Chapter 219 (Patreon)

Chapter 219

Riven stared down at the bag of Elysium coins glinting in the sunlight with a frown, ignoring the challenging tone of the rough-looking man in front of him.  “Genua?”

The elf immediately straightened on her seat.  “Yes, Riv?”

He snorted in amusement at the reduced name they were using for him in public.  It wasn’t like his features were all that different and in time people would likely put two and two together, but still.  “Would you like to go?”

His head turned and he clasped his hands with a polite smile.  “I won’t stop you if you do want to.  You can always come back if it’s me that’s holding you here.  I can watch Len for you and have Azmoth even escort you back and forth if you’d like.  Is that something you’d want?”

Genua’s face twisted in disgust, and she gave the three bearded men a once over before leaning forward to get a better look at the man in the top hat.  “No.  No it is most certainly not.”

“Are you sure?” Riven said, scooting the bag of coins over the table to her for her to get a better look.  “They’re willing to pay.”

“I said no, Riv.  Please don’t ask me again.”  She stiffened and one of the men standing nearby audibly scoffed, picking up the bag of coins and pocketing it.

Riven shrugged their way.  “There.  I asked, she didn’t want to go even given leave of her duties.  Please, go away.”

Azmoth took the liberty to stand up, getting some wide-eyed looks of astonishment when they realized just how tall he actually was.  Even in ‘human’ form, he was absolutely huge and towered over even Hakim who was already a beast of a man.

The middle of the three men, wearing overalls and fidgeting with one of his pockets before glancing over his shoulder to shake his head at his boss - made some unsaid communication with the other man before shrugging and sighing.  “Alright, that be fine.  If ya change your mind lady let us know, my employer is mighty rich and treats his women well.”

With that, much to Riven’s surprise, the three newcomers turned around and simply walked off without a care in the world.  There were no attempts to intimidate anyone, no threats, no angry yelling or pointing fingers.  They just left, and the man wearing the tophat and monocle sighed reluctantly before turning around with all of his hired thugs and walking away down the street.

Azmoth sat back down, causing the bench underneath him to creak.

“That actually went rather well.” Riven said with surprise.  “Usually I end up killing a bunch of people when things like that start.”

Hakim chuckled under his breath, shaking his head and resuming the monopoly game they had going on.  “You say that so casually!  I hope I don’t become like that.  Do you ever have questions about your morality?  Not trying to be offensive, I’m just seriously curious.”

Riven considered the question, drumming his fingers on the table and staring out into the forest beyond town where Athela was likely still running his way.

“It isn’t so bad.” Riven shrugged, taking another bite of a ham and cheese sandwich and chewing slowly before swallowing.  “I’ve given up trying to determine what is good and is not, what is evil and what is not.  I just do what I want, hope for the best.  Now tell me, is there a shop around here that would sell anything on this list?”

Riven pulled out a sheet of paper and shoved it across the table for Hakim, Tim, Julie and Tanya to look at.  Over thirty items were listed on the sheet, with various notes and starred items written in black ink.

“It’s stuff I could use for totem making based on the few beginner’s manuals I got back in Brightsville.” Riven said with a toothy grin.  “I’m really looking forward to starting.  I have enough to start out and make a few really basic totems, but by the time I go back my goal is to have finally acquired an ascended craft.  One of my previous familiars, Yattazi, had a cooking skill I never got to see and she didn’t have a cooking class - so I know it’s possible.”

“Might not be as good as those with a class, but yes it’s definitely possible.  I personally have a crafting class regarding the clothesmaking profession, but there are others here that have only the ascended craft.” Tanya muttered under her breath, flipping the page over to make sure nothing was on the back and brushing her fingers through her shoulder-length red hair.  Her face scrunched up and her freckles became more pronounced when she handed the paper back.  “There are two shops you might want to check out.”

“Glee’s General Goods Store and Odds & Ends.” Tim nodded in agreement, standing up and beginning to stretch.  “Want me to show you while the others finish their game and wait for Athela?”

“I still hungry, stay and eat.” Azmoth confirmed in his hulking, bald, barbarian form - but it looked more like he was just invested in the monopoly game and didn’t want to get up.

Riven chuckled, wheeling himself back and then around the table while Fay gave a polite nod to the others and stood up with him.  “Absolutely.  Let’s go, I want to start building things today!”

***

Glee’s General Goods Store already had a pack of men and women of various levels carrying backpacks or pushing carts right outside, talking about nearby dungeon runs or trading opportunities with other towns that were somewhat out-of-the-way according to Tim.  The building was a boxy two-story log cabin with the bottom floor being a general goods store and the top floor being where ‘Glee’ - the owner of the establishment - lived with her two sons.

“Scuse us.” Tim called out, getting a few head turns but also allowing Riven, Fay and himself to pass through when the other people crowding the area made way.

“New to town, eh?” A stick-thin woman wearing hiking gear asked with a puzzled but warm smile.  “Not often we see people coming through here besides the regulars.  They with you for a while Tim?  Or just acquaintances?”

“Hey Jarla, and they’re going to be here for at least a few weeks I think.”  Tim gestured to the two behind him.  “This is Riv, and that’s Fay pushing his wheelchair.”

“Can’t walk?” Another short bald man wearing a backpack asked - only to be chided by the woman named Jarla.

“Course he can’t walk, idiot!” Jarla smacked the bald guy with the back of her hand across his shoulder, causing him to wince.  “What do ya think he’s in the chair for!?  You got two brain cells up there in that tiny skull of yours and only one of them is working!  Riv, ignore this moron.”

Riven smirked at the man’s expression, having thoroughly tucked his tail between his legs, but held up a hand to dismiss the question.  “Not a problem at all.  To be fair I can walk, but it takes a lot out of me and it isn’t for very long.  Hopefully I’ll recover soon.”

“See!  It was a valid question!” The bald man humphed, getting a laugh from his friends when Jenny scowled ferociously his way - but Tim was kind enough to hold the door.

Riven waved to his brief acquaintances and let Fay push him inside, the succubus getting more than a few stares on the way in.

The sound of a bell jingled when the wooden door shut, and the interior was well lit with a couple barred windows as well as a few lightbulbs powered by a generator in the corner of the store.  Glass cases stood against the walls and as counters to lean on, with a few shelves and tables all displaying various goods and attached price tags.  It was obvious this had once been an outdoors and hunting store by the layout, or they’d simply adapted really fast with all of the stuffed deer heads.

“Hold on!  I’ll be right there!” a feminine voice called out from the back with the gruff laughter of more masculine voices around a corner and into an office area near the generator.  Opening the office and saying something to the occupants inside, a tall overweight woman with happy features and wrinkles indicating she smiled a lot said something sassy - getting a laugh from the men inside before letting the door click shut behind her.

She turned, brown frazzled hair completely unkempt and a smudge mark of grease on her face.  “Oh hello, Tim!  You brought some new ones with ya today?  My name’s  Glee, and this is my store - Glee’s General Goods Store in case you didn’t read the sign out there!”

“Hey Glee!” Tim replied happily, bouncing over to the counter and introducing ‘Riv’ and Fay one by one.  “They’re here for the next couple weeks and he’s looking for some supplies.  I know that a lot of people come through here and drop off their finds from monster kills or dungeon runs, so we decided to come here to take a look.”

“What kind of supplies?” Glee asked with a raised eyebrow, coming behind one of the glass counters and leaning her weight onto the top while giving Riv and Fay a once over. “Kinda odd you came all the way out here to Jerbyville with a chair like that.  I don’t know how you made it through the wilderness frankly.”

“He had help.” Fay said kindly, brushing her long silky blonde hair out of her face and blowing at it with a puff of air when it came right back over her right eye.  “I babysit him, basically he’s my pet.”

“You what!?” Riven said aghast, dropping his jaw in fake protest and whirling around to get a laugh from the young woman.  “That’s just plain rude!”

Glee grunted her acknowledgement while her eyes traced Fay’s figure in the sundress.  “Yes I think many a man wouldn’t mind being your pet, missy.  So what is it you both need?  A comb maybe?”

Fay snorted with a smirk.  “Yes, that.  But mostly we came for Rive- Riv’s new hobby.  He’s trying to become a totem maker.”

Riven playfully stuck his tongue out at the girl behind him and then took out his list, handing it to Glee across the countertop and waiting for her to read.

The store owner frowned slightly upon getting the list, then took out a pen and paper of her own before writing three things down.  “I have a few of them, but not much of each.  Werebear Fangs, Icewind Roots, and Glowstones I have in stock.  You said you were into totem making?  I heard that was a rare one.  Only Fae users can make and utilize totems right?”

“Unholy as well.” Riven corrected with a nod.

The woman paused, raising her eyes to meet Riv’s and blinking twice.  “You an Unholy user?”

“What if I am?”

“Then I’d say your type is very rare around here.  We only have two people with the Unholy Foundational Pillar in town, and neither of them are very talented.”  She finished writing on her own sheet and handed Riven’s list back to him.  “Might want to try Odds & Ends after my place, they probably have some of those soulstones you’re looking for.  I used to have em too but I sold all of them for a discount because they were wailing so damn much.  Made an absolute ruckus.”

Her frazzled head bobbed up and down while fumbling with a key and turning a lock after walking down the row.  She collected a couple bear fangs from the glass cases, went around to a shelf to collect a couple of white roots, and then bent down to snatch a few small round stones.  Coming back to the counter and laying them all out for Riven to see, she gestured to the items with a flick of her wrist.  “These what you’re looking for?”

[Werebear Fang:  These fangs are often used as crafting ingredients for jewelry, and contain a faint pulse of nature-attuned power.]

[Icewind Root: Alchemy ingredient.  This root is often found in cold climates, thriving in harsh tundras, but they can also be found in cave systems underground.]

[Glowstone: These stones are most often made through mana polishing.  Occurring in nature most often in rivers with creatures possessing a high water affinity, these stones can collect ambient energy over time that causes them to glow when they hit maximum storage.  After release, they turn back into dormant stones until the cycle is repeated.]

Three of the fangs, two roots, and five small round glowstones.  The stones weren’t glowing now, at least not until they had enough mana infused into them, but they were the real deal according to his identification skill; courtesy of Gluttony’s gift.  He didn’t even have to wear Messenger anymore to thoroughly identify things, though it also wasn’t anywhere close to what a real identification class at high levels would get you.

“Price?” Riven asked, noticing that the tags had been stripped off these items before having been placed on the counter top.

The storekeeper mischievously grinned.  “What’re they worth to ya?  Seems mighty interesting you have an entire list to collect.  You must have enough coin to buy it all, or I’d assume so anyways.  Is that right?”

Riven’s expression flattened, and he tisked in irritation.  It wasn’t that he didn’t have the money, he had more money than he knew what to do with.  In fact he had so much money that he was downright filthy rich and barely had time to spend any of it, but that didn’t mean he liked being taken advantage of.  “Come on, don’t do that.  That’s just mean.”

Glee laughed heartily, slapping her hands onto her hips with a shake of her head.  “No, no!  It’s business.  We all have to make a living young man!  Now, how about we price these at… I don’t know… 50 gold apiece?”

Riven didn’t even blink, flat stare boring into the woman while Tim let out a loud huff of surprise.

“50 gold APIECE!?” Tim gasped.  “That’s robbery!?”

Glee kept eye contact with Riven for a solid five seconds, before deflating when he didn’t make a move for the items.  “Ah fine, I just wanted to see if you’d do it.  I’ll be real with ya lad.  They’re more worth twelve silvers apiece.  How about it?”

Riven still felt like he was being ripped off, and he slowly tilted his head to the side in consideration of her offer.  “Do you people even have an Elysium Altar around these parts?”

“You people?” Glee repeated with a chuckle.  “Hardly.  But Elysium coins are the new currency and there is an altar far to the south of here down Pig’s River.  We have traders come up from there once in a while but not too often, the trek is well over two weeks on foot and there aren’t any roads - making it a bit unsafe.”

“How about seven silver pieces for each?”

“Ten.”

“Seven.”

“Won’t do less than ten.  Final offer.”

Riven huffed.  “Alright ten apiece it is.  Three of the fangs, two roots, and five small round glowstones.  That’s one hundred silver pieces straight… Fay, could you get it for me please?”

Fay happily obliged, pulling at his spatial sack that they’d tucked into the back of the wheelchair.  Digging around in it, she pulled out the one hundred silver coins in neat stacks and slid them over.  “You can count if you wish.”

But Glee was already stuck dumb at the sight of the bag.

“IS THAT A SPATIAL SACK!?”  She nearly tripped on her way around the glass bar, peering close at the emblem in Fay’s hand bearing the eye-sigil of Negrada.  “I KNEW IT!  You lot ARE rich!  Damn it to hell, I should have swindled ya more!”

“Take it or leave it.” Fay muttered, only faintly amused while the ticking clock in Glee’s brain seemed to work overtime.  “You already agreed, don’t go changing the price now.”

“Bah!” Glee silently cursed again and took the coins, taking her time to make sure it was all there before nodding and putting the ten crafting pieces into the sack Fay held out.  “Fine, fine, fine.  Just remember to come find me if you think of anything else ya need - I’ll be sure to up the prices when you do too.”

Riven rolled his eyes, then waved back at the clerk.  “Thanks anyways.  Come on Tim, let’s go to this other store to check it out.  What was it again?”

“Odds & Ends.” Time stated dryly.  “Hopefully they won’t try to rip you off there too.”

“I heard that Tim!  Don’t talk bad about me or you’ll have it comin!”

“Bye Glee!  And I would never dream of it!”

The bell jingled, and the group of three left to explore more of the town on the way to their next destination.

***

The Blood Moon Requiem was almost at a standstill as a society with all the turmoil going on, and tension was sky high between the ruling families of the courts.  Maneuvering the political landscape was an absolute nightmare that General Viku had never enjoyed, but it was even worse due to the fact that Allie and Riven were at the very center of House Wraithtide’s current predicament.

Not that he could blame them.  He’d outwardly exclaimed with a roaring chear when that lordling from House Barimont had been killed by Riven’s minion Athela, and had doubly cheered along with half of the officers around him at the time when Jalel - that prick of a prince - had been eaten by Riven’s gluttonous maw.  It’d all been live streamed after the empire had paid an extraordinarily high price to Elysium itself for selective cut scenes or frequent theatrical streams for the population at large to watch.

But those two deaths had led to problems.  Problems only exacerbated by the fact that Princess Kathrine Vonsilla Crushada the 9th had almost been murdered by a political rival - Lady Muren of House Muren, before Lady Muren was killed too.  Captain Rusof, a favorite great grandson of one of the greatest generals their empire had ever seen, was killed by Jalel himself, and there were more than a few daggers in the night searching for retribution and revenge behind the scenes in all directions.  Already scuffles on the bordering territories between House Crushada and House Muren were in abundance and on the brink of an outright genocidal fervor, and that was only the least of it.  House Wraithtide’s spies reported numerous military movements concerning House Barimont forces on the outskirts of Wraithtide territory, while the High Queen Nephridi and Elder Thune had publicly criticized one another before going into seclusion.

No doubt the elder council was trying to wrap this up out of the eye of the public so that people didn’t get ideas about the empire’s leadership not seeing eye to eye, but that image was already shattered.  The damage had already been done, and General Viku couldn’t help but wonder if this had been a calculated move by the high queen.  Whispers in the courts claimed that the queen had warned both of the Wraithtide siblings, but yet other rumors described her as the one who initially warned the late Lord Barimont about Allie’s potential reaction - even if it had been Elder Thune to actually send him to Panu in the first place.

But just what reason would she have to pit Lord Barimont and Jalel against Riven and Allie?  Surely it couldn’t just be a great grandmother’s love for her descendants, she barely knew the siblings and there were many easier ways of disposing of a young lord such as Lord Barimont than what had actually happened.

No, there was more to this picture - and if General Viku of House Wraithtide’s forces had any guess, it was likely very much woven into events revolving around Elder Thune.

The doors of the supercarrier’s great hall swung open, revealing servants and soldiers in uniform lining the walls and standing at attention.  His eyes fell to the large rectangular table where a dozen of the highest ranking family members of House Wraithtide sat, all of them either glaring at one another - or shooting him worried and angry looks.

One man in particular stood up before all the others did, however.  It was none other than Baron Orimus Wraithtide, a very outspoken antagonist to Riven’s policies and a man who was obviously disgruntled by the way things were going.  Not only in the empire, but on their home planet - Luteski.  Slave uprisings had been prominent reason the baron had given people concerning Riven’s inadequacies as a long-distance ruler of the house, but upon Riven’s overruling orders concerning General Viku’s intervention that had previously been halted by other nobles of this house - those uprisings were quickly quelled.

It now meant that Baron Orimus Wraithtide was very grumpy, and that he was looking for other reasons to pin fault and blame on Riven for the problems this house and the empire at large were having problems.  The most recent of those reasons, and a valid one, was the recent murder of Lord Barimont and Prince Jalel on a small, insignificant world of the newly integrating frontier.

“It’s about time you arrived, General Viku.  I and the rest of our esteemed house are growing impatient.”  Baron Orimus Wraithtide muttered, his wiry posture shifting while adjusting his slicked-back chestnut hair using a comb.  “Please tell me this meeting won’t take long.  We already have an abundance of problems to fix with House Barimont at our doorstep creating what is probably going to become a blockade on all trade, if not an outright attack.”

“Not to mention that we still need to go over taxes!” Lady Riska Wraithtide commented, the old woman’s silver-gray locks pulled to one side while she waved a fan as if to cool herself off.  “Taxes are the most important part of running a planet and we haven’t been able to do so with all of our tax collectors boycotting the job without proper escorts.  Preposterous if you ask me!  The slave uprisings are dealt with and there’s no reason we need to adjust for those idiots more by supplying them with body guards just to do their damn jobs!”

“Enough.” General Viku said, quieting the nobles down who’d once been the ones giving him orders, and his red eyes tightened with delight when he saw the baron and many of the others stiffen at the lack of respect he now showed them by not addressing them individually or by their titles.

Viku clasped his hands behind his back, his domed head reflecting the light of the chandelier above them.  “Prince Riven Wraithtide and his sister, Princess Allie Wraithtide, will be here within the hour.  I ask that all of you please refrain from doing anything or saying anything stupid, as many of you are apt to do, because Allie in particular is very easily set off.”

“As we are all very aware…” Lady Riska Wraithtide muttered, getting chuckles from some and scowls from others.  “Hasn’t even been to the empire yet and already has a name for her maliciousness and temper.”

General Viku ignored her comment, speaking over the mutterings without hesitation.  “The formations are already set and we’ll let you know as soon as they arrive, before leading them into the great hall here on the flagship.  Again, I very much stress that you not try to antagonize them.  Remember that they are the heirs to this house, Riven in particular being the one who - at a word - can make sure that you lose your title completely by dismissing you from the family.  I only say this as a warning, and mean nothing by it other than letting you all know that he is likely not going to be happy with my report concerning what I found in regards to what started the slave rebellions.  It is my duty to report all findings to the head of house, and I will do as my job requires without leaving out details.”

Immediately the room fell silent, and many of the nobles went even paler than normal - shifting in their chairs uncomfortably.

“You wouldn’t.” Baron Orimus Wraithtide uttered with clenched fists.  “General Viku… are you threatening us?”

The general raised one eyebrow the other man’s way, and shifted one pauldron with a roll of his shoulder.  “Threat?  No.  Just what reason would I have to do that, concerning such outstanding citizens of the empire such as yourselves?  Surely there’s nothing for you to hide, Baron.  I am merely stating facts, and sometimes facts can lead to more questions that - in the wrong circumstances - can lead to heads being detached from bodies.”