CHAPTER 20

“What do you think happened to Australia?” Dario asked.

“What do you mean? What happened to Australia?” Monte asked back.

“Well, all the creatures around here got weird; do you suppose the animals and bugs in Australia got weird too?” Dario elaborated.

The group was silent for a while. Finally, Tracy nodded. “We probably shouldn’t go to Australia anytime soon.”

“No shit.” Dario said. “I bet the animals got really weird.”

“Jesus Christ. Can you imagine the spiders?” Auggie observed with a grimace.

“Why do you think only the ants got big here?” Tracy asked.

“Well, that tree got pretty big.” Auggie replied. “You know, it’s probably all those sneaky ants all over the place.”

“What sneaky ants?” Everyone asked in unison.

“You know, those red and yellow ants I’ve been seeing out of the corner of my eye all over the place.” Auggie responded. “I can’t get a good look at them. Everytime I try to focus on them, they just kinda vanish.”

“That’s kinda scary.” Tracy said.

“They’re aren’t doing anything except watching people. No one else seems to be worried about it.” Auggie said. “I think they might be out in the surrounding area.”

“Are they a security force you think?” Dario asked.

“I don’t know. I’ve been here exactly as long as you have. Why would I know more than you?” Auggie asked. He shifted in his seat and brought out a snack he had in his pocket. He made a motion to share with his friends but they all declined.

Monte came into the inn they were sitting in. Tracy waved him over. Monte waved back, walked over and sat down.

“I got a job.” Monte began explaining. “The shopkeepers over at the Branch store hired me to make things.”

“What type of things?”

“Anything really.” Monte said. “It appears there is a serious lack of crafters in the area.”

“Makes sense.” Auggie said. “Everything else in this world has been jacked up. Did you figure the money situation out?”

“Yeah, everything comes from the tree.” Monte replied. Monte reached into his pouch and produced a collection of leaves and nuts. He tossed them onto the table. He started fiddling with the nuts and leaves. “The pine nuts are a nickel. The almonds are a quarter. Chestnuts are a dollar. The leaves have numbers on them. They represent whatever denomination is on the leaf.” As Monte talked he picked up each nut and demonstrated.

“What? No pennies?” Tracy asked.

Monte sighed. “The storekeeper said ‘Tree doesn’t care what you think, you can keep your damn pennies to yourself.’”

“But we need pennies for small transactions.” Tracy said.

“Don’t know what to tell you.” Monte replied. “You now know as much as I do.”

Auggie looked at the leaves and got a certain look upon his face. “Hmmm. This doesn’t seem that difficult to copy.” He observed.

“The shopkeeper mentioned that.” Monte warned him. “The tree has ways of telling. Don’t rip it off.”

“What can we even buy here?” Dario asked.

“All sorts of things.” Monte said. “The store has armor and weapons. There are people offering training classes. There is an anthouse on the other side of town.”

“What’s an anthouse?” Dario asked.

“Whorehouse.” Monte replied simply.

“Why anthouse?” Dario asked again.

“I don’t know. I didn’t go. I didn’t want to waste money.” Monte replied.

“Whorehouse ain’t wasting money.” Auggie chimed in. “Wimmin are expensive. At least with whores, there aren’t any strings attached.”

“You guys are gross.” Tracy added to the conversation.

Dario asked. “Asking for a friend. Where can we get more money?”

Monte replied. “There is a job board. The town council is always looking for help thinning out the local fauna. There is a bonus for new or interesting creatures.” Monte reached in his pouch again and pulled out a crystal. “The shopkeepers called it a looting crystal. It gathers and stores the dissipating mana essence for later retrieval. It randomly gathers the dissipating energy and allows access to the raw materials you need for crafting.”

Auggie picked it up and looked at it. “That’s pretty cool. I was wondering how they were gathering supplies. It is really frustrating watching everything you gather disappear into the ether.”

“Yeah, it’s super frustrating. There is also a gather bag that somehow prevents material from mana-pating as well. But you need a shit ton of leaves to buy it.” Monte continued on. “You’ll need to register at the mission board. We can all get a mana looter after you swear an oath to the tree. It seems to be pretty innocuous.”

“Well, let’s get to it. I’m hungry and money doesn’t grow on trees, you know.” Dario slowly stated. “Motherfucker, money does grow on trees doesn’t it?”

“In this town it does.”