Chapter 90
A Race Ahead
“A race?” Erin asked, confused by what the two kobolds were talking about. “What do you mean by that?”
“It’s just as you heard. We will be having a little contest in the form of a race,” Zadar replied. “Three days from now, my crew will have everything prepared. If you guys win, you’ll get all of the equipment you want so badly.”
“...And if we lose?” the redhead asked.
“Your friend here will become my personal slave,” the green-scaled kobold said with a smile while pointing at Lexton with his thumb. “I’ll have him work for me and make enchanted equipment all the time.”
The others were shocked by this announcement, except Zeldana who was only mildly surprised. None of them had expected their friend to go so far in order for them to get the equipment they needed.
“Hang on! Is this really necessary!?” Erin asked. “Why the hell does he have to risk himself like that!?”
“Simple. It’s the only thing worth anything that you guys have,” Zadar answered. “You guys obviously have anywhere near enough money to satisfy me and I can tell just by looking at you that whatever equipment you have now isn’t worth much either. Having someone with such a rare skill working for free is a far better deal than any of you could ever come up with.”
“Does it have to be him, though?” Durge asked as he stepped up. “If you just want a new servant, I can offer myself for this bet.”
“Same here!” Ryle shouted. “There’s no need for Lex to offer himself!”
“Alright, before all of you get to do your heroic little declarations, let me just tell you why none of you are worth my attention,” Zadar said with a small sigh. “The redhead and the orc seem to be good fighters, but I’ve already got more than enough hired muscle with me. The elf appears to be a medic, which I’m not in the need of and she would probably drink me to bankruptcy.”
“Meh. That’s fair enough,” Zeldana said with a shrug.
“Don’t you have any self-respect?” Ryle asked with a glare.
“I’m just being honest,” the elf replied.
“Indeed you are,” Zadar said. “Now, the blonde here is an obvious no, as I have no need for clowns in my caravan. This is a merchant operation and not a traveling circus, after all.”
“Up yours, you green bastard!” Ryle yelled angrily at the green-scaled kobold.
“A word of advice, miss. Nobody likes a rude clown,” Zadar said with a chuckle. “As for the kitty boy over there…”
Upon the focus of the conversation getting turned towards Arkay, Ryle almost instinctively stepped between him and the green kobold. She had a fierce look on her face as she stood her ground, ready to protect the youngest member of their group from anything.
“...Judging by what little I’ve seen, he seems to have a talent for magic, but so what?” Zadar said. “I have far more skilled people in that field already working for me, so having some greenhorn magic user would only be a bother.”
“Wait a second!” Arkay called out. “I have-!”
“Arnie!” Lexton shouted while giving the cat boy a stern look. “He already said that he isn’t interested. Just leave it at that.”
Having been shut down like that, Arkay realized what the kobold was trying to do. He wanted to keep the cat boy’s technomancer abilities hidden from Zadar, most likely in order to protect him. While he didn’t like the idea of having his friend sacrifice himself for their sake, Arkay decided to respect his wishes, seeing how determined he was. Still, he wished there was something he could do to help.
“So the only thing that you see having any worth in our group is Lexton?” Erin asked as she glared at the green merchant. “And unless we agree to this demand, I’m guessing that we can forget about getting the tools we want?”
“That was very well figured out by you. Good job,” Zadar said mockingly as he even clapped his hands a bit. “This way, I can guarantee some level of entertainment from you lot and even some level of revenue. So how about it? Do we have a deal or not?”
“Yeah, we have a deal alright,” Ryle said with barely contained anger. “The deal is that you can go-”
“We accept your terms, like we already discussed,” Lexton said, cutting the blonde off. “Are we going to meet here three days later then?”
“Fantastic! I was afraid your friends here were going to stop the whole thing from happening! Glad to see that you have at least some guts, even if I do have to doubt your abilities in regards to business,” Zadar said happily. “And yes. Come here after three days. My crew will have everything prepared by then. I’d wish you luck, but I doubt that will do you any good.”
“No need for that. I’ve never bet on anything so worthless as luck. We are going to win through sheer skill alone,” the red-scaled kobold said as he walked up to his companions, ready to leave. “Also, it’s not that I have guts. I just don’t make bets that I can’t win. Unlike you.”
“...You are certainly confident,” the green kobold said, slightly annoyed by the manner he was being talked to. “I wonder how long will that last, though?”
With their deal completed, Erin’s group walked away from the caravan. With nothing else to do for the day, they decided to find an inn where to stay for the next few days.
However, this didn’t mean that they would be walking to the inn in silences.
“Lex, why the hell would you do something like that?” Erin asked, slightly angered by her friend’s actions. “Why do you insist on sacrificing yourself like this?”
“I only make deals with what I have,” Lexton replied. “I would never try to make a deal where any of you guys were up for offer. Since we didn’t have anything that Zadar wanted, I had no choice but to offer myself. It was the only way I could get him to agree to a deal.”
“You could have offered me. I’m sure he would have been interested in my abilities,” Arkay said in a sad tone. “I get that you don’t want to put us at risk, but you could have at least told us about your plan beforehand.”
“Like I said, I only offer what I have myself,” the kobold said. “I was not about to make you into a sacrificial lamb just for my own sake.”
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“That’s very admirable and all, but is this really necessary?” Durge asked. “I get that you can make all sorts of useful stuff with your equipment, but is it worth risking your life over?”
“While it would normally be a bit too much to take such a risk, you heard what Zadar said. Enchantment tools are very rare and valuable. Even if we do find some, I doubt we’ll have as good of a chance of getting them as we do now,” Lexton explained. “Fact is that we have to take this opportunity now or we might not get one anytime soon.”
“That might be the case, but I still don’t like this,” Erin said with a frown. “Do you think Zadar is actually going to compete fairly with us? He didn’t seem all that trustworthy…”
“Are you kidding me? Of course he isn’t,” the kobold said. “As a skilled con artist myself, I know when I’ve met a person of the same trade. That guy is going to use every dirty trick in his book in order to win.”
“Wait a second! You know he’s going to cheat!?” Ryle asked. “Then why the hell would agree on any kind of a deal with that guy!?”
“Simple. I’m not going to lose,” Lexton replied calmly. “Isn’t that obvious enough?”
“I’m going to guess that you have something planned, don’t you?” Zeldana asked with a smirk. “Whatever it is, I’m looking towards seeing it.”
“Thank you, Zeldana. Now let’s go find a place to stay. There are still some stuff we need to plan,” the kobold said, as the group went on to look for a place to stay for the night.
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Later that night, the group had settled at a motel. While not exactly in the best of shape, the room they got offered them a place to sleep for the next couple of nights. They were sitting at a table, talking about what they would do once their race against Zadar would happen.
“So what are the details of this race?” Durge asked. “Any idea as to how this will be done?”
“We are going to be using motorcycles for this contest,” Lexton answered. “There will also be a sidecar attached, so two of us are going to be taking part.”
“So I’m guessing the first question is, can any of us ride a motorcycle?” the orc asked. “Anybody got any experience in that field?”
Arkay simply shook his head while Zeldana shrugged. They were obviously out as viable choices for the contest.
“...I rode a bike once,” Ryle said. “Does that count?”
Her response was glares from Erin and Lexton.
“...I was just trying to help,” the blonde muttered.
“I personally haven’t ridden a motorcycle before, but I think I can-” Durge began to say, only for Lexton to cut him off.
“Sorry, Durge, but no,” the kobold said. “I’m going to need you for something else.”
“What would that be?” the orc asked with a raised eyebrow.
“I’m going to need you to stay back and keep an eye on things here, while the race is going on,” Lexton explained. “The course we are going through is going to end over at the same place we’ll be leaving from. Your job will be to look out in case Zadar and his cronies have decided to prepare something for us when we arrive.”
“Sounds reasonable enough,” Durge said after thinking it over. “I’ll do it.”
However, Erin picked up on something that the kobold had said that the others didn’t seem to catch on.
“Lex, what do you mean by “us”?” the redhead asked. “Have you already decided to take part in the race?”
“Yes. While I won’t be the one riding the motorcycle itself, I’ll be in the sidecar, reading the map,” Lexton replied. “I’d say it only makes sense, considering what we are doing this for.”
“You could have at least asked our opinion on this first,” Erin said with a frown. “I don’t like how you keep making all these big decisions without bringing them up to any of us first.”
“While I can see why you’re upset, you should realize it yourself that it’s the best option we have,” the kobold said with a sigh. “I’m going to need Durge to stay back on watch and I doubt Zeldana can be trusted to do a decent job at map reading.”
“Then what about me!? I can handle it!” Ryle boasted.
Lexton didn’t say anything in response to the blonde’s claims. Instead, he simply handed her a folded paper that she opened and looked over. A look of confusion appeared on her face, as she turned the paper around in an effort to grasp what she was looking at.
“Uhhh… Is this what they call art or something? I’ve never been one to get into that too much,” Ryle said while scratching her head in confusion. She then seemed to get an idea of some kind. “Oh! I get it now! This is actually a story of some kind! And these weird blobs here are the main characters and-!”
“That’s a map, you idiot,” Lexton said, cutting off the blonde’s ramblings. “It shows the layout of the nearby lands and other important details. Those “weird blobs” as you said are actually know nesting spots of monsters.”
Ryle’s face turned completely red out of embarrassment as she folded the map and handed it back to the kobold without saying a word.
“Now that we have settled the matter as to who will be in the sidecar, we still need to figure out our driver,” Lexton said as he put the map in his pocket. “Seeing as how everybody else is either not suitable or is needed elsewhere, it leaves only Erin. Do you think you can do it?”
The redhead was a bit surprised at being asked directly to take on such an important task, but thought about it. Truth be told, she did have a bit of experience when it came to riding motorcycles. Back in her world, when she had been fooling around with her original group of friends, she had taken part in all sorts of wild, dangerous and even illegal activities. One of these things happened to be midnight racing. While most of the time it had been done with cars, there were a couple of times she got to ride a motorcycle as well.
“I… have some experience, if only a little,” Erin said after thinking about it. “But do you think I’ll be able to handle it, considering I don’t have one of my hands?”
“No need to worry about that. It should still be possible,” Lexton replied. “You also don’t need to worry too much about the lack of experience either. I had a feeling that this would happen, so I asked Zadar to let us practice with some of their bikes during the time they’re preparing the course. You should be able to get familiar enough with the process to do it when the times comes.”
“If you say so,” the redhead said, still a bit unsure about the whole deal. “But aren’t we still at a disadvantage here? Not only is Zadar going to have the better rider, but he will surely plan the route to his advantage as well. I don’t want to seem too negative, but our chances don’t look all that good…”
“That’s where you’re wrong, my friend. While the things you said are true, you forget that we have something that will even the odds. Me,” the kobold said with a smirk. “Zadar might have his tricks, but I’ve got plenty myself. Speaking of tricks… Arnie, can I talk with you in private?”
“Huh? Ummm… Okay?” the cat boy said, unsure as to what Lexton could want to talk about with him.
As Lexton and Arkay walked out of the room to discuss things in private, Erin could only worry about what they had ahead of them. While winning would certainly bring some very enticing prices to them, the loss would be a heavy one. She only hoped that whatever Lexton was scheming would work.
During the next couple of days, Erin and Lexton went to Zadar’s caravan to practice handling a motorcycle a couple of times. The redhead was getting a hang on how the vehicle handled and how she could ride it by using her prosthetic hand. She managed to pick up on things fast and would be ready once the race was going to happen.
Ryle also went along with her two companions to the caravan. Mostly it was in order to provide protection in case any of Zadar’s underlings decided to try anything funny with them, but she also wanted to try riding a motorcycle herself. The blonde thought she could prove that she was just as suitable as a rider as Erin was. This was so that she could put herself in the face of the danger, so that at least one of her friends didn’t need to do so.
However, after she ended up crashing in less than five seconds, it was ultimately decided that she would sit back and let Erin and Lexton handle the race.
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Soon it was the time for the big race itself. Erin and her companions made their way to the caravan, where Zadar was waiting for them along with a couple of his bodyguards. The green kobold had a smile on his face that practically radiated confidence. He was certain of his victory.
“Glad to see you all finally arrive. I had a slight fear that you might have decided to run away,” Zadar said with in a smug tone. “Good to see that I can at least expect you all to stay true to your words, even if I doubt you’ll be much of a challenge.”
While Erin and some of the others felt their anger rise up at the green kobold’s taunt, it was Lexton who responded to his accusations in a very calm manner.
“A true businessman always holds up their end of the deal,” the red kobold said. “Not only that, but they make sure to come out on top as well. You might want to keep that in mind, after this is over.”
“Are you perhaps saying that I’m going to lose?” Zadar asked, slightly annoyed by such a remark.
“I’m just saying that you’re not a true businessman,” Lexton replied with a shrug. “I’m sure you can figure out the rest yourself.”
“That’s certainly an interesting claim. However, I do wonder what you’re basing that on? Especially, since the evidence seems to be telling a different story,” the green kobold boasted, although one could easily tell that he was getting angrier by the second. “You claim to be a true businessman, yet do you even have a fraction of what I have? I have an entire caravan underneath my control to gather more wealth, along with items most of you might only be lucky to see once in your lifetimes! Tell me now which one of us is the true businessman?”
“Please… Flaunting whatever wealth you have is something any idiot can do,” the red kobold said with a sigh. “It shows your lack of class. Nothing else.”
image [https://i.ibb.co/4Kr9Gdy/Ch-90-Pic-1.jpg]
Erin and the others were completely taken aback by the way Lexton was speaking to Zadar. They knew that he could be aggressive and hostile, but they would have never expected him to do so with someone potentially dangerous like this. They could only stare in stunned silence as Zadar seemed to be seething, while Lexton stood in complete calmness. Everyone in the group could feel the temperature around them drop from the sheer animosity between the two kobolds.
“...Whatever! This type of banter matters very little to me!” Zadar suddenly exclaimed. “Let’s just get down to the actual business we’re all here for and stop wasting time!”
“A bit too clunky of a save on your part, but I do agree,” Lexton said. “We should stop wasting time already and get to business.”
As they all began to move deeper into the area where the caravan was situated, Erin walked up to the red kobold to whisper to him.
“Lex, are you sure about angering him?” the redhead asked in a whisper. “No matter how you mau feel about him, we are still in their territory and could get attacked at any moment! Don’t you think it would be in our best interest to not antagonize him too much?”
“This guy is nothing but an amateur. There’s no need to worry,” Lexton answered. “Just focus on the race ahead of us.”
Seeing as there was no getting through to the red kobold, Erin decided to let it go. She could only hope that her fears were unwarranted and that Lexton was right about them not needing to worry.