"Tell me about my shop, what's going to be inside of it? Where is it going to be built? Am I going to have annoying neighbors that I will have to fight with constantly?"
Neka had started asking questions non stop after she found out that pretty soon they would all be returning to the city. It would not be today or tomorrow but she was insistent on finding out everything that she could. Already she had managed to annoy more then half the group and surprisingly the one she was failing to pester the most was Tess.
For someone that didn't really socialize with others all that much he could be oddly patient when it came to things like this. He was just casually answering all the questions she had to the best of his ability and silently hoping she would go away soon and leave him to read in peace. Not the best plan, that he would freely admit but he found that it always worked if you gave it enough time.
"It is a nice place made out of enchanted stone and far away from any neighbors that you could have. That is regulation by the way in case you blunder on a magical plague or some other type of curse that can affect lots of people. It will be in the crafters quarters in the city's north district. Any other questions or are you good for now." He deadpanned, he was getting good at that and found that it usually speed up the process of people leaving him alone.
Something about telling people exactly what the wanted to know in the most monotone voice you could muster really seemed to get the point across. Maybe it was the look in his eye that made you think he was considering if he could get away with murdering you to go back to sleep. Could he get away with it, no. But what if....
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"Hay Sasha, Sasha, do you know how much business I am going to get? I want to have the most successful place around. Do you think that I could pull that off?"
Neka said while admitting to her self that she was just procrastinating getting every thing ready for as long as she could. Part of that was because she did not want to go back into danger so soon after surviving what should have been certain death. Part of it was because had a lot of stuff that was needed for her to travel safely in any capacity. Not for her safety mind you but for the protection of everyone around her.
It would only get worse when they did get to the city because she would need special precautions to enter without killing everyone. The only reason she could walk around freely was that they all had protective magic cast on them from when they crafted the cursed floor. If she were to wander down the wrong ally back in the city she could drain the very life from anyone that was just on the other side of the walls. Just walking into a crowd would earn her a triple digit body count in less then a minute.
"Considering the Fortress of Grudge is already spitting out cursed gear I would say that you are going to get a fair amount of business and if you work hard and try to advertise that you are the best around then people could come from other continents just to have you look at curses that have been placed on them." Sasha said while mixing up a batch of poison.
This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.
Nothing like what was on the second floor mind you, this would just kill you out right. You could wipe out a settlement by throwing it into the well if you wanted to, but other then that it would never really be much use for mass fights. The potential to harm your comrades in a group melee was just to high and anyone hit by this poison was not likely to be walking away, not even if they were cured. It would leave them with aches and pains for days to come.
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"Embrda, what are you up to? By the way I have been wondering about what underworld people might come to me for help or demanding 'protection' payments? Will I be extorted? I already know that I am going to have to have a lot of my stuff delivered so that I don't accidently kill everyone around me but what if they stop coming? What will I do?"
Neka was being a little bit imaginative of gangsters coming and knocking on her door in the middle of the night but in her defense, she had always had to look over her shoulder to make sure no one was coming to take what little she had to her name. Yes she was paranoid but in experience, that was a good thing when someone stealing your loaf of bread could mean the difference between eating for three days or starving the entire time.
The problem with failing was that you only got the chance to fail so many times before your life was forfeit. At the end of the day there were few second chances and no thirds to be had by any of the street rats she had grown up with. More then a few of her friends had died that way. She had killed a few by taking that loaf of bread when she got desperate enough, of that she was sure.
"Only the worst fool in the entire world would try to extort a curse mage. If that happens, feel free to make the idiots hair eat their head or something. No one is going to complain that is for sure. On that note your concerns of them taking you're porters out of commission is a valid one and if they do just go for a walk and loudly complain that you can't even get stuff delivered anymore, I grantee you that you will only need to do that once and the message will spread to the entire city."
Embrda informed her, he wanted her to understand that the rules are different for her now. They would want her to be happy because an unhappy curse mage was one of the worst things to have stomping through a crowd. When they had bad days like that a lot of damage could happen just from the bleed off of their energy. Nothing to long lasting but a spell of hair removal did not need to last very long to leave an entire city bald in the middle of winter. Things tend to escalate quickly when there type got involved.
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After spending the entire day bothering people like that, Neka was content to finally get everything ready to head out in the morning. She kind of liked these odd balls, they knew how to have fun and tell some good jokes. It was just to bad that they did not fully trust her, she would have liked for them to like having her around without being on guard constantly.
They were rather understanding of her need to be social because pretty soon she would be in solitude. She would have to be, few would want to be around her and her mere presence would drive away the weak willed. Anyone that couldn't hack it and stand up with her would run. Run from the primal fear of death and what might bring it. Like a tiger in their midst, always felt but rarely seen!
She was glad to call them friend, even if they didn't yet do the same.