"Ah, I see. So, mastering my skills before going out to level is best?" asked Adam. "I haven't played many role playing games in recent years. Not much at all since college, really."
"I'd say so. Your spells will max out quickly enough over time, but there is probably a lot that you can learn about the world simply by hanging out with the priests." Scott reached up to scratch Herbert behind the ear since the little fellow had started to scratch with his paw. Hopefully he did not have fleas.
Adam nodded then placed his hand to his chin in a thoughtful display. "What about the situation with the board?"
Scott shook his head. "My fiancé and her family are doing a bit of hearts and minds to try and raise interest in ARS. She doubts it will keep the board at bay for long, but it might buy a few years."
"It's strange to think that in a few years everyone there might be dead," said Adam, his eyes narrowed slightly even as the expression on his face hardened.
Scott snorted then nodded his head. He gestured toward Adam in a casual way. "I know, right? The board is a problem."
"It's true that they are only doing this because they are pretending to be like business men from Earth?"
The loud and obnoxious laughter that issued from Scott's lips surprised Adam for a moment. "What's funny about that?"
Scott made a little circle gesture with his index finger. "That's the thing about the gods. Most of them are nice enough, but they emulate us so completely that they don't realize they are doing terrible things that even we shouldn't be doing."
"So, it is true." Adam frowned. "I can't believe anyone would murder the population of entire worlds just because of a loss in profits."
"It's not even a major drop from what I've been told. The board is a bunch of over-reacting asshats pretending to be draconian businessmen. No profits, no life." Scott shifted his weight to the side a little. The chair that he sat upon was comfortable, but he had been sitting a little oddly. One of his ass cheeks had started to go numb. It was a surprising revelation really. His overall durability should have made that an unlikely scenario.
"That's..." Adam shook his head slowly then curled his hands into fists. "Someone needs to put a foot in their ass."
"I agree. Most of the company agrees too. It's a ridiculous situation, really."
Adam looked askance at Scott. "You're so calm about this."
"I've become accustomed to the bizarre reality of my fiancé's people. It took a while, and they still surprise me on an almost daily basis, but I understand greedy asshats. There's something disturbingly human about how the board is acting."
"That's human? Killing off planets for profit?" asked Adam, surprised.
"Ever hear the story about how America came to be a country that spanned a continent? How about the last world war, or the rise of pretty much any large nation in the history of the world?" asked Scott flippantly. He leaned forward then said, "Fucking someone over to get what you want is about as human as it gets with some people."
Adam really had nothing to say to that. There were a lot of good things about humanity, but he had to admit that there were many terrible people in the world as well.
***
Inside the cozy living room of the Jacobs estate, Scott and his rodent brother from another mother were deeply engrossed in quality television viewing. Soon they would head back to ARS, but Scott had wanted to return just before first light on their part of ARS. As such a few more hours had to be spent on Earth.
Herbert munched happily on popcorn as he watched the epic fantasy show that had piqued his interest. It was a deeply philosophical tale of love and friendship between an adorable yellow murder-rat, and his mentally challenged human boy.
The Grassrat chittered happily when the yellow rodent unleashed a powerful bolt of lightning and his pet human cheered him on. For some reason the humans talked a great deal more than the main character and had more screen time, but Herbert assumed that the chatter was somehow integral to the story. There was also a certain appeal when the main character was the strong silent type.
Not long after the final bolt of lightning was cast, a quirky song began to play while the credits rolled. It was something about being the greatest master. Herbert nodded in respect. It made sense that the adorable rodent was a great master. His pet human praised him constantly.
Herbert unleashed a happy little sigh then glanced over to his human. Unlike the small boy in the story, Scott could actually fight. It was better that way. The grass dancer was no great master like the rodent hero in the story. He could not have kept a small and unintelligent boy safe through such dangerous experiences.
Thoroughly amused by television, Herbert realized that he could spend most of his day on any given day watching other people have interesting adventures. Briefly he wondered if that was something other people felt as well, or if he had started to become lazy.
A few more random stories were told on the story box before it was time to return to the world of ARS. Herbert was both excited and slightly saddened by the change. Television was quite addictive. There was something similar in the hotel room that they had been using as a base, but it was not quite the same. There were no rodent heroes on C-Vision, at least none that he had seen.
Time passed and soon Scott took them back to their hotel room on ARS. Herbert immediately ran over to his little work station to check on the items he had been working on prior to their mini-vacation. Scott called out, "Hey, Herbert? Do you want to go into town with me?"
Herbert waved him off with a paw and a light shake of the head. He had things to do here and now.
Scott left the room, and the tiny little rodent went back to work. He had items and plans to make.
Tiny little paws poked and patted the cat skull that had been selected from the battle field. He had managed to separate the bone in several areas so that he could widen and elongate it for his purposes.
It was a necessary skill for a Grassdancer. The various body parts of an enemy held a portion of their power. By drawing upon the essence of the creature's nature, its greatest traits could be granted to the wearer of the item.
Herbert pulled out a small vat of glue and another one filled with wax. He eyed the skull briefly then nodded. Slowly, he crafted the item of power that he desired. Several hours passed while he performed painstaking work. He waxed and then glued six eagle feathers to the side of the skull near the back. After a brief moment, he repeated the process on the other side. He applied glue to a leather strap then wrapped it around the skull to help hold the feathers in place.
Bits and pieces of fur, leather, and beadwork were added to the skull as part of the craft. Herbert was not entirely pleased by the overall look of the helm, but it was a work-in-progress. His skill at crafting such things would increase over time, but for now it would be a great gift once it was completed.
There was nothing left to do for now but to allow the glue to dry. He would need to make a few more adjustments to it before it was complete, but for now it had to settle and harden into place.
He left his gift on the work table that he had been using, really more of an end table for normal sized people, and went to begin his dance training for the day. The hotel room balcony was the perfect place to practice as it allowed him to feel a breeze but provided a sense of solitude.
While the diminutive rodent moonwalked his little heart out, Scott had wandered off into the city. He had wanted to view some of the early morning city life before he went out to train once more.
The hardest type of experience to acquire quickly was social experience. It required someone to either spend a great deal of time socializing, or to accept and complete jobs. Basically, social contract completion equated to increased social experience.
A simple method to acquire small amounts of social experience was to simply wander around the city while taking in the local color. Scott felt it would be doubly beneficial if he soaked up that local color while familiarizing himself with the capital city. It was als
o one of the last chances he would have to wander the city alone before Rhea returned. Once she arrived they would spend a little time reminding each other of their love, and the rest of the time on easy to accomplish missions. She had to focus her in-world time on development due to her schedule.
During the battle and the subsequent clean-up the daily routine for his little group had been heavily focused on going back and forth from one location to another without much time to explore. He had taken the bus on occasion, but he had only walked the streets a handful of times.
His meandering journey allowed him to learn a great deal about the local populace. About an hour after dawn he started to notice that small groups of children had begun to gather near local bus stops. Representatives of various races, the little ones were quite the motley collections. There were lizard kids and rabbit kids. There were a few centaur kids, and a wide variety of other zoo-themed children as well. Human, or almost-human, children were the most numerous of all.
Roughly a half hour later Scott smiled brightly as he noticed a familiar face. He had never made friends or really spoken to them, but a certain mother daughter badger team had appeared.
"Now children, you know that you should behave properly while you wait for the bus." admonished the pretty badger mother. The small collection of children had begun to laugh and carry on loudly, as children often did.
"Mummy, you're embarrassing me in front of my friends..," said the little badger girl while several of her anthropomorphic friends giggled at her.
"Now, now, sweety. There's nothing embarrassing about proper civic behavior," said the white haired badger mom in a soft warm tone.
Scott did not want to seem like some sort of weird blue-haired stalker, so he continued walking. Eventually he discovered that the gathered children were going to ride the bus to school. The city had proper education facilities that were fairly similar to something from Earth. Though, he assumed that their elective courses would be much more entertaining.
The wanderer eventually meandered his way into one of the shopping districts. Most of his purchases had come via his Crysta-Com. Curiosity piqued, Scott entered the closest store Greelak's Sub-Machine Guns.
The interior of the store was different than the sorcerer had expected. For one thing, the name of the place was a play on words. It was a sandwich shop that also sold firearms.
"Hey, mah man. What can I get for ya?" asked a massive green skinned man from behind a deli counter. He wore a flannel button up shirt behind a bright white apron. Small white tusks poked up from behind his bottom lip, and he had the slightly pointed ears one might expect from a hog.
"Answers and a sandwich, maybe?" asked Scott.
The orc shop-keeper laughed merrily. "Always glad tah answer questions s'long as yah buyin' somethin'."
Scott ordered two subs, what some might call a hoagie or a grinder, and then paid the owner the two coppers that he asked for. It was quite the deal, really. "So, what's with the sandwich and gunshop thing?"
"Sandwich and gunshop thang?" The orc grunted then laughed once more. He was quite the genial fellow despite his brutal appearance. His laughter rumbled like thunder and his whole body shook with the power that it expressed. "Brother. Tha way I figures it, tha perfect shop was one that let mah customers buy 'em some lunch, or buy somethin' to go out and get it themselves if they don' like mah cookin'."
Scott laughed at that as well. It did make a weird sort of sense. Buy your lunch or buy something to go out and kill it and cook it yourself. It was a solid business plan for an orc if most fictional sources were taken into account.
"What kind of guns do you sell here?" asked Scott.
"All kinds, mah man! Look and see. You already bought somethin'. So, I don' care if ya look aroun' all ya want." laughed the barrel chested orc as he placed his fists to his hips.
Scott wandered off to look at the various firearms hidden behind display cases. As he did so, another patron came in and asked about the nature of the place. It was a new establishment in the area, and Scott was not the only curious party.
Unfortunately, something odd happened during the conversation. The new arrival, a man wearing a baseball cap and slightly rumpled clothes, asked, "Hey, what's this place about?"
"It's about fine dining, mah man!" exclaimed the orc in a good mood.
"Fine dining? I don't see anything but sandwiches and guns," said the man.
The orc's genial and overtly enthusiastic nature declined into a more neutral tone. "Yah, it's what we got here."
"Well, how can you call a sandwich fine dining?" asked the man.
The orc's eyebrow twitched a little. His lower tusks rose up slightly for a moment as his lips formed into the beginning of a snarl. He caught himself, however, and answered in a way that Scott decided was clever. "Well, sandwiches are just fine if yah wantin' to dine."
The new arrival snorted then shook his head. "Whatever."
The twitching eyelid became a full eyebrow quirk as the shop owner's hands curled into tight fists. "You sayin' a sandwich ain't good enough for ya?"
"Maybe when I was a kid," said the snarky customer. "Who'd pay for a damned sandwich when you can make one at home?"
Scott casually raised up his sandwich bag in victory even as he continued to peruse the gun selection. He loved sub shops back on Earth. It did not take long to get your order, and he could usually have them made exactly the way that he wanted. It had been no different here.
The sorcerer's actions were not wasted; both the annoying potential customer and the shop owner saw his upward thrust of sandwich victory. It was like he had chosen between warring factions as he immediately gained respect from one and a snort of derision from the other.
"Whatever. When I heard that an orc ran a restaurant I expected something heartier than a sandwich," said the man, after he snorted at Scott.
"Oh? Like what?" asked the orc in slow, measured, tones.
"You know, lots of roasted meat."
"I got ya roast beef right here, fella," said the orc white gesturing at his expertly sliced roast beef.
The snarky man shook his head. "Whatever, I'm just gonna go."
His rude commentary would have been allowed to slide. However, as he walked away the man muttered, "Damned greenskin trying to act civilized."
What the poor unfortunate moron did not know was that orcs had both an excellent sense of smell and an excellent sense of hearing. The latter was not quite the same level as a blood tracker or an elf, but it was still sharp enough to hear the muttered thoughts of a man who had both wasted the shop owner's time, and insulted his race.
"Oh? It's like that?" snarled the orc before he gripped his oversized butcher's knife and leapt over the counter.
"Me Greelak Elfsmasher make new meats!" snarled the flannel clad orc angrily. He then waved his butcher knife around like a madman.
The snarky pseudo-patron screamed in girlish fashion and ran for the door, but he tripped halfway there. Greelak started to shout random orcish stereotypes. "Me Greelak chop man-meats and raid villages for more man-meats! Have non-consensual sex with elf girl-daughters and elf girl-mothers who still good looking!"
The butcher's knife slammed down into the floor a full two feet away from the now crawling man, but he screamed like he was being killed. He took a hard boot to the ass that made him scurry forward.
Scott watched casually while the blubbering man desperately tried to escape from the ham-actor who followed behind him. It was easy to see from his vantage point that Greelak could have actually attacked the man seriously if he wanted to, but with the exception of the foot in his ass there had been no physical contact.
"Man-meat squeal pretty like elf girl-daughter... Make Greelak question his lifestyle choices." snarled Greelak while he waved his butcher knife around once more.
"Oh goddess above!" blubbered the man as tears poured heavily from his eyes. He sniffled loudly as snot began to flow from his nose without sign of stopping. Somehow, he managed
to escape from the rabid orc and ran off into the early morning light.
Greelak poked his head out the door and shouted, "Thanks for shopping! Please come again!"
"I needed that," said the orc before closing the door and walking back to the counter. His overwhelming rage died away completely. He was once again a genial and overly friendly restaurant owner. After counting out ten silver from his change drawer and annotating the expense in his ledger, he sighed heavily and waited for the inevitable.
Scott continued to shop for a few minutes as the gun selection was quite varied. Everything in the store was used or refurbished. Given the previous scene he was fairly certain who had used them. Sadly, even the cheapest weapon was outside of his current budget. Though, they were less expensive than new weapons. He could easily see himself buying a gun here.
While ranged attacks were a sorcerous specialty, that sort of spell required a great deal of knowledge and training to pull off in this world for a member of his class. Until his magical abilities were as strong as his knowledge of how the spells looked and felt in the classic server, ranged weapons would be a good idea.
Scott bullshitted around long enough that he was able to see the rest of the little drama play out. About ten minutes after the man had fled for his life, he returned with a police officer.
"That's him officer!" exclaimed the bedraggled man.
The black armored officer mentioned wore a set of full-body plate armor that looked like something a storm trooper from Star Wars might wear. Included was a full-head helm, and a face obscuring mask that prevented the officer's identity from being known through visual recognition. On duty, he was only a badge number, nothing more.
The officer raised one hand and then turned his head slightly to the side. "Remain silent and wait outside, citizen."
"Of course," said the man before stepping outside, a smug look on his face.
The heavily armed and armored officer strode confidently to the counter. "Are you Greelak Elfsmasher?"
Origin ARS 6 Page 10