As we were leaving the dungeon, the guards stopped us once again. This time we had to declare all we looted from the dungeon. They compared our hauls to the requests we had picked.

“Hmm?” One of them looks suspicious. “This wasn’t in a request, was it?” it was just some cuts from random monster I thought looked delicious. Almost like a miniature deer, but with horns growing all over its back, rather than on its head.

“Ah no, hunted that for me.” The guard sighs and pulls forth a dagger and starts carving a piece off.

“Hey, what’s the deal?” I ask.

“Oh, thought you knew. 20% of everything caught for personal use is taxed.” He said while finishing his job. A flat 20% tax? I try to calm down, but I find it obscene.

I had never understood people who hated taxes before. Didn’t they get that they paid for infrastructure and public services? But standing here, with something I did the work for, and they expect 20% for nothing… It was kind of an awful feeling that bubbled up in me. Then again, I never earned enough to be taxed much of anything in my old life.

When they are done, we turn it in to the Loffreq and they are surprised in the usual manner, that we completed many requests in no time with few people.

As we were walking back to the inn with our newly earned pekos.

“Was it really that great?” Kassa asked from underneath the hood. Her only experience with the dungeon was with the me and the villagers that were used to me, so of course she didn’t see it as anything out of the ordinary.

“For most people, going into the dungeons are not the leisure trips we take. Most average people will work in groups and only on the first few floors, otherwise they risk their life.” Kassa slowly nods along to my explanation.

When we returned, we had enough money to pay a couple of days ahead. Yasia was nowhere to be found, probably working in the back of the inn, so I spent some time with a slightly disgruntled Patir.

“If you had paid ahead only a single day, we could have gotten a bit of drink.” He complained. Suddenly I feel like he’s the kid.

“You can have your booze once we have a bigger surplus.” I lectured him. It felt great finally telling Patir off.

After dinner, I had asked Dixy to not say anything, so that I could leisurely sit and study magic in my room. It felt a bit lonesome practicing the patterns without the usual banter, but I don’t want people asking questions.

I was levitating off the bed in a sitting position with the book in front of me. Levitation was a fairly fickle magic. According to the book, it temporarily cuts off the tether that binds all to the earth, which I remotely understood as gravity. Problem is, the movement gained each minor bump or nudge doesn’t stop, or at least stops incredibly slowly, forcing me to constantly use small spells to maintain a reasonable position.

Getting to a perfect stop is frankly impossible, but I feel more and comfortable accelerating a little in one direction, then counteracting that movement with the opposite direct, freely moving in three dimension. I wonder how useful it will be though. If I receive an attack, I will also have to compensate for that change in momentum. It feels like a little bit of waste, but flight magic may not be that useful in combat.

Suddenly Yasia enters. She sees me and looks surprised for a moment, before moving to her bed and plopping down quite hard.

“Rough day?” I ask her.

Mmm-hmmm I hear a grunt from her face embedded in bed sheets.

“But if I want to do better, I have to do it.” She rises up and confidently says. Looking at her fills me half with pity, half with envy. When was the last time I trained to exhaustion and had a great rest?

When was the last time I worked so hard to achieve something? It didn’t sit well with me. I feel like ever since I lost my original goal of recreating sports in this world, I have become more and more lazy. I almost feel like conquering a dungeon for the hell of it, but it would probably take a long time and I can’t bear to stay away from the guys for that long.

The thought crosses my head, that I will have all the time in the world for dungeons, once they are all dead. It’s… unpleasant, knowing that this time we spend together is going to come to an end someday.

I sigh and glide over to the Yasia and pet her head from my sitting, levitating position.

“Good work today.” If the time we have is short, I don’t think I should waste it being angry with people. Her head rises and she almost looks like she is going to cry, then she jumps up and tackles me into a hug.

The force sends me backwards, and I barely manage to compensate before stopping in front of the wall.

I don’t know what brought on the heavy reaction, but I just kept petting her head, as she was hugging me. She started sniffling a little. After a little while, she separated and went to bed. After I confirmed she was fast asleep, I went out to spend the night with Dixy once again.

Big Mother tried to catch my attention once again, but I just ignored her, heading outside the city in the middle of the night.

The next day, Patir went with Kassa and I to the Loffreq. He didn’t plan on diving into the dungeon with us, but rather wanted to be the one to hire our supporters. I felt annoyed that he thought us unable to pick some decent ones ourselves, but I pushed the feeling away in accordance with my new mantra.

Supporters were pretty much all hanging out in one end of the reception hall. They seemed to be either old, injured or young. None of them looked like healthy, able-bodied adults. After Patir had picked out two young men, Kassa and I selected around double the requests of yesterday, much to their surprise and we went hunting yet again.