Chapter 16: The Loot Drop

Before Zion could think much further, pale light gathered near the rear wall of the barn. Mara noticed it first.

"There! By the wall!"

The light condensed into a wooden chest reinforced with dark iron bands. All four adventurers stopped.

Elias’ mouth curved into a wide grin. "So there is loot."

Zion immediately forgot about analyzing the fight. His attention fixed on the chest instead. This was what he’d spent nearly two hundred essence preparing.

Mara hurried toward it, but Gareth caught the back of her armor before she reached the lid.

"Check it first."

She looked over her shoulder. "It just appeared after we killed the boss."

"Check it."

Mara sighed but crouched beside the chest. She inspected the hinges, ran her fingers around the lock, and checked the floor beneath it before finally nodding.

"No trap."

Gareth released her, allowing her to lift the lid. Golden light spilled across her face and for a moment, no one spoke.

Zion waited for their reaction as the pendant rested alone against the dark cloth inside the chest. The polished silver chain caught the light from the barn entrance, while the white stone at its center gave off a faint golden glow.

Mara reached inside and lifted it carefully.

Her expression changed.

Elias stepped closer, curious about what would make her pause like that.

"What is that?"

"I don’t know."

"Let me see."

She handed him the pendant but her eyes never left it.

Elias held it near the crystal at the top of his staff and focused on the stone. The faint golden light reflected across his eyes as he examined the enchantment, turning the pendant once before bringing it closer to the crystal.

Then he went still.

Gareth noticed immediately. "What? What is it?"

Elias didn’t answer right away. He studied the back of the pendant, checked the stone a second time, and finally looked toward the others.

"This is enchanted."

Mara stared at him, her mouth falling open. "No way."

"I’m serious."

June stepped closer to get a better look. "From the first floor?"

"That’s what I’m trying to understand."

Zion felt a small burst of satisfaction. Of course it was enchanted. That was the entire reason the necklace had cost him one hundred and seventy-five essence.

Elias raised his staff again and examined the pendant more carefully.

"Low-tier enchantment, but definitely real. Some kind of holy protection. It looks like it also provides a little resistance against curses or corrupted environments."

Gareth looked between Elias and the pendant.

"How unusual is that?"

Elias lowered his staff.

"For a first-floor chest?"

"Yes."

"You normally don’t start seeing enchanted accessories like this until much deeper. Floor twenty, maybe farther depending on the dungeon."

Zion’s satisfaction disappeared.

Twenty?

Mara snatched the pendant back from Elias and held it closer to the light.

"You’re serious?"

"Completely."

She looked down at the glowing white stone before closing her fingers around the chain.

"We’re keeping it!"

Elias stared at her. "We are absolutely not deciding that before we know what it’s worth."

"It’s enchanted jewelry."

"Exactly."

Mara held the pendant against her chest. "Which is why we should keep it."

"You only want it because it’s pretty." June laughed softly.

"It can be pretty and useful."

Gareth rubbed one hand over his face.

"We earned it as a party."

"Then the party can agree that I should wear it."

"The party has not agreed to anything," Elias said. "If the enchantment is worth what I think it is, a merchant could pay enough for this to cover supplies for several dungeon runs."

Mara tightened her grip around the chain.

"Or we could keep the rare enchanted item we somehow pulled from a sheep dungeon."

"The boss was technically a ram," June said with a teasing laugh.

Mara shot her a look. "That does not make this less ridiculous."

Zion listened from above as the last of his satisfaction slowly turned into something much closer to regret. The pendant had definitely solved the problem of making the floor feel rewarding. Apparently, too rewarding.

He reopened the reward catalog and searched for the item.

[Pendant of Lesser Sanctuary]

[Quality: Low Enchanted]

[Summoning Cost: 175 Essence]

Nothing in the description mentioned Floor 20, or any suggested floor placement.

He stared at the information for several seconds before looking back at the adventurers arguing below him. He’d assumed that because the store allowed him to buy the pendant, it was an appropriate reward.

Apparently the system didn’t care whether he made good financial decisions.

It had simply offered him thousands of items and allowed him to spend his essence however badly he wanted.

"Oh." His attention returned to the pendant in Mara’s hands. "I think I overdid it."

He’d spent one hundred and seventy-five precious essence on something these people considered a reward from twenty floors deeper because he’d been too embarrassed to put a rusty dagger inside the chest.

For the same price, he could’ve bought five Goblin Warriors, covered a large portion of Floor 2 in terrain, or summoned more than forty sheep.

All of those things would’ve done considerably more to keep him alive than a necklace currently sitting in Mara’s hands.

Instead, Mara was clutching his essence and arguing about whether she wanted to keep it because it was pretty.

Zion suddenly missed his one hundred and seventy-five essence very much.

Below him, Gareth eventually held out his hand.

"We take it to the guild first. Someone there can identify it properly and tell us what it’s worth. After that, we decide whether to keep it or sell it."

Mara reluctantly placed the pendant in his palm.

"If they offer something insulting, I’m taking it back."

Elias laughed. "If they offer what I think they might, you’re going to forget how pretty it is."

"I doubt that."

June looked toward the now-empty chest.

"If this really is part of the normal loot table, we should probably come back tomorrow."

Mara’s disappointment disappeared immediately.

"Oh, we’re definitely coming back tomorrow."

Elias nodded toward the pendant in Gareth’s hand.

"And if the guild confirms this came from a first-floor boss, we probably won’t be the only ones."

That caught Zion’s attention and temporarily interrupted his regret.

More people meant more entry essence, more dungeon activity, and more chances to recover what he’d spent. Every additional visitor would also bring him closer to having enough essence to finish another floor before the grace period ended.

The pendant might’ve been far too expensive, but if it convinced several new parties to visit, there was still a chance the mistake could pay for itself.

The party began walking toward the exit while continuing to argue about the necklace.

Mara wanted to keep it. Elias insisted they find out exactly how much it was worth first. June seemed entertained by both of them, and Gareth carried the pendant himself, apparently deciding that was the easiest way to stop Mara from putting it on before they reached town.

Zion followed them across the pasture until they disappeared into the entrance tunnel.

[Visitors have exited the dungeon.]

Only after they were gone did he return his attention to the barn.

The Boss Drop Chest remained open near the rear wall, but the dark cloth inside it was empty.

Zion looked at it for several seconds and realized something. The pendant had been a real item. Of course it was gone once someone took it.

He opened the chest settings.

[Boss Drop Chest]

[Current Reward: Empty]

[Manual Restock Available]

[Auto Repurchase Available]

Zion focused on the second option.

[Auto Repurchase]

[Automatically repurchases the assigned reward after each successful claim.]

[Current assigned reward cost: 175 Essence.]

"No way!"

He closed the option immediately.

There was absolutely no chance he was paying another one hundred and seventy-five essence every time someone defeated the Horned Ram.

The first pendant was already painful enough.

If several parties arrived in one day while the chest automatically produced another enchanted necklace for each of them, his dungeon could lose essence faster than the adventurers generated it. That defeated the entire purpose.

He was supposed to be earning enough essence to build defenses, not operating some kind of charity for people who came here specifically to beat up his monsters.

Zion reopened the reward catalog and returned to the inexpensive section. The reinforced boots suddenly looked considerably more respectable than they had the day before.

The common sword seemed perfectly acceptable.

Even a healing potion no longer looked insulting now that he understood he might have to replace whatever reward he selected every time someone cleared the floor.

The rusted dagger was probably still going too far. He still had standards.

But there was clearly a very large distance between a three-essence dagger and a one-hundred-and-seventy-five-essence enchanted pendant, and Zion had somehow managed to ignore everything between them.

He’d need to create a proper loot table eventually.

Most rewards could be inexpensive enough to replace regularly, while something better appeared only occasionally. That would give adventurers a reason to keep trying without forcing him to sacrifice an entire group of monsters every time someone opened a chest.

For now, manual restocking seemed much safer.

Zion left the chest empty and checked his status.

[Current Essence: 302]

The party’s entry and activity had already recovered a small portion of what he’d spent.

It wasn’t enough to make him feel better about the pendant, but at least the number was moving in the right direction.

Elias’s comment returned to him.

We probably won’t be the only ones.

A few days earlier, the possibility of more adventurers discovering the dungeon would’ve filled Zion with dread.

Now he found himself looking toward the entrance and thinking about how much essence a steady stream of visitors could generate before the grace period ended.

Every person who entered gave him something. Every fight produced activity. Every successful clear could eventually become another monster, trap, stretch of terrain, or complete floor standing between the entrance and his throne room.

The dungeon needed adventurers to function. Zion still found that deeply inconvenient.

He wanted people to come inside often enough to make him rich, enjoy themselves enough to return, and stop progressing somewhere comfortably far away from the room containing his extremely fragile skull.

That seemed reasonable.

Zion looked once more at his essence balance, then toward the entrance where Gareth’s party had disappeared.

For the first time, he sincerely hoped they told everyone they knew.

Preferably enough people to earn back his pendant.