Cities in Chains

by Tao Wong

  “Ali, let’s get some messages out to some friends,” I say, looking at the Spirit. “And after that, I guess Kim and you should start briefing me about the city properly. Can’t rule it if I don’t understand it, and we might be in for the long haul.”

  Hours later, my head’s pounding from all the information fed to me. I wasn’t a business major or a politician or bureaucrat. But somehow, I was supposed to understand all of these things while running the city.

  In some cases, the System simplified what would have been significantly more complicated before its introduction. For example, transactions held by the Shop and transactions done by transferring Credits in the System were all tracked automatically. That made taxation simple, as I could tax individual sales and purchases within the town between Classers with a single adjustment in the core. Of course, then you ended up in the long, long discussion about consumption taxes versus income taxes versus… well, whatever. You get the picture.

  Right now, Kamloops is mostly a resource economy. Funds are generated from the farms or Gatherers and Hunters selling their loot. Of course, being a Dungeon World, the sheer amount of Mana in the surroundings speeds up growth and increases monster Levels in comparison to other worlds, so being a resource town isn’t a bad thing. However, as most undeveloped countries know, the real money isn’t in selling your resources—it’s in production and development. Turning those resources into Credits. In our case, that’s what Lana and Sam are tasked with jumpstarting. Until then, I have to deal with taking a hit on revenue as we divert sellable material to in-town crafters to Level them up.

  Furthermore, that means we have a lot of small transactions happening in the Shop as resource items are sold. The easiest way to generate more revenue would be to charge the tax rate when individuals sell, creating a basic income tax. It might miss a few outliers, but for the vast majority, that’d work.

  In Whitehorse, Roxley instituted a flat percentage charge on all transactions in the Shop, which actually impacted production Classes more than anyone else, due to their need to purchase additional products for their needs. That sounds bad at first glance, but it does mean that people are more likely to look into ways of building or developing technologies and secondary resource items in-town rather than purchasing them through the Shop. Which, I’m beginning to understand, is likely what Roxley intended.

  The world’s complicated, and only the foolish, ignorant, or those with an agenda would ever say otherwise. There are no simple answers to any of these problems, and even when I pop out to the Shop to get myself a quick, downloaded education, it’s not enough. Because sometimes, the question isn’t what’s best but what you’re trying to do.

  Right now, what we need is income and fast. I can’t afford to spend too much time on the long game, which is why I end up keeping a flat five percent tax rate on all transactions in the city. I even extended it to transactions between citizens in the town, ensuring the town gets their fair share. Of course, this was a reduction in the Shop tax rate from the initial twenty percent, so hopefully there aren’t too many complaints. Even though we desperately need funds, I have to think long-term as well, and that means helping the city grow.

  Next on our agenda was figuring out expenses. This was much simpler, since most items in the city were linked and run by the System. Of course, you could have the System auto-regenerate and fix all registered buildings and facilities, but one thing I’d realized after reading through the more in-depth menu was that this actually took Mana. Or more specifically, Mana regeneration. Across the city, Mana production and regeneration was actually tied to the amount of space a town controlled. So while Kamloops had managed to establish and even develop a higher percentage of System-integrated buildings, it actually produced less Mana than Whitehorse because of its smaller square footage. Not to mention it was situated at a lower level zone.

  Interestingly enough, buildings and the town itself seemed to generate less Mana than I’d expected. Compared to the Mana regeneration of an individual, it was paltry. It was only at this level, where I was looking at the Mana generation of a whole town, that it started showing up at all. With Kim’s help, I could turn off the default allocation of Mana for individual buildings, letting me store up more. For now though, I left it alone since I had no idea what we needed it for.

  Outside of Mana expenses, there were Credit expenses. Since we didn’t have to pay for maintenance for the most part—outside of simpler services like cleaning for non-System-upgraded buildings—payroll was the major ongoing expense I could expect. In this case, I actually didn’t have any since I hadn’t hired anyone and everyone previously hired was either a Serf—now freed and let go—or a Sect member who had fled. On the other hand, that meant I’d have to hire again soon. I mentally sacrifice Lana to this task with a smile before finishing the sparse file.

  “What’s next?” I say.

  “ALLOCATION OF ASSETS.”

  I grunt, staring at the dire blue words before nodding. Kim flashes up the list of buildings I currently own after kicking out the Sect.

  Commercial: 4 (City Center, Armory, 2 x Workshop)

  Residential: 178 Individual Residences, 24 Apartment Buildings

  Industrial: 7 Farmland, 3 Alchemical Laboratories

  Military: 14 Sentry Towers, 1 Shield Generator, External Minefield, Bionetwork Sensor Grid

  There used to be one more line here—one for Serfs—but now it’s gone. Obviously I’d dismissed all the Serfs and their debts, at least as far as it concerned me. If the Sect caught them within the next month, they’d revert to being Serfs, but after that, they’d be fine. It was, surprisingly, a decent Galactic law and said some interesting things about politics at the Galactic level.

  Scanning over the list, I looked to see if any of these buildings had been forcibly taken by the Sect, “purchased,” or taken as “collateral” for loans that would eventually force their owners into debt. There were a few, very few, lucky individuals who weren’t Serfs but whom I now owned their property because the initial loan was to the Sect. Since the property was registered to the town ownership, I actually owned it, but a few quick swipes transferred ownership back to them. This way, at least they owned the property they’d been paying the mortgage for.

  The question now, and it was relatively urgent to answer, was what to do with the buildings that had been taken or had been owned by others before the System. In the second case, I was leaning toward saying “tough.” The world had changed—all old property ties were gone, at least in my view. However, memories of a grenade, a shop, and undying anger came to mind. Whatever my personal feelings on the matter, it was also true that we couldn’t afford internal strife—especially the violent kind—while the Sect was still a threat.

  The smart thing to do is to leave things as they are, perhaps reducing the rent charged. Currently, the rent charged on each of the apartments and buildings is outrageous, specifically geared toward keeping Serfs and other lendees in perpetual poverty. For obvious reasons, I have no desire to do that, but at the same time, the rent is a major revenue source. One alteration I can make is to charge a daily rental fee rather than a monthly one, with the provision that individuals can pay in advance. That would give us more regular income rather than sudden surges. I hope.

  Of course, it isn’t exactly fair. Or nice. Or right. But…

  I sigh, staring at Ali. “This… did they all have to make decisions like this?”

  “All?”

  “Roxley. The city, the general, council. Rulers.”

  “Yes. If you think this is bad, wait till you see what bit boy has up next for you.”

  “Kim?”

  “KAMLOOPS REQUIRES SOLIDICATION OF ITS RULE OF LAW.”

  “Shoot me now,” I say with resolution.

  Having spent enough time with Angela, the ex-RCMP member in Whitehorse, I know how complicated the entire matter is. It isn’t as simple as taking our old laws and adding them back to our lives. For one thing, were we willi
ng to set up the full court of laws with judges, juries, and lawyers? Why? A simple purchase from the System could verify the truth of a matter. Never mind the fact that certain Classes have Skills that can divine the truth even without using the System Shop. But if we came to rely on a single individual, did we then create a single point of failure—of corruption?

  Property crime was less of an issue, though theft of items continued to be a concern. Of course, it only cost a little additional to “register” items with the System, though few Adventurers bothered. After all, with the increasing Levels, what equipment was useful now might be outdated within a few months. Why bother spending the money then? As such, item theft could be considered a “minor” crime these days, since anything truly expensive would be registered, making it much more difficult to sell the item.

  Then you had violent crimes, which needed to be redefined. Since nearly everything outside of actual death was temporary, breaking someone’s nose or arm or ribs was a lot less dangerous than before. It was nearly impossible to kill someone by accident these days. Of course, you didn’t want to encourage violence either—after all, if you did, combat Classers would trample production Classers. And while that might make certain juvenile individuals revel in their “strength,” it did nothing for the community. After all, if all your goods could be exhorted out of you, why would you put in any effort?

  I sigh, staring at the information, and get down to it. Luckily, since this is directly related to the town, I can use the town’s Credits to purchase information from the System, giving me detailed laws from other settlements that we could base ours off. In the end though, what I want is something simple and easy. I’ll leave it to the professionals to develop the complicated bits. My laws basically ran down to—don’t be a dick. If you are, don’t expect us to back you up.

  As for the buildings, I figure I’ll lower the rent and leave them in my care for now. Procrastination might not be a good thing, but it does mean I don’t have to deal with the problem right this second.

  Ingrid never makes it back that night. That’s okay. What I have planned for her is better said alone. When I finally find her, she’s seated in an abandoned office building, nursing a bottle of alcohol in the remnants of a window overlooking the city. I sit next to her, fishing a bottle of whisky from storage to join her in a bout of silent drinking.

  “Not going to bitch me out?” Ingrid asks eventually, noting the lack of blunt Spirit next to me.

  “No.” I shrug and sip on the drink. “Always been your call on what you want to do.”

  “Is not wanting to play hero that wrong?” Ingrid says testily. “What have these people ever done for me? Or you?”

  “Why the change of heart?”

  “Amazing, the things you overhear when no one notices,” Ingrid says cryptically.

  I wait for the teenager to add more. While we sit in silence, I take a moment to regard the First Nation woman and the bitterness that creeps across her face. I wonder what she overheard, what careless words were uttered. God knows, being a lipreader means that I’ve picked up more than one casual insult spoken when they thought I wouldn’t notice. The people here, they’re the same ones who were content to live in their own little bubbles and declare that they were “good” or “right” because they never did anything actively wrong pre-System. Just content to let the evils of the world happen because they weren’t actively taking part in it. I doubt much of that has changed and so, I understood her feelings.

  “But it’s not enough,” I whisper to myself and smile crookedly when she shoots me a puzzled look. “I don’t care what they did or didn’t do. Or if it’s right or wrong to give them back a little of their own medicine. Because I’m not looking to be them. It’s easy to be just about good enough, to be mediocre and normal.

  “The world ended, Ingrid. We had a damn apocalypse. If there’s ever been a good reason to change, I figure that’s it. I won’t, I can’t go back to just getting by, doing just enough to live. I tried that once, and all I did was mark off the days till I died. Now we’re here and I’m still alive and everyone and everything we knew is dead. So yeah, I’ll play at being a hero and doing the right thing, because I’ve tried the other way.”

  “Not everyone.” Ingrid’s lips twist slightly, and she tilts her head as she speaks. “You could play at being a villain.”

  “Meh. Villains are boring.” I say mockingly, “Oooh, look at me. I’m bad. I’m evil. Watch me stomp on a baby’s head because that’s so edgy.”

  Ingrid snorts at my words and the false face I put on.

  “So you in?”

  She takes a swig from her bottle, making a face. “Whatever. I don’t have anything better right now. But I’m not wearing tights.”

  “How about some leather?” I waggle my eyebrows and wince as she punches my arm, chuckling slightly. “But seriously, we need your skills. They’re going to be sending people at us, and we’re going to need as much information as we can get.”

  “You want me to spy on them?” Ingrid says flatly, and I nod. “Why don’t you just buy the information?”

  “I have some basics. The rest was too expensive. Spread around North America are four high-level Advanced Classes, fourteen mid-level Advanced Classes, seven low-level Advanced Classes, and just over two hundred Basic Class Sect members. Most of them are locked in combat around Seattle at the moment. The ones in BC are their holding force, the people in charge of keeping things running,” I say, explaining things simply to her.

  “For all that, the System can’t tell the future, so figuring out what they’re going to do isn’t something it can tell us. Guesses, probabilities, sure. But if you sneak in, look around, maybe ask a few questions…” I shrug. “Maybe you can figure it out. And either way, we’re going to have to take those cities later. It’d get pretty expensive if I just kept buying information. That bit of information already cost us two hundred thousand Credits.”

  “Really? You took one city and now you’re looking at more? Getting a bit of a big head, are you?”

  “Might as well do it right.”

  Ingrid laughs softly, tipping her bottle upward and draining it before she nods. “I’ll play spy for you. Until I get bored. Or get a better offer.” She snags my bottle and leans forward, flipping off the ledge into the darkness below.

  “My bottle!” I grumble softly, her dot disappearing from my map. That went better than expected.

  Chapter 10

  Breakfast. The most important meal of the day. Whether or not it matters for our altered bodies, it certainly helps as a ritualized meeting place for the team. Today, it’s Sam’s turn to cook, which means we have gruel, gruel, and bacon. At least there’s enough.

  “Ingrid’s not here,” Mikito says, dumping some chopped ginger into her gruel.

  “I spoke with her last night. She’s scouting,” I say unconcernedly. No point hiding this information from my team. It isn’t even too much a concern about need-to-know issues since anyone who really wants this information can buy it from the Shop. Though I am curious how Ingrid’s Skills affect that option. Something to ask Ali about later.

  “Huh,” Ali says. “Figured she’d have left.”

  “No thanks to you,” Lana says, waving a finger at Ali.

  Once the Spirit ducks his head, Lana takes the time to update us on her progress yesterday. The others follow suit, including me. I even take a moment to introduce Kim, who is extremely reluctant to even say hi. Everyone takes the introduction of the AI with aplomb—just another post-System moment.

  “Sounds like most of you have things well in hand,” I say as we stare at the empty pot. Bland as gruel might be, it was still decent fuel for the day. “Mikito, if you’ve got teams that are workable, let’s get them headed north to the dungeon. Get your best team on clearing it. If it manages to replicate, we’ll send another team in till the Mana pool is cleared. We’ll also want scouting teams moving to the communities. I know the Sect might have swept the place befo
re, but now that they’re out of power, we might be able to convince them to join us. Lana, I’ve got the basics up and running, but I want you to keep an eye out for talent. Someone’s going to have to run the city, preferably someones.”

  “Benjamin?” Lana says with a raised eyebrow.

  I raise my hand horizontally and waggle it. “Let’s not rush this.”

  “I’ll look around. But what are you going to do?”

  “The city needs money and I need more Levels,” I say, grimacing. “If I could hit Level 40…” I shake my head and push aside my regret. “There’s a National Park close by, so the zone should be decent. Might even have a dungeon or two.”

  “Har. So you’ve got us all working and you’re off having fun,” Sam says, waving the last stick of crispy bacon.

  “Well, yes.” I could explain how growing my strength means growing the strength of the city and our team, of how I can hunt, fight, and capture faster than anyone here, bringing in a significant amount of Credits. I could even note that I spent the entire day yesterday stuck doing paperwork, but really, I know he’s mostly teasing me.

  “Leave your drones, will you?” Sam follows up. “I want to study them.”

  “And John, can you have Kim stay in the city? She can be useful to me,” Lana says. “If you’re willing to let me work with her on assigning tasks.”

  “It’s an it,” Ali corrects before I can reply.

  “THE SENTIENT FORCE IS CORRECT. SURPISNGLY.”

  “Enough, you two,” I growl softly. “Kim, can you download yourself into the settlement’s ummm… core?”

  “YES.”

  “Good. Do that and follow Lana’s orders,” I say, settling that quickly.