A burly older fellow with a completely bald head and neatly trimmed brown and white streaked beard led two grunting workers out into the parade ground. They carried a chest with a huge lock on the front of it. The thing was strongly made with iron fittings and hinges. A boy trotted behind them carrying a table and a young girl ran last carrying a wooden chair. Four guards walked around the chest, two of them midniss from the night shift.

Dr. Mingelt yelled from his podium, “Before you go, I’d like to present your well-earned pay. Line up before Castellan Dartan to draw pay.” It started off with just Conan yelling but soon became a general cheer. Our fellow trainees began to line up.

I turned to walk back to the room. Jackson grabbed my arm. “Hey, aren’t you going to get your pay?” He asked.

“Oh yeah, I’m just going to gear up first.” I told him.

“Gear up? Why? We’re going for a day on the town. It’ll be a vacation.” The human said, confused.

“Do you recall back when we were playing the game?” I asked.

He nodded, “Yeah. It was good times.”

“When were we guaranteed to have an encounter?” I said with eyebrows raised.

“Shit.” Jackson said and followed me. Izzy and Niobe walked behind us. A handful of people from our squad saw the way we were going and followed.

“I don’t care what Mr. Frownybeard up there says.” Izzy proclaimed. “I am going to relax!”

“Oh girl, when I was making my great escape, I saw a public bath there in town. It would be like a spa day!” Niobe did a little dance step as we went up the stairs.

“Do you think they have hot water?” Izzy asked hopefully. “I mean, the baths here can get okay warm for a moment, but it cools off really fast. That and someone else is always waiting on the bath so you don’t have time to soak.”

“I bet they do! Warm fluffy towels… I’m saying there’s a really hot oiled up man who works there to see to our EVERY need.” The cat woman practically purred.

“Do you think he’ll peel grapes for us?” The sea elf smiled dreamily.

“I’m gonna get DRUNK!” Jackson yelled. Marko the ogre was following behind and the two fist bumped, grinning.

“Ugh, you guys have fun with that. After a positively decadent bath, I’m going to explore.” Niobe said.

Deniz the halnaak was walking with us and nodded slowly at that. “Me too. I’ll see if there are any other lizard people in town I can meet. I’d love to learn more about our culture.”

“Yeah, I might need to ask around about dwarves.” I nodded. “The only thing I know about my people is what I learned watching Lord of the Rings.”

“So no tossing you?” Jackson grinned. I pointed to my nose and then to him. He and Marko laughed at that.

We got to our room and changed. All of us struggling into our armor at once made it, so we bumped elbows and shoulders a good bit in the tiny room. It was the first time I’d seen my roommates armed for war.

Jackson had put on a good bit of size since we appeared here. His leather armor was jet black, matching his hide shield. The shield had several large rents in its face that had been inexpertly sewn back together. He carried a leaf bladed spear. One of the short ones with a long blade useful for stabbing or slashing, I think maybe an assegai? There was also a sword strapped to his hip.

Niobe’s armor was green, gray and brown slashed, giving it a cool camouflage look. She had a dagger with blades coming out of the handle that would go through the gaps in her fingers in each hand. Sort of like the world’s most brutal set of brass knuckles. It was the traditional weapon of her people and they called them war claws. The high priority to skills character also carried a sling and pouch full of lead bullets on her belt.

Izzy wore light green leather armor with deep green slashes that looked like kelp. Her hide shield was the same color and pattern. The sea elf carried a small club that looked like a thick hockey stick with obsidian teeth all along the fighting edge.

“Okay, y’all, we look like bad asses.” Niobe said as we headed out the door. We all agreed, talking about the glory that was us all the way out to the parade ground.

The line to get pay was pretty low by the time we arrived, only a few people still standing in it. When my group walked up geared out like we were about to start walking to Mordor the armsmaster folded his arms across his chest. “And where are you going, master dwarf?”

“Just believe in being prepared.” I told him.

Doctor Mingelt wandered over to investigate as well. “Hmm, I think you take holiday differently than I do.”

“Doctor, you brought us over because we’re gamers, right?” I asked him.

If you discover this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the violation.

“I did indeed. That was the basis of experimentation for The Great Work.” He exclaimed.

“So you must understand, by being gamers we experience a significant deviation from the norm in regards to hostile encounters.” I shrugged.

The doctor laughed. “Ah, I had not considered that. Good planning.” The doctor clapped me on the shoulder.

The castellan pushed a large book to me. There was a quill sitting in an inkwell right beside it. “Make your mark beside your name and I’ll count out your money.” He said in a gruff voice.

I signed my name. In this world my handwriting looked like something that would have been used to write the constitution, with lots of frills and curliques. He leaned over into the box and got out a fist sized cloth pouch with a drawstring at the top that clinked with metal. Opening the pouch, he poured out some coins.

“Two golden crowns. Twenty silver blades and one hundred copper shields.” The castellan said, counting out each denomination and pushing them over to me. I’m guessing the coins were named for the shapes on them. Crowns had a rough crown imprinted on it, while blades had a sword. Copper shields had a kite shaped shield. Each design took up the entirety of one side of the coin. I suppose that made clipping the coins and counterfeiting them more difficult.

“If you’re acknowledging receipt of all payment due, total of five golden crowns equivalent, then make your mark on the other side of the ledger.” The castellan told me like he’d gone over this a hundred times. I put my initials in the proper column.

Izzy, Jackson and Niobe got their coins. They walked back over to me. “You know, I have never felt lighter being weighed down by all this money.” Jackson said with a laugh.

“I wonder how much it is? I mean, back home you can sell a gold coin for a shitload of money. Like, what can we buy with it?” Niobe wondered.

“Only one way to find out.” Izzy said, sauntering out the gate.

We went out the gate of the castle, into the roadway area between the two extensions of the curtain wall. “Wow.” Jackson said, looking around. “This is a pretty crazy fortification.”

“Yeah.” I said. “I wonder what they were protecting when this was built? It wasn’t made to guard some out of the way farming valley.” We watched the workers repairing the walls for a while. There were fewer of them than when I came out the day before. Only a few masons worked the walls. It looked like they were mainly doing cleanup.

We passed through the opposite gate from the one I’d gone through to shoot my crossbow. Yet again, there was around a two hundred yard cleared area from the castle walls. This time, instead of big fluffy sheep there were long-horned goats munching on the sparse winter grasses. Big bales of hay had been put out and many of the curly horned goats were gathered around them.

One particularly feisty ram had come over to the road and was bleating at the stream of trainees walking down the road to the village. Marko the ogre walked over to the ram and roared back at him. The bulky, curly horned goat reared up on two legs and slammed his head down on the ogre, knocking the wind out of him and doubling him over.

“Ha! That’s what you get.” Izzy yelled, pointing and laughing.

Jackson jogged over as Marko was getting up, standing between the irate ram and ogre. “Hey now, he was just doing what goats do. No call to take it personal.” Jackson said calmingly.

The ram reared up again. Jackson smoothly dodged to the side and grabbed its horns. “Hey now, big fella. We’re no threat to you.”

“No call to take it personally?” Marko got up and drew his sword. “I’m gonna take his horns as trophies! You saw him attack me.” The ogre started to move on the animal, murder in his eyes.

The goat herd ran over, stick waving. “Please master, he didn’t mean nothing by it!” It was a boy, may ten or eleven years old with a big-headed furry dog trotting along beside him.

“You need to control your goat!” Marko yelled, pointing at the boy. “I’m gonna kill that thing.”

“Dude, you came up to him and talked trash.” Jackson shrugged. “He’s a goat. He didn’t realize you were just joking.” The high priority to combat human strained as he guided the animal by his horns. It bleated at him loudly.

“Why do you care? He’s only an NPC?” Marko snarled.

I walked forward, putting a calming hand on the enraged ogre’s shoulder. “You know, I don’t think they are. I bet you don’t either.” Marko spat and crossed his long arms over his broad chest.

The goatherd came up, approaching carefully. He put a hand on the billy’s back. “My thanks, sir. I’ve got him now.” The boy kept a watchful eye on the ogre, but led the big goat away by the horns. We could hear it bleating as they walked away, the boy scolding the creature as if it understood a word he was saying.

“Man, you just got whooped up on by somebody’s lunch.” Niobe laughed. Marko grumbled as he followed us to town.

The village was built in what, to my eyes, was a curious style. All the buildings were side by side with crenelations built onto the rear of them. I guess it was a cheaper way to create a curtain wall. It was low, only fifteen feet high in most places, but better than nothing, I guess.

Passing through the gate, which was a single strong wooden door with no portcullis or anything, led to a road just about wide enough for two wagons to cross without touching. The muddy street was slushy with melted snow. A blacksmith was to the left, banging away and making a great clatter. A general store was on the right.

The village was built on a quite steep hill, so the main boulevard sloped down at a pretty good angle. A few castle guards in full armor stood around, eying the trainees as they moved from building to building. To the left beside the stable was a wide, low building of stone. Oddly, it had no windows, only a single door. Dark smoke bloomed out of a chimney in its center. Elyse the midniss stood in front of it, wringing her hands.

“Hey guyss.” She said on spotting us.

“Is there something interesting about this building?” I asked, seeing her interest.

“It’ss the egg compound of the midniss mercenary company. Look, it’ss the ssymbol of the Eagless of War. This is where the midniss live in the area.” The lizardwoman said nervously. “Do you think they’ll accept me?”

“If they don’t screw ‘em. You can always drink with us.” Jackson proclaimed. That made the midniss smile and she strode up the stairs and went in.

Strolling down the main street, we came to a large square. In the center of it was a fountain with a carved statue of a human girl holding a pitcher. Water slowly spilled out of the pitcher into the large bowl below. Long stone troughs came out of the central bowl for watering animals. Several women stood around the fountain carrying buckets of water on shoulder yokes, chatting and laughing with each other.

To the right of the square was a big two storied building. The carved wooden sign read “The Drunken Goat” and had a curly horned goat up on two legs, either staggering or dancing with a flagon in his hand.

“Okay, I found our destination.” Marko chortled. We all went and sat down.

Jackson yelled to the harried innkeep, “Beer!”