Starred Tower: System Misinterpret Book One - A Post Apocalyptic Cultivation LitRPG

by Ryan DeBruyn

  In the end, I don’t plan to stay in Beach for longer than a month anyway. I think what really worries me is that they might have been able to help me in some other yet-unthought-of way. I continue to walk and dissect my choice but parked vehicles and crowds quickly draw my attention away.

  Market Street begins to take shape out of the twilight. Jacque had grudgingly pointed me in the right direction after he ‘graciously’ escorted me to the Star Bucks Guild front door. Literally just a point was all I got. Small storefronts with tarp awnings hang out into a pedestrian walkway. Many vehicles that I continue to marvel at are parked nearby.

  The closer I approach, the more the streetlights illuminate the diversity and liveliness of the area. Stalls stick out of the buildings’ lower levels, offering a quick bite of food or advertising the types of wares one might find farther inside. Well-dressed adventurers with new gear hail each other from all directions as merchants hawk wares or new equipment to them. People sit at outdoor tables in the late-fall night air, sipping drinks and eating in large groups. In fact, much of the noise and merriment comes from these areas as musicians play for a crowd of seemingly disinterested patrons.

  Lights hanging from the sides of buildings illuminate the area, and I realize that the Training Room amenities are everywhere inside the Suburb. It’s rather shocking to me, as I have only been told stories of these things. If nothing else, I would like one day to sit and enjoy a meal at one of these establishments.

  The security on the lane is a little more challenging to spot at first glance, but after a moment, I recognize a group of three wearing red armbands. Once I see the first, I notice several others patrolling the long and narrow space. They are coming into and out of my view, far into the distance. Just how long is the street?

  I shake my head and begin looking for merchants that might be willing to purchase the Leporid meat. Is my best bet the restaurants or the all-purpose stores?

  I take a casual glance at some of the food served by the first restaurant.

  Ratatoskr Nachos [Yellow]

  Quality: Fair

  Each plate I identify only furthers my belief that the restaurants won’t buy simple F-rank monster meat. The lowest quality I find gracing a table is D-rank stew, and its smell is mouth-watering while the quality is excellent—if I had money, I might even want to stop in and try some of it.

  The adventuring shops it is. I approach one of the hawkers shouting at nearby adventurers. He gives me a quick up-down before dismissing me and continuing to call to the bigger fish. I look at my far nicer clothing from Star Bucks and feel my eyebrows rise. What could be making this merchant dismiss me?

  “Excuse me, sir. I am looking to sell some monster meat and wonder if you would be interested?”

  “You deaf? I sell scribed charms to adventurers. Begone! Stop smelling up the place. Go sit in the moonlight and burn out your stench! No real customers will come by with a poor cultivator clogging up the place,” the surly man shouts at me. His volume makes me wonder if he has gone deaf from screaming all day and night. My cheeks start to flush and I can feel a bit of indignation rising from my stomach but I hastily move on, not wanting to cause a scene. Do I really smell that bad?

  I approach several others and receive similar treatment. I’m just starting to believe that no one will buy the meat when I notice that the shops’ quality seems to be lowering as I travel farther into the center of the area. The restaurant I just passed didn’t have a single C-quality meal and even had multiple E-rank meals on tables. Considering I can make that rank of food and even recognize F-rank creatures in the dishes’ names, I think I might have found the proper section.

  Studying the restaurant and its patrons more closely, I even notice that the quality of clothing and armor on nearby adventurers has taken a bit of a downturn. Still, they’re miles ahead of my borrowed clothes.

  I approach the restaurant kitchen, which is open to the front of the building through a large countered window, and call to one of the cooks I can see slaving over the stove.

  “Would you be interested in purchasing F-rank monster meat?”

  “We buy in the mornings and only from the market! Now scram and let me get back to my work,” the cook barks in a commanding voice without looking up. I glance behind me and see a few patrons waving hands under noses. I grimace, but need a bit more information still. . .

  “Sorry to ask a follow-up,” I say and then hurriedly add, “but where is this market?” The cook glances up for a moment, and her face softens ever so slightly upon seeing me.

  “Keep walking. It’s at the center of the square, boy. Tell ‘em Hue sentcha,” she responds with a wave of her hand. Whatever made her change her mind about answering wasn’t enough to stop her from shooing the distraction away, it seems.

  I nod in thanks and then turn to continue my journey. I don’t bother stopping at any other shops, knowing that there is a market specializing in monster meats. I do look up at the moon and stars and can’t help but wish to be cultivating right now. There are tales that the strongest humans can cultivate as they move, but I am clearly not at that level yet.

  The fact that I can feel a slight pressure on my circulatory system also tells me that I am very near my limit with two hundred drops of qi, anyway. That number will likely increase as I finish cleaning out all the gunk from my system, but right now, I have no idea how long that will take. Perhaps I can find my fill point tomorrow if I can find a new cultivation spot, but now I need to sell the meat and pay my first installment of restitution at the church.

  Ten lousy mithril coins. For one hundred and fifty pounds of meat? Considering I could get the same amount from direct bitcoin-to-mithril auction purchases leaves me upset. Yeah, there is no guarantee that I can win each bitcoin auction for a single ounce of mithril, but I was hoping the market would be better. At least I still have the weapon purchases from the auction as hope for something more.

  I walk into the church in a sour mood and slam the handful of coins down on the counter. Yeah, there is still another hundred and fifty pounds of the meat in the subspace. Yet, honestly, even if I sold the entire amount, I wouldn’t be able to pay back the thousand dollars I owe, not in thirty days at least.

  “Excuse me, young man, could you please indicate what you are paying me for?” a nun of the church asks with a certain level of amusement sparkling in her eyes. I shake myself out of my mood as best I can but only manage to not glare at the woman.

  “I’m paying restitution to Ride or Die. My name is Jeff Smith.”

  “Indeed it is. I don’t think anyone else would be paying your restitution, young man. It sure would be nice if benefactors just paid off debts, wouldn’t it?” she says airily, and I frown. This woman’s good mood is ruining my perfectly righteous and legitimately sour one. She actually smiles at my frown. “I know I would love all my problems to vanish without working on them, but just remember The Giver doesn’t place any obstacle in your path that you can’t handle.”

  The nun sniffs at the air and shakes her head slightly before narrowing her eyes at me. I feel a blush coming on but am over being judged for the day. I’m not in the mood to be told how this is a trial. If ‘The Giver’ existed, wouldn’t he have made sure that something this unfair didn’t happen in the first place? I spin on my heels and leave as quickly as I can. “May he walk with you,” the nun says as I stride away and I wonder if she is just happy to have my odor out of the building.

  Once I am outside the door, my level of frustration spikes. That was the most money I’ve personally ever held. And just like that, it’s gone.

  Being weak in this world isn’t easy.

  Chapter 30

  September 2nd, 151 AR

  Jeff Turle

  By the time I return to the Training Room, my pity party’s over. Everything is in my hands. I just need to work hard, to persevere. Soon, groups like Ride or Die won’t be able to do what they did.

  The first thing I do is sell one hundred and fif
ty pounds of the Leporid meat from the previous night and some of Ride or Die’s abandoned loot. Tonight, I need to be ready for inevitable injuries, especially considering our last dungeon run. I give the final Pulled Rodentia Sandwich to Mur to keep the goblin happy while I begin making the largest amount of soup that I can fit in the pot.

  Strangely, I put the sandwich on the table, but Mur doesn’t take it till I walk away, and even then, he holds his nose.

  “Mur not smell like flower,” I growl at him in Gartuski.

  “Mur never smell rotten like Jeff,” he answers, waving a small green hand in front of his nose. I throw my hands up in a classic ‘give me a break’ gesture.

  “Crash, is there anything I can do about this odor?”

  “We’re afraid not, Master. It will persist at this level until you have cleansed the majority of spiritual abscesses. Then, because you will be working on so many blockages at the same time, it will likely still linger to a minor degree.”

  “Are you telling me I have to walk around like this for the foreseeable future?” I hiss in frustration.

  “Yes, Master. The mirror in the locker room will be able to give you a more accurate reading,” Crash answers, not sensing the mood at all.

  At least he gave me something more. I rush into the washroom, abandoning my meal prep for the moment. My stats haven’t changed, but I do now have a new status effect.

  Fetid Odor [Yellow]

  - You are exuding an odor due to your method of cultivation. Spiritual abscesses don’t smell like daisies.

  Time remaining until circulating qi runs out: 33 hours, 39 minutes, and 35 seconds.

  Time remaining to cleanse the circulatory system of abscesses: 705 hours, 20 minutes, and 25 seconds.

  Some quick math tells me that it will take the rest of the month to cleanse my circulatory system.

  “Crash, do you know if that includes the organs?” I ask curiously.

  “No, sir, it doesn’t include the organs. Each organ, like the Sea of Qi, will need to be cleaned separately, but they will not add such an intense odor.”

  “You can’t even smell,” I complain at the blue head in the mirror.

  “Humans get quite sensitive when they are standing in front of a mirror. It must be a racial trait,” the AI opines as it fades away.

  I have had many changes in my life lately, but adding a month of smelling like I bathe in a swamp is pushing it. Stop it, Jeff. These are just steps on my road to ascension, and I can handle it. It takes several moments to realize I am getting worked up and breathing heavily, though, and so I clamp down on my oscillating emotions. It’s not like I have anyone I need to impress. An image of everyone’s reactions to me throughout the day flashes through my brain, and my shoulders climb toward my ears.

  Their opinions shouldn’t matter, but for some reason, they do. And perhaps most frustratingly, I can’t seem to stop picturing Veronica’s piercing green eyes. For the next month, I am going to have to avoid their rooftop. . .

  With that decision made, I exit the changeroom and begin cooking the industrial-sized pot of soup. The soup recipe cost eight bitcoins originally, but I pay sixteen since I want to double the amount. That leaves me with a single bitcoin remaining and I can’t purchase flasks like I hoped. Luckily, there are tall, thin Tupperware containers that can hold eight ounces apiece in the kitchen. Testing them with water, I am comfortable with their similarity to a bottle.

  So once the soup is complete, I make a bowl for myself and one for Mur. Then I fill up seventeen Tupperware full of the viscous liquid. A quick look at the auction house tells me an arming sword bid starts at sixteen bitcoins today. Of course, I have only one way to make the sixteen bitcoins before our nightly dungeon run. We both need to complete a workout and choose the bitcoin reward.

  Today’s workout is a heavy upper body day with something called EMOM.

  “What is EMOM?” I ask Crash cautiously.

  “Sire, it means every minute on the minute.”

  I groan. That doesn’t sound pleasant at all.

  Still sweating from the workouts and my cultivation, I place three of the flask-like Tupperware in the fridge.

  “Mur, these are for emergencies. If either of us gets injured, we will use this instead of the green goop you fed me.” I direct Mur’s attention to them.

  They won’t stay good in the fridge forever, and as long as no injuries happen tonight, I will let him eat them for food tomorrow. Still, I carry another fourteen in my subspace and plan to use them as top-ups to attempt to advance farther into a dungeon tonight. Killing one monster is good, but if we can somehow move to killing multiple, that would ease my mind as far as my debts to the Church.

  The end goal will be to take on a dungeon boss. If we can manage a dungeon boss nightly, then not only will we be quite a bit stronger, but we can also likely start increasing the number of Training Room apps or the ranks of existing ones. I finish my portion of soup and then stop at the auction house to bid on that second arming sword, thanks to the workout reward. I am still not sure that the first one will contain a surplus of mithril but consider that having one of the weapons as backup won’t hurt. After a moment’s hesitation, I place a single bitcoin on an ounce of mithril as well.

  I figure staying consistent with the payments will keep me off of the Church’s radar. Once I have a good idea of the best way to exchange meat for mithril or bitcoins to purchase mithril, I can make some calculations. I pick up the spear that I cleaned off in the shower before Mur and I exit the basement portal.

  Mur is wearing a deep hood to hide his pointy ears and green skin. I finger my own ears, considering for the first time that they might not be a birth defect. How I could be part goblin still eludes me, but I definitely get along better with Mur than humans. At least he only commented on my stench that single time. I’ve been hiding my ears from people my whole life, and now we hide Mur from everyone because people would kill him on sight. I tilt my head at my green-skinned friend. How similar are we? To further ensure Mur’s anonymity, we sneak out the house’s back and into the night. Once we are a fair way into the ruins, I turn my head in his direction.

  “Jeff and Mur try another dungeon tonight? Hopper tough,” I suggest in the monster tongue.

  “Gartusk strong. Tribe fight. Choosing enemy coward-act,” he grunts heatedly.

  “No coward-act, Mur. Fight enemy from strength. That not weakness,” I counter, hoping to sway my tribesman. I can tell my limited Gartuski does a poor job with the message.

  “No weakness. Tribe predator; ugly monster prey. If run now, always run,” Mur growls, his barks growing unnervingly loud, and I put my fingers across my lips to quiet the noises. I’m actually shocked by the philosophy he almost seems to be conveying in his words.

  “Go another dungeon. Try,” I insist, but Mur shakes his head stubbornly and walks toward the Leporid dungeon.

  I continue attempting to persuade him, but he refuses to change his mind. I am starting to see the problem with brawn over brains. Maybe I can purchase a few books on strategy and force him to read. The only question is, would there be books on strategy in Gartuski? Judging by his current actions, I doubt it.

  By the time we arrive at the Leporid dungeon, I have accepted the decision. While I do wish to find a more suitable dungeon for us, I can also see a strategy in continually challenging the Leporids. If we learn one monster well, then we can likely advance farther into a dungeon. Or at least that’s the silver lining I grasp onto as Mur holds open the clumped grass.

  I leap down first and immediately hear a chuff followed by a long, rolling grunt. The last time, we managed to drop into the dungeon when the Leporid was moving away from us. This time, it’s looking right at me. The moment of surprise ends, and the beast lowers its head and begins charging.

  “No come down!” I bark in Gartuski and begin climbing the wall back out.

  Just as I lever my stomach over the edge, I feel the ground shudder around me. I picture the Lepori
d having struck the wall right below me and continue to pry myself out of the hole. I roll away and regain my feet before I summon my spear out of the subspace. Mur slowly backs away from the entrance with his cudgel held ready.

  Mur is perhaps three feet away when the massive rabbit explodes out of the grass, throwing back the soil lid. It lands and takes a moment to survey the area, and its eyes alight on Mur first but dismiss the green goblin to find its original target. Me.

  As soon as it finds me, it begins another charge, and this time, without the constraint of the tunnel, it can really move. Its speed surprises me, but I dive out of the way and feel the rushing air as the Leporid just misses. Mur charges after the beast as it digs in its front claws and begins sliding to a stop.

  Agreeing with the tactic, I do the same. Mur is faster and strikes the Leporid in the left hind leg with his cudgel. I dig my heels in and come to a stop just in time as the Leporid bucks around. The wide head sideswipes the goblin with a twisting headbutt. I don’t think Mur saw it coming because he takes the blow without interposing his club. The side of the head collides with Mur’s shoulder, and the goblin crashes to the ground. The Leporid looks like it wants to attack again, so I jab out with my spear, lightly puncturing it in the shoulders and chest area.

  The small spear stings are enough for it to choose me as a target, and I see it bunch its hind legs to spring. It’s about as telegraphed a strike as I have seen—just one problem: its head is two feet wide, and my dive isn’t quite fast enough. The bone protrusion on the head cracks into my shins and bends my knees. The pain is excruciating, and I cry out. Unfortunately, the blow doesn’t end there. An eye ridge catches on my right quad. The force is too much for my hip’s flexibility, and I feel my back wrench painfully. The remaining momentum transfer causes my body to corkscrew in the air.