William’s elation was, much to his displeasure, brought low as he stripped the gear from the still bleeding Guard Captain. The man was dead but it took blood time to coagulate, turning the looting process into a messy endeavor. Stacey and Jane were keeping a lookout for more attackers as John walked up to William.
“Should we tell them about the other guys? Seems pointless to keep it quiet now,” John asked, looking at the two girls several feet away.
William paused what he was doing to look at John and noticed that the man’s eyes were lingering on Jane. He had took the piss with his verbal fuckery earlier and they never got to see the outcome due to certain annoying yellow headaches.
“Yeah, might as well. That Daran guy had basically revealed it anyway,” William replied, regretting his decision to spare Daran.
“We can tell them when we set off again. Kill of some time, you know?”
“That shouldn’t be too long as my hopes are dwindling pretty fucking quickly.”
“I’ll help you then, man.”
John lowered himself down to his knees and began unhooking the chain mail clasps. Neither of them had removed chainmail before and it showed. Unhooking clasps always seemed to work, regardless of the item, after all, it was what clasps were for. After another minute or so, the pair succeeded in taking it off from the bearded guy. William stowed it in his Spatial Ring and continued working his way down the man’s body. Most pockets were empty, but he soon smiled as he felt a lump shift in one of the pockets around the man’s belt. Another harder tap created the glorious jingle of money. William didn’t waste any time in taking the pouch and tossing it into his storage too. He could count it later and they needed to hurry before any witnesses showed up. The faction seemed well equipped and not something that William felt he could currently confront as a whole. He also desperately hoped that they weren’t from Everglade.
William mentally kicked himself, wishing he asked Devlin or Frenn about guards and military presence. No use crying over spilled milk however, and William continued looting, with John sat down now, watching the looting session. William found two more items on the man of note. The first was a literal note, and the second was a metal pyramid object that fit comfortably in William’s palm. William was tempted to use [Identify] immediately, but held off, curious about the contents of the note. He picked up the note and noticed John tilting his head over to look at it too. The girls also seemed to get bored and come over to read it too. William wanted to protest that someone needed to watch but fuck it, he couldn’t be bothered. With that, William opened the folded letter and the four of them read:
Official Orders:
Captain Armak,
You are tasked to take the survivor of the attack and two of your most reliable men further into the Verdanar region and hunt down the bandits that dared kill my son. I expect that you can succeed in this task, given the lack of true threats in the region. Kill all accomplices except the one who took my son from me. He must be brought back alive. I have my own justice to pursue. Use the survivor of the attack to identify the brute and see these orders fulfilled.
Victos Ammenori!
Baron Carn
“Wow you even managed to piss off a baron William, that’s impressive, even for you,” Jane said, patting William on the shoulder.
This prompted laughs from Stacey and John. Even William was impressed at the quick quip.
“Well played sis, it seems you can be funny.”
“Always have been,” Jane replied, flipping him off in the process.
William smiled slightly, happy that Jane had just made a meme reference, but equally sad that she probably didn’t know that.
William decided to cheer himself up with an [Identify] on the pyramid:
{Ascension_Protocol}
Construct – Portable Steel Tent
A device Enchanted as an ingot of steel with Expansion magic by Dwarven Enchantresses and crafted into a portable shelter by Dwarven Artisans. When a user imbues Mana into the item in its miniature form, the item will expand after a 5 second delay to full size. Full size can comfortably fit 6 people and as many bedrolls inside.
When a user imbues Mana into the item at its full size, the item will return to its miniature size after a 5 second delay.
[Notice – Only the user that activates item expansion can activate item retraction.]
[Notice – Any object or living being inside the item on retraction will be transported into the void (The space between realms). WARNING: Guaranteed death for any mortal being.]
[Notice – Mana imbued must be intended. Forced or accidental imbuing will have no effect.]
{End}
William was honestly rather impressed at the item. With the bed and now this, he pretty much had comfy shelter wherever he wanted. William explained what the item did to the others and the reactions were interesting. Jane looked envious, John had an expression of nonchalance like he expected William to get something cool, and Stacey had a gleeful expression, clearly happy to be able to sleep with a roof over her head. He tossed it into his Spatial Ring for the moment as he had to move the body.
William picked up Armak’s body, or who he assumed was Armak given the note he bore. William tossed it down beside the three others and began to loot them too. No items were present but the three did have coin pouches. William didn’t bother with the chainmail as the top parts were missing thanks to his Alpha Strike earlier. William took the pouches and summoned Armak’s then emptied them onto a piece of the yellow cloth of one of the dead guards so he could see the coins easier. Counting on grass was a good way to lose coins.
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A couple more minutes passed and the final count was fifty gold, forty eight silver, and twenty one copper, a good pay day for such quick work. Most of the gold had been in Armak’s pouch of course, with the bulk of copper and silver being from the three other guards.
“Not a bad haul,” William said, tossing the gold into his spatial storage.
His mind’s eye of The space was growing more interesting every time he saw it. His swords were on a neat weapon rack made from the ethereal space itself, with a mannequin holding the chainmail. The metal pyramid rested in what looked like a pigeon hole protruding out from the space’s perceived wall. The most pleasing sight however was the money he had. The total current count was three hundred and nine gold, thirty nine silver, and twenty copper. William’s excitement was eclipsed by something disturbing. He had definitely picked up more silver and copper than what was there. He then realized why after taking the currency value into account being 100:1. Had the space automatically converted it? He had to test it out. He counted twenty copper so he pictured summoning twenty one copper. He felt the metal on his skin and smiled as he saw twenty one copper coins glinting from the sunlight. A mental check showed that he had thirty eight silver and ninety nine copper. The math was good. He willed the money away and a final check told him that it had converted back. The ring was even more convenient it seemed.
William explained the phenomenon to the others as he piled the bodies up.
John let out a long suffering sigh as he said, “I really, really do need to get one of those.”
William smiled as he heard his friend echo the same complaint as the day they had found it originally.
“John, Stacey, do either of you have enough Mana to cast a [Fire-Bolt]?”
John nodded, cutting his rant short as William checked the [Party Interface] and saw a sliver of MP. At full MP, William expected John could cast [Fire-Bolt] all day long. It showed that [Fire-Wall] was powerful with how big of a drain it seemed to have dealt to the Mage’s MP.
“John, go for the cloak, it should light okay,” William added as John stepped up towards the pile and William stepped back.
As expected, the fire took hold and the four bodies burned. After an hour of sitting nearby and waiting to make sure the evidence was gone, the fire dwindled, having ran out of things to burn. All that remained was bone burned black and ashen metal from the pile of bodies. No sign of yellow, or personal effects remained. To anyone passing by, it would be obvious that battle took place and that the dead were burned, but they wouldn’t know whom did it or whom the bodies belonged to, and that was the most important thing. The smell of burning flesh wasn’t the most pleasing however, as all four of them grimaced for a long while before they adjusted to the smell, or come to tolerate it. With nothing else left to do there, William and his party continued their journey southward.
The day turned to evening before they noticed any difference beyond the shrinking hills and growing clusters of trees. It was as the sky began to turn orange and purple when a stone monolith about waist height came into view, beside the start of what appeared to be a game trail leading into another wooded environment. William briefly wondered if the creatures inside were different from the Sylvar Woodland’s denizens. The group looked at the text on the side of the construct:
Everglade – 30 Miles
It was a literal Milestone. They had apparently travelled twenty miles in the day by the time they had reached it. William felt like they could’ve gone further by that point if it wasn’t for the distractions, but they had been valuable in their own way.
“We could set up camp here maybe? We still have a long way to go so maybe now is a good time?” Jane suggested, looking at the woods with a very subtle expression of worry.
William had a feeling she didn’t want to be in the woods at night. If the place they were headed to lived up to its name, they would be in the woods for the last thirty miles of their journey, and even if the game trail led all the way to Everglade, it wasn’t a road and it wasn’t open space, meaning they wouldn’t be able to move as fast, especially not knowing what dwelled within. William would need to be alert the whole time as would the rest of them. The question plaguing him was whether to be a little mean now and force the group on a bit before making camp so that Jane could maybe get over or learn to cope with the worry she had, or he could be nice and let them make camp there, even if it was against his better judgement. If any patrols of those yellow-clad bastards appeared, then William would have to kill them as they would assume that the Guard Captain was using it.
He made his decision as he saw his sister get more anxious as the seconds rolled on.
“We make camp here. It’ll be two on watch at all times though as we’re very much exposed here,” William said, pulling out the metal Pyramid and waving for the group to step to the side. After they did so, William infused some Mana into the item and placed it down. The group watched over the following seconds as the small pyramid grew to the size of one of their Greenwell huts. William scanned the landscape around them, now growing slightly darker as the swirls of purple and orange plastered the sky. No one could be seen, relieving William as he had been worried of being blind to a surprise attack if they all went inside to check it out.
A metal rectangle grew from the side facing them and the face on it opened, creating a doorway of sorts. William walked in first, leading his party inside. Once inside, the space they saw was completely open with a polished floor, space in multiple sides for the beds he and John had, a bowl formed into the floor in the center, which from the metal tube directly above it separated by a six foot space of air appeared to be a fire pit. William was extremely pleased with his new item. The girls were awestruck.
John looked around in wonder before letting out a tired sigh as he said, “I need to get one of these.”
William chuckled at that as he smiled and replied, “If you take too long to find one, I might start charging rent.”
Jane scoffed at that and chimed in, “You’d charge your own sister rent?”
“Double for you, dear sister.”
“I’ll remember that when you need another arm grown back,” Jane replied, glaring at him.
William realized his mistake then. He had committed the cardinal sin of gamers everywhere. He had angered the healer.
“Okay, special rates for my dear sister.”
Jane’s grumpy face transitioned suspiciously quickly into one of contentedness as she nodded at his words.
He felt a warm arm wrap around his as Stacey whispered in his ear, “How much rent do I have to pay?”
William grinned and turned to look at her.
Matching her tone, William replied, “Free for you. Always.”
Stacey leaned in and gave him a long kiss. He got butterflies as he felt her lips on his and had to pull back before he gave in to natural instinct. He smiled and his eyes conveyed his lust for her. She picked upon it as she remembered Jane and John both being present.
The two were looking around, clearly trying to ignore William and Stacey’s shenanigans. An hour passed as they all sat outside watching the sunset and ate their dried foods not wanting to test the open fire pit out just yet. As the groups watched the sun descend and the creeping night begin its travel across the sky, William knew it was time for sleep. He tasked John and Jane with first watch. John gave him the look of a man who saw a friend helping him and Jane’s situation out. What he didn’t know was that William wanted Stacey alone in the new shelter. William had figured out how to activate the entrance. A metal plate protruded slightly to the left of the door on both sides and it allowed for the owner and a guest to imbue some Mana to gain access to the door controls. It seemed to be a way to have someone guarding from both inside, and outside. John was the one authorized to use the door control other than William. William was also the only one who could do it with a thought. John had to physically interact with the panels.
William saw Stacey walk in after him and give him a lustful smile. William pitched a tent inside a tent then and quickly put his bed down in one of the slots, the eagerness of libido grasping at both of them stripped off and once nude, pounced on each other.
It was several minutes into that when John and Jane learned, to their horror, magical shelters didn’t offer the best soundproofing.