+ 1 Upgrade point awarded.
The dwarf smiled carefully as the message ticked by his vision. The procedure for caring for this particular plant was something of both art and science. It required careful measurements of concentration and skill, along with the other components expected of rare fungal growths, like dead vegetation, a particular light band, certain incantations, a proper balance of pH, etc. The soft purple light glowed gently on the decay and dirt that surrounded the shroom that the dwarf cultivated.
The dwarf gently rested a particular piece of bark shipped in from some foreign land across the Great Seas. This particular shroom was known as the Tuber arcanatum. It had a particular ability to metabolize arcane energies and become imbued with magics of a unique variety.
The dwarf withdrew his hands from the safe and sighed, grateful the tuber was safe and growing well. Above the safe sat a framed picture, face down. The dwarf’s smile faltered as he lay a hand on the down-turned picture. He knew the picture and felt the deep, empty void. The void was a reminder that his soul was once full, but now the distant reminder only brought pain, and the fullness only existed in the picture he refused to see. In solemnity, the dwarf removed his hand from the frame, closed the safe, and then secured the bookshelf section that hid the safe in his office wall. He did not want to breathe for fear the remnants of her memory would fly out of the void and become lost to the breezes of the world.
Something pounded at the office door, rattling the loose panes of fogged glass held within its rickety frame.
The dwarf frowned deeply with the exhale—he did not feel inclined to receive interruptions today.
“Aaron, buddy,” came a deep, friendly voice from outside the door. “Open up, man, I got news!”
Aaron grunted while rubbing his temples, “Not today, Tommy. I’m in no mood.”
“Oh, this news will get you in the mood.” The door opened, and Tommy, the large island elf, maneuvered inside. “You know, you really should lock your door.”
Aaron waved away Tommy and stumbled over to a small table with a line of white dust that had gone untouched from the night before. Aaron tore out a sheet of paper from his little pocket notebook and rolled the sheet.
“Seriously, buddy?” Tommy asked. “You’re going to start now?”
Aaron leaned in, then inhaled sharp and long, inhaling the last of the dust on the table. The dwarf leaned back for a moment, waiting for the hit to kick, then exhaled as the weight of life eased just a little from his eyes. “Yes. What’s this news?”
Tommy picked up a metal ball from the dwarf’s disheveled desk and spun it around, smiling broadly. “I got a job.”
The dwarf frowned and moved to a cabinet in the corner, “That’s hardly news.”
“I got a job straight from the boss himself,” Tommy smiled wide as he spun the ball in his other hand. “It’s special, and it pays real nice.”
Aaron kicked the cabinet’s bottom drawer, and it slowly creaked open. Pulling out a bottle of brown liquor and a glass, the dwarf looked at Tommy, “The boss, eh? You looking at moving up?”
“I dunno, maybe.”
Aaron poured a heavy finger into the glass and shot it back.
“Rough night?”
Aaron poured another finger and capped the bottle. “So, why’d you come up here to tell this news, Tommy?”
“Oh, right,” Tommy put the ball back on the desk. “I need an investigator to help me with the job, and I thought, I know no better investigator than you.”
Aaron grunted while peering through the closed blinds of the office window—the sun was too bright outside. “I’m the only investigator you know, Tommy.”
“Exactly! You’re perfect for the job, buddy. You’ll crack this shit in no time.”
Aaron looked to the glass, swirling its contents. It took effort to keep his voice steady. “Tommy, not today. I appreciate your sentiment, but I don’t need your charity.”
“Aaron, buddy, you need this.”
Aaron looked at the large, bronze-skinned islander. Most people in the city stereotype elves as either scrawny street rats who descended from trees and nature stuff or snobbish, rich, golden-haired politicians who ruled from tall corporate towers and rarely mingled with the commoners of the street. Those elves on high at least maintained some of their ancestral dignity. Here in the concrete jungle, where trees and nature were a rare sight to see, the elves once known to be hewn from wood could only cling to the concrete streets and metal parking meters. The city was a place made from dwarves of old and was designed to be a place where dwarves would thrive among the artificial stone. Aaron hated his heritage.
“It’s for the boss’ daughter.”
“I don’t do kids,” Aaron growled, looking at the window blinds. The blinds were thick and heavy and kept his office almost dark. Aaron found comfort in the greys and darks of shadows. He shot the finger back in one gulp.
“No, no; it’s not the daughter,” Tommy clarified. “It’s for her. Boss is throwing this huge quinceañera for his daughter and wants to pull out all the stops.”
Aaron looked to Tommy with a raised eyebrow.
“Boss has this cursed gnome he likes to keep around for parties and stuff,” Tommy continued. “Well, the gnome has gone missing, and the boss wants me to find it.”
Aaron placed the empty glass on the table, regretting there was no more dust to help with this shit. “So, you want me to help you find this cursed gnome for your boss, who is going to use the gnome for his daughter’s quinceañera. Right?”
“You got it!”
Aaron moaned with indecision and rubbed his face hard. His beard was scraggly and unkempt, and his hair was a thick, wild mane of grey. He wasn’t old enough to have grey hair, yet his hair was that of an old dwarf all the same.
“Come on, you need this,” Tommy pressed. “And you need a break from the shit.”
Aaron shook his head, though he knew Tommy was right.
“So, you coming?”
“Yeah,” Aaron mumbled. “Just give me a minute to prep some skills for this.”
“Hey, buddy,” Tommy spoke hesitantly. “While we’re out, I need you to do me a favor.”
Aaron frowned with squinted eyes but waited to hear the favor.
“I promised I would take care of you, and you’re making it tough for me to do that. So, in an effort to help me help you, could you quit the shit while we’re on the job?”
Aaron’s face remained a squinting, upset frown.
“Come on, buddy. Just for this go around.”
Aaron sighed heavily and motioned to the table, “I already quit, see?”
Tommy chuckled, looking at the small table that held the empty drinking glass. “I’m serious, dude. No shit until after this biz is done.”
“Yeah, yeah, you sun-kissed bastard,” Aaron waved off Tommy’s concern. “Let me get my skills ready.”
Aaron pulled up his Hero Sheet and examined its properties.
Name: Aaron Frimslayer Moxie: 0 0 0 0 Defining Traits: HD: 1 [BLOCKED] UP: 1 Affiliations: Hero Level: [BLOCKED] Law enforcement (poor), Fourth Block Boomas (favorable), Ferdinand the Shark (poor), Alpha Numeros (indifferent) Attributes: Skills: [3 of 4 Preferred skills pending selection…] Intelligence: 7 Mycoculturist (INT): 2d6 Strength: 4 ... Spirit: 2 ... Dexterity: 5 ... Gear: [None selected]
Seeing the single upgrade point (abbreviated as UP on the screen) gently flashing reminded the dwarf there was an upgrade point that could use spending. He really wanted to drop it in the Mycoculturist skill, but he was capped out on that skill at the moment. He would need to upgrade his Intelligence to 8 before considering that skill upgrade—and getting the UP for that increased level would not come easy. Nothing came easy after level 6. Aaron accessed the skills menu and scrolled through the ones that would be helpful in an investigative adventure like this.
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The Hero’s Die was a system of pure magical and technological genius. It was something everyone gained access to just by being alive. Aaron found it rather frustrating to use, and though there were claims that technology played a part in the system’s implementation, the dwarf didn’t understand it and just chalked the whole thing up to magic.
This system was designed ages ago to help boost different skills, measure someone’s Heroicness, and (they said) it was supposed to help promote the Hero in everyone. As far as Aaron was concerned, it rarely promoted anything more than just making people bigger assholes. It was a means of boosting a person’s innate skills. Since skills helped boost a person’s abilities, some demonstrated exceptional strength, while others had increased smarts and stuff like that. The trick was that you could only use skills that you unlocked, and then you could only have 4 skills active at a time. The dwarf had heard that more active skills could be unlocked at higher levels, but that wasn’t something Aaron could personally confirm. It was easy to unlock skills, but it took time to actually and UP to improve them.
“I’m obviously activating my Investigation skill,” Aaron said while scrolling back and forth across the available skills. “You think I’ll need to use my gun?”
Tommy shrugged. Tommy didn’t like guns—he always preferred to work with his hands.
Aaron grunted and activated the first gun-related skill he found: Crack shot. With one skill left, the dwarf absent-mindedly scrolled through the rest of his options. “What skills do you have locked in for the day?”
That was the other catch to these skills. Once they were locked in, they could not be unlocked for an entire day. Some people liked to say you needed a “long rest” to unlock your skills, but Aaron couldn’t remember the last time he experienced anything like a long rest. There were just moments with his eyes closed and other times when his eyes were open. Eventually, the skills would fall off the sheet.
“You can check my sheet if you’d like.”
“I’m busy getting mine together. I’m not going to try to read yours while working through mine. Just tell me.”
“Alright, alright,” Tommy picked up a book from the floor and thumbed through a few pages. “I locked in Pugilist, my Ailoa Afi, and Blades.”
“Blades?” Aaron sat up and closed his sheet to look at Tommy. Pugilist made sense since Tommy liked working with his hands, as did Ailoa Afi, as that was a cultural-based skill the elf used to call on the fire from his ancestors (or something like that). “When did you ever pick up a sword?”
“Long time ago. Back before the Mad Mages. I was training to be a fire sword dancer before the war came to us.”
“And you found a sword in the city?”
“Nah, I just figured it was about time I pulled that skill out again. You know, don’t let it get forgotten and all.”
“So you locked in a Blades skill, without having a sword, in the hopes it won’t get forgotten?”
“Something like that, yeah,” Tommy put the book down in the file cabinet, then parted the blinds slightly to see outside the window. “Besides, you never know when the ancestors will drop a blessing in your lap, you know? Better to be ready to wield a blessing with skill than to lose that blessing because you ain’t got the skill.”
“Yeah, I don’t think that’s how this stuff works.” Aaron sat back and went back to the skills in his Hero Sheet. Hacker. Now, that was something from Aaron’s war days. A skill the dwarf was really good at and secretly held pride in—even if it was a skill frowned upon for a dwarf. Also, unlike his large, well-sculpted friend, Aaron had an item that could be used with this skill. Aaron locked in the Hacker skill and got up. “Almost ready.”
Tommy released the blinds and looked at the dwarf while smiling.
Aaron went behind his desk and hit an inner panel close to where his legs would be if he were sitting at the desk. The panel fell down to reveal a 0.460 caliber, long-barrel revolver. It was his grandfather’s gun, and it was used to put down Wererats back in the days of sewer hunting. Aaron had no silver bullets but doubted they would be swimming in the sewers anyway. Popping out the drum revealed five of the six chambers were loaded. The sixth round was sitting atop the desk. Aaron stared at the large bullet on his desk as it started to sway back and forth. The dust was finally kicking in.
“Hey, buddy!” Tommy clapped his hands a couple times. “We gonna get moving?”
“Yeah!” Aaron blinked excitedly as he came back to the present. This kick wouldn’t last forever, and the dwarf wanted to keep it going for as long as possible. He grabbed the round, smashed it into the drum, and locked the drum in place. Putting the revolver on the table, Aaron opened a desk drawer to his side and pulled out his Hacklet.
“Dude!” Tommy exclaimed. “You still have it!”
“Oh yeah!” Aaron smiled as he affixed the Hacklet to his left forearm. The device was a digital interface that strapped to your forearm like a bracer. Though it couldn’t provide any real protection like a bracer, it did provide Aaron the unique ability to hack into nearly any electronic device with a wireless signal. And if it didn’t have a wireless signal, well, Aaron had a cord for that. The device was officially called an Electronic Appendical Digital Forensicist Apparatus, or EADFA for short. This was technically an EADFA3. They were issued to all the military’s digital forensicists and were pretty crappy but rugged and tough. Digital Forensicist was the military’s occupational identification for “hacker” without actually saying “hacker.” Much like you don’t say “jumping jacks” but instead perform the “side straddle hop” because that sounds more professional. Actually, Aaron did like the name side straddle hop better, but this is the dust helping him along a fun tangent down memory lane, and memory lane can quickly turn ugly when it involves his time in the Esoteric Wars. So, let’s turn this Hacklet on and make sure it still has a charge. Oh yeah, by the way, all the hacker buddies that Aaron used to hang out with called it a Hacklet because it was worn like a bracelet by hackers. Stupid but catchy. Like the crew Aaron used to roll with—but not going to think about that because that was during the war. Focus on the battery—how much juice is in the battery.
“That thing still got battery?” Tommy asked while leaning over the desk.
Aaron tried to smile, but his face was feeling numb, so he manually checked to see if a smile was on his face—pretty sure that feels like a smile.
“Buddy, you okay?”
“Great!” Battery juice is still over 50%! “Awesome!”
“Well, fix your face so you look awesome, okay?”
Frown, narrow eyes, stare hard and give the beard a little tug—yeah, this is business. Tommy is going to see. Why is Tommy twisting his face like that? This is business, right? Whatever. Time to look like an investigator! Aaron is going to grab his trenchcoat and fedora.
“Dude, it’s not cold outside. You don’t need that long coat.”
“It’s always raining in the city,” Aaron said grimly with a tip of his hat. “And it’s a sorry chum who gets caught without his coat.”
Tommy cocked his head to the side, twisting his face as he tried to understand what Aaron just said. “What sort of dust did you take up the nose, bro?”
“It was from the bottom of the barrel, Tommy,” Aaron grabbed his gun and put it in one of the coat’s pockets. “And now I’m scraping from it.”
Tommy sighed. “This investigation is not going the way I expected. The shit kicking in?”
“That’s life, Tommy. It never goes as expected. One fine day, you’re enjoying rainbows and sunshine, then next thing you know, you’re half dead, shit kicked to hell in the gutter and being scraped up by the undertaker.”
“Okay, buddy. Let’s just, uh, find that gnome. Yeah?”
“The case of the lost gnome—scratch that. The case of the cursed, kidnapped gnome. It was a dark day in the city—ah!” Aaron jerked away from the bright sunlight that burst through the blinds he had opened. “What the hot Hells, Tommy! Why is it so bright outside?”
“You need some shades, bro?”
“Yeah,” Aaron stumbled with one hand partly covering his sun-blinded eyes and the other hand trying to compensate for the blindness the sun so cruelly beset upon him. “Shades would be good right now.”
Tommy looked over a disorderly bookshelf while Aaron stumbled into his desk, knocking most of the mess that covered his desk onto the floor. Miraculously, his hand grasped a pair of glasses. Perhaps the System would bring a little luck his way today. The dwarf fumbled with the two dark, round circles in a wire frame that fit snuggly around his head. Peering through the shades made his office look darker—it was tough to see but more comfortable than the light from outside.
“Found them,” Tommy remarked.
“Yeah,” Aaron responded while opening his Hacklet. “You said the gnome was cursed, right? What kind of curse was it? Think he was registered with any of the magical ministries?”
“He was cursed with a sombrero of infinite tequila.”
“How the hell is that a curse?” Aaron asked, peering over his shades. “That sounds like a blessing.”
“One gnome’s curse is another dwarf’s blessing,” Tommy shrugged. “I just know the little guy couldn’t get the hat off his head. Some of the Numeros were saying the little guy tried cutting it off, and all he did was jack up his own head under that wide-brimmed, straw hat.”
“Where does the tequila come from?”
“The top, I guess. I don’t know ’cause I haven’t actually seen the gnome.”
“Wait, we’re looking for a gnome you haven’t seen?”
“Well, not in person. But I got a picture.”
“Why haven’t you seen the gnome?”
“Boss doesn’t like to let the little guy leave the house, or the basement for that matter. Guess he was afraid the gnome would run away.”
“How did the gnome get kidnapped? Or did the gnome actually run away?”
“Boss says the gnome was stolen. So, it doesn’t sound like the little tequila man ran away.”
“Huh,” Aaron plugged some data into his Hacklet and started a query for cursed items. “I guess there aren’t too many gnomes running around with a cursed sombrero on their head that provides an infinite supply of tequila.”
“That’s what I was thinking.”
There was a chance the sombrero was registered as a cursed item and tracked by one of the ministries. Even if it wasn’t tracked, the list of enchanted sombreros was likely short, so it should provide a clue on where to start.
Aaron – Hacking skill 6 vs. Normal DT – SUCCESS 10 vs. Hard DT – SUCCESS 9 vs. Very Hard DT – FAILURE
Aaron smiled as his skill activated through the hack attempts. He managed to penetrate two layers of ICE before the hack skill met failure. The System was cagey about some details, like difficulty. DT stood for difficulty target, and these targets could range from easy to impossible. When it came to hacking, each successful attempt at using the skill would lead to a higher difficulty because the hacker would get deeper into the encryption. So long as the hacker did not encounter an exceptional failure, most hacking was pretty straightforward when using skills.
“Two levels of encryption did not reveal much, but it gives me a start,” Aaron said while closing the Hacklet. “There aren’t any cursed sombreros registered at that level. However, a line of lightly enchanted party sombreros was discontinued in its early testing phase.”
“You think the party hats were discontinued because they were cursed?”
“I think it’s our best start. Further, these Mexican party favors were developed by MIST.”
“No way!”
“Way,” MIST was an acronym for Magical Industries’ Syndicated Technologies. They were your standard multi-corporate conglomerate run by silver and golden-haired elves and two-faced humans dogged enough to think they could compete in such a brutal environment. They hosted charity events worldwide that fed, clothed, and bathed millions of people, all while spending billions on magical research technology that could control and warp the minds of those who used their gear. They were the richest sort of corporate scum and political slime one could find outside the streets and the reason for Aaron’s third-level encryption failing.
“So, what do we do now?”
“I’ve got to find a MIST hub. Hacking their encryptions won’t be possible wirelessly. I need a secure location where I can plug in my Hacklet.”
“Right… and where do we find one of these hubs?”
Aaron traced the seams of his Hacklet, debating on where to go next. “Crime is only the left-handed form of human endeavor.”
“What’s that mean?”
“Forget about it. It’s just something I heard from a movie once,” Aaron stood and promptly marched to the door. He looked at the words on the fogged glass. They were backward and fogged due to being printed on the outside of the door, but Aaron knew exactly what the door said: Private Investigator for Hire. “Come on, Tommy, we’ve got a corporate encryption to hack.”