That explained the question, at least. Serenity shrugged again; he didn’t see any reason not to. If this customer was someone Djen was close to, it might even help with looking into him. Even if the customer was only a random customer, it would give Serenity a reason to stick around. “Sure, why not?”
As they headed towards the stairs, Djen paused. “Oh, I’ll need a fee from you for making the connection. Since the client is already here, I can make it a nominal fee of ten kopeks; how does that sound?”
Serenity shook his head. He wasn’t sure what a kopek was, which meant it was almost certainly a local currency. “I don’t have any of those.”
“How about an Etherium, then?” Djen didn’t miss a beat, which told Serenity that he wasn’t surprised at the lack of kopeks and was really after Etherium. On the other hand, an Etherium was a fairly high price for an interview Serenity was fairly confident Djen was already getting paid for.
Serenity smiled and gave a counteroffer. “How about a tiny monster core?”
Djen actually seemed startled by that, which surprised Serenity. Monster cores weren’t everywhere, but they weren’t exactly uncommon, either. Most worlds ran on them, and tiny ones were generally far less valuable than Etherium. “Sure.”
Serenity was surprised again when Djen didn’t try to bargain up the amount, but he wasn’t going to argue.
Serenity reached into his pack to pull out the smallest bag of cores he had when he remembered he’d hidden them in the Rift. There were probably a few from the Tutorial stuffed somewhere in his pack, but he’d shoved most of them into the Rift while he was quickly hiding stuff, just in case. He pulled open a tiny Rift, just large enough to have one of his loose tiny monster cores fall into his hand while it was concealed in one of the backpack’s pockets. He deliberately muttered under his breath. “There it is, knew it was here somewhere.”
Serenity looked over at Djen and held out the core. “Will this work?”
Djen nodded. “Definitely.”
----------------------------------------
Serenity was led to a small room with a table and four chairs. One of the chairs held a well-dressed man who could have been forty or four hundred, depending on his Tier; he was politely not pushing his aura, so Serenity could only guess that he was probably near the low end of that range. He had dark hair and fine features, but instead of dark eyes like Djen’s his eyes were a very pale, frosty blue.
Djen stopped in the doorway and ushered Serenity in. “I will leave the two of you to talk. When you are finished, you may simply leave; you have no further obligation to me for this meeting.”
Djen stepped back and closed the door.
The seated man smiled but didn’t stand. “Please come in, have a seat. I’m Duke Kalo Lichbane of Lowpeak; may I inquire after your name?”
Serenity tried not to grumble to himself. This seemed to be one of the higher-formality worlds, based on the Duke’s phrasing. The fact that he had the cognomen “Lichbane” didn’t make Serenity feel any better about him.
Well, there was no reason to be impolite. Serenity matched his aura restraint to the Duke’s, then pulled out a chair and sat across the table from him. “I’m known as Serenity.”
“Hm, I see. It is pleasant to meet you, Serenity.” The Duke’s reaction was muted, but Serenity thought he caught a hint of surprise. Whether it was over his name or the fact that it was a Name, Serenity couldn’t tell. “I hear that you are a mercenary of at least Tier Three who has done bodyguard work?”
That was a huge relief. Many of the more polite planets liked to talk their way around the point, and while Serenity - well, Vengeance - had more or less learned to do it, he’d never been good at it or enjoyed it.
Serenity nodded. “Mercenary Guild, though I haven’t checked in with the local Guild yet. I wouldn’t have expected you to be looking for that sort of work outside the Guild?”
The Duke shook his head and a slight smile came to his face. “I can tell you’re not from around here. None of the multi-planet Guilds are welcome on Zon, including the Mercenaries. They were the last to go, along with the Messengers.” He sounded somber. Serenity wasn’t yet sure if that was simply his way of speaking or if he actually regretted the loss of the Guilds.
Serenity frowned. The Guilds not being present would make Serenity’s task harder; they were a major portion of the infrastructure that helped travelers across the galaxy and beyond. That wasn’t specifically what they were there for, but having them meant that he knew where to go if he needed something, and that was huge in a foreign city. It wasn’t the worst effect, but it certainly wasn’t helpful.
“That’s not good,” Serenity offered. “I suppose it’s why Djen offered his help finding me a position?”
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Serenity still didn’t know why Djen had done that. He’d assumed that the “position” was mostly to keep an eye on him, but Djen wasn’t acting like he really wanted Serenity to take it. Of course, maybe he just wanted Serenity to think that?
Bah. If he tried to doublethink his way through what someone like Djen might be meaning, he’d give himself a headache and never get anything done. Most people really weren’t that good at planning, not in reality. Something always went wrong, usually at the worst time.
“Perhaps he simply wanted the fee. This is a Hiring Hall, after all.” The Duke shook his head before continuing. “Can you tell me about your experience bodyguarding? I truly do need to hire someone.”
Serenity wasn’t certain if he wanted the job or not. If the Duke was associated with Djen, he was pretty sure he did want it, but he couldn’t tell if he was or not. Well, even if he wasn’t, having a job usually made answering official questions easier. On top of that, this seemed to be a world with nobility; having some noble backing could be useful. If it truly didn’t work out, he could quit.
“Most recently, it was escorting some very inexperienced people through their first dungeons. Training them to be better fighters and to work together as a team. Some were better than others, but I’m proud to say that I never lost any.” That was something to be proud of; inexperienced people in dungeons didn’t have a very high survival rate. The first few Trial Dungeons were easier, but there was still a reason escorted runs were popular.
The Duke nodded. “That’s a good start. Have you ever done any city bodyguarding, especially of a noble?”
Serenity started to answer in the negative, but suddenly realized that wasn’t true. Vengeance had done some, as a human. For some reason, most people didn’t seem to like undead bodyguards. “Yes, but it’s been a long time.”
The Duke nodded. “Too bad but not surprising; most people prefer long-term arrangements. I would too, generally, but there isn’t time to send for anyone from home. It’s good that you’ve trained the young; you will need that. I can pay in kopeks, Etherium, or gear; I see that your gear is rather poor for your Tier. Unfortunately, I must admit that prices for magical gear are rather high on Zon; very little is made here.”
Serenity knew the Duke was being polite. By the standards of any world other than Earth, his gear - other than his ax, duplicating knives, and whatever his second form was - was basically junk. The sort of thing a child would use, or maybe a young (and probably fairly poor) adult.
Speaking of which, he really should change his armor-self to look more appropriate for what other people were wearing. He’d have to keep an eye out and see what that was. “I have some better gear,” Serenity admitted. “I don’t like showing it off, usually.”
He paused as the rest of the Duke’s statement sank in. “Why isn’t much made here? Most places, almost everything is made locally or found in the dungeons. Low-end gear isn’t usually a problem and even up to Tier Three shouldn’t be unusual on a world this strong.”
The area he was in felt about as strong as the Tutorial, maybe a bit stronger. Serenity knew the Tutorial would support people up to Tier Four, so this world probably capped out at Tier Five or so; it might even depend on how strong the person was in the Tier.
It was very nice to not feel his mana and essence draining away the way it had on Earth. Of course, it also didn’t do that in the Tutorial, so he hadn’t immediately noticed it when he arrived.
“Come with me,” the Duke stated as he stood. “I’d like you to meet my daughter before we finalize anything. You’ll be guarding her if you suit each other. As for why magical things aren’t made here, you can guess as well as I can; they never have been. Anyone who wants to become a magical crafter has to leave Zon to learn, and few come back. Fewer stay, and those that do rarely ever make anything magical.”
As they walked away, Serenity puzzled over the lack of magical item crafting. Combining it with Djen’s strange reaction to the monster core made Serenity think that something was very, very wrong here. “Do you not have many dungeons?”
“You must have a Royal grant to own a dungeon, and how many you are permitted depends on your noble rank. All others that are publicly known must be destroyed, for an unowned dungeon is considered too dangerous.”
The Duke’s phrasing was interesting. Not only did he imply that there were dungeons that weren’t publicly known, but he didn’t seem to entirely agree with the policy of destroying them. Serenity dismissed the implication of hidden dungeons; every world had them. Dungeons were sources of power, and there were always people who would try to monopolize them, often by keeping them hidden. The routine destruction of dungeons was far more concerning.
They were several blocks away from the “Hiring Hall” when Serenity threw out a question related to the other topic he’d been wondering about. He’d come back to the dungeon problem later; it was unlikely it was going anywhere. “So how well do you know Djen?”
“Djen?” The Duke sounded startled. He seemed to think for a moment. “Was that the person at the Hiring Hall?”
“That’s how he introduced himself.” Serenity was surprised to find someone worse with names than himself. Or perhaps the Duke was simply too proud to remember peasants’ names? Serenity had seen that before. It might well not extend to his daughter’s prospective bodyguard. Close guards were often treated well even when everyone else was treated poorly.
“I’m not from Zenith,” the Duke admitted. “That meant I didn’t have the contacts to find someone, so I went to a Hiring Hall. That was the first one I found.”
That made Djen’s behavior make a lot of sense, then. He didn’t want to keep an eye on Serenity; he wanted Serenity as far away from what he was doing as possible. “That makes sense. I don’t know if I’ll be able to leave when you do. It depends.”
Serenity paused and re-ran what the Duke said in his mind. If that was the first Hiring Hall he came to, was Serenity the first person he interviewed? Was the Duke that bad at finding employees? “Was I the first person you talked to about this?”
Aeon didn’t have a word that exactly meant “interviewed”.
“Yes. You seem capable from what I can tell, and you have reasonable experience. I’ll need to give you a combat test, of course, but there’s no point in that until you meet my daughter.” The Duke didn’t seem to catch Serenity’s implication at all. Perhaps this was essentially an extended interview? It wasn’t like they’d really discussed pay yet, either.