Chapter 428: The First Employees of the Kingdom Headquarters

The first contracts were signed shortly after sunrise.

Sage sat behind a long table inside one of the Grand Guild Hall’s conference rooms while applicants entered in groups according to department, reviewed their terms and either signed or walked away.

The System recorded every completed contract immediately, but Sage still insisted on physical copies being prepared and archived.

Salaries, responsibilities, probation periods, confidentiality clauses, disciplinary rules and promotion procedures were written clearly enough that nobody could later claim they’d misunderstood what employment meant.

Some candidates negotiated. A few rejected their offers. Most signed. By the time the first group left carrying employee identification cards bearing the Adventurer Guild emblem, another group was already waiting outside.

Sage watched them disappear down the corridor toward their assigned departments and realized that, for the first time, people were entering the Kingdom Headquarters not as construction workers, applicants or curious visitors, but as employees.

The effect became visible almost immediately. Receptionists who had passed the first rounds of recruitment took positions behind selected counters in the Grand Guild Hall and began learning registration procedures before the Guild opened those services publicly.

Temporary recruitment desks disappeared as permanent workstations were organized. Record keepers carried boxes of documents into newly assigned archive rooms, while clerks labeled cabinets and established filing systems before paperwork could bury them.

The Finance Department received its first accountants in the morning, and Irene Valcrest was already inside before Sage arrived to inspect it. She had claimed one of the central offices, covered a wall with expenditure reports and begun separating Headquarters construction costs from future operating expenses.

"You started early," Sage said.

"I started on time." She said.

Sage looked at the wall.

Irene followed his gaze. "Your accounts survived construction because you tracked everything. That doesn’t mean the Finance Department gets to become lazy. Restaurants, hotel operations, salaries, merchant leases, cultivation fees, auction commissions, warehouse charges, regional transfers and mission payments will eventually move through this Headquarters. If everyone creates their own accounting habits, we’ll spend years fixing them."

"So you’re accepting the position?" Sage asked.

She gave him a flat look. "I signed the contract twenty minutes ago."

Sage opened Department Management.

[Finance Department]

[Department Head: Irene Valcrest]

[Status: Operational — Limited Staffing]

That was the first vacancy to disappear.

Mission Administration followed before noon. Garran Holt had returned for his final interview carrying corrections to the sample mission procedures he’d criticized during recruitment. Sage hadn’t asked him to do it.

Garran simply disliked the procedures enough to fix them. His proposal required mission clerks to separate information supplied by clients from information independently verified by the Guild.

Unknown dangers had to be marked as unknown rather than quietly assigned convenient estimates, and rewards could be challenged if the risk changed after investigation.

"Adventurers will complain," Sage said.

"They complain when they’re alive too."

"Clients will complain."

"They complain regardless."

Boren, seated nearby, nodded solemnly. "He’s qualified."

Garran became the first Head of Mission Administration.

Not every important position was filled so easily. Legal Affairs remained vacant after Sage rejected the strongest candidate for repeatedly describing noble recommendations as "practical legal realities."

Personnel remained without a permanent head. Regional Coordination had several promising applicants but nobody Sage trusted to eventually communicate with fifteen Regional Headquarters.

Dungeon Management remained open as well. Sage could have filled every department with the best person available that week, but he refused to confuse filling a chair with solving a problem.

By midday, the Headquarters was changing faster than the interface.

At the Grand Adventurer Hotel, Selene Arkwright walked through rooms with newly hired attendants and housekeeping supervisors, checking everything from linen inventories to emergency exits.

She hadn’t officially been appointed to the highest hotel position yet, but Sage had authorized her to lead the opening preparations while her final assessment continued. She immediately divided the hotel into sections rather than trying to open every floor simultaneously.

Standard rooms and party rooms would open first. Long-stay apartments would follow once procedures stabilized. Premium and VIP floors would remain closed until staff had been trained properly.

In the Dining Quarter, Maura Bellamy had already begun terrorizing suppliers.

"These onions are soft."

The merchant stared at her. "They were harvested four days ago."

"Then sell them to someone who enjoys four-day-old onions."

"They’re perfectly edible."

"I didn’t ask whether they could prevent starvation."

Mina stood nearby eating something from a test kitchen and watched the negotiation with admiration.

Maura had refused to open all twelve restaurants at once, exactly as she’d warned during her interview. Instead, kitchens were being stocked according to a phased schedule.

The inexpensive adventurer dining hall, grilled-meat restaurant, breakfast bakery and one general restaurant would be prepared first. Other kitchens would train staff and establish supply chains before opening.

Sage approved immediately. Empty tables were cheaper than twelve badly managed restaurants damaging the Guild’s reputation during their first week.

The Production Quarter was louder.

Bramdir Coppervein had accepted a senior smithing contract after negotiating access to the master workshops, authority to reject unusable materials and what he called "the right to throw fools out of dangerous rooms."

Sage had rewritten the final condition into professional language before signing it. Now smiths were claiming assigned workstations throughout the Grand Guild Smithing Complex. Apprentices carried fuel and tools between stations while experienced craftsmen inspected furnaces.

Some organized damaged practice equipment, and enchantment candidates began checking the formation rooms.

Sage found Bramdir standing before three newly hired smiths.

"Again," the dwarf ordered.

One exhausted applicant stared at the metal in his tongs. "I’ve already made it twice."

"And twice you’ve made rubbish. Third time might surprise us."

Sage decided the Smithing Complex was in capable hands.

The Alchemy Center smelled increasingly like herbs, alcohol and things Sage couldn’t identify. New alchemists catalogued ingredients while assistants arranged storage according to compatibility rather than alphabetically. Dangerous reagents disappeared into reinforced cabinets.

Common potion ingredients were moved closer to production rooms. Several senior alchemists were still under consideration for leadership, so Sage left the department without a permanent head rather than forcing an appointment.

The Medical Center changed more quietly. Elowen had accepted a senior clinical position and spent most of the morning inspecting supplies with newly hired healers.

She separated emergency treatment rooms from ordinary recovery wards, checked antidote stocks and demanded that the Monster Material Processing Center provide the Medical Center with a list of toxins likely to enter the complex.

"Why?" Sage asked.

"Because someone will eventually get bitten while processing something they were specifically told not to touch."

Sage remembered the applicant reaching barehanded toward a venom gland.

"Fair."

The Grand Library received its first shipments from Evergreen that afternoon.

Boxes arrived containing copied dungeon reports, monster records, branch reports, regional maps, herb information and mission archives.

Lucien Marrow stood among newly hired librarians and archivists directing where everything should go. He refused to place several monster reports into confirmed records because their sources contradicted one another, creating a separate classification for unresolved information instead.

"Evergreen already has more useful knowledge than these shelves suggest," Lucien told Sage. "The problem is that much of it was recorded for immediate operations, not long-term research."

"Can you fix that?"

"We can organize it. Fixing it requires people to keep sending better information."

"Then tell Mission Administration what you need."

Lucien paused.

Sage smiled. "You’re allowed to speak to other departments."

"That will take adjustment."

Elsewhere, warehouse crews began establishing the first inventory procedures. Every incoming shipment received a record before storage. Materials were separated by destination and handling requirements.

Tobias Merrow spent most of the afternoon walking freight routes between warehouses, production facilities and the main entrances, timing how long loaded wagons took to move through each section.

Security patrols began walking the avenues under Cassian Rook’s temporary command, learning entrances, public zones, restricted areas and emergency routes before visitors arrived in large numbers.

The Headquarters was no longer merely waiting.

It was preparing.

Sage returned to the Grand Guild Hall late in the afternoon and found Boren arguing with a well-dressed young man accompanied by two servants.

"My recommendation bears the seal of House Veltrian," the man said.

"I noticed."

"My uncle was assured I would receive appropriate consideration."

"You did."

"And?"

"You failed the accounting examination."

The young man’s face tightened. "Perhaps you don’t understand who my uncle is."

Boren looked toward Sage as he approached. "Guildmaster, apparently I don’t understand who his uncle is."

Sage took the recommendation letter, glanced at the seal and handed it back.

"You were guaranteed an interview?"

"Yes."

"You received one?"

"Yes."

"Then the recommendation was honored."

The man’s expression changed. "I was recommended for a senior Finance position."

"And you failed the accounting examination."

Silence followed.

Sage had expected this problem eventually. The Capital ran on relationships as much as coin. Noble Houses recommended relatives, merchant families placed children inside businesses, officials owed favors and organizations used employment to strengthen alliances.

Refusing every recommendation without consideration would be pointless hostility. Allowing recommendations to determine appointments would be worse.

"A recommendation can get someone through the door," Sage said. "It cannot make them qualified after they enter."

The young man stared at him for several seconds before leaving with his servants.

Boren watched him go. "That’ll come back."

"Probably."

"Good policy, though."

Sage opened Department Management again.

[Finance Department]

[Department Head: Irene Valcrest]

[Mission Administration Department]

[Department Head: Garran Holt]

[Security Department]

[Acting Department Head: Cassian Rook]

[Guild Logistics Department]

[Acting Department Head: Tobias Merrow]

Several more sections showed increasing staff numbers without permanent leadership.

Then came the vacancies

[Personnel Department]

[Department Head: Vacant]

[Dungeon Management Department]

[Department Head: Vacant]

[Regional Coordination Department]

[Department Head: Vacant]

Sage closed the interface.

There was no need to rush.

By evening, hundreds of employees had entered their first day of work, but Sage didn’t need the System to tell him that. He could see it. Security patrols crossed the avenues. Hotel employees moved behind windows.

Smoke rose from smithing furnaces. Kitchens received supplies. Warehouse workers pushed carts between storage buildings. Clerks carried records through administrative corridors. Lights appeared inside offices that had been dark the night before.

Sage entered the Grand Guild Hall through its main doors.

Then he stopped.

Voices.

Not the scattered voices of construction crews or applicants waiting for interviews. Employees were speaking behind counters. Clerks crossed the hall carrying documents. Mission staff gathered around empty boards while Garran explained procedures.

Receptionists practiced registration with one another. Somewhere above, someone laughed.

The Grand Guild Hall finally sounded occupied.

Sage stood there for a moment and listened.

Then he looked toward the enormous waiting areas.

Almost every chair was empty.

Hundreds of counters now had people behind them, but almost nobody stood in front of them. The mission boards were prepared, yet there were barely any missions. Registration stations were staffed, but there were no lines of adventurers waiting to register.

The Headquarters had employees now.

What it didn’t have were the people the entire Adventurer Guild had been built to serve.