After paying the guard a silver for permission to operate a stand for the day, I started sitting up outside the eastern gate. A bit off to the side of the road, but close enough that the guards would protect me. After leaving the others to dive the Dungeon, I had first visited a carpenter where I bought a table, a signboard and some scrap for firewood. Oh and a barrel for water. Next I had visited Fillard’s Sundries buying a lot of different things, like empty sacks, glass jars and other stuff I would need.

My coin pouch had gotten a lot lighter, it contained less than two and a half platinum coins by now. And hopefully I could spend that money buying a lot of rabbit carcasses. Otherwise I would be a little lost. Putting up my signboard, meant I was officially open for business. I just needed some of the yokel heads fighting the rabbits to realise.

The signboard had three lines: “Buying Rabbit Corpses. 2 SP per corpse. +5 CP for each level over 1.”. Looking out at the field between the town and the forest, I saw it was filled with colourful horned rabbits. There was also a bit of lightshow, every time one of them cast firebolts or other fun magic after the players.

In total I could see a bit over twenty players out there, which meant there had been a few late arrivals. The biggest group was of course the Bears, who seemed to threaten anyone coming within twenty meters of them. I also noticed that they made some new arrivals at the hunting ground pay some coins for the privilege of hunting rabbits.

Of course they themselves occupied the prime spot for grinding and hunting rabbits. A large concentration of rabbits, and close enough to town they could run back for help from the guards if necessary. The rest were lone players that seemed to have teamed up to tackle the rabbits. And as far as I could tell, all of them used the system assisted combat mode.

Since I had no rabbits to butcher yet, I turned my attention to the rocks I had collected earlier. Taking out the clay jar with the manastone solution first, I then took out the manastone kit. The kit was about half a meter long wooden box. After opening I looked down at it. I had seen them before, but ever used one.

The top half of the box could be removed, which revealed the four wheels in there. Three grindstones of different sizes, and a larger one to polish the stone on. In the bottom of the box I found the crank. After attaching the crank to the left side, I used one of my waterskins to keep the grindstones wet. Then I started to grind a rock into a more rounded shape. After a minute of cranking, I received the prompt I had expected.

You’ve unlocked the skill Gem Cutting, do you wish to learn this skill at this time?

Yes/No

While I was not working on a gem, the system recognized my intention and decided to offer me this skill instead of Stone Cutting. Which I would probably end up taking at some point as well. Maybe. Learning Gem Cutting meant that I could pull up the crafting overlay.

Small Manastone

Gem Cutting Level: 0

Design Used: No

Size: Small

Lowest Quality of Materials: Poor

Highest Quality of Materials: Poor

Average Quality of Materials: Poor

Base Crafting Points: 20

Highest Crafting Points of the Materials: 10

Possible Outcomes

Failure - 52%

Flawed - 30%

Success - 15%

Exceptional - 3%

Brilliant - 0%

Master Work - 0%

Base experience: 10 XP

Stamina Cost: 20

It was not great odds. In fact if I had done the automated crafting, I would have had a 40% chance of succeeding. However, if I used that mode, there were only two outcomes: Success or Failure. When using manual mode there was varying degrees of success, or failure. A flawed success would only have 75% of the crafting points a normal success would have. An exceptional had 25% more points.

Crafting points were used to customise the finished product. If I had used a design, the points would be allocated automatically. For example, when making a sword you could invest points into increasing damage, durability or structure. Or you might add a bleeding effect. In the case of a small manastone, I would only have to choices. To increase the amount of mana it could hold, and if it could be recharged.

After having manipulated the rock into a satisfying shape, I opened the jar to the manastone solution; immediately wrinkling my nose at the smell. It stunk. It was really bad. After dipping the rock in the solution, I quickly put the cork lid back on the jar.

After spending a minute or so of polishing the manastone, I noticed a few new lines in the event log.

>You’ve finished crafting a Small Manastone.<

>Rolling for outcome: 3.<

>You’ve achieved an Exceptional Success. Awarding 20 Gem Cutting XP.<

‘Wow, lady luck is smiling down on me,’ I thought and took a look at the change to the crafting overlay.

Item Name

Crafting Points

Maximum Mana

Recharge

Small Manastone

25

0

0

The first thing to do was of course increase the maximum mana. Increasing it cost 5 points, but increased both max mana and recharge by 5. The next increase also raised each value by five, but cost 10 points. The next increase would cost 15 points, five points more than I had available. Instead I threw the last ten points into the recharge. I did not see a reason to change the name, though I had the possibility if I wanted.

Item Name

Crafting Points

Maximum Mana

Recharge

Small Manastone

0

10

20

In the end, I ended up with a manastone that could hold a maximum of 10 points at a time, but could be charged with 20. Which would be a good manastone for summoning elementals, if the summoner had Imbue. If not for the fact that this was just a normal manastone, it did not have an element meaning it could not be used for elemental summoning. I would need a solution specific to each element, if I wanted to create elemental manastones.

Nevertheless, it was still a good product. After inspecting it I saw that I would be able to get two silver and two coppers for it if I sold it to a Native merchant. Which was not too shabby, for something that had cost me 4 coppers to produce. However, I did not plan on selling it just yet.

There was however two things I needed to do quickly, first was saving the design, so that if I got a similar outcome with the same materials, it would automatically allocate the points, saving me the trouble. The second thing was imbuing the stone with some mana, or the manastone would crumble. Closing my eyes, I concentrated on the manastone in my hand, and focused on sending mana into it. Luckily the system was very adept at reading intent, so it was not too hard to do. Did not need to find the place mana resided inside my body, and sent it through mana channels or something like that.

After a second, I noticed almost half of my remaining 25 mana disappear. At level zero, Imbue cost 11 mana just to charge a manastone with one mana. It was semi generous with the XP though, since it earned me 5 XP per mana charged. Since I had mana for it, I imbued another mana before sitting down to meditate.

While meditating some of the players had finally noticed my stand and walked over. Heard one of them whispering, without being really quiet, “Is that an NPC merchant?”

“Maybe, the devs placed him here to make it easier to earn money. I mean the loot dropped is only worth coppers,” another one answered. Opening my eyes I looked them over. They were a three man team I had observed earlier. A party of random strangers, a pick-up group. Two guys and a girl. All of them seemed to be equipped for melee combat. The girl and one of the guys both had shield and sword, while the other was wielding a ridiculously large sword. Almost seemed impractical.

“Nope, I’m a Traveller just like you,” I smiled and stood up, “Name’s Damian, and as the sign says, I’m willing to pay two silvers for any horned rabbit corpse.”

They all stood there staring at me for a moment, as if my words confounded them. I would not put that in the impossibility box. After a few seconds, the guy with the humongous sword exclaimed, “For reals?”

“Yes. For reals,” I said with a deep breath, controlling my urge to strangle the kid.

“That’s awesome, we’ll get you some,” the other guy was hooked, and immediately headed back towards the rabbits. Over his shoulder, he shouted, “This better not be a scam, or I’ll report you.”

The first guy had followed as well, leaving me with the girl. She kept glancing at her party members, almost nervous like. When they were halfway back, she quickly said, “The rabbits’ loot aren’t worth that much. You’ll be throwing your money away.”

Looking at her, I pulled up her name with Inspect, since I had already used Observe on her earlier. Her name was Crimson Petals, no guild affiliation. The first part of her name matched her hair colour. Smiling at her, “I know. However, since you’re being kind to me, I’ll return the favour. With the right skills, and the time to process the materials, I’ll be earning money on this transaction as well. Well most of the time, if the Mother doesn’t smile on me, I’ll be losing out. However, that’s the way life is.”

At first her face just showed scepticism, which transformed into confusion when I mentioned the Mother, “Mother?”

“Ah yes, the Natives are calling the goddess of luck for ‘the Mother’, though her name is Ettis.”

“Are you a roleplayer?” she scoffed.

“Depends on the situation. However in this case, if you haven’t noticed, the guards are within earshot,” I gestured to the two guards at the gate, which was ten meters or so away. Then to one of the patrolling guards passing by on top of the walls, “And while the Natives in the worlds we normally travel to are less intelligent, it’s not the case this time. Anything you say can influence how they react to you, just like in our world. And since we’re in their world, it’s prudent to adapt and adhere to some of their customs. And don’t forget the Gods are real, insulting them might just put you in a jam.”

“I see,” she said and walked away. She did not look convinced. Shrugging, I knew she would eventually find out. I had regained some mana, which I spent imbuing the manastone before going back to meditating and waiting.

Barely five minutes later I saw the trio returning with a rabbit in hand. The other players looked perplexed by their actions. Understandable, since after a killing a rabbit, the others just looted the rabbits. Some of the players who was resting, stood up and followed them.

“So you got our money? Or do I report you?” the shield bearing guy demanded, holding out a silver furred rabbit out for me to take. A quick look with Inspect showed that it was level one, so I fished out two silvers for him.

“Here you go, two silver as promised. If you get tired of hunting rabbits, I’ll also pay one silver for each seagull,” I smiled as I took position of the rabbit.

“Is that a hidden quest?” one of the onlookers asked.

“Might be,” another one said, as the Crimson Petals’ party thanked me and headed back to kill more rabbits.

One of the onlookers stepped forward, “Give me a quest.”

“I don’t have any quests for you,” I tried to keep a straight face.

“Don’t tell me that they got a unique quest, wow what luck. All I got is the starter quests, and they suck. I mean, if we deliver ten horns we get two silvers for the quest. If we sell them, we get almost four. Total ripoff,” the first onlooker complained.

“Shut up Swipe, I’m trying to get this idiot NPC to give me a quest. If it’s unique, the rewards must be great,” the guy in front of me hissed at his friend. Turning back to me, he put on a big smile, “I’m a better pla— I mean hero than those three out there. Is there anything I can do to get the same quest as them?”

I was just about to answer him, when a trio of players exited the gate. The trio from the beach, and they seemed to remember me. One of them loudly said, “Hey guys, isn’t that the dweeb who was collecting rocks earlier? And now he thinks he’s a merchant or something. What an idiot.”

“Yeah, that’s him,” his friends agreed. They were not wrong about me collecting rocks earlier, but the other things they said was slightly offensive.

“You’re a fucking player?” the guy in front of me screamed.

“I’m a Traveller, just like you.”

“Scammer is what you are!”

“I never said I was a Native, you just assumed.”

“Stop speaking like a weirdo, and speak plainly,” the guy growled.

“I’m not here to scam you. What the sign says is true. I’ll buy the corpses of any rabbit you bring me,” I stated calmly, resisting the urge to call him nasty names, or just plain throttling him. He just stared at me, trying to stare me down; clearly still angry at me because he made a fool of himself. I looked back, trying to appear relaxed and non-confrontational; but I was not going to be subservient and look away first.

The ruckus had drawn most of the other players over. Including the Blood Bears. The one called Iron Bear stepped forward, “Well, if you got that much money, why not share some of it with us poor players. I mean, we’re poor. Right guys?”

His sycophants snickered. Not even looking at him, “If you want my money, bring me some carcasses I can buy.”

It was as if time stopped, everyone just stared at me. As if they could not believe that I had just rejected the Bears. Even the guy trying to stare me down reacted. His eyes widened, and he started blinking rapidly. Clearing his throat, and a bit red faced, Iron Bear said, “I don’t think you understand. It was not a request, but a demand.”

“Oh, I’m aware,” I looked at the guy, who was trying to look menacing. He probably did to the newbies, but I knew his fate. And to be honest, I had been confronted with scarier dudes than him.

“It doesn’t seem that way,” he then drew his sword, “Because if you did, you would be more scared.”

“Yeah, we’re robbing you,” one of his cohorts chortled from behind me.

Cocking my head to the side, so that I could look at the guy who spoke up, “And?”

“What do you mean, and?” he asked confusedly.

“Yes, I already reckoned you were trying to shake me down, rob me, extort me or just plain being assholes. I already knew that. And my question is still the same.”

“I don’t get it.”

“You stated you were robbing me, so I’m simply inquiring as to what you expect to happen.”

“Eh, you scream like a little girl,” this drew some laughs from his friends, “And then you give us your money, or we fuck you up.”

“Yeah,” his friends nodded, so did his boss.

“So you want me to be scared, and then give you my money?”

I could see confused looks on their faces. Iron Bear quickly took control of the situation again, “Exactly. So just hand it over already.”

“Okay, give me a second to get into character, just so we can do it right and make it look good.”

“What a fucking weirdo,” someone commented.

“Yeah, certifiable,” another one agreed.

Then one of the independent players shouted an encouragement to the Bears, “Make the freak bleed!”

“A bit much,” someone nearby commented.

“Okay. I’m ready,” I said, and then like a horrible actor, I grabbed the sides of my head, opening my eyes and mouth wide as if scared. Loudly calling out, in a high pitched mocking tone, “Help, I’m being robbed. Someone save me!”

The crowd fell silent, seemingly unsure what to do. Even more red faced than before, Iron Bear took a step towards me, “Listen here, ha—”

Whatever he was going to say was interrupted by the appearance of black feathered arrow sticking out of his chest. Dumbfounded he looked down at the arrow. So did the rest of the crowd. I admit, I smirked. Just a bit. As his avatar started to dissolve into motes of light, I gave a little finger wave. Only his avatar vanished, his items were left behind. With a small poof, what was inside his personal inventory appeared.

A loud voice from somewhere above and behind me called out, “Anyone else making trouble will also be sporting a new chest ornament.”

The crowd was either looking at the pile of items left behind by the departed, or staring at the guard on the wall. Turning around, I quickly got his name with Observe, before giving a respectful bow and calling out, “Thank you guardsman. I owe you one.”

When I looked back, the Bears had backed away a bit. One of them, the same one that said they were robbing me, screamed at me, “Fucking hacker, I’m reporting you!”

Calmly I said in a loud voice, “I’m not hacking. You idiots tried to rob me inside the town’s safezone. Now, pick up your friends items and leave me alone. Unless you wish to sell me some rabbits.”

“Fuck you, I’m still reporting you,” he screamed, almost manical.

“I wouldn’t do that if I was you,” I shook my head. A few seconds later a figure, made of light appeared in front of him. A cone of silence had activated around them, because I could see them conversing, but I could not hear them. Just like at the Association. Whatever it told him, he did not like it, because he started looking even angrier.

“What was that, Black?” one of the Bears asked when the figure disappeared.

“Fucking GM, told me that there were no cheating or hacking. Well fuck them. All of you report him. If enough people report him, they’ve to do something about it,” the guy, apparently named Black Bear, fumed.

Shaking my head, “I would definitely not do that.”

“Fuck you, and enjoy your ban!” he laughed hysterically. A moment later a ray of light descended from the sky and disintegrated him. Leaving behind all his items. Several figures of light appeared in front of a dozen or so players. Amazingly enough, not all of the Bears received a visit, but some of the independent players did.

Petals, who arrived towards the end of the whole unnecessary drama, came over and asked, “What happened?”

Noticing a few of the nearby independent players moving closer to hear the answer, I smiled, “Well, if I was to take a guess. ‘Moron’ Bear over there, was told not to waste the GM’s time by falsely reporting. He didn’t heed that warning and was punished. Now the other people who reported me are receiving a similar warning. Maybe it’ll stick this time, I mean, there’s a visual lesson right in front of them.”

“You just made an enemy of those guys,” someone commented.

“Pfft, they’re nothing but common bullies. I might not be able to take them in a fight, but it shouldn’t be a problem outsmarting them,” I then clapped my hands to get everyone’s attention, “Now that the show is over. I would like to take a moment to reiterate what my sign says. I’m buying any dead rabbits you bring me for two silvers. A bonus of five copper per level above one. And before you ask, no I will not pay you if you pull a train of live ones over here for the guards to slaughter.”

“Damnit,” one of the nearby players exclaimed, making a few people chuckle. And they started to head back towards the rabbits.

I heard one say to his partner, “I’m worried that if we sell to him, the Bears will come and extort more money.”

Realising that was a possibility I called out to him, “That might be true. But the Bears are nothing but common bull—”

“Fuck you!” one of the Bears shouted, taking an arrow and was about to aim it. He froze when an arrow landed at his feet.

Seeing that the interruption was dealt with, I continued, “As I was saying. They’re just bullies. There are eleven of them right now, and thirteen of you. I’m not saying you should form a group. But why don’t you hunt near each other. And if the Bears start any trouble, you can help each other. Just let them be the aggressor, otherwise the system might find a way to punish you.”

The Bears stared at me with eyes filled with hate. While the others looked at each other warily. I saw someone standing on tiptoes to do a headcount, “He’s right, there’s more of us than there are of them. Let’s take over this hunting spot.”

The independent players seemed to come to some kind of agreement. And soon the crowd was back to hunting rabbits. With the prime spot now being controlled by the independent players, while the Bears moved further away.

To optimize my resource pools, I decided to butcher the rabbit before sitting down to meditate again. Though I had brought down the time it took to butcher a rabbit some, I still took about three minutes to finish it. A roll of 42 meant that I only got a pile of bones, two pieces of meat and the piece of fur. On the surface it was a bad deal. I had paid two silvers, or forty coppers, for the rabbit, but the loot was only worth thirteen coppers without further processing.

‘The Mother giveth, the Mother taketh,’ I thought wryly. Even if I managed to turn all of those materials into something else, I would be lucky to break even. The truly valuable items of the rabbits where their blood, eyes, horns and the foot. While looking at the event log a new entry appeared. It informed that Blue Lotus had earned five Guild Points, ‘One down, forty nine to go.’

An hour later I had to announce a two hour break from buying rabbits. Not because I was out of money, but simply because I could not keep up with the stream of rabbits coming in. Including the first one by Petals’ group, I had bought 27 rabbits. Most of them from the independent players, but after Iron Bear respawned, they had frostilly accepted status quo, and sold me some rabbits as well. Despite the many rabbits available, I had only been able to skin a dozen in the last hour.

There were two reasons for that. First, I had thought I would be faster at skinning the rabbit, however, it still took me around two and a half to three minutes per rabbit. And second; due to my low stamina, I had to rest after butchering six rabbits. With the downtime and sorting of materials etcetera, it took my almost half an hour for every six rabbits. Which also included a single attempt to make another manastone. I was quite determined to utilize my resource pools to the full extent.

It seemed that the Mother had still abandoned me. The loot had been absolutely horrible. I had several rabbits drop only bones. Only three eyeballs floated in one of the glass jars, while the blood in another only filled a fifth of the one liter jar. If sold without further processing, all of it was only worth nine silver and one copper. Meanwhile I had paid 26 silver for the rabbits I had butchered so far. Quite the loss.

At least I had gotten my hands on another manastone, which even flawed was worth two silver, almost as much as the exceptional one. It would seem that the extra recharge in a manastone was only worth one copper for every five mana.

Determined to change my loss to a profit, I found the large mortar and pestle set. Next I grabbed the piles of bones, which I started to grind down the first pile. I prompt asked if I was making bone meal as an ingredient or finished product. I picked the first option. A minute in, I got a new prompt.

You’ve unlocked the skill Alchemy, do you wish to learn this skill at this time?

Yes/No

Since I was making it an ingredient, there were fewer outcomes: Failure, Flawed Success and Success. At 64%, 24% and 12% respectively. If it was a flawed success, it meant that the quality would drop from Below Average to Poor. The stamina cost was also high, and XP low, barely making it worthwhile. Five attempts later and my stamina pool of two hundred was completely empty. It also left me with two failures, two flawed successes and one real success.

I poured the bone meal from the success into a cloth pouch, while the two flawed went into the normal iron cauldron. Luckily, failures became motes of light and vanished. Making cleaning up very easy. Taking the firewood from the cart, I built a campfire, and earned yet another prompt.

You’ve unlocked the skill Camping, do you wish to learn this skill at this time?

Yes/No

While I might pick up the skill at some point, it was not in the plans at that moment. So with a dismissive thought I declined. It was followed by a prompt that I already knew. It informed me that I could learn the skill at any point I wanted. Though I was unable to unlearn it when first learned. After lighting the campfire, which was not in a camp, I poured some water into the cauldron and placed it over the fire. I was attempting to make glue, using an alchemy recipe I had bought for five silvers. And though it took an hour to make, it could take care of itself, and the glue should be worth a whole silver even when using poor ingredients.

As I meditated once more, I saw that my guildmates had cleared the Dungeon yet again, ‘Good for you guys.’