A flash in the center of the room made everyone jump as two wooden boxes appeared, presumably courtesy of Dolos.
Henry could hear the approaching Bobrik armswomen, but they still weren’t anywhere close. He looked Tanushree in the eyes and the woman gulped, but squared her shoulders. Henry’s voice sounded distorted as he spoke, and he realized that his new, magical helmet covered his mouth.
“Your security fucking sucks in this place. Good food, though.”
Paths Less Traveled
Henry glared at the yucka pulling his wagon. He’d been feeling surly the entire morning, and the creature’s smell was not helping. “I seriously swear that yucka are half monster. I was hoping to never deal with these fucking things ever again,” he grumbled as he sat, gesturing at the huge beast of burden.
Tony nodded. “I don’t like them, either.”
It had only been a couple days since they’d thwarted the assassination attempt on Tanushree. The night after the fighting itself had been a clusterfuck with all the Bobrik people running all over the place and asking stupid questions. Henry had a sneaking suspicion he would have had to fight someone or just leave altogether if not for Tanushree herself ordering people to leave him alone.
The difference between how the Jaguar Clan functioned from the much larger Bobrik family was like night and day. Most of the Jaguar Clan had actually been related. In the Bobrik family, Tanushree’s parents including her father and three mothers, her two sisters, her Aunt, her aunt’s sister wife, her uncle, and her four cousins were the only actual Bobriks living in the estate. Everyone else was an employee or a retainer.
Something else Henry was getting used to was how often he got ignored in Berber. He was starting to feel like a robot. Everyone in the Bobrik estate knew he was ‘Bonded, some of them even knew he was technically a noble, but quite a few of the women just kind of glazed over when he talked, looking for confirmation from Tanushree. Henry felt kind of treated like...dangerous machinery.
He was starting to understand this was all just how Ludus worked, and he kind of couldn’t blame most of the women for ignoring him. Most Ludan men he’d met so far had been lazy, stupid sad sacks. Most of the men he’d met didn’t even know how to fight. They literally let the women fight their battles for them.
Tanushree’s father painted all day while her mothers actually ran the estate and took care of family business. Tolstey had probably been a bit different because there were more Mo’hali around, and the Mo’hali men weren’t as useless as most of the Terran men Henry had met in Berber.
The beast people had apparently been a good influence.
Henry couldn’t tell whether the Terran men in Berber decided on their own to be giant wastes of space, or if the women actually wanted them that way. Either way, the whole state of affairs was alien and uncomfortable for him. The only person with a penis he actually talked to regularly that he didn’t want to punch on general principal was Tony.
Jason is gonna have a fucking field day figuring out all this messed up bullshit. The tall, geeky man might enjoy learning about the politics and culture of Ludus, but Henry didn’t. He liked being ignored even less.
Most of the women were not exactly rude to him, but, at first, it was hard for him to put his finger on it. And then he’d figured out what really bothered him about it. When he had realized that he’d somehow gotten used to people deferring to him, to respecting him, even caring about his opinion...he’d felt disgusted with himself.
Nobody in Berber was really being mean, they just...weren’t falling all over themselves, giving a shit about what he had to say. Henry kept stewing about it. People should care about what he said. He was right most of the time, after all. But the fact it bothered him when they didn’t made him want to kick his own ass. When the hell had he gotten so full of himself?
At least a couple good things had happened the day before. One of the assassins hadn’t been killed, just chewed up by Rekkla, probably wishing she was dead. The Bobrik’s probably had not been kind to her, either. She’d attempted to kill the Bobrik heir, after all. Somewhat unsurprisingly, she’d cracked under her inevitable torture.
Henry had heard from a servant that Tanushree had killed the would-be murderess herself, using a ceremonial Bobrik family axe. Ludus is a harsh world. Henry had seen some hairy shit back on earth, but teen girls dispassionately killing condemned criminals was a new one for him.
Now the Bobrik family presumably knew who had sent the attack, but Tanushree hadn’t really said anything more about it. And unlike the Jaguar Clan where Henry had been accepted as part of the family itself, the Bobriks seemed to be treating Henry and Tony both like Tanushree’s retainers. Henry thought it was a little weird. Everyone in the estate knew that Tanushree was still alive because of them, but he still hadn’t even really talked to her parents other than briefly saying hello.
The Bobrik family seemed to be a lot more cold and impersonal about raising their kids. It bothered Henry’s American sensibilities, but he had to admit that Tanushree was tough as nails and smart as hell. Perhaps her upbringing had something to do with that.
Henry absently reached up and petted Honey where she sat on his shoulder, her favorite place to travel. The purple badger creature had passively followed him before reaching the Bobrik estate, and she’d seemed content to hang out with all the other animals in the stables there, even though she made the rest of them nervous as hell. But she’d appeared out of nowhere and swarmed up Henry’s leg to his shoulder as they had left, and he had just rolled with it.
Unfortunately, Tony didn’t understand why Henry had named her ‘Honey’. The one time Henry had joked, “Honey Badger don’t give a shit!” and begun laughing, Tony had been confused.
The young man had asked, “She doesn’t defecate? That’s amazing! I’ve never heard of that type of magic before!” The whole exchange had killed the comedy, and it made Henry grumpy just thinking about it. He was looking forward to meeting up with Jason again. His friend would think the name was stupid, but at least he’d get the joke.
Henry and Tony had gotten used to Honey being with them, but pretty much everyone else they’d met in Berber so far had given them funny looks. Henry was beginning to understand that the practice of keeping pets in general wasn’t very popular in Berber.
The other good thing to occur the previous day had happened around dinnertime. Henry had gotten an MMB message from Mareen. He’d excused himself to read the note and keep any emotional nonsense he might have experienced to himself. Nobody would have wanted to see that.
Actually, now that Henry thought about it, he hadn’t filled Tony in yet! The young adventurer hadn’t tried to remind him, either. The kid must have the patience of a saint! “So you’re probably wondering about the MMB, right?”
Henry immediately had Tony’s full attention. The young adventurer’s subtly inhuman eyes with tiny pupils lit up. “Yes, please!”
“Well, I suppose you’re worried about your cousin, right?”
A complicated expression passed over Tony’s face. He replied, “Yeah...worried. But tell me about everyone!”
“Well, Vitaliya is fine. She’s apparently worried about you.” The same complicated expression passed over Tony’s face again, but Henry didn’t know what it meant. He just continued, “Thirsty left the group before everyone else started heading up the river towards the mountains.”
“What? Why? Is he okay?”
“Yeah. Mareen said he didn’t want to be an adventurer, anymore. Well, he never wanted to be an adventurer in the first place. He went to the Mirana capital to do something there. Jason gave him a lot of money to get started, so that was cool.
“Jason is third rank ‘Bonded now like me. Speaking of which, are you going to use those spirit stones?”
Tony reached into his pocket and pulled out the spirit stones Henry had insisted he take. After the assassination attempt, Henry had pocketed both reward boxes for killing two orb-Bonded. Tanushree had seen hi
m do it, but none of the Bobrik people had asked about it despite knowing that some of the attackers had been ‘Bonded. Henry and Tony had just received a brusque, “Thank you.”
It had turned out that both boxes had a spirit stone inside, and Henry had given them to Tony. Tony rolled the spirit stones around in his palm and said, “I think so, I mean, what you said makes sense. It’s just…”
“Look, it’s simple. I’m already third rank, and I doubt my controller will let me level up for a while. I haven’t even scratched the surface of my new powers yet. You might be able to rank up immediately, though,” explained Henry.
“Yeah, but this is so much wealth,” said Tony, his voice soft.
“Look, kid, you’ve saved Princess Volleyball like twice now. Her family is weird as hell and won’t really acknowledge it, but from my perspective, you’ve earned it.”
Tony shook his head. “Her family isn’t bad, they’re just preparing her to be a noblewoman on her own in the capital,” he replied absently. “If she can’t deal with that sort of thing, she won’t do well there.”
“Yeah, I kind of figured it’s a tough love thing. Anyway, just use the spirit stones tonight. You’ve saved my ass multiple times in the past few weeks. Keep doing it and I’ll keep feeding you more spirit stones. But speaking of Tanushree, you two have been spending a lot of time together, right? I bet Rekkla isn’t happy about that.” Henry smirked.
Tony’s face colored and he reflexively looked over his shoulder, probably to check that none of the others were nearby. They weren’t. Henry had needed some time away from Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum and had wanted to talk to Tony without Lady Iceveins around. Just taking point as security in their little caravan had been enough to ensure that.
Henry felt a little guilty about engineering time away from their benefactor since Tanushree was effectively doing him a huge favor. They were heading to his Berber estates to officially become a noble. But Tony was his friend and his battle brother. At least once in a while, he needed to have a real conversation with the other man without Trask moping, or Rekkla trying to bite someone.
Tony scratched his face. “There isn’t anything with Lady Bobrik, you know, anything with...um…”
“I’ve seen how you look at her, dude. You’re about as subtle as a fucking car crash. I can’t tell how she feels because she’s got a poker face from hell, but you might as well give it a shot. I mean, unless you would rather have Rekkla. She’s got green skin but she’s actually kind of cute if you like ‘em short...and carnivorous, and not human...and psychotic.”
Tony put his hand on his stomach and grimaced, probably using his magic. He did that a lot now when he was flustered. Henry would think it was funny if the kid wasn’t probably changing the past. Actually, if it’s already the past, could he change it, or was he just creating the past? All of it still freaked him out.
Tony said, “Henry, I’m not you. I can’t just...talk to people. Plus, she is a noblewoman, a powerful one in Berber! I’m just a farmer from a parcel in Tolstey.”
“Bullshit. Look, I know I’m American and not really down with ye olde class system. This won’t mean anything to you, and it doesn’t apply to this world anyway. But what does matter is that you are an adventurer now, and more importantly, you are orb-Bonded. You’re a powerful orb-Bonded at that. The lines between different types of power are always hazy, and Ludus is no exception. In fact, all nobility are orb-Bonded, right?”
“Yes, if they have enough wealth. A lot of noble families won’t give an orb to a family member unless they’re important enough and have gotten old enough. That is why Lady Tanushree is about to get hers.”
“Why?”
“Little kids can grow up too fast or too slow with an orb, and a lot of noble children die young— assassinations, monsters, stuff like that. Tanushree said they don’t want to waste resources.”
“Oh,” muttered Henry. Well, that’s shitty, but makes sense. “Anyway, the point is, you should at least explore whether it could be an option. Do some research. Poke around. At the very least, you could find out if the girl likes you in the first place, otherwise this whole conversation is kind of pointless.
“Still, I bet being orb-Bonded is a lot like being really rich back on Earth. Back in the day, sometimes people bought themselves titles or married into the aristocracy on Earth...I think, anyway. Ask Jason when you see him again, he’ll know. But being ‘Bonded makes you more powerful and extends your lifespan. I have a hard time believing that powerful families wouldn’t be all over that like white on rice.”
“White on rice?” asked Tony.
“Never mind. It sounds better in English. Hold on, I’m gonna check the map.” Henry rummaged around in his thick leather pack, courtesy of the Bobrik family. “Oh, I am going to send an MMB to Mareen tonight. If you want to send any of your own, you know how to call them. I’ll give you some gold if you need it. That way you can message your cousin and tell—”
Henry’s voice trailed off as he unfurled the map and saw something completely unexpected. As he stared, he realized that the strange sensation he’d experienced before the attack when he could sense metal had been pulled his senses to a new area marked area on the map, too.
On the map, showing up in exactly the same way as dungeons had in Tolstey with Henry’s power, somewhat like a hologram, was a rotating, silver pyramid over a specific mark. The indicated point also happened to be in the same direction they were already traveling. Henry gave Tony a suspicious look. “How many times a day did you say you randomly use your magic?”
“What’s the matter? I don’t know, probably around a dozen.”
“Because,” said Henry pointing at the map, “this is one hell of a coincidence.” Henry quickly reminded Tony of his locations of dungeons power, but further explained that it hadn’t been working for him in Berber, probably because the ability still only had one level. Berber dungeons were higher level than Tolstey dungeons, so he couldn’t see them, at least that was what made the most sense.
Henry continued explaining, “But now I can see this pyramid thing. I’m assuming it has something to do with my metal magic.”
“And are we going to check it out?” asked Tony, betraying only a hint of excitement.
“Well, I don’t call the shots here, but I’d like to. Why don’t you go inform Miss Volleyball that I’d like to veer left about an hour ahead?”
Tony’s cheeks colored a bit but he smiled and began clambering off the slow-moving wagon. “I’m on it,” the young man called, already heading towards the rear of the caravan where Tanushree rode with her guards.
Henry watched him go and was amused by how fast the lone armswoman in his path got out of his way. They might all be scared of Henry, but they were fucking terrified of Tony.
***
Aodh gaped at the ancient stone structures surrounding his group, and felt tiny. Tiny and young. The dilapidated, long-abandoned buildings were the oldest evidence of people’s existence on Ludus he had ever seen.
The buildings had harsh, angular lines, constructed with sharp points and round decorations on the walls themselves. The ravages of time had put cracks and fissures in the stone, and vegetation broke up some of the surroundings. Empty, dark windows stared out at the invading caravan like empty eye sockets. Small trees threw up through cracks, the surrounding forest reclaiming the area slowly over time. Moss and lichen cascaded down from every rooftop, adding to the overall hush, the alien atmosphere of the place.
Aodh glanced back at his party and felt shame. Nobody else seemed impressed, not even Trask. The fussy little goblin was taking notes in a notebook he’d somehow gotten ahold of at the Bobrik estate, but otherwise showed no reaction. Rekkla seemed bored except for when she noticed Aodh looking. She straightened and her ears actually perked up. Aodh quickly averted his gaze.
Most of Tanushree’s armswomen were awkwardly standing around, looking uncomfortable. The majority of them had refused to even enter the ruins. O
ne of them had said even monsters wouldn’t usually enter, and so far, it seemed she’d been correct.
Tanushree herself stood talking to Henry, pointing at the pillar in the middle of the abandoned city and shaking her head. Aodh wondered what was going on so he began ambling over, continuing to gawk at his surroundings. As he got closer, he could see that the pillar actually jutted out of a massive, metal disc, partially obscured by the passage of time. Clumps of dirt and grass hid the one magnificent metal, now dull with age.
Aodh wasn’t an expert, but even he could tell the surrounding buildings had been constructed around the disc and the pillar. When he’d almost reached Henry and Tanushree, the purple accented creature on Henry’s shoulder sharply turned her head and stared at Aodh.
The animal’s piercing gaze was unsettling. Aodh wanted to say something to Henry about it, but he knew the other man would make fun of him for it. Plus, Aodh did feel a little ridiculous. He was a second rank orb-Bonded, soon to be third rank. He had two powerful, enchanted weapons the likes he’d never even heard of before. It was getting to the point that Aodh had to finally admit to himself he was becoming a powerful adventurer in his own right.
He was also the Voice of Memory, or so the Gobskulls told him.
But despite all of that, he could not deny that the cute little animal on Henry’s shoulder scared the hell out of him. Aodh felt dread in his bones and wanted to just run away screaming. He cleared his throat and as usual, he suppressed his flight instinct, ignoring the creature. If anything happened, he was going straight for his dagger, though.
His dagger...that was another problem. He still didn’t really know anything about it and he hadn’t talked to Henry about it much, either. Henry hadn’t pressed, probably because he knew Aodh didn’t want to discuss it, but the other man’s patience would only last so long. Aodh sighed and stood next to Henry, listening in to the conversation.
Delvers LLC: Adventure Capital Page 18
