Chapter 13 - Half-Baked Plan

“They say he’s searching the countryside Yurick, and any information will be rightly rewarded! Honestly, I wish I had some sorta lead to the guy just to claim that gold.”
“Yeah but what information is even going to work? The description the board gives is a ‘tall, blond-haired, grey-eyed man that looks plain and is wearing odd clothing.’ Look around you Nel and you’ll find at least four men who basically look just like that without the clothing bit, and that’s including the man right next to you! It’d be nice if the board explained what it meant by odd clothing. Is he a jester? Some sort of hermit? Honestly, I reckon this is just some other nonsense the crown’s imagined up to give credence to their ‘royal’ claim on the land.”
Hill’s Oasis, the larger of the two taverns in Gold’s Lodge, was alive with chatter and business as the sun set behind Mount Auger. It had been five days since the Voting Ring had collectively decided to handle the Stoneboar with patience rather than action and it was a decision I’d actually come to appreciate.
With the time that decision gave me, I’d finally been able to actually be productive and managed to convert five of my cleared acres into prepared land, rather easily since I could cast Trench with a single flick of the wrist. They’d still take some time to properly recover from the Mana Nymphs, but progress was progress. I’d known that we’d have at least a week or so from the vote before Garth would take the reins and start the tracking process and I really hadn’t been that worried about my part in the whole process.
Not until I decided to throw a few test fireballs just to make sure I didn’t accidentally set the forest on fire when we took care of the beast. This wasn’t something I could just shove back into a cage and call good. With the Mana Nymphs in control, the only real solution that didn’t give us more trouble down the road was burning every last bit of the Stoneboar and its new parasite to ash.
If we’d had a Shieldmaster or any sort of Warrior Activated that we could rely on, we could’ve let them handle the killing and then just built a pyre to dispose of the infected creature. But since the Mana Nymph’s drain was still strong if you were close enough, not to mention the risk of getting gored, a ranged solution was really the best way to handle both situations.
Though the system said my spell list had unlocked and I had access to my Basic Tier spells, that wasn’t quite the truth and it’s something I hadn’t known… because this was the first time I’d ever taken a Utility Class. Over my many lives, I’d gotten used to the rhythm of things. I’d die, make it back to level five, then have access to the simple but useful combat spells like Fireball and Aetherwave. It always sped things up no matter what class I’d decided to take.
But when I tried to summon a fireball, nothing happened. That was strange, especially since I’d been using Trench repeatedly up until then on my fields. But I’d cast it as I’d always done with my spells, with a mere thought instead of painstakingly looking through a Manifested Tome like most spellcasters, so I never actually noticed that that technique wouldn’t just work for my combat spells too.
When this annoyance made me open my spell list, I found every single spell designated as Combat had a little lock symbol on it. So… had I actually let my impatience get the better of me while I was in the Voting Ring, I’d have turned the entire group into hares only to discover I couldn’t actually finish the job, which would have been beyond embarrassing. I knew I could still handle things of course, I wasn’t incompetent after all, it just meant I needed more reagents than I’d find in Danwood.
Which was how I’d found myself drinking an unpleasant ale that was both far too dry and way, way too bitter at the same time, overhearing the idle gossip of the tavern’s patrons, trying to come up with a plan for acquiring everything I needed with very little time before the hunting party started.
I’d expected to get here, find some Blastroot or maybe a Rubyfyre flower, something most mining towns had in excess even though the reagents themselves were labeled as Rare by the system. But apparently Gold’s Lodge had system enforced market restrictions in place, leaving the purchase of those only to authorized purchasers.
And that left me with two options. Waste my time establishing legal authority to purchase them within Gold’s Lodge, which I’d have to waste even more time figuring out which license or qualification they’d even accept, or get gouged by paying black market prices. At least with the latter, if the miscreant tried to rob me it would be amusing and it made it more unlikely that Daniel or someone else might find out I came looking for something that I’d just claimed I could magically do.
“What do you think?” a voice asked. It seemed directed at me and I looked to the side. There were two large men, their faces smudged with soot, each with a mug in their hand staring out at the crowd.
“About what?” I asked, giving them a cautious glance. While I had been keeping an ear open, it wasn’t like I was specifically listening for anything in particular, it had just been a habit developed over years.
“The prophecy that Prince Frederick rides to fulfil and his search for the last of his fated companions? Yurick is convinced the whole royal family’s off their rocker, but the Fates saw the last three wars with the Ashborn clans before they happened,” the closer of the men said.
“Who couldn’t predict war with those savages!” Yurick scoffed and rolled his eyes. There were deep bags under them and his black hair was clearly thinning. “You need to stop spending so much time underground Nel if you believe in ghost stories like the Lord of Dusk. It’s just how mothers get their children to behave.”
“Have you ever seen the Lord of Dusk?” I asked, looking back down at my ale and swirling the unpleasant liquid.
“No but I’ve never seen a Shadestalker either and you still won’t find me creeping through the forest at night,” Nel laughed, chugging from his mug before holding it back to the bartender. “Get me another one, Quincy and add it to my tab, and one for my new friend here too.”
“You’ve spilled the last of this one,” the bartender said, wiping a hand on a cloth he kept at his waist before he took the mug and refilled it. Then he looked my way.
“I’m good, thanks,” I said to the unasked question.
“Gotta chug it down faster friend, Quincy only does happy hour until Mount Auger swallows the sun for the night,” Nel said with a smile, already raising his mug back. After he drank more than seemed reasonable, he breathed a refreshed sigh, then looked me up and down a bit too curiously. “Haven’t seen you around here. You come to join the Auger Mining Company?”
“Not in a million years,” I said, taking a sip, flinching slightly at the taste, and setting it back down. Given what I was looking for, a thought occurred to me and I decided to see if the poor ale still worked to loosen lips. “Deep dark caves are where Shadestalkers normally like to hunt. It’s probably the third most likely way to die mining behind a badly placed explosive and getting into a dumb fight over who gets the bigger hunk of gold.”
“Now that’s a folktale if I’ve ever heard one,” Nel laughed. “Ain’t no one gonna fight over the bigger hunk when none of it’s ours to take in the first place. Now explosives… yeah, I’ve seen enough accidents with those.”
“The cave-in that happened down in Third Cavern last year set us back for months and it’s not like they’re actually getting better with the detonations,” Yurick said, his lips tugging downward. Nel’s jovial attitude cleared up in an instant and he patted the man on his shoulder a few times. Yurick shook the hand off after just a moment, then pointed toward the door and grumbled, “outhouse.”
“Poor guy’s never gonna get over that… he tried to tell them the supports were wrong but no one listened,” Nel said, his tone far more somber than it had been. He watched his friend go for a moment before he returned to his drink. I hadn’t necessarily intended to isolate one of them, but it did make the situation a bit easier to manage.
“Ah… so, I take it that’s why there’s reagent restrictions in town?” I asked, trying to sound only casually interested.
“That’s a fancy way of saying they locked away anything that could blow the miners’ fingers off. Not that it’s exactly working,” Quincy offered, staring down through a pair of round spectacles as he wiped a few mugs down during the lull in service.
“Heh, they can certainly try to lock them away,” Nel said with another laugh, his tone flipping on a dime. He finished his drink up with far more gusto than the beverage deserved, then set the mug back down on the bartop. I eyed it, then my own as I saw an opportunity, even if I didn’t like it. I tilted my drink back, choked the rest of it down, then put my empty cup next to his.
“Two more,” I said, placing a silver down. Quincy looked at it, then me briefly before shrugging and scooping it up.
Nel smiled, his round cheeks noticeably more red when he looked back and saw his drink had refilled. He raised the cup to me and I tapped it with mine, then choked down another sip.
“Never did get your name friend,” Nel finally said when I’d lowered my cup back down.
“Corbin.”
“Well it is a pleasure, Corbin. Too bad you ain’t here to join the company. I could always use a new drinking buddy.” He stopped to take another drink. How he could keep going back for more so quickly I had no idea, the taste was still lingering on my tongue and I wished I had taken the time to refill my water skin. “Did yah just move here to the town, or are yah just passing through?”
“I actually just bought some land over by Danwood a few weeks ago,” I explained and this drew a look of amusement from Nel.
“Really? Why’d yah go and do a dumb thing like that?” Nel asked with a laugh. “That place was a half-baked plan by a bunch of promptless idealists if I ever heard one.”
My lips tugged downward as he chuckled and I stayed silent for a few extra seconds as he lifted the mug back to his lips.
“What’s the land even for anyway?” He asked when he’d finished his mug again.
“Farming,” I explained, choosing not to elaborate. While I absolutely would show Quincy what an ale should actually taste like, I didn’t need the observant little man deciding he needed to reinsert himself into the conversation, especially when he was busy with another pair of customers. “I’ve been working on some land clearing and got some stubborn boulders right in the main fields. Figured I’d be able to get the fix for that from a mining town but, well here we are.”
Nel let out a laugh loud enough that a few people looked our way. Their attention didn’t linger though and I assumed it was because this was normal behavior for the man. Even Quincy looked over, rolling his eyes without Nel noticing as he started to inch his way back toward us while continuing to tidy the workstation behind the bar.
“You must not be from around here if yah thought buying farmland in Danwood was a good idea. Or just dumb as dusk,” he laughed again and I found my irritation rising slightly. I must not have masked it well cause when he looked at me he quickly added, “no offense, friend.”
“Some taken,” I said, then mentally willed my face to behave. There was no reason I had to let the words of a jolly drunk get to me when there were still things that I needed. “So… how exactly would someone dumb get their hands on reagents with Flame or Blasting properties?”
“Reagants and properties?” Nel barked out a laugh and I flinched just a bit. “You hear this guy, Quincy?”
“I know my ale is strong Nel, but he did mention the reagent restrictions in place. The man’s clearly got some alchemical knowledge if I’m not mistaken, otherwise he’d just be buttering you up to find out where to buy some Blasting Jelly,” the bartender said, looking over at me curiously. “Which is also on the list of restricted purchases before you ask.”
“I kinda assumed that was restricted just based on handling requirements,” I said with a nod. “But yes, I know a few mix recipes specifically for farm work and land clearing that I’d been hoping to use.”
I was trying not to be too annoyed with Quincy, despite remembering him more pompously than he was coming off now. He was just a bartender doing what a tavern worker was often best at, listening, and if I’d tried to brush it off, that would only give him something new to focus on. It was my fault that I’d assumed Gold’s Lodge was close enough to a standard crown city that proper terminology would’ve been common.
“Hmm, well you’d want to get yourself registered with Samel over in the Steward’s Office for an Alchemical License. Though… given you’re not a resident, I’m unsure if you’d qualify,” Quincy said, thankfully doing the other thing a bartender was usually good at, offering solutions to solvable problems.
“Yes, cause that’s what my new friend here needs. Spending weeks dealing with paperwork just to be told he can’t be trusted with a little fire,” Nel laughed again.
“He’s not exactly wrong,” I admitted with a shrug. “I’m not exactly planning on making regular purchases of the stuff, so it’s a bit frustrating to have to fill out a bunch of paperwork just for that.”
Nel’s smile grew wider, his red cheeks glowing just a bit more. Quincy let out a noticeable sigh, already reaching forward to grab Nel’s empty mug.
“Well my friend, as long as you’re okay paying a little extra, there’s always the Before Dawn Market just outside the north gate. You would need a sponsor to get in, but you buy the next few rounds and I don’t mind helping yah out.”