Monroe -
Chapter Seventy-six. The calm before the storm.
"Fuck!" Bob's eyes flew open as he half sat up in bed, a sudden and tremendous pressure on his bladder having yanked him out of his slumber.
He looked down to find his cat sitting primly next to him, happily kneading his stomach with paws the size of tea saucers. "Monroe," he grumbled as he attempted to nudge the forty-four-pound cat off. "Mreow," Monroe replied as he proceeded to hop off his human servant and wandered out of the bedroom, content that his human-servant would be providing breakfast shortly.
Bob hustled into the bathroom to perform his morning ablutions.
At the sound of the shower starting, Monroe came barrelling in and hopped up onto the sink where he could bat at the falling water.
"Good morning Buddy," Bob said with a yawn.
"We're going to go see Thidwell and then delve a little bit his morning," Bob informed Monroe, "then maybe we'll go for a hike on the other side of town, over by where we crossed over."
Monroe's emotions registered as content-curious-hungry.
"I'll take that as a vote of approval," Bob said as he stepped into the shower.
He groaned as the hot water streamed over him. There had been frost on his bedroom window, and there was nothing like a hot shower on a cold morning.
Bob's mind drifted, as it often did, to just how the hell he was going to save everyone on Earth.
He couldn't trust the government. He wouldn't be believed, but instead disappeared to a black site. He could probably portal out of there, but his ability to escape custody wasn't going to suddenly cause the government to believe him.
And while he could probably spread the message around the world on the net, he'd be 'debunked' and decried as a hoax.
He knew how to recruit people to come to Thayland and level up in preparation for Earth's integration into the System, but what he'd come up with would net him relatively small numbers.
All that was without considering the issue of dumping huge numbers of people into Holmstead's Dungeon.
And of course housing and feeding them.
Bob sighed and rinsed off.
He knew just enough about logistics to know that he didn't know enough.
Bob summoned a thick fluffy towel, toweled off, and dismissed it.
He would go eat in the tavern this morning, he decided. Feeding Monroe had become a much more involved affair when he'd reached his level cap.
~ ~ ~ ~
Bob was sitting at a table with Monroe, both of them working their way through their respective breakfasts when Thidwell sat down across from him, the chair groaning in protest and his knees bumping the tabletop.
"Good morning," Thidwell rumbled as Theo hurried to place a huge plate of scrambled eggs and bacon in front of him.
"Morning," Bob said.
Monroe ignored the overly large human-servant and continued to carefully eat his breakfast.
"You brought your pamphlets?" Thidwell asked with a grunt as he started to eat his eggs.
Bob nodded and reached into his satchel, pulling out thirty of his laboriously printed pamphlets and setting the stack next to Thidwell's plate.
Thidwell reached picked one up and flipped it open, reading while he ate.
Bob had finished his eggs and crunched through two slices of bacon before Thidwell set the pamphlet back down, and turned his full attention to his meal.
Bob and Monroe both finished their meals, at which point Bob waited with a tinge of nervousness, and Monroe flopped over into the center of the table.
Thidwell finished his eggs and started toying with a piece of bacon as he said, "Those will work," he nodded towards the pamphlets.
"I'm expecting the wave soon, likely either tomorrow or the day after," Thidwell rumbled, "and I'm hoping those freshers who followed your advice will bring folks around to being Adventurers rather than plodding through the laborer path."
"Kelli said as much," Bob replied.
"Austan said you're planning to ride out the wave on the twenty-seventh floor," Thidwell said.
"I am," Bob agreed, "hopefully I'll be able to find a couple of Summoning Affinity Crystals while I'm there."
Thidwell grunted his agreement before he said, "After the wave, I expect you'll be heading to Harbordeep to gather the Elemental Affinity Crystals?"
Bob nodded again, "I'll be looking to you in order to get there," he said.
"I'll take you there, or close enough, and give you the general layout of the Guild in Harbordeep and the levels of the Dungeon that you'll be delving," Thidwell said before he stood up, his knees coming dangerously close to knocking the table over.
"These pamphlets," he rumbled softly as he picked them up off the table, "they'll save a lot of lives in the end."
Thidwell delivered a huge, terrifying smile and said, "I don't care about your old world, you're a good man and you'll always be welcome in Holmstead."
Thidwell patted Bob's shoulder with one huge, shovel sized hand, then headed back towards his office.
Bob blew out a breath.
He always came away from a meeting with Thidwell feeling like he'd just run out across the interstate in front of a semi, and made it by with half an inch to spare.
Bob picked up Monroe carefully and slid him onto the Makres.
Gary had reinforced the Makres when he'd updated Bob's armor.
After Monroe's growth spurt, the magnets hadn't been holding him too firmly, and the stitching had been pulling apart.
Gary had taken notice and had done something, magically or otherwise, to increase the pull of the magnets, while reinforcing the stitching.
Monroe was once again securely draped across Bob's shoulders, although it was now front and rear paws as opposed to head and tail.
Bob reached up to scratch Monroe's ruff, which the big cat leaned into as he started to purr.
"Let's go clear out some Komoscorps buddy," Bob whispered as he headed out of the Adventurers Guild.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
Bob rolled the Summoning Affinity Crystal across his fingers.
He'd known that Thidwell wouldn't have lied to him about where they were found, but he'd experienced a visceral thrill when he'd seen it on the ground.
He'd killed another fourteen hundred and thirty-four Komoscorps this morning, spending another four hours on the twenty-seventh floor of the Dungeon.
He'd found the Affinity Crystal just a couple of hundred monsters into the day.
Bob had been tempted to stay down there and farm some more, but he reminded himself that he shouldn't stay that deep for too long.
He stored the crystal in his inventory.
The twenty-seventh floor of the Dungeon, while pretty, was terribly slow in terms of how quickly the Komoscorps appeared. When you took into consideration the summoned copies of the monsters, it became that much slower.
He was only killing one every ten seconds or so, which when compared with the more profitable floors like the tenth, was an awfully poor return on time invested.
The Affinity Crystals made up for it though.
He shook his head and stood up from his chair as the sun started to set.
He had his planters arranged in the sunroom and he could imagine that when they had herbs, spices, flowers, and vegetables growing in them, the house would smell amazing.
That would be an after Harbordeep thing though.
He wasn't sure how long it would take him to gather the Elemental Affinity Crystals that Thidwell needed.
He suspected it would take less than two weeks, but he wasn't sure if he shouldn't pick up a few extra sets.
Bob sighed.
He'd likely run right back to Holmstead.
He needed to focus on Summoning Affinity Crystals while Thidwell worked on Conjuration Affinity Crystals.
He needed sixty-seven Summoning Affinity Crystals to be able to show each Adventurers Guild the power of the Endless Swarm path.
Bob suspected that Thidwell would have the necessary Conjuration Affinity Crystals long before then, and likely have traded for the Abjuration Affinity Crystals as well.
He hoped that the Dimension Affinity Crystals wouldn't be as time-consuming, although he recalled Thidwell saying they appeared on the thirtieth floor, coalescing from teleporting beetles.
Bob walked into his room and snuggled down under his covers as his mind wandered.
Monroe hopped up onto the bed, and lay alongside his legs, clearly ready to take a nap after a hard day of being the most handsome kitty in the world.
Bob closed his eyes and let the rumble of his buddy's purr lull him to sleep.
~ ~ ~ ~
Monroe woke up a few hours later and stretched long and slow.
His human-servant was sleeping.
Monroe hopped off the bed and padded silently out to the kitchen, where a fountain of water splashed down into a bowl.
He batted at the water for a moment then lapped up a quick drink.
His human had finally recognized Monroe's needs and had brought him to this new home.
He padded out to the open-glass room and hopped up into a chair.
This was proof that he had chosen the right human. In the day this room was full of sunlight, and there was even a long ledge along the windows that he could lay on.
Monroe looked out the window towards the stream.
His servant hadn't yet realized that Monroe would like a stream in their home as well, but the fountain was a good start.
He watched the stream for several minutes, his tail swishing.
There were fish in there.
Monroe loved fish.
In their old home, his human servant had occasionally given him fish from a small round metal container.
And while his servant's recognition that Monroe was the apex predator and deserved nothing less than hot, fresh, steaming meat for his meals, there had been a tragic lack of fish.
Monroe flowed out of the chair and walked on silent paws to the kitchen, where he easily jumped up onto the counter.
He eyed the rafters overhead.
Monroe crouched, his hindquarters wiggling, then he leaped up to the beam overhead.
Monroe adjusted his perch and surveyed his domain.
He made two more quick hops and then moved closer to the eaves.
Monroe paused, then carefully situated himself along the wall where the roof edged over it.
This was the spot.
Below, the stove/furnace was releasing just a bit of extra heat, which wafted up, making this the coziest place in the house.
Monroe covered his eyes with his tail and settled down for a nice warm nap.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
Bailli sighed as she sank down into the bathtub.
She'd been putting in long days to make sure her Lightning Blast spell was as high a level as she could push it.
During the wave, she was going to be on the twentieth floor with House Crenshaw.
She'd never delved with them before, although Thidwell and Austan spoke highly of them.
Bailli could admit, to herself, that she was a little concerned that she wouldn't measure up.
They were Nobles and level twenty or higher at that.
She was nearly a freshly pathed Adventurer.
Bailli shook her head.
She was an Elemental Conjurer, with a Conjuration Affinity.
She absentmindedly started to scrub the day's dirt and sweat away.
Bob had shown her, had shown them, the way.
She smiled as she remembered Bob telling Kelli to tell her about the path while Monroe draped himself over Bob's head and purred in his ears.
'Purrmuffs' he'd called it.
Bailli turned the water back on and opened the drain.
She felt like a nice long soak.
She let out a sigh.
She missed Erick.
She was looking forward to introducing Erick to Bob.
Bob was a good man if more than a little awkward and clearly damaged. He could do with a few more friends, and she was certain that Erick would like him.
She took a drink of ale and stoppered the drain, letting the hot water fill the tub back up and chase away the cool air that pebbled her skin.
She was a higher level than Erick now, as he'd been expected to stay at level fifteen until he finished his novitiate at the Cathedral in Harbordeep, which would be over in just under two months.
Bailli hadn't yet told him about the new path or the Affinity Crystal, wanting to surprise him when he came back home.
She turned off the water and slid a little deeper until the water was up to her chin as she leaned her head back against the edge of the tub.
She couldn't help but wonder where she might find an Invocation Affinity Crystal.
Bob would be able to figure out a good path to make use of it, she was sure.
She daydreamed of surprising Erick with an Affinity Crystal and a new, amazing path as she slowly dozed off.
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