Deciding The Policy And Allocating Tasks.

The following morning, a chorus of boisterous voices woke me up.

“Yawn… What’s going on?”

Opening my eyes, I shifted into a sitting position as quietly as humanly possible. Ever since Yoru and Kuu started curling up tightly against both of my flanks the exact fraction of a second I climbed into bed, avoiding sudden movements had become a completely unconscious, hard-coded habit of mine.

Rubbing the sleep from my eyes, I gently patted the backs of the two little entities, who were still completely balled up and dead to the world. For some cryptic reason, executing this specific routine ensured they would roll out of bed smoothly without throwing a massive tantrum.

Evaluating my memory of last night’s boisterous festivities, it appeared we had simply collapsed and indulged in a group slumber party right across the Goblin settlement’s central plaza. Scattered all around the perimeter of the bone-hearth were the familiar faces of my party members intersecting with clusters of snoring goblins.

Suddenly, a barrage of high-volume shouts vibrated loops through the air nearby once more. The sound vectors explicitly indicated the commotion was unfolding right outside the main gates, where a massive influx of people seemed to be pressing against the perimeter. I could hear high-pitched, desperate pleas demanding immediate entry, systematically answered by the mocking, boisterous laughter of the goblin gatekeepers.

“Ugh, shut up! What’s with all the damn noise?!”

“Yawn… Seriously, what is it this time?…”

Thoroughly disrupted by the chaotic racket, Heimo and Mia rolled over and opened their eyes as well. The exact fraction of a second our voices carried across the camp, the shouts echoing from the other side of the wooden palisade underwent a massive spike in volume.

“Oh! He’s actually alive!”

“How is Sensei-sama?! Is Sensei-sama safe?!”

It appeared the crowd outside had explicitly targeted me for a direct audience.

As I straightened my spine to stand up, Paula smoothly slid over to assume my positioning beside the two sleeping beast-girls. While she had clearly broken her slumber ahead of me, her morning vanity loop wasn’t entirely finished yet, leaving her long hair slightly disheveled. Noticing my gaze anchored on her, the beautiful brown-skinned woman let a faint blush creep across her cheeks—yet she refrained from vocalizing a single word, opting instead to gently soothe Yoru and Kuu’s heads to keep them from stirring.

“Thank you, Paula. I’m leaving their parameters to you.”

“Yes, My Lord. Leave everything to me.”

Briskly guiding my steps toward the gates, I peeked through the structural gaps of the timber doors and successfully verified the identities of several familiar villagers. The exact same realization clicked on their end; their eyes went comprehensively wide before a massive wave of cheers erupted down the line.

“Hooray! Sensei-sama is completely unharmed!”

“Oh, thank goodness… thank the heavens, seriously…”

Hearing their voices actively cracking with tears made it exceptionally difficult to enforce a strict administrative reprimand.

The moment I stepped past the threshold of the gate, the entire vanguard of village men dropped to their knees simultaneously to display their absolute devotion. The platoon was comprised of roughly ten individuals, every single unit meticulously outfitted with proper armaments and gear. Furthermore, a few select villagers had even strapped on the colossal back-baskets typically reserved strictly for high-yield harvesting operations.

“My apologies. It appears I accidentally triggered a massive wave of security anxieties across the community.”

“As long as your frame has suffered zero structural injuries, that is all that matters, Sensei-sama.”

“Man… the sudden relief completely drained my stamina loops. My legs have zero power left to stand…”

Because our party had flatly failed to return to the surface world yesterday evening, the local demographic had succumbed to sheer panic, organizing a high-intensity search party to march straight into the dungeon. The vanguard was largely anchored by the village youth alliance, supplemented by a few select units proficient with bows.

“If any disaster ever compromised Sensei-sama, our entire village would meet its absolute end-of-service threshold.”

“Honestly, my mind was in such a state of terror that my daily labor efficiency dropped straight to zero. Ahh, I am comprehensively grateful to the heavens that you are alive…”

“For the time being, let’s migrate this conversation inside the perimeter,” I suggested.

Reaching into my inventory interface, I pulled out a fresh batch of Goblin Amulets and distributed them one by one to the search party. I had previously issued a rigid security directive instructing the gatekeepers to enforce an absolute block against any first-time human units lacking this token. While our community loops hadn’t reached a phase where intrusion was a major threat, establishing this protocol early was mandatory to safeguard our long-term trajectory.

Filing into the settlement in a single-file line, the villagers’ eyes sparked with an immense volume of fascination as they scanned the environment, thoroughly astonished by the scale of the architecture.

“Whoa… this layout is incredible…”

“Yeah, the craftsmanship is far too grand. It’s completely blindsiding, honestly.”

“Heh-heh~! Pretty spectacular, right?! This is what a textbook Gob-chi village looks like!” Mia boasted.

“Yo! What on earth brings you lot barging into my sector first thing in the morning?!” Heimo barked, stepping forward to greet them alongside Mia.

Confronted by these highly familiar faces, the villagers’ features finally softened into a wave of profound relief. Seeing their own kind thriving inside the dungeon clearly stabilized their comfort metrics.

“Tell me… exactly whose administrative approval did you secure to organize a deployment to these coordinates?”

The exact fraction of a second the Village Chief’s voice cut through the air—perfectly calm, yet laced with an ironclad, rigid severity—the villagers’ relaxed expressions froze entirely. As the platoon collectively ducked their heads to evade his gaze, the Chief smoothly pressed the advantage.

“If my memory serves me right, navigating into the subterranean labyrinth without explicit authorization from Nino-sama is strictly prohibited by our community bylaws.”

“B-But, Chief!…”

“None of you had returned to the surface, so we calculated that a cataclysmic anomaly had guaranteed wiped out the party!…”

“Allowing your reckless, independent calculations to dictate your movements is the absolute fastest way to trigger a fatal operational failure. Have your systems completely forgotten exactly how hazardous the environmental data of this facility is?”

The Chief’s tactical argument was entirely flawless. However, considering our party had inflicted an immense volume of unneeded psychological stress upon them, a significant chunk of the administrative blame rested squarely on my shoulders. Right as I prepared to step in as a mediator to suppress his wrath, Paula smoothly pushed herself up to a standing position.

Her hair was already perfectly locked down, restoring her flawless, stunning aesthetic to its standard parameters. However, the seductive, playful smirk she usually sported had entirely vanished from her lips.

“My-my, how do you intend to resolve this administrative breach, Paula-sama?” the Chief inquired, throwing a brief glance her way.

“Let’s see… since they explicitly violated our ironclad rules, we have absolutely zero choice but to map an appropriate punitive measure onto their profiles.”

Faced with her completely cold, merciless words, the village youth turned comprehensively pale all at once. Intentionally maintaining a brief, dramatic pause to let the tension simmer, the beautiful woman subtly tilted the corner of her lips upward before shifting her gaze straight to my coordinates.

“However… given that their behavioral vectors were entirely driven by a desire to safeguard their Master, unthinkingly brushing aside their loyalty would be highly non-serving. Let us scale down the payload to a relatively mild threshold. …Suppose we sentence them to a mandatory stretch of hard labor right here within the facility? What are your directional orders regarding this configuration, My Lord?”

“Yeah, I calculate that protocol fits our objectives perfectly.”

“We are comprehensively grateful for your overwhelming benevolence and generous handling, My Lord. Well now, everyone, you should count your absolute blessings,” Paula purred smoothly.

“T-Thank you so much! Thank you, Sensei-sama!”

“Ahh, you truly possess an exceptionally merciful heart!”

What an absolute, orchestrated farce, I mused. It was glaringly obvious that Paula and the Chief had flawlessly retained all the data from our midnight planning loops regarding our future expansion targets.

“Alright, let’s get straight to it and systematically allocate the labor tasks.”