by D. Rus
For the next two hours, I pawed over my gold choosing budget versions of the remaining equipment. They wouldn't last, anyway, so I'd have to replace them one day.
With every delivery, my bag got tangibly heavier. Finally, I was done. I spread the remaining pennies thin over numerous clothes and jewelry slots. That was it, enough.
I changed into my new acquisitions and hopped around a bit, testing them. There was some clinking and clanking here and there but not much, despite the hundred fifty pounds of steel hung on me and another seventy in my bag. God bless the game physics! With my strength numbers, I didn't even feel anything lifting under 220 pounds. Above that, it went straight into overload.
Almost ready. I PM'd Cryl to let him know I had to leave for a couple days in order to complete a quest and could be reached by PM if needs be. I warned him about the contents of my bedside cabinet, asking him to take good care of Lena, accept her into our group, invest in some nice fat buffs and get leveling.
I walked downstairs to the portal hall past a few stationary patrols posted at the castle's key points. A couple of women and guards recoiled, shrinking out of my way, still wound up by Frag's security drills even though the threat level had now been lowered to yellow. And there I walked, a ghostly figure adorned with the Lord of the Dead's black crown, the breastplate's yellow ribs sticking out, a tiny piece of dark amber pulsating over my heart. I had used the precious gem to decorate my admittedly unaesthetic breastplate, filling one of the three available enhancement slots which incidentally had also boosted my Dark spells. It was probably a good idea to remove the breastplate in polite society, for fear of scaring everyone shitless.
I quickly arranged for a teleport to a small town about a hundred miles away from the castle. Its name didn't say much to me: my choice had been random. The portal popped open, taking me there. Another three minute wait in order to arrange for another transfer to their nearest town. Rinse and repeat. Fifteen minutes, six teleports and a hundred fifty gold later, I completed my little loose-end tying-up operation, ending up at the already-familiar square in the Original City.
When I'd been there last, I'd made a mental note of an imposing shop sign that competed with nearby bank logos. Thror's Gem House. I dreaded to think how much it cost them to keep a high-end edifice like that in the city's main square.
The massive door opened easily. Gear wheels turned, initiating a system of counterweights. Needless to say, everything worked without so much as a squeak. In place of an ordinary shop bell, I was met by the sound of a miniature gold hammer striking a silver anvil. Its significance dawned on me when I saw the goldsmith's apprentice in charge of greeting customers. A dwarf! The first ever dwarf I'd met in this world!
We both froze, studying each other. The dwarf stared at me with surprise, seeing a High Elf in a Drow city. His eyes widened as he took in my friendly status and the Mark of the House of Night. And once he noticed the piece of amber on my chest, he seemed to lose all contact with reality.
"With due respect," I patted his shoulder to wake him up, "I'd like to see Master Thror."
The dwarf startled, coming to. "I'm afraid, the Father of the House doesn't receive visitors any more," he cast me a guilty look.
I raised a puzzled eyebrow.
"I'll go and ask," the dwarf hurried to add. "He might make an exception... exclusively for you."
He disappeared, leaving me wondering who it was I was about to see. I needed a goldsmith, not some patriarch mascot figure.
I couldn't have been more wrong. The reclusive House founder turned out to be a brow-knitted giant—as far as dwarves went, of course. His bulging muscles could have belonged to a blacksmith not a jeweler, his eyes squinting at you as if through a helmet visor. An enormous pole-axe on the wall hinted at his fine military past.
If he'd read my appearance better than his apprentice, it didn't show. Not a muscle twitched on his poker face. "What can I do for you, young Elf?"
"I'm not going to waste your time, Sir. Let's move straight to the point. I've managed to lay my hands on a few items allowing me to build a Travel Altar. My limited skills don't allow me to embark on a project of this scale which is why I've come to your shop as it's the best in town. Think you could help me?"
Now his eyebrows did twitch. "Do you mean you have in your possession an item that used to belong to a God of Light, boy? So now you want to make a Small Altar? Or," he added just a hint of sarcasm to his voice, "you just happen to have some sacred relics to build a Big Raid Altar?"
"Not quite," I reached into my bag and produced two dark fragments.
The dwarf swung round, grabbed some paperwork from the desk and covered the stones with it. Then he raised his hand and made a complex signal with his fingers. I barely heard the hidden gunslots closing. He definitely wasn't your cute and cuddly grandfather type.
Thror froze, listening intently, then nodded, satisfied. He removed the paper and lovingly ran his hand over the stones.
"My apologies are in order, Sir Laith," he mumbled. "Technically, our clan belongs to the branch of Light. Not that we really know who we're supposed to worship there. Their clerics have no problem accepting our gold, but when it comes to our requests to create a temple dedicated to the God of goldsmiths and jewelers, they keep saying they don't have sufficiently powerful artifacts! And they've just used the recently acquired God's Heart to summon Asclepius—the God of physicians—and add him to their Pantheon. Asclepius, for God's sake! What were his parents thinking about, giving him a name like that!"
I nodded, soaking up the precious snippets of information. Seeing as I'd already been up to my ears in Gods' dealings, I had to keep my eye on the ball and learn all I could on the subject. I needed to know every detail, from their Gods' names and jobs to Venus' bra size if only she existed in our world.
The dwarf was already rolling the stones in his hand, studying them and analyzing their stats. Was he performing a spectral analysis of the reflected light? Or just admiring them? Neither would have surprised me.
"This is a complex and challenging task," he finally said. "It requires the level of a Famed Master in Goldsmithy. There're only three of them in town."
He was talking up his prices, the bastard. "I do hope you're one of them," I returned. "And if not, nothing prevents me from going to the birthplace of all true masters, the Kingdom Under the Mountain. Plenty of portals around."
The dwarf flinched, poker-faced no more. "They'll take them off you—and they just might allow you to keep your head. Or they could distract you with prayers and rituals while their masters fight for the order behind the scenes. It's not every day that a Famed Master lands a job that can level up his goldsmith skill."
I smiled: it hadn't taken much for this pick-wielding operator to give himself away. "So you see, Sir, it's in our interests you get the job, isn't it? Having said that, laying my hands on these fragments has drained my finances. Then again, knowing the advantages it could bring you, I'm quite prepared to give the job to you for the very modest kickback of a hundred thousand grand."
The dwarf fell silent, dumbfounded. Why not? I had better break the proverbial mold before he charged me full whack. Finally, he regained his composure and roared with laughter, slapping the desk.
"You're a joker, you really are! I very nearly believed you! I almost showed you to the door," he said with a hint of irony in his voice.
I smiled against my will, confirming my status as a joker. Thror opened a massive writing cabinet which contained, instead of office supplies, a small barrel of something definitely alcoholic. The dwarf tapped the barrel's fat slats, listening to the resonant echo, then poured two mugs and banged them onto the desk.
"Let's share a small cup of Dwarven Extra Dry. No good discussing a two-hundred-grand order dying of thirst!"
I choked. "Pardon me! I don't need an altar of solid gold. It has to be as light and inconspicuous as possible. Ideally it should look marginally better than a campfire tripod. Otherwise every Tom
, Dick and Harry will come running wondering what I have here. So I suggest we share the expense: the altars for me, the experience for you."
It was his turn to choke. "I don't make kitchen utensils! I'm a goldsmith! And of all things, I don't work for free! Having said that," his glare clouded over, then glistened again, "you, Sir Laith, bear the Mark of the Fallen One. It stands to reason you have met. And the fact that you have the stones tells a lot to somebody with my experience. Very well. I'll make you the altars you want free of charge, provided you bring me a small vial of the Fallen One's blood."
I jumped. "You don't mess around, do you? I don't think the Fallen One will like it when he finds out that his blood has become a mail-order trade tool to save some miserable ten grand."
We dedicated the next couple hours to this friendly banter. Finally, both of us suitably hammered, we struck a deal agreeing on sixty grand. Too much, dammit. I signed the contract and gave him his fifty percent advance, after which the dwarf reached into the cabinet for a bottle bleached with age.
"Dragon's Tears, forty years old," he explained proudly, pulling out the tight cork, as a Dwarven maiden carried in a trayful of food.
We downed a shot glass each. It did bring tears to your eyes. Had to be at least 120%. Pleased with the effect, the dwarf decided to show the clueless youngster how to chase it down properly. Taking a sausage off the tray, he grabbed the tongs and pulled a glowing ember out of the fire. Bringing it to his mouth, he exhaled, his alcohol-filled breath enveloping the sausage in a green flame, filling the room with all the smells of a German beerhouse.
"Dragon Breath," the dwarf commented, proud. "With a bit of practice, it can burn a hole through a piece of wood half an inch thick."
He was a piece of work, was this gray-bearded master. He asked me for a week to complete the order, explaining it away by the necessity of having to fly to the Kingdom Under the Mountain to pick up some rare ingredients.
We parted almost as friends. Swaying, I walked out of the building. My head could have done with a bit of clearing after his exercise in hospitality. I needed to find a café that served some really strong coffee and study a map of the city. My next port of call had to be the mercenaries' guild. No way I was going to venture into the Dead Lands alone. I needed a good backup. The next day, if luck had it, I would see the walls of the legendary First Temple.
Chapter Eight
From the online newspaper The Daily AlterWorld:
This is weird. The sixth empty dungeon in the past week. The interesting thing is that they all belong to various newb locations situated near large settlements. The last one was the Gnoll Hill, a mere mile away from the City of Light. This low-level dungeon now lies empty, deserted by all the mobs that used to populate it. The throne in the throne room appears to have been removed, the walls of the room itself are covered in obscenities written in blood-color paint.
See screenshot 14: We'll be back you hairless coyotes!
The AlterWorld administration offers no explanation on this phenomenon. All requests to add new low-level locations are met with vague promises without mentioning any particular deadlines.
* * *
The guild building was overpowering. A fortress within the city: its thick walls gaping with gunslits, its fat towers bristling with the steel needles of the ballistas. Two enormous golems guarded the entrance—projecting more the guild's wealth and influence to the world rather than really guarding anything. Each level 230, how awesome was that? I even took the trouble of looking golem-building up in Wiki. Oh well, it doesn't hurt to dream. My naïve hope of getting one of those as a pet one day and building my own zombie platoon was shattered before it even got off the ground, unable to survive the clash with harsh reality. Only a large clan could afford to keep one of those. To get access to golem building, you had to level up alchemy, goldsmithy and forging skills to Grand Master levels. And the prices! To build one could cost you a small fortune: to get some idea of the costs, place your creation onto the scale and keep balancing it with ingots of silver until you weep. And that was only the beginning of a long and winding road.
I stood there gawking at them, estimating their weight, then using my fingers and toes to convert it into silver and gold losing a few zeroes on my way. It was a lot. I patted a golem's warm mithril thigh and stepped into the dark gateway.
A short tunnel led into a gateway tower. Portcullises bared their steel teeth over both entrance and exit. The many arrowslits and suspicious openings overhead promised a bloodbath to whoever dared fight their way through there. Good job I went there personally instead of hiring staff at the mercs' marketplace. My potentially eternal lifespan meant I might have to build, defend and storm this sort of fortification one day.
The inner court was small but welcoming. It was surprisingly crowded—mainly by what seemed to be mercs waiting to be hired. The narrow space between the keep and the inner wall housed a couple of cafés, a pub, two permanently busy combat arenas and a number of shop signs offering supplies and gear repair among other things. The mercs must have let their guard down, I decided as I eyed the close space. During the first siege, all this razzamatazz was going to burn happily, getting in the way of the already-miserable defenders.
The keep's gates stood invitingly open. I walked through. The ground floor housed the actual gaming content: guild masters, traders, coaches and other miscellaneous NPCs. The first floor and above were rented out to the players who apparently had a good manager and an equally good interior designer. The decor was rather businesslike going on medieval, replete with information desk, soft couches in the waiting area, consultants' cubicles and management offices. All of it busy, all in full play. The money flow—which I enviously estimated at two pounds of gold per minute—ran through the marketplace, leaving in its wake a slight residue of guild taxes that aimed to maintain the local grandeur.
I voiced my rather modest request and was escorted to a cubicle: soft inviting chairs and a wall of fragrant plants that shielded us from the rest of the room. The babble of an artificial brook helped one relax and part with his money. I didn't even notice the consultant at first. He was perched on a couch amidst the greenery next to a side table loaded with all sorts of tasty morsels. This had to be a real-world paid employee with a primitive 3D connection—what perma player would agree to act out the miserable part of an office rat? It still didn't explain his choice of a goblin as character, of all things. Despite his hilarious appearance, the green creature listened to me with dignity, nodding in all the right places like a seasoned reporter.
Finally, he summed it up, "So you need a cover of five, capable of handling two or three mobs up to level 150. Objective: accompany you to the Dead Lands. The setup is clear. Now the fees. A team of five level-140 and above will cost you seven thousand. The minimum contract term is twenty-four hours. As for the schedule: the portal city nearest to those parts is Aquinus, a hundred and forty miles from your destination. Beyond it lie the Frontier Lands. A savage area, virtually unpopulated. Lots of feral monsters, one-off lairs and dungeons, high chances of running into trouble. Even though you've overestimated potential mobs' levels, I agree that in this case you cannot be too careful. If I could suggest anything at all logistics-wise, I'd recommend the Ferrymen clan. We have a good working relationship with their representative. You probably know that one top-level wizard can store up to fifty teleport points in his memory so between them, they've got our cluster all covered—apart from the Frontier, but at least their clan guarantees the minimum of one teleport point per thousand square miles. This should at least halve your travel times-"
"Why would I need it?" I interrupted the flow of his pitch. "Why would I want to pay for any extras if the minimum contract term is the double of what I need? I had actually hoped to hire a group for twelve hours, not more. Having said that, I've got an idea. You think you could ask the Ferrymen about the location of the nearest teleport point?"
The goblin cheered up, enthusiastically nodding his
agreement, then started dictating something into an open communications channel. He had to be getting his cut from the Wizards. Having said that, I had better remember the details of the offer. I could use them at a later date.
The goblin surfaced. "You're in luck! Apparently, the only track to the Dead Lands is blocked by the Bone Castle. And as it's quite a landmark, they couldn't overlook it and marked the nearest port point on the transport map. You only need to cover twenty miles: an hour and a half at your mount's speed. Treble it to include any emergencies, it's still only five hours. A group portal costs three hundred gold. What do you think?"
He leaned forward, his ear tufts quivering, his moist nose probing the air. A funny race, really. "Why not? On one condition: seeing as I'm obliged to pay for twenty-four hours, they'll have to work for their money. We'll start with eighteen hours of power leveling—power leveling myself, I mean—a full cover, top performance and a five-strong support group. That leaves us six hours to travel. How about that?"
"I'm afraid, it doesn't quite work like that. The twenty-four hour contract provides for seven hours of sleep and two one-hour meal breaks. That leaves you with fifteen hours to use as you see fit. In case of any eventualities preventing you from complying, an hour of overtime is paid at 10%."
I winced. All nice and logical but nitpicking any way you looked at it. "Agreed. Food and sleep is every soldier's sacred right."
The goblin rubbed his little paws and started typing away. "Considering the change in the assignment's profile, I'd recommend the following lineup: a cleric for buffs and healing, an enchanter for more buffs and mana transfusion, a rogue and a wizard as cover and a tank to take aggro. This would allow you to save on meditation and healing times and squeeze as much intense farming as you can in the contractual period."
I held my breath in anticipation. "How far can they level me up? Have they done it before?"