In a dungeon,
the Lord was the absolute core.
Beyond that, there were four crucial components:
Citizens, Soldiers, Heroes, and Adventurers.
Some of these identities could overlap, while others could be further subdivided.
For example, adventurers could be classified based on their level of cooperation with a dungeon: contract adventurers, exclusive adventurers, tourist adventurers, and so on.
Among them, hero units were the rarest of all.
If a Lord were a king or emperor, then heroes were equivalent to ministers or generals. A single high-quality hero was worth more than an entire army.
Different heroes possessed different aptitudes, and the boosts they provided to a territory varied greatly.
As the saying went, an army is easy to find, but a great general is not.
Only a tiny number of individuals possessed the special qualifications required to become heroes.
And the person Kanzaki Ren had just encountered—Nansilia—was one of them.
Not only that, she possessed top-tier hero potential.
Recruiting her was a critical step in his short- to mid-term plans.
Nansilia was not only immensely talented herself; her special identity was tied to whether Kanzaki Ren could one day take control of the entire Evernight Forest at minimal cost and unify the surrounding factions.
Of course—
Miracle City was still far too weak.
It did not yet have the ability to cultivate heroes.
And recruiting Nansilia would not be easy.
The girl trusted no one. She was cautious, deeply guarded, and extremely timid.
If her identity were exposed prematurely, or if someone attempted to forcibly bind her with a contract before gaining her trust, she would flee immediately.
Moreover, due to various constraints,
Nansilia would remain in the Gloomshade Valley for no more than half a year.
If she could not be recruited within that limited time, she would leave the region entirely.
It sounded challenging—
but Kanzaki Ren was confident in both himself and his territory.
The timing, however, was not yet right.
For now, he could not afford to alert her.
He first instructed the gnomes to strip all usable equipment from the goblin corpses.
[Goblin Short Sword], gray-tier, low-grade equipment.[Goblin Sickle], gray-tier, low-grade equipment.[Goblin Leather Armor], gray-tier, mid-grade equipment.[Goblin Hand Crossbow], gray-tier, mid-grade equipment.[…]
A total of 52 pieces of graded equipment were recovered.
The rest of the scrap metal was worthless.
Item tiers, from lowest to highest, were: Gray, White, Green, Blue, Purple, Orange, and so on.
Although these items were graded, they were all at the lowest gray tier. Kanzaki Ren kept five crossbows and five short blades for the gnomes to defend themselves.
All remaining gray-tier equipment was recycled through the dungeon core.
[You have recycled "Goblin Staff," Tier 1 Material Essence +5!][You have recycled "Goblin Leather Armor," Tier 1 Material Essence +3!][You have recycled "Goblin Sickle," Tier 1 Material Essence +1!][…]
Recycling all 52 gray-tier items yielded 87 units of Tier 1 Material Essence.
Not bad.
With these materials,
constructing the Trading Hall would be no problem at all.
The goblin camp also yielded 24 Redblood Fruits and 30 Blue Moon Grass plants.
After all, Red Claw Village possessed two spirit farmland plots, and these were the plantation's specialty products.
Spirit farmland was an extremely valuable resource. Some plots formed naturally, while others were artificially created. They absorbed energy from the Chaos Tides, allowing crops to grow rapidly.
Every ten days, Red Claw Village could produce 50 Redblood Fruits and 20 Blue Moon Grass plants.
Redblood Fruit could rapidly heal wounds and had medicinal properties.
Blue Moon Grass restored stamina and relieved fatigue.
Although both were common Tier 1 materials, they were extremely practical and quite valuable.
They could be consumed directly or refined into longer-lasting, more effective medicines.
For a novice dungeon lord, acquiring a resource-producing territory like Red Claw Village was a dream opening—an absurdly lucky start.
The resources could be used internally or sold.
It was, quite literally, a small money tree.
Any resource with a tier had value.
Even if it served no direct purpose, it could still be dismantled through the core to produce material essence for territorial construction.
However—
precisely because Red Claw Village was valuable,
the goblin lord would never let this go.
Retaliation was inevitable.
Miracle City would eventually be threatened.
Kanzaki Ren was not worried.
He still had inspiration crystals such as Sekiro and Legend waiting to be activated. As he advanced further, the number of inspiration crystals would only increase.
What he truly lacked were dungeon cores.
So the territory had to expand.
More land.
More cores.
Miracle City had existed for only one week. The protective field emitted by its core would remain active for another three weeks.
Even if dark races marched straight to its gates, they would be unable to breach it in the short term.
There was no immediate danger.
Kanzaki Ren then assigned the gnome citizens.
Thirteen were left behind in Red Claw Village to continue farming.
Two were selected to return to the main city—one male and one female.
The male was named Arno, the female Aya.
Arno was a somewhat dull-looking gnome youth with modest cultivation talent. In the future, he could potentially be trained as an adventurer or a combat unit for the territory.
Aya—
was, in fact, the elf girl Nansilia, disguised as a gnome.
After returning to the main city, Kanzaki Ren assigned them their roles.
Arno would handle miscellaneous chores and errands across the territory.
Aya would assist in the dungeon hall, helping receive adventurers.
Kanzaki Ren intended for the hidden elf girl to act as a sort of "front desk manager." It would reduce his daily workload while allowing her to gradually understand the territory.
Given Miracle City's potential,
he was confident she would earn her trust soon enough.
"Th-thank you, Lord!" Arno's face flushed red with excitement. He had been an ordinary gnome villager, and from the moment he was captured by the dark races, his life had been effectively over.
Yet now—
not only had he been rescued,
he was serving directly under a human dungeon lord.
He had heard stories of dungeon lords possessing miraculous powers. If one performed well and earned their favor, it was entirely possible to change one's fate completely.
"Thank you, Lord," Nansilia said calmly.
She harbored no suspicion.
Her gaze swept over the dungeon, brows knitting slightly.
This… was a dungeon?
It looked more like a refugee camp.
Clearly, this was a rookie lord.
No threat to her—and certainly no match for the Evernight Dragon King.
No.
This territory was far too weak.
It could not be the power she was searching for.
Still, protected by the dungeon's energy field, the area was extremely safe for the time being.
She decided to hide here temporarily and flee once the situation calmed down.
Kanzaki Ren transmitted compiled territory data to both of them via the core.
"These materials cover everything about the dungeon. Your daily responsibilities and precautions are all included. Study them and begin work as soon as possible."
"Yes!"
"Understood, Lord!"
With their assignments settled,
Kanzaki Ren moved on to construction.
[You are constructing Tier 1 Building "Trading Hall."Cost: Soul Crystals ×100, Mental Energy ×50, Tier 1 Material Essence ×30.Proceed?]
"Yes."
No hesitation.
The Trading Hall was essential.
Without it, territorial trade was impossible.
Remaining mental energy: 45Remaining soul crystals: 672
Seeing that his soul crystal reserves were still substantial, Kanzaki Ren decided to construct additional basic buildings.
He spent 200 soul crystals to build a Monster Camp.
He spent 300 soul crystals to build a Soul Altar.
[Trading Hall]Tier 1 special building.Dungeon capacity +10.Unlocks territorial trade functions.
[Monster Camp]Tier 1 basic building.Dungeon capacity +15.Recruitable monsters: 0/30.
[Soul Altar]Tier 1 basic building.Dungeon capacity +10.Contractable soul essences: 0/100.
With the Monster Camp,
Kanzaki Ren could directly summon monsters using soul essences. Up to 30 territorial monsters could be maintained. They lacked intelligence, but were fully controllable and absolutely loyal—like RTS units.
With the Soul Altar,
he could permanently imprint soul essences onto adventurers or citizens, granting them monster abilities. Since the power originated from Miracle City, it would bind them more tightly to the territory.
The more buildings constructed,
the larger the territory became.
Miracle City's current reception capacity rose to 160 adventurers.
Soul crystals remaining: 172.
That wasn't much.
Which meant—
it was time to harvest the adventurers again.