The questions came all at once after that. How did he die? How did he come back to life? What was the afterlife like?
It wasn’t the first time he’d told people this story, and he wouldn’t have bothered except for how well it seemed to work at getting people interested in him. It was easier to pretend to be a miracle worker after you’d already talked about a few miracles.
“How did I die?” he asked rhetorically. “Let’s call it an alchemical accident. I was mixing up a big batch of potions, and a sort of fireball spell went off when the city guards tried to arrest me.”
He wasn’t about to explain to them what a meth lab was or why that dumb fucking cop thought it was a good idea to use a taser in a room full of volatile chemicals and flammable gases. The fact that he’d died in a ball of fire had been true enough, though.
One second, he’d been whipping a big batch of the best crystal in Idaho, and the next, his door was being knocked down. It had been terrible timing because he’d been right in the middle of a cook, and before he could make a run for it, the whole world had caught on fire.
Lucas had thought it would hurt worse than it did, honestly. He’d been as surprised as anyone to wake up in a place that seemed more like the DMV than any heaven or hell he’d ever read about.
“Death is interesting,” he continued. “But the afterlife? Let’s just say that it’s a very boring place. They try to fix you, I guess you could say so that you will do better in your next life, but fuck that, right?”
“All that matters is that I’ve escaped worse jams than this and built myself up from nothing more than once already,” he said, flashing the men who were listening to his story a predatory smile. “So we’re getting out of this fucking pit, no problem. I mean, I am anyway because there’s no way I’m going back to heaven to take whatever punishment they want to dream up for what I did last time. The rest of you can come along if you want, though.”
He smiled wider, hoping he hadn’t laid on too thick. “A man can never have enough friends, right?”
He still didn’t understand this damn world. Whoever had created it seemed to make it up as they went along. He had what the locals called a minor gift when it came to alchemy, but that was just the tip of the iceberg. There were all sorts of minor gifts like his.
Maybe one percent of the people of Annorah had real-life, honest-to-god magic. They could heal kids instead of letting them die. They could use magic to make him confess or pull secrets from his brain.
That isn’t usually what happened. Instead of doing good deeds, the mages were usually off doing their own thing. That left the guards to use hot irons and rip out toenails and whatever else it was these guys did to get answers out of random guys they picked up from the street.
Honestly, he’d only interacted with wizards like the one in the Chalice a couple of times, and they gave him the creeps. They had crazy ass powers but they didn’t seem very concerned in using them for the good of everyone, and to this day he still wasn’t sure why.
He’d rather be in this hole amongst this motley little crew. Sure, they were pieces of shit just like he was, but at least they were honest about it.
The cell’s giant was named Hura’gh, and he’d been a tax collector’s hired muscle. Other than the glares and the bad breath he didn’t seem to be too bad a guy. It turned out that he’d accidentally beaten a man to death while trying to collect some coin earlier in the week.
Normally, that wouldn’t have been a capital crime since he was working for the kingdom. Right now wasn’t exactly normal, and the powers that be were looking to make an example out of people like them.
The dwarf was named Kar’gandin. He was a merchant who’d worked hard his whole life to pay as few of the taxes and tariffs that he owed the crown as possible. When it was his turn to explain why he was awaiting the headsman’s axe he was pretty straight forward. He made no bones about the fact that he’d confessed to everything rather than let the royal confessor pry loose his secrets one tooth at a time.
He boasted “every deal I made was fair enough, but over the years, I managed to get away with keeping the crown’s cut almost every time. I’ll bet I earned my own weight in gold like that before it finally caught up with me.”
That just left Hardcore, and unfortunately, he was still out with a concussion on the floor. Lucas knew nothing about the man to share with his new cellmates. He seemed like a scrapper to Lucas, and he felt a little bad he didn’t have a single healing potion on his person to help the guy out. After all, a three-man crew was well enough, but a four-man crew would have been even better once they’d figured out how to escape and the guards sounded the alarm.
For a time, Lucas thought that the dwarf should have been in the other cell with the nobleman. However, the longer he talked, the clearer it was that he’d done more than embezzle and fail to pay his taxes. The man definitely had blood on his hands.
In the end, the only person that didn’t fit the pattern was the Viscount across the way. Lord Parin was rather tight-lipped about why it was that he was down here, so the three of them made a game for the next half hour, trying to guess what it was. It was valuable time, and Lucas didn’t exactly want to waste it. Not with the occasional scream coming from down the hall, but nothing brought a group together like finding someone who thought they were better than them to mock, so in the end he didn’t rush things.
In the process, they came up with ever more shameful reasons for why one of the crème de la crème of the kingdom was about to meet the headsman’s axe along with a mob of his inferiors. Theft, affairs, buggery, drug addiction, cowardice, and even unsavory acts with barnyard animals all made their appearance to the man’s obvious distaste. When he stopped reacting to their odious stories, though, the game quickly lost its appeal.
Finally, the little Lord said, “You can hear what it is I’m guilty of when they read the charges to the baying crowd but know that those are just the excuses, not the reason.”
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Lucas nodded, “Well, I’m your one chance to avoid getting your head chopped off tomorrow or the day after or whenever they decide to do it, and if you want to get out of here with us, I’m going to need two things from you.”
“As if a battered runt like you could get us out of this hole,” the Viscount laughed. “If I still had my fortune, I’d bet…”
His words died away as Lucas lifted his arms to reveal that his manacles had been removed. “Sounds like you lose a lot of bets, man,” Lucas snarked as he turned to the half-orc. He started trying to unlock the hulk’s manacles with the same bent piece of wire he’d turned into a makeshift lockpick in order to keep working on building up some goodwill before he told them his plan.
“How did you…” the noble gasped.
“It’s called sleight of hand, and someday when you guys invent that shit, it’s going to be fire, trust me,” Lucas chuckled coldly, “So you can either tell us your story and join the crew or you can do the honorable thing and wait patiently for your final appointment. The choice is yours.”
“Getting free of manacles isn’t going to get you out of that cage,” Lord Parin shot back coldly. “There’s still two locked doors and a castle full of guards between you and freedom.”
“Easy,” Lucas answered, not bothering to elaborate as he moved on to the dwarf.
“What’s the second thing you need, anyway?” the noble asked.
“Besides your story?” Lucas laughed. “I’m just going to need your flask.”
“My what?” the man asked, playing dumb. He was a terrible liar.
“You know. The thing with your… I’m going to say brandy, but we can call it a medicinal herbal tonic if you prefer. Whatever gets you through the night.”
“I don’t—” the man started to say, but Lucas interrupted.
“I can smell it on you, even over the scent of Mister Smokey here,” Lucas smiled as he turned to the dwarf, “no offense.”
The dwarf shrugged indifferently as he took another puff, but Hura’gh snarled. “You holding out on us, rich man?!” he bellowed loud enough that the guards had certainly heard it, not that it mattered.
“It’s fine, man. Be cool…” Lucas told his angry friend. “He’ll contribute to the cause. Lord fancy pants over there might be too good to tell stories with the rest of us, but he wants to live, too. You can see it in his eyes.”
“Let’s say I had a flask, and I was willing to contribute it to your little cause,” the Viscount said. “What then? How does that open these doors to freedom? Past the guards, there’s a city full of men that would tell the guards exactly where any of us are for a few pence.”
“You want the whole plan?” Lucus smirked. “Okay. Here it is. I… let’s say I have a friend, who’s a gifted alchemist, and he’s taught me a few things. I’m going to take your flask to distill and isolate a few ingredients and make our friend here a strength potion. Then he’s going to—”
“Even with a strength potion, a half-orc isn’t strong enough to rip that door off its hinges,” the noble laughed.
“No shit, Sherlock,” Lucas shot back. “You think this is my first jailbreak? He’s plenty strong to bend the bars down here at the bottom where they’re rusted. Then our friend Mister Kar’gandin will crawl out, fetch the key, and unlock the doors. After that, we go upstairs to the cabinet where we’re keeping our shit; I get my hands on a dagger, pry up the bar holding that door closed, and then we fight our way free and lose ourselves in town. Between me and our merchant friend, I’m sure we got enough contacts to smuggle us out of the city, and then we can hide out in the greenwood until—”
“Why in the hell would you want to be in the greenwood?” the dwarf asked. “The place is fraught with dangers. Goblins, spiders, and of course—”
“Because that’s where the shit grows to make more blue,” Lucas barked. “Haven’t you been listening to anything I’ve been saying? You, me… hell - everyone in this cell. We go in business together. We get out of here, you keep the critters from killing me in the big dark forest, and when we get what we need to come back and sell it to blokes with the cash and quietly buy our names off the shitlist! It’s a plan so easy anyone could do it.”
Of course, that was the last thing that Lucas planned on doing. He’d learned the hard way more than once in his life that you didn’t shit where you eat.
So, now that he’d taken a big dump on Lordanin, he was going to have to skip town. These assholes didn’t need to know that, though.
They were only important for as long as it took him to get free. After that, well - they were on their own, just like he was.
“It takes a lot more than brandy to make a strength potion, what do you propose to brew here exactly?”
To answer the question, Lucas produced two redcaps with a flourish. They were poisonous as hell, but they had enough strength on them that he could make it work. That was especially true with the widower’s root and the pipeweed they had on hand.
Red Caps (raw): Poison 10, strength 4, intelligence -2, dexterity -1. Those who devour or imbibe redcaps have a 30% chance to go berserk for up to one hour.
“How in the blazes did you manage to smuggle mushrooms in here?” the half-orc laughed. “If you tell me you stuck it up your butt, then I ain’t drinkin' anything made from those!”
“Well, they took my weapons, my coins, and all my emergency potions when they arrested me. I had these in my boot as a just-in-case sorta thing,” Lucas sighed. “I keep a lot of those, normally. I even had an invisibility potion in my pouch, too. Woulda’ been perfect for getting me out of here next mealtime. I do think we have everything we need to make this if we all pitch in, though.”
“I still don’t understand how you think all of this is even remotely feasible,” the nobleman declared. “Alchemy is a complex and delicate magic! It requires refined reagents, precise ratios, and very expensive equipment. I don’t see a flask or a retort in sight. I highly doubt that you can do anything of the sort.”
“See - that’s just your limited worldview and imaginations sticking out and embarrassing you further, your nosiness. Me, I don’t got those problems,” Lucas smiled. “You just toss your brandy over here, and I’ll show you exactly what I can do.”
The incredulous man looked at him, frozen and scandalized, and when he finally produced the flask and tossed it over, Lucas was under no illusions that it was the half-orcs glare that did the lion's share of the persuading. Hura'gh immediately reached for it, but before the half-orc could grab it and down the liquid fire in a single gulp, Lucas pulled it away.
“Easy, easy…” he said. “This is for crafting, not for drinking. We get out of here first round’s on me, okay? I got a stash. I’ll hook you up.”
Brandy, 10 years old (Excellent): Purifying agent. Remove 50% of the negative effects of up to two reagents.
The half-orc glowered at him but said nothing, giving Lucas the breathing room to examine the thing. Then, once that was done, he smiled. It was time to do the shittiest cook of his life.