by Ryan DeBruyn
Leaning into the mirror like this, I notice that the decent food or maybe the increased stats are changing my physique. In the mirror, a somewhat less-starving young man stares back at me. The tight suit of black fabric actually has some definition that isn’t my rib bones. I flex an arm—
“Oh, not this again. . .” Crash’s voice calls, even though he isn’t in the mirror.
“You know what? You’re banned from the Locker Room,” I state as my cheeks flush. I look back into the mirror and see Mur flexing his own arms beside me while making faces himself. Is that how I looked doing the same?
After a few more poses, I decide to cook a meal before heading into the Suburb. I find another D-rank option in the kitchen app, but it is costly to make at twenty-one bitcoins. Still, the rewards should also increase.
“Sire, you simply must try one of the D-ranked quest recipes. I held my tongue last time, but the previous owner said that the higher ranks tasted like heaven on a fork,” Crash helpfully adds as I massage my ear.
“Mur want big food!” Mur states, and I’m unsure if he means quantity or the highest rank. It becomes even more confusing when he goes and sits by a plate of heaping raw Leporid meat.
Mur’s daily workout did just replenish twenty-two bitcoins and it seems he votes for the best. . .
*Small Kitchen App [Green]*
Please choose a recipe to initiate a daily quest.
●Gallus Breast with Broccoli and Rice [Gray](3 bitcoins)
●Rodentia Stew with Carrots and Potatoes [Gray](3 bitcoins)
●Leporid Haunch with a Red Wine Demi-Glace. [Green](6 bitcoins)
●Mushroom Rodentia Hock Soup [Green](8 bitcoins)
●Stewed Chunkalunk with Gravy [Green](10 bitcoins)
●Snowball Flank Steak [Green](11 bitcoins)
●Chunk-a-Lunk Shepherd’s Pie [Blue](18 bitcoins)
●Oven-Roasted Stuffed Snowball Breast [Blue](21 bitcoins)
It’s too late to go back after I choose the Snowball Breast option. I stare in horror at the recipe. It’s so much more complicated than anything I have seen before. It requires me to cook plenty of ingredients in a frying pan before blending them and mixing in cheese. Then I have to stuff that mixture between the meat. Wait, am I reading that right? After stuffing the raw meat, I seal and bread it?
I take deep breaths, trying to calm my nerves and build my confidence. If it follows the pattern, I should get better rewards. I scroll to the rewards section and smile. I can get five free points, ten bitcoins back, or stronger buffs, and today is a day I need to renew the Physical Boost.
Chef’s Inspiration [Blue](72 Hours)
-Temporarily increases the recovery rate of all healing in the Training Room by 150%.
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Chef’s Physical Boost [Blue](72 Hours)
-Temporarily increases overall strength, speed, and endurance by 2 minor ranks.
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Chef’s Mind Boost [Blue](72 Hours)
-Temporarily increases overall capacity, speed, and recovery by 2 minor ranks.
The discovery that the buffs will last seventy-two hours and increase the ranks by double makes my earlier miser smile. With the money from the daily workouts, we should have enough to make this sustainable. We also have outrageous amounts of boss-quality meat for two people. Well, as long as I keep Mur away from it, that is. I look back to the buffs. With the increase to five free points, I can stack the buffs, accept free points every third day, and almost break even on my previous progress.
“Is there a way to have Mur receive the buff from this cooking quest?” I ask Crash.
“Each individual in the Training Room can complete the quest, Master,” Crash states, and I look to Mur. He is still grinding raw Leporid between his teeth. I tilt my head.
Could he follow me through a cooking quest like he does the workouts? With a recipe this complex? A dribble of the meat’s blood runs from the corner of his mouth and he makes loud slurping sounds as he sucks it back in. Definitely not ready for a recipe like this. I really need to find a way to teach him English faster so he can interact with the Training Room. I already went through the shop and can’t think of a way to spare a hundred dollars to purchase the book from Beach. . .
I start cooking and place many vegetables into the frying pan along with olive oil. The scent of cooking garlic mixes with the crackling of the pan, and suddenly my attention is solely on the recipe.
Just as I think the spinach, broccoli, garlic, and carrot mixture is ready, I feel the qi circulating in my Dantian begin slipping out of my control.
Vertigo nearly slams me into the concrete floor, but my body’s reaction saves me from that because my hand shoots out to grab the counter as I crumple to my knees.
“Master, are you okay?” Crash asks. I try to open my mouth, but my stomach threatens to eject breakfast. “Your vegetables are burning,” Crash adds unhelpfully from beside me.
The dizziness only increases as something seems to be sucking my qi away, or perhaps it’s just a change in pressure? I lower myself the rest of the way to the floor and ignore both Crash’s and Mur’s questions. If I am not mistaken, I just broke through some of the major blockages of my River artery.
As soon as I enter meditation, I can feel it’s more than that. I have broken through the remaining four blockages simultaneously!
The uncomfortable sensation of vanishing qi is because my Dantian can now hold nineteen drops, and my River artery can hold seventeen in flow. Those two changes cause me to feel extremely off balance.
Sitting on the floor, I begin injecting some of the circulating Sun qi from around my body and top up both areas. Slowly, my equilibrium returns.
That would have been extremely dangerous if it happened in combat. I make a note to talk to Crash about it after. Carefully, I create an undercurrent in each branch arteriole surrounding my Dantian.
Opening my eyes and bringing my focus back to the present, my nose informs me it has been smelling carbonizing vegetables for the past few minutes. I leap to my feet.
“By the Towers!” I shout as I take the smoking pan off the fire. Crash is just staring at the thing, his face expressionless. Mur is standing beside me, and seeing my expression, stuffs some more Leporid meat into his mouth. I feel annoyance rise up, right alongside elation. I just broke through to F-9! That’s amazing, and I feel like it should be a celebration. Unfortunately, the charred vegetables sour it significantly.
“Jeff okay? Mur go eat?” Mur asks in Gartuski as soon as I seem to be okay. I take a deep breath. I realize that my annoyance isn’t with Crash or Mur, and only partly with the burnt vegetables. Attempting to break through multiple blockages simultaneously was the real problem. It all comes back to the growth speed, the same problem that led the Church to believe that their way is the best cultivation method. While I am now following a different route entirely, I must be careful not to fall into the same trap. Jumping from F-5 to 9 is a huge increase, but one that leaves both my physical and mental statistics far behind. Not to mention the danger that would have posed mid-battle!
I’ve closed my eyes, and I hear Mur scamper away and begin grinding raw meat up again. I nod to myself. It’s just a loss of a few bitcoins. I should be celebrating the breakthroughs. I can make back the money soon.
“Sire, you’ve brutalized your food again,” Crash states somberly.
Chuckling to myself, I begin scraping it into a trash bin that empties itself. Part of me realizes that Crash absorbs the refuse thrown here. So, I could theoretically throw the burnt food on the floor, like my annoyance with his last comment is demanding, but Crash is right. I did burn more food.
“Crash, please purchase replacement vegetables. Thank you,” I respond as dryly as I can manage. This time, as I begin cooking, I think about the problem of my stats falling so far behind my Dantian rank.
While I know I can increase those stats in higher ranks, it feels somewhat prudent to set up as strong a base in the F-ra
nks as I can before moving on. At least everything I read in the cultivation journal laments the previous owner’s missing these exact opportunities. Thinking of the journal brings to mind my failure to find a mental skill. I wonder if Barclay didn’t write any down or if I am just not far enough in.
Considering I am only about ten percent through it, I promise to carve out some more time to read it . . . or let Crash scan it, finally.
Chapter 36
September 4th, 151 AR
Jeff Turle
I jog around the Suburb to make my entrance from another direction. While I know this won’t guarantee my safety, I’m hoping that it may help hide the Training Room’s location from Ride or Die.
After about twenty minutes of jogging I hear the sound of many conversations from up ahead and begin approaching cautiously. I come across a sizable two-way street completely clear of debris. The road has two lines of vehicles of all shapes and sizes idling about. I begin walking up the line toward the front, assuming there will be an entrance. As I move, I study the many elegant carriages in one line—the faster and shorter of the two. The second line is large semis, hand-drawn carts, and a few old worn-down electric trucks.
The front of the second line has at least ten guards poring over each vehicle’s contents while the owners watch on. It takes me a moment to realize that this second line is for hunters like Alrick.
My skin flushes slightly, and my heart speeds up. Maybe Alrick is with one of these groups?! It’s something I didn’t consider till now. Even if Alrick isn’t here, someone might know of him, right? I still have his watch, and would like to hear the story of how he got me into the Training Room. . .
From the way Alrick tells it, hunters are probably the closest thing to the group of mercenaries I grew up with. Gruff, dangerous men and women that choose to clear dungeons in the wilds. So I should feel more comfortable here, but for some reason I don’t. I turn back and gaze down the long road. This road must be one that runs out of the city and into the dense wilderness.
The hunter was the bravest man I ever met. How else could he run dungeons in the wilds—dungeons with no classification or registry. In essence, hunters track free-roaming and mighty monsters back to their dens and then attack them to obtain rare and powerful loot.
I always picture other hunters as the pinnacle of adventurers but admit that Alrick may heavily tinge that point of view. My mental image of men in bright silver armor gleaming in the sun from Alrick’s stories clashes violently with the dusty, road-weary rabble in line. Many wear armor, but dents, scratches, and copious amounts of road grime mar any shine they might have had. Others wear leathers that are so heavily patched that they look quilted. In contrast to their shabby armor, are their well-kept, well-maintained weapons. Each one is sheathed or slung in an oiled scabbard or harness and the few glimpses of edges tells me each is extremely sharp as well. Pair their gear with the hard looks from each hunter, and each simple glance in my direction gives me chills. Some of the most dangerous looking ones have an aura that reminds me of Jamie and Markus: hard and deadly.
I shiver as I approach the guard, who doesn’t even ask a question before motioning me in—his eyes still on the much more intimidating men behind me. Once I’m through the gate I study the yard laid out in front of me. There is so much activity in the area that there seems to be a din of noise blanketing my ears. There is a strange humming that undercuts all nearby conversations and I begin searching for its origin. The streets quickly change from paved to packed dust and the buildings look more like hovels than the neatly constructed houses and sky-rises in the other areas of Beach. A few exceptions exist, and I can see crowds forming around the large warehouse looking buildings. In front of one of those warehouses is where the noise originates. I can see sparks flying into the air as someone holds some sort of spinning machine to the side of a massive truck. I dismiss it and keep searching. Near the center of this area there is a large four-sided board with lots of clear space around it. It too has a crowd gathering around it and I think I know what it might be.
Merchants don’t hawk their wares here; no, instead I see merchants shelling out coins to hunters for rare pelts, meats and items. A hunter glares at me from nearby when my eyes linger too long on his group’s interaction with a merchant. I forget to breathe thanks to the pain that look seems to promise, and I start hurrying through the area toward the church, scanning for Alrick as I move.
I am in such a rush that it takes me a few moments to realize that the entire large section of the Suburb is lit by sunshine, and I could use it to cultivate. In fact, a few hunters are doing just that. My stuttering pulse and chilly blood prevent me from considering it an option for long, though. With my added stench when I cultivate, I don’t think hunters or the merchants around will appreciate it. I will just find a new out-of-the-way rooftop—I would even go back to the Sabres’ territory before I cultivate a pervasive odor near the dangerous-looking hunters. I’m already getting enough looks for the way I smell without cultivating.
I make my way toward the large four-sided board. As I weave through streets and people, I continue to look for Alrick in each group. Nearer the board, I study the many papers stuck to the side I approach. I watch nearby hunters pull sheets down off of it and smile. This is what I was looking for. There’s a man standing to the side who hurriedly scribbles something down and pins it to the cork. These must be the message boards. Alrick used to talk about them often. It had been a bit of a backup option if we couldn’t join a hunters’ group. Alrick told me people put requests, letters, messages, and information up there.
Cautiously, I approach and scan the papers still waving in the wind. One hunter pulls down a piece of paper, and I manage to get a quick peek at it.
Looking for Fartan Sayle. Will be at Mary’s Bar each night near sundown.
Nodding, I approach the man at the side of the board.
“Can I add a message to the board?” I ask quietly.
“One dollar per fifty words,” the man responds back, shouting over the crowd, and my hand goes into my pocket for a coin without hesitation.
“Alrick Garod, I am here. Thank you for saving me and the awesome item. Find me. Jeff,” I state, keeping it short and simple. First, the price per word spooks me, but less information means less chance of someone else learning of my connections or location.
“That’s it?” the man asks, raising an eyebrow. I hurriedly nod and toss the coin to him. It vanishes out of the air, and the man pins my message to the board. I look at it and feel like I did something great. I feel the same euphoria from this morning. A near identical feeling to that of clearing a dungeon wells up in my chest. I’ve taken steps and might find Alrick! I hurry away after I realize I am just staring at my own message, stupidly.
The hunter’s entrance into the Suburb is much farther from the church. I can barely make out the structure on top of its hill. The church is down a long walled street that seems to be paved. I study the smaller buildings of the Hunters’ Yard, my personal name for the space, as I travel this new section of the Suburb. Well, new to me, at least. The buildings are actually old and shoddy. Large complexes, smiths, tanneries, butchers, and many alchemy shops are within the rather shabby area. Still, if the wood is an indicator, no one cleans or maintains them. When comparing this area to the others, it is instantly apparent that this would be the slums, but simultaneously there isn’t a single bit of land here not in use to create items that guilds, adventurers, or hunters all need.
I see many rooftops that could possibly serve as cultivation spots, but the buildings are all one or two stories and ready to fall over, making those options rather conspicuous or dangerous. No one pays me any mind as I continue to weave between the rough hovels. Before long, I reach another checkpoint at the start of the long, paved street toward the church. Two checkpoints? While inside the Array gaps, the second set of guards tells me that this area isn’t truly part of Beach.
The guards at this post are much m
ore thorough in their questioning but let me through when they confirm that I have business at the church. Turns out my name is on a sheet at all posts throughout the entire city. Great, every guard knows of my ‘criminal’ status.
From this guard post, it is a short walk to a church side entrance, and I find myself on the opposite side of the Suburb from the Sabres’ headquarters. Despite keeping my eyes open for good cultivating spots, I am forced to conclude that this area of the city is possibly more dangerous than many others. Why?
It’s filled with individually gated houses. Each is large enough to put four other houses inside, at least the houses from the ruins. This must be the lords and ladies district, and getting caught by any of them would put me in immediate danger. While the Sabres or Star Bucks may punish my trespass, they both follow a group decision on the issue. Alrick told me lords and ladies follow no such laws or guidelines. They will act as their mood dictates, which likely wouldn’t be charitable to a ragamuffin like me.
I enter the church and feel my shoulders droop back down from up around my ears. That leaves only one area of the city left to explore, and I plan to make an inquiry of the bookkeeper today to figure out what area of Beach lies nearest the water. There is a small lineup of individuals waiting on her today, and I join the back, listening to the people ahead of me.
“My son has been missing for three months,” a man growls at the attendant. “You don’t even have any news of the group he joined?”
“As I said, we have made all the inquiries we could, and no one has claimed to have seen your boy. I do apologize, but the Church has done all it can. Next!” the attendant says, looking past the man to the next woman at the front of the line.
