Dungeon of Niflheim

Chapter 1006: Chapter 1006: Three village pass (4)

"Haaaaa I need to do something otherwise I’ll end up becoming nothing more than a Bonafide trophy wife, good for nothing but my beauty and fists." She the talented prodigy of the fenrir clan was more than just muscle with a pretty face right?

Maya sat on the sofa, her head resting against her right hand, supporting it in a lazy, couch potato fashion as she nursed her boredom. Everyone else was doing something, only she had nothing to do.

There was no point in her training, she wouldn’t get any stronger and Frost was off doing something with Daki. The kids also had their own tasks to complete at this time of the day thus leaving her alone and bored.

"I need a hobby." Usually she’d read a book to pass the time or wander through the city streets in search of entertainment but far too often she was finding herself consumed by boredom and she’d had enough of that.

Her gaze roamed the private space as well as her own body as her mind churned through possible options in which to invest her time.

Before her post as Frost’s guardian she was a Princess of the Fenrir tribe, a woman who stood at the very peak of lavish life, never want for anything. Every time she trained and grew stronger she’d be rewarded with praise, gifts and a bottomless allowance so that’s all she did. Her primary and only focus was to increase her strength and because of that she managed to reach S-rank in no time at all, faster than even many of her most talented ancestors.

The Guardian job promised to aid in that endeavour further thus Maya didn’t really hesitate to volunteer but the shift in lifestyle was quite dramatic. The one who had been waited on, praised and guided was now the one doing the praising, guiding and waiting.

Early on she was quicker to frustration, pushing down her irritation in leu of the promise in furthering her own strength but as time passed she started to really enjoy her time in the Dungeon, with Frost and to a slighter lesser extent Nanna, Loki and even Daki.

She was no longer singularly focused on her strength and had thus noticed that beyond that her life was rather empty.

She still enjoyed things, certain foods, training Frost, teaching Nanna and Loki as well the pleasurable activities that she frequently engaged in with Daki and Frost but none of them could be considered hobbies or personal activities in which she could thoroughly invest her time.

She had no interest in the card game [realm of monsters] at least not any more than the standard player. Smithing a big no, same with alchemy, artificing, carving and even gardening nothing really retained her interest for more than a few days. The only thing she could really pontificate on (bar fighting skills) was alcohol but that trade often beheld a negative monicker. She wanted even less to be seen as a trophy wife with not only powerful fists but a penchant for the drink.

But after repeatedly losing interest in other hobbies and trades she found herself once again staring at several bottles of wine, whiskey and sake.

"Haaaaaa I guess I should give it a go, what’s the worst that could happen." She resigned herself to follow where her talents and passions guided her, finally after several months using the DP Frost had reserved for her to create a space for brewing wine, she’d start there before moving onto spirits.

While Maya picked herself up from the comforts of the private space’s massive sofa Frost and Daki had returned to the 16th floor where the former started arranging for small groups of frost dwarves, frost trolls and frost sprites to teleport down to the Dungeon’s new bottommost floor.

"This will be your new habitat, a village which you can develop in any way you see fit, just make sure its sturdy enough to repel the aggressions of both adventurers and bestial monsters." With an audience of dwarves, trolls and sprites listening to his every word and looking all around with expressions of awe Frost explained the dynamic he wished to establish here on the 16th floor.

"We’re to engage in trade with the invaders?" A frost troll chief who could speak almost fluent common tongue asked on behalf of his slower thinking colleagues. The trolls in Niflheim often took on roles as leaders, captains, and field commanders as they boasted both strength and intelligence.

"To a degree. Depending on what you yourself develop in your personal villages you can offer services to these adventurers and charge them for those services. The prices and trading materials however I’ll leave entirely up to you." Frost wanted to foster a sense of independence, allowing his monsters to take on a role that would frequently be seen in the natural world. A tribe would congregate together, build a village and enforce their own rules and standards within the territory they controlled. Diplomacy whether positive or negative, peaceful or aggressive would thus form between the tribes within the local area. The 16th floor and hopefully the following four would replicate this environment, trying to appear as natural as possible.

Frost words garnered hushed communications, some monsters were confused, others excited while others fixated on the promise of free development, the frost dwarves in particular.

"You’ll have pretty much free reign here, if you want to expand, expand if you want to communicate and trade with the other villages then do that and if you have a conflict you can even go to war as long as you fulfil your tasks in guarding and handing out the tokens to the adventurers who garner enough favour then I’ll rarely interfere in your affairs." Even if one tribe took over another village and painted it in their colours Frost decided he wouldn’t interfere, instead he’d let nature take its course. As long as the duties he arranged were still being carried out he would not care.

A risky gambit but one he was determined to try.

Frost proceeded to answer any questions his monsters had before shuffling them all into their individual villages which right now still looked incredibly bare even with the injection of new blood.

"I’ll probably have to spend north of 50k to properly populate all nine villages and another 60 or so on the bestial monsters that’ll roam throughout the floor." After bringing down additional dwarves, trolls and frost sprites Frost also summoned revenants, lesser yuki-onnas and even the recently gained wolfmen, an intelligent evolutionary path of his frost and dire wolves to outfit the nine villages with some semblance of variety and to ensure that the upper floors weren’t stripped completely bare, but the floor was still pretty empty over all.

He initially hoped to get all five floors created and maybe three of them populated but now it seems it’d be difficult to ensure just the 16th and 17th floors were ready for visitors.

"Haaaaa developing the Dungeon is like feeding a bottomless hole." He was almost in tears, Daki having to literally support his shoulder as his initial 500,000 DP dwindled to a mere 1,300 (not including the 20,000 he always holds in emergency reserve) and that was after trading in some gold coins at 1000DP a pop.

"There, there Frost it’s ok, it’s all going to a good cause." Even though she couldn’t feel the transition of life energy involved Daki could very well imagine the pain her partner was experiencing, he’d literally went from a gold magnate to a pauper in a matter of hours with only two fully outfitted (but still lacking in personnel) floors and three empty ones bringing the Dungeon to 22 floors officially and 20 active. What made it even worse was the fact that the cost for a new floor jumped another 20,000DP after he crossed 20 effectively doubling every ten floors. Clearly Frost and his siblings were designed for the long game, growing slowly and gradually like monster lairs that may not even show a single change over the course of several years.

"I know but....damn does it have to cost me an arm and a leg every time." Back when he first started out 15,000 DP took him so far but now such an amount couldn’t even cover his replenishment costs.

"The moment those refugees start arriving in mass I want them locked up in the inns and dorms or better yet forced into the Dungeon only then will I get my twenty floors done in time." The more floors he had the greater his costs, soon half a million would seem like chump change.

"Rana’s been notified and manpower has been redirected from the wall to the construction of accommodations, we’ll be ready for the flood don’t worry." Usually she pumped all her time into her forge but after spending the day with Frost she better understood the pressure he was under, so much fell on his shoulders. Even when he was designing the 16th and 17th floor every so often a troll, yuki-onna or ronso would appear with a report on behalf of Findley, Yuna or Khuno respectively and he’d have to deal with that before putting his nose back down on the grindstone....she admired his work ethic and in turn was forced to think about her own struggles.

’What am I missing?’ She asked herself, still unable to give a clear answer after being pried away from her forge for several hours.

"Oh Neve good to see you settling in, how’s things?" She was brought out of her thoughts however when an enchanting woman bearing a strangely similar but highly obscured nature appeared before Frost as he pulled himself back together from staring a hole into his DP balance.