The old man chuckled at him, “You don’t have to try hiding from me, boy. I was the same way after finding my daughter…” Bruce paused at this point, allowing his own mask to fade, bringing out a look of hate and self-loathing.

He quickly switched back to the bubbly and carefree manner that he usually showed. “We all have a past, and we all have our own quirks. You can be yourself with me.” The man said.

Geth’s impression of him rose a bit, he could see the man’s sorrow from losing his daughter. He could also see that the man hated himself, presumably for not knowing his daughter’s intentions.

“Let me see that rock in your hands,” Bruce called. Geth walked over and handed it to him. The man then pulled out the rest of the water Geth had given him hours ago.

He poured the water on the rock slowly while wiping it off with his hands. After a few moments, a dull metallic sheen could be seen reflecting off of the stone.

“This is iron, boy. It’s raw. I’ll have to melt it down multiple times and pull the impurities from it, but I could likely get a golf ball’s size of workable iron from it.” He said.

Geth was quite surprised, the raw ore in question was the size of a small football. “So, it’s going to take a lot of digging to gather up enough to be useful, isn’t it?”

Bruce nodded, “That’s right, but once we get a team set up and teach them a bit, efficiency will increase. We can likely farm a few weapons worth a day, but it will take a while to smelt into something useable.” He laughed loudly. “You can just leave that to this old man.”

Geth looked at him for a few moments before nodding. “Then I’ll leave you to it. I’ll be heading out for a few days, I hope to see some progress when I return.” He patted the old man on the shoulder as he walked past him.

His current goals were to recruit the people he could trust, strengthen the Dungeon, and find seeds to bring back for the Farm. Since the other matters were settled, it was time to form a party and begin exploring.

Geth was a bit less stressed while heading back towards the Barracks. Now he needed to decide who would be best to bring with him on this trip.

They would need something close to a basic party formation. Though he had abilities for most situations, he was essentially just a tank. There was still a need for DPS. For now, he believed that he could handle the healing as long as they planned properly.

‘Filthy is an obvious choice, range DPS is a necessity. Zolis would be my next pick, but I’m not sure if she’ll want to leave the kids.’ He thought for a moment, then chuckled to himself. ‘Who am I kidding, she probably can’t wait for a break!’

‘The ideal party would be six members, with both ranged magic and physical DPS, a close-range heavy DPS, a tank, a healer, and someone who could act as an off-tank/DPS. The off-tank could be swapped depending on the situation.’

He was stroking his beard as he thought about what his old friends would have built themselves for. As he walked into the Barracks, he found that there were already some people waiting for him.

“What can we do to help?” It was Til speaking, standing beside Geth’s mother and three sisters.

Geth looked at them all for a moment before speaking. “I’ll be leaving shortly. Til, Bruce is going to need help with mining, we don’t have many men right now, so I’ll have to rely on you. Bruce will take care of smelting the ore that you harvest into ingots.”

He looked at his mom and sisters. “If any of you wish to mine with him, you can. Otherwise, one person will need to spend time washing and cleaning the mined ore. Someone will have to deliver the ore between the mine and the Smithy.”

“The other two of you can choose between helping in the mines or prepping the Farm area. Mom, when I get back I’m hoping to have seeds to plant and I hope that you’ll be in charge of the Farm. Even if you struggle with other jobs, you’ve always had a green thumb.”

“We will try to bring back as many cores as possible to distribute between the people staying here and the Dungeon itself. Even if you aren’t out fighting, we can’t have any low levels around while others are pushing into the upper realms. You’ll just be a liability.”

Everyone nodded in understanding, all of them headed towards the mines to see what they could do to help. Geth glanced at their backs in satisfaction, glad that they were willing to work. He had no doubts about Til, but the others were pretty spoiled.

He turned back and walked towards the house where Filthy and Jen were staying. Geth knocked on the door and waited patiently, not having to wait long before Filthy opened the door.

“Come on in, man. Let us know what we can do to help.” Filthy said.

This young man had also always been a hard worker. This was one of the reasons Geth never had any issues with him helping raise his oldest son. Geth stepped into the home and smiled at Jen, who was leaning back against the wall nursing the baby.

“I’ll keep this short,” Geth said. “You’ve always been better outdoors than I have and I could use someone to accompany myself and Zolis. We need to find a nearby place to hunt for meat.”

“On top of that, there are some folks I would like to find and recruit, and we need to clear some Dungeons to improve our current habitat.” He finished.

Filthy didn’t hesitate in his response.. “I’m glad you asked, it would be a bit stifling for me to stay around here.”