There are way more guards here than there were in Pehrink, I noticed as we walked through the oddly-quiet streets. The proportion of guards to non-guards around us was almost five times as high as in the other cities I had seen, or around one guard for every twenty people. Additionally, the guards were more attentive than normal, regularly scanning the passerby instead of just standing around looking bored. Was there some kind of incident, maybe? I wondered, That could explain why there are fewer people out in the streets.

Koyl and I arrived at Dkehpmz Mecantile’s local branch office, a nondescript building we would have missed if not for the simple sign on the door, and entered. The lobby inside was even smaller than usual, and after some very boring but polite conversation between Koyl and the male attendant we were each paid exactly ninety-seven ngoywngeyt and fifteen ngeyt, a value that I could only assume was derived from some intense calculation on Dkehpmz’ part. With our wallets now much heavier, we exited back into the street and walked around a block before stepping aside to talk.

“Can’t believe we actually got paid,” Koyl laughed.

“It’s possible those slips were intended for the deceased guards,” I replied. “We should try to avoid Dkehpmz in the future, just in case.” Koyl nodded in agreement, then looked around at the street traffic.

“Just weird,” he muttered. “So look, I’m going to try to find another caravan or something so we can get going to Kahvahrniydah. I don’t know what you want to do, but I don’t really need your help with this. We should meet back up at the inn come sundown, alright?”

“Why do we need a caravan?” I asked. As far as I know, we’re free to leave the city whenever we want, I thought, we could just walk. Koyl shook his head derisively.

“There’s another forest between here and there,” he explained. “You do remember what just happened to us a few days ago, right? Do you really want to risk getting stoned to death by monkeys or eaten by a bear? That's also not considering possible banditry.” Fewer people would make less noise and attract less attention, I thought, but on the other hand, if we were ambushed by those monkeys we would need ranged weaponry to fight back. Plus, if we were ambushed, the outcome could be decided in advance if the attackers were human, or had human-like intellect. The behavior of the monkeys, specifically sending runners for resupply, indicated much higher intelligence than Earth monkeys.

“You have a point,” I admitted. “Can you at least try to find a legitimate caravan this time?”

“No promises,” Koyl replied.

To occupy my time, I first went to get my clothing repaired. Finding a shop that dealt in gambesons was quite easy, but none were willing to do a repair on the spot due to a supposed backlog of other repair work. Since I wasn’t particularly attached to the gambeson, I managed to trade it for another for a much lower cost than buying one new would have been. I also purchased a new pair of loose-fitting pants and had my boots repaired by a street cobbler. There was very little haggling involved, a price was stated and paid immediately. The only non-business request the cobbler made of me was to look him in the eyes for a moment before he began his work, which I complied with.

After getting my boots repaired, I decided to do some more observation of the populace in the town. Walking around to the richer area, my attention was quickly drawn by more typical street noise coming from one area of town. As I approached I found that a section of the road was blocked off and had crowds on either end. After pushing my way through the crowd enough that I could see the center, I was shocked to find that instead of the combat I was expecting, there seemed to be some kind of magic demonstration going in.

A young woman in floral-looking attire and a long dress was dancing atop a raised platform. Around here, hovering midair, were half a dozen balls of what appeared to be flaming cloth. As the spun and moved her own body, the orbs of fire weaved between her arms and legs, as if complementing the dance itself. To her left and right, two men juggled similar flaming orbs between each other, tossing them around the woman and catching them with force magic to avoid burning themselves. Honestly, their control is very impressive, I thought, trying to decide if I could have performed a similar feat.

I watched the performance a while longer, then departed when the act failed to move on to any new methods of using magic. As I left I felt the gaze of a guard, who didn’t even pretend that he wasn’t watching me when I made eye contact with him. Well, I still have several hours to waste, I thought, maybe I can find a secluded spot and test my force magic control a bit. The guard tried to follow me subtly, but I ditched him in under five minutes by rapidly turning corners until his line of sight was broken, then ducking behind some crates. Maybe I should try the poorer part of town, I thought.

The poorer end of town to the east was less policed, to the point of having no guards present at all once the slum-like areas began to emerge. That much wasn’t unusual, but what was unusual was how the foot traffic was still very light and relatively orderly, though not as much as the rich parts of town. People tried not to get too close to one another, clearly distrustful of the motives of others, and left me a wide berth even if I ended up moving against the flow of foot traffic. Ah, alleys, I thought as the buildings grew closer together, I never thought I would want for those.

I found an alley that was sufficiently hidden from any of the main roads, then found a spot in the alley that looked clean enough to sit down in. As I had been walking I had also been trying to figure out a way to potentially weaponize force magic juggling like the performers had been using, and I quickly came to the conclusion that force magic could be used to extend the lever arm when throwing a knife. The wooden side of the building across the alley was already damaged, so I figured nobody would care if I added a few more scratches to it.

Floating a knife in front of my hand and keeping it in the same relative position was fairly easy, but trying to shift the position in tandem with my arm movements to increase the throwing speed of the dagger was quite a bit harder. Several times I ended up releasing my knife too late, or too early, or just not moving it properly, resulting in nicking myself with the blade. I have to think of it like a second hand, floating out just past my actual hand, I figured, magic works best when it’s reflexive, and this is a complex set of actions. A few dozen more attempts with my new “meta-visualization” that I used to control the movement and release of the actual magic resulted in a rough, but effective technique.

I don’t even think I was using the original visualization for that last one, I realized. Trying again while consciously avoiding the “normal” force magic visualization of lever arms, I found that I couldn’t quite activate the magic properly. I checked my blue bar to find that it was barely depleted, not more than I would have expected for using external force magic at a low level for about an hour. I could have sworn it worked though, I grumbled to myself, spinning the knife around above my hand as my face turned into a frown. With a flick of my wrist, I flung the knife at a seemingly impossible speed into the wall across from me, which lightened my mood somewhat.

Another hour passed, and my technique improved tremendously. The sort of universal grip that force magic allowed was extremely useful for stabilizing throwing knives, to the point that a straight throw instead of a spinning one became far more practical at all distances. All it took to remove the spin of my arm’s force was a slight rotational tweak in the opposite direction. I also added in a lengthwise rotation to stabilize it, and I knew just from the single longer-distance throw I made that I had almost doubled my effective range and accuracy.

The sound of humans speaking drew me from my pseudo-meditative trance. The noise of the street, dampened by the alley, had included human speech, but not to the clarity that I found myself hearing. Sounds a bit hostile, almost, I thought as I analyzed the tone, Could be interesting, maybe I should go see what this is about. As it turned out, the noise was coming from another alley that was branched off of a branch of the alley I had been sitting in, which was why the sound was so clear.

In a small open area that joined three intersecting alleys, a group of humans was having some kind of dispute. Two groups, I corrected, clearly noting how three of the humans appeared to be surrounding the last one, preventing him from escaping. All of the humans looked to be Luwahriy, but the lone human was dressed in patchy attire and appeared less hygienic compared to the remaining three. One of the group raised their hand, and the lone human moved to protect his face, backing up and hitting the wall behind him.

“Don’t make this harder than it has to be, jhoymahzmoyjh,” the lead human of the group said. Judging by the tone of voice, she was a woman. “You’re getting this mark either way. Can't have you wandering around into places you don't belong.” She displayed some kind of metal tool, the nature of which I couldn’t quite tell from my viewing angle. The victim human whimpered something in response that I couldn’t make out, earning him a kick from the man on his right. That word means… not-valued? I thought, pulling apart the sounds in my head and analyzing them for meaning, No, that's not quite right. A more accurate translation would probably be “detested”. I should get closer, this seems interesting.

I crept closer to the group, staying out of sight, but then the victim human’s eyes locked onto mine. His expression, pleading for assistance that I had no obligation to give him, drew the attention of his attackers. As they turned around, I saw that they were all late-stage adolescents, or at least much smaller than the adult humans I had seen so far. No threat to me, I scoffed internally, they aren’t even armed, except for that metal rod.

“Who are you?” the lead human snorted, twisting her face into a taunting smile.

“I'm just watching,” I replied. “Please carry on.” The three humans looked at each other, and the victim human’s eyes widened. He’s older than them, I thought, looks to be at least… wait, they mature in around twenty years so… twenty-three or so?

“You didn’t answer the question, uwmzaejhay,” the girl spat. I couldn't exactly translate the new word, but I knew it was an outgroup label by the tone. Almost the exact tone Mpahray used for sehpeyzm yaal, I thought with a small degree of amusement.

“I’m nobody,” I replied, “just watching to learn about local customs. I’m not going to stop you or call the guard or anything, I just want to know what you’re doing.” My very honest response did nothing to diffuse the adolescents’ suspicion of me. One of the boys looked at my sword, then back to my face, and drew a knife from inside his jacket. I guess they were armed, I thought, still, not a threat. This could be a good chance to test out my new throwing technique.

“Do some magic, uwmzaejhay,” the boy without a knife demanded.

“Why?” I asked.

“You’re from pretty far away, aren’t you?” he asked, obviously rhetorically. “Here in Uwriy, we like to have new people show us a bit of magic. It would be impolite to refuse.” The other two humans snickered as he finished his sentence. Could you make it more obvious that you’re lying? I wanted to ask, but instead, I reached over to the wall beside me with my right hand and pulled out a piece of wood. With the barest twitch of the fingers on my left, the sliver of wood ignited.

“Good enough?” I asked.

“That the best you’ve got?” the unarmed boy mocked.

“The best I can show you,” I lied. Better to appear average, I thought, I don’t want them to know what’s about to hit them if I have to fight.

“He’s just another detested,” the knife boy hissed derisively. “A foreign one at that.”

“That just means we get to mark a second one today,” the girl smiled viciously, and the metal instrument in her hand began to glow with heat, “Vowaozhao, grab him.” The unarmed boy chuckled, then exploded toward me not unlike how Yaavtey had during the start of our fight in the slums. Unfortunately for him, he wasn’t nearly as powerful as Yaavtey, and less than half the size. My closed fist connected with his cheek, shattering his orbital bone and sending him spinning to the ground in a groaning heap.

“That’s an interesting branding iron you have there,” I said, using the English words for the tool I now recognized in the girl’s hand. “How about you let me take a closer look at it?”