Vultressant didn’t need to check his inventory to be able to answer that question. The help feature of his interface had updated with knowledge on the first two tiers of essences from their conversation. Each tier had ‘minor’ and ‘greater’ versions along with the normal essences. The Gnoll captain had supplied them with a green essence apparently called ‘emerald’, and the Giant Ape dropped a greater emerald essence. “We have two emerald essences; one of them is of greater quality. Does that matter?”
Rena nodded. “The better the materials that you use, the better the chance for a favorable result. Do you have any ruby essences?”
“We do; two of them are of minor quality, but there are ten other normal ones that we have also.”
“Then, as long as you have enough cobalt, the only thing that you will need is the construction fee, which if they settle on a sword similar to what your friend is currently carrying, will be about thirteen hundred silver pieces. Thirteen gold if you prefer.”
Vultressant was glad that they had enough to cover it, but he worried about the chance of failure. “How much better would it be if we used the greater emerald essence? If we use more essences, does it help?”
Rena shook her head. “No to the second question; using extra materials gains us no advantage. But replacing the emerald with a greater emerald will certainly help, and using an emerald in place of one of the rubies would help to a greater degree, because that is a larger gap in quality; you are increasing a full tier instead of just using a higher quality of the current tier.”
Vultressant worried about using both of the tier two essences, but getting Taloc an item that could help him in combat and put him more on a par with Ewtain and Maroftis would help the party greatly. He thought about asking how much more common the tier one essences were compared to the tier two, but he had already come to a few conclusions regarding that. First, they had only found emerald essences on the most challenging creatures that they had fought, so that was likely to continue. The second thing that he had discovered was that they had been far more difficult to extract than the lower-tier ones. If the first try was a failure, then they had enough resources to try again, except for the core if that was used up as well. He added a third thought: the foundry was willing to sell them the ruby essences but not the emerald ones, so the ruby essences must be much more common.
“I assume that all materials are destroyed during the process.”
“I am afraid so,” she said simply.
He knew that was going to be her answer. “What is the process?”
“Well,” she said, “Blassie will put four or five Dwarves to work making the sword; once they are done, I will attempt to enchant it. It will be best if your friend is here, so I can hopefully bond the weapon to him. That typically has better results and sometimes produces powers that only affect the bonded subject. Now, if you plan to have others using it as well, then that might not be wise, but from what the two of you have said, Taloc will be the sole user.” Vultressant nodded, and she continued, “Then make sure that he is here four days from now unless Blassie gives you a different time. He knows how many projects are going on currently.”
“What time do you need us here by?”
Rena looked over at Taloc, who appeared to have chosen a sword style, and said, “Just after second-rise will be good, I think. I work better in the morning.”
“I almost forgot. Can you identify this?” Vultressant asked, holding out the hand where he wore the ring he had found on the Goblin Summoner.
Rena held out a hand, and Vultressant took off the ring and handed it to her. She studied the ring. After a minute, she handed it back. “I am afraid that I can tell you little. It is magical, but I cannot determine the type. I believe that it is likely some sort of concealment magic, since those are difficult to discern due to their nature. If it is concealment, then you need either someone with that magic type or someone with the augury magic skill.” Rena shrugged. “It could be something else as well.”
Vultressant thanked her for the effort, and the other two came back from trying out weapons.
“We good?” Taloc asked Vultressant.
“We have the materials, what is the breakdown of cost of creating the weapon,” Vultressant replied.
“The cost to forge the weapon is 800 silver,” Blassie said.
“The cost to enchant the tier one weapon with the materials that you have is 500 silver,” Rena added.
“Can we trade you the morningstar straight up?” Vultressant asked.
Blassie and Rena looked at each other, and she nodded. “I suppose that will do,” Blassie said. “Now, any more questions?” he asked, and when none were asked, he said, “Do we have a deal or no?”
“I guess we do,” Taloc said. “How long until it’s finished?”
“Four days,” said the Dwarf, “and I will work on the blade me self. I will start tomorrow,” he promised. “Bring the cobalt here tomorrow, and if it no be enough, we have extra metal, and we can negotiate the price if necessary.”
“I think that we have plenty,” Vultressant said, and they left the foundry.
_________________
That night, Maroftis sat with his friends at a large table sized for Humans in the tavern area of the Silver Penny Inn, where they were currently staying. He had an oversized chair to accommodate his abnormal size, complete with an open part in the back for his tail to fit through. Vultressant sat on a booster chair so that he could eat at the table without having to stand. There were tables sized for Gnomes in the inn, but who the hell wanted to sit at them? Only tiny Gnomes, that’s who; Maroftis had begun to think that even the Humans were tiny. There were four members of their party able to use this table without modifications, and that outweighed having five normal-sized or large members of the group scrunch into a small table. Well, maybe Vanya could sit at the kiddie table too, he amended to himself.
Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.
Most of them ate some sort of meat pie—goat, maybe? Vanya was eating some sort of stew; it probably just had vegetables in it, knowing her. He remembered eating at least three dozen fish today, but he still gobbled the food down. He clearly had the appetite of a Korak, since he now generally preferred his meat raw. He ate the pie despite it being cooked. It was beautifully spiced and reminded him of African cuisine. The others were all eating except for Isla, who was piss-drunk and really needed to eat something. She was really amusing to watch, though.
Taloc had used a good amount of the party treasure to commission a sword to be made, but only Isla seemed to care, and that might just be the mead talking; she had graduated from wine to mead when she had asked for something stronger. A sword wouldn’t have been the first choice for Maroftis; his came in handy for reach and blocking stuff, but his claws were able to do significant damage on their own. Vanya had found some hedge witch to teach her how to craft potions or whatever. She was excited and went on about it, but he had missed much of the story when he went to track down the waitress, or possibly wench? Anyway, he’d needed more beer and to not hear about potion recipes. He missed the time when he couldn’t understand Common very well.
Isla had spent the day sleeping, and when she woke up, she had started drinking pretty much straight away. It was glorious. She used to get drunk regularly when they were playing online, and Maroftis always had a great time antagonizing her, so this felt more normal to him than he had felt in a long while. He only wished that he could share in the drunkenness; he was slamming them back, but he didn’t feel any effects of the alcohol whatsoever. He wondered why and considered two of his abilities: regeneration and slow metabolism. He thought that the latter would help his efforts to get drunk, since he believed that a high metabolism would help a person remove alcohol from their system more quickly. His regeneration might be the problem, or his greatly increased mass. He looked around for the server. “Has anyone seen our server?” he asked the table. “Oh, and do we call her a wench?”
Isla laughed at the question, but Vanya looked at him. “How about ‘barmaid’?” she chided.
That sounded reasonable to him, and he nodded to Vanya. “Cool. Where’s the barmaid? Isla and I are low, and I want something stronger—this beer is doing nothing for me.” Isla cheered and went to look for the woman.
When she was out of earshot, Vultressant said, “Dude, she’s clearly trashed. Don’t encourage her.”
Maroftis eyed Vultressant mischievously. “Okay, dad. Um, are you sure that you should be allowed to drink while sitting in a booster chair?” Vultressant looked ready to make a reply, but instead he just scowled and took a drink of his beer. “That’s what I thought,” Maroftis said.
Ewtain was the only one who hadn’t spoken of what he’d done during the day; Maroftis could sense that he had been exerting himself given the heat that his body was giving off, but the Night Stalker gave no indication as to what he had been doing all day. “What were you up to today, Ewt?” he asked after draining the last of his beer.
Ewtain shrugged. “I investigated the town, mostly down by the dock area.”
The response was a little vague. “You find anything cool?” he asked, hoping for more.
Ewtain seemed to withdraw further into the hood of his cloak, which he had taken to rarely lowering, even in town. “Mostly no,” he said, “but I was asking around about the magical fountain, and while most people that I talked to about it seemed to think that they are myths, I was given an area in town to search for answers. There are a few spellcasters living in the northwest part of town, so I may head there tomorrow.”
“I need another fountain!” Maroftis said. “Maybe then I’ll be the size of a giant.”
“Be careful what you wish for,” Taloc said with a smile. “You won’t be able to stay in town if you get to be that size.”
Maroftis raised his glass to make a toast. “Then we find a giant keep with tons of treasure.”
Taloc raised a glass in response, but he said, “They may be above our pay grade for the moment, but I like where your head’s at.”
Isla returned with the barmaid in tow. They were each carrying drinks, and the barmaid also had a bottle of something. The woman set the bottle and what looked like a shot glass in front of Maroftis before serving the rest of the table. “She told me that you requested something stronger,” she said in an accented voice. She pulled the small cork out of the bottle for him.
“Thanks, he said, “bottles are hard.” He held out his hands, which resembled those of a crocodile, except for longer and stronger nails; it was difficult for him to do more precise manipulations. He could hold a weapon just fine, and he could certainly handle the bottle, but opening it without breaking it might have been a problem.
“No worries,” she replied before departing to service another table.
He ignored the tiny glass and just drank from the bottle. He swished the liquid around his mouth before swallowing. It tasted like fruity beer. He thought that it tasted like something that he had drunk before—a drink called Framboise that had a raspberry taste. This drink was much harsher, and it did feel like he was drinking something with very high alcohol content, so hopefully it could get him drunk. His original sip was enough to prompt him to empty the rest of the bottle in the next one. He slammed the empty bottle onto the table and said, “One more of those, please.”
Isla looked at him wide-eyed, and then she covered her open mouth with a hand and started laughing hysterically. When she had finally finished, she appeared blurry in Maroftis’ vision. “Is it too late to tell you to go easy with that stuff?” she asked and immediately began to laugh again. There were definitely three of her now.
Maroftis looked around but couldn’t focus on anything. “I think I might pass out.”
“She told me that a glass should get you drunk,” Isla said as she reached for her own drink. “The whole bottle, man? You’re a lush.” She had to set her drink down as she started laughing again.
His stomach began to rebel against the strong liquor, and he gripped it with a claw and muttered, “I need some water and maybe some bread.”
Vanya looked at him with concern in her eyes, but Vultressant and Taloc just smiled. Taloc held up a hand and yelled, “Waiter! Monsieur needs a bucket and perhaps a hose!” in his best French accent. Vultressant followed it up with, “Bring him a mint.”
“I think it might be serious,” Vanya said as she looked at both Vultressant and Taloc admonishingly. “I’m going to see if I can get him anything for this.”
Vultressant smiled broadly. “Smart—you are surely in the splash zone now.” He looked at Maroftis, then back at Vanya, who was sitting directly across the table from the Korak. Vanya’s eyes grew wide, and she hurried away from the table. Taloc and Vultressant laughed when Vanya ran away, but they both got up and prudently moved behind Maroftis. Ewtain looked at Maroftis warily, but he just took a sip of his beer. Isla was giggling hysterically and seemed to have no intention of moving. The Night Stalker and Skirmisher were both flanking Maroftis, who now cupped his enormous head in his claws.
Maroftis did feel as if he might vomit, but given his cloudy head, he hoped that he would pass out first. He thought that it would be a close race. The last thing that he remembered was three or four Vanyas leading a host of people towards the table.