Rennos’ Market was a very busy place, a whole area of the city protected by a huge dome and filled to the brim with many stalls showing from juicy and freshly harvested fruit, to tools and weaponry ready for immediate use. One could easily get lost among the crowds of people, for navigating the market was a skill only honed by the most powerful of merchants and housewives. Fortunately for Gabi and Luci, Hanna was a very knowledgeable woman herself, having learned about the best routes to take since she was a young girl.

“I doubt you will be gone for very long considering you are only exploring the sewers, but you will need proper equipment!” The cook nodded sagely, casually moving through the multitude without bumping someone even once. “A visit to the alchemist should be good. I know a good blacksmith too, if you want to get better armour this time.”

“My brigandine will do for now.” Lucrece limped through the crowd, wincing and grumbling as she was barely able to keep up with Hanna’s pace. “Although getting my halberd checked and oiled… What about you Gabi? Your armor got wrecked by those bog bodies before, what about a new set?”

Gabrielle could only nod, her motions had turned stiff and nervous since she had been forced to enter the market with the rest. She detested crowded spaces, especially while having only a cloak to cover her red hair! As a consequence of this, the girl had fully retreated into herself, leaving behind a slow moving automaton with a face eternally contorted into a pained and confused grimace. Luci felt terribly bad for the girl, but they couldn’t simply leave her behind!

The words of her father came to her mind, “he will never learn if you keep coddling him”. She could be sure no one had ever coddled Gabi in her life, so why didn’t she ever learn to deal with people? Could it be that the harshness of life had made things even worse rather than better?

“After this we can spend some time in the parks, I promise.” Luci whispered to the still panicked Gabrielle, but she could only nod in response. Sigh.

Their first stop would be the Alchemist’s Laboratory. One of the few house-like structures inside the dome, built entirely out of red brick and sporting a long chimney constantly fuming towards the outside world. People only visited either when running out of options or when solutions required a bit of an experimental, explosive solution. After all, Alchemists threaded in the line that divided Science from Superstition, forever fearing the whispers accusing them of witchcraft.

All alchemists required (at least when working in the realms of the Church of the Saints) an official license given by the Inquisition that specified and proved that what these people were doing was not, in fact, heretical magicks. These Alchemy Permits were not exactly cheap, but to have one hanging from your doorframe was the greatest legitimacy a man of the craft could have.

“So they are not witches?” Gabrielle dared to ask, relieved to walk the less threaded ways of the market.

“Of course not! That would be illegal.” Hanna dismissed the idea with a shrug. “Alchemists being witches would be a disaster!”

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“What about the Man of Stone though?”

“Shhh! I don’t know what you are talking about, and I am not interested in hearing that sort of thing. Shhh.” Knowing much better than to speak heretical tales in the middle of the market, Hanna quickly shut down the curious redhead. “Now be quiet. We are entering.”

Once inside of the alchemist’s de everything n was lit by the sunrays filtering through a huge, wide window on the back of the instance. Small, quaint, with some coloured bottles of tonic decorating its curved walls, the room wasn’t exactly interesting and mysterious as Gabi would have expected it to be. It didn’t even have shelves to be admired and manipulated, no: all business had to be made at the wide wooden counter waiting at the end of the chamber.

The old man waiting on the other side of the counter awakened as soon as the little chimes on his door jingled. Dressed in a colourful red, white and gold uniform partially covered by an abundant white beard falling on his chest, the alchemist gave an exaggerated bow to his visitors.

“Welcome, blessed visitors. How may I help you on this fine day?”

“Greetings!” Lucrece took the word before Hanna could. “We are looking for a few bags of serpentine, linen filters, corvid masks and a flask of laudanum.”

“Now hold on just a second!” The cook quickly reached to pull Lucrece by the ear, whispering loudly to her. “What in the blazes do you think you are doing, you little wretch!? Do you think we are made of money here!?”

“Well I just thought that, considering we are risking our neck for a hundred empires, you would invest a little on us!”

“A little, yes. This is too much!”

“Fine, ugh.” The lancer would take a deep breath and then look back at the alchemist. “Forget the laudanum, and make it two pouches of serpentine.”

“That’s better.”

“Coming up, my blessed costumers.” The alchemist would rush right out of sight through a door to his left.

Gabrielle, meanwhile, would curiously look at every little mark on the few bottles being showcased: she recognized the curvy forms and elegant, “exotic” artistry: these bottles were surely souvenirs from the Lands of the Star, a conglomerate of “heretical” realms on the west of Jericho that refused to follow the teachings of the Saints and instead read different interpretations of many pagan scriptures… or at least that’s what Gabrielle had been taught. There were very little common threads uniting the many cultures in the West of Jericho besides the fact that they didn’t follow the Saints' followings.

Sadly, those kinds of details were lost in favor of the exotic, mysterious and dangerous image that the Church tried to spoonfed its citizens since the fall of the Golden Empire.

“This man follows the Chaotic Star…” Gabrielle whispered to Lucrece’s ear. “He must have traveled a lot.”

“Bah, don’t fall for it Gabi. Most Alchemists claim to come from the Starlands just to look more mystical.” Luci shook her head, refusing to fall for more tricks in her life. “Most of them have never left the Church Domains.”

Both girls would quickly fall silent when the old alchemist returned, setting the objects on the counter: two huge wooden masks that imitated the visage of a bird, ten little disks of linen that just reeked of alcohol, and two pouches of serpentine powder; the man would pull a pinch of the black powder and snap his fingers in front of his clients, causing an small warm explosion in his hand. It was the usual way of ensuring the powder was real.

“Here it is, ten linen filters, two corvid masks and two pouches of serpentine powder.” With a wide smile, the alchemist would begin counting with his fingers. “It will be sixty five silver empires, please.”

Hanna would begrudgingly pay with a single golden empire: the most valuable currency in circulation, a golden coin showing the images of the Great Throne of Byzantia and the visage of Emperor Legatus Caesar XIV, the last emperor the Golden Empire of Byzantia had before its Great Calamity.

Of course, to Gabrielle all these names and words meant little more than a little historical anecdote learned after years of repetition. She would simply stare at that coin as money changed hands, and both Hanna and Lucrece conversed with the Alchemist about the evergrowing value of Serpentine in an attempt to haggle.

Really, there were many things she didn’t know… and she wondered if she would ever learn them before growing old.