Chapter 410: Setting up Shop

Chapter 410: Setting up Shop

Long after the rest of the family had gone to bed, Ozzy sat in the guest room, sipping on a bottle of Vassily's brandy. It was good stuff, and he was finally starting to feel the alcohol hit him. Regular beer or wine, and even something harder like brandy, had little chance of making him drunk unless he drank a huge amount quickly. Thirty large flagons of beer and two bottles of brandy turned out to be the point where he finally felt something. The huge increase in Poison Resistance he'd been awarded and his high CON made minor poisons irrelevant, including alcohol. Makken's dwarven whiskey was another story, and Suzette was getting better with her brewing. Her wine tended to sneak up on you, especially the stuff that doubled as an energy drink. Some of her enhanced beer recipes also had quite a kick to them. Of course, nothing compared to his few shots of ambrosia, but he doubted he could pick up a bottle outside of visiting Mount Olympus. If there was a Mount Olympus.

Feeling just a little tipsy, he lay on the comfortable bed, finding it easy to relax on the goose-down featherbed. It was a hell of a lot more comfortable than the old bed he slept on in Sedgewick. He added a new bed to things he needed to shop for tomorrow. Just because he and Suzette didn't sleep that much didn't mean they shouldn't do it in comfort. And he had some money to burn.

Today had been fun, he had to admit. He hadn't pulled a scam like that in a long time. Greed did silly things to people, and that went double for corporations. It was interesting how they'd been so interested in his property. He knew Billy and Vern had bought a tiny little shop to sell magic items, but that had been with Building Points. It seemed that if you were a corporation, money was no good for buying property unless the rules were bent. That told him why Billy and Vern valued those building points so much. Billy and Layla were still pissed that Vern had kept control of that little shop. Vern was pissed that it had nothing to sell with Billy controlling the items that came out of his dungeons. And Billy had trouble converting those to gold unless someone visited Gadobhra or Sedgewick, and couldn't sell them for real-world money. But Ozzy was pretty confident Billy would be able to fix some of those problems soon. He'd already been pushing Ben to find a way to repair or replace Gadobhra's old teleport stone.

It was apparent to him just how big an advantage that salvaged teleport stone, and its proximity to the Gnomish Bank of Sedgewick might be. Coupled with the Kallvek merchant network he saw quite a few interesting things they could start doing. But they had to be careful, and not get greedy. Too much too quickly would tip people off. If they could get a teleport stone created for Gadobhra, or put the shattered one back together, everyone would assume the flow of items came from the Baron. He'd talk to Ben about that when he got back, and see if there was any way he could help with that. Until then, they'd funnel most of their manufactured magic items, like the Hellboar tusk daggers, through the Kallvek family.

They had to be careful with the gold they earned as well. Thank all the gods they had a secure place to hide it! Earning 30,000 gold today had been fun and profitable. He'd been angry that they were trying to steal his building and causing some trouble had been his original goal. That changed when he got a handle on the people in the auction and read the rules. It was pretty obvious someone had spotted a loophole in the laws and thought they could take advantage of Billy defaulting on Gadobhra. It had probably looked like a sure bet from their end. He could guess that bribes had flowed from corporations and nobles to the petty bureaucrats setting up the deal. Then they'd brought in a reputable Auction House.

Based on the rules of the auction, the Auction House had taken one look at the deal and recognized it for what it was. There was a very good chance that the whole thing would fall like a house of cards, leaving them holding the bag. The high percentage of fees was their cut, knowing Stravos would be happy with 50% of the sale, money he never expected to get. But to make sure they didn't get stiffed, they'd added the clauses that had them get paid first out of the seller fees. They needed to mitigate the risk they were taking on, and this type of deal had a lot more risk than usual. Hell, he'd taken a big chance that the corporations didn't just drop the auction on him. That would have been trouble. A choice of either losing money or admitting to his little scheme. He would have paid the money to avoid the complications. Better a drained bank account than open himself up to whatever bullshit the imperial accountants and taxmen could cook up. As things had shaken out, it was probably heading to the courts, but that wasn't any problem of his.

Splitting the money with Vassily's daughters had simply felt right. That windfall would help them get a start, and they'd been helpful with pulling off the scam, even if they hadn't known it at the time. Having two good-looking girls standing next to him added to the outrageous pirate persona and created a distraction. He'd seen both Chuck and Jerry staring at them while they negotiated. Neither of those guys was much of a poker player, that had been obvious, and he doubted they had read the terms of the auction as carefully as he had. Its language was like something a corporate lawyer would put together, and he was sure that's where it had come from. No gnome would ever be that sloppy. But he could see where the auction house had changed the wording and covered all their bases, taking no chances of things falling apart. The corporate lawyers and agents had been sloppy this time, but that didn't mean they'd be sloppy the next time. The competition was going to start heating up as they grew their infrastructure. The more they got down in the mud and learned about the world, the smarter they'd be.

Billy was going to be a player in that, even if Gadobhra was out in the ass-end of the Empire. Teleportation and cheap mana meant access to markets far away. Choice of markets meant extra profit. And picking the right people to sell to came with advantages. The Red Company was a good example of a good customer and secure market. If anyone interfered with his shipments to them, they'd find an angry Duchess or Mercenary Captain in their face, depending on how she handled it.

Billy and Layla were an interesting problem to contemplate. The Baron and Baroness had an amicable relationship with their workers at the moment. Billy was getting more out of his Contract Workers than he'd ever dreamed of and was repaying that with a loose hand on the reins. But Ozzy was under no illusion how quickly that could change. Vern and Billy were fighting with each other over resources and trying to convince the ACME higher-ups who should have control of resources in the game. If Billy lost, they might have to deal with Vern.

Or Layla and Billy could have a falling out. And pressure from the board to produce more could make Billy grabby. He'd seen what the pressure of working for a corporation did to people. Hell, he'd seen that today with two guys too eager to please their bosses. All good reasons to keep any wealth hidden away in the bank and not divulge all their business dealings. Just in case.

This trip had been a little spontaneous. When he had time, he'd begun infusing smoke into the timbers used in the keep as a precaution against fires. He'd suggested to Bill that he should take a load of wood and be first through the teleporter, based on how trigger-happy the Mage's guild had been on a previous trip. A load of wood was easier to replace than a load of sausage, and he wanted to see if there was a market for the strong, fireproof timbers at the Carpenter's Guild. Billy liked the idea. Wood and Smoke cost him nothing. Both of them liked the idea of creating the illusion that this was just 'business as usual' in Gadobhra.

Ozzy was going to take one timber over to the Carpenter's Guild on his way back, but the rest were going to his new building for repairs. Billy also wanted him to drop by the Red Company barracks and drop off some pamphlets for his new line of war machines. The Red Company were light cavalry, and not likely to want to tow along wagons of heavy ballistae, but their Captain wore another hat, and the Duchess had a city to defend. for new novels

Despite not needing more than a couple hours of sleep, he found it easy to stay in bed and nap until he heard noise and smelled food cooking. Outside his door was a pitcher of water and a fresh towel. He quickly washed up in the basin in his room, then used the Cleanse spell on himself and his clothes. He'd gotten a lot of use out of the cantrip and it saved a lot of time. Butchering was hard on your clothes. The huge dining room table was filled with people eating, but a large chair was reserved for him at one end.

Vassily waved him to sit down, and his daughters rose from the table to bring him a mug of tea and fill his plate with a lot of everything on the table. He noticed they'd been sitting next to two young men who looked a little shell-shocked and both girls kept glancing at the simple silver bands on their fingers, rings that hadn't been there yesterday. After he'd had his fill and a little more, the girls each grabbed an arm of their betrothed and brought them over to meet Ozzy. He shook hands with Jacob, who was with Daria, and Polina introduced Hector. Both young men were about twenty years old. After that, the boys stood nervously behind the girls and Ozzy suspected something was up. Vassily was sipping his tea, looking far too nonchalant.

"Why do I suspect you two have something to ask me?"

Hector brought his attention to an oddity. He'd found something strange in one corner of the warehouse. Rough wooden boards had been put down in one of the destroyed rooms, covering the floor. They'd come loose when the fire heated the glue used to hold them in place over the stone floor. With the flooring removed, Ozzy saw that set into the floor was a 6'x4' slab of stone that didn't match the rest of the flagstone flooring. Ozzy could see where a winch and pulley had hung overhead. It was right over a recessed steel hook securely fastened to the stone. "Any ideas, boys?"

Jacob nodded, "A couple. It might be access to the sewers that drain out of the city. They could have dumped their waste from the butcher shop into the flow. But I don't think so, everyone knows that's how you breed slimes and sewer badgers. But if it's one of the larger tunnels, they might have used it to gain access to the sewers to move goods. We're only a hundred yards from the city walls."

"Smuggling?"

Hector spoke up. "You hear about it all the time. People want to avoid taxes on high-value goods like alcohol, and pipeweed, or get people in and out of the city that have a price on their heads. Sit in a tavern long enough and someone tells a story about knowing a guy who knows a guy who can get you cheap whiskey with no taxes."

The Butcher was curious, "Only one way to find out, step back a dozen paces, just in case." The boys moved back and watched as the Butcher hooked two fingers in the loop and levered the block of stone up. It proved to be six inches thick. Once he'd moved it up enough to get a hand underneath, it was easy to pick up the block and set it to one side. Looking down into the dark, he saw broad stairs leading down to a ten-foot-wide corridor that ran in two directions. It certainly wasn't part of the sewers. The air was cold, giving him a chill, and there was an odd smell to it that he couldn't place.

"Well, well. I wonder what Stavros was up to. I'll have to have a talk with a friend about this. But for now, I think I'll seal it back up. Keep this quiet for now." Hector and Jacob just nodded, silent as they watched Ozzy set the rock back in place. Lunch was long gone, but they heard the girls at the front doors with dinner. The boys needed a break and Ozzy wasn't going to turn down another meal from their mother's kitchen.

After they were done, Ozzy decided it was time to see how they handled a little of the crazy stuff that revolved around him. "It's going to get smokey in here. Why don't you four stand by the door? You can watch, but if you start coughing or get hot, head outside." They all nodded, curious about what he would do next.

Ozzy summoned the Ancient Billhook of Entwined Fates. The chains on his arm slithered off and began stacking the debris higher and higher. Ozzy pulled some heat from his pit, then breathed out flame and heat, igniting the pile with Butcher's Breath. He wasn't trying to burn the building, just create a lot of smoke and make sure it never burned again. "I want the smoke to get into every beam and floorboard, Chainey. Hold off on the third floor for now, but I want the rest of it shiny and as black as we can get it" The chains rattled happily. Shiny and black was Chainey's favorite color.

The pile began producing smoke, and the Butchedr controlled the heat, holding it in the pile and not letting it catch anything else on fire. The debris pile started glowing as it was reduced to coals. The smoke billowed in heavy clouds, only to disappear as the Butcher and sentient chains forced it into the wood. At some point, his audience went outside for some fresh air. It took Ozzy over an hour to reduce the pile to fine white ash, leached of any smoke and heat. The wood wasn't quite where he wanted it, but it was getting there. Chainey had scrubbed off any charcoal while it worked, and the smoke had left the oak and ash beams as dark as mahogany. The building looked clean now, cleared of debris. Certainly, it was free of vermin and insects. Chainey wrapped around his arm and he put his weapon over his shoulder and left. The two couples were standing outside, talking.

Jacob was the first to speak. "That was amazing! Are you a fire mage? Daria said you were a pirate!"

Ozzy winked at her, "A little of both sometimes. But I'm just a Butcher who knows some tricks with smoke and heat. Think you still want the job? Things can get weird around me."

They all nodded. "Fine. Here's the deal. I'm going to talk with Vassily about some work that needs to be done on the building and what is a proper wage for my valued employees. We need new windows in the Butcher shop for one, new countertops and display cases and some work on the roof. I'll leave money and a list. One of you lads will stay here and oversee that work. The other is heading to Sedgewick for a crash course in running a Butcher Shop. My partner Runt will teach you the basics and we'll have some fun for a couple of nights at the stockyard. The next week, you'll switch places. We'll also get you registered with the Butcher's Guild next door. I'll pay you guild fees the first year."

He let all that sink in and then said, "I know you'll have questions. Come find me at the restaurant in an hour, but for now, go take a look at the third floor. If it suits you, we'll fix that up for one or both couples to live up there." They didn't waste time, running into the building and pounding up the stairs. Ozzy walked over to drink some of Vassily's brandy and get his advice on what to pay them. He hadn't planned on spending a second night, but let himself be talked into it. He left early in the morning, just as the sun was coming up with a mostly empty wagon and some shopping to do.

A few quick errands and then he'd head back to Sedgewick