by S Bailey
Director Devon looked angry at his sister for betting on her ability points and the system, but nothing could be done now, and he said, “The Arc guild will agree to keep your confidences.”
Jen looked directly at Cristi and gave her a sincere, “Thank you,” and then looked at Director Devon and said, “and thank you, Director. We haven’t told you everything we would like for you to consider, and I hope you’ll understand why when you see this.”
Jen then lifted her hand and pulled from her ring the sword and armor of the bandit Ganjo and said, “We would like to know if the guild would be interested in selling this armor we looted from bandit Ganjo’s dead body.”
The Director was completely taken by surprise with the turn of events. The Head of Security’s eyes almost fell out of his head, and Cristi looked like she was about to faint. The Director was at a loss for words; he couldn’t understand how these two were able to kill the high-level bandit Ganjo, and everyone knew you would’ve had to kill him to get his sword and armor!
The Director finally said to Jen and Sam, “I apologize, but the guild requires us to check that you have come by these goods honorably.”
Jen replied, “Director, no need to apologize, we killed the bandit in order to free some farmers and three other weird people that Ganjo forced into slavery.”
Director Devon gave his chief of security a thoughtful look and wondered if the three weird people were the ones from Earth that were rumored to have teleported into Ganjo’s territory.
Director Devon pushed his thoughts of travelers from Earth aside as he obtained an ability gambling oath from both Jen and Sam that they killed the bandit Ganjo. He advised, and then asked Jen, “We can send it off to the auction next month on your behalf. Our fee for handling the sale confidentially is 10% of the net proceeds obtained at the auction. Is that agreeable?”
Before Jen could answer, Sam said, “Aha! I’ve got it!” Sam had been inspecting the enchanted rod and working on decrypting its meaning in order to find the error, and he had just realized the problem.
Everyone was now looking at Sam, so he explained, “This enchanted rod is actually made up of 10 smaller separate rods, connected along here.”
The location on the rod that Sam was pointing to did not look any different than the rest of the rod to everyone else in the room. In explanation, Sam broke the 10 pieces apart. Cristi almost fainted, believing that the rod was now irreparably broken.
Sam then started connecting the rods together again explaining, “My guess is that at some point, someone must have dropped the rod, and the 10 parts became unlinked. They then linked the 10 pieces back together, but they had linked them in the wrong order for the enchantment to work.”
Sam finished snapping the pieces together and twisted the rod causing another clicking sound. “There, all fixed!”
To Jen he said, “Go ahead and pay 4 gold to Cristi.”
Sam privately messaged Jen to confirm she was in agreement, then he said to Cristi, “There’s one more thing. In addition to increased production, this enchanted rod will also increase the physical size of the crop. Can you show us your farm today, so that we may get this rod installed and working?”
Cristi’s world had just done several summersaults. She had been leaving the guild with no money, but now, she had a chance to make things better for the farm. She felt light-headed and was close to fainting, but she refused and stayed conscious, she didn’t want to wake up and find a different reality. Cristi finally said, “Yes, it is just outside of the City. It will not take long to get there.”
Director Devon looked at his little sister full of love and relief, and said to her, “Go ahead and take them to the farm, Cristi. I will have the 4 gold sent to Lee Zhang, and he will be paid in full before the end of the day!”
Director Devon then said, “Master Sam, I have one more question before you go, would you be able to fix the glass vault in the showroom?”
“My daughter was correct when she said I only have a small skill in fixing enchantments. For example, if you were to see a gauntlet that had the middle finger and the thumb mixed up, you would know exactly what was wrong with it, but that doesn’t mean you have the skills of a blacksmith to fix the gauntlet. This is like your glass vault that I cannot fix.
“However, if you saw someone trying to put on a suit of armor, and they kept trying to put the gauntlet on their foot, you could tell them that the gauntlet belongs on their hand. This was like your sister’s enchanted rod: a simple correction that my small skills were able to make.”
As Sam and Jen were walking down the road with Cristi, Jen heard the Head of Security say, “Those two are very, very dangerous people. I don’t think I could have killed the bandit Ganjo in a one-on-one fight. Don’t be fooled by Master Sam’s actions. I watched the way he communicated with his daughter very closely. I think he may be a good man, but if someone were to even threaten his daughter, I don’t think an entire army could stop him.”
The Director’s reply was lost to Jen as they moved further down the road.
Jen and Sam did not fully realize the ally they created by helping Director Devon’s sister.
Chapter 30:
It’s Like Riding a Bike
On the way back from Cristi’s farm, Sam said to Jen, “Your ability to sense mana is unbelievable. I had to be within 10 feet of those poison enchantment rods before I could sense their location.”
Jen replied, “I use my psych skill to sense the difference in the mana signals, emotions, and just about everything else in this world that uses mana, so I was able to sense the mana that just felt “wrong” and follow it back to the rods.” Jen then laughed and said, “I would love to be a fly on the wall when the farmer’s guild eventually takes those poison rods back to their supplier, and they realize that they are not working!”
Sam laughed as well, he was feeling good about being able to help Cristi and Joe. He felt like he hadn’t really helped anyone other than himself or Jen in years. Sam gave to charity, and he would help people in little ways all the time, but he felt like what they did today had really made a difference is some good people’s lives.
Sam then asked Jen, “I’m not complaining, and I am glad we were able to help Cristi and Joe, but why did you get us involved?”
Jen knew that Sam was not upset in any way, but was simply curious about her motives. She had to pause and think about it. She wasn’t really sure why she chose to get them involved either. She then replied, “Initially, I didn’t think it would interfere with our goal to get Kelly back, and I hated the idea of that slime Lee Zhang stealing property from anyone, but now, I’m just glad we could help Cristi and Joe. My soul actually feels like it is healing a little after being forced to kill all those bandits.”
Sam’s simple reply of “Me too,” made Jen’s soul heal just a little bit more again.
“My turn,” Jen said, as she looked to Sam and asked, “Why on earth were YOU, the guy who always blends in, crawling around on the floor in the Arc Guild’s public shop?”
Sam looked shameful as he responded, “I noticed the enchantment in the glass vault, and my gut was telling me something was wrong. I was thinking that if I could spot the problem, it would get us in the good graces of the Arc Guild and maybe get us some work. Before I realized what was happening, my focus and trance got out of control, and I lost myself, and the next thing I knew, I was on the floor looking at the runes on the bottom of the enchantment and that sales clerk was hollering at me.”
“That’s scarry,” replied Jen.
“I just didn’t realize the depth of concentration my Words of Understanding and Meditation skill put me in. We were lucky I didn’t learn this somewhere else! I will not be doing enchantment decryptions in public in the future, not unless I have you ready to stop me from drawing the wrong kind of attention to us.”
Jen simply nodded and replied, “Yeah, this shit is all still pretty new to us; we need to watch ourselves more closely. What about the
glass vault enchantment, were you really unable to fix it?”
Sam looked thoughtful for a second and said, “Probably not. I think I could have eventually decrypted the enchantment code, but I’m guessing it would have taken me at least several weeks of work to decrypt and go through the code. It would then take me several more weeks to get a complete understanding of what it did and what was wrong with it.”
“Why is that?” Jen asked.
“Understanding enchantments is kind of like looking at a 10-speed bicycle. If you have never seen a bicycle before and it was laying on its side, you would have no idea what it was for or how it worked. With my Words of Understanding skill, I use my power to create a user’s manual that explains everything about the bicycle. You can read the user’s manual and understand the part on how to shift the gears on the bike much easier than the part of the user manual that explains how the front and rear derailleurs work and how the gear ratios work. I have to actually understand the user’s manual to be able to fix the enchantment. If someone brought me a broken enchantment and told me what it did, then I can build the user manual more quickly, but depending on what is broken, I might be able to quickly understand how to fix it, or it may take weeks or months of study to understand how to fix the problem.”
“What about the excel app you created. Could you decrypt the enchantment quicker that way?” suggested Jen.
“Hmm, that’s not it. Let me give you an example. If the chain has slipped off the bike, I would quickly know how to fix the problem, but if a derailleur was completely missing, I would have to learn what it did and how it worked from the manual, and then invent from scratch a replacement. It may take months for me to complete this type of enchantment repair, unless I could “borrow” a working derailleur from another enchantment that I’ve fixed in the past, and then patch it into the one I’m trying to fix. With the glass vault, even if I eventually figured out how to fix the enchantment, I would then also have to learn how to etch enchantments on glass. Not to mention how long it would take me to charge up the mana in that type of enchantment. It basically holds a crap-ton of mana in case someone tries to breach the vault. They probably spent months initially charging it up, and I’m sure someone would need to top it off with mana everyday if they got it working again.”
Jen looked at Sam while shaking her head, and said, “So to summarize, bla, bla, bla, months to fix it maybe. Bla, bla, bla, some story about old boomers riding bicycles, and you don’t know how to etch enchantments on glass. Is that correct?”
Sam gave Jen a look of utter exasperation and pretended to be offended the rest of the way home, while Jen couldn’t keep the shit-eating grin off of her face.
Chapter 31:
Making Money
Jen rented a store with retail space in the front and a living area/warehouse in the back. “I really like this store,” Sam said as he stocked the shelves with the different low-level charms he had created.
Apparently, almost no land in Casino City was privately owned. Jen learned that the Arc Guild owned its guild house and had their own transfer pad within their courtyard. However, most guilds had to rent property and the city never sold land with transfer pads anymore. Which explained why the Acid Guild had to run out of its guild hall to surround the transfer pad for their Deck Dropper.
Sam and Jen had also learned from conversations with Director Devon, that the healing charms would be in high demand at 20 copper each, and they were warned to take precautions from someone trying to buy them all up and resell them.
“I know you are on your ‘Jen the saint’ character build, but I still think 20 copper a piece is too cheap,” said Sam.
Jen huffed at Sam and said, “For the hundredth time, a typical farmer makes 25 copper a day. At most, we could sell them for 50 copper each, but then they would resent us when buying them, and for what? The coppers are not why we are opening the store. We are opening the store to get people to bring in their enchantments for you to fix and decrypt, and so I can gather intel about the Decks from as many people as possible. Before you say another word, yes, I am glad that we get a chance to help some of the poor people in this city.”
“You’re right Boss, I’ll try not to be a whiny little bitch anymore today.”
Jen quipped with a laugh, “You mean, whiny OLD boomer.”
Sam took his deserved ridicule as he continued to work and asked Jen, “Did you get a chance to ask Tamako what she thought about the magical gambling contracts I purchased from that scrivener’s office?”
Sam had purchased magical contracts that said he would look to fix or recharge enchantments, and if he could not fix the enchantment, he would return the item without charge for his services. The contract also forbade him from copying and selling the enchantment to anyone else. If he was able to fix the enchantment, they were required to pay him for his services. Once signed, the magical contract would disappear. If the contract was breached, the breaching party would lose half of their ability points back to the System.
Jen kept cleaning the front window display cases and said, “Oh yeah, I took one of the contracts to dinner last night and Tamako said it looked good to her, and it was fairly standard for the type of work you will be doing. However, because of the lack of enchanters on this Deck, she didn’t really know if you needed it because people really don’t have the option to go anywhere else.”
Sam liked the idea of a contract, and he wasn’t worried about signing it because after repairing the enchantments and learning how they worked, his Enchantment app would always strip the enchantment of useless or misleading runes, and then he would re-encrypt a new more efficient and better enchantment.
Less than a month after arriving in the First Deck, they opened their store for business. They were only open three days a week to keep the majority of their time focused on training. The first few days were a little slow, but when word got around about enchanted charms for 20 copper each, they had a line down the street.
They created three lines for customers, one line was only for those that wanted to purchase healing charms, and they had to use the charm in the store before they left. A second line was for anyone that wanted one of the other charms, and the customers could buy as many of the non-healing charms as they wanted. The third line was usually empty, but it was for customers that wanted enchantments fixed.
The blazing heat from the sun was causing everyone to get cranky inside the store when a system message appeared:
Casino City Block-Wide Notice
The Greater the Risk, the Greater the Reward!
==
Gambling Quest: Start a riot in the Enchantments and Charm store
==
Select your Fortune:
Accept and start a riot within 20 minutes that causes the destruction or theft of all the merchandise in the store, receive 1x the ability points you gamble and euphoria. Minimum bet 2, Maximum bet 4. Odds of death 40%
Decline Quest and continue your life as a risk-avoiding weakling!
==
Sam Selected “D,” and the quest was declined.
==
A scrawny, fidgety man sweating in line complained loudly, “It’s too hot in here! They should give us the charms for free to cool us down! They’re not even from our city!”
Their store contained the same posted warnings about gambler activity as all the others, but it was obvious the man accepted the gamble. Unfortunately, he was getting some grumbling agreements from other patrons. Before the man could say another inciting word, Sam jumped over the counter with such quickness and speed, the scrawny gambler didn’t even realize what was happening until he felt the strike of a wooden baton against his leg. The man screamed as he fell to the ground. Sam didn’t utter a sound as he quietly beat the man black and blue with the baton. He didn’t hit the man’s face or break any of his bones, but the man screamed and screamed as Sam continued to relentlessly drag and beat him out of the store. Jen could hear Sam continue to beat the gambler out in the
road. She looked nervously at the customers, but was surprised when she heard their response.
“Stupid gambler shouldn’t have tried to start shit!” said an older man.
“He’s lucky Master Sam didn’t simply kill him,” said another.
“Did you see how fast he jumped over the counter. I bet no other lazy gamblers will try messing with their store again!” said a farmer.
“Next!” Jen called out to get the customers attention back onto store business.
When Sam returned to the store, he received a System Message.
==
A gambler has failed his quest against property you own, and you stopped him. The system has received 1 ability point, and you have received 1 ability point in luck from the unlucky gambler.
==
After they closed the store at the end of the day, Jen commented, “I think you beat that poor gambler too much. You could have easily drug him outside after you hit him the first time.”
Sam had expected Jen to comment on his actions, and said “I know you are going to disagree with my reasoning, but he had to be made an example of. I made sure not to break any of his bones or hit him in the face. However, I admit that I did try to get him to scream by inflicting as much pain as possible.”
“That’s just horrible!” replied Jen.
“I know, but if we didn’t make an example of him, there would be other gamblers testing our resolve, and we might have to kill them.”
“Protecting our store is one thing, but beating a man unnecessarily is just torture, and that’s bullshit! What do you think Kelly would say if she saw what you did!” retorted Jen.
Thinking of Kelly’s reaction was like a punch in his gut, utterly tearing down his arguments for beating the gambler. Sam looked down at the floor as he replied with the sadness and guilt of what he knew Kelly would think, “You’re right. Kelly wouldn’t even want to look at me. I just….I screwed up. It was wrong and I will do my best to discuss things with you first in the future before taking any action.”