Ryan led the way down the winding stairs to the first basement level while Kara followed. Light leaked through the partially opened doorway, illuminating the dim corridor leading to Old Ben’s kingdom; the armory.

He hesitated before pushing the door open, apprehensive about dealing with Old Ben without the Deputy Guild Master there to act as a buffer. The old man was cantankerous, to say the least.

As with Ryan’s previous visit, the expansive underground armory was crammed full of orderly stacks of equipment and maintained in an almost spotless state of cleanliness. The cranky quartermaster himself sat with his ledgers, massaging his temples. He glanced up upon Ryan’s entrance and Ryan spotted the glint in his eye that made him want to sprint back for the stairs.

“Come back so soon to plunder my stores, have you? Got a taste and now you’re itching for more, are you? You better have a signed and witnessed order directly from the Guild Master before I’m giving out any gear, you hear? Kara, you muscle-brained barbarian, you’re definitely not getting a single scrap from me!”

“Oh shove it, leather face. You keep it up and I’ll use these muscle-brained arms to put you over my knee like someone should have done ages ago.” Kara emphasized her point with a slap to an imaginary ass.

“You talk big, but don’t make promises you can’t keep,” said Old Ben. He shifted his attention from Kara to Ryan. “Now, what do you want? You didn’t come all the way down here to yap at me and waste my time, did you? Spit it out.”

Ryan stepped up, unsure if he should contribute to what he realized was banter. Old Ben was definitely cranky, but he appeared to be more good-natured than Ryan had thought. Best to play it safe and stay on topic.

“I’m here to use a skill stone. Kara and Lancer have convinced me to switch weapons to better match my fighting style.”

“I knew it! Listen up, I don’t have time for charity, and I’m sure as all forgotten gods not handing out a skill stone without signed paperwork, at least not without you paying the coins, and you don’t look like you can afford to have the trash collector scrape you out of the gutter.”

Ryan gritted his teeth. The guy just couldn’t lay off for a single second. He’d have to abandon Plan A, it seemed.

“If you’d let me get a word in edgewise, I’d have told you I have some money. At least enough to buy you a skin treatment to help smooth out that craggy mug you call a face,” Ryan said, following up on Kara’s jab at his old man face.

“Hah! You’ve got some bite to you after all. Listen up rookie, you’ve just started out as an Awakened, so I doubt you’ve got enough, even if you have some spare change. I’m assuming you want a common skill stone. Even after the Guild discount, you’re still looking at 30 silver coins for a single use.”

Ryan paused for a second, considering the number, and sighed. “I don’t actually know if that’s a lot of money or not.”

Old Ben had obviously expected him to say something different, because he stopped whatever he’d been about to say. His face turned thoughtful for a split second, breaking Ryan’s image of the man for a span, before his face reverted to its normal hostile state.

“Destin mentioned something about you not knowing a damn thing. Well, listen up then. I don’t want to be explaining stuff to you all day. A common laborer here in the city will make one gold coin in a year in pay, thereabouts. There are 100 silver coins to one gold. Same with copper to silver. Thirty silver will get you a room in a ratty inn for almost four months, or a decent inn for around a month.”

“That… is a lot more than I thought. I got a reward today, from Destin. Turns out it was a lot more than I thought. I have enough for one skill stone, but I need two. How much would it cost to buy Keys?”

“That’s far too rich for your blood, scrappy. You might be able to afford a Body Key after a while, as you are now. It would cost you around five gold, which even a new craftsman would have to save up every single copper coin for a couple of years to afford. To buy a Mind Key would run you around 15 gold, too rich for most anybody who isn’t an upper class rubbish pile. A Soul Key, if you could even find one, would run you around 80 gold. You’d need the backing of a strong house or a very strong Awakened to even find one for sale, let alone afford it. 80 gold is enough to buy yourself a small mansion out in the countryside.”

Eighty gold for a Soul Key. The first Key he’d found had been a Soul Key. It hadn’t seemed all that odd to see Mags react so strongly to it, but looking back on it, Ryan thought she hadn’t reacted enough. And the enormity of her generosity staggered him. She could have easily taken the Key for herself, and Ryan would have remained ignorant.

“So much money. You’re telling me that all the Awakened are running around with three mansions’ worth of Soul Key in them? How are there so many Awakened if they’re so rare?”

Kara patted him on the back and said, “It only seems like there are a lot because you’re in the city where we congregate. Body and Mind Keys are common enough and you’ll find most villages have a fair number of people with them. Many people consider getting enough Soul Keys to be the first major hurdle. Other than not dying, of course. Besides, if you survive long enough and kill enough beasts, it’s just a matter of time. Sometimes a long time.”

He braced himself on the counter for a second to steady himself before picking up the purse he’d earlier slammed. Thirty was the price for a single use of a skill stone, after whatever discount the Guild was giving, and he probably needed two. He dumped the coins into a pile on the counter, the characteristic ringing of silver echoing from the nearby stone walls.

Ryan set aside the 20 silver that Brady had wrangled out of the city Administrators and spotted a handful of what looked like oversized silver coins with a different shape that had come with the purse, and some loose copper.

“These are worth double or triple?” Ryan asked.

“They are worth five times as much, by weight. It looks like you’ve got about 80 silver or so sitting here.”

Eighty silver. Based on what Old Ben had just described, it was enough to have a room at a decent full service inn for almost three months.

“I need a skill stone for sword and shield. Is there a single stone for both, or do I need to get two?”

“Yup, I’ve got a single stone with a fair number of uses on it. I’m assuming you’re just wanting a common stone.”

Before Old Ben took off for the stacks, Kara called out, “Get individual ones for shield and sword. Preferably specific skill stones for buckler and short sword, if you have them.” At Ryan’s questioning look, she just shook her head and said, “Just trust me on this. It’s better in the long run.”

Ryan shrugged and waited for Old Ben to return. The memory of Mags and the Soul Stone reminded him it was time to think about traveling to Rild to meet up with her. There was no rush now that he knew she had made it out of the village and he could afford to take a few days to get more acclimated to the city. Maybe he’d take a few missions from the Administrator boards.

He had heard no news about the Shadowmen or the shadow wolves. Mags would want to go retake her land. Ryan wanted to help, but knew he wouldn’t go back to living there. The taste of freedom and independence he’d gotten over the last few days spurred his desire to keep getting stronger. There was so much out there to see, so many things that only a couple years ago had been impossible that he wanted to experience.

Old Ben returned, carrying two disks the size of small dinner plates that looked to be made from some kind of ultra smooth cement mixture. He placed them on the counter, side by side. Tiny and precise Rune Script covered the entire surface, situated in graduated circles with interwoven phases in various places.

Although he could read some individual runes, he was coming to find that having an academic understanding of the basic runes did nothing to help him understand the purpose of functional inscriptions like the ones in front of him.

Old Ben stood there, looking at Ryan with a smirk on his face. Ryan stared back, suddenly cautions and confused. Ryan looked at Kara, who likewise tried to hide a smile.

“The one on the left is just a generic shield skill stone, but it should do fine, regardless. The other is for the short sword. If you think you’re walking out of here with these, you’re even dumber than you look. Best get to it.” Old Ben counted out 60 silver, scooped them up, and walked away.

There was no point in waiting for whatever joke Old Ben and Kara were sharing, so Ryan placed his hand on the skill stone for the shield and activated it.

Ryan looked up from the floor, confused and disoriented. How much time had he lost? He propped himself up on his elbows. Kara was snickering off to the side, and Old Ben had an unabashed grin on his face.

What felt like hundreds of spiders skittered across the inside of Ryan’s skull and were followed up by what felt like the strongest ice-cream headache he’d ever experienced. His hands flew to his head, and he yelled, partly in anger, but mostly in pain.

“You’re a bunch of sadistic assholes! Oh god, why does everything always have to hurt so much? Why can’t it feel good instead?”

Ryan laid back flat on the floor and waited for the chaos in his head to die down. The skittering feeling and headache faded away to what felt like random static electricity bouncing around in his skull, then disappeared after a few more minutes. He dragged himself to his feet and went back to the counter, glaring at the assholes still standing there grinning like idiots.

“You two are messed up. Whatever, I’m glad it’s over with. I’m getting the hell out of here before you guys pin me to the floor and start taking chunks out of me for fun.”

“Oh no you don’t.” Kara tapped the remaining stone.

Ryan attempted to deny reality with a powerful groan, but he stepped up to the counter anyway. Hopping up and down to psych himself up, he shook out his hands and almost wanted to shadow box, but held himself back. The smooth texture of the skill stone met his fingertips as he reached out to activate it.

###

“You’re pouting,” Kara said.

Ryan was not pouting, he just didn’t feel like talking to the sadistic maniac that had allowed him to go through the skill stones without warning. He marched out into the courtyard before stopping, not sure where he was marching to. Gear was his priority. A sword and a shield, and whatever else he could afford after that.

“I need to buy some gear. Weapons, armor, if I can swing it with what I have left over after the skills.”

“You have enough for some serviceable weapons. You should hold off on armor, though. Armor at Iron Rank is overkill and too expensive to warrant it. When you hit Bronze is soon enough. Come on crybaby, I’ll make it up to you by taking you shopping.”

Kara led them down the main boulevard, through the ever present crowd, and onto a street that looked to be occupied with shops of various craftsmen. Just at a glance, Ryan spotted a cobbler, a tailor, and some specialty shops dealing in various accessories. Nothing fancy, just general working class fare.

“Do I need to train to get used to the new weapon knowledge in my head?” Ryan asked.

“Not really. You need to practice, but it’s better if you just go out and do something. The knowledge is in there, you just need to get your body moving and synced up. It’s not as good as having gone through the painstaking training, but the difference at your level isn’t going to matter much. Over time, the difference will stop mattering as your skill naturally gets better anyway.”

Soon enough, Ryan followed Kara into a dimly lit shop. They didn’t spend much time looking around, but Kara seemed familiar with the place. She helped him pick out a wooden buckler with some sort of thin dark steel layered over the surface, and a short sort that was ugly as sin, but solid and well balanced. Both items, while ugly, were finely crafted killing instruments. The items cost 8 silver total, leaving him with twelve more and an unknown number of copper left in his purse.

Eight silver for what amounted to the bare minimum quality needed to be reliable and functional. It was no wonder the villagers used spears. The average person in the lower class would have to spend a month's worth of wages for these items, or get their hands on some low quality items of questionable quality.

Ryan insisted on stopping at the tailor as they walked by and picked up a few sets of very high quality clothes more suited to fighting; namely thick, tight fitting, that didn’t hinder his movement. He even managed to find some dark blue colors to go with his cloak. The clothing set him back almost another silver.

They meandered their way back toward the Guild manor, occasionally stopping to window shop. Ryan noted many interesting things to check out later, much of it having runes inscribed to impart interesting effects like self repair and resistances.

Just before coming back to the city center, Ryan dragged Kara into an armorer’s workshop.

“I swear, I just want to look. I won’t buy anything, not that I could afford it after all the stuff I bought earlier,” Ryan said, rationalizing to Kara.

Kara rolled her eyes but followed him through the shop until they came across a display laid out behind a side counter, showing off various types of leather gear. Ryan’s eyes almost bulged out of their sockets at the sight of a full suit of leather armor.

If Ryan had to describe it, he’d have to go with a rugged and more stylish version of a well known `caped crusader`, without the mask. The leather was tight fitting and matte, with various accents of violet and blue trim. There were no extra frills and no fancy decoration, but it was beautiful nonetheless.

“This. Looks. Awesome. I thought leather was useless as armor though,” Ryan said. Kara attempted to say something but was interrupted by a nearby voice.

“That’s not just any leather. That is leather brought back through from a run into a Bronze ranked Breach. It has various intrinsic properties that make it tougher, stronger, and lighter. Not to mention the armorer covered the inside in runes. That armor will shrug off a normal sword strike as if nothing happened and resist a fair amount of damage from abilities.” The voice in question belonged to an elegant older woman, dressed in high quality tailored casual wear, sitting behind a nearby counter sorting through various items and placing them on display.

The way she moved and her demeanor screamed ‘warrior’. Ryan looked for her aura and wasn’t surprised to feel a strong response. Very strong. Silver ranked strong, if he had to guess. Hanging around so many Awakened over the last few days had given him a better feel for auras, it seemed.

She continued to describe the armor’s other effects and Ryan’s desire increasing by the second. He couldn’t tear his eyes off the armor. If it weren’t sequestered off behind the counter, he’d be caressing it lovingly.

“How much is it?” Ryan asked.

“Fifteen gold, negotiable of course.”

Ryan blanched, did an about-step, and all but ran for the front door. Kara followed him out, laughing the entire way.

“I told you so,” Kara said.

“Shut up, you. You’ve caused me enough pain already today.” His voice sounded harsh, but he looked over and grinned as they made their way back to the Guild manor.