Little Known Fact: Coolidge spent the last three years of his Presidency constructing a 15-level mega-dungeon under the White House, where he eventually hoped to hide in the event that he won another term. Many eyebrows were raised when the POTUS personally requested 15,000 H1-B work permits for a mix of goblins and kobolds with a smattering of bugbear, orc and troll slavemasters. Public dismay grew when Coolidge began openly referring to his Secret Service bodyguards as 'Men-At-Arms' or 'Zero-Level Normal Men' in his last State of the Union address. Eventually, on the evening of January 12th, 1928, Coolidge, heading the weekly Cabinet meeting, announced his eleventy-first birthday and abruptly disappeared in a puff of strangely acidic greenish-orange smoke and has never been seen or heard from since. For the first couple of months the White House got a regular influx of multi-racial parties of 5 to 8 "security experts" who sought to descend into the tunnels beneath the White House to find the 'Mad POTUS'. Most spent a day or so striding the halls of the Presidential home asking everyone if they knew any rumors before walking through the back door in the kitchen leading to the first level of the dungeons and likewise disappearing for good. Some latter-day Coolidge-experts point to rumors of tunnels connecting all the Wal-marts in America as proof that the Mad POTUS is still alive and adding new levels.
In recent years, some house Republicans have begun to claim the US could balance the Federal budget by aggressively seizing Coolidge's treasure chests (or anyone bearing monetary evidence of them) while others advocate a more hands-off approach to allocating experience points. Democrats remain skeptical, claiming no apparent "trickle-down" benefits from adventurers spending gold coin in the marketplace on the overall welfare of the average American working-man.
Indeed, the town of Washington D.C., which still provides services for a dwindling number of adventuring parties has begun to strain under the weight of an increasingly unwieldy Gold Piece Standard that contributes significantly to inflation in the prices of common consumer goods as varied as hard rations, iron pitons, high hard boots, 10' poles and sprigs of wolfsbane. Crime and other social ills have skyrocketed. What was once 'Brother, can you spare a copper piece?' has become 'Up against the wall motherfucker! Give me all your gold and platinum, spellbooks and +2 weapons and above, I've got encumbrance limits!'
Comments