Clarissa was a short, stout woman. She had jewelry dripping off of her in hanging chains with little gemstones in them. She even had a chain from her nose to the top of her ear. Though it appeared all her 'piercings' were just clamps.

"Okay, my skill is called 'True Value'," Clarissa said as we all sat around her table. "This watch, it says is 24 karat gold."

"That's right," Marisol said with a smile.

"It's worth one-hundred-twenty-five Coin, because the gold is only really being used as an accent piece. Most of the gold-colored metal here is brass that's been shined up," she explained. "It's very expensive looking, but for a fraction of the price."

"Yeah," Marisol picked up the watch and put it on her wrist. "Back when, it was worth like two-fifty, but since it's just labor and materials now..."

"Yes, I'd say that's correct," Clarissa stated. "There's only a small percentage of profit allowed. People are even able to 'set' the amount of profit. Everyone has it set to its highest right now, of course..."

"Stockpiling coins is smart," I said.

She grinned, showing off gold capped teeth. "I'd agree. That's the whole reason I bought so much jewelry and fine art. I sold about half of my possessions and now I'm sitting pretty."

"Very shrewd," I said. "But isn't art just a painting, now?"

"In terms of value, no," Clarissa replied. "After the change, now my paintings and jewelry are actually worth more or less depending upon their uniqueness. And age. My vintage pieces are worth double, but the gaudy sets I bought for the purpose of just selling the big gems later was half the price it was supposed to be, because it was a mass-produced sort of thing."

"So, actual artistic value," Patrice said and sighed. "I have art in my place, but it's all mass-produced."

"Ahhh," I thought that over. "One moment."

I pulled out a spell card, an empty one. And I began drawing all over it with my ordinary pen. Not my Stylus. Clarissa starts laughing when she sees what I'm doing. But I simply continue as she explains to the others.

Resolving to myself that I will never make anything like it again, I hand it to Clarissa.

She grins as she uses her skill on it. "Would you look at that. The worth of the ink and paper are low, but the fact that it's one of a kind and from an unknown artist, also factor in. You'll still get about ten Coin for it. Twenty if you become a bit more well-known as an artist or if you just do this on better materials."

"So wait, we can just be artists now?" Annika's eyes were wide and she slapped the countertop. "Damn it!"

"The System has hinted before that we can change our classes at some point, for some reason," I said. "So you'll get your chance, eventually. Survival is most important. And until now, that meant defending yourself, as you had no idea if anyone else would do it."

"Yeah, you'll put that art degree to good use, later," Patrice said. "For now, you're a healer. Why'd you pick Bone Healer, by the way?"

"That's what my art is," Annika said. "Broken bones, like from ancient burial sites, covered in flowers... wrapped in ribbons and maybe fashioned into hairpins or something."

"You mean like paintings or actual bones?" Marisol asked.

"Both," she replied. "I use animal bones for the jewelry and stuff, though."

"Wow," Patrice said. "Anyway, can you tell how much Cursed Items would be worth? Like... cursed pelts from monsters and their organs and such...?"

"Hmmm," Clarissa looked off into the middle distance, which is likely what it looks like to anyone when we open our personal menus. "Ah! Someone over on the other side of the world cleared a cursed dungeon. It's called Sector 'Asia' on this thing, but it's not Asia anymore, so it's likely just... uh. Where it was, in relation to us. East. They only put up the pelt, teeth and heart..."

"Why?" Marisol asked. "Can the rest not be used for anything?"

"The system doesn't have information on it, but maybe they have a different kind of appraiser on their team... or maybe no one has any gutting and cleaning skills," Clarissa replied.

"How much do the pelts, teeth and heart cost?" I asked.

"Well, since it's combat, it takes your level and experience into account," she said. "It's two-hundred-fifteen Coin per cursed pelt at your current levels, with your current party. But if your party were bigger or more highly leveled, it'd go down. From thirty to fifty Coin, depending. But only that low, I think. So you'd still get a good hundred from them, even if you were highly leveled. And then there's the teeth and heart. Teeth are worth about fifty Coin, as they're able to be used in cursed objects that certain classes need to boost their abilities. The Heart though, is five hundred Coin. It's used in certain potions, though it doesn't say which ones..."

"Do you think there's immortality potions now?" Marisol asked and everyone exchanged a glance.

I tilted my head. "If there were, it would likely require trading someone else's life for your own," I said. "You have to get the vitality from somewhere. Even the things the System first made were likely made from the cast off matter of the worlds they ripped apart. I refuse to believe they can just will things to existence from nothing."

"And even if they could," Patrice said, leaning over the table on her crossed arms. "That doesn't mean we could."

"We need someone to clean the carcass," Marisol said. "Let's go and find someone who'll do it for a good price. There's got to be someone in the building or neighborhood that knows how, right?"

This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.

There was a chime, but it didn't come from the system. It was a simultaneous phone chime, for messaging.

Everyone in the room looked at each other, though I was already reaching for my phone and bringing up the message.

BlissfulDreams: Some people from the Neighborhood want to join our Guild. We don't really have any reason to turn them away, but this does mean we have to find places for them to live.

We can't postpone the Guildmaster selection, so we're doing that first. Whoever ends up Guildmaster is going to have to prioritize finding places for these people to live that are secure. For now, we're putting them in empty rooms in the building and letting them sleep in the lobby where it's safer than outside or in their homes.

Just letting everyone know.

"Huh," Patrice said. "Can't say I didn't expect it, but... I figured people would try to wait it out at home for a while first."

"They likely saw the monsters, even if they didn't fight any," I replied. "It will most likely be those with children and elderly relatives, or those who are disabled themselves... or just those who live alone and are afraid to do so any longer."

"This means we have to look ahead. Even if Lila isn't the Guildmaster, we can give a list of places to Carlo," Marisol said.

"Marisol, you and Patrice can do that," I said. "Annika and I will find someone to clean the carcasses and if possible, line up crafters in the building who might want first grab of the items."

When we left Clarissa's place, Annika seemed highly discomfited. I wanted to leave it alone, but she kept swallowing and the sound was going to drive me insane. Once or twice over time, perhaps I could've handled. But my biggest sensitivity issue aside from touch was sound.

"What exactly is the matter?" I asked her as we walked toward the door of the one who'd answered our Guild-wide message. "You're swallowing like you need to drink a gallon of water."

"Uh... it's nothing really-" she began.

"I am not going to sit here and politely pick at you for an answer," I said. "Stop doing that or answer me."

Her lips pursed. "I just... isn't it unsafe for a bunch of unknown people to come and sleep in here? Especially since all our guards are mostly looking outside for trouble. We don't know who they are."

"I assume you feel the same about refugees from other countries," I said.

There was a dead silence between us as she stared back at me. "No... I don't."

And that was all we said, as she took the initiative to walk ahead and knock on their door. I followed behind, but I was dissatisfied with the situation.

People are twice as idiotic when they're afraid of something. They stop using logic and reasoning, start following their feelings and get upset when you don't. I predicted many people would have this problem and sent a quick message to Grand that he should ask them to go out and find another place for them to stay, if they're so opposed.

Most people in the building now have personal protection in their combat skills or have a means of calling for help that no one can just 'shut off' without knocking them out first. It's possible for people to attack you, but now it's even less likely they'll get away with it. We're actually safer from each other now than we were before. Even if you're meticulous, your skills will leave traces and even if you don't use them, your victim will.

Not even mentioning the familiars.

"What is it?" the woman who opened the door was familiar, and I realized it was the woman from a few days ago. The one I asked if she was high and having a bad trip. "Oh, it's you. I got that class 'Cleaner' so I can do it, but I want Coin."

I suppose it's just who she is. Loud, abrasive and paranoid. At least she's upfront about it.

"Cleaner," Annika blinked. "Subclass or Class?"

"Class," the woman retorted. "Subclass is Gutter. I used to do it with my daddy out on hunting trips. He showed me how to make it quick and easy when your shot didn't kill the thing right away, too."

"That's great," Annika said with a queasy look on her face. "Uh, I'm Annika Christof. You are?"

"Bella Bern," she replied. She had a cigarette in her mouth, but wasn't smoking it. "Didn't you see my name on my message?" She asked with an irritated tone, then noticed me. "Hey, are you with this girl?" she called out.

"Yes," I replied.

"Well, both of you get in here," she said and turned, walking back into the apartment.

We followed, though I kept my distance from Annika and Bella both. I disliked talking to people if I knew it was going to be confrontational. Nobody else has 'rules' for arguing, like not getting up in the person's face or only screaming when you're across the room from each other. And I didn't want to get in trouble for punching someone who got too close and yelled too loud.

"Now, my skills say just Field Dressing," Bella said. "But I have two 'subskills' and I don't know what that means. I tried calling my daughter, but I can't guess what name she's usin'."

"Subskills are skills dependent upon other skills," I said. "If you had the skill 'Slice' and the subskill was 'Dice', it would mean the level of skill you had with the subskill would be directly dependent upon your skill with the first one."

"Well, the skills are Skinning and Gutting," she said. "Why aren't they on their own? Field dressing's just a name for those."

"It means that your Gutting and Skinning skills are too different from each other to be dependent upon each other, but still belong to the same category," I said. "Field Dressing makes it so you can gain skill in both when you practice either. Which likely means Field Dressing can be leveled or evolved to something else."

"Well, either way," she said. "I can skin and gut whatever you bring me. Field Dressing just says it can remove the blood. I figured that'd be in gutting or that gutting with the organ and meat would be with Field Dressing, but I guess not. I can even preserve the meat and organs if the old ways hold true, even without a skill."

"Have you tried, since things changed?" I asked.

"Nope," she replied. "Bring me some fresh meat and we'll see what happens."

There was another simultaneous Chime.

BlissfulDreams: Hold your asses, everyone, it's a hell of a newsbreak.

Some of the people we brought in were interviewed as part of the processing. You know, 'how many kids you got' and everything. But we asked them how many skills they had and we boggled a bit, you know. Cause we only got two to four, depending upon class? Except Toria up on the 8th, cause her Class is exotic.

They told us they got a skill every time they did something they used to do. One of them had a 'poisoning' skill because they knew what chemicals did what to whose body, cause they were in poison control. But their Class had nothing to do with it.

Everybody, start doing your old job tasks and anything else you can think of. Hobbies, art pieces... find the skills you're missing and send a message about what you're able to get.

It went without saying that Annika and I had to leave after that. We promised to return when we needed her for the job, but Annika was anxious to get to her room and start painting...

As for myself, the only things I really knew how to do before the fall were crocheting (which tortured me with the disgusting feeling of the yarn), weaving on a small plastic loom (same issue unless I wore gloves, which I usually did) and some small cleaning skills I'd learned while doing particular jobs.

I thought on it as I left for home, to find out what sorts of skills Sophia might have uncovered, as I'd taught her both of those crafting abilities...

And I knew one or two things that were going to get me in trouble, if I did them and someone found out.

Weaving it is, then, I thought.