Chairman Viktor had given Pest an assignment. Pest clutched the document in one hand and his very own weapon in the other. It was a blade that the chairman had modified specially for him, and he was eternally grateful for it. Though not the tool of a modern businessman, he felt that a respect for the old ways and a show of martial prowess might earn him respect from rivals. Not to replace his glorious war dance of intimidation, but to augment it to even greater levels.
According to what the chairman had told him, he needed to go into a residence and rid it of a nuisance. And for every few nuisances he removed he would get a trade disc. A coin as the chairman called them.
Pest had to give up the last of his coins when they had to pay for upkeep of the transportation contractor. He wasn’t very pleased with the fact that he had to separate from the coin but the needs of the business were as they were. He relished the opportunity to earn more coins from this job.
Pest was walking down an alley within the town, looking for a specific location. He didn’t have a scent trail to follow so it was more difficult for him to find his target than he was used to. The chairman had led him to this alleyway and said he needed to go down three more domiciles to reach the listed location.
The chairman left him to his mission and said that he was going to go participate in some more construction training. Pest was grateful that he had his own task to accomplish. He found construction to be horribly dull. Any businessman worth his musk knew that the best nests and dens were built of burrows into the earth, not fancily arranged dead trees. A proper burrow needed to be hidden, not advertised by a looming construct.
He frowned to himself as he looked at the examples of just that he walked past. They were large constructions with tightly sealed walls and fenced yards of dirt or very sparse vegetation. In Pest’s opinion they were completely unlivable.
The residence he found at his supposed destination was much better in his own estimation. It was well adorned with plants sprouting from the dead vegetation that made the roof adding some camouflage, weak as it was. The boards making the walls were loose and, in some cases, missing completely. This made the nest easily accessible through multiple holes and gaps.
In addition it held a yard full of tall brush and shrubbery within its fencing. It would providing cover from rivals if Pest wished to enter one of the many provided entrances. Glancing around Pest judged the home to be the only one along this alley to boast such a natural grassland aesthetic. The scent around the home stank of rivals.
He cut through the vegetation along a neglected trail leading to the large front door. Viktor had coached him that this was the best way to approach this sort of job opportunity. The door hung crooked, one hinge broken and leaving a large gap along its edge. He could have easily slipping into the home as it was, but he knocked at the door instead. It was a small timid knock, like a youngster one trying to wake their parents for a morning snack.
Nothing happened, so he knocked again, this time using his full strength. It was still mildly ineffective, but Pest was persistent and kept knocking until someone answered the door.
“Hrrrrmm?” A voice hummed before clearing a dust throat as the door was roughly shoved out of the way. Pest had to jump back to avoid being struck. The aged woman who did the shoving was spectacularly wrinkled, every bit of her skin etched with deep crevices. Her back was stooped and she squinted out as if the small illumination of the overcast morning was the most blinding of sunny days. She rapped a short stick she used as a cane against her door frame.
“Well, what is this? Hrmmm?” She grated out in a voice that was stringy and deep. Pest was delighted, she was the shortest person he had ever seen, only a few times taller than his own respectable and proper height. Not the average unsightly and towering figures of the rest of these humans he had met.
“Job.” Pest said waving the parchment at her.
“Ah, are you here to rid me of the little nuisances?” She asked him and he nodded.
“Pest will eliminate all rivals.” He said confidently before adding. “For coins.”
“Of-course honest work will get paid. You are lucky my Wilfred was a warrior and knew this language. He taught me, else we might have to do with grunts and gestures to talk,” she said was a little cackle and demonstrated the grunts and gestures she meant.
Pest found this informality from a business partner a little vexing and just stared at her. She didn’t seem to mind his stoic acceptance of her dance.
“One penny per five rats.” She told him after the grunts and gestures seemed ineffective.
Pest had to ponder the stipulations of the job for a moment, numbers weren’t his strongest subject. The value of five was a little hazy to him, his normal arithmetic following the line of one, two, few, and many. Five must be more than few and less than many he figured, so he nodded in agreement to her terms.
“Very well little fellow, I am Lynnea,” she introduced herself and shuffled to the side. “Welcome to my home.”
“I am Pest,” he said and entered the home. It was a place he felt was made for him. The walls and floors were jammed full of treasures and knickknacks of all kinds. Every available space had been crammed full of items of all sorts, stacked to the ceiling in some places. The only way to get through the collection were thin paths carefully cultivated and shored up like mineshafts. Poles and planks the only thing holding back an avalanche of everything.
He had to control his instincts to dive into the piles as he followed her though the twisting and turning path. The piles were so close in some places that she rubbed against them as she shoved though. They would wobble precariously threaten to topple each time. A stack of blankets and crockery tipped in and met at the top forming an arch.
Pest thought he might be wrong about these houses that Chairman Viktor wished to learn about, they could indeed make a true nests for a connoisseur of collectables.
She led him to what once had been a very large kitchen, but a lifetimes supply of pots and pans mixed with utensils piled in haphazard mountains had taken over most of it. She grumbled and shoved at a pile that had slid from the main collection to block a doorway. Pest helped her by picking up stray pots and pans and moving them aside. Behind the doorway revealed stairs descending into an unlit space underground.
“Hrmmm. Thank you,” she said as dabbed at her forehead with a small handkerchief. “The rats holed up down there. For whatever reason they never come up the stairs. But they are destroying everything in my basement, including my food stores. I’m not sure if I can make it through the winter at the rate they are eating up all my pantry.”
“I will eliminate the rats who ruin your collection,” he told with some scorn for the destroyers. Without anything else forthcoming from Lynnea he headed down into the dim basement.
The stairway was made with shallow steps that didn’t require Pest to slinky down. Each stair held a collection of something. Clay jars sealed with wax plugs. Piles of wooden plates and bowls. A box of parchment scrolls that Viktor had been fiddling with this morning. All sorts of things.
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It took him some time to descend and below he found an underground space that was dark with no windows or fires providing light. Only small burrows dug in from outside the building filtered in a weak light. Lynnea had shoved closed the door behind him so the light from the kitchen was cut off as well. This didn’t really bother Pest, his well-trained eye for a deal could pierce even darkness such as this. At the bottom of the stairs, he could easily see the rivals. They were fat for their kind, well fed and comfortably housed in the basement. There were enough of them that the floor seemed to flow and move like a living carpet. Pest would count them as many. Many many. Which meant many many coins.
He drew his new weapon from its sheath, the blade glinted faintly in the low light. He was unused to it, but he felt even his unknown talent with the sharp blade would be a benefit to the work ahead. His jaw ached at the mere thought of having to bite so many of them.
The horde of little rivals didn’t seem to have any interest in his presence. Completely confident in their safety within thier space. As he got to the last step, one of the rivals reared up and tried to bite at his foot. He found that his new feet, though larger, were nimble and strong, so he slammed his new foot down on the head of the rat as it tried to bite into him.
A rival. It was an interesting and old concept for him. Rivals were ones that threatened the business, that took what his business needed to thrive, or worse, tried to take the lives of his business associates. As the rat thrashed and twisted trying to free itself from under his foot, he reconsidered the rat.
These weren’t rivals. They posed no threat to him or his business. There were just nuisances, feeding on the edges and dross that people forgot or left behind. He would proudly get rid of them for the woman upstairs who had amassed such a respectable collection of desirable objects. Not only was it a way to show respect to such an admirable person, he would also earn coins doing it. This adventuring was a new sort of business he was in, but he would do it and be a businessman of another caliber.
He tested the blade as he carefully positioned it on the rat’s squirming head and leaned onto it. He had to put both hands on the long hilt and press his weight into it, but it cut through and ended the nuisances struggling.
[Short Sword]
Unlock Conditions - Use a mid-sized bladed weapon to do injury to an enemy.
[lvl 1] - Know the bare basics of swordcraft with a short sword. IT'S DANGEROUS TO GO ALONE! TAKE THIS.
The auditor approved with a new skill. Pest ran his gaze across the moving floor of rats. This would be a true test of his skills. And this new skill would be useful many times. The group of rats looked at him, having been drawn by the screams of its dying kin and scent of blood in the air.
Sometime later, Pest knocked on the door to the kitchen. A bustling noise followed by an avalanche of clattering pots and pans and some cursing proceeded the door being opened. The light blinded him for a moment, and he staggered out of the basement.
“By Frigg, you look like one of Gorm’s goats, after the festivities.” Lynnea greeted him.
Pest looked down at himself. Blood thickly covered him nearly completely. His fur was pasted to his body like they had been glued down by it. His vest was torn and pierced, his pants had been shredded, the pockets ripped nearly completely off. Multiple bite wounds covered his new legs, and a gash ran down his back from one industrious rat who had leapt on him from behind dragging its sharp teeth down his flank.
His new weapon, whom the auditor had claimed to be skill level two by the time he had finished, was caked in dry blood and viscera. He found the use of a weapon to be quite better than tooth and fang. Though he had used those plenty as well. His bite was even accessed at level four now. He had tried to sheath the blade, but the encrusted gore on it made it difficult.
“I have taken care of the nuisances.” He announced.
“How many did you get?” She asked him.
“All.” He said simply before using an upturned pot as a stool and sitting down.
“Really?” She looked a little surprised and slightly unbelieving of his claim. “If that is true, why do you look so defeated?” She asked him.
“I need to…” he trailed off, not wanting to utter the words.
“Hrmmm?” She encouraged.
“Wash.” he finished with a shudder.
Lynnea provided to be a generous host and used a large pot from her collection to warm some water. Once it was prepared Pest reluctantly entered the water and scrubbed himself clean of the thickly matted blood. The water stung at his many wounds, worse so when Lynnea provided him with a scented bar of soap. Pest removed his clothes in the bath and scrubbed them as well. It took three entire buckets of water to rid him and his cloths of the gore. He noticed his clothing had been altered in the process.
His previously cream-colored pants became a rusty red in color. His vest seemed to be missing the rips and tears it had earned, but the white stripes were now a rust-red color as well. After liberally rubbing himself dry on a fluffy fabric that Lynnea provided, he felt mildly better. The residual pain from his wounds only a dull ache. With the gash on his back being the only serious wound that bothered him.
Lynnea again provided a helpful solution to this by wrapping a white cloth around his torso helping to protect and pad the wound. He slipped his vest back on over the top of it so it was less noticeable. He realized after all this that he had lost his hat somewhere in the mess below.
After being cleaned and a short break with some flavored water and delicious tasties that Lynnea provided. He was really starting to like her. He went back into the basement to assess the aftermath of the battle. The entire floor was covered in the carpet of rats still, but this time they were all still. He had even managed to go into their deep-nests and get all the hairless little ones. Lynnea came down shortly after him, holding a candle on a metal dish that let out a gentle flickering light.
“Wow, you really did get all of them little buggers, didn’t you?” She wondered aloud.
“I am a professional.” He said simply.
“That you are, little fellow. Let’s count them up, shall we?” She went down to the bottom of the stairs and waded into the mess of corpses without a care. She found a wooden crate and pulled it out from where it rested, removing a wadded collection of fabric from it. The fabric contained rat nests and droppings but she just tossed them all out onto the floor. Once satisfied with the effort she slowly stooped down and grabbed a dead rat by the tail before tossing it in the box. She repeated this until she had five total.
“That’s one batch.” She told Pest. He joined her and helped her toss rats into the box.
Pest watched her closely and found out she was right about five, it was more than few and less than many.
“One, two, few, five.” He counted out, and she gave him a sharp look.
“That was only four, you aren’t trying to cheat me, are you?” She accused him.
“I am an honorable businessman! One, two, few, five!” He said to her with mild rebuke.
“You forgot four! One, two, three, four, five!” She told him.
As they counted, Pest learned some numbers he never knew about. It wasn’t a complicated system, but once he had gotten past five, he began to lose track.
Pest retrieved all the hidden rats he had killed in the burrows, the box was overflowing with their corpses by the time they finished.
“Oh… Oh dear…” Lynnea announced as she took in the sheer enormity of the work Pest had done. “I might not have enough coins for all these.”
“You break deal?” Pest asked with narrowed eyes. He liked this woman, but breaking a deal was very bad business.
“Oh… No, but instead of coins would you be willing to barter for some of my treasures?” she asked him as she squinted around at the basement full of junk. “I’m sure we could find something that would suit you.”
“Okay.” Pest said.
Pest spent the next few hours pillaging Lynnea’s stores for acceptable payment. She did give him some coins for partial payment, and upon seeing him trying to stuff them into his tiny torn pockets she gave him his first item. It was a small rucksack, made to fit a small child. The straps were just barely adjustable to a usable size for Pest’s tiny frame, but the bag still looked enormous on him. He didn’t seem to mind.
From there he went about grabbing things as his heart desired. He tried to choose things wisely, but the sheer number of interesting items was overwhelming. After filling the bag halfway, each item making Lynnea hiss or wince as if agony stabbed her, he tried to ask himself if the items were useful for the business. He started choosing things that he had seen Viktor scrutinize in the marketplace during their shopping trips. Small vials and jars of unknown liquids and papers with indecipherable scribbles.
By the time he had finished cramming the bag to bursting, it was almost too much for him to carry, but his resolve in doing the best possible business transaction empowered his limbs.
“Thank you for your good work today.” Lynnea said as she seen him off from the front door. “If you want to do some more bartering I could use a fellow with little hands to help close up all those holes the rats made in the walls.”
“Yes.” Pest said with a nod, his eyes gleaming with the possibility of further trade. He looked the small house over, maybe a few construction ideas from Chairman Viktor would be wise after all.