by M J Sweeney
“What would it take? I mean, if we limited free supply to… let’s see, twenty of each of those per year, and a certain discount on further supplies. And same if the new ingredients we’re supplying allows your da to create other potions, elixirs, and whatnot. I mean, we would get nothing right now.” Marcus frowned at me with that statement. “Maybe just a few more health-cakes.”
“I am authorised to make deals like this on behalf of the clan…” he murmured aloud. “And you would bring all ingredients to me? Or to one of our clan?”
“Him too—if you want to do it also, Marcus.”
“I think so. I mean, I was looking forward to selling this stuff for cash, but a long-term arrangement will… last longer.”
“Yup.”
“It would be like you’re joining our guild, right?” Drognad finally said.
“Yup, I guess so.”
“From what I understand, there’s standard guild fees. To join a guild, you need to be beyond your apprenticeship, but I think we can waive that part.” We weren’t level 20, nor skilled in alchemy.
We nodded agreement to that.
“But you would have to make an oath of service, to be bound and witnessed by your Gods and ours… and you’d have to pay the sign-up fee.” Drognad grinned at himself, happy with that last.
My interface dinged, and by the look of Marcus, so had his. I didn’t bother looking.
“Okay Drognad, I’ll bite. What’s the sign-up fee?”
“Standard for all guilds. Fifteen zorb.”
Damn. I looked inquiringly at Marcus, who nodded. “It’s true,” he said, looking glum.
“Now Drognad, I think we know each other a little by now.”
“I know that look in your eye,” he interrupted. “Here it comes.”
“And I think we are friends. In fact I would say we are very good friends, and I would trust you with my life.” His face dropped a little, and he couldn’t stop himself from nodding. “Not only that, but I recall a time when I did actually save your life.” He started wringing his hands. “And lastly, I swear on the name of Anthul to uphold this contract, and to protect the honour of your clan. If you call I will come, and me and mine will do all they can to help, if it is within my power.”
I heard another set of dings.
Marcus was looking at me oddly.
Drognad looked kind of miserable. Or maybe he just felt outgunned. “I… I hear you, dryad, I hear you. In that case… five zorb for you, fifteen zorb for him… He never saved me life, after all…” But he wasn’t sounding sure of himself at all.
“Drognad! Now that’s just unfair! Marcus is going to make his oath too.” I nudged Marcus in the ribs.
“Oh, ah… yeah, sure. I, ah, I promise to hold to this agreement and protect your clan, may Aras witness these words.”
“Now, I’m sure that’s sufficient to give him a sizable discount as a special friend of your clan, Drognad.”
“Ach! All right, best offer—five for you, eight for him.”
“Marcus?”
“Damn.” He was fingering his pouch. “This is the first real gold I’ve had. And now most of it’s going to damn research.”
I took a moment to read a bit in my interface. Then I said, “Look, we’ll be getting more coins from the swords, plus Drognad here is about to give you twenty of each of the balm and cakes as your first dividend, no?”
“First dividend?” Drognad snorted.
I glared at him. “Drognad, it’s already in the agreement. Pay up, sir gnome, else you’ll be breaking contract, and we both know how gnomes feel about that.” I folded my arms over my chest. I knew Drognad had a good memory and would be able to recall my words. Besides, I could see in my interface it was already there.
/ Zahn & Derge & Co., Honorary Clan Member / Friendly (10% discount)
[Yearly Dividend: 20 health-cakes and 20 health-balms, to be upgraded as the clan upgrades] (Other items to be bought at 10% discount, as per disposition)
Marcus naturally agreed, happy in the end to get something for his payout. I promised Drognad I would start investigating having the labels translated, and so took one of the jars as a sample. We exited, wishing Drognad farewell. I knew I would see him later.
Now we had a few days to spare. Marcus had promised a meeting with his superior, but would need time to arrange it. I had some things I wanted to take care of as well—namely, a few beers.
For the next few days I slept in my little room at the Barracks of Aras, wandered the streets, and took in the sights. I was tempted a few times to climb the Great Tree, but I resisted. No need to go chasing trouble.
We also got coins for the swords and daggers amounting to three zorb and forty-four dran. After giving Drognad his money, this left me with twelve zorb and thirty-five dran. Not a bad sum. Of course, I started spending it on booze and food, but after all that time in the forest, was that any surprise?
Chapter 19
I discovered a nice little place by some botanical gardens called the “Popina.” It was a bit rough around the edges, but filled with mixed races, owned by some dwarfs, and super loud, as the guests drank, talked, yelled, sang dwarven songs, and played dice. Dice and darts were very popular. It also helped that meals were served by a really pretty half-elf woman, a tall, leggy brunette with pale blue eyes. The dwarven barkeep (also the co-owner) went by the dubious title of Thugan “Big Nose” Thorgian. He did have one of the biggest noses I had ever seen, like someone had taken a giant potato, put it on his face, and smashed it with a bat. I did my best not to stare while I yelled at him for a drink.
“Howza!” He held up one hand, so I guess that was a kind of hello.
“What’s on tap?”
“Beer?”
“Yes!”
He pointed at his taps.
I pointed at what I hoped was an ale.
“Hrany?”
“What?”
He reacted with an undecipherable sort of outburst—I half-expected to see an exclamation point floating over his head.
“Yes?”
“Hrany?”
“What?”
“Aggh!”
I shook my head. It was just too loud. He reached over, brought my head down, and yelled into my ear, “Howdy, elf… how many? Yer want a pint, a pitcher, or give a round on the house—hrany?”
“Just a pint! Thanks!” I yelled back.
“Fer sure.”
I handed over the coins.
I stayed for a few drinks and played a round of darts, which I lost to a dwarven sharpshooter. But it was fun, and I made a few drinking companions.
I spent the next few days drinking, singing tavern songs, and drinking some more—plus chatting with the barmaid. She was nice, friendly, and not that into dwarfs… which I figured was to my advantage.
After a few days of beers and darts and stupid jokes, I discovered some of the first dos and don’ts of dwarf culture. Insults were fine, gruff talk was acceptable, but certain subjects were off-limits. For reasons I never quite understood, once a dwarf started talking about his beard, or insulting someone’s beard, you knew things were about to get serious and probably bloody.
Later, I found out a couple of other interesting facts. Big Nose didn’t get that squashed nose from bar fights—he was a retired dwarven axe-master. And you didn’t insult his beard. Ever. Nor did you insult any dwarf’s head of hair, but you could insult his sexual prowess, or dick size, or anything else if you wanted.
I also learned dwarf women were no less vocal and fierce. Big Nose’s wife, a woman by the name of Geranium, or Ger for short, was not what I was expecting. Although short, she wasn’t that stocky, closer to skinny, if the truth be told. She had similar dark hair like Big Nose, but fortunately no beard—not sure what I was expecting there—and was more than a bit pretty. She was also a great cook, and wielded her knives, pots and rolling pin to great effect.
When one group of five dwarf lads demanded that Big Nose put their rather excessive drin
king bill on their father’s tab, she storms out, up to her neck in flour, and begins smacking about with her rolling pin, and by the sounds of it breaking jaws and fingers indiscriminately. The whole time she’s quietly telling them she’ll be onto their mothers, and telling them what the boys have been up to. Well, they shut up real quick, and promptly emptied their pockets until all was accounted for.
The whole pub had gone quiet staring from Geranium to Big Nose and back again, so Big Nose gives a big shrug, and smiling so we could all see he was supporting his wife, he gives her this great big kiss. Well, it looked like she was about to brain him next, raising the implement in his direction…
“Thanks love, you handled that perfectly. Couldn’t ’ave done it better meself.”
And so as the crowd gives a roar of approval, she blushes slightly and menaces everyone with her rolling pin instead, and stiffly walks back into the kitchen, back to ordering her assistants around. The group of lads, embarrassed, bloodied, and outclassed, simply shuffle out. But with a few slaps on their backs, other older dwarfs wishing them well. Obviously no hard feelings there.
I was also interested to note many of the dwarfs had different accents—some sounded a bit kind of working class like Big Nose, but many spoke common just like the high elves, though without the sing-song voice typical of that race. Geranium was like that. Apparently she’d grown up in Geras Anandiel, and Big Nose had been whelped off in the country somewhere. It seemed that dwarfs did not speak with any discernable Scottish or Irish brogue which was a pleasant surprise. The men did usually have disproportionately deep voices. Dwarf women did not, nor did they wear beards or otherwise behave any differently than most women I knew.
Later I also learned the half-elf barmaids name was named Erilesse—by asking Big Nose—and we started hanging out a bit more. Honestly, I wasn’t sure if she was my girlfriend, and certainly we weren’t about to become life-partners. But having female company, someone nice to talk to and just be normal with, was great. And of course, we had lots of fun with some great sex. Figuring out some of the nuances of my new body (and hers!) was also awesome, if a little awkward at first. I’d never been a magnet for women in my past life, and I wasn’t about to start here—I’d always been a little too slow out of the gate. But once we got started, and I could see she was really enjoying herself, then all was good.
After a few days of that, I came back to Anzan’s Exotics and, with his help, started looking up elite and legendary items. If I was going to continue down this path, I wanted to see a few high-end options to know if I was on the right path or if I should steer a little differently.
The interface for item shopping was interesting. Anzan actually sent me his interface link, and as long as he stood within a few metres of me, I could browse to my heart’s content. This showed me both what Anzan had in stock and any local supplier he was connected to, all mostly within Geras Anandiel and Bann Arden—the two largest cities in this part of the world, which weren’t too far from each other.
Initially, I looked up rings and armour. I saw that most rings gave some kind of resistance to harm—whether elemental damage, slow, mental control, that kind of thing. Other rarer rings were actually skill-based—for at the highest level, anything that could increase a skill (or an attribute) past the normal cap of 100 was considered awesome. The basic rings had just one special feature (orange/uncommon), a few had two (green/rare), and just a couple had three or four (blue/elite). Special and expensive item types were things like the Ring of Athleticism, or the Ring of Shadows, or the Ring of Glib Tongues. Anzan had a few of all of these for sale—but mostly the minor and middle-level rings, and just a couple of the greater. I couldn’t wear many of those until I was level 20, and some not until level 40.
Generic crafted armour (like I was wearing) gave very small bonuses individually, but when worn as a set gave respectable increases to a few resistances and abilities. Also, the “vanity” adventurers really liked exotic sets, usually crafted out of unique materials, such as griffon hide or dragon scales, and would pay a premium for them.
I decided that I liked the generic gear, as it was also fairly nondescript and wouldn’t invite theft. I bought another Minor Ring of Fire Resistance from Anzan to add to my collection, and was hoping to save more coins for a Ring of Elemental Resistance to increase all a bit more evenly. I could wear two fire resistance rings at a time, but not more than that, else none of them would work. Anzan also seemed a little more expensive than Maximus, but not significantly so. He was also selling a small Bag of Holding for eighty-five zorb and a large Bag of Holding for two hundred and eighty zorb.
He had magic necklaces dedicated to a few of the Divines, particularly the elven deities. The one for Lindane (a miniature bow) gave increased tracking (+10) and increased bow skill (+5); the one for Anthul (a miniature harp) gave increased lore (+10) and increased enchant (+5); the one for Cylvai (a metal disc with three stars) gave increased spellcraft (+10) and increased healing (5%); and the one for Seti (a wooden disc with a carved four-leafed flower) gave increased horse riding (+5) and increased movement speed (5%). Something about the symbols of each struck a chord with my memory, but it soon slipped away. As these holy symbols were only of the basic generic variety, they did not give the greater bonuses granted by more enhanced pieces.
I noticed that I now had a basic amount of spellcraft (five) and lore (six), when I didn’t have those skills when I first entered Memory. I had no bow skill, a decent tracking skill (twenty-seven), and no enchanting skill. The amulets for Cylvai and Seti seemed most useful for me at this stage, but it was the one for Anthul that I was most drawn to. I found that interesting.
“Are all the holy symbols generic?” I asked Anzan.
“The magic ones, you mean?”
“Yes.”
“Yes and no. They all have generic stats, but that’s because the church that makes them decides on what their Divine most represents, then mass produces as many of these as possible so the faithful all buy them. But you can also pay a premium and have a church craftsman or bishop make or bless one specialised for you. That is, if you’re high enough in church standing—it’s basically the same for all the guilds, churches, and craftsmen.”
“Thanks, that’s quite helpful.”
I started looking at weapons and found the following entry at the top of staffs.
/ Golden Ring-Staff of the Monkey King / Legendary Golden Adamantite
[+10% Deflection, Arrow Deflection +2, +5% More Damage per minute, +10% Stun chance, 1-2 seconds, +1m range of attack / minute, Affliction of the Monkey King: 2% cumulative chance per minute while in combat] (Limited to Warrior, Monk, Barbarian, 75 Agility Required, 75 Strength Required)
2500 zorb, or trade for an equivalent legendary item of mage class
The first thing I noticed, of course, was the cost. Holy Mother! That was the price of a small kingdom. No way was I affording that. I also looked at the stat requirements and shuddered. Talk about a ‘late’ game acquisition. I looked at the abilities it gave and wasn’t so impressed initially, but then noticed that the damage increase “per minute” was exponential—as the staff increased in size, it kept doing more and more damage. There was no upper limit for as long as the battle lasted. What a wrecking ball. Not my style at all, but nice all the same. Below that item was another curious entry.
/ Golden Head-Band of the Monkey King / Legendary Golden Adamantite
(Unknown / Unclaimed Quest Item—reward offered for alleged location or pertinent information)
Lore
[Sun Wukong, considered an ancient avatar of Isserad before he reincarnated as human, is the mischievous Monkey King. In order to contain his troublemaking ways and curb the power of the Golden Ring Staff, the Divines developed a cunning plan to trap the irrepressible devil. With a quest for enlightenment and a pious priest as companion, the Great Sage Equal of Heaven was forced to wear the Golden Crown of Mental Fortitude. Not only did this crown protect Sun Wukong from hang
overs, it granted near-immunity to all forms of mental persuasion and trickery, including his own. Beware; power comes with a cost]
It seemed certain legendary set items were really hard to find, and often at least one item in the set was truly unique—only one in the world, period. That meant there could be only one person at a time wearing the full set of legendary gear; all others were pale imitators. I liked that idea. It also showed that once gained, legendary items could be stolen too, so adventurers went out of their way to protect such gear. There were a number of amusing and sad stories of adventurers killing each other over such items.
One thing I read was that thieves and murderers here were treated quite harshly. There was no ‘friendly’ thieves’ guild, nor a prominent assassin’s guild with pretty fliers and a government booth for signing up. Such places were inherently evil, and shunned by anyone with half a mind and decent ethics. I’d worked for such people before—perhaps not as bad as assassins—but I knew intimately how self-degrading that stuff soon became.
Even though murder was not condoned, and punishable with either imprisonment or execution, duelling was allowed, if the Gods of Memory deemed it just. If the interface accepted a challenge between two parties, you were given the opportunity to duke it out, either to first blood or, more rarely, to death. Sanctioned “to-the-death” fights could gather quite a crowd, with large bets taking place. At the end of a death-match, the victor could loot one item of gear, whatever he thought was most valuable, before the body respawned—if it did. A sober thought that one. Respawn was never guaranteed, Isserad’s frigging luck.
I checked down the list at other staffs and didn’t see much else I liked. Most were for mages and priests with extra spells stored, or bonuses to summoning and necromancy. Some of the generic monk-class staffs were quite good; most of these were of elite (blue) range, with bonus deflection and bonus speed or bonus damage. They were better than my staff, but started at about twenty zorb and went up from there. Then I went looking at staff-spears and saw one I liked.