Rock lead Thomas up to a grand building made of white marble and decorated with gold gilding. The building reminded Thomas a lot of the temple he first spawned into AoG inside of, only significantly more decadent and gaudy. Rock gestured to the building as he spoke to Thomas, "This is one of the Banking Guild's branch offices."

Thomas nodded and looked a little closer at the building. He couldn't see anything special about it. However, the doors leading inside were guarded by two men in full plate mail that looked rather imposing. Rock walked to the doors to enter and Thomas followed without saying anything. Banks were a very common theme in any vrmmo game, there was just no way players would be able to carry everything they owned on their bodies and leaving it inside of a house would just make it inconvenient to get something you needed if you were far away.

After entering inside, Thomas was rather surprised. The interior looked a lot like a modern-day bank with teller windows and a line for customers to wait in. None of that was really surprising, what was surprising were the creatures sitting in the seats at the teller windows. They were all green with bulbous heads and long hooked noses. Awkwardly, they were all dressed in pristine business suits while some even wore glasses. Thomas immediately recognized the race of creatures before him and turned to look at Rock, "The bankers are... goblins? But... aren't goblins monsters that kill men, steal gold, and capture women to breed with?"

In every game Thomas had ever played Goblins were some of the most loathsome creatures in existence. Right up there with orcs. Both races were known, lore wise, to rape women to reproduce. Thomas could accept a lot of things and very few things ever really bothered him but there was just something about rape that would throw him into an absolute killing frenzy. Seeing the goblins, a race known for such acts, made Thomas have to use every bit of his willpower not to pull out his kukri and attempt to kill them all.

Rock looked at Thomas with a frown, "Not these goblins." Rock sighed and started to explain, "About a thousand years ago all goblins were like you described. But around that time a few goblins began to evolve and became much more intelligent. They realized their weakness and that the actions of their species were only going to bring doom upon themselves. So those few goblins took command of some goblin villages to stop their brethren from committing evil actions. It took decades, but eventually, they managed to broker a non-aggression pact with the other intelligent races of the world. Knowing that they were being watched closely the goblins did their best to show their good intentions and not provoke the stronger countries into action. During that time the goblins developed a unique ability. No one really knows what that ability is, but using it they created a bank."

Rock smiled and gestured to the building around them, "Banks had existed before, but whatever magic the goblins developed made their banks much more convenient to everyone in the world. The greedy goblins were known for became their greatest asset. No one has ever managed to steal from a goblin bank and get away with it. In the hundreds of years that have passed by since they opened their first bank, many have tried and all died in the process. Only a single person managed to actually steal from them, but the mercenaries the goblins employ tracked the culprit down within hours and killed him to recover the stolen goods."

Rock gave Thomas a serious look, "This is the best and most trustworthy place to store money and items. It's also the only place to do so!"

Rock gave a hearty laugh at the end of his statement and led Thomas into the line to wait for a free teller. The goblins were quick and efficient in their work, so it didn't take them very long to get to Rock and Thomas. Rock led the way and spoke congenially with the goblin behind the counter while gesturing to Thomas, "He's here to open an account."

The goblin squinted its red eyes at Thomas from behind his spectacles, "To open an account you need a minimum deposit of 1,000 gold. Once you open your account, deposits of gold are free but withdrawals will cost you five gold each time. Item deposits and withdrawals cost five gold each time. Groupings of similar items, such as bundles of arrows or herbs count as a single item." The goblin spoke in a flat monotone voice like he had said the same thing a million times before and was dead tired of saying it.

Thomas hesitated for a moment while glancing at Rock. Rock nodded and gave an encouraging action so Thomas nodded in return and thunked the sack of gold coins onto the tellers counter. He retrieved enough to leave himself with 487 gold with the intention to deposit the remaining 9,000 gold. Grinning at seeing the goblins eyes open somewhat, Thomas addressed the goblin, "I'd like to open my account with a deposit of 9,000 gold."

The goblin visibly swallowed and suddenly turned a lot nicer to Thomas, "Of course sir." The goblin pulled out a crystal ball, similar to the one from the adventurers guild, and a similar metal card, "Once you drip some blood onto the globe it will open an account for you. The card will be your only way to access your funds in the future, so do not EVER lose it. Replacements are exceedingly expensive and difficult to procure. The card will keep track of not only your funds within the bank but also the items you have deposited. You can retrieve your money and items from any guild bank within the world."

Thomas nodded and wondered how the game 'logically' implemented the functions of a game bank into the world of AoG. His best guess, space magic! Well, if space magic existed anyways. With that thought, Thomas realized he didn't know very much about magic within AoG, but he'd just had so little free time to do any exploration or to learn anything other than the professions. It could wait, magic wasn't going anywhere!

Accepting the offered needle, Thomas pricked his finger and dripped a drop of blood onto the globe. It began to glow with a golden light as his identity was carved into the metal card. Once the glow faded the goblin picked up the card and the bag of gold coins, "Give me a moment to process your deposit."

It only took the goblin about five minutes before he returned and passed the metal card over to Thomas, "Please check your balance to make sure everything is in order."

Thomas looked at the card and saw a line beneath his name stating that his current balance was 9,000 gold. Nodding in satisfaction, Thomas awkwardly thanked the goblin before leaving the bank with Rock. Together they headed back towards the artisan district while Thomas once again wished he had an inventory to store the card inside of to protect it. Without that handy ability, Thomas instead hid the card within his boot. When he had the spare time he would have to design a belt with a hidden sleeve to store the card inside of.

After arriving at the artisan district Rock bid Thomas farewell and headed towards Rock's Armory while Thomas made his way to Hyde's Hides. After entering the building, Thomas greeted the energetic Teena before heading into the back room to greet Hyde. Hyde gave Thomas a warm smile and spoke, "Today is your lucky day. I don't need any more backpacks for the moment."

Thomas let out a sigh of relief and looked expectantly at Hyde, "So what do you need me to work on?"

Hyde gave Thomas a playful grin, "It seems Rock has been experiencing an increase in sales lately and his apprentices have been having some trouble keeping up with some of the requests." Hyde gestures to a crate, "Every weapon in there needs their handles wrapped in leather."

Thomas moved over to the crate and opened it, there were at least a dozen weapons inside of various shapes and sizes from daggers to longswords, and even a greatsword. It was probably the production work of a little less than a day at Rock's. Every weapon had been completed with a firmly adhered wooden handle that Thomas was now going to wrap leather around. He wasn't sure if this was funny or not, but he still chuckled.

"Well, get to work already!", Hyde called out.

System Notice: New Quest! Hyde has requested that you wrap the handles of each weapon within the crate with leather.

Rewards: 50 Exp and 5 gold per weapon handle wrapped.

Time Limit: 1 day

Seeing the quest, Thomas couldn't help but sigh. He was not going to get very much leatherworking experience from this for sure. He needed to maximize what little he could get so he intended to make every weapon wrap perfect! Instead of pulling out a weapon to get started, Thomas made his way over to the stacks of leather and grabbed one. Using a straight piece of metal and a razor sharp blade, Thomas started to quickly cut the hide into strips, trimming off the ragged sections at the edges and ends of the leather.

Thomas started by selecting a knife from the collection of weapons. Knives had the smallest handles so it would make a good piece for him to get some warm-up practice on. That's not to say that he didn't take his time or do his best, he just needed to get a feel for the process again so he could do it properly. He started by carefully coating the handle in glue, then gingerly placing one end of the wrap at the top beneath the crossguard. Slowly he wrapped the leather around the handle in a smooth motion letting the leather overlap slightly.

It only took a few minutes to wrap the handle, the next part was where he really had to be careful. Picking up the leather cutting knife, Thomas very carefully began to cut along the overlapped areas of the leather. The point of doing so was to make the two edges of the leather wrap match perfectly, making any gap between the wraps of leather as small as possible, or even nonexistent. The carefully removed thin strips of leather allowed the handle to transform from lumpy to exceptionally smooth.

After he finished cutting off the last tin strip of leather, Thomas carefully examined the handle and nodded in satisfaction. He picked up the knife and tested it in his grip as the system notification appeared to give him his reward.

System Notice: You have finished a Normal leather wrap on the handle of a Magical knife. Quality: Perfect. You have gained 73 leatherworking experience.

Thomas let out a small sigh at seeing how little the experience gained was. It wasn't all bad though. He'd managed to do the first wrap in about three-quarters of an hour, so he could do quite a few in a single day. In fact, he should have enough time to complete the entire task. Determined to do so, Thomas began to work without complaint as he glued, wrapped, and cut the strips of leather to make smooth leather wrapped handles onto all one dozen weapons. By the time he was finished, he had earned a total of 884 leatherworking experience from wrapping the handles of all thirteen weapons. It was significantly more than what Thomas had expected to earn from the job. After he had finished four of the wraps the experience per wrap had gone from 73 up to 74 granting him an additional eight experience. Not a ton, but every tiny bit helped!

Opening his character sheet, Thomas let out a depressed sigh. He only needed 203 more experience to rank Leatherworking up to 25! Why couldn't there be just a few more hours in the day? If he had finished today he could have either had two days off or just turned in the quest early to get started on the next step tomorrow! Shaking his head in disappointment, Thomas turned in all of his work to Hyde for him to examine. Hyde took a careful look at each weapon before he gave his nod of approval and fetched Thomas's payment for the day, a total of 65 gold coins.

System Notice: Quest Complete! Hyde has requested that you wrap the handles of each weapon within the crate with leather.

Rewards: 50 Exp and 5 gold per weapon handle wrapped.

Time Limit: 1 day System Notice: You have gained 650 experience.

Accepting the money, and experience, Thomas bid goodnight to Hyde and made his way back to The Swans Nest. It would only take a couple of hours, maximum, for him to get the last bit of experience he needed to finish of Leatherworking tomorrow. After that, he would immediately go to Hekrin and get the next stage of the quest started. If he could repeatedly complete the quests early and start a new one, he might be able to finish the entire chain faster than expected. Confident in his plans, Thomas stepped into The Swans Nest to do his usual routine before heading to sleep for the night.