They reached the city in the last of the light. Dorianna absorbed her familiar again, he had literally melted into ink on her arm and absorbed into the skin and formed his regular tattoo form, swimming around in her skin.
They paid the docking fee for the regular pleasure yacht marina and settled the Serenity in place. It looked at home amongst the other luxury vehicles, its deep blue crystal emitting a light all around it to illuminate the dock and the water surrounding. Teddy had extended the top cover to give them a measure of privacy on the top deck from the tall ships all around them but the front deck would still be open.
They had dinner together on the middle deck, surrounded by the decor Kyra had picked out all around them. Pride of place was an item from Firenze, the gold ranker who they had met at Shawnahakswee lake. He had disgraced himself by hitting on Kyra in front of Teddy and had cut off his own beard (which they had in storage somewhere for some reason), after this he had explained the tradition of giving his ceremonial dagger to them in penance. Which meant that he needed another, which he could only get from his people, which meant that he had to explain what he had done, which meant that he was held to account for his behaviour. The team had thought that this was a good reminder of accountability so had the dagger mounted and placed on the wall in the dining area.
Dory had never left Honshuraskil and was trepidatious about the next morning. The girls promised to break her in easy, clothes shopping first, then creature comforts then magical gear and items the next day.
“It’s awkward to say, you’ve given me so much. I haven’t paid for any of the food or board since I joined you.”
“Don’t be silly.” Kyra admonished her gently. “You’ve been our guest. As for paying for anything in the city we’ll front you the money. Then it’s in our interest to train you up so you can pay it back!”
Dory started to well up. She wasn’t normally much of a cryer but the sheer amount of changes was still overwhelming. Lucy was sitting opposite her at the table and flicked a pea with unerring accuracy and it bounced off her nose.
“None of that. You haven’t even seen how hard we’re going to work you yet. When we get you your awakening stones, some gear and a weapon that suits your powers then we’ll really start the training.”
Dory thought about the exhaustion and the bruises she’d already felt. She gulped at the idea of even harder training.
The next morning Dory woke up on the sofas at the front of the middle deck. She looked back to see Teddy and Lucy at the breakfast bar sipping coffee, she wandered over and sat with them and grabbed a mug from the ‘fridge’ that kept any fresh goods in the condition they entered, including coffee kept hot perpetually.
“Morning, where are the others?”
“They stole out early, Kyra needed to go find Clarissa. She’s a business partner who’s in town.”
“You have a business?”
“That coffee in your hand, its our special secret recipe we sort of, maybe, kind of brought from our world. It’s our black liquid gold. We’re trying to break into Arngo.”
“We thought you might like to come with us to the adventure society, we’re going to cash in all the contracts we took between Honshuraskil and here. Show you how it all works.”
“That would be amazing!”
Teddy and Lucy smiled. It was easy to be a little bit jealous of Dory in the position she was in. Dory had lived on this planet her whole life and was just discovering it all for the first time. They had been in this world a little over two years and were still amazed by it, they knew what that was like to find new things every day.
They had a quick breakfast and headed out. When they went on the top deck to take the gangplank off onto the dock they saw Koda lounging asleep in the morning sun.
“James didn’t take him with them?” Dory asked.
“No, he’s a good guard, James calls it the B.E.A.R.S.S. When he leaves him here, he’s very proud of it.” Lucy answered spelling the acronym.
“He’s a bear?”
“No its an acronym. The Basically Everything’s All Right Security System. Who’s going to mess with the Serenity with a giant bronze rank bear on it? How about it Koda, any difficulty using your armour without James around?” Lucy asked him, scratching behind his ear that she could only reach because he was lying down. The top of his head now came to her waist.
He yawned and shook his fur out and the armour seemed to seep out between the hairs until he was covered. He paused for Lucy to see then gave a little chuff and the armour re-absorbed.
They each gave him a scratch behind the ears as they moved off. They had a buggy in their storage but they chose to walk. This was the luxury yacht marina. A more expensive berth for the Serenity when they could have taken another marina on another spoke of the spider-web designed city that was for working adventurers or cheaper visitors. The market stalls around here were much higher class, with finer goods being displayed. Dory had only ever seen the regular shops in the mountain city and the odd wandering merchant like the one that had brought her octopus essence. She felt bad dragging the other two from stall to stall. She didn’t buy anything, not wanting to test them at the offer to front her money just yet but she wanted to see everything. It was all so different. One seller was selling just scarves and she had no idea how he stayed in business with just one product until she saw the price on a little ticket. Another was selling handbags, enchanted to protect against pickpocketing with dimensional storage upgrades.
It took them the whole morning to get out of the marina. Which would normally be a short walk but Dory had been stopping every few meters to explore the goods.
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[Hey guys, where are you all at? I met up with Clarissa. She’s going to come round for dinner tonight as she was busy which is good to see. I lost James as soon as I started looking at the market stalls, he said he had better shops to go look at.] Kyra wrote on the group interface which included Dory now as a guest.
[No, I said any shop would be better than looking at magical hair ties, you literally got gifted hair bobbles by a god, why would you need one that makes it curly?] James replied.
[They’re not bobbles! A girl has to have variety in her life you oaf.]
[We’re almost at the adventure society, we also got waylaid by the stalls. Fancy lunch in the society grounds? There was that nice café.] Teddy offered.
[Sure.]
[See you there.]
They met under the shade of the two small umbrellas of the tables they’d pulled together. Lucy, Teddy and Dory were sat waiting and had already ordered for everyone, the first to turn up was Kyra.
“Hey, hey!”
“Hey yourself.” Teddy said, standing up to give her a kiss then held her chair out for her. “So how much of our coin have you spent on trinkets this morning then?”
“Oh not much, quite reserved really. I got you this though Dory.” Kyra passed a small shopping bag over the table.
“For me? You really shouldn’t have.” Dory said awkwardly as she took the bag.
“Open it, have a look, its not much but they’re useful.”
Dory opened the bag and looked inside. She turned it over and a steel necklace dropped into her other hand. Kyra had recognised it as a Singapore chain, delicate links all twisting around in a simple pattern. Hung from it looked like a Celtic knot, the circles all move around each other and could be twisted with your fingers. In the centre was a smooth polished black rock.
“It’s beautiful thank you, but how is it useful?”
“Well, we’ve seen these before but they just give you a privacy bubble. This one does that, but if you twist it this way…” She leant over the small table and twisted the links on the charm. “You have a very small and relatively weak shield, don’t underestimate having tricks up your sleeve though. The third turn will give you the ability to not have to breathe underwater for a relatively short amount of time. Again, don’t underestimate it in a clinch moment but also don’t overestimate it, don’t want to be caught out too deep when it runs out.”
“Oh wow! This is incredible!” Dory said, stammering. She was really at a loss for words with the generosity.
“It’s not fair being able to read her aura this clearly all the time.” James said walking up to the table. “We need to get her an aura power asap. And if you thought that gift was good then here.” With that he tossed a jet black stone to her. She read it with the interface, now familiar with how it worked.
Item: [Awakening Stone of Ink] (unranked, rare)
An awakening stone filled with the all the potential of brush and canvas. (consumable, awakening stone).
Requirements: Unawakened essence ability.
Effect: Awakens an essence ability.
“Made sense to me.” He said, sitting next to Lucy and taking her hand. “You really are full of potential, you faced a bronze rank monster voluntarily as your first, didn’t go so well but never mind. Then you jumped off an airship having lived inside a mountain all your life. Consider this a gift, a well done for everything so far.”
“I, I, I…” Now Dory truly was speechless
Lucy intervened in the conversation to save her.
“Where did you get an awakening stone of ink then?”
“Well magical density is higher here right? I popped down to see Edmund Edland in his familiar equipment Emporium. It’s just a fun shop so I thought it would be better than looking at new purses.” He shot Kyra a stink eye. “Turned out to be an interesting trip. He has a visiting tattooist that comes through every now and then. Specialises in tattoos that give a special effect to familiars.” He stopped looking at the shock on the others faces. “Nononono! He doesn’t tattoo familiars, that would be weird. Tattoos the summoners, same rules as any normal magical tattoo, you get one and one only but the effect goes to a bonded or summoned familiar.”
“Did you…” Lucy started to ask, part warning part curiosity.
“No I did not, I would never get a tattoo without consulting my wife… again. I’m booked in this afternoon and wanted to take you with me.”
“Damn straight.”
“Anyway, he was setting up his equipment yesterday or the day before and there was a manifestation in the back room he was working in. He had got it valued and was wondering if he should auction it or not. We were chatting it and he mentioned it, I gave him slightly above market rates for it. You’ve already got an Ink Kraken, lets see what this does!”
Dory had gone sheet white when he said above market rates for a rare awakening stone, that was more wealth than her family had ever seen since she had been born.
“Ooh, after lunch we can go grab a ritual room if you want this stone, there's a few for hire in the adventure society campus!” Kyra said excitedly. Just then a waitress came over to see if the newcomers wanted drinks. “Ooh yes! I’ve heard of a wonderful new drink. Do you have any coffee?” She asked, a picture of innocence.
“I’m sorry Madame, we do not, rest assured we will be serving it soon, a new supplier is coming to town and we are already becoming friends.”
“Well that is good to hear! I look toward to it.”
When she was gone Dory continued.
“Err, I can’t, I’m banned from Magic society facilities because of... because of what I did.” Dory said ashamedly.
Kyra waved the thought away with a hand. “Pish tosh, it’s adventure society grounds and facilities, I’d like to see them take away a three star bronze rank adventurers booking because you were with us.” She said patting Teddy’s arm as the teams three star holder.
There was no trouble with them getting a room, with a city this big there were so many facilities there were plenty to go around. The only check they asked was for banned combinations but didn’t even ask her name, only a request to follow up with the magic society if she got a rare or unknown power from the stone.
Lucy guided Dory through the ritual, she was impressed at the fundamentals her father had managed to teach her in an afternoon and there was little adjustment to be made to absorb an awakening stone.
Ability: [Unroll the Canvas] (Deep)
Special ability
Cost: Extreme mana.
Cool-down: None
Current rank: Iron 0 (00%)
Effect (iron): Essence user has the ability to have multiple Magical tattoos limited by the strength of their Spirit attribute.
“Well damn, they say getting inked is addictive, you’re going to have to be careful!”
“Err, I’m not allowed tattoos.” Dory said.
Everyone at the table looked at her hand. The Ink Kraken was looking at the basket of bread rolls hungrily from inside the skin on the back of her hand.
“I think that airship has sailed.” Kyra said with a smile.
“Pretty sure if you flit off to another continent with a bunch of bronze rank adventurers your dad’s rules don’t count anymore anyway.” James said helpfully.
They showed Dory around the adventure society campus and went to check in with one of the many clerks, a city this size with active adventurers of all ranks meant they went to a specific desk for visiting adventures of bronze rank. Teddy generously split the contract for the alligator monster that involved Dory, insisting that she was in the fight so she gets a share, it was more than several months of her previous wages and she felt nervous about having so much money of her own to hold.
They decided to all attend James’s tattoo appointment.
“All right, but no one. NO ONE, is to mention a cartoon bear with a wizard hat.”