Ace facepalms, “Well that explains why he is getting away with so much stuff.”

The shortest lady in the group tilts her head to the side, “What does those paths have to do with that?”

Ace sighs, “If he is getting paths related to using his dad’s power then he probably has a few skills and abilities related to making people believe him. In your town, there are probably people with authority who aren’t exactly all that powerful. Even with how weak he is, those abilities and skills still let him control them.”

The first woman to talk rolls her eyes, “And how are we even supposed to trust you if he’s been messing with our heads?”

Ace shrugs, “Well, the fact that you can notice that he messed with your head is a good sign. I might not have skills devoted to that kind of thing but I do have enough authority that his fake power doesn’t work around me. I’m not saying you should just believe me right off the bat. Rather, he is in the dungeon right now so you don’t have much to do. Instead of trying to figure it all out, I’ll have someone show you around. Even if he wants to dive all the way to the lowest floor, it won’t take him all day to do that so we should know what is up by the time the boat returns. At that point you can decide what to do.”

Ace turns to Jeremy, “You can hand them off to your wife. I’m sure she can show them around and help them figure things out.”

Jeremy nods and leads the four towards the gardening area. This leaves Ace alone at the tunnel to the dungeon. He stands there for a few more moments in case the guy chickens out early before returning to managing the settlement. The only thing left on his mind is that it would be nice if those ladies stayed because the settlement sorely needed someone with a cooking skill. Quite the odd gap in skills to have, but there you are. Closest is the Barrai’s and their alchemy but that doesn’t really work all that well.

As Ace worries about what skills the settlement needs, Doyle is watching one of the more incompetent delves he has seen in a while. To start with, he had already doubted their ability to go too far as the group was made entirely of melee fighters. This was working alright against the goats mind you, Doyle just doubted its ability to get them through the dungeon in the long run.

Besides that, though, the six of them lacked stamina. After the very first encounter with four goats, they all ended up sitting on the floor, winded from the fight. Sure, they used some flashy skills but Doyle can tell by how much energy dissipated into the air it was mostly smoke and mirrors to look cool. Underneath it all, the skill probably started as a simple heavy bash or some such. Now though, they are wasting all their energy on creating a light show.

Next up was the vine room, and this is where they lose their first party member. They fight the goats fine but completely miss the stealthy kobolds with daggers. As the group ends up huffing and puffing on the ground again, the two kobolds sneak up behind the guy farthest out from the others and do a quick one two stab. Both their daggers went into the sides of the guy’s neck, resulting in a quick kill.

The rest of the group is able to kill them after this but not before they suffer a few shallow cuts. And of course since they are down a guy and only have melee fighters the next couple rooms are terrible for them. Outnumbered by the goats, the group can’t help but take some damage in both the six goat rooms. Then in the nine goat room one of the goats manages a good hit, crippling the arm of one of the dudes. Easy enough to fix with some healing magic, if only they had some.

The idiot in charge however laughs it off. He had heard the report on the first floor and was confident in at least dealing with the last room. Plus, the other guy was the weakest in the group. After all, he insisted on working on his skills more than the others instead of pumping up his levels. Nevermind the fact he was the one who was doing the best against the goats.

Anyway, the kobold camp has little suspense for Doyle. While at first the party seems to do alright as they fight the four melee kobolds. But without a magic user of their own to counter the healer and one of them with a crippled arm it doesn’t go well. The kobolds just outlasts their pitiful stamina while chipping away at them. In the end, the idiot tries to run away. Normally this would have worked except for one little kink in his plan. Doyle didn’t like them.

Back right before they tried to first enter the dungeon he had set it so that once they started a fight, the monsters could chase them if the party retreated. Just as a onetime thing and now it shines through. The idiot manages to haphazardly run a few rooms before collapsing from exhaustion. Without Doyle’s change this would have been enough as while they can move around a little, the monsters are mostly assigned to their rooms. The idiot doesn’t get this courtesy and soon finds himself with a mace through the forehead.

With them dead, Doyle goes and checks if he has enough to start on the next floor. And the answer to that is a resounding no. While whenever the founders did a delve he would gain a good 600 or so towards the goal the idiot and company barely hit 400 despite them dying. Doyle can only shake his core in derision. Though it does firm up his decision on being a fair dungeon. While quantity can have a quality all of its own, there aren’t exactly enough people around to get to that point.

While Doyle thinks about bloody matters, back outside the dungeon, not much time has passed. Susan has just finished up showing the four ladies around the settlement and it isn’t like that takes much time. At the moment the only impressive thing is the two walls. Besides that, the space in between the walls is mostly filled with partly assembled buildings and a few completed houses.

Susan didn’t waste the time though and had found out a few things about these ladies. Of course, the first thing was an exchange of names. Amusing all around as one happened to share her first name, Susan. Though her last name was Smithson so there wouldn’t be too much confusion and it was inevitable that eventually people would end up with the same or similar names.

Besides her, there was also Jessica Lewis, Pam Stern, and Courtney Williams. Upon hearing Courtney’s name, Susan promptly questioned her, as the settlement had someone else with the last name, Williams. Though in the end she was unrelated to Nancy Williams as far she could tell.

As Susan guided them around, she was able to ferret out what each of them was good at. Ms. Smithson had picked up sewing to keep the idiots’ pre-system suits in top condition. Jessica had been a high class chef even before the system and so doubled down on that. Pam had been a maid since she was a child and could clean and shine just about anything. While Courtney had picked up a bunch of skills related to chauffeuring and could probably drive any vehicle.

While some of their skills aren’t instantly useful, Susan can definitely see a future for them at the settlement if they wanted to stay. Courtney alone would be important once they get a boat of their own to see what the next town over was like. Though top of the list to pull over was Jessica and her ability to cook.

And the longer the four are away from the idiot, especially after he died in the dungeon, the less hold he has on them and the more they consider staying. Though this does bring up how they would be included in the settlement. After all, they aren’t one of the core members nor even one of the original group. Susan isn’t quite able to answer these questions so brings them back to Ace so they can find out.

When they arrive, Ace is in the middle of calculating how much money they have. With people from the town upriver starting to send people, the need to turn the settlement into an actual town grows. Not long ago they had barely a quarter of the needed funds. Now though they blew through the halfway mark and it seems the amount of money will only be going up.

Since people started clearing the second floor a lot more coppers had been coming in and with the instances Ace is considering having two four or five man parties in the dungeon at all times. Of course this would contradict his most recent changes to the rules but if you can’t change with what is happening things won’t go well for you. Though just before he can decide on how to announce the change, he sees Susan and the ladies approaching what passes for his office.

Standing up Ace nods, “So, how did you like the settlement?”

Jessica shrugs, “Compared to the town we came from it is a little quaint. Though the walls are oddly comforting. Oh, by the way, my name is Jessica, that is Pam, she is Courtney, and last but not least Susan Smithson.”

Pam nods, “Sorry about not introducing ourselves before. It was frowned upon. Anyway, I agree with Jessica on this. Though going by what you have planned, I think things will be quite nice once everything is built. I do have to ask though, why start on building everything instead of focusing on one building at a time?”

Ace sighs through his teeth, “Well. Yeah, we probably should have. It is just that we started by laying out how we wanted things in the inner circle built and sort of never stopped working on it all. With some magic we should be able to have decent wood and stone buildings up in no time, though. I expect us to be done with everything within a couple weeks and most of that will come from finishing touches. The actual buildings will be fully enclosed within the week as long as there are enough rocks in the area to use.”

Jessica nods, “Fair enough. I guess you don’t feel the need to rush when you already have enough space to sleep. Though I do have to ask, you’ve set aside way more space than your small group needs. Are you expecting migrants? Because the four of us aren’t exactly going to fill up all that extra area.”

Ace shakes his head, “Most of the buildings you see will be empty or have temporary uses. The area between the walls is meant for those of us here that I trust completely. For the moment, if you decide to join us, you will get a place inside the walls but that wouldn’t be permanent. We plan to raise up another wall much further out and to set aside the area in between that new wall and the current outer wall for people to move into.”

Courtney frowns, “So you would eventually be kicking us out of this inner area?”

Ace nods, “Eventually. I see this inner space eventually becoming more of a management district sort of area. With a dungeon we are going to have way too many people coming through to keep track of unless we put a lot of manpower into it. Also, we wouldn’t just abandon you. Since if you stay there will be time to build up trust once we do move you out we will build you proper houses near the inner wall.”