11 Creating a Castle Town

4,000 DP just in the first hour! With this much, even if it was just a lucky occurrence, they could at least expect around 100,000 DP in a day, much more than their initial estimate.

'I'm worried that the goblins are straining themselves,' Ein thought.

"Lilith, go and tell the goblins that they should keep a pace where they can continue nonstop operation. I don't mind even if the mined volume decreases a little."

Lilith, receiving such an order, couldn't help but smile. "I'll go and relay your orders."

Ein could have ordered them mentally since he was the dungeon master. However, he instead chose to send Lilith to the goblins to pass on his words directly. Lilith guessed that he wanted to show that he appreciated them, so he sent his only aide, Lilith, to both pass his orders and slightly raise their morale.

When Lilith left, Ein was left alone in the dungeon master's room. Having nothing better to do, he started inspecting the raw gems and crystals that were mined. Far from his expectations, the raw gems were dull and not that sparkly. If he were to see such a lump of colorful rock by the roadside, chances are that he would ignore it.

Ein remembered hearing somewhere that what makes gems shine is actually the way they are cut. Artisans cut the gems at certain angles to maximize the reflectance of the surface.

"Right, I think the way they used it in the Middle Ages was called faceting? Let's try that."

Since he didn't have a pedestal to mount the gem on, through the system, he bought a small file and a clip. After affixing the milky white gem, probably a raw diamond, onto the clip, Ein picked up the file and slowly chafed the top and bottom sides. When it was finally looking like a pancake, he turned the gem on its side and started chafing the body.

"I'm not that dexterous nor artistic, so let's just make it an eight-edged gem!"

He worked on the gem slowly until he finally made a hexagonal column shape. After that, from each edge, he traced a diagonal until the middle of the column and chafed the edges carefully. After finishing all edges front and back, he repeated the step with a little offset, making little triangles in the gem. After the third layer was done, Ein decided to end his work. After washing off the powder on the surface, he observed the gem closely.

"Hmmm... Not as shiny as I thought. Well, since I know nothing about the best angles to do it, I'll consider this a job well done," he muttered.

Losing interest in what he had finished, he just threw the diamond back into the crate. When he was about to select another raw gem to practice on, Lilith returned to the room.

"Lilith, welcome back. How're the goblins?"

"There's no problem. The goblins seem more eager to work now though, probably doubling their efficiency." Lilith chuckled.

"Rather than that, I want to show this to master," she added while pulling out a small red gem from her pocket.

"What's that?" Ein, who really had no clue about identifying gems, couldn't help but ask.

"Do you remember what a philosopher's stone is?" Lilith asked.

"!!!"

"No, no. This thing isn't a philosopher's stone." Lilith quickly denied it after seeing the excited look on Ein's face.

"This is called the fool's stone. You can think of it like the initial stage of a philosopher's stone," she explained. "After hundreds to thousands of years bathing in natural mana, a fool's stone could be transformed into the philosopher's stone."

"So, is it rare?" Ein quickly asked.

"It's not that commonly seen, but it isn't really a rare find. Miners could dig one every year on average."

"Then why do you want to show it to me?" Ein was confused.

"I could turn this into a mana generator. If I do that, the mana density in this place would increase greatly—at least double," she announced. "The excess mana would be in turn reflected as DP for the dungeon. With this size, it would be about 50,000 to 75,000 DP a day, I think."

The fool's stone Lilith was holding was just the size of a fingernail. Hearing that such a small gem could actually produce a ton of DP, Ein was amazed. Before he was able to give permission to proceed, though, Lilith further spoke.

"However, the fool's stone would react with the dungeon core and end up changing the whole dungeon's appearance. Based on my estimates, it would change from a cave-type to a building-type, specifically a castle."

Hearing this, Ein first thought that it wasn't a problem. Just a simple change in appearance wouldn't hurt. However, when he noticed that Lilith could have made the mana generator first before telling him, he noticed that there was a fatal flaw hiding in this small stone.

"... We'll get discovered easily..." Ein pointed out.

A cave within a mountain was nothing of note; it was natural. However, if a castle appeared on a mountain, anyone who could catch a glimpse of it would definitely do a double take. It was too eye-catching.

"We'll definitely attract unwanted attention from the locals of this world," Lilith emphasized.

Ein began to think. The risk of being easily discoverable was definitely game-breaking. If a strong species like a dragon noticed them and invaded, then there was nothing they could do. Only death awaited them.

However, the mana generator from the fool's stone wasn't something he could easily let go of. In his current state, he needs as much DP as he can get. Not only for improving his dungeon but also for improving his personal defense.

Lilith, who noticed Ein's pondering look, finally decided to open up about the plan she had made.

"Master, what do you think about creating a castle town?" Lilith asked.

A castle is definitely a fortified building, as it was hard to invade. However, the defense of a single building would not matter for monsters like dragons. If they built a town using local materials and erected more defensive structures around it, then the castle would be even harder to attack.

"I already scanned the whole area, and the nearest city to us is about 1,000 kilometers away. If we claim a few kilometers of land around us, nobody could blame us."

That much distance would be equivalent to 5 days' distance for a horse carriage, or nearly a month of walking with 10 hours spent traveling each day.

"This area is probably uncharted land, so if we develop it, we can legally lay claim to it," she further added.

Hearing this, Ein remembered that Nayta and Melina's settlement was further south of their current location, whereas the nearest human city was to the north. This forest was probably the border area separating humans from demi-humans and monsters.

Ein thought that even if this area was within some kingdom's or country's jurisdiction, given the distance to the closest settlement, they could probably reinforce their defenses before enemy forces could reach them.

"Ok, fine. Let's go with a castle town," Ein finally decided.

"As expected of Master, I knew you would say so." Lilith chuckled. "However, before that, you need to settle some loose ends first."

"Loose ends?" Ein wondered. "What loose ends?"

"Those two elves."

Nayta and Melina are both ignorant regarding Ein's identity as a dungeon master. If he implemented the plan of creating a castle town, he wouldn't even have any excuses to deceive the two.

Ein initially wanted to keep them as a source of DP and local information. However, now that he already has a stable source of DP in the form of the mine and that they know the direction where the nearest human settlement is, the two have already outgrown their purpose.

"..."

Ein was troubled. His conscience as a human couldn't let him abandon the two, who had nowhere to go. Furthermore, he couldn't bear to harm them either. Furthermore, there's a side of him that feels bad for the two who had to live inside a cave with wolves.

After gathering his resolve and considering all possibilities...

"... I'll tell them the truth," Ein finally decided.