The Flying Emporium

A tiny, unknown store in the middle of nowhere. Selling products hitherto unheard of; that was both in terms of their promised effects themselves, but also their magnitude.

When everyone was either still dismissing these reports as rumors altogether or were at least still waiting for new, more reliant information, she was the only one who hadn’t hesitated. Only she had decisively jumped at the opportunity, risking her, at the time, cushy job.

And the higher ups agreed. They granted her this opportunity to prove herself and her intuition. If she managed to establish a new branch-provided, of course, the rumors turned out to be true in the first place-she would get the job.

And indeed, her risk had paid off. The rumors had been true. No, if anything, the previous reports had been understatements. The reality was far more remarkable.

But there was also something she had misjudged. That was the difficult owner of that said store, who claimed all the surrounding land for himself.

A whole floating mountain.

Those hadn’t been just empty words either. Without his approval, it proved impossible to settle down on that patch of land.

Unlike every other sensible person in his position, the man hadn’t welcomed her and the prospect of an entirely new branch of the Adventurers’ Society’s right on his doorstep.

But even that proved only a small obstacle; all it took were some light negotiations, and they came to an agreement.

Surely, from then on out things would be smooth sailing.

And indeed. The store’s fame began to spread as its assortment of outlandish products continuously expanded. Not just its wares, but the store also underwent numerous incredible changes. As did the mountain itself at one point.

If one disregarded the existence of a certain ship-state, she now was the administrator in charge of the first and only non-stationary branch of the Society.

With the legitimacy of the Emporium long confirmed, all of these facts attracted an ever-increasing amount of customers. Which profited not only the Emporium itself, but her business as well.

Or at least that’s how it should have been.

In reality, things seemed to only ever get worse.

Her place should have long been expanded to match the increase of traffic they received every day. Similarly was true for the amount of her staff.

But nothing.

The HQ’s usual support for a job well done never came.

Instead, that contract she had signed with the shopkeeper, the one which, at the time, had seemed so innocuous to her, as well as the fact that things never seemed to settle down with the Emporium, only had the opposite effect.

The Emporium and its owner were so much of an outlier that the higher-ups only became more and more cautious and reserved.

Not even the fact that the Searing Witch herself was now working for that man seemed to change their attitude.

But thinking about how she had to force some of her staff to use that damned machine to swap their classes-a fact which still weighed heavily on her conscious-she could almost understand why the people in charge refrained from sending even more of their people and resources into such an environment.

But that didn’t mean she could accept their decisions. She and her people were simply overworked. They severely lacked the manpower necessary to successfully run a branch with such daily customer volume.

And finally, it came to bite them in the ass.

Just when she thought they finally got a few days’ break, things somehow turned even worse.

Bad enough that in the past those products had already forced the Society to adjust some of their rank evaluation guidelines, now a group of newbies had set a new precedent, fundamentally questioning the Society’s way of categorizing dungeons and their dangers.

A major dispute also among the adventurers, who demanded answers and clarifications.

She couldn’t help but snorting a self-deprecating laugh.

‘As if that decision was up to me.’

But she immediately lost her laughter when she thought about that other incident during that stupidly named Broadcasting Event. She felt like crying.

What a disaster it had been. If only-

She stopped herself just in time from breaking down entirely and took two deep breaths to calm herself down.

Now was not the time. Not for grief, and certainly for self-pity.

But it was time to swallow her pride and to do what had to be done.

Determined, she forced the usual smile onto her face. Then she stood up, left her office, and headed outside.

It was still early, more night than day, and the festivities hadn’t yet resumed. Still, things were already busy on the mountaintop. Jasmine’s troops, in particular, had their hands full maintaining order.

While she was, of course, grateful for their support, this observation only further dampened her mood.

Someone in her position shouldn’t have to rely on anyone else’s support to handle such situations. Not if the Society wanted to remain truly neutral. Not to mention their prestige.

She didn’t let her thoughts show and simply continued towards the portal station – another one of those technologies the Emporium had brought with it, and another reason the higher-ups refrained from any drastic measures, she suspected.

***

Twenty minutes later, Magda stood in front of her destination.

It certainly wasn’t comparable to the HQ, but it was still by far the largest and most influential branch in the area.

Coming here and having to beg for reinforcements was humiliating, the situation unfair.

She hesitated. But only for a moment.

The situation was truly grave, and she refused to let her personal feelings or ambitions influence her decision making.

She swallowed her pride-not least for her people's sake- and stepped inside.

Purposefully, she walked past the queues that had already formed this early in the day and waited.

The moment she saw one adventurer had finished her business and was now leaving, Magda nonchalantly squeezed into the resulting gap.

“Miss! You can’t just-”

Magda didn’t wait for the diligent clerk to start paying attention to her uniform or the badge she wore and instead directly handed over her papers to identify herself that way.

“Excuse me, but I really need to see the local manager. It is urgent,” she assured.

The woman behind the counter was visibly annoyed by the interruption, but realizing she was dealing with the manager of a different branch, she didn’t dare argue.

The woman leaned to the side and made an apologetic gesture to the person behind Magda, the one originally next in line.

“One second,” she then excused herself and stepped away from her desk to disappear into the back.

Not a minute later, she returned.

“Mr. Lee is waiting to receive you.” That said, the clerk placed a key onto the counter between them and push it over towards Magda. “I trust you know how to use it? The elevators are over there,” she pointed.

“Thank you very much.”

“Of course. My pleasure.”

Magda didn’t call out the clerk’s obvious lie and headed towards the elevators which had been pointed out to her. They were smaller than the regular ones, and a plague indicated they were exclusively reserved for staff.

Magda stepped into one of them. Once the door closed behind her, she took the key she had just received and put it into the opening below the buttons panel.

And then turned it.

Soon later, Magda found herself standing in an expansive, otherwise inaccessible office.

“Miss Magda,” she was immediately greeted by a short man with a friendly voice. “Please, come and tell me what brought you here. For someone in your position… I can’t imagine it’s a pleasant occasion. Is it that Emporium?”

“I- Mr Lee. Thank you for receiving me,” the woman returned the greeting, offered her hand, and, after a gesture from her opposite, took a seat. Only then did she satisfy her curiosity.

“The Emporium? Why are you saying that?”

“Haha, am I wrong? Ever since it had appeared, things have become quite the hassle. We have more to do than ever, and the kind of requests and inquires we receive have also changed drastically. Everyone wants to know where to buy the elixirs that increase one’s stats. Or the foods with similar effects. Or they want to know how to combine different consumables together into one. That and all other kinds of similarly absurd requests. And the situation has only become worse with the appearance of that portal right outside our city.

I can only imagine how all of this must affect you.”

Magda took a moment to process that revelation. Then shook her head.

“No. You are exactly right. It-,” she hesitated. “It shames me to have to ask you. But I fear I must. I urgently require backup. A trained exploration group. Preferable more than one.” In the end, she admitted frankly.

Mr. Lee raised his eyebrows. Whatever he had expected, this had obviously not been it. So Magda quickly continued to explain herself,

“A new dungeon has formed on that mountain. You should have heard about it already? Now, because of its proximity, it obviously falls onto me and my people to organize and conduct the reconnaissance mission. It… it’s just that we are currently very much understaffed, and I fear my remaining people aren’t exactly up to the task.” Magda couldn’t hide the bitterness in her voice.

Hearing her explanation, Mr. Lee’s eyebrows raised even further.

“Of course I’ve already heard about it. How could I not? But I also heard it was quite the low level dungeon. Even a group of four newbies with only one or two skills in their repertoire had managed to conquer it successfully. My sources tell me it was quite the close call. And they also told me that dungeon was quite unique in some other aspects as well. But even then...”

The meaning in his words was clear, even without him having to finish his sentence. No matter how much the HQ had neglected Magda and her branch office, there was no way she couldn’t deal with something like that herself. Either that or the woman was utterly incompetent.

Seeing and hearing his reaction, Magda naturally felt she had to explain herself.

“It is not quite that simple. Have you seen the dive?”

“I have not,” Lee answered matter-of-factly.

“In that case, let me show you.” With that, Magda produced several crystals; a [Receiver] as well as a [Transmitter Crystal]. “I got my hands on a recording.”

“Please,” now Lee was intrigued.

***

“Well, I must admit. Even apart from its unique characteristics, that dungeon is quite something. That fake trap,” he shook his head almost in admiration, “quite devious. The stress it caused was probably more harmful than an actual trap would have been. Especially to an inexperienced bunch like them. And that boss? Quite the nasty move, I got to admit.

But still, you have to excuse me. I quite frankly don’t see how any of this explains your request. Despite all, nothing’s changed- it is still just a low level dungeon. You don’t mean to tell me that…” here Mr. Lee hesitated. He was looking for the right words to express his opinion on the matter without having to directly insult Magda and her staff.

Magda understood where he was coming from. “If it was just that, I wouldn’t have come to bother you. I assure you, my people could handle at least that much.

Last night, I already set out some men to map the dungeon.”

“Oh?” Lee’s curiosity was once again piqued.

In response, Magda took out a second set of crystals and wordlessly handed them over, her expression grave.

Lee still held his doubts but was too polite to deny her. Obviously, there was more to it.

And so, soon, a different recording started to play. This time, in much better quality; it wasn’t just a recording of a big screen with parts of an audience visible and audible like the last one, but clearly the original.

The contents were also different. Though it clearly showed the same dungeon, the group exploring it was a different one.

More professional, judging by their equipment and the manner in which they carried themselves. Also, the group’s number of members and their composition:

Five people, as opposed to the previous group of four. And the only one carrying a melee weapon.

Based on what he had just seen before, Lee had a good idea regarding the intentions behind this setup. He nodded in approval.

The skeleton’s only skill had been a deadly sweep of its sword; a group composition which tried to minimize the damage this attack could do was only prudent.

He could already imagine the group’s formation. The tank would bind the enemy to himself in the middle of the room. The other four would spread around them.

‘Very simple, very basic. But also very effective’ He couldn’t see how any of this could possibly go wrong. But given Magda’s grave expression, so became his.

The group proceeded slowly. Not because of caution, but because one of their members had to conscientiously map every stone in the tunnel. The mood was relaxed, jovial even, with friendly banter between the group members. Until they approached the eighty meter mark, as indicated by the fourth pair of torches on either side of the tunnel.

“Somewhere around here was that fake trap mechanism, right? Slow down a bit. I have to record where exactly. If you all keep going like this, it will take an eternity to figure out which one of you triggered it.”

“Chill. I’m confident it was right over here. Look.” With that, the man at the front confidently stepped onto a particular stone plate.

*click*

“Se-”

fwoosh fwoosh fwoosh fwoosh fwoosh fwoosh

Just like that, the careless man at the front had been skewered by numerous metal spears.

The panicked shouts began, the healing spells flew forward. But too late. The man had instantly been killed.

“What just happened?” Based on the angle of the recording and the lighting, it was difficult to see how everything had happened.

But Magda had watched this scene multiple times already. “A classic ceiling trap. Nothing special.” Besides the obvious grief, there was also a hint of anger in her voice. “Easily preventable. So unnecessary.”

“Then…?”

“Just keep watching,” her voice was shaking. But despite her words, the first thing she did was actually pause the video and fast-forwarded the recording a good forty minutes. She couldn’t handle sitting through the whole ordeal, the screams and the cries of the group. Not again.

And now this group, because of the lack of the usual exiting portal right at the beginning of each dungeon, had been forced to carry on and face the boss of this dungeon without a tank.

As the recording resumed, Magda turned her face.

Another eight minutes and a bloody struggle later, all but one member of the group lay dead on the ground.