Eliza ran a tavern in a village called Mazevale.
Since the town was a hub for beginner Adventurers, the Four-Leaf Inn was good business. Every day, she’d tally up her coins, put some in her savings, and send the rest back to her family in an elf town on the continent’s far side.
But though she always drained the kegs and rented every room, her pockets were oddly light.
She had an unexpected expense. That expense’s name was Rick.
Rick was shaped like a scruffy, baggy-eyed young man; and he was the youngest kind of man who was still legally allowed to drink in the Kingdom. His voice was calm and rich, though the words he’d say might be misconstrued as crude.
“Nice beer!” He might say. Or “nice view!” when she was scrubbing the windows, bent down and all sudded up in front of him. He was talking about the windows, right…?
But Eliza didn’t mind a comment or two. He wasn’t a moral hazard, but a financial one—and she’d set her foot down this time. She swore it to all the Gods of Andrestia!
“One more drink, lass. You’re looking healthy as always,” Rick said.
No thanks to you,” Eliza walked over. “You know, last night I was surviving off stale bar food.”
“I’m envious. The pub grub’s great.”
“Not when the ‘grubs’ are real insects!” said Eliza. She was kidding—mostly, and then mostly filled his glass. Rick watched the amber liquid settle and wore an easy smile; it was the kind that filled a viewer’s heart with a warmth like freshly baked bread.
Eliza hated it.
“That’s not as full as the usual Four-Leaf standard. Cheers to you, anyway.”
“Hold.” She grabbed his hand before he could lift it away. “Two coins.”
“You want me to hold two coins…?”
“Beer costs two coins!”
“Just add it to my tab,” said Rick, and drained the glass in one swig. Two copper marks wasn’t a lot after all, and even a lowly D-Rank Adventurer could make 20 marks a day. Oftentimes a tavernkeeper would allow drunken greenhorns to drink on credit and extract pay from their quest rewards later.
“I see… yes, I’ll write the fee right in.” Her hand dove into her apron pocket, fishing. “But Rick, I just can’t seem to find your tab. I wonder why that could be?”
She picked up a folded paper. She took it, unfurled it, and it dangled down to her knees.
“That’s cause you don’t have a tab. You’ve got a goddamn scroll!” Eliza shouted. “You’ve been eating free for weeks!”
“Just charge it to Room 103,” said Rick.
“That’s where I’ve been letting you bum around for free!” Eliza said. “Elves live for a long time, but there’s a limit to my patience, Rick. I might be a 150-year-old spinster but flattery won’t get you out of this one.”
Rick’s eyes glazed over as the elf girl yapped about such nonsense as ‘payments,’ ‘debt,’ and ‘calling in the Guild’—he turned his focus instead on a new group of Adventurers who had just entered the bar.
Most Adventurers in Mazevale wielded leather bucklers and holsters, rusted swords, hunting bows, and wooden spears. There was nothing wrong with that, for low rank adventurers could only afford the most basic equipment. Rick himself only had a pair of leather gloves.
But that did mean all of Mazevale's heroes appeared in various shades of brown.
In contrast, these new Adventurers stood out like gold flakes amidst mud. The lady knight wore a pure white mythril breastplate and brandished a jagged longword with an emerald in its hilt. The muscular mage was dressed in a dark cloak with gilded embroidery, and clutched a beautiful book bound in what appeared to be animal skin. Their kind-looking healer swished forwards in more modest dress, but based on the way it flowed over her body it could only be stitched from silk.
“Waitress!” called the mage, a handsome young man. “Would you care to seat our party?”
“Every seat’s taken,” said Eliza. “There’ll be space in fifteen minutes when the evening rush is done.”
“We’re an Adventuring Party with a mandate straight from the King,” the mage replied. “Surely you don’t care more about these yokels than His Majesty’s strongest party.”
A fourth and final member walked through the door. This one wore a five o’clock shadow, a leering grin, and piercings made from dragon bones. He had two daggers at his side—he drew one and used it to pick at his teeth, and the other he pointed at Eliza.
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“You can’t…” The tavernkeeper hesitated.
“Yes, I know, I know.” Rick said. “I’ll make way for paying customers. You don’t have to say anything, Eliza.”
“But I wasn’t going to?”
“Of course.”
Rick settled on an empty barrel in the corner; one of the “pub grubs” buzzed at him and he absentmindedly caught and pocketed it. He used to be an Adventurer too, and those kinds of people had a hard-to-shake habit of putting random things into inventory.
He’d picked out this barrel because could hear all of what these rowdy Adventurers said from this location. Despite the awful impression he gave off, Rick didn’t actually like watching women; he liked watching people.
“Remember I’m only here because King Galon commanded it,” said the lady knight. “And take some advice from an S-Rank to an A—you weren’t acting very professionally just then.”
“But I was just telling the elf girl the truth. With Constance the ‘Saintly Healer’, Isaac the ‘Bone Rogue’, and myself as the ‘Blazing Mage’, you’d be hard pressed to find better humans for our party.” The mage smiled, and the lady knight clasped her hands to pray before eating their meal. But she had pressed her hands together so tightly that her knuckles began to turn white.
“Calm now,” said Constance. “We fight monsters, not one another.”
“Constance, Isaac, Matt. Eat well, for we’ll need our strength on tomorrow’s outing,” the knight muttered.
“Yet bread, chicken scraps, and potatoes are a pauper’s fare,” Matthew replied back to the S-Rank girl.
The lady knight was good looking in the low tavern light. Her armor flattered her figure as much as it protected it, and perhaps it was ceremonial in nature. But no amount of eye candy could soothe the complaints that grated against Rick’s ears.
I’m glad I’m done with that life, Rick thought. Going on an outing, they said? More like to an outhouse. That party’s a gathering of assholes.
He made eye contact with the mage. The other man sat up, a concerned expression crossing his chiseled face.
“Ricard?” the mage said. “Is that you?”
…Shit
“Do you know that man...?” the lady asked.
“Yes, of course. We both enrolled at the Southfield Guild.”
Rick grimaced, but the man continued on.
“It’s me, Matthew! Buddy!” Matthew dumped his plate in the trash and walked over to Rick’s corner. “Hey, what happened to you? How’d you end up lazing about in a backwater like this? You won’t believe all the crazy things the rest of our class is up to.”
“This town’s called Mazevale. And this and that happened, you know…” said Rick. “But it’s not really your concern.”
“You don’t have to say anything; I keep track of the records. For all the human Adventurers worth following, anyway. Is it really true that when it comes to quests, you never—“
Rick didn’t care. He was long past the point of caring about his Adventurer Record; he had come to terms with his E-Rank, and was content stewing in the “village backwater” he now called home. But there was still something about Matthew that pissed him off.
“Thank someone if they give you a meal.”
“Huh?” Matthew’s mouth was half-open.
“The farmer sows his seeds in October. He toils the fields, waits through the winter, and harvests his crop in the spring. He gives it to the merchant, who sells it to the miller, who grinds it into flour. The flour goes to the baker, who rises early in the day to make bread, and finally it’s bought and served by an adorable innkeeper. Got it?”
“I get it. You’ve given up as an E-Rank Adventurer to become an F-Rank poet.”
TK!
The inn fell silent. Rick had struck him.
“There was a fly.” Rick shrugged. In his palm was a splattered bug. It was obviously the “pub grub” he had pocketed before, but Matthew was a mage, not a magician. He couldn’t be sure of Rick’s sleight-of-hand.
The mage’s handsome face turned taut and strained. His robed arms were strong and hard-muscled, and he breathed in with a powerful hiss. He tensed to strike—when a certain elven Christmas cake intervened.
“Is something going on?” Eliza asked.
Constance watched with wide eyes, and the lady knight in his party sipped her barley wheat tea. They said nothing, and the arm shivered, lowered, and finally relaxed.
“Everything’s fine,” Matthew said coldly. “Why, I’m just incredibly grateful to see an old friend. If Ricard could see a bug on my cheek that I could not—then it just shows that even an E-Rank has tricks to teach this A-Rank stooge.
“But I couldn’t help but overhear something when I walked in—this guy’s got big debts, doesn’t he? Fetch me your owner, elf girl. Money means nothing to me; I’ll pay it all off.”
“Oh. Well, I’m the one who owns this inn...”
“Oh? You? Wasn’t expecting that—well, elfie, how much? Twenty coppers? Twenty silvers? Twenty golds? Can’t be that much, but you never know how much it’ll be when you have an Adventurer with a reputation like his—”
“I don’t want it,” Eliza said. “Don’t need charity from a brave Adventurer like you.”
“You’ll take it.”
“I won’t,” Eliza said. “And with that attitude I’ll have to ask you to leave.”
“Me? Do I look like someone who’d pick a fight?! It’s him! It’s that surly-faced, ill-groomed mooch!”
“Would you feed and cloth someone in your own home if you didn’t trust them?” Eliza said. “I trust Rick. And I don’t need to explain why to the likes of you.”
Matthew stormed out, muttering something under his breath as he passed Rick. The healer gave a slight smile and followed the mage out the door, and the middle-aged rogue stood after he swallowed his chicken bones whole.
The evening rush soon ended, and quiet returned to the inn. Eliza folded her arms and looked affectionately at her financial problem.
“Compliments aren’t worth one hundred coppers,” Eliza said. “But they feel like king’s gold when they’re sincere. Keep them coming.”
“I’m going.”
“Why?!”