Ace frowned, the system, through his provided secretary, had been too helpful. Of course, everyone had a ton of questions on what the two upcoming events would entail. And they got answered!
Sure, not every question, but more than expected. Even during the tutorial, the system had been hands off, allowing the guides to control how much they taught as long as it was judged that they had learned enough by the end. Which, given his world’s technological background, was quite easy to pass. The guides had even joked about it as apparently, having even a single literate person in tutorials was considered good.
This ti, though, it was like having a direct line to the system. When would they be inford of who they could invite? One week. Were they safe? Yes, the system pulled them out and was temporarily holding them on the ecunopolis the quest would be happening on. Did that an they might have knowledge that would help with the quest? Maybe it depends on if they had observation skills and could figure out what they might see out of a window as they weren’t exactly allowed to wander around.
And a ton more questions like that. One interesting answer was on how they would get to know who they could choose from. They would apparently be getting so pre-system tablets, which were retrofitted with Mana batteries that could refill off of ambient Mana. That particular detail ended up dominating many of the questions afterwards for almost an entire day.
It seed that the introduction of Mana to the universe didn’t suddenly invalidate how the rest of reality worked. Even if it could warp things, it tended not to truly touch the more basic things without a much denser amount of world energy than a normal world would have. Though Mana shielding was a thing, what with how dense dungeons get if you go deep enough and the fact that places like deep-sea trenches and spiritual areas having small pockets at such a density.
This was a major relief to Ace as it ant the knowledge they had hoarded would eventually let them remake their world’s pay heights. Not just that, but the fact the system was giving out pre-magic tech from their world, if adapted, ant they would probably gain access to ans to get more of it. Their current situation was likely the system’s thod of making sure people had adapted and fully accepted what had happened to them. It might take decades, but the system should eventually give them back access to their technology.
And the quest would be the first step. Because they had certainly asked a bunch of questions about that as well. There would be tech to scavenge and more importantly, knowledge on crafting. Sure, it would be a long process to make things as it required a large build up of foundational knowledge and tools.
However, Mana added one interesting quirk to technology, or rather, magitech. Ace wasn’t sure where he had first read it, but there seed to be a the that technology built up a broad foundation while magic built towers. As in, technology allowed for regular people to live easier and have more power, while magic went towards building up individuals.
This wasn’t set in stone, of course. However, it was a general trend, especially with how spells tended to be personal, with even seemingly duplicate spells ending up being completely different between people. On the other side, a tech based flashlight could be built exactly the sa as long as you work off the sa schematics.
It was at the intersection of magic and technology where you had so interesting developnts. Ace’s particular interests lay with how a single person could build you up instead of needing an entire civilization backing you. Because, sure, early tech was easy enough. Anyone can make a waterwheel if they have the ti and knowledge, but a computer?
Magic allowed for soone to develop computers just as complex as anything pre-magic, all on their own. No need for specialized kilns and clean rooms to develop the silicon plates when you can use magic to grow the plate and even fix any mistakes. Of course, such things are much more efficient if you just use technology as much as possible, but magic makes it possible to diy technology in a way that wasn’t a thing since long ago.
So Ace hoped that they could bootstrap themselves back to their old technological heights. And this was a pri chance to Kickstart the process. The only question was how best to accomplish this.
A question Jim thought he had an answer to. “So yeah, we just need to make use of the guild to get everyone else to work for us on this. Most won’t realize how useful the knowledge will be as they’re going to be adventurers and we’ll be able to buy it all up cheap. All it will take is a repeatable quest for books or the equivalent.
“There’s only so many of us in the inner circle and we can’t just drop everything to go in any way. At most, I figure we end up with two teams at any one point in ti, one team while making sure we have enough ten person teams staying inside for long enough. On the other hand, there are nurous adventurers who will jump at this chance.”
Ace wasn’t so sure it would be that easy, but trusted Jim’s knowledge of his own people. So that just left figuring out who to invite and how. While Ace wasn’t certain if anyone else in his group of settlents would be fighting for people, it was inevitable that at least soone else would be and the most desirable people would receive amazing offers.
Offers that seeing as this was system facilitated would be backed up by more than just verbal promises. There was, of course the offer of housing. Easy for Ace to include and sadly not as important to those special enough to really want to pull in. After all, a person with a needed skill will easily be able to gain housing. Though not to be overlooked when dealing with a family, as an assured place to live will be more important.
Besides that, though, there wasn’t much. Offer money? They had nowhere near enough spare to truly tempt soone important. A position of power? Sure, so places will offer such things, but Ace wasn’t willing to, at least until he got a better feel for who they are as a person. He couldn’t even offer to power level them because experience was determined by personal difficulty and not how powerful a foe you could scratch before soone else went and killed it. Not even getting the killing blow ant anything if you weren’t in danger.
That did point to one advantage Ace has. Their dungeon was doing quite well. While any danger could gain you levels and the more controlled danger of a dungeon certainly provides less, that was kind of the point. You could fight powerful foes knowing that sothing too powerful doesn’t co along and curb stomp you.
Of course, Ace recognized that slower leveling while still being able to fight powerful foes was actually a benefit. You can fit more skill levels in that way. He just wasn’t certain if those he would be trying to invite would know that as well. So all Ace could do was wait and worry.
Down in the dungeon, Doyle was also worrying, though more about the quest. Neither he nor Ally could actually join in. Doyle because he was the dungeon and that wouldn’t exactly fit through whatever portal might pop up. On the other hand, Ally wasn’t able to leave Doyle’s dungeon influence. If she tried, she would be stopped as if the edge was a literal wall. Even if soone else physically forced her out, she would simply vanish and then reappear, once again, inside.
However, it was based on the dungeon’s influence and so she could go anywhere within the town and at this point, a good bit beyond it. Ally just didn’t feel the need to when she could even more easily pop up a blue screen with a live view. Though the Fae mindset certainly didn’t hurt.
As she had explained it to Doyle one lazy afternoon as they were just watching an interesting team delve. Fae, especially on the low end, were close to being living tropes. Every species deals with immortality in a different manner and for the Fae who naturally have it, they fall into their role. As an example, a brownie will clean the sa house every day until the end of the world, but break one of their rules and they’re gone.
The never-ending days of cleaning the sa stuff doesn’t wear on the brownie nor do those days blur together. Unlike a human in the sa position, the repetition reinforces them. And as a dungeon Fae, Ally’s natural cycle is to observe everything from her place deep in the dungeon. Of course, being royal Fae ans that more than almost any other Fae, she can break role as desired to a point.
The nature of Fae roles can go deeper, beyond even royalties’ ability to ignore it. The fact she would reappear within Doyle’s influence if removed by soone else was a good example of this. Ally’s role supersedes her nature as a physical being to the point that outside of his influence, her physical body stops existing and she is drawn back in.
All that to say, they would have to send monsters into the event if they wanted to send anyone. Though Doyle has a plan for this and it still involves Ally. Because chances are, the portal to the quest will pop up within his influence, which ans she can use her illusion magic to hide the monsters.
As for which monsters to send? That was easy to decide, kobolds. Not just because it is one of the original monsters and thus the most advanced. But because of the fifth floor boss.
Doyle couldn’t exactly send the actual boss. People would notice if she was missing. However, her path provided a handful of excellent team leaders that could be used instead. In the end, though, Doyle decided to just send a single team led by the healer.
He had a few reasons, but overall, it was because the healer was the easiest to pick up the slack for as well as most likely to survive the quest and bring back so stuff. To replace him, Doyle just needed to turn a few regular kobolds into healers. As for survival? Well, healing magic is a good start and not being a Frontline fighter should get him the rest of the way.
The biggest problem Doyle could see was actually getting them back to the dungeon. There would be a mont where they first leave the quest and they would be visible. In theory, Ally could blanket the portal with an illusion, doing that classic looped footage trick you always saw in heist movies. Except, they didn’t know when other teams would be exiting, which would cause a problem.
After all, you don’t want the kobolds to bump into soone else and it would be strange if a regular party exited the portal, but didn’t show until a few feet away from it. Doyle does know of one specific point in ti that would work, though. Right at the start, Ace plans to have three groups of ten enter and basically wait out the required ti.
While that is happening, no one else in the town is going to be allowed in. Sure, so people in town are going to complain about them hogging it all for themselves. That, of course, isn’t the point, but rather to get a feel for what they’ll be facing.
And it is exactly when Doyle will be able to slip his team of kobolds in, helped by the fact that every team that enters will be placed randomly each ti they enter. Then they need to make their way out before that ti is up.
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