A Bit of Remodeling

I decided to leave the mysterious sisters Setsuna and Nayuta alone until their so-called instructions arrived.

I did consider gathering information from Haku-san and Ittetsu, but unlike with Rin, this isn't particularly urgent. Better to gather information myself than owe them a favor. Setting aside the conditions for someone's DP income being zero, there's a higher chance this "Toy" thing has nothing to do with dungeons anyway.

So I decided to do some work on the dungeon for the first time in a while.

Let's review the current state of the dungeon.

Starting from the entrance: the entrance area, the labyrinth area, the now-empty former Puzzle Area, then down a spiral staircase to the Warehouse Area. From the Warehouse Area, it branches into three paths.

The new Puzzle Area leading to the arena and boss room, a dead-end meadow area for camping, and Feni's miniature garden area leading toward the [Flame Cavern] that Rokuko made.

By the way, there's a hidden ceiling above the boss room leading to the Core Room. Nerune's laboratory is there too, but that's a different story.

Now then, for this renovation, I'll be making two things.

First is the warehouse.

I'd been using the Warehouse Area as a storage space as well, but with adventurers entering the Warehouse Area going forward, that's not ideal. So this time, I'm going to make a proper warehouse somewhere no one will come. "Warehouse Area (Real)." This warehouse will be completely isolated from the outside, just like the thug human ranch I left to Rei… Honestly, we don't even need that facility anymore. The village has grown and that income is much bigger now. Besides, with the other facility I'm about to make, it'll become even more unnecessary.

So onto the second thing. I'll be remodeling the old Puzzle Area.

The old Puzzle Area that had been left as-is since Rin destroyed it.

Right now there's nobody there, so it's a good chance to renovate. I'm thinking of installing the gimmick I came up with before.

However, I'm not building an obstruction. I'll be making a small room branching off to the side under the pretense of a discovered hidden passage. The room can't be too big since this area happens to be right at the edge of [Flame Cavern]. So then, what is this small room?

It's a DP collection room.

DP collection doesn't mean killing people. It's basically just a "jail." I set up several cells about the size of toilet stalls that can fit one or two people. By confining people in them, the confinement effect times the jail effect results in six times the normal daily DP.

So what will this jail be used for? Adventurers will voluntarily enter it.

Obviously no one would just walk into such a suspicious small room for free. So I'll pay them.

I'll return a portion of their DP income as items, including money. Just a small portion, though.

Someone normally worth 50 DP per day would be worth 300 DP in the jail. Even if I give back about 100 DP worth as a silver coin, I'd still profit handsomely. Well, that's 10,000 yen for a day of doing nothing. But since they're literally just sitting there, maybe fifty copper coins would be enough? Then again, I could be generous at first as a grand opening event.

With the renovations done, I brought Niku along for a trial run.

Even if I report it to the guild, it wouldn't be a false report if I've actually used it, so I need to use it myself at least once.

If people don't know how to use it, no one will use it. The tragedy with Uzoh and Muzoh at the magic sword test room was enough. Besides, this time it's even harder to figure out than the test room was. I need to report it.

I broke through the wall of the hidden room, opening a path to the DP collection room.

Rooms were lined up there like toilet stalls. They were all jail cells, but I disguised them with ordinary doors to protect privacy.

Occupied cells would display a red mark on their doors, but of course all rooms were vacant right now. Just like a toilet.

"Well, let's go in."

"Yes."

I entered a small room with Niku. Inside were just two hourglass-type timers placed side by side and a door that would lock through that mechanism. There was also a red emergency escape button as a considerate design feature.

Behind the scenes, once money or items are set, they'll drop into the payment slot only when the timer runs out naturally.

As for payment, there's no such thing as a daily DP sensor, so Rei and the others will have to manually handle it behind the scenes. That said, since I've set it so nothing is paid out unless they stay for twelve hours or more, they only need to check once every half day. The payment calculation is simple enough to handle between reception duties using the calculator golem. Payouts are basically money, with occasional items.

We have more than enough money from running the inn anyway. We're depositing it in the guild, but honestly we don't use much of it.

I flipped both hourglass timers upside down. The hourglasses were small, but there was a golem mechanism at the neck that made the sand take twelve hours to fall through. Only one hourglass lets sand fall at a time, so that makes twenty-four hours total. To extend your stay, you just flip the finished hourglass again.

I tried to make it as simple as possible since adventurers probably wouldn't remember if it was too complicated.

This time, as a test, I plan to leisurely spend twenty-four hours here.

I laid out a futon inside the private room. I'd designed it to just barely fit. Then I lay down with Niku as my hug pillow as usual.

If I get hungry, I'll eat some of the food in my [Storage]. Zzz…

 

＊ ＊ ＊

 

Crap, there's no toilet… This is a critical flaw.

Even I was woken up by Niku for this.

This time I had Rokuko collect it and managed to get by, but humans can't hold it for twenty-four hours…

Should I put a pot with a jelly in it for waste disposal? A pot-squatter instead of a bottle-pisser? Ah, wait. Jellies are monsters, so I can't place them in safe zones. What do I do about the toilet?

… Should I remove the safe zone? Can't exactly skip the toilet.

Taking toilet breaks along the way, we somehow got through the twenty-four hours. The moment the door unlocked, three silver coins clinked down into the payout slot under the hourglasses.

Looks like the mechanism is working properly… By the way, this time my portion wasn't factored in. My DP income is zero after all.

Let's call it done for now and get an adventurer's opinion.

"So I made this kind of facility. What do you think, Ichika-sensei?"

"Why sensei… Well whatever. First off, the earnings are bad. I think most people'd rather just earn money normally than go in there."

An immediate rejection.

Now that she mentions it, if you have the ability to clear the labyrinth area, you'd earn more hunting Iron Golems.

"It's only pocket change, and being locked up in a tiny room is lowkey rough. Doing nothing alone for twelve hours is just…"

"… You could just sleep though?"

"Only Goshujin-sama can sleep that much. Twelve hours is way too long. And ya best not remove the safe zone either. Otherwise ya can't rest easy inside a dungeon."

… Now that she mentions it, it's fine for me since it's basically my own home, but for anyone else it means spending twelve hours in a dungeon not knowing when something might happen. Without a safe zone, they couldn't relax.

"I'm stuck on the toilet part though."

"For a toilet, just go in a pot and use [Purify] on it."

"Huh, that works? [Purify] sure is convenient."

The [Purify] almighty theory. So toilets can be handled with [Purify] too…

"Well, I said the earnings are bad, but if there's a jackpot that pops out sometimes, that'd be a different story. Goshujin-sama, ya have that thing, right? The one ya used on the Uzoh Muzoh brothers the other day."

"I see, I should use Golem Blades as bait."

"That's right! Might be able to get a magic sword just by resting for twelve hours. Now that sounds like a pretty good deal. And magic swords trade for gold coins, yeah?"

"Kukuku, Ichika. You too are quite the villain, aren't you?"

"Not as much as Goshujin-sama."

Ichika and I shared an evil chuckle together.

Distributing too many magic swords would be a problem since it'd drop their value, but demand is still high enough that this level shouldn't be an issue.

Moreover, Golem Blades are close to ordinary swords and are basically consumables. They recover somewhat if you pour magical power into the magic stone core, but they'll eventually break, so having a second or third isn't a bad thing. I hear plenty of other magic swords work the same way, so this shouldn't be a problem.

So I went to report the new facility to the guild.

That you get locked up when you flip the hourglasses, but can get out immediately if you press the red button.

That you obtain silver coins by waiting until the sand finishes falling.

That each hourglass takes twelve hours, for a total of twenty-four hours with both.

That information earned me ten silver coins.

The next day, an investigation quest was issued from the guild. Several adventurers headed to the DP collection room with various items to pass the time.

After a several-day investigation, the consensus was that it was "a place where you get money or items if you wait twelve or twenty-four hours." It seems one of them was even lucky enough to get a magic sword. That guy apparently stocked up on food and immediately went in for a second round.

The result of his second time? Twenty copper coins.

And so, these small rooms came to be called the [Avarice Lodge]. It got that name because quite a lot of people ended up sleeping through the twelve hours of confinement.

Since there was a chance to get a magic sword without facing any danger, a decent number of people went in, and it became a facility that generated a decent amount of DP.