Nick the guard guided Pete the Pizzaman to the Greenlake general goods store. They stopped outside, and Nick said. “I hope you find all the ingredients you need, son. Don’t forget that you owe me a pizza with all the meats on it.”
“As soon as I can track down the ingredients to make one, you’ll be the first to try it.” Pete agreed.
“Very good,” Nick smiled, patting Pete on the shoulder. “Have a nice day. Stay out of trouble.”
“Right,” Pete told him. “I promise to stay out of trouble. Thanks for your help.”
The guard nodded, rotated on his heel, and marched away.
Before Pete went into the general goods store, he decided he should check his inventory page. Before he did, he glanced left and right to make sure the street was clear. Then he willed it to open, and it responded, and he looked at it. His inventory included 13 tomatoes, a red gel pen, a black gel pen, a receipt from the last time he filled up his car with gas, a cell phone, 74 dollars, 28 cents, and 100 len.
Then he opened his job skills page. In the top left corner, the page read Pizzaman Job - Novice Skill Tree. In the top right, he saw he had 12 job points to allocate. The tree consisted of a single triangle in the center of the page. The word Pizzaman was in the triangle. From the triangle, three lines sprouted at the points, one going straight up, and two angled down and to the sides.
When he focused on the triangle, a prompt appeared:
Unlock Pizzaman Novice Skill Tree. Cost to unlock: 4 job points. Do you wish to Unlock Pizzaman Novice Skill Tree?
“Yes,” he told the prompt with his mind.
Skill tree unlocked.
A circle appeared, connected to the triangle by the line pointing up. The word Fire appeared inside the circle. When he focused on the word, a description appeared:
Summon a small cooking flame. Spell Cost 1 MP. Cost to unlock: 3 job points. Do you wish to unlock Fire?
“No,” he told the prompt. He wanted to look at his other options before he made any other choices.
A pentagon connected to the line going down and to the right. Heat Resist appeared inside the pentagon. He focused on the words and read the corresponding prompt:
Grants a permanent 20% heat resistance to survive hours by the oven. Cost to unlock: 3 job points. Do you wish to unlock Heat Resist?
That was amazing. He’d spent many summer nights by a hot oven. Plus, being 20% resistant to heat would come in handy if he ever faced a fire breathing dragon. Not to mention, it was a permanent resistance. He didn’t have to cast it or use it as some unique ability. Even so, he still had one more option to evaluate before he made any choices. “No,” he closed the prompt.
The line going down and to the left connected to a square with the words, ‘Steel Hands,’ inside it. He opened its corresponding prompt:
Use ability Steel Hands to double your slapping proficiency for thirty seconds. Slap perfect pizza dough every time. Cooldown sixty seconds. Cost to unlock three job points. Do you wish to unlock Steel Hands?
Pete paused to consider. The cost to unlock all three abilities was nine job points, but he only had eight left. He’d have to pick two of them. Lucky for him, it wasn’t a tough decision. He reopened Fire, selecting to unlock it. When he did, a line extended up from the Fire ability, connecting to a new circle. Milk to Cheese appeared inside the new circle. The ability allowed him to turn a quart of milk into a block of cheese for one MP. It would cost his remaining five job points to unlock it. He considered it, but only for a moment. He closed the milk to cheese prompt.
Then he opened Heat Resist, allocating three points into the skill. As had happened before, a new line extended from the skill. At the end of the line, a pentagon appeared. The Pentagon offered the ability Cut Resist.
In his years at Pizza Place, he’d cut his hands on the pizza cutters and some prep knives, so he understood where the skill could be useful.
Though, Cut Resist was not as impressive as the other skill that had appeared. When he learned Heat Resist, simultaneously forming lines extended from Fire and Heat Resist, meeting to form a circle. The Circle read, ‘Strong Fire.’ It was a more robust version of the spell he’d already learned. It also cost more MP to use.
He sighed, knowing he wouldn’t make any more job point purchases and closed the job skill menu. Then he looked up at the General Store in front of him.
Varnished logs formed its natural exterior walls. Its entrance came in the form of a tall, green door made from tin. The green matched the shingles of its roof. Pete pushed on the door and stepped inside.
Three rows of shelves ran the length of the store, dividing it into four aisles. Where the shelves held food and drinks, rope and other supplies hung along the walls. A checkout clerk—a dwarf with a dark beard and big brown eyes—sat behind the counter to the right. Pete tipped his hat to the clerk as he entered in.
“Let me guess.” The clerk smiled at him. “you need some string to fix your shirt?”
Pete glanced down at the hole in his shirt that the tomato plant monster had caused. He’d almost forgot about the hole. Even so, the tear didn’t bother him. He’d need to upgrade to something that protected him better than simple cloth, and the sooner he did, the better.
“Actually,” Pete told the clerk. “I need whatever you have of the following: a pizza cutter, a pizza fork, a pizza peel, cheese, and pizza dough.”
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“I have cheese.” Clerk wrinkled his nose and pointed his lips to the side. “I don’t know what those other things are.”
“I’ll take the cheese then,” Pete answered. “Where in town would I find cooking tools?”
The Dwarf thought before responding. “Joey will have those.”
“Who’s Joey?” Pete asked.
“He’s the smith.”
“What about a wooden dowel? One about four feet long?” Pete was beginning to realize the general store was far from the supercenter chain stores he’d experienced back home.
“Carpenter’ll have those.” The Clerk shrugged. “Do you want me to grab you the cheese, though?”
“Yes,” Pete nodded. “Thank you so much. How much is that by the way?”
“Five len a block.” The clerk told him.
“Could you please get me five?” At that moment, Pete came to a horrifying realization. He didn’t know how to get to his money. Sure, he had the United States money in his pocket, but the len transferred direct to his inventory. He wasn’t sure how to access it. How could he buy something when he couldn’t reach his money? Something told him the Dwarf would not accept Earth money.
“Five blocks of cheese,” The Dwarf repeated. “Sure thing.”
The clerk returned to his spot behind the counter, placing a bag with cheese on the counter, and a prompt appeared:
Transfer five blocks of cheese to inventory for 25 len?
Pete sighed, realizing he’d been worrying for nothing. Spending money in Round was even easier than spending it on Earth. On Round, he didn’t even have to dig for his wallet.
When Pete selected yes, the cheese blinked out of existence from atop the counter, and Pete checked his inventory. Sure enough, it had five blocks of cheese and twenty-five less len. As he closed his inventory, a prompt appeared:
You have acquired 5 blocks of cheese. 2/6 ingredients needed for quest Gathering Ingredients. Gather the remaining ingredients to complete the quest.
Pete bid farewell to the clerk and made his way through town until he came to the smith. Unlike the general goods store, the smith’s workstation was outside. The station was a fire next to an anvil. The smith sat there and used a pair of tongs in his left hand to hold a narrow piece of glowing red metal against the anvil.
With his right hand, he beat a hammer against the metal to shape it. Then he’d lift the metal with the tongs and dip it in cold water. When the hot metal touched the water, the water hissed like a snake, sending steam into the air. After a few cycles of this, the smith spoke, “Are you going to stand there all day and watch me?” He had a Scottish accent. “Or are you going to tell me what you need?”
“Sorry about that,” Pete told him, stepping forward. “I didn’t mean to lurk, but I didn’t want to interrupt your work.”
“I can work and talk.” The Smith answered. “What do you need?”
“It’s something specific. I’m not sure you’ve made something like it before. Do you know what a peel is? Or a pizza fork?”
“I’m not familiar with a pizza fork,” He continued to hammer. “Tell me more about it.”
“The pizza fork has a head that is a two-pronged fork, curved at a slight angle in one direction. Each prong is about the same length as a finger.” Pete curved his pointer and middle finger to imitate the shape. “You take that head and put it on a long dowel.”
“Sounds simple enough.” The smith used the tongs to dip his current project in water, creating more steam. “You need me to make the metal forkhead part?”
“I do.” Pete nodded. “And I need the peel, too.”
“Is it a simple bread peel?” The smith put down his tools and the metal on which he worked, and he stretched. “A wide piece of metal with a handle that bakers use to pull bread out from the oven?”
“That’s it.” Pete nodded, holding up his hands about sixteen inches apart. He would have said sixteen inches, but he wasn’t sure what units of measurement people used in Round. “I need one with an arm length handle and a head that is about this wide and long.”
“I can make those things.” The smith said.
“I’ll need one more thing, too.” Pete knew he’d have a difficult time explaining what a pizza cutter looked like and how it functioned. He had a way to work around that, though. “But I need to show you a picture of it.”
“A picture?” The dwarf smiled. “I do love pictures. My mom was a painter.”
“It isn’t quite a painting,” Pete explained, removing his phone from his pocket and checking its battery. It still had a 70% charge. “This is a magic box. I need to show you…”
“That isn’t magic.” The smith cut him off. “That is a communication box. I have one myself.” The dwarf reached into his pocket, removing a smartphone.
“Oh,” Pete hesitated, surprised at the development. “Everyone in Greenlake has communication boxes?”
The smith laughed, “you are a strange one. Show me your picture.”
Pete opened his photos and showed the smith an image of the pizza cutter, explaining how it worked.
“I can make that, too.” The smith explained. “For everything you need, it’ll cost 50 len. On the peel and cutter, I’ll wrap their handles with a rubber grip, so you don’t get burned while using them.” The smith cast Pete a questioning glance. A glance that asked, you do have enough to pay, right?
Pete did have enough to pay but paying 50 len would bring his total money down to 25. Would 25 len be enough to buy dough from the baker and a shaft for the fork from the carpenter? He’d have to worry about that bridge when he got to it. “I have enough to pay,” Pete confirmed.
“Good,” The smith smiled. “I’ll have your commission done in 30 minutes. You can wait in the corner or come back after it’s done.”
Pete chose to wait in the corner.
The smith only needed twenty minutes to finish. When he handed Pete the items and Pete chose to buy them, new prompts appeared:
You have acquired a pizza peel 3/6 ingredients needed for quest Gathering Ingredients. Gather the remaining ingredients to complete the quest.
You have acquired a pizza cutter. 4/6 ingredients needed for quest Gathering Ingredients. Gather the remaining ingredients to complete the quest.
Ten minutes after that, Pete arrived at the carpenter. The carpenter’s shop was much like the general store. Though, it was a more expansive building with a tin door, shelves forming aisles, filled with things to buy.
Unlike the general store, the carpenter’s shop had no one at its counter. While Pete searched for someone to help him, he examined some of the things in the store.
There were wooden snakes and other animals that swayed with realistic movements. They had a thin piece of wood down their center, rounded pieces of wood glued to it on each side. He saw small carvings of animals and flowers. All of it looked so real.
“Can I help you?” A woman’s voice pulled him away from his browsing.
He looked at the woman, and her beauty caused his IQ to drop twenty points. He never was good at talking to someone who he found pretty. She was a tall elf in green leather armor that fit her slim figure. Her pointed ears stuck out through braided blond hair, hair that hung down to her waist. Unable to answer her question, he stared.
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“Can I help you?” She repeated.
“Help,” He pulled himself back together. “Right, yes, help, you can help. Help would be good.”
“Okay?” She squinted her emerald eyes together in confusion, forcing a smile to her red lips. “How can I help you?””
“Umm…one second,” he wasn’t sure how to remove the pizza forkhead from his inventory. To hide his ignorance, he put his hand behind his back and willed the item into his hand. He hoped it would work, and it did. The second he desired for the item to appear, it popped into existence. He held it out in front of himself. “I need you to affix this to a rod. It needs to be longer than my leg but not longer than I am tall.”
She reached out with a natural grace, plucking the forkhead from his hand and examining it. “That’s an interesting request. What is it for?”
“I’m a pizzaman,” Pete began, “which means it is my job to make a food called pizza. When pizza cooks, it has a layer of cheese over the top. The Cheese is prone to bubble which can cause the dough to cook more in those spots. It can even burn the cheese. I am going to use the fork to reach into the oven and pop the bubbles. That way, they won’t ruin the food.”
“Seems simple enough,” she stepped past him, patting him on the head as she did. “You be a good boy and wait here. I’ll be right back.”
His brain went blank for a few seconds. Wait… Did she pat his head like he was a dog? He blushed, unsure of how to respond. By the time he’d come to his senses, she was already gone. He didn’t even see where she went.
“Here you go.” Her voice sounded close behind him, causing him to jump. “That’ll be 20 len.”
Then he thought about what she had said…20 len… His eyes widened. That meant he only had 5 len left, and he still needed to get the dough. In the end, he understood he didn’t have room to argue, so he made the purchase:
You have acquired a pizza fork. 5/6 ingredients needed for quest Gathering Ingredients. Gather the remaining ingredient to complete the quest.