The mountain tribes have a saying that everyone has but one bowl within them. To fill it with something new, an equal portion must be emptied. That, or the vessel must be grown and cultivated.

- The Human Question by Gideon de Salavia 378 AC.

We left the Adventurer's Guild and started our walk along Scholar’s Row. It was just as I remembered it: an eclectic collection of disparate buildings with little architectural uniformity. But there was money here. A lot of money.

Friezes depicting scenes from myth and legend adorned the buildings. Men fought monsters, both real creatures and those purely from the realms of the imagination. Scaled dragons chased giant birds across bright blue marbled walls. Titans strode across the lands, and Divines smote from the heavens, all rendered with varying levels of skill and detail. The fronts of businesses were painted in gaudy, vibrant colors, creating a magnificent display. If I were to describe Scholar’s Row as a person, I would call him a most eccentric one indeed. And like all people there was a story in them…

The smell of cooking food caught my attention, and my stomach rumbled in complaint and interrupted my casual appreciation for the local architecture. The fruit and tea from earlier were not nearly enough to satisfy my five-year-old hunger. Not wanting to open the Necromancer’s box, I had Larynda pay an old man hunched over cooking coals for a roasted crispy root vegetable on a stick. A passing grade and far from exceptional, I barely registered its flavor. Hunger made for a fine sauce, but the food was simply fuel for me.

“She’s not usually that bad,” Larynda started, munching into her own veg-on-a-stick as we walked along.

The half-elven girl was tall enough to keep pace with me now. I remembered a time when she would lag behind and often have to intermittently jog to catch up to me. A shared memory of a past both distant and close, depending on the perspective.

“Melli’s not usually that bad infers that she has been bad on more than one occasion before. And on this occasion, she seemed bad enough to me, that is for certain. Brash, rude, and prejudiced to boot,” I replied bluntly. “Were she not your acquaintance our encounter would not have gone well for her.”

Her shoulders slumped at my response. Her mouth opened silently as if she was coming up with a response, but she thought better of it. Larynda instead settled for something else, “You know, it’s been fine years. Do you know where you’re going?”

I stopped midstride and really looked at her. The damn girl had an annoying habit of being correct at times. Her eyes, soft emeralds set in hard marble, had a certain gravity behind them now. Larynda had grown both in level and maturity.

Instead of answering with words, I made an exaggerated sweep of my arm, a gesture for her to take the lead. She walked on ahead, and this time it was I that followed.

Looking at Larynda, I thought of my recent encounter with Melliana. It was the tune of the threat of violence that had always hung over me and the bloody business that lay ahead. My heart beat in time with soft anticipation, like a lover waiting upon an invitation.

The very air here was suffused with the raw vibrancy that comes from the powerful stimuli of money. That is what I saw, that is what I felt, as we wormed our way to the Exchange through the teeming throngs. I must have heard snippets from a dozen different languages, the sounds of which tempted me with their familiarity to simply stop and soak them in. If someone told me that the whole world gathered at Al-Lazar, I would have been hard pressed to call them a liar.

It was a sensory overload that only added to my growing excitement. In addition to this, I gained another experience point for seemingly no reason. I could not help that I was forgetting something.

“You’ve probably never seen it before, but that’s the Exchange,” Larynda said, grabbing my arm and pointing to a magnificent building across the square of an equally magnificent fountain.

The Exchange was a grand edifice. It’s front had colonnade of imported marble supporting a broad domed roof of pearl tiles. Imported no doubt, for the local stone was of a yellow hue. Each column bore the mark of a foreign nation carved and colored. I saw, or believed I saw, the Aranthian Drake, the Wave of the Tides, the Empire’s Gryphon, and the twin stars of Quas and Qisnia. Places for the most part I had only read about.

People, as varied as the leaves and flowers in the forest, flowed in and out of the Exchange in a constant stream.

“This wasn’t here while you were asleep. So many foreigners needed to exchange their gold and silver for Al-Lazarian notes that they needed to build this place,” explained the young Mage. “They say that the wealth of nations flow into the city now ever since the New Green Road.”

A smile grew on my face. So this was where Vincenzio had invested my small fortune.

I nodded in acknowledgement of her explanation. “The Bulls’ den is close to here?” I asked tersely, violence demanding that I begin the introduction to the opening verses.

The blonde girl nodded and pointed to a walled compound down the main boulevard from the exchange. Even from a distance, it looked like a fortress planted in the heart of the city. Yellow sandstone blocks formed its walls, and a single gate was the only point of access or exit.

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Suddenly, a sharp, piercing scream echoed like the call of a hunting bird, only much louder. A large shadow fell over me, and I instinctively dove to the paved road, dragging Larynda down with me.

People looked at us strangle as passed, oblivious to the threat. Confused, I got to my feet.

Larynda dusted herself off, looking somewhere between vaguely amused and annoyed. “What was that for?”

“I heard a monstrous cry… surely…” I began, seeing a large shape drop down into Bull’s compound.

The girl chuckled at this, covering her mouth as she looked at me in amusement. “Oh, that! That’s a messenger Gryphon!”

“I see,” I replied, feeling silly and not bothering to hide my annoyance.

“If you’re afraid of a little kid riding a Gryphon… well. You sure you really want to go in there alone? I can try and get some help, I’m sure I can get some like-minded adventurers to help out the great Gilgamesh,” she offered half-mockingly. A second later her face grew taut with worry. “Apologies, I shouldn’t have said that,” she admitted looking down.

I raised an eyebrow. The girl was also capable of self-correction, an admirable trait. Also, the last thing I needed was for some random minor NPCs to steal my kills and experience.

Squeezing her shoulder in reassurance, I asked, “You are sure the City Guard will not interfere? I intend to slaughter as many of them as I can.”

Larynda nodded slowly. “You’d be basically doing their job for them. Most of the Council don’t really want them here at all in the first place. The Guards will be neutral, if not downright supportive. If you can push out one of the biggest gangs in Al-Lazar the Council can claim all of their property… and you better believe that’s worth a pretty penny!”

“Very well then,” I responded. It was too late to second guess myself this close to the dance.

However, suspicious thoughts and questions entered my mind. For such a large event, why had there been no Quest message? What were the Quests? How did one trigger them exactly? Were they a creation of mine or was some external force responsible for them? Was it a good or bad sign that I had received no notification for a quest?

The voices, my old friends, soothed my suspicion. I needed to focus on the present, the needs of the now. Cracking the mystery of the Quests was best left for later. I did not need such extraneous thoughts on mind.

*****

We found an alley just off the main boulevard. There, I stripped off my robe and handed it to the girl. I felt lighter without the dark robes, like a butterfly emerging from a chrysalis. It was as if I was shedding something, exposing myself to the world for the first time. Despite the robes being of no real weight, I felt much lighter of spirit.

“Who leads the Bulls?” I inquired, my voice flat.

She looked away for a moment before answering carefully, “That would be Aschart Deschanel, everyone knows that.”

“You are hiding something. I do not wish for any surprises, spit it out.”

Larynda gave out a heavy sigh. I prepared myself to receive a complication. “There’s a reason the Council tolerates the Bulls, well, is forced to tolerate the Bulls…”

“Which is? Hurry up with it!” I barked, my patience already starting to wear thin. I had a chore to get to. The desire to get more experience was threatening to clot the blood within my veins.

“Umm… Aschart, like, has a really, really powerful man is he emply. Vince thinks he might be a Visitor like Kaila,” she explained.

At the mention of a Visitor, hunger filled me, a sudden need to simply devour. Did the girl know of my true origins? Even with only my eyes peeking out from my helm and chainmail coif, Larynda registered something, for she looked fearful.

“This should have been explained,” I complained. Larynda started to open her mouth in retort, but I plowed on. “It will not be a problem at all… I will enjoy the added experience. It is our mission, after all, to rid this world of the Visitor’s stain.”

“Wait for me across the compound and try not to be seen,” I ordered in a no-nonsense tone. “Do not come for me unless an hour has passed.”

The girl surprisingly just nodded, folding my robe neatly and placing it in her bag. For a moment, Larynda looked like she would voice another worry, but her features tightened, and she stopped herself.

I did not bother with a backup plan, for I would not fail. Did I have enough Charisma to pass whatever skill or attribute checks that were coming? Part of me didn’t care and was almost welcoming of failing those invisible tests. Today would end in bloodshed, that was certain. What did it matter if the festival started earlier than planned? Thinking about it, the plan I had formulated was terrible in its conception. So decidedly simple.

Buoyed by the confidence born from my time in the Dust dream and my improved Skills and Attributes, I felt frankly invincible. With purpose in my stride I walked up to the gates, pushing past the others that sought entry. Some looked as if they were about to voice a complaint, but seeing that I wore the uniform of the City Guard they thought better of it.

Two burly men, head and shoulders above me and armed with halberds, blocked my ingress. The obvious muscle of the Bulls. They wore lamellar and chainmail beneath rough surcoats, each emblazoned with a bull insignia on their chests. They looked like men-at-arms, or at least a rough approximation of them. Unlike the citizenry I had pushed past, these professional guards would not be easily cowed.

“Your business, Lazarian whelp,” one of them challenged, his voice high and nasal, stripping it of menace. He was an ugly one, with a straggly beard, flattened nose, and beady little eyes like a wild pig's.

Feigning irritation, I locked eyes with both guards before speaking quietly, “I come with a message from Ahmed Alim. It concerns city business of a most sensitive nature.”

“You can just tell us here, and we’ll be sure to pass it on, samasa,” the wild pig mocked.

“I’m afraid the message is for your boss’s ears only… but if you turn me away, have no doubt, I will report this,” I bluffed, improvising as I went.

His partner, no less repulsive with his splotchy, oily skin and foul breath, looked at me incredulously. “That’s the Captain, right? Captain Alim of House Alim?”

“Correct. I will be sure to inform him immedi—”

“What are you waiting for then? Come in! Oi, Rogiere!” the guard with the bad skin shouted at a teenage boy carrying two buckets. The youth, looking perplexed, put his load down, unsure why he was being summoned.

“Take this man to the boss and be quick about it!” he commanded.

Grinning beneath my coif, I marveled at my Luck. This was going far smoother than I had expected.