I had no reason not to follow her so I kept pace behind her as she walked toward the keep that was under construction. When we arrived, there was already a table and chairs set out for us. Austin wanted nothing to do with the lunch and left me high and dry saying he had important things to do making the chair set out for him empty.

The bastard.

My mind couldn't comprehend why Tracy was acting like she was and it was looking for some indication of a trick or trap. I feared poison at first but even that was too underhanded for something she would do.

Still, I kept my vigilance up just in case.

"Sit, sit, tell me of your travels. How was the surrounding area, did you come across anything interesting?" Tracy started while what appeared to be an aide came to serve us both food.

It was a cut of meat from something nearby, I suspected, along with some kind of berry sauce. There were no grains or vegetables as those were rare to find.

Without a reason not to, I went into my story.

"Our travels were mostly mundane. The forest and plains were mostly free of anything high level and there weren't that many people to be found. We gathered all who wished to join and pointed the rest in the direction they wanted to go. The only interesting thing we encountered was a dungeon about a week's travel Southeast." I explained.

There was no reason to hold anything back. We were on a one-way trip through the area and nothing we came across needed to be kept secret.

"Oh, a dungeon? Did you go into it?" She asked and I nodded, "Fascinating things, really. When I went into the one near here it was unlike anything I had seen. It kind of reminds me of the fallen pylons but a little bit more organized."

Alright, this is getting confusing and I'm sick of it.

She was acting like we were friends having a casual chat and I couldn't take it anymore.

"Why did you ask me here?" I laid my question bare. Abigail was working on getting me more diplomatic but I had no hand for it. Blunt and to the point was infinitely better than the dance we were going through that led nowhere.

Playing along would be a waste of time.

"As blunt as always I see," She laughed, "Surprisingly, that is a trait I've come to like."

I just stared at her for my unanswered question.

Her smile diminished before she answered, "What did you expect from me? That I would be mad? Angry over how the tutorial ended?"

"Yes," I answered.

She shook her head, "I made it out alive and that was all I wanted. While it would have been nice to get a few more Reward Points, I think I did pretty well all things considered."

She just looked at the dubious look on my face and sighed, "Look, I understand why you did it. You made a decision for you, I'm not angry about it, I would've done the same. Plus, as much as I would like to believe in what I've built since our return," She waved at the walls and keep under construction, "I doubt anything has changed with my abilities to defend against you. I don't even think the City Lord would make a difference."

She made good points and some of my hesitation faded away. While I didn't know her the best, she didn't seem to be lying.

Wait, City Lord?

"You're not the City Lord?" When I ran into her with a group of bodyguards, I had assumed she was the City Lord.

"Oh god no, I learned my lesson during the tutorial. I do not want to be the leader any more than I have to. It's better to push that responsibility off on someone else." She said.

Tracy then laughed at a thought before explaining, "That way, when an Ice clad madman comes knocking, it isn't me they're looking for."

I snickered at that and we both enjoyed the joke.

"I didn't think you were one to give up control," I commented. Tracy seemed like one who needed to be in charge.

"That's the best part. Nick wants nothing to do with running the city and only wants to be Lord in name only. All he cares about is leveling up and I still retain all control, but dish off all the responsibility to him. Someone comes to conquer the city, his problem. Another City has a problem with us, his problem. While I get to control everything else. It's a win-win really." She said while cutting up the food on her plate.

Now that seemed more like something she would do. After the conversation got rolling, it was easier to talk about things with her. I wasn't looking for the hidden dagger and she held a lot of things I wished to know about.

"What of the pylons since our return? I haven't placed mine so I still don't know how much has changed." I questioned.

"That was a major headache. The store isn't as easily available anymore and buying the things we need is difficult." She pointed at the stones flowing as people carried them by in with her fork, "We have to go and haul stone from the area instead of buying it from the store. Everything else is gone as well, no more buying information. No more consumables or treasures. The entire shop is missing and a bare bones one replaced it." She said.

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I had feared as much when we realized that was a tutorial-only occurrence but there was other information about buying goods from other planets. How were we to do that without a shop?

"What replaced it?" I asked. While we knew the shop we once knew wouldn't be a thing, it still had to be an option. We knew buying things from other planets was possible so it had to have that function at some point.

"A hassle that's what. The new shop requires a Merchant high enough level to open trade up." Tracy answered, "Once the pylon is placed, there is no shop tab like before, it only becomes an option once you appoint a Merchant for your city. What's available in the shop depends on what level or rarity Profession the Merchant is."

"What do you mean you need a Merchant?" I asked. This was the first I was hearing of this and while we had a Merchant, Jonathan, it would have been nice to know before hand.

She gave me a questioning look before realization flashed on her face, "You don't know? Oh, I guess you only would after placing your pylon so that makes sense.

"Certain functions of the pylon require an advisor slot with someone with a specific profession before they can function. The shop won't work unless you have an appointed Merchant or Trader of a certain Rank or Rarity. The higher level the Merchant the more things you can do. Trade outside the planet is still well out of reach but pylon to pylon trade isn't that far off.

"An E-ranked Merchant should unlock regional trade between pylons in the area. We aren't sure how far the range is, but it should reach any pylons nearby, hopefully." She explained.

"What, so you can just appoint a Merchant and the store opens up? I thought it would be more than that." I questioned.

"It's a bit more than that." She said, "It's similar to appointing a Seneschal or Mayor. They need to be affiliated with the city and a member of your faction before you can appoint them as a City Merchant."

Jonathan is already above level 50 in his profession. If he gets a few more levels before we place the pylon we can start out with trade. My thoughts turned toward how I was going to use that feature and how I could best utilize it.

"There are other things you can do to increase the range of trade or boost other things but learning that is slow going. Without the readily available information, we have to find out new things from the people who join us. The tutorials focused on different things and other people will have different knowledge than us." She said, "A few other things changed with the pylon but nothing as major as the shop. The pylon levels are similar from what I can tell, we are still only at the Town level but it was the same as before."

We sat and talked about a few other things over the meal but none were as important. She talked about her time since returning while I talked about mine. After hearing about a possible pylon in the city I had left, she questioned to know more about that.

I told her what I knew but that was likely outdated by now. It had been a while since we left and the whole conflict could be resolved by the two factions by now.

The points that I picked up from her that stood out were the struggles at the beginning. They had placed the pylon but they had nothing to build with. They needed people to gather resources but they had nothing to pay them with.

Everyone had just returned and no one had any money.

"People chipped in when they could but that ran out quickly after the bare necessities were met. No one wanted to work for free and we had nothing to pay them with." She explained.

"Nick went into the dungeon a few times by then and I could offer something but no one knew what a copper coin was worth. We didn't get people up and working until we started taxing the dungeon exit and the coins started steadily coming in. But even then, we paid people mostly in food or materials."

It was how I had expected the start to go when I founded my city. I planned to have a bit of a treasury when we finally arrived at our destination but that wouldn't last forever.

The one good thing about taking time to travel and visit other cities was learning how much things were worth. Now, that would change with supply, but the general worth of a coin would be set by the time we started dealing with it.

People would know how much being paid a coin or two was worth.

it was as we were wrapping up our meal and I was about to depart that Tracy said something that surprised me.

"I know you prefer honesty and I don't want you to confuse my intentions." Her start made me curious to where she was going, "The tutorial was the tutorial. That's the past and I don't want there to be any bad blood between us. I intended to establish relations between us during this meal and I hoped it worked. I have no doubt your city will do well and I want us to start diplomacy off on the right foot."

She knew I preferred directness, but I hadn't expected her to just come out and say that. She did a good job of changing my opinion of her by freely giving my information on how the pylon changed and her initial struggles and I hadn't looked deeper at her intentions in doing so at the time. I should have expected her to have an angle, she always had an angle.

At least this time, it wasn't one I would be mad at. Trying to build good relations wasn't that bad of an idea and I saw no reason to refuse. The world reset and starting our clean slate with an enemy was not what I wanted to do and she wasn't that bad of a person. Chronically selfish and mostly looking out for herself, sure, but not the worst person in the world.

"I see no reason to refuse, but we will be quite a distance apart. I don't plan on stopping anytime soon. I was being truthful when I said we were only here to resupply before we continued our journey." I mentioned.

"Oh, I know, but you can never have too many friends. And you seem like the kind of person who makes a good friend." She said with a small smile, "I can help you get some things you probably wouldn't have been able to but I can't just give it to you for free. We still have a lot of people to feed and all but I can make it a touch easier."

"I appreciate that. We have some coins from the dungeon we hit on our way here. I do not need, or wish for, charity." I said firmly.

It was partly because we didn't need anything from the city. We had everything covered in terms of base necessities but it was also not to be in anyone's debt.

Similar to starting this fresh slate with an enemy, owing someone a favor was probably worse, especially for something as little as some free goods.

"By the way, I expect some of our group to stay after we move on. Not everyone is cut out for travel and we already lost quite a few. The first day after leaving the city nearly 10 people changed their minds and left." I mentioned.

"Duly noted. How long do you plan on staying before moving on?" Tracy asked.

I considered for a moment, "Not long. A day or two at most, probably less."

"Well enjoy what little we have to offer. Nick has the dungeon on lockdown currently, but other than that you can do anything." Tracy said.

That seemed a touch odd but I said nothing of it.

The whole experience went better than I thought it would and I was happy to be leaving in good spirits rather than what it could have been.

We were now free to resupply and get on our way without any other problems coming up.

We were barely a month into our trip and were still a long ways away.