Saying nothing else, Joe straightened and left, Kilniara following after. That was probably stupid, but I don’t want a repeat and that seems tame enough. They arrived outside to find Garnedell and Zilnek slacking against the wall of the building, chatting amiably with one another.
Joe’s mood quickly returned and he nodded his head, “Let’s get out of here!”
Both guys nodded and settled in at their side and the four took off down the now crowded streets. Took too long in there… Joe sighed to himself. It was a bit frustrating with all the close traffic, but he quickly turned his mood away, not wishing to be annoyed this early in the morning and focused on enjoying the conversation with the other three.
When they returned to more familiar areas, Joe sent the other three on ahead and slipped off to the temple square. Time to begin my journey into magic! He made it to the square easily enough and quickly looked in the direction of his next temple to exploit, correcting his angle slightly when he spotted the entrance. It happened to be on the other side of the square and he pressed on, but at about half way across, the crowd began to grow agitated and then pressing to the sides, becoming denser as people shoved and pushed away from the center. Joe growled in frustration as he was pushed away, trapped on the other side of the widening corridor from the temple he needed to go to.
He continued to struggle to get to the temple but then realized that it would be impossible without causing a scene as the widening space between the people was being created by a long string of guards pushing their way into the crowd and cutting it apart. When Joe saw this, he stopped. Huh… something big going on. Should I stay and see what happens? Wonder how long it’ll take… hmm… nah. Can ask Kukurnal tonight.
Joe gave up on looking for a way to the other side of the temple square and turned away, looking over the temples on this side. He searched for one he had not been in before but saw that he’d already visited all of them. He finally decided to simply go back to the very first one. It’s been a week or two, right? That should be enough time.
Joe set his backpack down and rummaged through it for his notebook before looking back at his notes on when he’d first came to the city and which temple and cloak color he’d first chosen. He’d listed his cloaks in a pseudo random order loosely matching the order of the colors of the rainbow where they matched and the rest just kind of randomly placed where he felt they fit best. He ended up with a couple extra cloaks so took out cloaks that were too similar in color until he only had one more than the number of temples he needed to go to. This setup automatically had him shift through the colors of the cloak one off each iteration through the cycle of temples. This way, he would always have a different cloak every time he reentered a temple until he’d gone through the entire set of cloaks for each temple.
It was a good setup, easy to do without any complicated setup or planning. It would just always work out that way. Now everything’s screwed up! Wait… just… Joe smiled and checked the last color in the list. Heh! This is it. Joe flipped on that last color and headed into the first temple once again. All he would have to do the next time he came her would be to skip the next cloak and this temple and he would be right on track. No prob! Joe smiled as he walked into the temple and flipped open his available jobs tab again and looked through his options one more time. Yep, still just physician, mana-ologist, or spell caster. Hmm… well, I’d guess mana-ologist would give me more help to figure out how to do this whole mana thing, so maybe I’ll do that? I’ll take physician tomorrow, then spell caster last. We’ll see if there’s anything else after that and how well we get our way into the underground for the less than legitimate information sources.
Choosing mana-ologist, Joe got his job changed quickly enough and then turned to leave. As he approached the main entrance, one of the temple workers ran up.
“Sir? Sir. Sir! Please, sir!”
Joe shook his head and waved them off as he said, “No thanks. I do not want anything,” then slipped past them and out of the door.
The bright light outside blinded him somewhat and he simply stepped out for a couple of steps to wait for his eyes to adjust, staring forward and waiting patiently. When his eyesight returned, the first thing Joe noticed was a long line of carriages, carts, soldiers, and servants; an entire entourage heading down through the middle of the parted sea of the crowd.
His eyes flickered across the landscape to take in what he was seeing, something odd tickling at the back of his mind, but then found his eyes ripped back to the caravan when he saw one rather important man suddenly stand up and point directly at Joe. Joe blinked in surprise, staring at the man in a bit of confusion as he wondered why he was pointing directly at him. The man simply continued staring at him but quickly dropped his hand, mouth clicking shut before he looked away and sat down on his seat; face forward, back straight, and obviously unsettled.
You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.
Joe found the entire experience quite odd but he just continued to stare at the man as the caravan passed through the temple square before the last of it disappeared out the other side of the square. Huh… wonder what that was about?
Joe’s attention returned to the temple square and suddenly realized what the odd feeling had been that was tickling at the back of his thoughts. Every person in the square was laying almost prone on the floor, except that they at least had their knees under them, but their foreheads and palms were pressed directly to the stone plaza floor. The fact that people were so crowded into the square that some people had hands and heads shoved up one another’s rear ends seemed to not make a single difference as every person there maintained that posture for a bit until the shouts of a herald that had been at the very end of the caravan faded away. Once the herald’s voice was no longer heard, everyone quickly stood back up and began to move about their daily business, no one seeming put out by their time on their knees.
Several people around him had seemed taken aback when they stood and found him already upright, but they only shifted uncomfortably and quickly distanced themselves from him. Whelp… that was stupid. Stood out like a sore thumb there. Hopefully no one really knows who I am.
The only good thing that Joe could think was that he had his robe on still, covering his face and making him only noticeable by the bright color of the robe. Well… crap… might need to change this cloak out and throw this one away, then. Joe sighed and shouldered his backpack then began pushing out of the temple square quickly, heading for a smaller street than he would normally take. He reached that street quickly enough and Joe pushed himself down the road for a bit before he found another smallish street that would take him to the dungeon but would require another immediate left turn right after. This would give him a quick switchback to maybe loose anyone who might be following and he ducked into the side street. He still didn’t know the streets well enough to lose himself in the maze of back alleys so could only hope this might help.
As soon as he was around the street, he quickly increased his speed while also flipping the cloak off and bundling it up in his arms in a tight ball held against his chest. The next street over was only about ten feet away and he broke into a quick jog for those ten feet before slipping around the corner and slipping into the flow of traffic and matching everyone else’s speed. Best I’m going to do. Joe would have liked to have been a bit more diligent have had a better plan, but this was the best he could do at the moment. Going to think up a better plan tonight, that’s for sure.
Joe moved down the street and a man from a store came out and slipped in ahead of him for a bit before stopping off at another store. Joe suddenly had an idea and acted on impulse, taking the cloak and draping it across the man’s shoulders.
“Here you go. A gift.”
The man turned around at the hands on his shoulders, jerking abruptly in surprised anger, “Hey, what…”
Joe ignored him and continued walking, not even looking back or acknowledging him. Joe couldn’t know what was happening, but the way he’d trailed off seemed to indicate the man was at a loss, looking around the crowd to see who had touched him or where the cloak came from. This was perfectly fine for Joe, although he clapped his hands down on his pockets and swung the backpack around in front of him. With the cloak no longer on him, it was too easy for any pickpocket to slip their hands in and take what they could find. Granted, he’d made sure that everything was tied down as it should, but that meant little to a thief well trained. Several tense moments of travel saw him at the dungeon entrance, relieved.
“Joe! We are here!” came a call and Joe looked up the line to see the other three about three quarters the way through.
Joe smiled at the call and waved back, “Coming.”
Garnedell waited till Joe was with them before asking, “All went well?”
“Yes. We are here and we are ready, so. Let’s prepare.”
Garnedell smiled, “I can’t wait to kill some on my own. We are a good team!”
Kilniara nodded happily at that, “Yes! We are.”
Zilnek came in a bit later with his own agreement, although a bit more subdued. Gotta get him back in his job. Think that would really help his morale!
Joe remained silent as the others began chatting and Joe calmed his heart and breath. He stood with the other three for a bit, remaining a bit circumspect but then realized that wasn’t exactly behavior free of suspicion, so began looking around instead, as he usually did.
He didn’t notice anyone seeming to look for him and that calmed him quite a bit until he finally relaxed completely and began to engage with his apprentices once again, although he did take a moment to go over his to do list one last time. That morning affair in the temple square had done a number on him and he wanted to make sure he’d done everything.
Practiced forms and mana. Check. Asked about learning about religious jobs. Check. Plan to figure things out: black market and library. Check. Change job for now to magic stuff. Check. Dungeon run today. Check. Oh, right. Screwed up the party… Crap!
Joe looked at the line and found they were already at the front, ready to go in, and Joe frowned in some frustration. Glancing back to the end of the line, he noticed that it had almost doubled since the time he’d come and he turned to Garnedell really quick.
“How long was the line when you first got here?”
Garnedell glanced up at him before looking back down the line, “Maybe five times? Ten times? I’m not sure. I’m no merchant.”