Drip-Fed Pt. 08

Lubrin was perhaps the richest person in Heralry. That was a 'perhaps' that only applied to raw money in his possession. If one were to combine holdings, owned structures and social capital with that, Lubrin was without a doubt the richest person in Heralry.

Himself an accomplished merchant, he was also the head of the local Trader's Guild branch. Every piece of import or export had to go through his administration, unless they wanted to be banned from the large market square and try to sell their things somewhere else. As such, Lubrin could enrich himself not only through the advantages he gave his own company, but through bribes from all his fellow traders as well.

That money seldomly rested with the merchant himself. Instead, it was invested into houses, shops, loans and other such things that would return some interest over time. There was one thing, however, in which Lubrin didn't quite think like a merchant.

And that was his own house.

It was packed to the brim, which was an accomplishment in its own given its size, with luxurious items. Pottery from distant leaves, cured, tropical wood of dark and light colours, little plants that looked like fully grown trees, spices in glass jars, themselves works of artistic mastery.

Those things were scattered all throughout the mansion, for everyone to see and marvel at. They were works of great value, sometimes worth more than adventurers would be able to earn in an entire year, but showed off only one thing: that he had money. Anyone with the necessary sums could get those things.

The unique stuff, he kept elsewhere.

"Let's go to the vault, then," Lubrin announced, wrapping up the fist-sized core in the now slightly damp cloth. "You will get your money once this rests in its rightful place."

With an unsatisfied groan, Gabrame rose from the couch and they both walked away. Thankfully, the way wasn't too far. The mansion laid at one of the most secure locations of the city, directly adjacent to the barracks of the city guard.

The location of the vault was just another example of Lubrin's wide-reaching influence, being in those very same barracks. "Your hobby is really odd," Gabrame commented when they reached the massive stone wall that surrounded the arrangement of structures. All forged from grey stone and metal, they had a menacing feel to them.

Aside from the sleeping grounds of the guards, many of which were sleeping there outside of their prolonged shifts, the training grounds and the prison, the city guard also had a number of empty buildings that could be used for numerous purposes if needed.

As unlikely as it was, Ctania could always come under siege by an expanding empire or something like that. Best to have the extra space. Right now, a good portion of that space was being rented by Lubrin. An entire warehouse, including its own shift of guards, was being paid for by the Trader Guildmaster.

They entered without much of a problem, the guards on shift asking quickly to see proof that Lubrin was himself. The merchant was paranoid enough that he even thought about potential shapeshifters stealing from him. Granted, if an Infiltrator of a high enough level were to come to Ctania, this warehouse was the only worthwhile target.

After Lubrin showed an intricate card made from multiple metals, all welded together to show the face of a trickster, and answered a series of security questions, they were guided to a massive door. All three locks were opened, each of the two guards and Lubrin himself having a key, and only then were they finally inside.

"I mean, you have all of this stuff and you show it to nobody," the sharpshooter said and gestured at the immense treasure trove before him. Trophies upon trophies, gathered from countless worlds and originating from countless different things were arranged here, each on its own pedestal, on display, with glass cases separating them from the surrounding world.

There was the tooth of a dragon, as long as Gabrame's arm. The preserved claw of a Tharnatos-class demon, three fingers and two thumbs on opposing sides, all ending in razor-sharp claws. A scale from a Creeper Titan. A half-rusted sword with a ruby in-laid into the handle, radiating a constant red light. Most importantly for Gabrame, there was a jar full of the eyes of a Living Graveyard. Pitch Black, with a single white dot for the pupil, the creature he had slain so long ago still seemed to stare.

Gabrame just yawned, the only thing it reminded him of was how he first got into contact in the first place.

"Seeing my trophies is an honour I do grant some people," Lubrin waved at the sharpshooter, indicating what a great favour he did him by even letting him come along. "That aside, just possessing things that nobody else has is... just the greatest."

"The gods don't like the greedy," Gabrame grinned as he cited a pretty common wisdom. "At least you aren't cruel as well."

"No, that's what I pay you for," Lubrin answered with a laugh, carefully unwrapping the slime core. "Not even a single scratch on it... really nice work."

Gabrame was a bit surprised by that. Even though he had landed a perfect shot, the force should have etched at least the three thorns of the arrow into the sphere. However, he wasn't about to mention that. Certainly, he was just that good. "Maybe I should get a bonus," he suggested.

"Yes, maybe you should... what is that?" loud bells suddenly rung from outside the warehouse, along with shouts that escalated bit by bit. Something about an escaped prisoner. "...Maybe I should reconsider my security," Lubrin mumbled, then looked at the Hunter. "Aren't you going to check it out?"

"Why, are you going to pay me for it?" Gabrame shrugged it off, mentally in the next tavern already. "Not my damn problem what the guards fuck up."

"Fair enough," Lubrin searched for an empty pedestal and soon found one at a distant wall. "This one is truly unique, nobody has ever heard of a creature like this," the merchant was tremendously excited about this. In one of the few acts the rich man still did himself, he carefully dusted off the pedestal, choose a light blue pillow, harmonizing with the almost black, midnight blue of the core, and put it down.

Only when the corners aligned perfectly with the square base of the pedestal, did the merchant put the sphere into the depression in the middle of the pillow. The fitting glass case had been left nearby and Lubrin grabbed it with gleeful anticipation. Then let out a shocked gasped. "It's cracked!"

Just because he didn't have anything else to look at, Gabrame checked on that statement. Indeed, the case had a large scar running through one of its sides, with a miniscule opening where some shards had fallen off. "Just get a replacement."

"I have none of this size ready!" Lubrin grumbled. "I will need to get one done. Bah, my day is ruined!"

"I don't really care. Can I have my money now?" Gabrame asked, wanting to finally get away from the merchant. All he cared about was the money the guy had, their relationship didn't extend beyond that. Rich people had all these oddities to them that the Hunter disliked.

"Sure..." Lubrin rummaged within his expensive clothes and pulled out the massive sack of coins. "250 gold coins, as agreed," he said and then, after a moment of thinking, grabbed a much smaller sack and pulled a single, silver-white coin, which he showed for a moment and then put into the gold purse. "And one platin, for the perfect condition." Then he threw the entire thing at Gabrame.

The Hunter caught it and didn't even bother looking inside. Lubrin had never undercut him before, so there was no reason to assume he would start now. "Pleasure having done business with you," Gabrame said.

"You say that like it's going to be the last time," the merchant noted.

"It might be," Gabrame shrugged. "All this running around got my old bones going. That aside, I don't want to be on the same leaf as a Cardinal who I potentially pissed off, so I'm leaving for at least a few years. Maybe get some youth back, make some more bastards elsewhere, who knows."

"Ah, how sad... I will miss your reliability," Lubrin stated.

And that was really all he would miss.

____________________________________________________

Two knocks on a wooden table. "I call," said Filch, grinning at his hand of cards. His victory was basically guaranteed. Opposite of him his fellow guard on the shift, Delgue, made a disgruntled face.

"Bloody hell, dude, if this continues, I am going to be eating at the cantina exclusively for the next month," he announced as he threw his cards on the table. The losing hand landed right between a wooden mug of water and his helmet. Aside from that and his gauntlets, Delgue was wearing the complete steel plate of the city guard. The armour clunked as he moved to take an annoyed sip.

"Just be happy that you get free food in the first place," Filch suggested with a giant grin, gathering the cards back up to shuffle and start another round. They were being hyperbolic anyway, they only played for a few copper each round. It was the only entertainment they could get while guarding the vault of Lubrin.

"You say that like people are starving in the street," Delgue grumbled, running a hand through his short black hair. A look that Filch shared, including which armour pieces he had removed, although his own hair was brown. They also shared blue eyes. "This is a summer leaf," he continued, "we have cattle and grain abundant."

"Really makes you wonder how people on winter leaves get around," Filch mumbled as he dealt the cards for both of them. He picked his own cards up and laughed loudly, almost knocking his mug of the table in the process. Managing to catch it at the edge of the table, where it remained for the rest of his giggle-fit, he answered Delgue's questioning gaze by showing his hand.

It was a Royal Flush. The round was over at the very first draft. "Fuck me sideways," Filch grumbled, shoving another copper over the table. "Soon, this extreme luck streak you have right now is going to run out and then you'll be sorry for using it all up on stupid card games!"

"Yeah, I should probably go to the pub. The first girl I meet is practically going to beg to marry me," Filch mused, turning his head to properly look at the mug while moving it back into a comfortable reach. Without thinking a lot about it, he took a large gulp, emptying the remainder of the mug. "Sadly, I can't get away from here, so I am stuck with your superstitious, paranoid as-" he was interrupted by his own coughing, a scratching in the back of his throat causing him to almost spit the water out again.

"Look at you, you can't even drink correctly," Delgue mocked, "what girl would want you?" He was shown the middle finger in return, a gesture that perfectly conveyed the intent even without words. While Filch continued to get his coughing back under control, Delgue first shuffled the deck and then went to get both of them a new filling of water from the pump outside.

By the time he came back, Filch was down to the occasional clearing of his throat. "Water went the wrong way, I guess," he grumbled.

"Happens to the best of us, buddy," Delgue pat him on the back after placing the refilled mug in front of him. "Although you are definitely not in that group."

"You're a massive dick," Filch pointed out.

"And you have won the last 25 rounds," Delgue retorted. "I am allowed to be quite annoyed! Just be happy I am not letting you run yourself. Now, do you want to sweat to death in this blissful endless summer or continue playing games?"

"You just ask that because you think that was the sign for my luck running out," the brown-haired guardsman responded. "Just see, the moment the shift ends, I'll get called by the superior and be promoted to interrogator!"

"Dude, would you really call being promoted to that luck?" asked Delgue while sorting his pretty mediocre hand by numbers.

"Pay is better, plus you don't have to run circles and deal with drunk adventurers every second day."

"Yeah, and you get to hang out in the damp dungeons instead only to eventually get murdered by some crazy catgirl," the luckless man continued and wished for a moment that he could justify drinking something as strong as whiskey on his shift. However, if anything happened to the vault under their watch, the owner would make sure they never worked a day on this leaf again. As a guardsman or anything else.

"I guess... bad thing that," Filch mumbled, remembering the absolute chaos of that day. By the time the break-out had been discovered, they had already lost two more guardsmen to that Rogue. The guards around here were trained and used to dealing with beginner adventurers, particularly of the rowdy variety.

This girl, Reysha or whatever her name had been, had stolen a fair bit of equipment from their armoury before disappearing completely. Any attempts to find her for the past week had been completely in vain. By now, they had put a bounty on her head and let the more experienced and stronger members of the guard and adventurers take a crack at it. The order was dead or alive, no wonder after she murdered three people.

"Yeah," Delgue agreed grimly. "Bloody idiot as well. Went into her cell."

"Why would he do that?" Filch asked, that was the first time he heard of that. His colleague gave him a long stare and it clicked after a few moments. "Oh... oooooh... I guess that job is even more boring than ours, huh?"

"Something like that," shrugging the two of them continued to play cards. Eventually, Filch coughed again. "Man, that is really sticking to you, huh?"

The formerly lucky guard rubbed his throat. "Yeah, feels like I am coming down with a cold or something. Guess I am heading to bed early today."

"Not testing your luck in the pub after all?" Delgue teased in the tone of a friend.

"What luck?" Filch grumbled, assorting his absolutely terrible hand.

Luckily for both of them, their shift ended relatively soon thereafter. As the sun set towards the horizon, two other guards came along and took over. While mugs, helmets and gauntlets were all taken with their owners, the cards remained on the table. Nobody even knew who had brought them there in the first place, probably a guard that had been promoted out of shift duty by now, but as they were the only past time they all had, they hadn't left that table in years.

The two of them walked over the cobblestone plaza and towards the barracks. Inside, they separated, going for their individual rooms. They weren't much, just a bed, a table, a chest and an armour stand. It was good enough though, rent free and the stone walls were relatively thick. Not that it mattered, having people over was forbidden. These rooms were only for sleeping, writing and armour polishing. If a guard wanted to see a loved one, they had to go visit them, not the other way around. Officially, at least.

Filch coughed again. 'I really did get a cold or something,' he thought, feeling that characteristic little pressure at the back of his throat, likely a lump of mucus that was stuck. At least his nose wasn't running. Yet, anyway.

As it was the end of the month, he would usually prepare a couple of letters now. He was a guard mostly for the pay, which he parted into three equal parts, keeping one to have fun and sending the other two away, one to the bank so he could save up for retirement, the other to his family at the outskirts of Heralry. They were just farmers, so they could use the extra money to make up for the workforce their oldest son could no longer provide.

However, the heat was getting to him and this lump was giving him slight troubles breathing, so he should be keeping those letters for tomorrow. It wasn't an urgent matter anyway. As such, he took off his armour and laid down.

Reysha finally managed to break out of the city's sewers. After her successful breakout, she had made the mistake of sleeping in one of the many smuggler's corners she knew about. This had given the city guard the time to formulate a response to her. After the ease with which she had been able to escape the prison, she had honestly underestimated them.

Once the higher ups took over and put some more intense resources on the case, however, she found all of the gates, publicly known or smuggler preferred, guarded in some capacity. While the tiger girl liked her tactics with a dash of recklessness, she preferred to still be able to win. Just not as clean, quickly and unadventurous as more rigid people wanted engagements to go.

While she was pretty confident that she could take out most if not all adventurers that still saw this leaf as a challenge, the instructors were a different matter entirely, as were the higher ups in the guard. Luckily for Reysha, they were few in numbers, so they couldn't both guard all the exits and search the quite vast system of tunnels.

For an entire week, she had been dodging the few scout parties that existed and subsiding off rats and whatever little clean water she could find. Another lucky break for her was that her condition was something the enemy was barely informed about. If they had taken the time to read up on it, they would have found out that Reysha would eventually turn into a pretty apathetic character that would basically not care about being spotted.

Instead, after a week of not finding her, the people trying to find her, instructors and promoted guardsmen that had many more interesting, safer and better paying things to do, the first of them just decided that this wasn't worth their time. Just a few, many more were committed to finding the murderer, but enough that Reysha found a gap in the security and went for it.

And just like that, she escaped into the wilderness.

'What now though?' she asked herself as she hid inside that cave in a cliffside that, months ago now, Apexus and Aclysia had inhabited before they all went to the Birchia dungeon. It seemed like a good hideout and, more importantly, it had a natural source of water. Cold or not, she could at least drink it and then scrub the filth off her while she was thinking.

Noir was still laying low. Surprisingly so, since it had been about two weeks now since her last dining on monster flesh. At least some dulling of the senses should have occurred by now. While she had episodes where she felt a bit of grey creeping in, generally she was doing fine. For all she knew, that was because Noir continued to evolve her.

'I obviously won't be able to leave for a few months at least,' she thought, realizing full well that the city would keep extremely close eyes on the Stem. She would maybe be able to infiltrate the city again, but that was a big maybe with how easily she was distinguishable from other people. Doubly so now that she didn't have her robe.

Indeed, she had none of her former equipment. Against all reason, she had hoped to maybe find it in the armoury, but all she had found there were standard guard equipment. Not that that was too big of a detriment. She had stolen a complete plate armour, used it to disguise herself, making it much easier to leave the city guard's building complex, and then ditched all of the heavy metal bits in some alleyway.

That the guard was equipped with serialized armour that was supposed to make all of them look like equal, shining enforcers of the law once the heavy visor was down, was pretty useful in situations like that. Even without the armour, the brown leather undergarment was pretty good protection, if basic and not as stretchy as she preferred.

Same went for the weapons, the short sword she had gotten was longer than the daggers she usually used, and certainly heavier than the stiletto she had used for so long, but it was of stellar quality. She had gotten off with only one of those and a knife that was more for cutting ropes then people. There had also been spears and shields, but Reysha was largely unused to those. She still would have taken some, if she had an adventurer's bag with her.