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“Hmm ok, so three fur scraps sell for 1 gold.” Jay checked his inventory “So that’s 10 gold since I have thirty scraps.”

Jay brought out thirty scraps, placing them on the bench by his side.

“Next is the tiny green crystals from those bayrings… hmm, let’s see… okay so 0.7 gold per crystal. Since I have seventy, that will give me… about… hmm, I’m not sure.” Jay shrugged, “I’ll have to trust Lillian.” The system didn’t have a calculator, and Jay wasn’t as educated as the nobles.

“Now… the ferritic plates. 1.3 gold per plate. Not bad.” Jay wondered why they were slightly more expensive than what he expected – based on the prices of the other drops.

“Hmm, they probably make armour and weapons out of these. Perhaps it’s due to the war going on in the north…” he continued checking his inventory

“Hmm, now the silt-wolf spines…” Jay spent some time searching for spines, wolf bones – yet nothing came up except for things such as ornograff beaks, or yuule and dragon bones.

Jay exhaled in frustration while searching, but nothing – “What the…” he wondered “Does no one want wolf-spines?” he asked himself sarcastically, chuckling to himself before assuming it might be due to his class “Perhaps it’s a necromancer thing to get these… after all, they were left behind after I used a skill on them..” he glanced at his ring before returning to the hatched door.

Gathering his crystals and putting them back into his inventory, he made his way to the door where Lillian was – knocking three times.

Scratching the sill with his finger while he waited, the door didn’t open – instead, the hatch in the door slid across, Lillian greeting him with a slight smile and bored eyes.

“So? How’d it go? Buying or selling?”

“Good thanks, selling some drops. I have 30 minor green crystals and 28 ferritic plates.”

“Just a moment.” Lillian walked to the side of the room, touching the gemstone imbedded in the wall as she checked their prices.

“How the hell has he got so many drops… he’s only been adventuring for a few days.” Lillian wondered as she calculated how much gold to pay him “If he keeps this up, the whole economy could change” she joked to herself.

Returning to the window sill, she had calculated the price.

“It’s 85 gold, minus the 10% fee and it’s 76.5 gold. Since it’s 0.5 gold, we round it down to 76 gold. Are you happy with that?”

“Uh…” Jay thought that rounding down was lame, but this was the only reasonable place to sell drops. “..yes. Where do I put my items?”

“Hmm, since you have so many, come inside.” Lillian closed the hatch and opened the door, and after Jay entered, closing it again and locking it with a bolt.

What she did next made Jay hold his breath in awe._.

Lillian summoned a light-sword into her hand, it destroyed all the shadows in the room – or so Jay thought. It’s blade was as long as her body and about half as wide. She thrust it downwards into the black slate paving of the room – a circle of golden light grew out from where it met the black slate ground; meanwhile the floor wasn’t damaged at all.

A series of otherworldly runes filled the circle – then disappeared as the whole circle lit up. Jay had to look away due to the brightness. When the light had died down, he looked back – a seemingly bottomless black hole appeared within a glowing ring, while Lillian had dispersed her light sword.

“Perhaps it’s a portal to another plane?” Jay wondered, as everything through the hole was complete blackness.

Lillian smiled in pride “Throw your items in here” she said “Obviously, my inventory would fill up if I had to hold onto everything; this is one of my skills. Blade bore. It’s basically a bigger, secondary inventory.. Also infinite.”

“Oh… Right, ok.” Jay snapped out of his stun from the display before pausing again at the last thing she said. The light-ring around the bottomless hole was still drawing out any shadows in the room, sucking them into itself – all shadows were gone except for the one inside the golden circle.

Jay promptly brought out his crystals and ferritic plates while standing in front of the dark, bottomless hole created by the sword. Against all his rational thoughts, he dropped the crystals and the plates into the black void.

Lillian nodded, counting the amount of items dropped in through her ability. Smiling as jay finished, she reiterated the amount.

“Thanks.” She smiled as her black portal disappeared, then handed Jay a small green pouch.

“Here’s your payment. Seventy-six gold.”

“Thanks.” smiled Jay. Lillian walked over, unbolted the door and Jay left the room.

With a moment of silence, Jay was thinking to himself, considering if adventuring was even worth it.

“Hmm, 12 gold per buckler…” he looked at the prices on the market list.

“I could’ve earned about 120 gold at the butchery in the last few days, and without putting my life on the line – but I only earned 76 gold… But at least I got stronger…” Jay held his hand on his chin as he was thinking, slightly disappointed by his earnings.

“Well, I guess I am low level. When I level up, it will surely be more lucrative… But maybe adventuring will become more costly.” he wondered to himself why high level adventurers didn’t simply clear out low level dungeons for some easy gold.

– – –

On a quieter side of the village, a series of small wooden houses made a loose boundary between the evergreen forest and Losla. A single house in this line of houses pointed out to the forest instead of into the town.

“Hmm, I thought I would be more excited about tomorrow, but I feel nothing.” Mark folded his hands, sitting on a step outside his small house facing the forest. A cup of tea sitting next to him periodically made wisps of steam which smelt sweetly pleasant to Mark. His front yard was usually overgrown with forest weeds, though they were mostly spindly bushes at the moment since it was winter. Clearly, keeping a nice-looking yard was not a priority.

“Tomorrow, hopefully, I can finally leave this all behind..” he thought as he stared off into the forest while sipping his tea, a few unpleasant flashes of distant memories went through his mind – before he shook his head and snapped out of it, returning his gaze to the quiet forest.

Four years ago, Mark’s father died adventuring – his mother was filled with grief and hopelessness at this news. She became a shell of her former self, drinking every day until vomiting, and crying herself to sleep most nights.

Mark was just an impressionable fourteen year old kid at the time. Images of his mother getting the bad news, shaking in grief, and vomiting after drinking too much were seared into his mind – the pain had become a part of him.

Eventually, Mark began drinking too, often drinking more than he planned to; he simply couldn’t control himself when he began. The intoxication made the sadness feel good – or perhaps it only numbed it for a while. Mark wasn’t sure, but he hated himself for this.

Observing the quiet forest, Mark didn’t notice a short blonde girl walking around the side of his house. Her footsteps were almost completely silent.

It was of course Anya, who herself had things on her own mind.

Anya was wondering why Jay seemed to be cold to her. “I haven’t been rude to him… I didn’t even hit him, it’s bullshit, I did naht.” she threw her muffin down as she said this expressionlessly, walking around the small wooden fence around Mark’s house before finding him.

“Oh, Hi Mark.”

“Oh. Hey, how are you?” Mark said with a smile, though he had forgotten her name but remembered her face.

“I’m good thanks. You’re joining the military tomorrow aren’t you?”

“Yeah. Hopefully.”

“I’m sure you’ll get in, especially with your class.”

“Heh, yeah probably.” Mark looked at his hands. “I just hope they don’t try to push me harder because of it.”

Anya shrugged “Time will tell… anyway… the military escort will still have to visit numerous other villages around the countryside for recruitment – but there is a way you can skip all that.” she smiled.

“Skip it? What do you mean?”

“Sullivan said he’ll be happy to make an escort for you to take you directly to a military hub. It’ll save you weeks of senseless walking.”

Mark stopped relaxing and stood up, interested in what she was saying as he sensed that there was a condition to the terms.

“That would be great..” he looked a little confused as he half-smiled “But why?”

“Well, there’s a quest of sorts. We need your help, and it will run until tomorrow so you’ll miss the military escort.”

Mark half-smiled, his guard wasn’t down but he reasoned with her for a moment, realizing it was actually a great deal.

“Oh, awesome. Better to be slaying monsters than walking.” he sipped his tea and smiled, looking into the forest again.

Anya was glad she didn’t need to do more convincing.

Generally, guards in the association followed orders without question, however after working with Jay, she expected more people to be like him: resistant and self-contained. While she disliked these qualities in him, she unknowingly and ironically strived for them in herself.

“Oh…” Mark scratched his head, looking a little disappointed “I was actually planning to do a dungeon run with Jay and Kel today…”

Anya smiled widely, “That’s ok, Jay’s coming on the quest. And Kel can come too.” she tactfully recruited both of them at once.

“Awesome. Same deal for Kel, right? She was planning to join the military too.”

“Yeah, sure.” Anya made a promise she couldn’t keep, but was sure her father would allow it anyway.

Sullivan seemed to be more concerned about recruiting Jay into the quest anyway – he didn’t want more people discovering Anya’s class, knowing that she would become drafted into service of some noble; he aimed to have her party with Jay to level up, making her strong enough to decide her own fate.

“Great. So, what is the quest about?”

“A small settlement has been attacked by forest monsters. We’re going south east to investigate and exterminate. The quest should be about four or five days long. It’s urgent so we leave in an hour.”

“Oh ok, right. I see.” Mark finished his tea in one go, realizing he had to be ready to leave. “Well, I was already packed and ready to leave with the military tomorrow, so I’m ready to go now. Want me to go get Kel?”

“Yeah, sure. Meet at the snakeraven inn, in about thirty minutes?”

“Snakeraven inn, got it. We’ll see you there.” he smiled before turning to go inside.

“See ya” Anya smiled, leaving the same way she came.

– – –

“Hmm, perhaps I will need a tent after all.” Jay thought, still scrolling through the market’s item list. “Oh, but it won’t come in time… damn. Hmm… I suppose there’s a chance they have stock here.”

Jay realised that purchased items take a few days to travel there since this market hub didn’t have a teleportation device.

Jay got up, knocking on the hatched-door again.

Lillian “Find something nice?”

“Well.. I need a tent, but I need it today.”

Lillian smiled back in amusement “Well, I can’t do anything about that. We don’t have any in stock.” she looked up in thought “But there are some alternatives.”

“Mm? Like what?”

“Just a moment.”

Lillian closed the hatch in the door, and after the shine of a light escaped under the door, she returned with a large green bag.

“This is a swag. It’s better than a tent since you don’t have to set it up. All you have to do is unroll it and jump in. It’s a combination of a mana-powered self-inflating mattress and sleeping bag with a waterproof outer layer.” she smiled, passing the bag through the hatch.

Jay grabbed it, it was about 5kg “A swag? Hmm, ok cool. Can I test it?”

“Sure. But you have to roll it back up.”

“Sure” Jay chuckled, Lillian watching as Jay was opening the bag and unrolling it.

Sure enough, it was like a large sleeping bag with a thick outer layer which would certainly keep out the elements. The head hole could be closed up, while a small mesh around it’s mouth area for fresh air.

“Huh, better than a tent.” Jay channelled some mana into it, the inbuilt mattress rose slightly in response, providing about five centimetres of clearance from the cold ground.

“Nice.” nodded Jay.

Satisfied with it, he unplugged a hole to let the air drain and began to roll it up while talking to Lillian.

“So, how much is it?”

“Seventy gold.”

“Seventy?” Jay’s brows furrowed. “Yikes… That’s nearly all my work these last few days.”

Lillian only half-smiled, tilting her head to the side since she couldn’t do anything about the price.

Jay sighed “Okay, I’ll take it.”

“Great. Seventy gold please.” she smiled.

“Wow, she has really white teeth” Jay thought to himself as he handed her the gold.

“See you next time” she smiled before closing the hatch, leaving Jay to pack up his swag.

It wasn’t too hard to roll it up, only taking Jay a few minutes before he could fit it back into the bag it came in.

“Nice.” pleased with his purchase, even though it was expensive, he promptly stored it in his inventory.

“Hmm, I wonder if I can just store it in my inventory without even rolling it up… Guess I’ll test that later… well, I better get going.” he thought to himself.

Jay started to walk toward the exit – then paused for a moment, considering if he should buy better armour.

“Some new armour would be good… But I think it can wait. After all, I have high health thanks to dumping a lot of my points into vitality.”

He continued to walk out of the adventurer association, saying bye to Margaret as he left the building, then making his way down the hill again.

“I wonder who Anya was going to recruit into the party anyway.” Jay wondered as he was on his way to the Snakeraven inn.