After Koyl finished up his laughing fit I left and scaled a nearby wall, laying down on the roof and sleeping through the night. The entire night I dreamt about being chased by, and murdering, various humans in bleached white robes while having to explain to guards why I was justified in doing so. When morning finally came it was almost a relief to be back in reality, and even though my heads-up display showed that I was perfectly functional I felt mentally exhausted. I don't even remember the specifics of the experience, I complained to myself, how can it be exhausting if it was just a hallucination?
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After looking off of the side of the building to ensure I had a clear landing space, I descended the same side I had climbed up and dropped down into the alley below me. The streets were back to being crowded enough that I would have trouble moving through them, so I tried to think up a plan before being distracted by the sound of something falling to the ground behind me.
“Ah, damn that hurt,” Koyl groaned from the ground. I watched him get back to his feet and rotate his right ankle, wincing as it popped and creaked from rapid healing. “So you're finally up then,” he remarked, “you sleep late.” I was sure he didn't see me climb up the side of the building because he was already asleep, I thought.
“Why are you here?” I asked bluntly. “Did you follow me? Were you faking being asleep so that you could track my location?” I quickly checked my equipment, finding that nothing was missing. Even the twelve ngeyt I had in my pouch was still there.
“I'm not so low as to steal from a man while he's asleep, you know,” Koyl said in an almost teasing voice.
“I don't believe that for a second,” I replied instantly.
“Okay, yeah, you're probably right,” Koyl agreed, “I would do that to someone else, but I think I've taken a liking to you. Besides, if you caught me you'd probably rip my head off with your bare hands.”
“That's ridiculous,” I replied, “I would stab you in the skull, rendering you unconscious until you ceased to be alive.” Koyl blinked, seemingly unable to come up with a good reply for a moment. “You know where the docks are, right?” I asked.
“Yes, b-” Koyl started to reply.
“Take me to them so I can charter a ship,” I commanded. Koyl's face contorted for a moment, showing emotions of regret and anxiety. “Or is there some other way to reach the mainland?” I asked.
“No, it's just that,” Koyl hissed through gritted teeth, “I might have lied about how much it costs to get out of Vehrehr that way.” Why am I bothering with this? I wondered. “Look, even if you sold everything you have right now, you couldn't afford it,” Koyl informed me. “Looking at that stuff, that's maybe... twenty ngoywngeyt worth of gear you have and that's a high estimate. The cheapest room rental you're going to find on a ship that won't try to sell you into slavery is a hundred and fifty, minimum.”
“To be clear, what is the value of one ngoywngeyt in ngeyt?” I asked. Koyl chuckled at my question.
“Twenty-four,” he replied with a raised eyebrow, “you really didn't know that?” Mentally, I ran over the economics and tried to make sense of them.
“You're lying,” I stated frankly, “that kind of price is absurd for sea travel. You're telling me that it would cost years of room and board at an inn to get off of this island?” Koyl held his hands up at chest level submissively, loosely gripping the walking stick in his right.
“Sea travel is expensive in general,” he said. “Most of those ships deal in thousands of ngoywngeyt worth of goods per trip, and their repair and crew pay runs into the thousands as well. Crossing between the mainland and Awsriyah island is especially risky because the area is storm-prone and there are places where the sea floor rises quickly with no visual indication. The entire trip also takes roughly forty-five days one way, weather permitting.” He seems pretty well-informed about this, I thought.
“So you had no intention to leave at all,” I replied. “It was all just a ruse.”
“Oh no, I want to get out of this shithole,” Koyl assured me, “I just don't have the funds to do so right now. I'm not from here originally, you see, my hometown is Kahvahrniydah. Not that that means anything to you, I suppose.”
“You suppose correctly,” I sighed. So assuming this idiot is telling the truth, there's no way I could swim across or build my own small vessel, I thought, I could try to hijack or stow away, but I have no idea how to crew such a vessel on my own if I get caught and have to kill everyone. “You're a thief,” I continued, “why not just steal the required money?” Koyl flinched at the mention of the word “thief” and looked away.
“As I said before, I'm not suicidal,” he said quietly.
“I would dispute that,” I countered. Koyl let out one spurt of laughter and looked back at me.
“Are you interested in earning some money?” Koyl asked. I furrowed my brow as I thought about what an offer like that from someone like him might entail.
“Yes,” I replied after a second of thought.
“Well good,” Koyl smiled, “I know a place where there are some odd jobs to be done, not a lot but enough to get us some rooms and food for the night, so just follow m-”
“Where, and why were you out robbing people last night if you knew about this?” I demanded, cutting him off. This sounds like another potential ambush, I thought, I don't trust this human at all. Koyl grimaced, baring his teeth in anxiety and sucking in air.
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“Well,” he replied slowly, “there was a reason I wasn't there yesterday, but that's not really the main thing you probably want to know.” His speech sped up as he went through the sentence, as if he was trying to get me not to pay attention to it. “So as you probably do know, or maybe not, there are a bunch of mercenary companies and guilds on Awsriyah Island,” he continued. “Out of all of them, the one that pays the best for their odd jobs, and by the best I mean is most likely to actually pay you at all, is the Steelheart Company.” Upon hearing the name, a small pit-like feeling formed in my stomach.
“I can't work for them,” I replied quickly.
“Why not?” Koyl asked, raising an eyebrow.
“I've had negative dealings with them in the past,” I said vaguely, not wanting to get into detail. Koyl snorted, then sighed and rubbed his brow.
“So you're a mercenary then?” he asked.
“No,” I replied. I suppose that technically, if I accepted payment, I would qualify as one, I thought.
“Soldier?” he asked.
“No,” I replied again. A soldier is a member of an army, I don't even have operator backup, I thought, If I want to be that specific though, all I could call myself is a "contractor" of some kind.
“Some kind of bandit?” Koyl queried. “Were they hired to kill you?”
“No, nothing like that,” I replied. I considered my next action for a moment, then decided to continue my previous lie. “I found some of their dead in the forest and scavenged equipment off of them,” I continued. “I sold it in Frahmtehn, which may have attracted attention.” Koyl looked at me like I was crazy.
“Did you kill them?” he asked. “The dead you scavenged, I mean.”
“No,” I lied.
“Well who cares then?” he chuckled. “You think they're going to report you or ban you from working for them for a bit of scavenging? You think anyone from Frahmtehn is going to bother sending word to Vehrehr about some giant Gwahlaob-looking guy who sold some of their gear?”
“I thought scavenging was looked upon poorly here,” I said. Koyl barked out a few more laughs condescendingly.
“You are a weird one, you know that?” he laughed. “Look, just follow me and we can go to the nearest office of theirs. It's on the edge of the slums. If they kick you out, they kick you out, it not like they'll put a hit on you just for walking in the front door.” I don't like this one bit, I thought, maybe I should get a mask of some kind to hide my face? No, if there was word sent to them they would have mentioned my size. “You... you don't have a hit on you right?” Koyl asked hesitantly when he saw my own hesitation to follow him.
“Not to my knowledge,” I replied truthfully. Though I'm sure the people of Suwlahtk want me dead, I added mentally.
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“So here we are!” Koyl announced. It had taken just under an hour by my estimation, but we had finally reached the edge of the slums and found the building Koyl was talking about. It was stone, much like the others, and had three floors with windows on the second and third floor but not the first. The entrance was a large double door made of metal-braced wood, and above it was a sign with extravagant-looking text. Above that sign was a large symbol, the same one I had seen on the sword I looted, forged out of steel.
“So that says Steelheart Company?” I asked, pointing to the sign.
“You can't read either?” Koyl scoffed. “You're lucky that you're a giant, friend. There's not much use for a man as dumb as you are in these parts unless he's also strong.” Before I could rebut him, Koyl turned on his heel and walked to the double doors, pushing them inwards dramatically and walking inside. I followed in a much more reserved fashion, closing the doors behind me.
The room we had entered was small, perhaps just seven meters deep by twelve wide, and had a standing desk attached to the floor near the center of the back wall. There’s a word for that... I thought, podium? Along that back wall there were three doors, one on the left, one on the right, and one in the middle, and a woman stood in front of the middle one behind the desk, watching us. To my left, I noticed that the wall had many pieces of paper pinned to it, each covered in the same unintelligible writing I was now used to seeing. Nobody else was in the room besides the three of us, and the silence was oppressive.
“Koylzmeyl,” the woman behind the counter declared in a cold voice. She wore a strange black hat which was partially stuffed and had a single feather sticking out of the middle of it. Her other clothing, rather the shirt and which I could see from my position, was a deep burgundy color with black outlines around key parts. It looked to be some kind of formal wear, with a line of buttons in the middle and a tall flared collar which touched the bottoms of her short, blonde hair. Her face looks immaculate, I thought, but her hands are covered in long, straight scars. Knife wounds? The woman's orange eyes briefly locked with my own before turning back to Koyl.
“Dawp!” Koyl replied, exuding friendliness and gesturing widely with his arms. His still-torn shirt fell down his arm, and he quickly pulled it back into position.
“You know you are supposed to call me Dawpvaol,” the woman snapped, “I told you last time that you were banned from taking on contractor requests through us.” I stood in place near the door and observed quietly, while Koyl walked up to the desk and laughed gently.
“And I told you, I didn't steal anything from the client,” Koyl rebutted in his still-friendly tone. “He's a crazy old man and he just misplaced that dueling sword. I tried to explain it to him but-”
“Why don't you let me take a look at that 'walking stick',” Dawpvaol demanded ominously.
“I couldn't possibly do that, it's filthy from being in the street,” Koyl replied. “In fact, I was about to throw it away before I had a very fortunate encounter with my new friend here.” Koyl turned around, leaned on the desk, and gestured back to me with his hand. Judging by the spots that her eyes passed over, Dawpvaol figured out very quickly why Koyl's clothing was damaged.
“You can't make him work for us and then pay you the money either,” Dawpvaol said sternly, “zeyngteylmpaatmoydh is forbidden.” Is that the word for subcontracting? I wondered. I noticed that Dawpvaol was taller than Koyl by around two centimeters, which still left her shorter than my own body.
“Nah, we were thinking of taking on some of the labor jobs,” Koyl said, looking back at Dawpvaol, “do you have any of those?”
“He doesn't look like he's here for labor,” Dawpvaol grunted, once again directing her gaze towards me. “He doesn't look like he's been in many fights either, though,” she added. Her eyes assessed me, and for some reason she appeared thoroughly unimpressed. “You do know how much of a scumbag this guy is, right?” she asked, somewhat rhetorically.
“There's no need to be hurtful, Dawp,” Koyl interjected before I could reply, “he's a big boy, he can make his own decisions. Now please, if you would, I'd like to help my friend register with you so he can earn some money.”
“Do you have a name?” Dawpvaol asked, once again directing her question at me and ignoring Koylzmeyl. Reluctantly, I began to move forward to approach the counter.
“Get this,” Koyl chuckled, “he says his name is Yuwnahd.”
“Yuwniht,” I corrected, “you can call me that if you need a name to use.”