Chapter 9 - Sweet, Sweet Loot.... (Patreon)

Lyria was waiting outside the Arcanery—arms crossed and back against the wall. When I emerged, she pushed off, ready to follow me. It was mid-afternoon. The giant planet floated contentedly in the blue skies, one half lit brightly from the sun and the other shrouded in darkness.

I stared up at it, shielding my eyes and squinting. 

 “Come on,” Lyria said. “We need to get your room.”

“Your boss mentioned something about clearing an infestation in the morning,” I said while we headed down a central path between shops and buildings. My head was on a swivel as I took it all in. “Can you tell me more about the job?”

“Like what?” she asked, always staying one or two steps ahead of me and walking a little too fast. 

I had to weave between people to keep up, sometimes jogging as she plowed ahead. “Is clearing an infestation dangerous? And what makes him think I’d be able to help?” 

“Dangerous? Extremely, but we’ve got a very large group commissioned. And he’s not asking you to fight.”

“What does he expect me to do?”

“Help drag the bodies back to town when we’re done.”

“Oh,” I said. I felt vaguely insulted by that. “What do you do with the bodies?”

She looked back at me. She really was quite pretty, with fair skin, a dusting of freckles on her nose, and full lips. Even the fact that she looked like she could likely kick my ass was mildly attractive in a weird way. “Where are you from, exactly?”
 I narrowed my eyes. It felt like a slightly dangerous question. “Why do you ask?”

“Because you don’t seem to know much. About anything. And there’s something off about you.”

“I’m not from here,” I said.

“Where are you from?” She’d stopped walking now. This didn’t feel like the type of question I would be allowed to dodge.

“I’m… not supposed to say,” I tried. I made sure to put on the sort of serious face you might wear if you were keeping very important, very grave secrets.

She stared back at me, then finally threw up a hand in surrender. “Alright. Suit yourself.” She started walking again, forcing me to hurry to keep up.

“So what do they want the bodies for?” I asked. 

“Crafters with the right skills condense them.”

“Into what?”

She let out a long sigh through her nose. “Into primal cores.” Lyria must’ve seen the look on my face because she answered the next question I was going to ask. “Crafters can combine them with reward tokens to make items.”

I pulled the bag of tokens out and shook it, peeking inside again. “Speaking of… where do I trade these in, anyway?”

She reached suddenly, closing the bag and pushing it into my chest, looking up and down the relatively busy street. “Are you crazy?”

I raised my eyebrows, meeting her gaze. “I don’t think so. Why do you ask?”

“Put those in your slip.”

“I’m sorry. My what?”

“Your slip space.” She was using that voice again, the one that told me she was blown away by my ignorance.

In my defense, I was ignorant. I had no damn clue how long it took Seraphel to reach godhood when he first landed here on Eros. I may have had some lingering benefits from that journey, but I had absolutely none of the knowledge. I wouldn’t get knowledge if I didn’t try to build friendships.
 After all, power came in different forms. There was the power of my own hands and the tools at my disposal. But there was also the power of knowledge and connections. In my old life, I’d always been good at surrounding myself with the right people. And sure, maybe she seemed a little cranky, but Lyria didn’t seem so bad. In my experience, the people who started off as mildly antagonistic were exactly the ones you could trust.
 People who wanted something from you tended to butter you up. They’d jump at the first opportunity to help and endear themselves. People who were happy to call you an idiot or roll their eyes, though? They weren’t trying to get anything from you, and if you could break through that ice, they were usually the strongest friends in the long run.

At least, that was my experience on Earth. Whether it was true on Eros was still up for debate. 

“When you say slip space,” I said. “Do you mean my inventory?”

The word made her dark red eyebrows furrow, but she shrugged. “Just put them away. Somebody is going to try to mug you, and you’re going to make me have to do my damn job.”

I stashed them and found they went to a currency tab, just like the money I found in the tomte village. My slip space. It sounded kind of dirty.
 I also doubted anybody could’ve managed to snag the bag from me before I could stash it. The action was faster than the blink of an eye. 

“What the hell did you do to get so many tokens at once anyway?” she asked.

“A little bit of this and that,” I said carefully. I couldn’t exactly tell her the lion’s share was from a 300-year-stasis. I also thought maybe the genocidal rampage was probably something I should keep to myself. “Do people not usually get this big of a haul? Around these parts,” I added unconvincingly.

“Royals with an accomplishment guide, maybe,” she said. “And no. I’m not answering any more of your dumb questions about what that is, or why, or how. My job is to keep you alive and out of trouble, not be your butler.” 

I swallowed my questions and focused on keeping up with the fast-walking guard. But then we passed a shop with wavy glass windows and a display of dresses on wooden mannequins. I absently glanced toward them, then stopped when I noticed my reflection. I walked closer, raising a hand to touch my cheek.

“Woah,” I whispered. I was handsome as hell. My manhood and muscle tone might only have earned a slight boost, but my face… It was me, just… not. My jaw was sharper, even if it was dusted with a little stubble. My features were more striking. My eyes were a lighter green, and my hair had a kind of effortlessly floppy, “guy who doesn’t have to try” thing going on. Given all the strangeness of the last day and a half, this hardly even registered on the “weird” scale. At least this flavor of weird wasn’t trying to eat me or steal my helmet. 

Lyria realized I wasn’t following her. She stalked back toward me, then paused and laughed. It was a nice sound compared to her angry grunts and clipped tone.

I turned, curious what she was laughing at. Then I realized it was me. She was laughing at me because I’d stopped in front of a very girly dress on the other side of the glass. And then I’d put my hand on my cheek like I was in love with it.

“Uh,” I said slowly. I couldn’t exactly explain that I wasn’t admiring the dress—no, the real answer was much worse. I was admiring myself.

Lyria grabbed my arm and yanked me back in the direction we were headed. “Once you’re not my problem, you can buy all the fancy dresses you want.”

I couldn’t tell if this was shaping up to be the worst or the best first impression I’d ever made with someone. Maybe it was a bit of both… 

I fell back in behind her, nearly bumping into people as I ran through my mental list of all the reward tokens I’d claimed so far.

[Common Ingredients Token]

[Common Survival Token]

[Common Bed Token]

[Common Weapons Token]

[Common Armor Token]

[Rare Ingredients Token]

[Rare Bed Token]

[Epic Ingredients Token]

[Epic Bed Token]

[Legendary Bed Token]

[Cursed Bed Token]

It seemed like quite the haul, even if I wished all those high-rarity rewards were weapon and armor tokens. 

If I ignored the planet overhead, I could almost imagine I was just at a medieval Renaissance fair or something. With my… What would Lyria be? My grouchy guide? My hot bodyguard? 

I thought about my rewards as we made our way through town. Mostly, I was curious about the one that seemed to be the highest tier—my cursed bed token. 

“Do you know anything about cursed items?” I asked suddenly, still struggling to keep up with Lyria as we exited the market section of town and entered someplace more residential-looking. 

“I know they’re bad news,” she said simply, giving no indication she thought I was asking for personal reasons. “The highest rarity tier is a three-way split. Angelic, Demonic, or Cursed. It's downright terrible luck if you get your hands on a reward that godlike, and it winds up being cursed, though. Only lunatics ever claim them. There was a story of a famous gold-ranked swordsman who found a cursed weapon token. Turned it in, and he got a weapon so incredible nobody even believed his description of its abilities. The catch was the curse turned his arms intangible. They passed right through anything he touched, including his sword. Couldn’t swing a sword or feed himself properly and retired on the spot.”

“How did he wipe his ass?” I asked.

Lyria laughed a little, then cleared her throat and remembered to keep frowning.

There we go. Hit her with a little of the old charm when she least expects it. She’ll come around in no time.

“So,” I said. “Stupid question, but—”

“Shocker,” she said sarcastically.

One step forward, two steps back, apparently. But if we did that enough times, we’d practically be dancing, right?

“If someone could delete an item,” I said. “Would that also delete the curse? Assuming they didn’t think the tradeoff was worth it.”

“If you could, maybe. But you can’t, so it doesn’t matter.”

“And how exactly do I use these tokens?”

I saw she was opening her mouth to make a comment about how even a newborn baby on Eros should know the answer to something like that, so I raised a hand, cutting her off.

“For both our benefits, let’s just say I’m from very far away and know absolutely nothing about this place. Okay?”

She looked suspicious but gave a small shrug. “You turn tokens in. Improvements to your personal space get turned in at a furnisher because there’s some extra step to change your personal space, and you can’t be inside when it’s happening. Equipment and supply tokens get turned in within your personal space. And, well,” she added. “You can always sell them or trade them.”

“Which is the smarter choice?”

“If you want to be an adventurer, you should turn them in. The rewards tend to cater to your skills and class. If you just want to sit somewhere and get fat, then you could sell them, I suppose.”

“No,” I said. “I want to get stronger. As strong as I can.”

Lyria slowed her pace for once, giving me a searching look like she was seeing me for the first time. She nodded slightly. “Good. At least you’re not completely stupid, then.”

I was about to ask her more about how getting stronger in this world works when we reached a large crowd and a covered wagon. It was being pulled by a breed of horse that looked far more lean and light than any I’d seen on Earth. The horses also had trails of shadow coming away from their hooves, reminding me of the magical effect on my helmet.

“What’s that?” I asked.

“Envoy from a divine house.” She craned her neck, trying to get a better look, but she was maybe five and a half feet tall. The crowd of people was probably blocking her view.

I squinted at the wagon, noticing a painted sigil on the side. “Red flames behind a white fist?” I asked.

“Oh,” she said. “That’s the sigil of Azmeria.” This time, Lyria saw the look of confusion on my face and saved me from having to ask. “Ithariel is the ultimate divine. The others have been gone for centuries if you even believe the stories. But he left four of their divine houses intact, and they’re run beneath him with puppets at their head. Azmeria’s house is the least influential of the four remaining houses. Ithariel sends them out when he suspects treason or treachery. They’re known for interrogation and torture techniques.”

“Thus, the nervous-looking crowd,” I noted.

“Thus,” she agreed.

Two figures in red and white robes adorned with strange, pure white metal chains were moving through the crowd. People practically fell over themselves to make room for the two.

I tried to inspect them but remembered I wasn’t wearing my helmet. When Lyria’s back was turned, I pulled it out, slipped it on, and studied the two figures.

[Human, Level 44 (Gold)]

[Human, Level 13 (Gold)]

Even in the commotion and scene, a few people gave me awed looks. 

“What are you doing?” Lyria asked. 

I hadn’t realized she turned to face me. Reflexively, I put a hand on my helmet. I could snap it into my slip space instantly if she moved to reach for it.

“Relax,” she said. “I’m not going to take it. I’m a guard, remember? I’m the one who’s supposed to keep people from taking your stuff.”

“Yeah, well, can’t be too careful,” I said.

Lyria just shrugged.

I had to admit I was desperate to know more about my helmet’s abilities. Maybe she lied about not wanting to steal it, but how could she, even if she wanted to? I’d have it in my slip space before she could touch me.

I realized a small woman was trailing behind the two robed figures. She was wearing a simple white robe and caked with dirt and ash. But she was jaw-droppingly gorgeous. She had thick golden hair streaked with orange. Her eyes were big and a bright blue. She had plump lips and a figure I couldn’t fail to notice, even in the bulky robe.

I felt a pang of sadness for her. If Lyria's words were true, it looked like she was in some kind of trouble with the divine house of Azmeria.

I inspected the beautiful stranger.

[Human, Level 50 (Wood)]

“If my helmet let me see what level people were,” I said slowly. “Would that be a big deal?”

“Your helmet lets you identify people?” Lyria whispered, awe clear in her tone.

The woman climbed into the back of the wagon, followed by the two robed figures. The driver gave the reins a little snap, and the strange horses trotted off, nearly trampling townspeople who hadn’t cleared out of the way fast enough. 

“I’m asking hypothetically,” I said, pulling it off and returning it to my inventory.

Lyria rolled her eyes and started walking again once the crowd cleared. “You saw the lens that naidu in the Arcanery had, right? That’s an identification lens. They’re extremely rare and valuable. Usually, you don’t see them outside an Arcanery or very high-level adventurers. I’ve never heard of a helmet that can identify people.”

“Right, yeah, me neither,” I said.

The look she gave me said she wasn’t buying my “hypothetical” question.

“How does everybody else know what level someone is?” I asked.

“There are high-level items. Lenses, wands, and elixirs. Employment offices like a town guard, the military, or adventurer’s guilds will use them to verify your level before they’ll hire you. Mercenary groups, too.”

From the sounds of it, the identification ability alone on my helmet made it incredibly valuable. The fact that I could also see accomplishments and tooltips probably pushed the value even higher. I raised a finger. “One more question…”

Lyria sighed. “Yes?”

“If I died with this on my head, would it dissolve when somebody tried to take it?”

“Yes.”

“So why wouldn’t my clothing?”

She eyed the rough robe I’d been given when I arrived in town. “Because your clothing is mundane. Using magical items requires a mana tether. When a tethered item is in your possession, you’re tethered. If you die without releasing the tether properly, the item dies, too.”

“Right, yeah. Makes total sense,” I lied. “So, in theory, if I threw a little tiny knife at somebody, would that release the tether?”

“It would depend on whether you were strong enough to maintain the tether when it wasn’t in your possession…”

“Mhm, right,” I said, nodding as if I’d already known this. It made sense, though, in a way. That explained why the tomte knives Jinglefoot threw and dropped didn’t dissolve, but the one in his hand did.

“Where are we going again?”

“To get you a room.”

“Any chance we could swing by one of those furnisher places to turn in my bed tokens first?”

“You can turn in your tokens on your own time. I already took you to the Arcanery. Jarn just asked me to get you a room and keep an eye on you. That’s what I’m going to do.”

“Got it. Once you get me a room, you’ll be obligated to follow me when I make my own way to the furnisher.”

Lyria’s jaw ticked with annoyance. “I would prefer if you stayed in your room so I could sit at a comfortable table by the fire, enjoy a drink, and know you’re inside somewhere, not causing trouble.”

“Your preferences have been noted. Thank you for sharing them.”

For a moment, I thought Lyria might actually punch me. Instead, she picked up her pace and led us toward a double-doored building that looked like an inn.