The poor thing was wearing a blue and white sailor suit and was not looking happy about it. The goblin’s face was set in a frown, her ears were not as perky as before, her shoulders drooped. Jennifer moved off her seat onto her knees and pulled the goblin into a hug as she laughed. The goblin flailed around for a moment, but after a few heartbeats, the goblin returned the hug.
When the two separated from the hug, Jennifer was no longer sad. She wiped her eyes clean. The goblin was still frowning, but she was no longer dropping her shoulders, and her ears were pointed up again. That was a good sign, so she turned to hug Kevin as well. He scoffed a bit, but he too returned the hug.
All her negative thoughts were shoved to the back of her mind. She was here. She was with friends. A wolf that was trying to kill her only two days ago was now the best emotional support wolf in the world for her.
"Oh, there’s a goblin here, dude. Free XP."
The words caused Jennifer’s heart to freeze. Kevin growled at the intruders as she turned towards the player who spoke.
Giant Intimidation: successful - Area of affect – line of sight.
"This goblin is my friend." Jennifer spoke in a loud voice, adding as much command and warning as she could. The notifications for Giant Intimidation all came back as successful or critically successful. The difference was how long the intimidation lasted. A smile crossed her face as she scanned the frozen crowd.
"Kevin, speak.”
He barked at the command, which caused the people to run in fear.
Turning to the goblin, and sarcastically, she said, “I’m sure they all just remembered the oven they left on."
The goblin smiled at Jennifer, and she smiled back.
"Normally, girl, I would not want you to do that, but they need to know not to mess with my town." The mayor's words were slurred, and he was not walking in a straight line. "So, are you two coming to the after party? You should come so we can”—he slurred his words— “rub our win in their faces." He walked towards her, and the smell of liquor hit Jennifer well before he came close to their little group.
She had no idea there was an after party, and the idea of the party caused her lip to curl down in a scowl.
Giant Intimidation failed
"Why in the infernal levels would I want to go to the after party?" Her words were pointed and cold.
“Well, there goes my buzz.” The mayor gave Jennifer a look. She was unsure if it was due to the content of his blood or something else, but she could not discern the meaning of the look. "What did you think you did today?" The mayor’s words lost any hint of a slur.
The question caught Jennifer off guard. In her mind the mayor was right along with her the entire battle. She raised her hands to her head and massaged her brow. With her voice more under control but still loud, she said, "I fought in a pointless battle where a lot of people got hurt."
"No girl, you just saved the town." The smile on the mayor’s face made his eyes twinkle.
Jennifer took a step back.
Chapter 15: Explain That One Again
Before Jennifer realized it, she was back in the Chateau De Jim, trying to get the mayor to explain to her how she saved the town.
"My girl, this is like leading a horse to water and the horse expecting you to hand feed him too." Stiffness reverberated in the mayor’s movement and words. He was still smiling, eyes however were glazing over.
"The warlords of the next shell over are playing some kind of empire expanding game. They mostly have functionaries doing the fighting with a few parallels. They feel strong, and probably are stronger. One on one, maybe. Since they are used to fighting the functionaries like the ones that were in the paper raid. They did well, and you did better."
"All I did was give out a few healing potions and cast my force field. Oh, and raised undead a few times. The only reason I scored high was because I survived. Others beat the beaver."
This story originates from a different website. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.
"Yes, all you did was play a support, almost no one does that here. You also took the beaver prisoner when it was about to transform into a new form. When bosses transform, they become more dangerous, they get some new power up or ability. Sometimes their hair changes color and becomes ten times stronger due to some prophecy. I could have revealed my loud trump card or let the beaver kick our behind so hard that the town might have lost some profitability."
"So it was good I asked for it to surrender. It stopped the fighting." She did not know why she felt the need to defend her actions. They were the right actions.
"As someone who buffs others like using your force field and your heals, you got a lot of points. Then you rallied us and came up with a freaking on-the-fly plan to beat the boss. And with the web trap from your pet, we were able to win. Girl, without you, we would’ve failed. You did the right thing."
"Without me, the raid may not have escalated so far. And what was the deal with the taxis or the blues playing man with a hellhound?" The frustration of the world was getting to her, and she had to vent. "All Alice had to deal with was a mad hatter and a rabbit that was late. I have monsters, goblins, an electrical mayor, and a wolf named Kevin. And I somehow saved the town?" She checked her menu. The Save the Town quest marker was still not completed, so the system did not think she had saved the town yet either.
"Yes, girl, you saved the town. And now the town is drinking until the ship be sinking!" The mayor sang out his reply, and the other patrons at the bar joined in.
Jennifer massaged her temples. It was all madness. Before she could come to grips with her own thoughts, the dinosaurs walked in.
All was silent.
The air crackled with tension as the dinosaur leader scanned the room for his quarry.
When he laid eyes on Jennifer, she smiled warmly back and gave a friendly wave. Reading the expression of the dinosaur was not easy, but the death glare she received was a glare to behold. Grinning, she mimicked the glare.
Fusing Dinosaur Intimidation glare and Giant Intimidation failed. Giant Intimidation on dinosaur warlord was successful. Due to frequent uses you can now assign points into intimidation as a passive power.
Jennifer had forgotten to check if she had leveled up after the battle. With a mental flick she checked her stats.
Congratulations: You are now level 10.
Despite her misgivings about the paper raid, it gave her a lot of powers and enhancements to choose from. Glancing over her choices, she got a little overwhelmed. She decided to wait until Woozle felt better and would be able to give her advice. The power options were nice, but what she really wanted was to be able to craft more healing potions, so she wanted a lot of her enhancements geared toward that.
A fist slammed into the table in front of Jennifer, pulling her attention away from her menus. The offending dinosaur slurred his words as he raised his voice. His rancid breath could have felled a moose with or without the alcohol. “I was talking to you, fragment. What's your price?"
She looked the dinosaur man up and down, making the movement apparent to everyone watching. She did not like the way he asked the question, how he referred to her, the tone in the man's voice, or how he looked at her. The line, when they go low, you go high. Play on the friend of her mind. She decided on what position to take in this argument. "I find you lacking lizard man." No emotion entered her voice as she talked. She felt her words may have come from someone straight out of a renaissance story plus, the wording would aggravate the warlord enough for him to leave her alone.
The dark leathery brown of his face turned red before he made an offer. “One purple per battle."
At his words, the female dinosaur, with the strange horse-like mouth and long tubular horn coming out of the back of her head, snapped her mouth shut. Her head shifted back, leaving the rest of her body still. The dress she wore was red, and sparkly.
Keeping her poker face, not knowing what she was asking for, "One purple per battle sounds nice on paper, but how often will I even be in battles?" Jennifer raised a hand to signal the barkeep that she would like another drink. "And you are paying for my drinks tonight?" She was having half blueberry lemonade, half ice black tea that cost five oranges. She did not order the first one as the innkeeper brought the first one out and the mayor paid for it. She really liked them, but they were overpriced. If they did not pay for the drink this was going to be her last one for the night.
She watched the gears grind in the dinosaur warlord’s head.
As his mouth slowly opened, the female dinosaur butted into the conversation with a rush of words. "One green per victory with four yellows a month guaranteed no matter what. We will include dental and one full cosmetic change per year. You will get a two-year contract with options to renew with a twenty percent bonus and three minor cosmetic visits per month.”
The whole situation annoyed Jennifer, and she did not want to deal with these lizard people. She was happy to be in this town. It was close to school. She was trying to get them to stop making offers. She wanted to let them down easy, show them why she was saying no, without saying no. "I have land here in town—”
"We will buy that land, and give you double the space." The warlord interrupted. "You can choose any land, even in our capital."
Her blood boiled. While she tried to be diplomatic, these people were trying to bribe her to work for them. She wanted to help others, but these lizard people were warlords. She wanted to go to school and better herself than to find her place in the world and add her name to the side of good. These dinosaurs, literal dinosaurs, wanted nothing but war.
"No," was her only reply. The whole room fell silent. A maid placed Jennifer's drink on the table, then quickly moved away. Jennifer watched the warlord's face turn even redder.
The colorful feathered lizard man in the wizard hat spoke next. "You said land, not a house. If money you do not seek, what interest would peak?"