Planning the Home Renovation

“Are you going to get right to it now, or...?”

Putting down her finished bowl of breakfast stew, Krvavy turns to Thea. “Kind of? But not really. This isn’t something that I can just do in a day, so I figured that we should plan it out first. I don’t want to have to start over halfway through because I’ve changed my mind.”

“Well then, what do you have planned?” Thea asks, before her voice gets tinged with derision. “Will we have an actual home, or will it still be... like this?”

Krvavy raises an eyebrow at her little blonde brat. When the barbarian first brought up the idea of renovating this place she told her girls what she wanted to add in: windows, a better bed, a fireplace instead of the campfire, a kitchen, and a bathroom. That sounds like an actual house, so what is Thea playing at...? “What do you have in mind?”

“You must add walls, doors, and a proper floor too!” The noble brat forcibly demands. “I can not continue to live in a simple cave!”

“Of course!” Krvavy almost laughs out. “What, did you think I was just going to slap some things down and call it a home~? No, no, this place will be nice and cozy when I’m done with it. Well, I do want ceilings that are tall enough that I can’t even touch them when I jump, and I’m not sure if that counts as cozy... But still, this will be a proper home.”

Thea huffs out indignantly. “I demand that you also build a walk in wardrobe and a balcony overlooking the grotto!”

“What do you want a wardrobe for? It isn’t like you have any clothes~!” The barbarian can’t resist teasing the girl, even though she is beginning to get on Krvavy’s nerves.

“And who is responsible for that?” Thea coldly responds. “You agreed to start treating me better, and I refuse to remain naked for the rest of my life. If your cold lizard heart does not care about that, then need I remind you how much you seem to enjoy seeing me in my underclothes? I will require a place to store them, at the very least.”

“Everything okay?” Krvavy questions, getting a little concerned with how Thea is acting. “You are being rather... confrontational.”

“Confrontational!?” Thea huffs out indignantly. “You are discussing our future, so I must put my foot down to assure that you do not build us a simple rocky hovel! I require certain amenities, amenities that I once had before you meddled with my life!”

Krvavy narrows her eyes as she stares at her impudent brat. “And you think rudely making demands is ‘putting your foot down’? If you want a closet, then ask nicely.”

The noble brat rolls her eyes. “Oh mighty dragon, please build a place for me to store clothes that will replace the ones that you destroyed.”

“No.”

“WHAT!? Why not!?” Thea angrily sputters out.

“If you aren’t going to even try being nice, then I don’t see why I’d bother building something for you.” Krvavy coldly responds.

“UGH! Fine!” The bratty noble makes some annoyed noises as she gathers herself, closing her eyes and taking a deep breath. Opening her eyes back up, Thea gazes pleadingly up at the barbarian. “Oh please will you build me a wardrobe large enough to walk inside of, as if it were its own room?”

Krvavy crosses her arms. “That is better. But it was clearly an act. Be more sincere.”

Thea’s pleasant façade cracks away in an instant. “What, was that not good enough for you!? Savage bitch! I am asking such a small and minor thing of you! I am bending to your demands to humiliate myself! And yet you still deny me!? Do you expect me to beg?! Do you want me to prostrate myself before you and kiss your feet?! Degenerate beast!”

The barbarian leans forwards towards the noble brat, who defiantly holds her ground. “I don’t mind you having a bit of an attitude or being feisty, but I won’t tolerate you acting like a complete bitch.” She forcibly hisses out. “So all I ask is for you to stop putting up acts and to just be sincere.”

Thea quivers in rage, just barely holding back whatever angry response she has. The two remain staring at each other, neither willing to back down. As seconds become uncomfortable minutes, Thea’s resolve crumbles. Breaking eye contact and turning her head to the side, the noble brat speaks out in a fairly timid tone. “P-please? Can you... do that for me?”

Krvavy waits a few moments before responding, taking the chance to calm herself down. She is clearly being a bit harsh on the noble girl, seeing as how Thea brought out some actual insults. But she needs the little brat to be honest with her. If the girl had just asked for a walk in closet then Krvavy would have agreed to make one. But Thea decided to get on Krvavy’s nerves by demanding one, and then had the audacity to act all sickly sweet and innocent...

With a slight sigh, Krvavy reaches out and pats her blonde brat’s head. “Alright, you can have a closet. Just don’t be a bitch and don’t act so fake.”

Thea huffs out, still slightly upset, but keeps her temper under control. “Thank you.” She tersely responds, still looking away.

“What about you?” Krvavy asks, turning her attention to Beryl. “Have any requests for our home?”

The tanned wood elf had been sitting off to the side during that whole exchange, simply listening on as she adds some finishing touches to the deerskin loincloth she is making for Krvavy.

Placing down her thin bone needle, Beryl glances up at the barbarian. “Ah’m good wit’ whatever ya decide on, though Ah would appreciate havin’ a place ta grow a few little plants. Nothin’ big, just a few pots so Ah can get some fresh herbs without havin’ ta walk down ta the garden each time.”

“Sure, I’ll see what I can do.” Krvavy tells her elf with a nod. “Though we might have a bit of issue regarding space... There are a lot of things I want to add to our home, but this platform just isn’t big enough to fit all of them. So I’ll need to dig into the cave wall, which will take a lot of time. We’ll be limited by how fast my mana regens. Or really, how slowly it does.”

“Could you not just use your magic to carve out chunks and toss them off the edge, or something?” Thea asks with an unpleasant tone in her voice. “You don’t need to magic away the whole rock.”

Krvavy opens her mouth to reprimand her brat for talking down to her, but stops herself. “That... isn’t a bad idea actually...” The barbarian muses. “And if I can re-fuse the stone back together somewhere else, then building walls will also be pretty quick... But that does mean I’ll have to move a bunch of bricks around, as I can’t just toss them down into the grotto...”

“Well,” She continues with a shrug, “thanks for the idea, Thea. Now I guess we should start actually planning what will be where... So, the bedroom will be here on this platform with all the windows, more looking out towards the grotto than the darker part of the cave. Which means directly beside it, on the path down towards the hot springs, would be a good sport for the closet and a... bathroom... Hmm...”

“Is everythin’ alright, my dearest love?” Beryl speaks up, questioning Krvavy’s hesitant tone.

“I’m not sure if I can even make a proper bathroom.” The barbarian admits.

“And what would you know of ‘proper’ lavatories?” Thea condescendingly asks.

“Alright, that’s enough.” Krvavy calmly states as she rises to her feet, grabbing the noble girl under the arms as she does so.

“Hey! Unhand me this instant!” Thea cries out as Krvavy lifts her into the air.

“Why are you being so moody today?” The barbarian blankly asks as Thea kicks the air and futilely struggles against her grip.

“Moody!? I am not moody!” The noble brat whines out.

“Then what’s your problem? I thought we were finally connecting.”

Thea crosses her arms as best she can while being lifted off the ground, before taking a deep breath to compose herself. “You may have unwittingly rescued me from a loveless political marriage to an old creep, but that alone is not enough to forgive the myriad other offences and humiliations you have laid upon me!”

“My dearest love,” Beryl speaks up in a fairly neutral tone, “Ah believe she may be upset about how loud Ah was last night. And how we left ‘er alone wit’ yer puppy.”

“That green-skinned savage would NOT LEAVE ME BE!” Thea cries out, immediately losing what little composure she had left. “She slobbered ALL OVER ME! And hearing all of the noises you were making just riled her up even more! She would not stop trying to violate me! FOR THE WHOLE NIGHT! GRINDING AND RUBBING HERSELF ACROSS EVERY BIT OF MY BODY SHE COULD GET AT!”

Krvavy glances over at Khalia, who is curled up in the bedding. She must be pretty tired to sleep peacefully through all this noise they’re making... Maybe Krvavy shouldn’t have spent the night down in the grotto with her elf... Not that she had the energy to climb all the way back up, but still.

“Can.. Can you put me back down now?” Thea sighs out in defeat, too exhausted to keep fighting.

“Are you going to behave yourself?” Krvavy asks, returning her gaze to the rather tired looking noble brat in her hands.

“Yes...” Thea grumbles out reluctantly.

Rather than just place the girl back down, Krvavy instead pulls her in for a hug and brings Thea into her lap as she sits back down.

“Now, back to what I was saying...” The barbarian ignores the quiet grumbling complaints of her noble girl. “The issue with making any sort of bathroom is the water. I don’t know how I’d get any up here. Well, I could divert the drinking water from–”

“Ah’m buildin’ my garden around tha’ stream.” Beryl idly interjects. “So Ah’d appreciate it if ya kept it flowin’ down inta the grotto.”

“Okay, I could redirect some of it over here,” Krvavy corrects, “but that water is cold. So any bathroom stuff will need to be lower than the hot springs.” Either that or Krvavy figures out how plumbing works. Being able to exit out of the game to look that up would be really helpful... “Well, as annoying as having to walk all the way down there would be, it is better than what we’re doing now...”

“What about the bed...?” Thea mumbles out questioningly, her voice slightly muffled by Krvavy’s chest. “You had said that you wanted a better one.”

“Oh yeah, the bed... I’m honestly not sure if that is something we can really improve right now.” The barbarian honestly admits. “Reshaping stone isn’t the most useful thing for making a nice spot to sleep. At least not if we want it to be comfortable.”

“If Ah may...” Beryl begins, placing down the nearly finished loincloth to focus fully on Krvavy. “Wit’ time, Ah should be able ta cultivate a soft moss ta use as a cushion fer our beddin’. It’ll be much more comfortable than wha’ we ‘ave now, and it should be fairly simple ta clean too: pouring a bucket o’ wa’er on it will wash most filth away, and if worse comes ta worst patches can be ripped off and regrown wit’ my magic.”

“Tha’ way ya can use yer stone sculptin’ magic ta make the shape o’ our bed.” The wood elf states, before furrowing her brow slightly. “Though it will take some time ta get the moss feelin’ right. There just aren’t any tha’ would be good fer tha’ sort o’ thing around here...”

That actually sounds pretty good to Krvavy, and it’ll let her make a bed that isn’t exactly normal in size or shape. Perfect for something four, or more, people will be sleeping on. Shame about having to wait for the moss though... Wait... Would the stuff growing in her respawn point work? “What about... elgian moss?”

“Elgian moss? Ya found some o’ tha’ all the way up here?! Tha’ll be perfect!” Beryl cheers out. “My dearest love, Ah’d appreciated if ya could show me where tha’ moss is later. But fer now ya can continue yer planning: Ah need ta finish off yer loincloth first. Ah’m so close ta bein’ done wit’ it.”

Krvavy nods. “Okay, so... Once we have a general idea of what we want and where it’ll be, we’ll need to actually mark out walls and doors and whatnot. Though maybe I should make sure the floor is all flattened first? Either way, we’re not quite there yet.”

The barbarian then clears her throat. “Alright. Where we are now will be the bedroom, with the fireplace in a wall over there, towards the storage platform. Which I kind of want to turn into a vault, with the path leading up to it walled off into a tunnel, but that is getting a bit ahead of myself. Next to the bedroom, towards the hot springs, we can have the bathroom or closet. We can just mark the area off and figure out how to deal with it later. Or just give Thea a massive closet.”

“And then on the other side of the fireplace I’d like to have a living room of some sorts. Just a nice place to sit around and maybe even eat. Though, thinking about it,” Krvavy muses, “I would like to have an actual dining room as well. One with lots of windows. But the only place where that would work is right here, on the part that juts out into the cave... But that is where our bedroom will be... Hmm... How do you both feel about having another floor beneath this one?”

“Ah don’t mind. As long as it isn’t too much work fer ya.” Beryl answers.

“Were you planning on making our home only a single story? That–” Thea questions in disbelief, before cutting herself off and taking a deep breath. “I would not complain about having a proper home with multiple stories to it.”

“Good, because that makes cramming all the rooms in a lot easier. And less crammed.” Krvavy states. “Though it will take a lot of time to dig out a second floor, even if I save mana by carrying bricks out. And I’ll need to make some stairs, maybe even smooth out the path up to here and make it less steep...”

Krvavy might be getting a little carried away with what she wants in this new home of hers. But she just can’t help herself. Leanna always had to live in small cramped spaces, so now that she has the chance to change that and live somewhere nicer with more room...

“Ahh... Whatever.” She shakes her head and moves Thea off of her lap, much to the noble girl’s annoyance. Not that Thea would admit to being annoyed by that, of course. “We can talk about this all we like, but it is just that: talk. We’re not really getting anywhere with this, so let’s get started.”

The barbarian rises to her feet and looks around her. This home of hers is really just a cave. The platform of stone is uneven and bumpy. The campfire is rough and crude. The pile of furs and sheets that they call a bed is, well, really just a pile of furs and sheets. But soon it’ll be different. It will be better. A home, all of her own.