003 - TOWARD THE EDGE OF THE OLD WORLD
Conrad stared after Karina as she walked away, rejoining her adventuring band as they continued down the road toward Edge. Behind them, in the homestead, the result of the battle with the lizardkin was left to the homesteaders to clean up. There had been dozens of them, and more than a couple Maulers mixed among the scattered lesser types.
It was with more resentment than he had ever felt toward the work of a homesteader that he gripped his mop. He should be carrying a sword, he should be going after Karina and leaving this kind of work to the homesteaders, like his grandfather had done before he lost his leg. There was no XP, no progression in cleaning up the aftermath of battle and helping his neighbors to fix fences and gardens.
He slapped the wet mop onto the floor, the thrill of his first kill with the rush of victory, relief, and experience still lingering on his consciousness as he resigned himself to the drudgery of his position.
Lost in bitterness and fantasy, he hardly noticed when his grandfather sidled up to stare out the window at the aftermath of the fight.
“It ain’t normal,” the old man said.
Thinking of how late he’d be working burying the dead monsters and putting the place back together Conrad replied bitterly, “This is exactly normal.”
His grandfather slapped him on the arm and pointed out the window, "You don't see it, do you? Look with your eyes. Those aren't rock dogs, forest imps, spiders, or any of the creatures we're used to seeing around here. Those're lizardkin.”
“We’ve seen them before,” Conrad said, not sure what the man was getting it, “They’re the most common monsters in the Warren Dungeon, not exactly that weird to see out here.”
The old man shook his head, “One or two, maybe, but a full day out from the Node and the dungeon? This feels different. Could be an expulsion if the Warren has leveled up but just look at them! Something has changed at the dungeon, something is going on.”
His grandfather had a point. Monster attacks were mostly due to the homestead expanding. Chaos’s way of fighting the incursions of Order. They could also simply be chance.
But they were never this intense, not here. Not to mention the uniformity of the group of lizardkin. Something about humanity, about Children of Order, made even the ferocious creatures of Chaos work together when they happened to all end up in the same place. Monsters that would tear each other apart out in the Chaos Lands would forget old enmity and focus entirely on people, making for diverse groups of creatures of all kinds working with the common goal of slaughtering men.
But in these numbers? And only lizardkin? Yeah, the old man had a point to be sure.
He shrugged, “Doesn’t matter. Doesn’t change anything about what I’ll be doing about all this.”
“Yeah,” his grandfather said, scratching his beard, “We’ll see about that.”
He clapped Conrad on the shoulder and hobbled back deeper into the shop calling, “Bridgitte!”
His mother emerged from a store room with a few fresh panes of glass for fixing the window, “What is it?”
“We need to know what’s going on,” he said, and went into his suspicions about the monsters.
“That’s a strange way to offer your help fixing the window,” his mother said dryly.
"After this attack, the whole homestead'll be working to put the place back together for the better part of the next week - but what if this isn't the end?" Conrad's grandfather reasoned, "And what if we're not so lucky next time?"
“We improve our protections. Same as we’ve always done,” his mother said, matter of fact.
The old man sighed and rubbed his temples, “Bridgitte, that was a lesser lizardkin that broke off the iron shutter. Did you see the Mauler? One of those things could tear off the door. We’ve never seen creatures that strong out here. I know! There was a time when-”
“Oh, please. Not another tall tale from Toran the Bladesman!” his mother said, rolling her eyes.
Conrad went back to mopping. Whenever his mother started calling his grandfather by his name and class, she was done listening.
“Chaos take you, Bridgitte! This is REALITY!”
Conrad stopped again, and so did his mother, both of them stunned at the curse.
“You’re ignorant!" his grandfather yelled, voice once again that of the adventurer, "You know nothing of fighting and so you see this woman Berserker kill a Mauler and you think 'couldn't have been that tough!' You look out at the aftermath out there and feel safe, forgetting entirely that those corpses were put there by men and women who have dedicated their lives to the purpose! And none of them even live here!
“You act like it was something we did, rather than the charity of strangers that kept us alive! And listen close, Bridgitte, and let my missing fucking leg be proof enough of what I’m about to tell you. Conrad handled himself well enough against the lesser one, but against a Mauler? He's out-armored, overpowered, and there’s nobody here to back him up. Who's going to have his back when no adventurers are passing through our homestead? You? Me? If that woman hadn't killed it when she did, if it had gotten in here, your ignorant, wishful hope that you can live as a non-combatant in a world as violent as this would have gotten one or all of us killed!"
The shop was silent. This same fight had happened dozens of times in the past, but never with this level of fervor, and for the first time, the reality of their situation was lending strength to his grandfather’s reasoning. It had been a close call, and his mother knew it.
“I’m not asking you to turn Conrad into a killing machine. What we’ve been doing has worked well enough so far, but we need to be prepared for the day that it doesn’t. And that starts with finding out what's going on with the Warren Dungeon, and why such a huge group of lizardkin is out here in the first place."
This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.
“Okay,” his mother said, voice small.
“What?”
“I said okay,” she repeated.
The fervor suddenly left the retired adventurer. Conrad had seen the two of them go at this fight for hours before, and to see his mother capitulate so quickly was a shock to both of them.
But the old man recovered, “Ahem. Okay then. First thing we need to do is send Conrad to Edge for news. I know you’ll say we should wait for adventurers to travel back this way, but it could be a week or longer before we see anybody, traffic flows into Edge but adventurers tend to stick around and run the dungeon."
His mother closed her eyes a moment and then nodded.
Conrad shared a look with his grandfather, both of them utterly disbelieving, and that exchange seemed to embolden his mother at least a little bit.
“We have other errands for him to run while he’s there,” she said, “Some additional supplies, we’re running low on field armor repair kits, some potions… I’ll draw up a list.”
His grandfather nodded, “Right, yes. Edge isn’t exactly close, no point sending him for a single thing.”
Bridgitte set about making a list of what would be needed and Conrad moved to his grandfather and whispered, “This is wild.”
“Once in a lifetime,” the old man said, “don’t waste it.”
“What do you mean?” Conrad asked.
“You’ll be gone at least two days, probably three or four with all the haggling you’ll be doing. Who’s to say it isn’t a week or two?”
Conrad thought of the possibility of being away from the shop for a week or longer. He had never had that kind of time since coming out here. There was always work to do around a homestead.
His grandfather continued, “Spend some time at the guild, see if anybody will train you a bit. Wander the wilderness a little and earn some more experience. Maybe even join a fresh band going into the first level of the Warren. You’ve got the grit, the spark that could make you a true adventurer.”
"You think so?" Conrad asked.
“I don’t want to inflate your ego too much, and that fight of yours was a mess, but the way you turned it around… you can’t teach that. What I’ve shown you is enough to handle yourself but it’s all only so much theory if you can’t get out there and experience the real thing.”
“Maybe Karina’s group would take me on,” Conrad ventured.
“Doubt it,” the old man said, “The way she handled that Mauler says they’re not new to the job. Old hands rarely have the time to mentor a new person. But a fresh crop just sticking to the early levels? That’s the sweet spot for you.”
It was good sense, but whether or not Karina’s band would take him on was irrelevant. He had to see what was behind that woman’s invitation.
With the prospect of taking a solo trip into Edge, and all the accompanying dangers and excitement of venturing alone into the Chaos Lands ahead of him, it was good he had so much to do before he managed to get to sleep. Once they saw to the repairs of the iron shutters he was kept busy with helping the rest of their neighbors with the long labor of cleanup. The few adventurers who had decided to bed down for the night in spare rooms took on the duty of keeping watch while the homesteaders worked late removing bodies, fixing defenses, and tending to the men and women who had been injured during the day's fighting.
Well past sundown, exhausted, Conrad groggily cleaned himself up before dropping into a dreamless sleep.
He woke, too soon, to his grandfather hobbling into his room, lantern in hand.
“Sun’s going to be up soon. Time to move if you want to make it to Edge by sundown,” the old man said. He was carrying a package under one arm.
“What’s that?” Conrad said as he rubbed sleep from his eyes and sat up.
His grandfather dropped the package to the ground with a heavy thud and metallic clinking, “Your mother thought it’d be fun to wrap it up. Get geared up.”
A few minutes later Conrad emerged from his room dressed and kitted for his journey. He wore the same steel chainmail he had the day before, but now accompanied it with hard leather greaves and vambraces, both strapped with thin steel bars for additional protection. His usual sword and shield were waiting for him, and now he wore a set of leather load-carrying straps which included a scabbard for his sword and hook for his shield over his shoulder.
He wished he had the inventory ability for carrying some of this, but it wasn't available to tier-one non-combat classes, so he would have to carry his gear the old-fashioned way and hire some help to bring back what he picked up in Edge.
All of these and other expenses were accounted for in the sack of gold his mother handed him along with a satchel with water and a few meals worth of food.
“Heavy load,” Conrad said.
“Quit complaining,” his grandfather replied, “About time you had some proper practice rucking with a full kit. Your strength and endurance stats should compensate by the time you’re back and you’ll barely notice it.”
His mother fussed over his fit, tightening a strap here and adjusting his load there, but when it came time to send him off his grandfather gave her a stern look and she nodded, saying only, “We’ll see you when you get back. Be safe.”
He hugged her, shook his grandfather’s hand, and headed out just as the sun peeked over the horizon.
Their homestead was situated a day’s journey south of the mountain city of Edge, just before the foothills began. One could just barely make out the homestead in the distance from the vantage point of the city’s walls, but it was the verticality that made the distance seem much longer. Going up was always harder than simply walking.
Still, the journey was uneventful enough, if tiring. Conrad made several stops at springs or to clip berries from bushes near the path. It was a road he knew fairly well, which was an advantage that most adventurers didn't have and so the places he knew to stop were, for the most part, unspoiled.
He spotted a rock dog stalking him, but unsheathing his sword was enough to send the beast running. The road could be dangerous so homesteaders, and adventurers for that matter, tended to travel in groups, but it made for slower going and some argued that it was the speed and noise of the groups that drew more creatures. A single man or woman didn't have nearly the same amount of trouble. But if they did, they were less prepared to handle it.
The day ran on and the road grew steeper and Conrad noted a few gains in his stats as his grandfather had predicted, the notification - a direct message from Order about his progression along the path - briefly obscured a corner of his vision:
Status Modification
Strength: +1
Endurance + 1
He felt the change almost immediately. Where before he had been nearing exhaustion and contemplating taking another break to eat the last of the meals he had prepared, he now felt he could continue another few miles in relative comfort.
As the sun began to set, the shadows of the mountains and trees grew long and the sky purpled just as the red walls of Edge came into view.
The city was huge by the standard of the homestead, home to more than ten thousand people. It was built almost entirely of brickwork made by mixing the iron-rich rock of the mountain with a particular clay common in the area - Conrad wasn't sure of the details - but the result was of a rusty red stack of blocks situated on every available horizontal surface the mountain could provide, and more than a few cut from it specifically for the purpose.
The city had a wall that filled every gap facing the rough lands around it, but it was more for regulating who came and went, leaving it almost ceremonial where Chaos was concerned. The real protection of the city was evident as Conrad crossed it and a sense of rightness, peace, and calm washed over him as he crossed the border of the protective Node of Order that kept out the monsters that roamed the Chaos Lands.
He had arrived.