Chapter 42 - Victor's Spoils

Joshua gushed at Max so much it embarrassed him. Max couldn’t help but to smile, regardless. It felt good to stand up to bullies and brutes. And besides he had done the right thing. That felt good in itself.

Joshua surely had his weaknesses as a leader, as any person would, but he was earnest and wanted what was good for everyone. Max could trust Joshua to at least try to do the right thing, and that was enough for him to vote for Joshua. And to Max’s great fortune he was in a situation where his vote happened to cast a long shadow. And Max would be damned if he wouldn’t leverage that.

Dwarfmind, huh? Speaking of that, I really need to find time to Cultivate.

But that time wasn’t now. Now he was sitting with Joshua and a bunch of other people at the logs. It was time for the spoils of war. Joshua was giving a little speech about Max’s daring adventures, and he made Max recount some of the tale.

Max wasn’t as good a storyteller as Joshua, but people seemed interested enough, which was of course flattering. He stumbled with his words a few times, but people only smiled kindly and patiently. Max had never felt anything like that before. It was good. Not that he protected and helped the camp for smiles and approval, but it sure didn’t hurt either.

Even Brian and his men nodded along as Max recounted his tale. Joshua had adroitly stopped them before they left to hunt with their proverbial tail between their legs, and asked them to join the little gathering.

Joshua and Max had agreed that Brian and some of his men would do well with the new equipment the camp was about to get. Max would have personally rather given Mike most of the items unusable for himself, but Mike was still out of commission.

“Max, please bring the camp eleven equipment boxes,” Joshua declared.

That didn’t work. That was probably because Max couldn’t take the boxes out of his inventory. He could only open them in the inventory menu, and the item within would materialize in his lap.

Max whispered the notion to Joshua and he cleared his throat, a little embarrassed.

“Max, please bring the camp eleven pieces of equipment.”

[Quest received]

“That did it,” Max said and started opening the boxes.

*

The experience had been quite substantial. Each of the D-grade items was worth 250 experience, and the C-grade item had been worth 500. That gave a total of 3000 experience to Max. Not bad at all.

Max didn’t know how much experience Joshua got from these quests, but he told the people around that he just leveled up and everyone cheered. That put Joshua at level 15, if Max wasn’t mistaken.

The momentary pensiveness on Joshua’s face confirmed that guess. He must have gotten a lot of notifications. He’d talk about the Cultivation business later and would probably end up giving him a handful of [Celestial Illumination Pills]. They were valuable, but Max had so many that it’d be a good idea to give them to people who knew what they were doing.

Max was extremely happy that he had been greedy with his Cosmic Coins. As there were several items that Max claimed for himself. But first they’d distribute the items useless to Max.

To the good fortune of the camp, not all of the equipment was combat related. There were two pairs of gloves that gave stats in Precision and Constitution, which would be very useful for pretty much any non-combatant. And most importantly, it was two pairs of good leather gloves for the camp. The camp must have made a world record in callused hands by now, and nobody complained. But for some jobs, you definitely wanted gloves.

There was also a hammer with a proper metal head, looking very much akin to the ones used on Earth. Not something you’d choose for battle, for lack of reach, but definitely useful for nailing things in place, for example pegs on the ground. It wasn’t decided who should have it, but there would certainly be uses for it. It had bonuses in Strength and Precision, but people were more excited about the utility of the item.

Along with all that was an apron of smooth leather that gave 5 Dexterity and 4 Strength, which was given to Bill, who had taken up building defenses against the panther attacks. Two weapons, a bow and a battleaxe, which were given to Brian to give to his men.

Brian wasn’t exactly over his humiliation yet, and Max wondered if it was a good idea to give him more weapons, but he had to trust Joshua’s judgment in this. It did feel like Brian was being thoughtful, and the thanks he gave seemed genuine. But time would tell.

The rest of the items were Max’s to keep. He smiled at his pile of items, all of them useful to him in varying degrees. There were four D-grade items on the ground for him and one C-grade item folded on the log as carefully as Max could. He went over the items one more time.

[Necklace of Insight (D-grade)]

+4 Intelligence

+4 Precision

It was a thin chain with a white bauble attached to it. It was a paltry trinket compared to the ones he had seen with the obsidian dwarves, but the stats were useful to Max.

[Ring of Sturdiness (D-grade)]

+5 Constitution

+2 Resistance

+2 Toughness

This is so nice! It’s Exactly what I need. This would probably suit someone with a tanking class best, but as long as I am flying solo I’ll make good use of this bad boy.

Wondering how many rings he could wear in total, Max picked up the next item.

[Sash of Prowess (D-grade)]

+3 Constitution

+6 Precision

Max liked this item. It was a light silken waistband that was easy to cinch around him. The stats weren’t exactly ideal to him, but definitely useful. The Precision was starting to rack up, and it did make maneuvering [The Maverick] easier. He could control enemies with his abilities, but when it didn’t work well or he would be in some other sort of tight spot, this was sure to be handy.

[Boots of Careful Steps]

+5 Wisdom

+2 Precision

+2 Constitution

Upgrade! I can definitely appreciate the Wisdom boost. These white ones that came with the jumpsuit are of excellent make. It's probably best to give them to someone in the camp. Surely there will be a use for them.

That left only the last item. The folded purple and black robe of soft and light material. Max’s first C-grade item. And it was a head above anything Max had gotten so far, barring [The Maverick] of course.

[Robes of Shadowsilk (C-grade)]

+6 Constitution

+9 Intelligence

+3 Resistance

This is so good… It’s almost on par with the treasures of the five kings. Those items must have been B-grade items. The [Pocket of Thousand Tools] could have been an A-grader, even. This doesn’t have any additional effects, as B-tier items and above apparently have. But I can upgrade it with my Cosmic Coins.

“Hey,” a miffed voice called. “If you plan on upgrading this dirty rag to 10 before me, you have another thing coming.”

Max chuckled. “Well good morning to you. Where were you?”

Maverick yawned. “That’s a good question. I believe the world is notably  ready for my fulgurant presence.”

“Fulguwhat?” Max cocked an eyebrow. “So you were… sleeping?”

“Sleeping has such a pedestrian ring to it. I would like to think of it more like resting, or hibernating.”

“Why?” Max asked.

“After the initial burst of excitement wore off, I became increasingly tired. I think I need to get used to being sentient. It’s hard work. You wouldn’t know.”

Max gave him a look. “You don’t think I’m sentient?”

“Barely,” Maverick said. “But you get the job done by carrying me around to exciting new places.”

Max just shook his head. “Well, now I’ll be even better at it with all these new items. I suppose we should also spend the free points from Cultivation.”

“All in on intelligence,” Maverick said immediately. “Trust me.”

“You know we’re going to eventually run into people from other species?” Max reminded him. “We need defensive stats too.”

“Best offense is a good offense,” Maverick said.

“Don’t you mean best defense?”

“I mean, you should blast them up so quickly that you don’t need defense.”

“That sounds great on paper, but things can get very messy, very fast.”

Maverick huffed. “Fine. Do as you see fit. But put at least some points in Intelligence. Heavens know you need some…”

“That’s not what the—ugh…”

There were some amused chuckles around him. Most people were busy sorting, wondering, and arguing about the new items Max had given them, but a talking gun was admittedly quite an attraction. Max could sense Maverick enjoyed the attention.

Max turned back to Joshua for the little ceremony to continue. There were still two [D-grade material boxes] for him to turn over. After that he was looking forward to finding some quiet place to cultivate for a bit. As much as he appreciated the people around him, he needed some space.