There were times a man had to stop and take stock of what he had. Looking up at the ten meter tall walls of the Free City of Lotrot (pronounced Low Trot, unless one wanted to stir up the locals), Roberto Garcias thought this might be a good time to consider the state of their funds.

"Looks like a long line waiting to get into the city," Jason said from beside him.

Guardsman Wayne, a hulking bear kin among their escort, said cheerfully, "No need to twist your tail over it. We get to slip in at the front."

"Our horses aren't going to cause a problem, do you think?" Rob asked, remembering the reaction which the Lotrot military liaison to the Studio of Capricious Dreams had displayed on seeing them for the first time.

The bear kin shrugged. "Your wolf's more likely to stir things up. Some people might think nightmares, but those are rare enough around here that most would think they're some kind of dungeon asses, and the tribesmen use the wild ones around here often enough. The fact that you're all with us will keep people from panicking, and if you get him and your kitteagles nice ostentatious collars soon enough, well, you'll be getting offers to buy them."

Another guardsman, this one a gray scaled arassas, said, "Please don't. Sell them in Lotrot, that is. Don't want to have to come find you lot for tax evasion."

"Yeah, that's not what we're wanting, either," Rob said. "So, what kind of paperwork do we need to fill out while we're here?"

"No need to twist your tail. We'll walk you through it all. You do have a kop a piece for the entry fee, right?" Wayne asked.

Rob fished into a hidden pocket on his pack's belly strap, finding the coins Lena had promised him. He pulled out the string, finding shining bronze and copper bits, along with some tarnished nickel coins and a small number of silvers on his money string.

Wayne nodded. "Respectable walking money. You know the currency, right?"

Rob fingered the nickel coins. "These are the kops, right? And the bronzes are bits, the coppers tails, and the silvers are nobs, right?"

"Yep. You'll need to hand over a single kop piece for each of you. And when you get to the Splendid Tail, remember to tell Bardell that Wayne sent you."

The paperwork was rather fast, a record of their names and species, noting down their intended inn and stay length. In return, Rob and Jason received pendents on twine as their visas into the city state of Lotrot.

Wayne went over the directions to the Splendid Tail once more before happily waving them along their way.

They kept silent for the first few minutes spent threading their way through the crowds. After a month and a half spent mostly inside Lena's dungeon, the Studio of Capricious Dreams, the press of bodies felt a little overwhelming. At least on the military level of the Studio, there was a sense of order and the familiar organization behind the apparent chaos. In the city, not so much.

"Damn, Jace, you're right. This is like some of the older parts of Germany. Much more modern than I would have thought, given the swords and spears weapons tech," Rob commented, taking in the cobbled streets, brick and wood structures, and light posts crowned with mana gems. There were wagons, but they were pulled by donkeys and sometimes something that looked like a feathered ox.

Jason shrugged. Rob could understand the mood his friend was in and let it go. The fight between Jason and Lena had gotten serious enough for her to invite him to leave, and had been building for long enough she had even made provisions for the departure. Like their horses, gear, and even the coins in their pockets. Oh, and the magical contract binding them to Lena's dungeon. She had put that together on her own, and Rob wanted a bit of time to go over what he and Jason had agreed to as they took off.

The worst thing about it all, as far as Rob was concerned, was how frickin' obvious it was that the pair of them loved each other, even if Jason hadn't worked up the nerve to ask Lena on a date before the *event* that transported them from Earth to Rhofhir's Grand Tapestry. The whole Lena turning into an actual Dungeon Master and being disembodied in the process hadn't helped with advancing the romance there, but had engaged just about every protective instinct Jason held. Those instinct were already weird, thanks to Momma Kline.

Rob set aside thoughts about interfering in Jason's love life for the moment and focused on their surroundings. More aptly, he focused on the *people* surrounding them.

About half of the pedestrians were arassi. Once Candy had pointed out how much they looked like anthropomorphic raptors, Rob couldn't unsee the similarities, especially because it annoyed his little brother Aaron. According to Aaron, the arassi were more mammal than reptile, even if they blurred the line by being warm blooded, milk-providing egg layers. They just really didn't look like mammals, especially when their scale rippled with their emotions, or just to let off the faint steam of their sweat during physical exertion.

The easy tells for spotting the difference between male and female arassi came down to the breadth of their chests, thickness of their tails, and depth of their voices. Females were more slender in build and had ground shaking bass voices while the males had builds meant more for brawling and a vocal range closer to human male. Rob did note there were a few nursing mothers walking together, babies in slings held close to their chests. Jason had relayed the questions Kargerran's squad had asked him on his initial venture to the city, about why Candy and Lena had "engorged mammaries", but if the nursing mothers even had breasts worth speaking of, Rob couldn't tell.

Unlike the military and City Watch, however, the civilians dyed their scales in all hues of the color spectrum, though most seemed to prefer jewel tones. Black dye with washes of rank colors overlaying were reserved for the military, and the City Watch reserved shades of gray for their visual identifiers. That, according to Kargerran, was part of some kind of treaty between the Free Cities. Most arassi, he had told them, preferred to wear their house colors on their scales and city clothes.

The color restrictions also applied to armor, mainly because of the beast-kin enlisted in the various city state armies. Unlike scales and clothing, though, few civilians took the trouble to color their armor. That likely had to do with how most civilians didn't own armor unless they were members of the Adventurers Guild.

Beast kin made up the next largest population chunk in Lotrot. The 'kin were predominantly bears, wolves, and foxes, with a smattering of cat kin and the odd family of some other creature type. Rob still wasn't clear what made a lupine different from a wolf kin, but there was that layer of complexity with their species typing going on, too. Bear kin seemed to be either the most prevalent or the most politically powerful of the beast kin, at least judging by the presence among the military and political people Rob had seen over at the Studio.

Rob had to admit to harboring an appreciation for anime cat-girls, which led him to a mild sense of disappointment on discovering that cat-kin, like the arassi and most other beast kin, were flat chested unless they were nursing babies. On the bright side, elves might be slim in the chest department, but they did still have recognizable breasts, and passed that feature on to their half-blooded children.

Thinking of elves, Rob stroked the edge of his own newly elongated ear. He hadn't even seen the blow that crushed his chest so viciously his contract with Lena's dungeon had kicked in and re-made him according to the patterns that they had acquired at that point. Human hadn't been one of them. Rob had mixed feelings about his remaking. On one hand, he was an elf now. How cool was that? On the other, the only reason the Studio had the pattern for elves was because some shifty elf bastard had gotten caught sneaking their way over to attempt to extort Lena into giving up her Dungeon Master status.

They hadn't killed the bastard. The parandrous tribesmen that quickly set up camp near the Lotrot dungeon entrance did that, and then, following their religious beliefs, dumped the bodies in the dungeon for karmic recycling. That was, in fact, how they acquired all of their Aware patterns with the exception of the human one. Rob's healing had given them that.

Parandrians were another oddity. They weren't beast-kin, but they did look like a cross between a deer and bear that decided to walk upright and grow fingers.

Rob didn't see any of the tribesmen in the city, nor did he expect to. The killing hadn't stopped, mainly because the idiots looking to raid Lena's dungeon hadn't stopped coming. While the city had to acknowledge that the tribesmen were abiding by the various treaties existing between the two groups, no one liked the reminder of how many idiots were willing to violate the tribesmen's territorial rights on their way to usurp Lena's control over the Studio of Capricious Dreams, and the money maker they perceived it to be.

Despite their distractions, Jason and Rob made it to the Splendid Tail. The directions weren't exactly hard to follow. Stay on the North Gate street until they crossed under the portcullis of a gate on the inner wall. They would know it by the multitudes of bronze heads mounted to the stone wall. The gateway was known to the locals as the Usurpers' Arch. The inn would be on the East side of the street with a sign made to look like a fox curled up behind a bushy tail.

Guardsman Wayne had mentioned it might be a touch on the expensive side for lodgings, but the inn was a favorite with the city watch, and they could rely on the innkeeper to knock what heads needed knocking to keep out thieves and cut throats.

From the outside, the inn looked to take up a sizable lot, fifteen meters across the front and maybe a little less in height. Judging by the windows, there should be two floors and maybe an attic.

Jason stayed outside with the beasts while Rob ducked in to see what arrangements they might need for their companion critters.

Inside, several bench tables took up most of the floor space. A good sized stage dominated the front left corner (currently empty), and a long bar ran the width of the room at the back of the common room. Rob estimated the bar sat ten meters back from the entrance, and noted there was plenty of room for multiple bartenders behind the counter. A door in the far wall made it a safe bet that the building when further back, and a broad staircase in the far left corner led up. A fireplace with some comfortably worn armchairs surrounding it divided the stage and the stairs.

Behind the bar, a big bellied fox kin polished the bar while carrying on a conversation with a pair of gray-scaled arassi wearing loose fitting trousers and flouncy shirts that made Rob think of pirates. The fox kin looked up as they entered. His smile seemed to freeze on spotting Rob, but only for a moment.

"Ho, there, what can I do for you?" he called out in greeting, stopping in his polishing.

Rob smiled. "So, Guardsmen Wayne said we'd find good food and secure accommodations with Bardell of the Splendid Tail. We in the right place?"

The fox kin blinked, and some of the stiffness left his posture. "You are indeed. I'm Bardell. Come on in and let's discuss what you need."

Rob ran his hand over the back of his head. "Well, first, we need a place to settle our critters. Two horses, kitteagles, and a shadow wolf."

That got the two off duty guardsmen to turn around and stare at him. Bardell smiled. "I never heard of a horse, but the kitteagles and the wolf can stay in your room with you if they're trained and restrained. It'll add a kop a night to your stay, though."

"Sounds reasonable. Think big donkeys for the size and needs of the horses. Not quite as smart, though."

Bardell shrugged. "I have an arrangement with the stable two doors down. They'll include standard feed with the rent of the stalls, but they don't exercise or groom the beasts."

"Great! We'll be right back," Rob said.

Back on the street, he looked around. Spotting the stable wasn't that difficult. The building sat a few meters back from road and had large double doors, currently open. A pair of young bear kin played a game with scattered sticks just to the side of the barn doors.

Rob waved Jason to follow and took the lead of one of the horses. As they approached, one of the bear kin youths looked up, his adorable round ears flexing. He spotted Rob and Jason, said something to the other youth, and slipped inside the stable. By the time Rob crossed the street, an adult bear kin had walked out and the youths were picking up their sticks.

Dropping Wayne and Bardell's names seemed to make the bear kin happier. He introduced himself as Kathel, and they easily settled on a kop per horse per night.