spot this tale on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.


    Did I really want to become a chef? Building things seemed way cooler.


    But yes. I did. Everyone had to eat. And adventurers loved eateries. Not just because they needed to eat, but because certain foods gave stat boosts.


    Mystic Falls might not have been much now, but as soon as it had a fancy eatery serving up specially curated status effects for adventurers... it would mean we''d eventually rival Kinon for places adventurers wanted to be most.


    Anything I could do to destroy Duncan''s little empire.


    It was nearly nightfall again before we were done with the walls. But I felt a thousand times better that night, and slept better than Mel.


    And in the morning, we did it all over again.


    And by we, I meant that I fetched breakfast, paid for some new supplies (a carpenter was willing to put together five sets of tables and chairs for only 50 gold total, which seemed like a steal for how expensive stuff was in this town), and got right back to work on the repairs.


    We used the leftover [Cut Stone] to make a dividing wall between what would eventually become the kitchen, and what was the dining area. Then we used the [Cut Timber] that was finally delivered to patch up not only the roof, but the floor as well. There wasn''t nearly enough of it to do an amazing job with either, but we did what we could.


    Honestly, I was surprised with the results, though.


    When we installed the [Iron Bars] as a sort of fence out front and extended the roof over it, the roof didn''t cave in. And there weren''t any new holes, either.


    And the floor creaked a lot less as well, which was saying something considering it groaned more than Mel did about having to do physical labor.


    By the time the sun set on that third evening, we had a surprisingly functional building on our hands. Once the tables and chairs were delivered (the menu told me it would be another day and a half, which was fine) and once we got the kitchen all set up, we''d almost be ready to open this thing up.


    "Did you figure out who the local building inspector is?" Mel asked, casually, over another disappointing dinner. This time it was some cabbage soup stuff that smelled and tasted like literal ass.


    "The who what now?"


    "Building inspector. You can''t just make modifications to a building like this and not get it inspected."


    "Why the hell not?"


    Mel put her bowl down on the floor in front of her and leaned forward to glare at me. "Seriously? You''re the one from the human cities. You should know this stuff."


    "Yeah, well, if it didn''t have to deal with stabbing monsters or saving damsels, I didn''t really pay attention."


    "Right. Great job, Harps." She rolled her eyes, but she was smiling under the irritation. "Buildings need to be inspected. Otherwise the menu won''t let you open it up. Take a look."


    I did as she instructed, and low and behold, I couldn''t set the eatery as open. There were a few other issues (the menu prompted me that I needed at least an oven, a preparation area, one table and two chairs, and a basin to wash dishes in, not to mention a name for the place) but "Building Inspected - NO" stood out like a giant slap to the face.


    Ass.


    "So, what, we just figure out who the person is and they make sure we did everything right?"


    "Yeah, I guess. I think they also make suggestions for what could be done better, but I''m not really sure if you have to do what they say."


    Double ass.


    "Alright," I said with a huff. "I guess I''ll go ask Phelps about it in the morning. And I really hope they don''t need us to like... do anything else. Because this is already way more expensive than I thought."


    "Told you," Mel said, although the words were muffled, since she''d just taken a giant mouthful of cabbage soup.


    I didn''t say anything, mostly because she was right. But I was also pretty sure we wouldn''t survive the rest of the week on the 30 gold pieces I had left in my inventory, especially if we needed to make more repairs.


    I needed something to go right, for once.


    But of course, it didn''t.


    It never does.