“This… prison you have designed. Can you trust that it will hold him?”
“No, but it need only buy us time.”
The Ruined City of Araedi. Day 02.
A soft boom and the shaking of the bakery’s foundation jolted Weaver awake. Breathing quickly, he looked around.
Nothing was on fire and Sinnamon’s breath was still the even slowness of deep sleep. Given that there was apparently no big emergency, he let her sleep.
Weaver folded his half the blanket over Sinnamon—not that there was much left to fold, she had stolen most of it in her sleep.
Closing the door softly behind him, Weaver started for the stairs, but stopped as the scent of smoke wafted through the cracks around the door labeled “Gavriel’s Lab”. Weaver knocked on the door lightly before pushing it open.
“Is everything alright in here? I heard a boom and I smelled smoke.”
“Weaver? Come in! Come in!” Gavriel was coughing lightly and his face had a fine layer of soot all over it. “I didn’t wake you, did I?”
“Nah, I was already up.” Weaver glanced at the contraption in front of Gavriel. It was a large, rectangular metal box about the size of a small refrigerator. He recognized the device as a smaller version of the dishwasher in the kitchen. “What happened to it?”
Gavriel wiped his face with his apron. “I was trying to work out a way to speed up the drying time for the dishes after they’re washed. I used a hammer on a rotating assembly to strike the firestone at regular intervals to keep the heat going. I think my timing was a little too fast. Come take a look if you'd like.”
Weaver stuck his head inside and saw the timing mechanism Gavriel was referring to. On the ceiling of the box, a mess of clockwork and a dangling broken chain were the only remains. The whole unit had a faint glow to it that made Weaver’s brain itch.
“I think… I think the timing’s fine. Hot air rises, right? Since this is at the top of the dishwasher, could the heat be building up and causing a runaway reaction with the firestone?”
Where had that insight come from?
Gavriel scratched his beard. “Yes! Yes, I believe you’re right! Ah, I’m a fool! Moving it to the bottom would require a complete redesign, though. I put it at the top to make changing out firestone crystals easier.”
“Or you could add another gear with fan blades on it and some metal sheeting here and here to direct the airflow throughout the chamber.” Weaver traced the path of the hypothetical vents.
It took the older man a second to follow what Weaver was saying, but he smiled happily when he caught on. “That would definitely work!"
The two began sketching out mock designs and began a healthy banter over the best shape for the blades and position of the vents.
The smell of something sweet filled the air and Gavriel set down his tools.
“Smells like Yen’s making breakfast. We should head up.”
Weaver’s stomach growled. This new Berserker body had a far greater appetite than his earth one and right now he was ravenous. “Sounds great to me.”
As he and Gavriel walked towards the doorway, Weaver noticed a metal wardrobe left partially open. He stopped to look inside and saw two sets of impressive looking armor. Both were made of identical maroon leathers, though one had a bow and quiver of arrows beside it while the other was covered in holsters for daggers that hung behind the armor. On the left shoulder of each was a small golden patch that looked like an eye with two lines below it and one line above it. The insignia looked familiar, but Weaver’s still-sleepy mind couldn’t quite place where he had seen it before.
The armor had the distinct iridescent glow, a purplish red in this case, of enchanted equipment. Weaver couldn’t view the enchantments, they didn’t seem to generate a prompt in front of his face like other enchanted equipment. Strange.
“Nice armor.”
Gavriel paused in his steps and looked back to Weaver.
“Yentel and I used to belong to the adventurers guild. That was a lifetime ago, I keep the armor as a memento from those days. Though I really shouldn’t keep them in here when I do experiments with firestone. I don’t think it’ll hurt the armor, but they are really old.” Gavriel closed the cabinet and set the latch on it.
Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.
“You two used to be adventurers? I’m not sure I can imagine you or Yentel wearing that!”
“I’m a hundred and seventy-three. That’s hardly old for a half-serethi. I’ve probably got another seventy or eighty years left in me.” Gavriel feigned indignation, then jokingly said, “Okay, maybe I am old, but I could still wear that armor if I had to. Maybe even go toe to toe with you, eh?”
Weaver put up his hands in mock surrender and the two shared a laugh.
“I think you’ll find most of us older folk have gear collecting dust with similar stories. It was a much more dangerous world before you Guardians showed up. More monsters. More chances for men to do evil to one another. It’s because of you that Yen and I were able to lay down our weapons and open this bakery. We owe all the Guardians a great thanks.”
“My world isn't so different. We don't really have monsters like this one, but men do evil things there.” Weaver took one last look at the wardrobe and followed Gavriel up stairs. It definitely hadn't been an accident for him and every player to be brought here. It had been a long effort in the making and they had gone to great lengths in both worlds.
But why? Why the people of earth? Whatever magic they used had the ability to grant immense power to him and every other player. Why use it on them and not the people of this world?
Weaver couldn’t figure out an answer to his question, but he might as well do some good with his powers until he did. But his current build wasn’t really optimized for a group effort, it was more geared towards solo play. The Gladiator subclass was fine for a warrior who occasionally did quests with a party, but he had a feeling he was going to be doing more of the latter than the former.
One of the changes to the class system was the introduction of professions. Scrolling through the selection, he saw it basically worked the same as subclasses. The list of available professions wasn’t exhaustive, instead, it only included those he met the requirements for. Even so, it was a rather long list.
As he looked at the list of potential professions, however, a thought occurred to him. Introducing earth’s technology to this world might not be such a good idea. Even helping Gavriel with his dishwasher might have unintended consequences later on.
But there would be no doubt that others from earth weren't capitalizing on the discrepancy between the tech levels of earth and gaea. It would only be a matter of time before someone created a modern rifle, or a nuke, or a blend of magic and technology neither world could have conceived of.
It was an inevitability and so someone would have to act to balance against the potential threat of earth tech. Weaver knew which side of that scale he was going to tip. Weaver made his profession Tinkerer.
Yentel had two plates of fluffy pancakes covered in brown sugar and syrup waiting in the kitchen when Gavriel and Weaver finally came out of the lab. Gavriel and Weaver each took one. Weaver went down to the room they'd been given and saw Sinnamon was still asleep. Deciding not to wake her, he returned upstairs and went into the dining room while Gavriel returned to his lab.
There was a small library, more a single shelf stuffed with books of various sizes and thicknesses, tucked in an alcove. Weaver grabbed a book at random, A Scientific Treatise on Mages, Volume One, and opened to the first page. The name was a mouthful, but the book itself was fairly easy to follow, much like his intro to engineering textbooks.
Weaver took the book to the booth he and Sinnamon usually sat at and began reading. He wanted to learn more about this world. Something as fundamental as whatever magic system everything ran under was as good a place as any other to begin.
“One of my favorites. I knew Loraina Grimli back when she was working on this. She was a renowned scholar dedicated to the study of mana.” Yentel appeared beside Weaver, holding a covered plate. “Unfortunately, she let herself be consumed by her research. She took a team of adventurers west, trying to see if it was possible to break beyond the fourth rank of mage. She and her party were never heard from, presumed dead.”
“What do you mean by four ranks?” Weaver asked.
Yentel began explaining the magic system. There were four ranks of mage; Initiate, Apprentice, Adept, and Master. It took some back and forth, and Weaver understood it to mean the range of levels one through forty that almost all the NPCs fell under. The notable exception were the city-states’ Royal Knights, whose enchanted armor allowed them to temporarily exceed the fourth rank. The armor didn’t work beyond the magic barriers and took a physical and mental toll on the armor’s wearer, leaving it usually only reserved for existential threats like quarreling Guardians on the steps of the city’s guild hall.
Apparently the Royal Knights, night spawns, and Guardians were the only examples of beings achieving higher ranks.
“Do you think Loraina Grimli was right? Do you think it’s possible for you to reach the same rank as me?” Weaver asked.
Yentel scratched her head in thought. “There were legends of higher ranks in the past. Adventurers have been chasing those legends for centuries. But those are just that, legends. I suppose if there are three well known exceptions to the rule, it must be a pretty bad rule. At least that’s what many believe.”
“Did you believe that when you were an adventurer? Gavriel showed me your armor. Told me you used to be an adventurer.”
“He did, did he?” Yentel asked with amusement in her tone. “We weren’t the dungeon diving type. We were hired escorts, mostly. And the occasional goblin slaying type. Though I guess I would say yes, it’s possible.”
The weapons both sets of armor were outfitted with definitely leant towards more clandestine uses than simple escorting. But Weaver didn't bring that up. Yentel and Gavriel were entitled to their secrets. Or maybe she was telling the truth. They had offered their home freely to Weaver and Sinnamon, the older couple didn't really come off as the skulking around type.
Yentel left Weaver to the book and he read through the pages while taking several bites of his pancakes. As he ate, he tried to remember where he had seen that symbol before.