Chapter 35: GuestsI am so relieved that Sherry accepted smithing. Of course, I’ll wait for a while before I reveal the other part. It’ll be good to let her gain a few levels before she takes that jump.

  Sherry got praised by the rest of the party. What a great group of people we have here. I’m so happy to be a part of it.

  Sherry announced, “Thanks so much everyone. Being here is so different from everything I was told about svery. This is absolutely wonderful.”

  “I am so proud of this party. The way we can support and be happy for each other is simply fantastic.”

  Then they said a bunch of excessively nice things about me. I did my best to endure it all, but this sort of thing really makes me want to act much meaner. Of course, I started all this sickly sweet talk so it’s hard to compin now. Better to just change the topic.

  “The best way to build up power — which I call levels — in your job, is by sying monsters in the byrinths. Sherry, you have a new job so you might feel a little weaker for a little while. Theo and Alina experienced that recently. I also want to check in on our favorite vilge and introduce them to Sherry. It’ll probably be raining pretty hard so make sure to bring a cloak.”

  I decided to bring us to the vilge first. If they had guests, we could go to the byrinth and check back ter. Warping to the usual spot brought us to a literal mudslide. I pulled everyone back and opened a new portal right in the middle of the vilge. A quick word with Bernhard confirmed that they were in serious trouble. We needed to get them out of here as fast as possible.

  Fortunately, our good history with the vilgers helped them to trust us immediately. Alina stayed with me as the transtor. Marcus worked security. I sent Theo and Sherry home to receive the refugees. I started to ferry the residents in groups of five back to our house.

  About half way through, I took Marcus to the byrinth so I could recover MP. Of course it looked like a really strange thing for me to do in the middle of a rescue operation — like interrupting a surgery to squeeze in a round of golf — Marcus knew to just let me swing away.

  While Bernhard was out making a st sweep for anyone hiding, Alina asked something that’d evidently been bothering her.

  “David, why didn’t Sherry recognize you yesterday?”

  “Because we just met.”

  “Then how did you know she would be there? You’ve been preparing for her arrival, right?”

  “I read a story, which included someone like Sherry. I didn’t actually know she’d be there, but I hoped.”

  “Was anyone else in that story?”

  “A few. The most important was a wolf-kin who could help me survive here.”

  “What happened?”

  “I don’t know. I didn’t look for her. I don’t even know if she’s real.”

  “Was I in that story?”

  “No, you were a complete surprise.”

  “Good. I like it better that way.”

  Bernhard soon returned and confirmed that nobody had been left behind. Once at home, Bernhard made an extra check while I took Marcus and Theo to Curatar to buy a load of bnkets, a bunch of bread and two hams. I just popped a strengthening pill to regain MP this time — forgot to bring them with me before. I then hurried off to fill and warm the tubs.

  Sherry cooked red beet soup and Theo fried some ham. We served this to the vilgers with bread and mead. With the immediate crisis over, Alina and I went to speak to Bernhard. He was polite enough not to ask any questions and I instructed my people not to mention the name of the nearest towns. Everything was still at the level of pusible deniability even if the children started talking, no dangerous secrets would be revealed.

  As was perfectly evident, no one from the county came to help them. Even in the heavy rainfall, the soldiers who visited earlier were completely uninterested in their predicament. It turns out they were looking for someone, namely, me. Whether to praise or punish, there was no way that finding me should have been prioritized over helping their own citizens.

  I refilled and reheated the baths a couple times with short trips to the byrinth since I had more time. Eventually, some of the vilgers helped with the cooking and we all rexed. In the evening, Sherry made another bracelet and then Marcus and I took her out to Curatar’s fifth floor. We didn’t stay long, but it was enough to help her level up.

  By the time we got back, the vilgers were trying to figure out where to sleep. With the addition of 37 guests, it wasn’t easy. The elderly stayed in the house and most of the children slept in the barn. Thankfully, the night was warm and calm so even the people who slept under the stars were reasonably comfortable. Alina and Sherry stayed with me… to save space.

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  Day 32

  The next morning, I discovered some compelling evidence that I am indeed human. When I shared the news of my new, human-specific job,[1] Sherry got a bit embarrassed and Alina ughed loud enough to start waking some of the guests. I gave Sherry the rest of my thread collection and asked her to regurly make several bracelets every day.

  While several fires were set-up outside to help make food, I took a couple people back to the fetch supplies and assess the damage. It looked awful, but not quite as bad as yesterday. After coming back for breakfast, we held a quick meeting to decide on an action pn. Actually, it was just me, Alina, and Bernhard, who was actually just a Vilger. Since I hadn’t bothered to break the party, I decided to fix that.

  “Alina, please try to casually suggest that Bernhard’s leadership in this crisis may have granted him the Vilge Chief job.”

  I took a few of the vilgers to buy building supplies — we went to Vale so no one would have to worry about keeping secrets. A couple loads were taken back to the vilge to start rebuilding while my party went to the byrinth. Could we have helped them? Sure but it’s their stuff and they didn’t really need us. It was an unspoken agreement that I would help with the stuff they couldn’t do — of course, unspoken was partly because we didn’t share a nguage.

  The new monster on the ninth floor was sheep. Alina completely switched over to sword and shield and gave the steel spear over to Sherry — the club was a bit too hard to use in a group. Marcus and Theo were in the front, as always. Sherry’s spear worked best up front while Alina moved back to stay with me.

  My wish to occasionally switch the positions around wasn’t very popur but they did it anyway — well, I am the boss. Eventually, they came to appreciate the chance to rest a bit in the back… or they pretended to accept it for my sake. My real motivation was to make sure we could quickly adapt if anyone got hurt. We kept the best configuration in pce most of the time anyway.

  I popped out every hour or so to check on the vilgers. Of course, we’d walk out the real entrance like normal people, but not before I warped out to a hidden spot to make sure the coast was clear. It seemed quite unlikely that the soldiers would come back so soon, but the extra caution took very little effort. Of course, there was even the possibility of another ambush.

  By mid-afternoon, the workers were ready to return.

  After dinner, Alina stayed back to help the vilgers while the rest of us went back to the ninth floor of Nordselm’s Labyrinth.

  Once there, I got an unexpected question from Sherry.

  “David, why do you have an elven vilge?”

  “It’s not my vilge. I just like them and I saw that they were in trouble.”

  “Really? That’s it?”

  “Yep, that’s it. By the way, thanks for all your help. It’s just been one big surprise or crisis since you joined our party. I promise, it’s not usually so wild.”

  “Are you really sure that you’re human?”

  “Well, I didn’t grow up around here so that could expin part of my strangeness. The rest might be that you have too narrow of a view of humans.”

  “Hmm, yes, even Marcus and Theo are a lot nicer than expected. So many things I thought I knew are turning out to be wrong.”

  Sherry is just so easy to talk to, which possibly says more about me than her. I must admit that I was considered a bit odd even back in my old world.

  We eventually finished the floor and returned home.

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  Day 33

  Right after breakfast, I ferried the vilgers back home. There was still a lot of work to do and they were a bit short-handed with some of the big stuff. It was decided that Marcus, Theo and Sherry would stay there to help. For some weird reasons connected to status, I wasn’t allowed to participate. Instead, Alina and I stayed home to clean-up.

  In the new calm, I started thinking about when Sherry and other’s felt so confident about me not being human. I wonder who else came to that conclusion? Could it be that Tuuli have made the same assumption after seeing my warp skill and odd values? An assumption like that could have some practical implications. Well, I should visit Luke at the merchants guild to buy those crystals… and maybe make a quick little side-trip.

  I left the st of the clean-up to Alina and warped to the starting vilge — I never bothered to ask the name. It’s been awhile since my st visit and my first time to arrive from the main road. I was greeted by chief Somara — I had to use Identify to get his name since I’d already forgotten.

  We exchanged basic greetings. He thanked me again for getting rid of the brigands and I thanked him for his hospitality. I asked about Tuuli and was told that she’d moved away to another vilge and was expected to get married soon. I tried to ask if there was anything different about her, but realized that it’d be too soon anyway. Well, she seems to be doing well and I am probably over-reacting anyway. Seems best not to disrupt her life at this point. The vilge merchant gave me directions so I could probably find her ter.

  I walked down the road a way before warping to Curatar’s merchants guild. It didn’t take long before I could talk to Luke. As expected, he won bids on the three remaining caterpilr crystals I had requested for 4200 Nars each.

  “Sir, I believe you expressed some interest in higher-grade armor.”

  “Oh, have you found anything?”

  “Yes, indeed. I was fortunate enough to win a bid on a set of dragon-leather armor, if you would be interested.”

  Luke opened his Item Box and withdrew an absolutely beautiful set of light armor. It had two open slots, presumably known only to me. He offered it for 45k. I wanted this and couldn’t just wait for a criminal to drop something this nice. Of course, I bought the armor and the crystals.

  “Luke, if I remember correctly, I still have credit for another bid. This time, surprise me. Just whatever comes up for sale at, um, a maximum of 6500 Nars, I’ll take it. I’ll come back in a few days and likely request more crystals, but I haven’t decided which ones yet.”

  “Mr. Moreau, I must admit that you are the very first customer to make such an open request. If more people did this, they would probably find some really good deals. I look forward to your next visit.”

  Technically, Theo would benefit more from this new armor. Unfortunately, it would be terrible etiquette to have a leader dressed worse than the regur members. I simply couldn’t be so rude to Theo.

  Alina was trying to fix the fields when I got back home. The vilgers probably hadn’t recognized such a small plot as being significant so ended up trashing it. Together, we fixed the furrows and even did some pnting. My previous experience with agriculture was basically limited to picking out the good stuff from a grocery store or light foraging in a forest. We ended up doing this for a couple hours until it felt like it was time to bring the rest of the party home.

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  [1] The race-specific job avaible to humans is not generally discussed in polite company.