Chapter 125 - Arbiter

“So why do you look like that?”

“Look like what?” Nutt asked, stopping in his tracks and turning to Jack with a confused look.

“Ya know. Different. Every goblin I’ve come across looks and smells like garbage. You on the other hand look like something Disney might sell.”

“Who is this Disney? Another slaver?”

“Seriously?” Jack ignored the question, “Why are you so… cute?” he squinted at Nutt, unsure how the goblin would take it.

Badly was how.

Nutt’s face turned sour, and he stomped off in a huff, cursing Jack under his breath.

“Hey!” Jack chased after the little goblin. “Are you like a mix or something? Was your dad a teddy bear?”

“Enough!” Nutt protested “I don’t ask you about your life, so you don’t ask me about mine.”

“Yea right,” Jack said as he fell in step next to Nutt. “You’ve been asking me nonstop questions for the past two days about my involvement with the Black Centipede.”

During their trek through the desert Nutt made mention of a group called the Golden Scale. He said they should try to find and join that guild. Nutt was adamant we would be more than strong enough to become active members in the guild. When Jack asked him about it, Nutt practically went googly-eyed with praise for the honorable Gideon the Golden Dragon. Jack punted the little fucker halfway across the desert after that.

As it turns out, well-meaning Gideon had started the Golden Scale which was meant to help, protect, and usher humanity through the Tower. Jack explained to Nutt in no uncertain terms that Gideon wasn’t to be trusted. Which of course the goblin vehemently denied, saying the Dragon was the most honorable thing to exist in the Tower.

Jack told him his story, but the goblin was skeptical.

“The Black Centipede is a bedtime story. A myth. They don’t actually exist.”

“Then explain the tattoo” Jack said pushing up his sleeve “Wiggleworm, a little help here?”

Wiggleworm peeled off his skin, glanced back and forth between Jack and Nutt, then went dormant again on his arm.

“Plenty of people have disgusting familiars.”

Wiggleworm jumped off Jack’s arms at that comment and wound itself tightly around Nutt’s neck.

“Beautiful! I meant beautiful!” Nutt screamed, clawing at the centipede. Wiggleworm slowly relented, leaving a terrified Nutt gasping for breath on the ground.

“I will admit, Wiggleworm is convincing,” he said, eyeing Wiggleworm as she melded back onto Jack’s arms, “but I want more proof.”

“Like what?”

“I want to join,” the goblin said matter of fact.

“Sure. Consider yourself a full-fledged member, your first task is to help me assassinate Gideon.” Jack shrugged.

Nutt was agreeably gullible. That was literally all it had taken to both convince Nutt the Black Centipede was very real, and to get him to agree to kill Gideon. Nutt then spent the next several hours regaling Jack with his plans to create a dragon killing bomb. That had been the entirety of his journey through the second floor.

After the second day he was pretty positive Nutt didn’t actually know where they were supposed to be going. The only somewhat reassuring sign they might be heading in the right direction was the occasional signs of life that dotted the desert. A doused out campfire or lone traveler who immediately ran away the second they spotted Jack and Nutt.

“Seriously. You owe me some answers. Why are you so much smaller and more approachable than your goblin counterparts?”

Nutt stared off into the distance for a long moment before pulling a vial of something brown from his pocket and downing the contents with a grimace. He let out a long sigh as he wiped his mouth.

“Fine. Since we are both assassin comrades, I’ll answer your questions.” He turned to Jack with a serious look on his face. “My mother was a talented alchemist. She climbed the many floors of the Tower and came closer to achieving the Philosophers Core than any alchemist had ever come. Before she could fully conquer the Tower and complete her Philosopher’s Core, she found herself with child. Me.” Nutt had taken on an overly dramatic tone, and Jack gave the goblin an eye roll as he barreled on with his story.

“She retired from her life as a Tower Climber and returned to the first floor where she raised me-“

“So, who was your father?” Jack interrupted.

“This story has nothing to do with my father,” Nutt glared. “My mother is the reason I look this way. After she retired on the first floor, she turned her powerful alchemical mind to something new. Cosmetics. I was patient zero. Mother’s little test doll. She created special ointments to rid me of my warts. Creams to make my skin glow lustrous and green. I was a walking advertisement for her. She even entered me into all the goblin beauty pageants! We exploded in popularity, and soon after she had a goblin cosmetics shop on every corner. She even expanded her product line to orcs and trolls and is currently working her way into the elven market!” he finished, a slight exasperation in her voice.

“And you’re so tiny because…?”

“Some goblins are just tiny!” Nutt squeaked with an angry glare. Jack nodded in response.

“So, you mean to tell me you’re the heir to the goblin makeup empire within the Tower? Are you rich or something?” he squinted at the goblin.

“Was the heir,” Nutt corrected. “I was cut off for blowing up our supply warehouses.”

“Oh good. You’re a terrorist. That’s better,” Jack rolled his eyes. “Sounds like you ruined a good thing.”

“Did you miss the part about the beauty pageants? It was traumatizing for me. Her business deserved to be blown up.”

“Get in line dude, we’ve all got terrible childhoods.”

Nutt simply huffed in response as the two continued their track through the desert.

“Are you sure we’re going the right way.”

“Of course. We’ve been able to see the city for the past hour. Are you blind?”

“What?” Jack stopped again and stared in the direction Nutt was pointing.

“Wait…” he slowly said, “Just how big is this city?”

“Big.”

Jack stared at the horizon for several long moments. Or at least what he thought was the horizon. The color of the sky had changed from black to grey at some point, and Jack just assumed that the weather was changing, or a storm was coming. He now realized he was staring at an impossibly large wall. He turned around to see nothing but the black night sky. When he looked forward again it became obvious that he wasn’t looking at the horizon anymore. The wall had to be massive if it was blotting out the entire skyline. Jack looked from side to side and wasn’t even sure he could see where the wall ended.

Jack picked up the pace as he started to run towards the city. Nutt screamed after him unable to keep up, so he grabbed the goblin and threw him on his back as he pushed off the ground. Nutt let out an excited scream as Jack burst forward towards the city in explosive speed. It was at this point they started seeing other people. A lot of other people.

Jack crested a sand dune and stopped in his tracks. The wall was massive, stretching up into the night sky and disappearing completely. A quest notification immediately filled his vision.

Quest: Climb the Second Floor

Quest Tier: N/A

Quest Sponsor: The Tower

Objective:

Join or create a faction that controls at least one sector of Broken Moon City.

Complete ten quests.

Reach level twenty.

Raise one stat mastery level to the rank of Adept.

This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

Raise one ability mastery to the rank of Adept.

Raise one passive mastery to the rank of Adept.

Reward:

Access to the third floor of the Tower.

Further rewards determined by the tower based upon individual performance on the floor.

Jack dismissed the quest and stared down at the base of the wall. A giant gate was carved into the wall with a line of people stretching out of it. Jacks’ eyes scanned the long line. Not since first entering the Tower had he seen so many different races. Dwarves. Orcs. Beast people. Weird liizard people. Gnomes. Some sort of bird-like person. Elves. Lots of elves. Everyone in the line looked like they wanted to kill each other.

Built out all around the line of people was a sort of haphazardly thrown together shanty town with sprung up tents and a small marketplace that bustled with people trading and arguing amongst themselves.

“Try not to stare too much lad, people will know this is your first time seeing other races in the Tower,” a voice rumbled next to Jack.

Jack glanced down to his left to see a stocky dwarf with a massive hammer resting on his shoulder. His black beard ran with reckless abandon creating a bush-like effect that concealed his face. Jack rubbed his void rings. He hadn’t sensed the dwarf at all, which was surprising considering the dwarf smelled like literal death. He was too distracted with everything else, and he let his awareness slip. He bit down in annoyance with himself and gave the dwarf a casual, relaxed smile.

“I feel like being human already gives away the fact that I’m not used to seeing other races.”

“Fair enough,” the dwarf agreed. “Been a long time since you lot got to climb the tower. Just be careful not to stare at the orcs too much. They’ll start swinging right away,” he finished with a dry chuckle.

“He’s already got a guide,” Nutt jumped off Jack's shoulder and puffed his chest out at the dwarf that towered over him, “take your scam somewhere else.”

“No scam” the dwarf held up placating hands, letting out another wry chuckle .`You've got a dangerous swagger about ya and I thought it might be worthwhile to team up with you for the monster hunt. Always wanted to see what the humans were capable of. Figured now’s my chance. I’m Argyle. Warrior.”

“Someone want to explain to me what the hell is going on here? Why can’t we get into the city?” Jack asked, paying the dwarf’s offer no mind.

“Entry fee. Gotta kill one of the moonlight beasts and bring back its heart if you want in. The bigger the heart, the deeper into the city they let you go. Right now, entry into the first sector requires you to kill a moonlight beast that can be found about thirty days travel out into the desert.” Argyle said matter of fact.

“Didn’t feel like this was information worth mentioning on the two-day journey it took to get here?” Jack glared at Nutt, who was pointedly ignoring him. He had asked the goblin half a dozen questions about the city, only for the goblin to offer up vague and cryptic answers.

“I didn’t think they would still be in control of the first sector,” Nutt finally relented. “They’re so unpopular that I thought someone might have killed the councilor and taken out the Painted Shell by the time we got back, and the entry fee wouldn’t matter anymore. Plus, even If it still did exist, we needed a team to take on a moonlight beast. Remember the band of orcs you killed? That’s the size of a party required to kill a moonlight beast.”

“I killed them,” Jack stressed, “clearly I’m more than enough to handle whatever these moonlight beasts are.”

“Wait. You killed Gramgo and his goons? Holy shit.” The dwarf said, eyes giving Jack another look of appraisal from beneath his bushy beard.

“Ok.'' Jack said, rubbing at his temples as he tried to piece together the information. “So we have to kill a monster and bring back its heart if we want to get into the city… What did you mean by killing the councilor?” Jack looked down at Nutt, but Argyle interjected instead.

“You got the quest right? You see that bit about controlling a sector of the city?”

Jack nodded at the dwarf, pulling the quest up and reading through it more thoroughly.

‘Join or create a faction that controls at least one sector of Broken Moon City.’

“Broken Moon City is also known as the Ever-Changing City of the Dead. Inside the walls are six sectors, each governed by an undead councilor and ruled over by the city’s Mayor, Mortimaxx, lich eternal. Don’t worry, all of them are Tower generated, not the actual undead race.”

Jack gave the dwarf a blank stare. Nutt nodded along like this all made complete sense.

“The objective for floor two is to form your own faction, kill off the undead councilor in charge of a sector, making you the new councilor in charge of giving you control of the sector. From there you gain access to a system that allows you to change, upgrade and set rules for your particular sector of the city. It’s a reward system of sorts. The more sectors of the city your faction controls, the bigger the rewards and secrets you can get from the city.”

“Okay… So why exactly do we need to pay to get in?”

“The first sector of the city is largely considered a shithole, usually no one takes control of it and getting inside is pretty easy. However, there is one advantage. If you control the first sector you control entry to the city. You can charge people an entry fee. Usually, factions don’t do this because it’s a solid way to turn every single race in the Tower against you and earn yourself a swift death. You’ll notice the camp of people below waiting for just that very thing,” Argyle said with a vague gesture towards the campgrounds below.

“See. We can just wait them out.” Nutt squeaked.

“I wouldn’t be so sure little green. The Painted Shell has been in charge for the past few months now with no signs of stepping down anytime soon.”

“The Painted Shell?” Jack asked, his attention returning to the line of people outside the gate.

“Tortugas. Very good at defense. Make for difficult to kill targets. For some reason they are obsessed with the moonlight beast’s hearts, a relatively rare resource in the desert. That’s why everything’s so backed up.”

“And all those people in line have one?” Jack asked, trying to pick out a target.

“Unlikely. They are all trying to bribe their way in I would assume.” Argyle continued.

“How much?”

“Current rate is fifty million AP to gain access to the first sector. However, everyone in line seems to think they can haggle the price down.”

Jack let out a sigh. This was becoming annoying fast, and he still wasn’t sure he understood what the hell was going on. He needed to find Hannah, she would have a decent grasp of this by now.

“Is this the only point of entry?”

“Nope. This is the west gate. Follow the wall in either direction for about three days walking pace and you’ll reach the north or south gates. Or you can continue on further to the east gate. Although I’m told the situation is much the same at every gate.”

Jack let out an annoyed tsk. He could stay put and wait for Hannah who might not come. Walk around the city walls aimlessly checking each gate for signs of her. Or just go find a Moonlight beast which would be two months round trip by the sounds of it.

“How do you know all this?” Jack finally asked the suspiciously helpful dwarf.

“Been out here for a few weeks now gathering up information and waiting on the rest of my clan to show up. Although I suspect they may have continued on without me.”

“Uh huh… So how many people does a beast heart cover entry for?”

“Five.”

Jack thought back to the orc warband. There had been twenty-seven of them total when all was said and done. So, they had to get at least six hearts if they wanted to get everyone inside.

“However, that’s just for a one-month beast. If you travel even further into the desert, say three months, and kill a three-month moonlight beast then that’s good for about thirty people. Or you could use it to buy entry all the way to the third sector of the city if you used it on just one person. But a monster of that caliber would be exponentially harder to kill.” Argyle mused to himself, taking on a tone of consideration.

“And what happens when a party shows back up with a beast heart? Everyone here just… lets them on through?” Jack asked, turning back towards the desert and scanning the horizon for any returning parties. Instead, the desert was dotted with adventures who looked like they had just arrived on the second floor themselves.

“Surprisingly, yes.” Argyle nodded, stepping up beside Jack.

“Really?” Jack said, some disbelief in his voice.

“Well, the city has generated arbiters to patrol the makeshift camps. If people were to start attacking returning parties all hell would break loose, and everyone would die in a bloodbath before they even stepped foot inside the gates, and that’s bad for business.”

“These arbiters are capable of stopping something like that?”

“Don’t mess with an arbiter.” Nutt squeaked from below. The goblin had long since fazed out of the conversation, and now had a small chemistry lab set up at Jack’s feet. He took a tentative step back. “When I first got to the second floor I arrived at the south gate. A fight had broken out between a group of elves and gnomes. An arbiter showed up and wiped them all out in seconds. Dozens exploded into bloody mist,” the goblin shivered at the memory. Jack just cocked an eyebrow at the goblin, annoyed that he didn’t bother to tell him any of this information before reaching the city.

“Should listen to your friend. Not worth crossing paths with them.”

Jack glanced back at Argyle who was nodding sagely at the goblin’s words. Mostly, he glanced at Argyle’s hands gripped tightly around the hammer hefted onto his shoulder. They were gray. Originally, he had thought it was some weird dwarven skin color, but the more the dwarf talked, the more suspicious he became. He knew too much. Plus he had managed to sneak up on Jack, appearing out of nowhere. He also smelled like rotting death.

Broken Moon City is also known as the Ever-Changing City of the Dead, the dwarf had told him. Jack realized what had been bugging him about the dwarf. Argyle was undead.

“Tell me…” Jack started, drawing Argyle’s gaze from beneath his bushy beard, “Are you one of the arbiters?”

Nutt let out an audible gasp, dropping one of his concoctions that let out a small puff of smoke on the ground beneath them. Jack and Argyle stared at each other for a long moment. Then the dwarf grinned.

“You caught me,” he laughed, slapping his thigh. “The second I saw you I knew you would be trouble. I’ve been at this a long time, and you’ve got that look about ya. Plus, you’re marked by the centipede. That only confirmed my suspicions.” Argyle was staring at Jack’s left arm, which was covered up. Jack felt his hackles rise. How had he seen that?

“I’ll only warn you once,” Argyle stepped forward, releasing a hidden pressure of death as he stared Jack in the eyes. “Don’t cause trouble out here. Gather up a party and go get yourself a beast heart. Yes, it’s time-consuming but it’s also easy. Someone like you won’t have any trouble killing off the creature.”

“I could also just wait for another group outside city limits and attack them… couldn’t I?”

“There’s an idea!” Argyle agreed with a sudden toothy grin. “So long as I can’t see it, I don’t really care how you get the heart. Just don’t bring any of the drama back to the gate and you’ll be fine. I like to keep things nice and quiet out here.”

The dwarf didn’t wait for Jack to respond, he simply turned and walked back towards the city, ending the conversation.

“That was close.” Nutt had his arms wrapped around Jack's leg, hiding behind him as the dwarf stalked off and disappeared into the camp below.

Jack shook the goblin off his leg and stared down at the city gate. Then he looked upwards towards the cracked moon. Then past the moon at the many floors of the Tower and the heavens above. He had finally started climbing the Tower and it was time he made good on several threats. It was time to make his real debut to all those assholes above. It was time to fire a warning shot of what was to come.

“Nutt,” he said after a long moment. “I’m going to tell you right now there is no way I’m going to spend a few months chasing after some monster. Things are about to get a lot more hectic. If you don’t want to get involved, I suggest you start heading to another gate now.”

“I knew you would say that,'' the goblin harrumphed. “What are you going to do?”

“First. We’ll be taking a beast heart from the next party that shows up at the gate.” Nutt nodded like that was to be expected.

“And then,” Jack smiled, “I’m going to kill that arbiter.”