82 - Classes

Sable looked herself, then Roman, over. The necromancer had rather wild hair after the long, swift flight across so many miles of terrain, which she was irritably trying to wrangle into order. Sable sympathized with her plight.

“Okay. We’re all good?” Sable asked.

“As we’ll ever be.”

Like before, Sable had stayed high in the air for the trip and sky-dived back down in human form to maximize the covertness of her arrival. They’d found a second feather-fall ring for Roman in Skatikk’s armory for her to do the same; it was a common enough artifact.

They’d made the trip without problem—or at least no noticeable ones. Whether someone had seen Sable’s passing and reported on it would be an issue that presented itself down the line, not immediately.

As a pair, the two of them set off toward the road. They were dressed as adventurers, since that provided the easiest casual backstory for passing into the city and getting situated.

The road heading for Wastehaven was far better maintained and constructed than the one to the nowhere northern town of Sunstone, made of paved stones rather than simply flattened dirt. It was more traveled, too. Even in just a few minutes of joining onto the road—though actually making their way to the road took much longer—they passed wagons, stagecoaches, and many bands of people.

The people were of course the interesting part. Wastehaven was a true cosmopolitan city, and the southern part of Auldstone too—if generally less so the further one traveled away. Because of that, humans weren’t the only races they passed. Sable had only seen goblins and humans in her time in this world, though she’d heard of plenty others. For the first time, she set eyes on them directly.

Beastkin—like Sable—were the second most common race, followed by dwarves, elves, and even stranger one-off races. The beastkin were human in appearance besides their animal characteristics, which varied from significant to barely noticeable. Antlers, cat ears, fox tails, and more adorned the various people streaming through the busy major roadway. Some people, Sable wasn’t even sure whether they were a beastkin at all—like a giant bear of a man who had enough body hair that he seemed like he might be one, but maybe he was just a hirsute regular human.

The dwarves and elves were just as interesting. They matched the image Sable had in her head, the former being short, stocky men and women with intricately braided beards. Elves, in contrast, were tall and willowy, with fair complexions and pale hair. They moved with a natural grace that drew the eye. Beyond the odder races, they were the least common; Sable only saw a few pass by.

Finally, there were the unique races, who she saw only singulars of. A man passed by them, six and a half feet tall at a guess—taller than Sable herself—made of blocky white-and-gray crystals. Her first impression was of an elemental like Granite, but rather than bulky, the man was tall and thin, with typical human proportions. He also wore clothing. A darker shade of white-gray crystal clumps made up his hair, and his skin glinted in the light. He nodded to Sable as he passed, catching her looking, and she returned it, unflustered.

“What was he?” Sable asked, leaning to Roman to be discreet.

“Salt elemental. From the Elemental Isles.”

“What are those, again?”

“A series of floating islands not far from the eastern shore. They don’t come to the mainland much. I wonder what business he has.”

“How many types are there?”

“Salt, amber, obsidian, and nebula.”

“Nebula?”

“I’ve never seen one. They might be one of the most reclusive races on the continent.”

“Huh,” Sable said. “How come they’re sentient?”

Roman gave her an odd look.

“I just mean, some elementals aren’t.”

“And neither are some primates,” Roman countered.

“That’s … fair, actually.”

Sable continued watching people stream past her; it was a far more interesting experience than her trek in the northern parts of Auldstone. She tried to be subtle about it, but seeing how Sable drew attention herself, her eyes met strangers’ often.

She could intuit she was less of a spectacle than in the northern part of Auldstone, since beastkin were common enough here, but Sable’s all-white ensemble still drew a few interested looks. Nobody stared at her or seemed outright fascinated like Sunstone, though. She was just another strange person in a sea of diversity.

Adventurers and common folk were immediately differentiable—and merchants, soldiers, and whoever else—simply by their clothing. She knew that classes and high-levels were far more common in this part of the world—and even more common in the High Kingdoms and other red and black zones—but she didn’t actually have a great idea of exactly how common. Seeing how she and Roman were strolling down a road, headed for the city, and would be doing so for at least another half-hour, she had a good opportunity to ask.

“How common are we?” Sable asked.

“We?”

“People with classes. Though, adventurers, too. I just don’t have a great idea of it.”

“You could probably find a census with that data,” Roman said. “But I could make an educated guess.”

“Please.”

“Well,” Roman said, “this is a yellow-zone city situated near the Wasteland with a few nearby red-zones for further hunting. That means even for a yellow-zone major city, the numbers would be skewed higher than average. But classes are never common. Even in black-zone cities in the high kingdoms, the number would be closer to one-in-four or one-in-three. Here, I’d guess one-in-eight to one-in-ten.”

“That few?”

“In a city of a million,” Roman said dryly, “that means a hundred thousand classed.”

Sable paused. Put that way, it was a lot. In Aylin’s tiny goblin clans, there’d only been a handful of everyone she knew.

“But the vast majority of classed are low-levels,” Roman said. “Especially because while citizens have to disclose that they have a class, and the general category of it, the details are often kept a secret. But even in Wastehaven, I would guess one in hundred classed are above level ten, and one in ten of those are above level twenty.”

Sable did some quick math. “So about a hundred level twenties in the whole city?”

“With a few level thirties scattered about,” Roman said. “Certainly no level forties or above, not in this part of the world—unless they’re visiting for some reason or another. I’m being pretty loose with my estimations. But I think it gives you a vague idea.”

Sable herself was level ten, but she would probably be masquerading as a level fifteen; that was the more accurate representation for a ‘normal’ person. That meant she was in a small group of people, but not any esteemed or extraordinary tier.

“But how many are just civilian classes?” Sable asked.

“Non-combative?” Roman asked. “That’s the proper terminology. And I’d say about,” she waffled for a moment, “Four in five?”

So by strength, she was more powerful than any five thousand people, at least in her humanoid form. There were only a handful of people capable of fighting her even in dragon form in this city, but they did exist, and with strength in numbers, a large group of level twenties would also be a nightmare.

“But combat classes also tend to reach higher levels easier, so I don’t know,” Roman said. “There’s some census data about all this, but especially when you start talking about higher levels, people don’t share much. This is all loose guesswork.”

“How much does it matter?” Sable asked. “Classes and levels. What kind of social status and prestige does a high level bring? That’s what I’m trying to understand.”

“Depends.”

“On?”

“The class, to name the obvious,” Roman said. “A level thirty [Farmer] would certainly be living large, running a good swathe of countryside himself and bringing in enough money to make even a prince pause, but compared to a level thirty—well, say, [Noble], for example?”

“Wait,” Sable said. “[Noble]? That’s a class? How does that work?”

“Like any other.”

“What kinds of skills do they get? And why would they have more prestige?”

Roman raised her eyebrows. “Because princes rule over kingdoms? So they have prestige? I’m not sure I understand.”

Sable conceded the point; she’d just been surprised. “Are their skills stronger? And what do they do?”

“The same as most managerial-type classes. Which, no, aren’t an official classification. But there’s classes for most everything, not just primitive job types like [Farmer] and [Hunter]. There’s [Bureaucrats] and [Nobles] and [Scholars]. They receive skills that do as you’d expect—help them in their field.”

“And for a noble, that would be … ?”

“Beyond that sort of information not being highly available,” Roman said dryly, “it also varies by the person. But you could think of it as a support class, frankly. That affects far more people consistently, but with weaker results.”

“For example?”

“Oh, I don’t know. A baron might have a skill that improves the mood of the city to some minor degree. Or if he rules over a town with a lot of craftsman, maybe a slightly stronger boost to productivity and success rates to them. But, really, skills can be anything. You know that.”

“A mood boost? To a whole city? Isn’t that, like—I don’t know, mind control, in a way?”

Roman gave her a funny look. “Not really? It’s the equivalent of drinking a cup of tea, or something. Just feel slightly more pleasant. Besides, you can reject such a skill if you please, though I don’t know why you would. It’s hard to miss when a friendly skill takes effect on you, even when it’s a subdued one.”

“Huh,” Sable said. All of that was interesting, but she’d gotten side tracked. “Back to the original point, how do classes and levels link with political status? Specifically combat classes. When they’re so individually strong, it has to bring a sort of—I don’t know, nobility in its own right?”

“More or less,” Roman said. “Though it’s more common for adventurers who make something of themselves to simply be adopted into noble houses. Most adventurers wouldn’t make great rulers—but if they choose to retire and settle down, they’ll often become patrons of some city or another. All the benefits of nobility, but with people better suited to the actual ruling handling that side of the job.” She shrugged. “Though there’s plenty of warrior kings, or even warrior barons and viscounts. It’s hard to break down the nuance of a whole society, you know.”

“I bet,” Sable said. It was a common trend of their conversation. Roman tried to give a generalized overview, but she missed a lot of the details in the process. It simply varied by county, province, and kingdom—and race, time period, and so on, for that matter. “I think I get the picture, though. But for a concrete understanding, what kind of respect or position would a level ten adventurer have? Twenty? Thirty?”

Roman pursed her lips, considering for a moment. “Well, generally, they’ll just be respected adventurers. It’s only when they seek out noble status that they’ll have it; they’re not just given titles. But that said, past level twenty, I’d figure just about any noble house besides the royal families would be eager to scoop you up—unless you have a horrible reputation. Level tens would likewise have easy opportunities for being taken in and possibly even given small amounts of land, should they want it.”

“I see.”

“Though, most noble houses create their own talent,” Roman said. “They have the resources and know-how to foster classes from their scions. It’s not a guarantee, but it’s certainly rare for a prominent family to have a classless heir. Give a young boy training from a world class [Swordsman] from the day he can walk, and there’s pretty good odds he’ll become a [Swordsman] himself.”

Sable nodded, digesting all this information as they studiously trekked forward. The tall, gleaming walls of Wastehaven slowly came into sight.