Chapter 127 – Tactical Espionage Action (1/2)

Dun dun DUN! Dun dun DUN!”

I suddenly raised my head from the form on my desk.

Ever since I got the paper mill set up, work had grown much smoother.

By printing templates for people to fill in, the accuracy and readability of the submitted forms had explosively improved to the point that I didn't have to put in much effort into correcting them anymore. The amount of work correcting and copying them onto new sheets had decreased to the point that I only had to do it a few times a day.

But by the same token, the ease in which to using our services having improved so much, an altogether unexpected problem ended up rearing its head, and that was the sheer quantity of requests that had started to come through our doors.

Almost anything which came from the dungeon people had learned to come to the Hunter's Guild to make the requests to get. It wasn't just the crafters and artisans, but many families wanting everyday goods had started to make requests when they wanted specific things that wasn't being traded at the markets.

It had gotten to the point where we had been forced to set up standing requests for commonly requested ingredients, to accept from any and all who brought it in at any time. Then we simply sold those in bulk from our warehouse to the traders who would then sell at one of the markets.

We denied sale of those common ingredients below our bulk numbers so as to not disrupt the markets and allow those systems to grow as naturally as they could considering the situation.

But the paperwork didn't end. It was relentless.

At least in comparison to what I was hoping when switching from bark to paper. Even setting up the printing press in a nearby building and hiring someone to operate it for me to set up a steady supply of printed request forms didn't lower my work load nearly as much as I was hoping. Though that was entirely because the number of requests were increasing.

Maybe if I was lucky, I could get more helpers under me in the near future, as fixing mistakes had grown less and less important lately.

”Barara~ rararaRa~ra~ rarara~rararara~ra~...”

The singing which had originally caused me to raise my head continued, and was distinctly closer than before.

While I couldn't see who it was singing the sons of liberty theme, [Sense Presence] had no trouble tracking the one who was doing it.

Starting from the partially open window, the singer was moving along the walls and close to the floor while approaching me. Whether she was actually making an attempt at sneaking or not, it was hard to say considering her kind.

”La~la~la~ bararaRa~ra~ Lalala~ bararala~la~ eeek!”

Right as she reached the climax of the song, I grabbed the figure who had reached my chair and was reaching a hand through he arm rest.

”Nooo! I was so close!”

”What do you think you're doing Orphne?”

I glared at the little fairy as she hung in front of my eyes while I pinched the back of her shirt.

”No, well, I came to visit you know!”

”Visit who, exactly?”

The fact that her eyes were glued firmly downwards rather than meeting my eyes did nothing but confirm my suspicions.

Somehow, the requests to touch my belly had only increased since my baby bump had grown pronounced.

On one hand, I could understand the desire. I kept catching myself gently stroking my belly whenever I had a hand free. Something about it was calming, and filled me with a warm feeling.

On the other hand, they were requesting it of another's body! Seriously, ever since I had gotten pregnant, the attention I had been getting for this one feature of mine was grown to preposterous levels.

(I'm not an exhibit, damnit!)

The fairies especially were bad. Maybe it was because they had such poor inhibitions in the first place, but it wasn't uncommon for some of them to suddenly show up out of nowhere and greet my baby before even acknowledging I even existed.

To be frank, it was actually a little cute, and was mostly tolerable. If they didn't also include a quick rub or hug along with it.

”You! Obviously!”

The little fairy's response came after a bit of deliberations. The fact that her arms were waving to my lower body hardly made her case any better. Though at least she was being honest.

But the fairies in generally tended to avoid lying, and were completely honest to their desires in the first place.

”Anyways, quit it.”

I tossed the little figure up into the air before grabbing the stack of papers in front of me.

”Noooo! I wanna touch the baby!”

”You touched her two days ago.”

”Two whole days! She must've grown bigger since then!”

”Of course she has, but not so much that you could tell.”

”You won't know if you don't try!”

”OF course I know. I check every day.”

”That's unfair! I wanna check every day!”

”It's my body. It's my right.”

”That's unfair!”

What was actually unfair was that she really thought that it was, and had no mind to separate from that line of thought.

The best I could do was to put up a block of air to push her away whenever she came too close. All the while I quickly scanned through the papers and confirmed that there wasn't any major problems with them before tossing the entire pile together with the other checked forms.

”Anyways, no is no. Try again in a week.”

”But that's forever!”

”It's not. It's only a week. Or do you want to make it two weeks?”

”Erk!”

It was a card I didn't like using, but against the fairies, hardly anything else worked. That or threatening to cut the desserts they got, but the more the economy of this country got on its feet, the less the threat worked as they had a steady supply of treats and desserts to enjoy.

”In return, I'll do another story time when I get back, alright?”

”Really?”

”Really. So gather up a group in two days, alright?”

”Okay! It's a promise!”

I waved away the little fairy as she dashed out of the room's sole window.

Sigh

Story time, along with the doll duels, had grown to be the few real weapons I had to placate the fairies lately.

Between the two, story time had actually come first, but it took a bit of time for them to latch on to it properly. The original stories I told were the old fairy tales from Earth, but it seemed like they weren't very receptive to such tales. The dark people's kids enjoyed them well enough, but while they were cute, the fairies were the ones I was most worried about as they were mostly out of control in the first place.

It was when I moved on to retelling stories from various shows, movies, and games, complete with singing their theme songs, that the fairies really took to them. Especially when it came to the music, they had grown to enjoy singing them as well wherever they thought was appropriate.

Though singing an epic style theme song while sneaking was hardly something which worked together, even if the place it had come from was a stealth oriented game.

Leaving my office, I made my way out, even though the sun was still continuing it's last stand, it was soon to falter.

”I'll be taking tomorrow off. Think you'll be all right without me?”

Before leaving, I made an announcement of my sudden vacation. I really needed some time away from people treating me as a mobile carrier for my ever expanding belly.

The fact that each of my subordinates glanced at my belly before acknowledging my words was proof enough.

With a light sigh, I left the building and headed towards the dungeon entrance as my feet made crunching noises as the thick late winter snow compressed under my feet.

I was again thankful of my high stats, as it seemed to prevent me from feeling particularly cold. At worst it only felt cool despite how thin my clothes were, but I couldn't help but worry a little if maybe Alicia felt cold and my actions weren't good for her.

Elli's words ran though my mind again, saying that as long as I personally didn't feel too hot or cold, my baby would feel the same being protected by my body's natural resistances. It was reassuring. Especially because everyone else I had asked said virtually the same thing.

But I repeated their words softly as if it was some sort of mantra as I arrived in the fountain room.

I floated through the air, magical wind pushing my back as fast as it could take me.

Despite the time I spent gathering the various things I might need on this trip, the sun still refused to relent its assault. Thus flying the proper way was hardly a choice at this time.

But this method was still pretty slow and mind numbingly boring, so I turned to my thoughts.

Two months ago, I had managed to meet up with Mint, and we wrote up a business deal regarding the paper. Solid prices for both the paper and the products I was trading for the paper as well. I had no interest in arguing over prices each time we met, or in general for that matter, so I simply went with his prices. They all looked reasonable, though if all the prices of my goods rather than just a few were deflated, I had no way of knowing. Even checking other places for the prices mattered little as it didn't take into consideration the differences of conditions of our own trade deals.

Mint seemed like there was something on his mind, but as he refused to elaborate on it I had little choice but to just leave the topic be.

In regards to the next shipment, as we had decided that the would come monthly, there was still a week before I had to come to make the trade, so there wasn't any point in visiting Edgeworth Village at this point.

The neighbouring Linsington City on the other hand, I still hadn't made my way over yet.

I was a bit curious how the kids at the orphanage was doing. Philia as well...

My cheeks grew a bit warm at that thought, but I quickly shook my head free of that. I had no time to deal with personal relationships. There was still a lot of work everyday at the Hunter's Guild, and my levelling had slowed in the dungeon ever since I decided to prioritize keeping Alicia safe.

My level had broken past the 300 mark though, but the further it rose, the more my levelling slowed down as I wasn't facing stronger monsters.

(Level 308. It's hardly a number I could consider safe.)

Maybe once I reached level 350, I could consider myself strong enough to be safe from future assassinations, though I wouldn't know until I actually faced more such threats.

In fact, it would be really nice if I could concentrate on just power levelling. Being someone who played games as I grew up, wandering around farming XP or other resources for hours on end was hardly something foreign to me.

In a particular game series, I've even taken on the same 20 minute monster fight over and over to get a 5% drop, only to end up realizing I needed more than one once I managed it. In the end, the worst of those incidents, I had ended up killing almost a hundred such monsters on my own to get three of those special drops.

Either way, mindlessly wiping out those lesser dragons every night had turned more into a habit than anything. At this point, killing them had turned into a great way to destress for myself. Something I really needed. The way that I was able to blank out my mind and practically enter some sort of zen state going through the same routine for hours on end.

I was quite thankful for the therapeutic effects those lesser dragons were giving me, not to mention how great being able to drink two or three dragons worth of blood every night.

My appetite had grown quite a bit in the last month, and in a sense, it was nice. Less of the dragons was being wasted due to that, and I was able to spend more time enjoying the rich flavour. My time on the 101st floor was quite decadent, I had to say. It was as if I ate nothing but cake all night, though I had no reason to doubt the nutritional value of dragon blood. So far, I couldn't feel any problems with my body aside from the occasional pain and nausea.

I had asked around, but it was only confirmed that what I was dealing with was quite normal during pregnancy. Even after being examined by some of the experienced midwives introduced to me by Elli and Frigg, they had concluded that there was no abnormalities, though my symptoms were noticeably on the worse side, it wasn't anything which should be harmful to my baby. Though they did stipulate that they didn't know anything about vampire bodies, so their assessments might not have been accurate.