Chapter Five
I have found over the last couple weeks that the chef Merchant Gwon needed a shipment delivered from the river docks every second day. Once a week the warehouses at the docks needed to be cleared of rats. Plains cats needed to be driven from the farms twice a week. And the biggie I couldn’t do without a bunch of other players, on a real-world Friday evening a three-meter tall Boar with burning eyes came out of the woods across the river. Marching up and down the banks as it bellowed challenges.
Two hours of exercise before breakfast, two hour each of scribing and chi practice each morning. Three hours in town three afternoons a week, the other four days spent learning how to get bruised in new and interesting ways. Meditating each evening.
This pattern repeated for the next few weeks until one morning after breakfast.
I set down my empty bowl. Sifu looked at me with a serious expression.
“Today we shall not train together. You must dress in your old clothes and prepare.”
“Why aren’t we training Sifu? What am I to prepare for?”
“Today you go before the Magistrate and will bear his judgment.”
“The Magistrate! I had forgotten.” Pausing for a second, “Sifu, I have a letter to the Thieves’ Guild I had been ignoring, what should I do with it?” Pulling the letter from my storage he read it.
“Deliver the letter. The Upright Man is not always evil. Keep your heart, mind, and eyes open and this will be a lesson. Go in blinded and it will be a trap.”
=-=-=-=-
The Imperial Magistrate sat on a chair on a dais. A lower dais held the town mayor, the guard captain and the three resident nobles in town. The rest of us knelt on the wooden floor below them.
We had all given our testimony. I had a Truth Telling cast on me that was most awkward, as my motivations and desires were investigated. When questions about my residence at the School came up, they were quickly ruled irrelevant.
Now the Magistrate spoke,
“I see that this Traveler is indeed innocent of crimes, yet this Growlf did go against the common law of the land and the will of the Emperor. It is my judgment as Magistrate that it is the will of the Emperor that Growlf help restore the good will of the citizenry and bring back the happiness that was lost. Even the Imperial Family has a standing order for the Merrow’s pipe weed. It is our ruling that Growlf travel south to the land of the Halflings and find a relative of the Merrow’s to assume ownership of the Merrow farm within the month. It is further in our judgment that three bandits perished at Growlf’s hand and that the bounty of fifty silver be paid to him. As well, all the bandit belongings are clearly his without contest or question. The Emperor has spoken!”
*ding*
You have received the quest – The Emperor’s Will – Smoke Signals
You must travel to the halfling lands and find a relative to take over the Merrow farm. The citizens are unhappy that they have lost the source of their pipe weed.
Type – Story, Chain, Mandatory
Difficulty – Moderate
Rewards – Status increases with Imperial Family, Citizens of Yangsan, Merchants of Yangsan, Halfling Nation.
Failure – Abandon the Quest: Enmity with the Imperial Family. OR Fail to find an heir to take over the farm within the time limit and lose status with all Imperial Factions.
Time Limit – One month
Okay, so no arm-twisting there. Nope, do what I say and succeed at it or run for the hills. And Sifu warned me about the Upright Man and not the Magistrate. I nearly burned the letter on the spot.
The Guard Captain came up to congratulate me,
“Well, boy, I had my doubts, but you came out smelling like roses. Taking up with the Monks too, they don’t deal with riff-raff.” His smile was broad.
You have gained favor with the guards of Yangsan +100, you are now trusted.
I was relishing this next moment in the same way my old rogue characters would taunt their victims and the town officials.
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“By the way, Captain?” I asked
“Yes?”
“Where might I find the Upright Man at this time of day?”
And ba-da-dum-DUM, there it was. The look of shock on the Captains face was priceless.
You have lost favor with the guards of Yangsan -250, you are now distrusted.
Okay, so maybe that didn’t work out quite as well as I had planned.
“No, no. It isn’t for me, I just have a letter to deliver to him.”
The searing glare the Captain turned on me actually hurt me in some non-HP fashion.
“It’s afternoon so he will be down at the docks, having breakfast at The Scuppered Maiden.” Then as the Captain stomped away, my sensitive ears picked up him muttering under his breath, “Should have known better than to trust some tricky fox.”
Okay, so that had been a really bad idea…
=-=-=-=-
I wandered down to the docks and soon had a beggar happy to point the way to me.
Arriving outside the inn, the true meaning of the name became apparent as they painted sign showed a girl cowering naked in a puddle of torn skirts. So, the ‘ruined’ Maiden. Not an auspicious sign of what awaited inside.
Dark and smoky, the odor of unwashed bodies troubling me now as it wouldn’t have a few weeks ago. The Ogre bouncer just inside the door seemed disappointed to find no weapons to confiscate, my eating dagger allowed to remain.
I stepped over to the bar and watched as some breed of Troll was serving up tankards of a thick ale. This gave me a chance to peruse the room, blue, green and red outlines appeared everywhere.
“Best you don’t do that.” Came a voice startling me out of my focus.
“Wha… what?” was my ever so clever reply.
Plunking down a tankard of ale that I hadn’t asked for,
“Nosy people, get them cut off.” The troll laughed sinisterly.
“Oh, right.” I dropped the observation, or at least the active portion of it. “Umm, need to speak to the Upright Man, can you point me to him, or let him know I am here?”
“Never heard of such a thing. Now drink up, that’ll be five coppers. Then you can go back to your fancy bars.” The rich brown ale smelled crisp with a hint of apple.
While the Troll never gave anything away, the drunk slumped over his table nearby, distinctly looked into one of the corners. Letting my gaze pass quickly over the corner I saw just how obvious it was. Three tables in that corner, the ones on either end held a half-ogre and two humans each, they had weapons, lots of weapons. The table in the middle, a single human there, alternately kissing the barely dressed cat girl and bunny girl.
Taking my ale I walked over to the middle table, the bodyguards following my every move closely. An icon started flashing as I got near and I saw a dim red outline of some humanoid, I couldn’t see it in detail, but there was definitely someone hidden behind the Upright Man as I went to speak to him,
“Excuse me, I don’t mean to interrupt…” I started.
“Then don’t!” He interrupted me. Then he went back to kissing the Cat girl. The aroma of arousal thick in the air.
“I have a letter for you.”
“For me? Girls, get lost.” Both stood up, making it clear they had nothing on below their waists. Picking up their skirts from the floor they flounced off. Tearing my gaze from their cute butts I saw the Upright Man watching me.
“The letter is indeed for you, if you are the Upright Man of this town.”
“Me? I am just a respectable businessman having lunch.”
I looked around the room, pointedly noticing the exchange of coins for a necklace and goblet. Two men dueling with daggers. A cloaked and hooded figure with a skull mask accepting a sack of coins and a piece of parchment with a face drawn on it.
Looking back at the man. I raised one eyebrow and twitched my nose.
“Oh, alright. Maybe not so respectable, but it was a very good lunch until you got here. Sit and show me this letter.”
I handed the letter to him, then leaned back to sip at the amazingly good ale.
“I had heard of these three. I take it you were the cause of their demise?”
“They tried to kill and rob me, I took it poorly.” I smiled
He gestured and a shot glass of something green and chunky was set on the table next to my tankard.
“What is this?”
“I would really suggest you drink that sooner, rather than later.” He said.
“Why? What is it?” I lifted the glass and sniffed at it.
“The antidote to the poison in your ale.” He snickered.
I swallowed the shot, chunks and all.
“Dear Gods!” I snarled, “You poisoned the best Ale I have ever had! What kind of Monster are you!?” I slammed down the shotglass.
“One that is buying you a whole new, poison free one.”
“Well, then, all is forgiven. Do you regularly poison the patrons here? Must be bad for business to carry out all the bodies.”
“Oh, you wouldn’t have died of it. Just woken naked in some alley with no clue who or where you were.”
“Ah, the same thing those three did to me. Lethe. Except the alive part.”
“Really? My apologies then. I am glad you handled them before I met them. I may be a thief and murderer, but I have standards. You saved having to appease the one who sent them.”
You have lost favor with the guards of Yangsan -50, you are still distrusted.
You have gained favor with the thieves of Yangsan +150, you are now trusted.
“With the lack of decent pipe weed around here now, can I ask you to find me someone I can trust to run the farm?”
*ding*
You have been offered the quest – The Emperor’s Will – Thieves Aplenty
You must find a trusted surrogate to take over the Merrow farm. All the residents are unhappy that they have lost the source of their pipe weed.
Type – Story, Chain, Optional
Difficulty – Hard
Rewards – Status increases with all branches of the Thieves’ Guild, Citizens of Yangsan, Merchants of Yangsan, Halfling Nation.
Failure – Abandon the Quest: Loss of status with the above factions. OR Fail to find a trusted replacement to take over the farm within the time limit and lose status with all Thief factions.
Time Limit – One month
As I went to leave,
“By the way, you might want to get someone better at stealth to hide behind you, I had him spotted before I was close to the table.”
The thieves all spun to where I pointed, only to have the figure drop a smoke bomb and run. I decided to leave myself in the confusion.
Walking back to the School I was proud and happy.
Joy! I loved it when parallel quests asked for the same thing.
I was halfway back to the School when it hit me, now to satisfy the quests I didn’t need to just find any relative, now I needed one that the thieves could trust. Oh, bugger…
=-=-=-=-
“So, with the hangdog expression which trap did you fall for? The Magistrate? The Thieves’? Both?” Sifu chuckled a bit as my expression darkened.
“Both and worse. I may have pissed off the Guard Captain beyond repair.” Who would have guessed that such a refined and stately man could guffaw like that? “Go ahead, laugh. You’ve proven that I cannot be let out without adult supervision.”
Laughing too hard to speak, Master Lin rang a small table bell, then collapsed while holding his sides.
Then suddenly turning dour Master Lin spoke, “Time to rest. Your bag is already packed and your travel clothes laid out. Be ready to leave at first light.”
*Logout*