Ep. 36

I faced the Udaeus and raised my cane. The monster slammed the ground, releasing a wave of spikes against me. I jumped on top of the spikes and acted like nothing happened. The Udaeus roared and slammed its arm against me. I tried blocking it with the cane, but it started creaking and actually got some cracks here and there. Damn, I even liked this thing… I made the damage on the cane fictional and stored it, switching to my Gae Bolg.

The monster summoned its sword and raised it above its head. What a shitty move. I dashed towards the thing and started stabbing my spear through its legs' joints, pulverizing them. It lost its balance and tilted to the side, before using the sword as a crutch to keep its balance. I circled around to the other side and took out the remaining legs.

After having effectively taken away the Udeaus' mobility, I ran along its spine, up until the shoulders, then stabbed my spear through its right shoulder, while I threw it at the left one. I then placed my hand in its eye socket and used Demon Boar's Gluttony. After a few seconds, the monster disintegrated into particles, leaving only its sword behind as a drop item.

Unfortunately, the fight was boring since the enemy was weak. It also seems that I can't use the cane in the Dungeon, otherwise it will break. I guess that I will keep it for easier worlds and style points when needed. What a fucking drag… I checked the time and barely three hours passed. It's almost lunch time, so I left a magical 'beacon' on the 39th Floor, then apparated back to the inn. I had lunch with the waifus and Ereshkigal, who was smiling like an idiot. Oh, such a pure Goddess… It makes me want to pat her head, so I will. It's like having a pet!

I decided to stop dungeon diving for the day and instead took a look at my interface. I got an Aquatic Physiology and Weapon Summoning. After a small test (aka me eating a damned knife), it turns out that I can summon a strengthened version of any weapon I consume. I immediately devoured my cane and Gae Bolg, along with Excalibur, Rhongomyniad, Honjo Masamune, and Tauropolos. I now have a cane-sword, a spear, a sword, a lance, a katana, and a bow. Perfect, I'd say. They were also all black with red accents, so they match with my wand!

In the afternoon, I checked on the automata that was dealing with the bookstore. Everything was fine, no attacks, no theft attempts, no blackmail attempts… I was also informed that Umbitch was 'mysteriously' found dead in the Thames, while Fudge gave his resignation. A new government will soon be elected, hopefully it will be a good one.

I decided to finally check on Hephaestus' shops, so I got my new and upgraded cane and went for a stroll. Listening in on the conversations around me, it seems that someone saw me snacking on the Goliath on the 17th Floor and I gained the unofficial nickname 'Vampire King'. Well, they have no idea that it is actually correct.

A few minutes after leaving the Familia's HQ, I found myself in front of the main Hephaestus Familia shop. I could see several different weapons and armors, but none got my attention. I entered the building and was assaulted by a subtle smell of metal, sweat, and hard work. Want to know what the last one smells? Of even more sweat and tears. I was approached by a Familia member.

"Good afternoon, how can the Hephaestus Familia help you?"

"I'm looking around. Mainly daggers, spears, or maybe anything 'strange' you might have. Money isn't a problem, just make sure that they are First-class weapons."

The guy had a glint in his eyes and started showing me around. I saw many weapons, but none were even remotely near a First-class weapon like Ais' Desperate.

"Yes, these are all very nice toys. Now show me the First-class stuff."

"What do you mean, dear customer? These are the First-class weapons."

I put a hand on his shoulder and put a little bit of pressure on him. "Look, I don't like getting scammed, getting confused with an idiot, or wasting time. You either get me to the good stuff, or your Familia will have one less store and surely one less member. You feel me?"

"Yessir!" Fear always works wonders. The guy went into the storage area and came back a few minutes later with a bunch of fine weapons in hand. Let's see… A stiletto dagger with a triangular, vortex-shaped blade. Quite interesting, a couple of enchantments for durability and sharpness, plus cognition impairment and Durandal attribute.

"I like this. Keep it aside, will ya?" I then examined a sword the guy brought. This one was quite normal, so I stopped caring about it after a few seconds. I saw a couple of spears, but they were only a decoration compared to Gae Bolg, so those were also set aside. Then, I looked at an interesting gauntlet. It had enormous blades on each finger, so long and sharp that making a fist would be impossible. The sharpness was top notch and it even had some sort of extension enchantment that basically fires off the blades like a grappling hook. "I will also take this. Does your Familia deal in jewelry as well?"

"Yes, we do. What exactly are you looking for?"

"Rings, earrings, maybe a necklace." The guy brought me around to see many different types of jewelry, but I ended up choosing a nice ring with a flower-shaped gem for Mother and a green ring completely made out of gemstone with an intricate engraving for Risa. I hope that they will like these. Spoiler alert, they did, a lot, and I was rewarded. What a great thing, the law of equivalent exchange!

Well, anyway… A few days soon passed. I am now Level 17 and gained the Librarian, Researcher, Magic Warrior, Wizard, Sage, Ninja, and Mana Battery Development Abilities. I wonder if they'll ever run out. Now, why did I skip ahead a few days? Well, that would be because of a certain annoying guest in my bookstore.

Basically, the bookstore got popular in a matter of hours since it had books on a different type of magic, much more 'liberal' than the one previously seen in DanMachi, so many different mages came to check it out. I had actually set up a sort of book café where the wizards from the Potterverse could exchange their ideas on magic with those from DanMachi. Well, the food was prepared by another automata I created, so it wasn't that much extra work.

Oh, if you are wondering how and why that is possible… Well, by linking my bookstore to DanMachi, I equalized the time flow, so it's a 1:1 ratio, more or less. Well, the actual time differs, but the rate at which time passes is roughly the same.

At that point, some 'cultural exchanges' started occurring between the Potterverse's wizards and DanMachi's mages. I even put up two clocks with the 'Orario Standard Time (OST)' and 'Diagon Alley Standard Time (DAST)'. And this obviously attracted the magic-oriented Familias aka the Hecate Familia. The annoying guest I was talking about is Hecate herself, who barged in quite rudely and started demanding to speak to the manager like a fucking Karen. The thing is: she's speaking to an automata, not a human. I am their God, not some random woman.

"I want to speak to the owner." she was promptly ignored. "I said I want to speak to the owner!" Ignored again.

"Did you not hear me?! I want to speak to the owner here!"

"Shut it, woman!" said a wizard from the side. The wizards didn't even care that the 'new guys' sometimes used strange words, they just wanted to exchange their views on magic.

I burst out laughing from upstairs and decided to meet Hecate.

"I agree with the customer, Hecate. You can't shout in a bookstore, you should know better." I was basically admonishing a child, but it worked and caused a wave of embarrassment to emanate from her. "Anyway, I would be the owner. What can I do for you, dear customer?"

"Oh, it's you!"

"Lower your voice." I put a little bit of charming magic in my voice. Her Godly aura didn't even hold a second before allowing my compulsion to affect her.

"Yes… I wanted to know what this place is..."

"It's my wives' bookstore, as well as the Ereshkigal Familia's HQ."

"These books… I've never seen this kind of magic."

"Trade secret. How about you buy them and start coming here for the 'cultural exchange' part of the experience?" Another hint of compulsion did the job. Like so, I got myself a Godly customer. Hecate started coming every single day to actually ask questions and buy more books. She was a pain in the ass since her Magic Divinity didn't actually help her understand a different world's magic. I laughed my ass off when her eyes started spinning during my first explanation session. I wonder how it would work for me… A Divinity I mean. Theoretically, if I gain my Divinity here, it shouldn't work as well in other realities, but I am a dimension-crossing, Vampire troll. Did I just become Zelretch? Hell yeah!

Anyway, the Ereshkigal Familia had a boom in popularity and was basically known as the new strongest familia. I mean, the Freya Familia was basically carried by Ottar, so once I wiped the floor with him, they were immediately out of the picture. Other than that, I just explored the Dungeon. I found a couple of uncharted areas when comparing the Guild's maps with mine, so I made them public. Except for a hot spring that I turned into my private relaxation spot.

Ereshkigal was as happy as ever and really enjoyed talking with Mother and Risa, so who am I to take that away from her? She also couldn't wait to brag about her Children's greatness during the Denatus. I have given her a bracelet similar to the one Skeeter had, so I am not worried about any sort of assassination attempt or retaliation from the other Gods.

The Loki Familia ended up organizing an expedition in two weeks, so I will join them. I will try to reach the 60's or 70's in terms of floors, just to get to unexplored territory. It will be so fun! But my waifus still didn't want to go into the Dungeon, so I will be going alone. Well, I guess that it is time for me to cash in some drops that I collected throughout the past few days. Now that I think of it, I've already spent almost two weeks here.

I strolled towards the Guild and bought myself a nice skewer as a snack. A little bit of condiment, courtesy of Subjective Reality, and it's really good. I found that Rose's booth was empty, so I had to check in with someone else. Mm, what a shame. Eina Tulle had the shortest line, so I went there.

Soon enough, my turn came. What? Did you think that I would skip the line or something? I'm a civilized man, for fuck's sake!

"Good morning, Ms. Eina. Is Rose taking a break?"

"Oh, Mr. Maleficarum. Yes, Rose has finished her shift for now. She'll be back in the afternoon."

"I see. I have a few drop items that I would like to cash in. Where should I put them?"

"Here on the desk will be perfectly fine." They surely won't fit, but she's the one who said so. I started dumping Obsidian Soldier's Body Stones, Barbarian Furs, Amphisbaena's Dragon Livers, Iguazu Wings, Metal Rabbit Furs, Goliath Teeth, Blue Papilio Wings, and a metric fuck-ton of Jack Bird's Golden Eggs. Dulcis in fundo (Pseudo-Latin expression), I took out the Udaeus Black Sword. The desk actually broke under the weight of my drops.

"Here we go, please appraise these things." She froze. I waved my hand in front of her face but got no response. I turned to an Adventurer that was close by and asked: "Did I break her or something?" He nodded absentmindedly while murmuring something about how life was unfair. What a scrub, git gud.

"Wha- Eh? Uh… Sure…" said Eina while staring at the drops. What? I only collected the good stuff and left the rest for the other Adventurers, otherwise I would have enough to fill the entire floor!

I caught Rose's ears in the corner of my eyes, so I apparated behind her and whispered: "How are you doing, Rosey?"

Jumpscare ensued, cute squeal ensued, punch in the gut ensued. Why does it always end up with me getting assaulted.

"You! Where were you for the past week?!"

"Setting up a business, finding an HQ for my Familia, renovating said HQ, and exploring the Dungeon. Didn't you see the new maps going around? Those are mine."

"Then why didn't you come and report! I am your Advisor! I should know what kind of stuff you're doing! And what's with all these drops! Is that a damned Udaeus drop?!" she said, looking over to the pile of drops.

"Yeah, why?"

"Why?! It's on the 37th Floor! You registered not even a month ago!"

"Rose, I've been wondering since you started shouting at me, but do you not pay attention to rumors and gossip?"

"No, why would I?" Oh, she calmed down.

"Well, you should ask some people about me. You'll sleep better after that. Well, I should probably go. Eina should have finished appraising the drops." I apparated back at the booth and found Eina using some sort of gimmick to calculate how much the stuff was worth. Her eyes were fucking spinning, I shit you not.

After almost an hour, I exited the Guild after almost bankrupting them. What a nice feeling!