Ethan was left speechless for several seconds.

Staring at the oversized head filling the screen, he instinctively glanced back at the sketch in his hand. The drawing clearly depicted a woman who looked to be in her fifties or sixties, her facial features sharp and aged, yet that face was attached to a body that was barely a meter tall. The contrast was so jarring that his thoughts stalled.

Was this…

Dwarfism?

In Ethereal, character proportions were modeled directly after the player's real-world physique. That meant the person on his screen truly looked like this in reality. Ethan felt a headache coming on as understanding settled in.

'Master Roger, you damned old man,' he thought bitterly. 'You seriously cannot tell the difference between dwarfism and a young girl?' All that time wasted, all those assumptions, gone in an instant.

On the screen, the woman's mouth kept moving without pause, her expression animated and relentless. Ethan did not hesitate. He muted her feed.

Instant silence.

Relief washed over him as if someone had turned off a roaring machine. Her mouth had been like a Gatling gun, spraying words at a terrifying pace, and now that it was quiet, he finally understood why the other guild members had suffered so much. Not only did she talk endlessly, not a single word out of her mouth was pleasant. Complaints, sharp remarks, needless commentary, all delivered without breathing.

If he were the raid leader, he would have kicked her out long ago.

He ended the video call entirely and immediately sent a private message to Celia. He did not want to hear another sound from that person. At the same time, he knew better than to offend her outright. He still needed to deliver her to Master Roger to complete the quest, and until then, he had to endure her existence.

What puzzled him more was how she had ended up next to Celia in the first place. Was Celia not supposed to be stationed at Renegade Citadel?

[NotADruid]: Celia, how did that person end up right next to you?

The reply came quickly.

[Tears of the Fallen]: Her? Don't ask. No combat team wants her. She lost her crafting profession, she's an acquaintance, I don't know her exact background, and she doesn't seem interested in leveling. She's a half-crafter now, mainly responsible for protecting crafters during resource-gathering runs and escorting supplies. The crafters were just relocated here, and the Mad Engineer from the All-You-Need chain is here as well. Several parts for that Fortress Defense System schematic you have are already forged. The Mad Engineer says they can be partially assembled. It won't be at full power, but it'll be functional. The remaining components can be added gradually later.

Ethan leaned back slightly and let the information settle.

So it was not just him. She was universally annoying. That explained everything.

'Fine.'

He typed his response without hesitation.

[NotADruid]: Does she have any contract with us? Get her to sign a lifetime one, then ship her over here so I can finish this quest.

He was, in essence, planning to sell her off. Given that she was clearly a nuisance within the guild, someone nobody wanted to deal with, and that even Celia sounded exhausted by her presence, this solution benefited everyone.

The reply came almost instantly.

[Tears of the Fallen]: Got it. On it now.

Celia's agreement was so fast it caught him slightly off guard. Ethan sent her his current coordinates right away and told her to message him as soon as the person arrived.

With that problem temporarily resolved, Ethan turned back toward Master Roger, his expression shifting effortlessly into a broad, confident smile.

"Master, I've found your person," he said smoothly. "So, about these goods…"

Now that the target was located, he could finally focus on the real prize. The explosives. These were not just quest items, they were the key to his next steps. If everything went according to plan, he would use them to take control of all four high-tier fortresses surrounding Harmony City.

Ethan had promised cooperation with other guilds and even agreed to share fortress numbers, but he had never once specified tiers. None of those guilds even knew that fortresses were divided into tiers to begin with.

In the end, possession was nine-tenths of the law.

Whoever controlled the high-tier fortresses controlled the entire region. Even if other guilds occupied the mid-tier and low-tier fortresses, they would still be required to pay a portion of their income upward, much like counties paying taxes to a city. The structure was built into the system itself.

His first objective was simple and absolute, secure every high-tier fortress surrounding Harmony City.

After that, he would move north.

The two northern cities were still largely under NPC control. If he moved fast enough, he could seize their high-tier fortresses before players realized what was happening. Once player guilds took ownership, wresting control away would become exponentially harder.

Speed was everything.

Low-tier fortresses provided basic siege engines. Mid-tier fortresses offered improved versions with better durability and output. These engines made attacking high-tier fortresses significantly easier. Even if their quality was lacking, something was always better than nothing.

Unfortunately, the siege engines at the high-tier fortress he and Lyla had captured were gone. Completely annihilated by her Forbidden Spell.

Losing the siege equipment of a high-tier fortress was no small blow.

He did have the schematic for a catapult obtained from the Mana-Forged Colossus, but production took time. Time he did not have. The Fortress Defense System needed to be built, and at least one catapult had to be manufactured as soon as possible.

The real bottleneck was not resources, but people.

Expert-tier crafters were painfully scarce.

At present, he only had two reliable hands. His own crafting alt, and the Mad Engineer. One was a Master Blacksmith, the other a Master Engineer. That alone put him ahead of most guilds, but it still was not enough.

Then something clicked in his mind.

Had Celia not mentioned another hidden-profession Alchemist in the guild? One who rarely showed herself?

If he remembered correctly, the Mad Engineer had been chasing after her relentlessly.

Ethan frowned slightly.

He wondered how that had turned out.

Before he could sink deeper into thought, Master Roger suddenly spoke up, cutting through the silence.

"No problem, no problem! Take whatever you need…" The old man was grinning from ear to ear, his eyes nearly disappearing into the folds of his face.

"Take whatever, for free?" Ethan asked, half joking.

"Take whatever, no need for money!" Master Roger replied without hesitation, his tone entirely sincere.

"Really?" Ethan blinked, genuinely surprised.

"Of course! When has this old man ever lied?" Roger puffed out his chest proudly, then abruptly paused. His expression shifted. "That day, I merely…"

He cleared his throat, then narrowed his eyes with unmistakable satisfaction.

"From now on, all of my apprentice's expenses will be your responsibility."

He finished with a smug squint, as if delivering the final blow in a long-planned scheme.

Ethan's eyes widened.

"Why?"

He knew better than anyone how expensive it was to raise a specialized crafter. The Mad Engineer was living proof, a walking money pit that devoured resources without mercy. Even if funds would no longer be an issue once Amber Zane returned, why should he be the one footing the bill?

"Why?" Master Roger snapped back, glaring at him. "You ask why? Who do you think benefits when my apprentice grows up?"

The answer hit instantly.

Ethan slumped, all the air leaking out of him like a punctured balloon.

He had just instructed Celia to get ImOnlyThreeYearsOld signed onto a lifetime contract, fully intending to secure a long-term asset for himself. He had assumed he was getting a skilled laborer at a bargain.

Too optimistic.

This old fox had seen straight through him.

Still, as the frustration settled, another thought quietly surfaced in Ethan's mind.

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