Let's Pay Back What I Borrowed

The number of staff who can manage the dungeon has increased.

In other words, even if the dungeon gets bigger, we can run it without any problems.

For now, let's expand the dungeon toward the foothills, in the direction of Tsuia. The underground is free to use as we please.

Come to think of it, I've been expanding the dungeon's aboveground territory as well, but if I don't divide it into floors regularly, dealing with intruders becomes a huge hassle.

For the [Tsuia Mountain Tunnel], I didn't divide it into floors at first, so if even one person was inside, I couldn't do any renovations. I had to hurry and section it into several blocks.

Even the plaza in front of the dungeon entrance where the inn sits is properly sectioned off as its own floor to secure the dungeon's territory.

… Apparently, areas can count as separate floors even without being divided by stairs, so lately I've been wondering what a "floor" even means anymore.

By the way, it costs 5,000 DP to set up one floor.

Our income has gone up compared to before, but… it's still a pretty big expense. I wonder how many days' worth of income that is.

The adventurers who come here are E to C-Rank. Each person naturally generates around 30 to 80 DP per day. Parties are around two to five people, and we get about two or three parties coming in on rotation.

When they're holed up in the inn's rooms, DP income doubles, and there's the inn's revenue on top of that… the calculations get complicated. Should I keep a ledger? … That sounds like a pain. I'll just hope Menu-san adds a feature like that someday.

On top of that, every time Haku-san comes to stay, she drops DP through payments and tips for Rokuko, so in a sense, calculating might be pointless anyway. That woman really does show up out of nowhere and pay lavishly.

Cream soda is her favorite; she orders one the moment she arrives, another at dinner, and more after her bath and before bed. She pays a gold coin for each, and on top of that, she gives Rokuko a 5,000 DP tip every time Rokuko brings one over. That's how it goes. She spoils her little sister way too much.

Anyway, let's add more floors and move the boss room deeper in.

The Puzzle Area still hasn't been cleared yet, but once someone breaks through it, having only golems as the last line of defense is pretty nerve-wracking.

Let's say there's an adventurer who specializes in golems. Someone who would win against golems no questions asked.

If this person broke through the Puzzle Area, our dungeon [Cave of Desires] would be completely exposed.

… Golems only use physical attacks, after all. At the very least, I want something that can use magical attacks.

For that, I'd need to spend DP.

"Let's make some money."

"What's the matter, Kehma? Why so suddenly? We're getting plenty of money from the inn and the cave toll, aren't we?"

Come to think of it, I still haven't paid back the DP I borrowed from Rokuko for the Dungeon Battle against [Flame Cavern].

Actually, when I hurriedly added floors to deal with the problem of not being able to renovate the dungeon, I borrowed even more. I gave her gold coins as collateral, but Rokuko herself has no use for gold coins even if she has them…

"I want to pay back the DP I borrowed from Rokuko."

"You don't have to, you know. You and I are partners, two halves of the same whole."

"Precisely because you're my important partner, I need to keep these things clear. I don't want it getting muddled and causing problems."

"… If Kehma says so, then I guess we should keep things clear. Humph, can't be helped. You're my important partner, after all, so I wouldn't want things to get complicated either!"

Rokuko looks rather pleased, grinning from ear to ear. After being alone for so many years, having a partner like me must make her happy.

Then I opened the menu and checked our DP.

"Let's see, the DP I've lent you is 53,000 DP, right? The gold coins I'm holding as collateral are 53 coins… So how much DP does the dungeon have, not counting mine?"

"Since I summoned those three girls the other day… just over 9,000 remaining."

About the gold coins I handed over as collateral: if we just convert them directly, they become 53,000 DP, which would zero out the debt exactly. But the troublesome part is that producing 53 gold coins through DP would cost 530,000 DP.

Because of this exchange rate difference, it's best to handle DP with DP and currency with currency.

If I'm going to earn, it's better to earn DP since I need less of it.

"Well, converting the collateral would make it zero, so if you just keep running the inn, you could pay it back eventually, right? You're going to sell sugar too, aren't you?"

"… That's true, but it still bothers me. When I'm bothered, I can't sleep peacefully."

Now then, I do have an idea for making money. Remember the sugar beet field I made before?

Those sugar beets were finally harvested the other day. Now we're going to make sugar.

"Sugar is a luxury item… so it should become a ton of DP!"

"Oh, but you got those seeds with DP, right? … Will it be okay?"

"Even gold coins produced with DP can be turned back into DP, so theoretically it's fine… The question is how much DP it'll become."

First, I tried converting a beet as-is into DP… It became 5 DP.

"Ooh, it increased, it increased!"

One seed set (5 DP) produced 50 beets, so just like that it's a 50-fold return.

The question is whether refining it into sugar will increase its value.

…

Huh? How do I even turn this into sugar?

 

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After much trial and error, I somehow managed to make a brownish, clumpy sugar.

After I ruined two of them, Rokuko said, "Come to think of it, can't you get a recipe with DP?" and saved me… I was able to get one for 20 DP.

Who knew you had to cut it into small pieces, soak it in hot water, and then boil down the sugar-infused liquid.

"That was quite a lot of work."

"Yeah, thanks for helping out, Kinue-san."

Since it was cooking work, I had the silky Kinue-san help out. She really was incredibly deft about it. If Kinue-san hadn't helped, I probably would've burned it a few times.

"Hey, Kehma. Why do you add '-san' to Kinue?"

"… No particular reason? I mean, she's basically become like the dorm mother for the employee dormitory."

Her easygoing demeanor and love for cleaning just radiate that married-woman energy.

When I gave her a bamboo broom, she started sweeping outside on her own initiative.

"Now then, the sugar is… brown, but how do you make it white?"

Unfortunately, the recipe only covered how to make sugar up to this point.

For now, I converted one beet's worth of sugar into DP.

…10 DP, huh. It doubled.

"That covers the cost of the recipe too. I'll leave the rest to the golems… Kinue-san, please give the golems their instructions."

"Understood, Master."

Now then, with this, 47 sugar beets become 470 DP.

So from now on, 5 DP turns into 500 DP… Yeah, that's not bad, right? If I sell it to a merchant, converting through money might make it even more efficient.

If I do this 100 times, that's 50,000 DP… Should I expand the field? No, couldn't I make a field inside the dungeon?

Kukuku, the agricultural king of dungeons… not bad. Though it does sound like it would become a rather pastoral and peaceful dungeon.

"But how many days did that harvest take to grow? You say 500 DP, but locking a human party in the magic sword test room for one day would be way faster, wouldn't it?"

… Come to think of it, that noble and his entourage party who've been locked in since yesterday generate 500 DP per day just from that.

Since I'm using a prison door in conjunction to keep them locked in, the prison effect (x3) multiplied by the confinement effect (x2) means we're getting six times the income compared to just leaving them be.

"Wouldn't it be better to think of another method?"

"No, well, yeah, you're right…"

Damn, I thought it was a perfect strategy…

 

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So I changed direction and decided to make a figurine with a golem and sell it to Ittetsu again.

It sold.

When I summoned Ittetsu and said, "I got my hands on a dragon figurine from Tsuia Mountain. How about giving it to Redra as a present?" and showed him the gold-plated dragon golem figurine, he said, "Heeh, that's nice. Redra'd love it," and bought it at my asking price.

Even though I asked for 100,000 DP, he just said, "Well, that's about right, ain't it? Hahaha," laughed heartily, and paid the full amount on the spot.

100,000 DP. Considering that a sweet bread assortment costs 5 DP, in Japanese yen that's about 10 million yen.

He paid that way too easily. Just how much income does he have?

And so I obtained 100,000 DP and paid off my debt. It was so anticlimactic that I was caught off guard.

… What was all my worrying for!

"But didn't it take you three days to make that gold-plated figurine? So that's about what you'd expect, isn't it?"

"No, but, three days for this kind of income… meanwhile agriculture takes daily effort just to squeeze out 500 DP…"

"You're just not cut out for agriculture."

That's right, I'm a Dungeon Master after all. Agriculture is just a bonus.

But we can still get fresh vegetables out of it, so I'll have the golems keep working the fields. As for the sugar beets, selling the sugar to merchants should work fine.

… I-it's not like I'm attached or anything! Even a side job adds up over time, okay?!