“Ugh, I never want to eat any fungus again,” Thera said as they got out the next day, the main base of every meal they ordered having been too much, even if most of it had ended up packed away after just a few bites. “This place needs a bit more variety to it.”

  “I mean, we are underground. It’s not like vegetables are going to grow down here, and there’s not much room for livestock either.”

  “Sure, but trade exists! This is a gate city, they can bring in as much meat and vegetables as they can manage!”

  “Ha, okay, yeah, but it wasn’t like it was bad either though, was it? I liked it all at least; it’s a shame we won’t be here while any markets are open. I’d love to see what sort of selection they might have.”

  “Okay, it wasn’t bad, but I still need something different. It was just too much.”

  Ben laughed, having never seen a weakness for mushrooms or other fungi from Thera when she’d eat his cooking, but he supposed the quantity really had been a bit much in the end. Dozens of meals across the three restaurants they’d been to had certainly been focused on what seemed like local cuisine, with only bits of each dish clearly having been imported through the gate.

  Still, when they finished up there that day they’d be off to their last stop with different meals and options waiting for them and already knowing what they needed to do, they didn’t wait, starting at the closest cave wall to them to begin what was going to be a very long tour.

  In essence, there were three parts to what they’d be doing. Killing demons, making repairs, and adding defenses to prevent more demons from coming through, to whatever extent they could and all of that they worked to accomplish in three distinct ways.

  Thera, with her life sense, searched for any distinct masses within her range that were outside of Ben’s connect and used a directed charm spell, specialized for those monsters to lure them over, if that was what they were. Once close enough for Ben to read any drawn creature’s mind, he would confirm that it was a demon before one of them would warp the stone it was digging through to crush and kill it.

  When that was done, Ben would determine the best way to repair the damage it had done going to them, along with any damage that was already there from previous demons and fed the instructions directly into Thera’s mind, letting her handle the bulk of that while he focused on the final thing and tried to make it harder for any future demons to come through and attack.

  With the solution there being simple, even if it was expensive mana-wise as he decided to essentially brute force it, using his material sense in tandem with Thera’s earth sense to feel as far out from the settlement as he could and used his magic to create miniscule gaps in the stone, slowly building up a barrier of orichalcum around it.

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  As thin as foil, given that magic material’s property of only being able to be shaped by magic, there was no concern about a physical force breaking through from something like pressure alone. It wouldn’t be a perfect solution, any demon with the right magics would be able to get through without issue, but there really was no perfect option and it would at least make it far harder for anything without the right powers to find their way in, reducing how much more damage could be done to the city in the next few months.

  Of course, just because he was only materializing it as a thin foil didn’t mean the task wasn’t mana-intense. As much as his mana pool had grown with all of his awakenings, he was trying to cover an entire city; it was never going to be cheap or easy. He managed the cost as best he could, but as the hours wore on while he moved, he had no choice but to take from Thera from time to time to deal with it, leaving a complicated thought running through his head.

  I went from less than ninety to almost fifty thousand, and I’m still finding ways to spend all of it.

  There really never would be such a thing as enough mana when the main way he would use it was the most costly way it was possible to do so but as dull as the work was, they were slowly getting through it. Having to go over the whole of a city was no small thing, but once they found their groove, Thera began moving them with her magic to speed it up until finally, they were nearly done.

  Morning had turned to late evening by then, but they still couldn’t say they were finished when there was one last thing to do.

  One last, slightly more dangerous thing. It’s fine, we’ve got this.

  To make sure no demons had managed to slip into the vicinity while they were working in any way, moving through the walls that hadn’t yet been sealed off, the two of them went around the whole city again, using a far broader range for Thera’s charm to lure any demons than the more controlled way that they had been doing at first, waiting to lure any stragglers out and getting three they missed in their first pass through, the demons each exploding out of the walls to get to Thera, making the other civilians in the area jump from it by the time it was already dealt with. Three demons were nothing to either of them at that point, easily dispatched with a mere flicker of mana before the new damage they’d created was undone and the two could finally say that stop was completed.

  “Alright, the ceiling isn’t going to come down on anyone living here, there shouldn’t be any more burrowing demons nearby, and there probably won’t be any making it through for at least a little while to come. That sucked, but we’re done.”

  “It really wasn’t that bad.”

  “No, but it was boring. Come on, let’s tell the guild master that we finished and rub it in his stupid face that we’ve completely repaired their cave system.”

  “You really just ran all of this off of spite, huh?”

  “No… maybe. Doesn’t matter. What does is how we’re going to explain how we added a bit of demon suppression. If word gets out that these walls are full of orichalcum now, it might be some of the city’s own residents burrowing through them next.”

  “Just give the guild master’s head a look. If it doesn’t seem like he’s the sort to try and take advantage of that or let it on to anyone else, then he can worry about it being found eventually.”

  “Alright, sounds like a plan to me.”

  Which means only one more settlement to build after this, along with getting back to some sweet, sweet sunlight.