Iris casually perused the racks of clothing in the open air shop, taking time to soak in the ambience of the shopping district and the cool breeze that brushed past her. There was distant chatter, ever present music, and people of all kinds walking about. For a moment she was a child back in the empire, shopping in the city with her mother.
Her hands felt the fabric of a dark blue robe. It was soft like silk on the inside, but coarse like scales on the outside. Strands of silver lined the cuffs and the collar, which extended down the chest and overlapped like a warm coat. A matching brown leather belt hung with it, tall and wide and designed to cinch over the top of the robe. She curiously felt around, and was delighted to find pockets on either side, as well as a third pocket inside the left breast of the robe. A small paper tag was tied to it with a thin string, fifteen gold.
Iris didn't actually have any money of her own, she hadn't brought it with her when she left her home for her first day of adventuring because she hadn't expected to need it -- or to find herself on the other side of the world the next morning. Eli had given her fifty gold, more money than she'd ever had at once, as her share of the loot he expected to sell that day. She had the sinking suspicion that to him fifty gold wasn't even a lot, which made her wonder how expensive things on the frontier must be. This robe was by far one of the most expensive items in the shop, however, with most of the shirts and trousers costing only five silver, half of a gold piece. In fact, from what she’d seen so far, it didn’t seem like the economy here was similar to the one back home at all.
A while later she was approaching the counter with an armful of clothes. She had several pairs of heavy duty trousers and blouses for adventuring, several more pairs of soft leggings and baggy shirts for leisure, and the carefully folded blue and silver robe balanced atop them all. Stuffed somewhere inside the pile of clothes were socks and undergarments, and a pair of plain brown boots dangled by the strings looped around her fingers.
She waited patiently behind the two strangers at the counter in front of her. As they spoke, she tilted her head to peer over the clothes in her arms, then to the side to peer around them. It was the two men from the Flopping Fish, the small green one and the tall golden one. The man behind the counter was similarly small in stature and green in color as the smaller man, but stood on a raised platform which brought him eye-to-eye with the taller man, and looking down on the smaller one.
"Grell please," the shopkeeper pleaded, "I have customers, don't make this a scene."
"Don't make a scene?" the small man demanded, "my own flesh and blood charging full price and I'm making a scene?"
"Father, it's alright--" the tall man started.
"It isn't!" Grell insisted, keeping his ire focused on the shopkeeper, "Fal, my boy Adan must wear the finest clothes, you know that. Can you even imagine, this beautiful creation mistaken for common rabble! All because you wouldn't--"
The shopkeeper sighed as the rant continued, placing his elbows on the counter and his head in his hands. He peeked up at Iris with an apologetic look.
"Fine, I'll take off ten gold," Fal sighed, "if you never come back here again."
Grell was smiling when the sentence began and scowling when it ended, "you would ban me? Your own brother? Disgraceful, disdainful! What would mother think? You sick fuck."
"Final offer."
"Fine!" Grell yelled, then spoke softly, "Adan, pay the bastard."
The tall golden man reached into a pocket, carefully counted some coins and handed them to Fal as Grell pulled the pile of clothes down from the counter and struggled not to drop anything.
"Father, let me help," Adan said calmly.
"I got it," Grell insisted, dropping a sock on the ground as he turned to leave.
Adan quietly picked up the sock and followed his father.
"And if you come back I'm stabbing you," Fal said, "I mean it, simple as that."
"Yeah, yeah!" Grell shouted over his shoulder as he left the shop.
"Sorry about that," Fal said, as Iris approached and placed her items on the counter.
"It's alright," she said with a reassuring smile, "I'm a shopkeeper back home, I know how it is."
"For your sake," he said, "I hope you don't know what it's like to have a brother like that."
"No, I don't," she said, "I can't believe he treats you that way."
"Eh," Fal said as he tallied up the items, "I barely know the guy."
Iris gave him a curious look.
"Ah, right, human," Fal said, "you're normally close with your siblings, right? It's different for goblins. I have sixty-four brothers and thirty sisters, can't even name them all. Based on what I know about human families, you could consider Grell more like my distant cousin."
"That's a lot of siblings," Iris said, astonished.
"Actually we're still a young family," Fal said as he attentively folded the clothes into a neat stack, "most families have something in the hundreds."
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"Do you all live in the city?" she asked.
"Goodness no," Fal laughed, "just of a few of us, most still live back home in the Den. It's in the mountains to the east, you should visit if you get the chance, it's quite nice. Next month is the Ancestral Festival, nothing but music, theater and bar fights fueled by the finest whiskey on the continent for thirty straight days. That'll be twenty-seven gold even."
"I'll keep it in mind," Iris said as she paid the shopkeeper, "do you mind if I use the dressing room to change?"
"Of course not, help yourself."
A short while later she emerged from the dressing room wearing the new pair of boots, dark brown trousers, and a white blouse underneath the fine blue robe. She breathed a fresh breath of air and sighed in the relief of finally wearing her own clothes again.
"Thanks!" She waved as she left the shop.
"Don't forget the rest of your clothes!" Fal shouted.
"Don't worry, they're all in here!" She patted the small bag tied to the large brown belt, and Fal raised a curious eyebrow.
Iris was nearly skipping down the street with glee at her new clothes. When it came to her appearance she had felt quite pitiful since waking up in the Giantrock Region, though she'd rarely had a chance to see her reflection before they arrived in the city she was sure she looked ragged and pathetic. Now, she was one major step towards putting her life back together.
With time left to waste, she got lost in her mind as she wandered through the streets, taking errant turns whenever she felt the urge. Slim alleyways cut between buildings and lead to side streets with yet more shops, restaurants and townhomes. It was in one of these alleys that she suddenly remembered Eli's warnings about the lawlessness of Giantrock.
There were four figures at the far end of the alley, dressed in rough clothing and leaning against walls or crouched on the ground. They all stood to attention when they noticed her, obnoxiously spreading out to block the alley.
"Are you guys going to rob me?" she called out down the alley, "if you're gonna rob me I can just go another way." She turned, and saw two more thugs step into the alley behind her to block the way she'd come, "of course," she sighed.
She'd only practiced aura sensing a few times so she couldn't be certain in her readings, but she was pretty sure she wasn't sensing any power from these guys whatsoever.
"Do you guys even have abilities?" She asked, her voice faltering despite her efforts to remain brave.
"Shut up," one of the men barked as they closed in on her, "drop the bag and everything in your pockets."
"Yep, alright," she said, holding her hands up, then slowly reaching down with one to remove the bag from her waist, "are you sure you want it?" she asked the man who had spoken.
"Shut up and do what you're told."
"Alright then," she tossed the bag towards him and disappeared.
"Blip," she said, appearing behind him and yanking down his trousers. He twisted to swing at her and tripped over his own trousers, falling and slamming his head into the wall.
"Oof," she winced, "sorry."
The other thugs were rushing towards her as she scooped up her bag and withdrew her large wooden training sword. She tossed the bag into the face of an oncoming attacker, who yelped as the loose drawstrings wrapped around his head and held tight. Iris cocked her head to the side curiously, watching as the man desperately failed to pull the bag from his face.
A weight slammed into her from behind as she was lifted off the ground into a bear hug. She tried to blip away, but felt her ability push back against her as her mana drained. She grunted and twisted, but was unable to escape. Her captor twisted his body and threw her like a doll. She bounced limply off the wall and slapped into the ground with a groan.
She looked up in time to see a kick coming for her face, and blipped away down the alley behind the rest of the attackers. She popped to her feet and dusted her robes with a curt breath, "you guys are assholes."
She ran towards them, leapt up and kicked off the wall, blipping past the first thug in her way and reappearing behind him to crash a fist into the face of another. He spun from the blow and fell to the ground motionless. She looked at her own fist in surprise, then ducked and whirled around as the man behind her twisted and aimed a high kick for her face. His foot whipped over her as she ducked, then she darted forward and wrapped herself around his planted leg, toppling him to the ground.
She blipped away again, this time appearing on the other side of the alley. At this point the thugs were in complete disarray, shouting disorganized commands at each other as they whirled around in desperate attempts to keep eyes on her. There were six in total, two were knocked out, one was still flailing around with her bag clinging to his face -- though his movements were slowing and she was pretty sure he couldn't breathe -- and three remained as the man she toppled climbed back to his feet. Her sword was on the ground in front of them, and they were all turning to face her.
She reached out for her sword, and it disappeared from the ground and reappeared in her outstretched hand. She frowned, realizing she was holding it by the blade.
"Good thing this is wood," she cracked with a laugh, but the thugs were not amused. They ran towards her, shoving their suffocating friend to the side.
She flipped the sword in the air and caught it by the handle, "let's try this out."
She ran towards them and leapt into the air, blipping past them and twisting as she reappeared. She brought the sword overhead even as her momentum carried her away from the thugs, then released it. It disappeared, then reappeared toppling end-over-end with ferocious speed. As she landed in a crouch, the pommel of the sword conked against a skull and dropped a thug to the ground. She laughed.
The thug with the bag stuck on his face leaned against a wall and slid to the ground, his arms falling limply beside him. A second later, one end of the string untangled from the man and shot out to wrap around the ankle of one of the men as he ran towards Iris. His stride yanked the bag and jerked his unconscious friend by the head as he tripped. The tripping man fell harshly, slamming his face chin into the ground.
The last man charged forward with rage in his eyes. He was the biggest one, and his fists here clenched tight as he gritted his teeth. Iris stood casually as he barreled towards her. The man stuck out a shoulder to slam into her. Just before they collided, she blipped slightly to the side, extending a foot to trip him. He tumbled forward into a roll, quickly coming back to his feet and twisting to face her again.
She blipped backwards to gain distance and reached out behind her towards her sword. As it disappeared, she brought her hand forward and thrust it in the direction of the man -- who was already charging at her again. The sword reappeared, flung forward at full speed by her ability, and hit the man in the thigh. Though the tip of the wooden blade didn't pierce deep, it did hit hard and lodge itself awkwardly beside a bone. The man tripped forward, falling onto the sword with all his weight as the pommel struck the ground. He toppled awkwardly to the side and screamed in pain.
As the man writhed in pain, Iris glanced around at the others. No one was getting up. She reached out and called her sword back to her hand. She reached down and picked up her bottomless bag, she held up to her eyes and stared at it suspiciously.
"Since when can you attack people?"
The bag said nothing.
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IRIS ORION
Hero Rank, Level 5
Experience Points: 692 / 6680
Progress to next level: 10.35%