image [https://i.imgur.com/vUxRaUh.png]

Trading post

Safe zone

From a cramped cozy tunnel, hiding from a pack of angry wolves, into a…

Fur trader? Herbalist? Jewellery store? All of the above? None?

Will swiped away the message window informing him that he was in a safe zone, and looked around himself. He was standing at the entrance to a large wooden room. Large racks full of any kind of fur or leather he could imagine filled up most of the room. From raccoon fur hats to pelts that were bigger than a bear and striped like a tiger.

Other racks held bundles of dried herbs, mushrooms and strips of tree bark. Or tusks, antlers and fangs from beasts large and small.

Finally, on the furthest wall, behind a counter and what must have been the owner, stood glass cabinets full of glittering gemstones of any colour imaginable. And some that weren’t imaginable at all. And some that he would really have preferred not to see or imagine.

“And who, or what, might you be?”

The question pulled Will’s attention to the person standing behind said counter. He was short and stocky. Will estimated about a hundred and forty to a hundred and fifty centimetres tall, and about a meter across the shoulders. He sported a large, black, and bushy beard, which was braided into an ornate set of macrame braids that lay over his suit of chain armour. A pair of piercing black eyes were all that Will could see of his face behind the hair. Last and not least, a large axe was hanging from a belt loop, conveniently placed where his right hand could easily grab it.

A dwarf? Will thought in amazement.

“I know what I am, beast. Now what in the deepest mines are you?”

You can understand me?

“As clear as undoped corundum. Now answer my question, or I’ll add your fur to my goods.”

I’m Will. And I’m a wombat, I guess?

“Will the Wombat? Really?”

Well, I wasn’t a wombat yesterday!

“That would explain why you aren’t sure then. Very well, Will the Wombat. Welcome to Fili and Kili’s Trading Post and Inn. I’m Fili, and I handle the trading post part of the business.”

Fili and Kili? Aren’t those the names of dwarves from The Hobbit?

“Names from The Hobbit? Names from The Hobbit?” Fili’s voice got louder and louder with each word. Suddenly, the dwarf started reciting what sounded like a poem. In a language that Will didn’t know, but which sounded close to what he’d always thought Swedish would sound.

Not that he had much of an experience with Swedish, outside of the chef from The Muppet Show.

Nevertheless, he found that he could understand it perfectly fine.

“Then all the regin went

to judgement seats,

the vastly holy gods,

and considered that:

who should create

companies of dwarves

From Brimir’s blood

and from Bláin's legs

There Móðsognir had

become the greatest

of all dwarves,

and Durinn the second;

they made many

in man’s likeness

dwarves in the earth

as Durinn said.

Fíli, Kíli, Fundin, Náli,

Hefti, Víli, Hannar, Svíurr,

Billingr, Brúni, Bíldr and Buri,

Frár, Hornbori, Frægr and Lóni,

Aurvangr, Jari, Eikinskjaldi.

“Those names come straight from the Völuspá! Written more than six hundred years before Tolkien was even born!”

By the end of the rant, Fili was practically shouting.

OK, OK. Sorry!

“Dwarves from The Hobbit indeed!” Fili muttered, before visibly breathing deep to calm himself. “Anyway. Welcome to Fili and Kili’s Trading Post and Inn. We buy monster parts from you, and any skill shards you don’t want, and we sell whatever skill shards you might need!”

Monster parts?

“Yeah. Like those Dark Forest Wolves you’ve been fighting? I’ll buy the fur from you. Can’t tell you about other things I’ll buy though. Not until you encounter them. Those are the rules.”

Not sure how that would work. I mean, even if I knew how to skin a wolf, I don’t really have hands any more.

Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on the original website.

“Oh, that’s simple. You just need to use a harvesting skill. I can sell you a very nice Hunter shard for, say, two silver marks?”

I don’t have any silver marks. Just some copper bits.

“You should have two hundred copper bits, for starting in the Grasslands. And you shouldn’t have met anything to trade with before me. One silver mark is one hundred copper bits, so you have just enough for the shard!”

How do you even know that? Will wondered. No, you know, never mind. I don’t want to know. I’m not sure I want to spend everything I have on this.

“Well, you can certainly hope to find one in one of the Spaces. But that’s going to take some luck, and you won’t be able to harvest anything until you get it.”

Will thought frantically to himself. The FOMO was really working overtime on this. On one hand, he apparently needed a way to get money, in order to buy new skill shards. And who knows? Maybe he’ll come across a blacksmith or something and be able to buy armor and weapons, now that he knew that wombat specific equipment existed.

On the other hand, he’d be completely out of cash. And what if he ran across that blacksmith and couldn’t buy anything?

“You know what,” the dwarf added after a few seconds of silence. “I’ll throw in a free room for the night, dinner and breakfast.”

OK, fine! I’ll take it!

Fili turned around to the glass cabinets behind him, and unlocked one of them with a key he pulled out of his beard. Carefully taking a small red gem, he re-locked the cabinet and turned around to Will. A message window appeared

Skill shard: Hunter

Tier: Basic

Type: Harvesting

Cost: 10 stamina

Duration: 10 minutes

Extract all of the useable parts of one dead beast type enemy.

What were you doing until now? Just killing for fun?

Will didn’t waste any time before absorbing the skill shard.

Thanks, Fili. I hope this will be worth it.

“Pleasure doing business with you. And don’t worry about it. It’ll get you your money back before you know it!”

I hope you’re right. Can you tell me where’s the inn part of your place?

“Just go through that door on the left,” Fili waved his hand in the direction of a door that Will didn’t even notice. “Tell my brother you paid me for room and board!”

The room on the other side of the door might as well have been a picture in the dictionary next to the definition of “medieval inn”. The wooden floor was covered with sawdust to soak up spilled beverages. A long bar took up one entire wall, with wooden ale barrels standing just behind it, and a shelf full of glass wine and liquor bottles rising up to the roughhewn ceiling. Roughly crafted and oft-repaired wooden tables and chairs took up as much space as it was possible to take while still letting people move between them. At least, if any people were actually present.

The inn was completely empty, except for a dwarf standing behind the bar, polishing a tin mug with a piece of cloth. He looked identical to Fili, except that his macrame beard was braided in the other direction.

Will ambled towards the bar, and after considerable effort, managed to get up on one of the wooden barstools.

Mr. Kili, I assume?

“Yeah, that’s me. I take it you met my brother in the trading post part of our establishment?”

Yeah, I did. He told me to let you know that I’ve paid for room and board already.

“Oh, he did, did he? Bloody trade-stealer. Do you know how long we’ve waited here for our first customer to show up and trade with us?”

Um… no?

“Bloody ages! And now he got to trade for both whatever you bought and for my part of things! How am I ever going to be able to get any essence if he’s taking all of the action?”

I don’t know? I just want my dinner and to go to sleep, please.

“Yeah, OK. Sorry. It’s just that we’ve been waiting a long time for this Board to open up for business so that we could have customers, you know? Anyway, what do you want to eat? We’ve got lamb stew with potatoes, or roasted chicken. With potatoes.”

I don’t think either of those will work. I’m supposed to be an herbivore.

“Just the potatoes then?”

Sigh. Yeah, just the potatoes.

“You also get an ale with it. It’s made out of barley, so should be OK for you, right?”

Will had no idea. He didn’t think it was OK for it, but he was also far beyond caring.

The potatoes were nice. Roasted in the oven with some herbs, and smothered in butter. Which he probably shouldn’t be eating, but to hell with it. After the day he had, butter was the least of his problems.

The ale was weird, once he managed to grab the mug in his paws and drink it. The barley and the hops tasted a lot better to his Wombat taste buds than they did when he was human, but the alcohol was strange.

Not bad though. Just… Strange.

After finishing his dinner, Kili directed Will to his room. Apparently, the inn had specialized rooms for burrowing species, and Will went to sleep in a nice, comfortable tunnel, far away and safe from any wolf.

***

Will woke up well rested, and to a very welcome message screen.

Overnight healing!

Having rested for a full night in a comfortable location, the following wounds have improved:

Left leg: Least wound healed up completely

Left ear: Least wound healed up completely

Left shoulder: Lesser wound improved to least wound.

So each one of my wounds improved by one category after resting? That’ll be useful to know.

Will left the cozy little tunnel he’d slept in, and went back to the common room of the inn. Kili was standing behind the bar, as if he hadn’t moved a millimeter since Will went to sleep.

“Good morning, Will the Wombat!” the dwarf greeted him. “Sleep well?”

Very well, thank you. You seem to be prepared for guests of… my disposition.

“Yeah, we’re ready for just about anything! I’ve even got an aquarium for aquatic guests ready!”

Will had no idea how anything aquatic would even get to the inn, past the grassland and the forest. But he was hungry, and if he wanted to have breakfast before going away from the inn, he had to eat it before he could go to the toilette.

What’s for breakfast, Kili?

“Well, the traditional breakfast here and Fili and Kili’s Trading Post and Inn is eggs and bacon, but for you? I’ve got a nice big salad!”

Will was tempted to try the eggs and bacon, but the smell coming from the kitchen was less appetizing than he’d remembered eggs and bacon to be. Salad it is.

Breakfast was good. Will wasn’t much for salad as a human, but his wombat self was very satisfied with the complex flavors of cucumber, tomato, carrot and lettuce. After finishing his meal, Will bade Kili goodbye, and went to the toilette, ready for whatever the Board sent his way.