Chapter 22 - Inn Selection

Nate glanced at Kiri as she finished stripping the second tail of the Razorlash, winding it up like a length of rope before tossing it onto the grass with the other one.

He turned around to look over the remains of the Razorlash. The bloody thing was the size of a horse.

“This was only a juvenile?” he remarked, slowly walking around the dead beast.

Kiri looked up for a moment, before returning to cleaning her knife off. “Yeah, probably one of Shadowscales brood. You find a couple of them this far out of the heart of the forest every few years. Whenever she has kits I suppose.”

“Shadowscale?” he asked.

“You’re really not from around here, huh?” she glanced at him, measuring his reaction, then continued after a moment of awkward silence. “She’s a Razorlash, old and powerful. Basically owns this forest. She doesn’t really care much about the outskirts of the forest, like where we are now. But if you venture into the heart of the forest and she doesn’t want you there, she’ll let you know one way or another. Rumour is she is an Epic Classer. That’s why her kits are so strong. Rare classes the lot of them.”

Nate stopped his stroll around the beast and looked over at Kiri. “This thing had a Rare Class?”

“Mmhmm. One of the few things in the outskirts that does.”

Nate pressed his hands against one of the scales of the beast. “Is the tail the only thing worth…anything?” He had been about to say coin. An assumption he didn’t want to make.

“Of course not. Alchemists could probably use some of the organs, the teeth, maybe the claws. The bones could be used by blacksmiths or enchanters. The hide and scales by leatherworkers. Selling the whole thing would probably feed a family for half a year. But unless you’ve got a cart hidden in that robe there is no way we’re dragging this thing out of here.”

Nate looked at the corpse in thought, thinking at his Familiar. “Should I take the risk and trust her? How rare are spatial storages really?”

“It’s your call, boss man. They’re rare but not THAT rare, you know? I’d take the risk. You're rich, but this way you’ve got a bit of an excuse for some of the gold you’re going to spend. Besides, pretty sure she’s only got a Rare Class after Evolution. I’d bet money on you, if it turns out she’s a no good, conniving thief. I’d be cheering for her though. That’d be so goblin!” The conversation finished with the sound of Frick cackling in his mind.

He looked back at Kiri, “I suppose I could transport it for us. If that is something you wanted?”

There he went again. Sounding so terribly unsure of himself. He was about to tell her not to worry when he caught her looking at him curiously.

“You going to bring it on a barrier or something?” she asked.

“Umm, no. I was going to put it in my spatial storage,” he replied.

“You have a spatial storage?! Ha! I knew it. You are some nobles get,” she crowed. “Don’t worry m’lord. Your secret is safe with me. And sure, if you don’t mind, and it’ll fit. We can make a fair bit of coin off it. I’ll even split it with you right down the middle. Deal?”

Perfect. He had confirmation they had coins. What he said though was, “Yeah that sounds fair. And please don’t call me m’lord.”

“Oh. Right. Hiding from your family or something. Nate. I’ll remember from now on. Promise,” she finished with a beaming smile.

Nate just shook his head and touched the corpse, tugging on his mana as he moved the corpse into his spatial storage. Before he dusted his hands off and pointed at the tails questioningly. Kiri nodded quickly and he added them as well before turning back to find her walking off between a couple of trees. She was gone less than a minute and returned with a backpack bursting with herbs. The smell was nice, calming even.

“So Kiri, which way to Helmfirth?” he asked.

She just laughed and started walking, calling behind her, “This way, Nate.” She stressed his name and he took her meaning. Just her way of reminding him she was not calling him m’lord.

They walked for a little while in silence before Nate thought to ask, “So it’ll take about a day to get to Helmfirth?”

“If we keep up this pace we should get there before the sun sets. Which is perfect timing because we can swing by the Guild, off load the Razorlash and my bounty. Get paid. Then find you an inn for the night,” she said with a happy tone about getting paid. “I figured we would take it easy m.. Nate, since your hand looks broken?”

“Yeah it’s broken,” he said with a shrug of his left shoulder. “What’s the Guild we’re swinging by?”

Kiri gave him a funny look, like he was an idiot or something. “The Adventurers Guild, obviously. I’m Silver Rank actually,” Kiri turned to face him, walking backwards as she turned out her collar to show a circular silver badge with a hole punched in the centre and some writing around the edge. She closed her collar before he could read it.

Frick’s voice echoed in his mind, “You keep asking questions like that and she is going to know something is going on. Up to you, boss man.”

Clearly the Adventurers Guild was a relatively known quantity. But perhaps not the inner details of how it worked? Either way he needed more information if he ran the risk of making Kiri more curious about his background.

“Do you think they would let me join?” he asked.

“Sure. Not like you’d be the first noble on the run to hide out in their ranks. And it’s not a bad life. Depending on how willing you are to get your hands dirty though,” she said with a grin.

“That’s not an issue. Though, I am curious, what benefits would I get from joining? It sounds interesting.”

“Oh, the Guild has a bunch of Class and Skill information that is only made available to members. Limited by your rank of course. Not like they’re going to let you look at the limited information they have on Epic Classes and Skills when you’re only a Bronze ranker. They have Guild affiliated trainers to help you advance. They will cost you, obviously, but the Guild pays them a bit to offset the cost, so you know, cheaper training,” Kiri continued walking, her hands gesturing wildly as she got more and more passionate.

“Then there are all the services they do on the cheap for their members. Equipment repair, monster processing, a bunch of others. And finally, the jobs pay pretty well, all things considered, so it’s a great way to advance while getting paid to do it. Dangerous, obviously, but still, best bet for us common folks, you know?”

Nate grinned at her passion. He could relate to it. He could get the same talking about art, with the right audience of course. Rambling about different graffiti styles and their relevance wasn’t for everyone. There was one question on his mind though.

“How about...Enchanting?” He had been about to say Runecrafting, but enchantments used sigils as well and seemed more prevalent. But most of all, he wasn’t sure how much to reveal just yet. Kiri seemed nice and helpful, but he’d see how long that lasted after they got to the town and offloaded the Razorlash.

Kiri glanced at his robe, clearly taking in the silver stars and their golden threaded runes before looking back up at him. “What about it? You angling for some sort of Enchanter as your Secondary Class?”

“I am leaning that direction,” he replied, being non committal.

Kiri shrugged as she walked beside him, scanning the forest as she talked. “I was never one for spending my time with my head in a book, but yeah, I know the Guild has some trainers and books on the topic. Pretty sure the Enchanter in town used to be a member of the Guild. You could always ask him before you decide?”

“That sounds perfect. Thanks Kiri,” Nate said.

“No problem. We’re battle buddies now!”

Nate could hear the teasing in her tone but he thought maybe there was a hint of hope in there too. That was fine with Nate. They hadn’t been travelling together long but so far Kiri was easy to chat with and if he really did end up joining the Adventurers Guild it would be good to have someone to work with.

“What am I? Chopped liver? This is bullshit!” echoed in his mind.

“Shut up, Frick. You’re only good company when it’s time to go goblin-mode,” he thought back at the Familiar.

“Between you and me, boss man, I fucking love that name. How does a Dead Realm with NO goblins even come up with that name and yet get it SO SO right. If we ever go back to your realm, I want to watch one of these television shows with goblins in them. Just saying.”

Nate smirked and shook his head, ignoring the funny look Kiri gave him.

The silence stretched for a while as they walked, the river gurgling beside them and the wind through the trees. Nate enjoyed it. It wasn’t one of those uncomfortable or awkward silences. It was companionable. And they both kept checking the trees, scanning the branches and the bushes. Which was reassuring for him, since he still wasn’t terribly confident with his perception and ability to check for things hiding or waiting in ambush.

As they walked he started listing in his head all the things he needed to do once they got to Helmfirth. First was to help Kiri offload the Razorlash and get some coins to get himself started in the town. Second was probably to convert his gold into some coins as well. He had no intention of staying in your run of the mill inn. He had been poor on Earth. Here he was reasonably confident he was rich. And while he knew spending all his gold on comfortable living would put an end to being rich quickly, he was at least initially going to see how the other half lived. But the other half certainly didn’t live in underwear with holes in them. So he would need to see about clothes. That was the third thing.

He had to get signed up with this Adventurers Guild. Probably anyway. He’d ask them about their rules and requirements before he signed or agreed to anything. Either way that took him to four, regardless of whether or not he joined the Guild. That broached another issue. What if they wanted to know about his Class? Or worse, they could see his Class? It’d been made pretty clear by Frick that a Legendary Class was pretty rare. He didn’t trust people with that information, especially not if they were gathering it without his permission. Which meant he needed to be able to hide his Class, much like his Robe hid itself from casual Identification. So instead that should probably be number two. Then after that he could get some clothes, organise his living arrangements and maybe sign up with the Guild.

Five things to get settled in Helmfirth. After that it was time to dig into his Skill development. He had to raise his Improve Material skill to twenty and evolve it to a Mythic rarity. Easier said than done. That was going to require a decent amount of time and research. But he was going to be researching magic, actual magic. He could do that for years.

The thought struck him hard. He could really see himself doing that for years. He’d need at least that long if wanted to figure out a way home, but still, years. Maybe that wasn’t long in the grand scheme of things, but to him, an eighteen year old kid, that was an eternity. Yet the thought didn’t daunt him or cause any distress. He had been in this new world so short of a time but he had already fallen in love with magic. If it took him a year to figure out how to evolve his Skill, then that is how long he would take.

Still, he could start collecting information for his other problems now.

“Hey Kiri, how many inns are there in Helmfirth?” he asked.

“Oh, there are four, depending on what you’re after. There is the Axed Tree. That’s the inn the locals frequent. Unsurprisingly we’ve got more than a few lumberjacks around here. Then there is the Lash and Tickle,” she blushed as she named the second inn. “It’s also for the locals but umm, it serves the less reputable locals. Yeah. Then there is the Coin & Cart. Mostly used by merchants and wagoneers passing through. Finally there is the Oaken Ring. That’s where the rich folks stay.”

“Hmm, how much for a night at each one, if you know?”

“The Axed Tree is probably a silver. The Coin & Cart maybe a silver and five coppers. Umm, the Lash… depends what kind of services you ask for… but I hear the beds aren’t made for sleeping one person if you catch my drift m’....Nate. The Oaken Ring, I heard the rooms there are like five silvers. Just heard that from a friend though so we’d have to go in and ask,” she replied, before muttering quietly, “assuming they’d let us in through the doors.”

“You should definitely stay at the Lash. Goblins win because they breed like rabbits!” Frick whispered in his mind. Nate chose to ignore that comment for now.

“So for the Oaken Ring, a gold coin would be enough to stay there for two days?” he said, fishing for the conversion from silver to gold. Copper to silver was clearly something like ten copper to one silver.

Kiri looked at him like he was an idiot. “Did you mean twenty?”

”I did. Sorry. Hit my head earlier. I hope you don’t mind me asking, but after we’ve finished up at the Guild would you mind showing me the way to the Oaken Ring?” he flashed his best smile at her. Twenty days. That meant it was a hundred silver to one gold. Good information to have.

She laughed at him, “No need for that you goof. You’re helping me make a lot of extra coin by bringing the Razorlash corpse back. The Guild is going to be really happy. I’ll show you around the town and take you wherever you want to go. Even the Lash!”

Nate went red in the face and that only made Kiri laugh harder. Before he knew it he was laughing along with her. It hurt his ribs and he couldn’t keep it up for long but it felt good to have company again. Especially such easy going company. Reminded him a little of his friends back on Earth.

“So, a town with a lot of Lumberjacks? Is that what your dad is, a Lumberjack?” he asked.

Kiri blew out a snort. “Not likely. Dad’s a retired Royal Ranger. Used to work for the Kingdom out on the frontier. Met mom and decided that was enough of that. Retired as far from the frontier as he could, he said. So that’s how they ended up here. We’ve got a nice place on the outskirts of town. Meant I grew up in these woods. He even drops in the Guild occasionally. Heard he teaches a few of the more advanced classes sometimes on woodcraft and other stuff. He won’t tell me though.”

“Sounds like a pretty amazing guy.”

“He is! You can meet him if you end up joining the Guild. Not that he would have much to teach you, I reckon.”

Nate nodded and with that they settled back into a companionable silence as they trudged through the forest.

The sun had started to set when they finally broke out of the trees. The sight that greeted Nate was farm fields with something that he thought might be barley or wheat but with a mixed green and red colour, and off in the distance what was obviously a town surrounded by what looked like a wooden fort. Helmfirth. He’d finally arrived at civilization. The smile on his face stretched from ear to ear and he noticed Kiri grinning in his peripheral vision. It was time to settle in.