Dungeon 42

After some snickering, I selected an Elemental Earth Hound for Elim. It looked like rocks held together by moss with glittering black gemstone eyes. More importantly, it looked like a good boy. At rating D, it was formidable but not insane. It was also a creature that might reasonably appear in a variety of areas without eliciting terror.

I felt like the last point was necessary in case he had to use it in public. Intimidation was useful at times, but it had limits and wasn't something I wanted to rely on. You could only push the peasants so much before it was pitchforks and torches time.

As a bonus, the earth hound was an excellent tracker, had a strong sense of direction, and the ability to find water. The latter was something it needed to keep its mossy coat nice and lush. Or at least that was what I decided to assume because I thought it was cute.

With that done, I sent the contract.

"Take your time reading it and make sure I didn't change the terms unfavorably," I cautioned. Since Elim had already looked at one version, this would be a good moment to slip in something fucked up, were I of that inclination. I wasn't, but that was a good mentality to have with any kind of contract, in my opinion.

"Oh… Not to be grim, but you should relocate your family once you're out of the Earl's service. Just in case," I said. The thought was unpleasant but necessary. Even if everything went right on our end, there was still a lot to go wrong.

"That's easily done. My mother's family left her property in the backcountry where they won't do quarantines or burnings. I was worried about not being able to find healers, or we'd already live there," Elim said agreeably.

"Property?" I asked, surprised by the news but happy.

"Your mother, she isn't a commoner, I take it," I said, holding back the strange sense of elation I felt. His life matching up with my idea of a proper backstory was childish, at best. Not that it stopped me from being excited.

"How did you know?" Elim asked. I pointed at the sword I'd carefully put back before he woke up. It wasn't a thing an ordinary family would have had, even if it wasn't a crazy magic metal. Swords should be expensive in pretty much any era. Or pseudo era as the case may be.

Land ownership also wouldn't be available to anyone outside of the aristocracy. Probably anyway, I wasn't anything like an expert in feudal systems. I really needed to start looking into the local one. I had no idea how important an Earl was.

"Well, truthfully, we're no longer noble. Her father was a Baronet, and that's not a hereditary title. Besides, he threw her out when she got pregnant with me. That was the family coat of arms from her mother's side," Elim said glumly.

"Your grandpa sounds like a charming man," I grumbled. Reading about a bag of dicks noble who made people's lives hard in a story was one thing. That was the stuff of character development and relatable struggle. Knowing someone who'd suffered because of their shitty grandfather was another thing entirely.

I kept thinking of Elim as a game character in some respects, but he was a real person. It irritated the hell out of me to think someone had been unkind to him and his mother.

"Hm?" Elim hummed questioningly.

"Nothing. If your grandmother's side had a coat of arms, shouldn't they still be noble?" I asked, confused by the way it was discounted. It might have been an inheritance thing, with it not passing down through female descent, but I wanted to be sure.

I had some choice things to say about his grandfather but kept them to myself. It wasn't my business. Elim seemed fine talking about it, but that didn't mean it wasn't uncomfortable or painful to dredge up.

"That's… A bit hard to explain. Her family had a coat of arms and were noble once, but they weren't sure when or where exactly. Her great-great-grandfather took that secret with him to the grave. Or maybe pretended to because he didn't know. The heraldry is strange, though. It's probably foreign or old," Elim explained. The bit about his great-great-grandfather having one over on the family almost made me laugh. That would be fucking hilarious, though I thankfully kept that to myself.

"Why is it strange?" I asked. I thought it looked nicer than most examples I could think of from my old world, but that was bias. I didn't know enough to pick on something like there being a weird element or color. The fact the rose was drawn nicely might have been the issue itself, after all. Most heraldry art I could think of seemed a bit ugly to me.

"No other families have flowers that I know of. It's always animals, helmets or hands, things like that… I don't know much of the why, but I've seen a lot of noble coats of arms working for the Earl," Elim said thoughtfully. He ruminated for a while, then shook his head.

"I think they must have a rule about flowers, or just think they're weak," He added.

"Roses benefit from being fed blood," I said offhandedly.

"What?" Elim asked.

"Blood, well blood meal, is good for roses. They grow better with a bit of it," I repeated. I could vaguely recall it being a good source of nitrogen. It didn't seem like I'd been terribly interested in plants. Like most things I knew, it was probably gleaned in passing during a life saturated with information.

"Slaughterhouses would sell it to be used for plants where I'm from," I added to clarify, though I wasn't sure if I did or not. Elim looked over at this sword and then smirked and laughed.

"I wouldn't have suspected," he said with a smile.

"About the horses, would you get in trouble for selling them?" I asked as an idea occurred to me.

"No, not as long as I hand in the bill of sale to the garrison," Elim said after some thought.

"I have to report it, but I'm entitled to any goods found," He added. I nodded at that since it made sense to me. It would be hard to keep soldiers from taking spoils, so it was likely easier to make it official policy.

"Well, I thought it might seem unlikely for you to cross the desert with a bunch of horses on your own. There's a village that trades horses a ways down the range. If you go that way, it might seem more believable that you survived," I offered. The desert wasn't that wide here, but he had been left for dead.

It was probably more believable that someone injured had chosen to stay near the mountains. The path was more accessible, and there would likely be water. Particularly since I didn't find anything like a compass in his gear.

"It trades horses? Are you sure it's not a post town?" Elim asked.

"What's a post town?" I asked instead of answering. I knew one definition for the term that didn't seem relevant to our discussion.

"It's a town on trade routes meant to ease travel. Merchants and officials can get fresh horses and spend the night," Elim explained. I thought about what I'd seen and couldn't say for sure if that were the case, but it was likely.

"Possibly, I only observed it for a short while," I admitted. I wasn't going to get into detail about my creeping on the settlement to size up potential victims. That was a TMI I couldn't see being helpful to myself.

"I'll be able to send a letter if it is, so I hope so," Elim explained. I nodded, feeling a bit awkward. Our business was done, so to speak.

For a few minutes silence stretched between us while I tried to think of anything else we needed to discuss. I came up blank all too quickly—an unfortunate but inevitable turn of events.

It was selfish, but it would have been nice to keep Elim a bit longer. I couldn't justify it without a solid reason despite my personal feelings. He would genuinely be more useful to me outside of the dungeon.

"I'll give you some extra supplies, and you can think about the terms of the contract on your trip back," I said with ease I didn't feel. I wasn't worried about him leaving before he accepted. He'd already agreed to the first one that would keep him from fucking me over.

Worst case scenario, he decided not to take the deal, which really wouldn't hurt me. I doubted he'd back out, though. Even if he decided the village was a lost cause, he genuinely worried for his mother and daughter. Signing on with me would let him do more for them than he could on his own.

"That's fine. I'm a quick reader," Elim said. I tilted my head in confusion, not sure why reading speed mattered.

[Contract Accepted]

[Dungeon Asset acquired: Elim, Employee]

I felt my orbs flicker as I looked at the alert. Seriously, what was I going to do with this kid?