Karl surveyed his newly prepared trade stalls, a dry, critical eye sweeping over every detail. The polished stone tiles gleamed, the carved wooden displays were meticulously arranged, showcasing the artisan's intricate figurines and the promise of future leather goods.
Everything looked perfect, ready for business. His gaze settled on the Level 10 Trader skeleton, standing silently by the counter, its bony fingers resting on a stack of wooden plates. It was the face of his burgeoning corporation.
Then, the glaring, skeletal truth hit him with the force of a blacksmith's hammer. A grand opening sounds like a perfect idea, a truly magnificent spectacle, a testament to my genius. But then… the glaring, skeletal truth hits him. My skeleton workforce, especially the front-desk ones like this trader, have no way to actually speak to the living. How can they negotiate prices?
How can they upsell? How can they even explain what they're selling? They'll just stand there, silently intimidating potential customers with their empty eye sockets and rattling bones. This isn't just an oversight; it's a critical, fundamental flaw in my business model. Communication is paramount for commerce.
He mentally opened the System Shop, scrolling through the various categories with a determined, almost frantic, focus. There has to be an upgrade for this. A speech module, a charisma chip… something to bridge this rather significant, and frankly, embarrassing, communication gap.
The System Shop interface appeared, its glowing text a familiar sight, now a source of desperate hope. Numerous upgrades unfolded before his eye sockets.
🛒 BoneMart™ – Necro Approved!🧠 Personal & Minion Upgrades━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
💀 Balance: 1,320 Necro Points (NP)
📂 Category:
[🧠 Karl Upgrades] [🦴 Minion Upgrades]
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
🔹 Self Core Upgrades → Customize. Enhance your capacity, efficiency, and strategic dominance.
[🧠 Mental Clarity Serum] – 80 NP → +1 Intelligence permanently. Enhances spell control and build awareness.
[📖 Arcane Bonegrip Codex] – 100 NP → +1 Necromancy permanently. Improves minion control cap and summoning finesse.
[🔧 Cog-Forged Cortex Chip] – 90 NP → +1 Engineering permanently. Increases blueprint efficiency and build logic.
[🪙 Sixth Sense of Trade] – 60 NP → +1 Trade Sense permanently. Boosts negotiation, value detection, and market interactions.
[🧬 Neural Convergence Node] – 180 NP → Grants "Auto-Connect" with any nearby structure. Access blueprints, upgrade paths, and production metrics without touch.
[📡 Dungeon-Wide Mental Broadcast] – 220 NP → Greatly enhances command range; enables issuing mental orders across the entire dungeon, no proximity required.
[🪞Phantom Form: Visage Projector] – 250 NP → Creates a temporary humanoid illusion, you can use for face-to-face diplomacy. Grants non-intimidating presence for negotiations.
🔹 Skeleton Minion Upgrades → Improve their utility, intelligence, and interaction skills.
[🔊 Sinew String Larynx Kit] – 75 NP → Enables Speech Synthesis for skeletons. Useful for diplomacy, customer interaction, and basic verbal reports.
[🛠️ Fine Motor Precision Kit] – 50 NP → Skeletons equipped with better hand articulation. Increases Workshop & Metallurgy output speed by 15%.
[🎭 Behavioral Mask Pack] – 90 NP → Skeletons can emulate gestures, facial expressions (through posture and props), and mimic humanoid behavior. Boosts trust from visitors.
[🛡️ Combat Doctrine Install] – 80 NP → For trained skeletons: improves formation discipline and adaptive combat responses. Boosts field survival rate.
[📣 Customer Service Protocol] – 65 NP → Skeletons can speak in friendly, helpful tones. Ideal for innkeepers, front-desk greeters, or tavern staff.
[🎼 Ambient Soundscape Voice Pack] – 50 NP → Speech-synthesized skeletons can emit background tavern chatter or relaxing phrases to improve guest satisfaction.
[📍Zone Anchoring Chip] – 55 NP → Assigns a skeleton to a specific region of your dungeon. Prevents overcrowding in key zones.
🛒 [Add to Cart] | 🧾 [Confirm Purchase]
🌀[Refresh Self Upgrades – 10m Cooldown]
Karl quickly scanned the options, his mind racing. While many personal upgrades were tempting—the "Phantom Form" for himself, the "Dungeon-wide Mental Broadcast" for his own personal upgrade—his immediate priority was clear. With 345 NP on hand, he focused on the skeleton upgrades. Phantom Form for myself, Dungeon-wide Mental Broadcast… tempting, very tempting for future negotiations, for presenting a less terrifying image. But my front-line staff, my sales team, needs to be able to communicate, now. Customer service is paramount. No point having excellent products if no one can sell them, if every potential customer flees in terror from a silent, rattling salesman.
He mentally selected:
[🔊 Sinew String Larynx Kit] – 75 NP
[🎭 Behavioral Mask Pack] – 90 NP
[📣 Customer Service Protocol] – 65 NP
[🎼 Ambient Soundscape Voice Pack] – 50 NP
A total of 280 NP. His balance would be razor-thin, but the investment was critical.
Karl confirmed the purchase. Immediately, a low, resonant hum vibrated through the dungeon, a subtle thrum that seemed to emanate from the very stone. It was followed by a cacophony of new, startling sounds: a chorus of clicks, whirs, and then, surprisingly, synthesized voices, some clear, some garbled, all distinctly artificial.
The dungeon chatters begin, Karl thought, his eye sockets widening slightly. It's… louder than I expected. And far more immediate. This is going to take some getting used to.
From the workshop, a distinct, synthesized voice, sharp and demanding, cut through the general hum. It was the artisan skeleton, its voice a bony rasp, devoid of warmth. "You bony bastards! Your hide-stretching technique is inefficient! The tensile strength is unacceptable! Are you deliberately attempting to sabotage the quality of our future handbags?!" The words echoed, a bizarre, disembodied lecture.
The tannery skeletons, previously silent, now emitted a series of whirs and clicks that sounded suspiciously like grumbling, a low complaint. One even seemed to slump its bony shoulders.
Karl sighed, a long, drawn-out sound that echoed slightly in the stone hall, a dry, exasperated rasp. I must've made a mistake. A good mistake, perhaps, in terms of functionality, but a mistake nonetheless. My 'Customer Service Protocol' seems to have a rather… aggressive internal quality control feature when applied to the artisan. This 'Ego Codex' is proving to be a double-edged sword.
Elsewhere, the Trader skeleton, previously a silent sentinel, now emitted a low, welcoming hum, followed by a slightly stilted, synthesized voice. "Welcome, Master. How may I be of assistance?" It paused, a faint whirring sound emanating from its chest cavity. "No, too formal. 'Greetings, esteemed patron. Might I guide your gaze to our exquisite wares?'" It seemed to be practicing, adjusting its tone, as if rehearsing for an unseen audience.
In the canteen, the skeleton assistant chef, previously moving in silence, now began to experiment with their new vocalizations. One skeletal assistant, its voice a strange, almost unsettling echo of human courtesy, turned to a kobold waitress, a young female named Mina, who was wiping down a table.
"Good morning, Mina. May I inquire as to your current state of well-being?" the skeleton intoned, its voice a flat, synthesized tone that seemed to vibrate in the air.
Mina froze, the rag slipping from her clawed hand. Her furred ears flattened against her head, and her eyes widened into disbelieving saucers. She stared at the skeleton, then at the rag on the floor, then back at the skeleton, her jaw slightly agape. She had only ever known the skeletons to communicate through gestures, their silent efficiency a constant, unsettling presence.
Another skeleton, acting as a mock customer, approached a male kobold assistant chef, its voice a mechanical whir, then a synthesized, flat tone. "Another serving of… rabbit stew, perhaps? And ensure it is… satisfying."
The kobold assistant chef, who had been diligently stirring a pot, dropped his ladle with a clatter. She spun around, her eyes wide, staring at the speaking skeleton as if it had just grown a second head. A faint, terrified squeak escaped her.
A third skeleton, seemingly tasked with ambiance, began to emit a faint, synthesized background chatter, like a distant, ethereal murmur of a tavern crowd, punctuated by oddly polite phrases. "The weather is quite... stable today, is it not?" "Indeed, a most... agreeable temperature." The dungeon had found its voice, and it was certainly… unique, filled with the eerie politeness of the newly vocal undead and the stunned silence of their living counterparts.
Later on, Karl and Orkesh sat at a small, newly carved wooden table in the canteen, the subtle hum of the upgraded skeletons providing a bizarre backdrop. Orkesh, with a newly drawn, more detailed market map unfurled before them, began his briefing, his small, clawed finger tracing lines across the parchment.
"Mr. Karl, about the market pricing," Orkesh began, his voice earnest, his eyes darting between the map and Karl's silent, skeletal face. "The common currency here is bronze, silver, gold, and royal gold. For every 100 bronze coins, that's 1 silver coin. 100 silver coins make 1 gold coin. And 50 gold coins are equivalent to 1 royal gold coin. It's a fairly standard system across the Hillwilds, easy for anyone to understand."
A simple, tiered system. Good. Easy to integrate into my accounting protocols, straightforward for my future ledger-keeping skeletons. Karl's mind already began to convert values, calculating potential revenue streams.
Orkesh then moved to product pricing, his finger tapping various points on the map. "Foods like roasted meat are typically priced at 25 bronze coins. Iron weapons… they vary. Low quality might fetch 1 silver, while a high-quality, well-made iron sword could go for 5 silver."
Standard. Nothing revolutionary there. Yet. Karl's internal assessment was swift, a slight impatience stirring within him. His products were anything but standard.
Orkesh's voice gained a note of awe, his small eyes wide as he spoke of Karl's products, his gaze fixed on the gleaming iron sword displayed at the nearby stall. "But your weapons, Mr. Karl… after my own valuation, they are of the highest quality. Even the iron swords, with their ornate designs on the blades, and the fantastic craftsmanship… it wouldn't be an overestimation to say each iron weapon will be priced at 10 silver coins. That's double the market rate for high quality! And your first batch of steel swords, with that same consistent quality, will be priced at 70 silver, and may even fetch 1 gold coin or above at auctions, especially among nobles or collectors who appreciate such artistry and durability."
Karl's skeletal jaw stretched into a wide, almost predatory grin, a silent, chilling expression of triumph. "This is just the quality of Necro Corp, Mr. Orkesh. We aim for… consistent excellence."
Just wait until they see the fire-spewing weapons I'm going to develop. Or the musket ones, primitive by Earth standards, but absolute game-changers here. In the Middle Ages of Earth, early muskets were highly sought after, revolutionizing warfare. And the tanks I'm going to produce in the future? fighter planes? This is just the beginning of a technological revolution, a complete disruption of this world's entire industrial and military landscape.
He laughed in his mind, the sound echoing with dark, unbridled ambition, envisioning a future where his Necro Corp dominated every market.
Karl's internal laughter subsided, replaced by a more pragmatic, immediate thought. Though, for those advanced weapons, for the gunpowder that fuels muskets and cannons, I need to find sources of sulfur and saltpeter. Essential components for gunpowder. That's a future acquisition priority, a new strategic resource to secure.
He turned to Orkesh, his expression serious, the predatory glint in his eye sockets softening into one of focused purpose.
"Mr. Orkesh, I have a task for you. A trade run. To the nearest city, Stonehorn Crossing. For this first venture, take only a selection of our iron swords and a few of the wooden figurines. We need to test the market, gauge initial reception." He paused, his gaze intensifying.
"And while you're there, purchase some flour and salt for the canteen. Most importantly, I need you to subtly spread rumors of a new, hospitable inn and trading post hidden deep within the Spinebride Mountains. A place of safety and unique goods, a sanctuary for weary travelers and a source of unparalleled craftsmanship."
Karl pointed towards the bouncer skeleton, now wrapped in thick, dark clothing that completely obscured its skeletal form, making it appear as a tall, silent, heavily cloaked figure. As Karl gestured, the bouncer skeleton turned its head, its empty eye sockets fixing on Orkesh.
"Greetings, esteemed representative," the bouncer intoned, its voice a deep, synthesized baritone that vibrated with an unnatural resonance. "I am assigned to ensure your safe passage and the security of the Necro Corp's assets. I shall remain vigilant throughout our journey."
Orkesh stiffened, his fur bristling. His jaw dropped, and he took an involuntary step back, his eyes wide with shock. He had known the skeletons could communicate through gestures, but to hear such a deep, artificial voice emanating from one of them was utterly disorienting. A moment later, a wave of relief washed over him. The voice, though strange, was polite, even reassuring. He had been so used to their silent, unsettling presence. This… this was different. He let out a shaky breath. "Ah… greetings. Understood." He managed a small, nervous nod.
"Understood, Mr. Karl. I will ensure the message is spread and the goods are acquired. We will not disappoint you. This is a chance for my people to truly begin again."
Karl offered a final, dry nod. "Good. Return with information, Mr. Orkesh. Information is as valuable as gold." The dungeon was ready. The market awaited.