Chapter 37: Disconnect

Subject: Caim Location: Maliscade - Blightbane Guild

Caim’s badge shone white briefly, and he watched in awe as it settled down to the default grey color like it had been when he first received it. The vanished violet hue signified a completed contract, while blue meant that a seeker was on an active contract.

The Guild clerk placed a stack of grey husc coins on the desk. The sign behind the clerk said “contract redemption”, and Caim found it easy enough to guess it was here that he should be going to receive payment.

But he didn’t expect the transaction to happen so swiftly. He took the coins and added them to the pouch he’d received at the initiation ceremony.

“Registration complete. You may now retrieve your badge.”

It wasn’t much of an accomplishment in the context of his larger goal, but Caim had completed his first contract. A great many experiences lay ahead, and this was the first of many milestones to mark the path to the first goal.

“Oh, Caim, was it?” the clerk asked.

“Hm? Yes?”

“As I understand it, my colleague Mille wishes to make sure you are properly adjusting to life as a seeker. She is away on other business at the moment, but I have a message to pass on.”

A message?

“What is it?”

“She wants you to: ‘sleep in your bunk bed and check in with her in the morning. Seekers, especially those unaccustomed to the profession, must get proper rest to safely continue their work’. As is the case with many of my colleagues here at the Maliscade branch, Mille is a personal hero. If there is anything I can do to help, you only have to ask.”

There was no doubt that it was Mille who had given the clerk this message. She’d told Caim to “get some proper rest” almost ten times now. He could even hear the faron hum of her voice saying the words, even through this human male’s mouth.

“Thank you for telling me, and for offering. I don’t need anything right now, but I’ll let you know if that changes.”

The clerk politely smiled.

“We’re here to help, Initiate. Keep up the good work!”

Caim lowered his head out of respect and returned to the table where his new friend Gwen sat. He was happy she hadn’t heard that exchange. It was embarrassing having Mille keeping tabs on him like one would a child.

Even if it isn’t without reason...

“I’m back,” he announced, and the young merchant greeted him with a cheerful smile.

Relieved, he found her already looking more relaxed than during their recent heated conversation. In fact, her body language didn’t seem to show concern for whatever heretical goal he’d accidentally spouted in the heat of the moment.

Gwen saw her salvation in sight. With this in mind, Caim had been considering giving away a portion of his payment, but he thought it best to refrain. Mille had shared some truthful warnings about generosity. Caim had a debt to repay, and he’d already given away enough today.

“Listen…” Caim began.

He briefly explained the circumstances and made sure Gwen would be fine without him. He was going to try to listen to Mille’s instructions.

“No problem!” came her unexpectedly cheerful reply. “You’ve already helped me a lot. Don’t worry so much, and don’t look so guilty. Just promise me that you’ll come back.”

He’d feel better if Gwen didn’t look so much like a lost puppy in the sprawling Guild building. This public space was also a mere fraction of the total size of the Guild’s domain.

“I promise I’ll return.”

Just then, a vaguely familiar voice called out to Caim.

“If it isn’t Alice’s little Initiate! Back from your first contract?”

Caim didn’t remember her name, but standing before him was a high-ranking seeker wearing a peculiar armor he’d seen only once before. A segmented carapace of lightweight silver armor, with clear liquid flowing through channels in its translucent surface.

The sight wasn’t something a person easily forgot. He also remembered that this was around where he’d met the thirty-something-year-old woman last time, too.

“Caim, right? I don’t remember you being with this one before. Did she hear about your performance?”

Gwen’s ears perked up. She seemed to pick up on Caim’s predicament and leaped in to demonstrate her worth.

“My name is Gwen. I have some experience harvesting, and teaching, and trading!” she exclaimed with an excited smile.

Gwen’s voice was considerably higher-pitched now. The smiling wasn’t necessarily fake, and Caim wouldn’t have noticed anything off if he were only just meeting her, but Gwen’s forced enthusiasm stood out. She was also looking up at the other seeker in awe, masking what was most definitely fear.

I can’t blame her for putting on an act. After knowing no one in the city and being too trusting, she became the victim of predatory lending.

It wasn’t that Gwen disliked the Blightbane. Apart from being afraid of blightbeasts, her feelings about seekers and the politics of the Guild were neutral.

“I’m new to the Blightbane life,” Gwen continued, “but I met Caim on the road. He convinced me to join. You look like some kind of seeker hero. What’s your name?”

“Oh? I’m Seeker Champion Nina, and I’m pleased to meet you, my dear. Are you thinking of becoming a Harvester for the Guild?”

Nina was blushing. Gwen’s flattery was doing the trick, and Caim wasn’t forced to go through the mild embarrassment of asking for Nina’s name again.

“Wow... meeting a Champion on my first visit. I didn’t know Caim had friends like that. I’m thinking of becoming a Harvester, yes, but I’m worried I can’t handle dangerous situations. I’m hoping to be a merchant for the Guild, but I have to start somewhere.”

Nina and Caim looked at each other awkwardly.

“It isn’t that I don’t hope to become Caim’s friend, but we’ve really only just met. I only know that Alice, a mutual friend, has taken an interest, and that speaks volumes about his character.”

Now, it was Caim’s turn to feel embarrassed, the target of exaggerated praise. He thanked her.

“Will you be alright getting food on your own? I need to try and close my eyes in the bunkhouse for a bit,” he asked.

“No problem, I’ll be fine,” Gwen assured him. “I’ll probably find a cheap place to eat and then come back here. I don’t really have anything else to do, so do you think the Guild would mind it if I waited here?”

Nina slapped her gauntleted fist down on the table. It shook the whole table, and Gwen jumped slightly, but the smooth material was solid enough to withstand the impact without noticeable damage.

“I’ll save you the trip. I know the food sold here is a little more expensive, but the atmosphere is well worth it. It will be my treat, and I can tell you some things about seekers that might help you decide whether the life is for you!”

Gwen cracked a genuine smile and agreed. Caim left the two of them in peace.

Subject: Caim Location: Maliscade - Blightbane Guild

Caim left the showers feeling clean but uncomfortable. He wasn’t accustomed to public facilities like the one in the Guild. The other seekers weren’t self-conscious, so he tried to ignore his own feelings and get the job done.

Armor and weapons were checked in with an attendant in an intermediary hallway between the bunkhouse and the public area. This checkpoint station also served to scan seeker badges on the way in.

This station was just beyond where the hallway to the separate Guild residence buildings branched off. Caim couldn’t remember if that was where Alice lived, but he had never seen her use this passage.

He didn’t have a weapon, but he did learn that known mages were casually tracked in case an incident were to occur inside the checkpoint. Caim was one such mage, even if he hardly felt like one.

Caim made sure to take the badge off the armor and keep it close. Losing it would be disastrous, but he was grateful for the many posted reminders to keep one’s badge close.

Citizens had other ways of proving who they were, issued by the Shroud government. But it looked like a seeker’s badge was a deeply important fragment of their identity. He hoped he would understand more about why that was after more experience.

Caim sat on his assigned bed, looking down at the dim, deep blue lights illuminating the aisles. Without these dim markers, it would have been difficult to navigate the perpetually-darkened sleeping area.

He lay across the covers, in his cheap casual clothes. The spare outfit purchased at Ashera’s Attires was no-frills, comfort and style fitting for the low pricetag. The bed was equally low-quality.

It wasn’t that Caim had lived a luxurious life before all this, it was just that he was realizing the little things he took for granted. You could lose everything in an instant, only surviving in large part because you were lucky and people around you were generous.

Caim understood Gwen’s situation more than she knew.

With seekers keeping different schedules for hunting different blightbeasts in different locations, there were always people sleeping here. In fact, right above Caim was a man loudly snoring away.

Glimpsing death gave a person surprising clarity.

Nope. Can’t do it.

It wasn’t the snoring that kept him awake, nor the stiff clothing, nor the hard bed.

No matter how many times Caim tried to tell Mille, she expected him to need more sleep than he did. It had something to do with the time disparity. Something to do with the way he’d become disconnected from the normal flow of things.

Disconnected... Is that accurate? I don’t know, it’s just a feeling.

Caim was wide awake, and even the fatigue from his first contract had faded in the time it had taken to return.

In his mind, he reflected on the people he’d met since arriving in Shroud, their personalities and their struggles. Caim continued to trace the path to his hazy goal. It was a long way away, so he had to try harder.

He remembered the promise he made to Mille, and the loans both she and Alice gave him. He slid his legs over the edge of the bed and rose to his feet in silence.

Walking past the sleeping forms of a handful of seekers, he was reminded of how different their lives were from his own. He’d adopted the profession, but he was different from them.

The armor that had saved Caim from an embarrassing death at the hands of the weakest of blightbeasts, The Mage’s Carapace, had been cleaned instantaneously. It still smelled of dried sweat, Caim’s blood, and hint of Riventread sand. The magic the Guild used wasn’t perfect, but it was a service offered at-cost for only a meager sum of his pay.

Seekers were forbidden from bringing their weapons into the bunkhouse could retrieve them here. A preventative measure to protect those inside.

I wish I had a weapon. It will be a real struggle until I get one.

Subject: Caim Location: Riventread - Outskirts

On his second visit to the festerfont, Caim walked the outer edge of Riventread, keeping his eyes on the black seeker pillars marking the border.

Flourish Catalyst gripped his body in faint, familiar strands of green and yellow light. It felt good to have this extra support. The spell would subtly enhance his recovery, supplementing his stamina deficit.

Caim had elected to choose the same contract. It came with painful memories of being battered by swarms of Carapasers, but that had been a learning experience.

The pair of faron seekers that saved him from ending his seeker career early had also taught him how to use the giant seekerstones to navigate the festerfont, which was the reason they were there in the first place.

Tracing the roughly oval circumference of the arid festerfont, Caim entered and exited combat in sync with the activation subsequent dormancy period Scion. In doing so, he became better attuned to the signs so he had even less of a need to look at the information tablet in his pocket.

Gravel crunched under his boot as he shifted his weight to react to a third Carapaser emerging from its spawning cavity. Unfurling into its mobile form, the pest cut a winding path for Caim.

“Now they only appear in groups of three or more?” Caim mumbled to himself. “It’s like Riventread is reacting to my new strategy. Or, maybe, I just killed all the isolated enemies already.”

The Carapacers were no more intelligent now than they had been before, but Caim was trying to find the rhyme in their distribution on the outskirts layer of the festerfont. He felt there must be some overarching logic to it.

“Scion, finish off the closest one and then let’s get out of here,” Caim ordered, simultaneously conveying more specific targeting instructions through their wordless link.

Enemy found, Scion acknowledged.

Had he encountered groups of Carapasers from the start, it would have taken more time to finish. Caim only needed one more, and he could return to the Guild.

Scion’s steady barrage finished the creature off in no time at all. Caim lunged forward and circled around the remaining two enemies to collect the seed before sprinting for the festerfont’s boundary.

Panting, he caught his breath once they were no longer in pursuit. He was tired, but the feeling would have been much more pronounced if he didn’t have the Flourish Catalyst backing him up.

Instinctively, a wave of nauseous anticipation rippled through Caim’s body. He’d be forcing himself to swallow all the seeds he collected now.

It will make me stronger, he rationalized, to psych himself up.

Caim brought the first grey-bristled seed to his lips, trying to distract himself by thinking about how curious it was that the sun was only just starting to descend from its peak in the sky.

Subject: Caim Location: Maliscade - Blightbane Guild

“Back again? Did you need something?”

Caim saw the same clerk as before staring back at him, looking confused.

“I’m finished with a contract,” he explained.

The clerk controlled a small infoboard screen atop the redemption desk. Stroking his chin, he took a careful look at Caim.

“Weren’t you going to sleep? You really went back to Riventread?”

“Yeah… about that. I guess I didn’t really need sleep. I’m well-rested, for now. I completed this contract faster, so I think I’m gradually adjusting to the work,” Caim lightly boasted.

This time, he had remembered to deactivate the Flourish Catalyst before entering the city. Even though he’d slipped past the detection mechanisms before, he didn’t want to take any chances.

Caim did not have a license to practice magic in the city. On top of that… he wasn’t even a citizen. He really couldn’t risk attracting attention.

That said, the longer he used Flourish Catalyst, the more powerful it seemed to grow. Caim could have been imagining it, but the strands of light were now more visible when he concentrated on them.

“You don’t look sleep-deprived, but I really think you should speak with Mille before you go out again. She isn’t back yet, but she should be here within the hour. You are free to do as you wish, of course. It’s only a suggestion.”

The Guild employee smiled nervously like he thought he’d overstepped.

Mille has the same rank as this guy. His Administration Division badge is identical to hers. But the way he acts makes it seem like she is his boss. She would have demanded I stay.

Again, Caim added a small stack of husc to his pouch.

“No, I appreciate the suggestion. I’ll rest now. For real.”

Caim wasn’t lying. He really was starting to feel a little sluggish.

“Take care, Initiate!”

But just as he was about to arrive at the security checkpoint to the bunkhouse, Caim remembered the weapon store he’d seen on his way to the Guild.

There had been prices listed beside the pieces on display. Going off Mille’s previous explanation of currency exchange rates, most were well out of his reach. However, a handful of items would be within his budget if he could save up a while longer.

Caim wanted to buy a weapon, enabling him to take on more challenging contracts, before paying Alice and Mille back.

He turned around and bumped into another seeker behind him. After quickly apologizing, the seeker waved Caim’s words off.

“No worries… I know that look. You’re hooked and you hear the festerfont’s calling out for worthy challengers.”

Caim laughed nervously, grateful he hadn’t offended the stranger.

“Thank you. Yeah, I… Wait, what?”

“Between you and me, I feel like the cry has been getting louder, lately,” she shared, with a feverish smile. “I hear it in my sleep.”