Almost there-

  The rest of the journey to Memphit was uneventful. I’m wearing my mask once again, now properly showing that I’m a human with the class Knight. I wonder what abilities a Knight would normally have. If I had to guess, it wouldn’t be a magical class, so maybe doing things like Aura of Frigeration or Soul Conjuration is a bad idea.

  I want to hide my class because Eva told me that people would try to pry to figure out how to acquire it. Classes that almost no one has heard of are rare. That’s why Aubrey was so excited to learn about my class, speaking of-

  Occasionally, I kept catching Aubrey giving Eva and I weird looks. When she looks at Eva her soul becomes irritated, but when looks at me she feels… Pity? Is she pitying me?

  Something about that pisses me off, but I ignore it for now.

  And after our long journey since I first got to this world, we reached my first city. The walls are massive, almost over a hundred feet tall and are made from rock and dirt, roots sticking out at random. The gate we approached seems to be made from clay bricks and a metal gate bars the entrance.

  Two men stand next to each other and watch us as we get close. One wears some cheap looking leather armour, but the other has these baggy pants and isn’t wearing anything to cover his bare chest.

  (Soldier / 28)

  (Bandit / 33)

  A Bandit? What’s someone with a class like that doing here?

  The Bandit has a shimmer of recognition in his eyes and a small smile on his face. “Ahh-! If it isn’t Atremer and Aubrey back from the abominable forest, and surprisingly not covered in chimp shit! That’s a first. Who are these two mystery ladies?”

  Atremer grimaces at the Bandit, but the Bandit continues ignoring his annoyance, “Y’know, I heard if you fuck a Cleric you’ll get closer to the gods.”

  Something about that sets me off. Not really what he said, but the way he said it. How he looked at Eva as he said it. So I responded, “Say that again and I’ll rip your throat out.”

  He sucked air through his teeth, “Yeesh, feisty… Alright, enough fuckin around. Five for you two, and ten for the newcomers.”

  Atremer gives the man the money and the Soldier slams on the gate three times. After a moment the gate slowly starts getting pulled up into the wall with a loud squeaking.

  We start to walk past the guards, but when Eva walks by the Bandit he partially gets in her way. “Hey girly, y’know… say if you wanted we could-”

  I Instant Position myself between me and the Bandit, grabbing onto his throat and cutting him off, “I warned you.”

  I towered over the Bandit, his eyes widened as my grip tightened around his neck. Before I could kill him, I heard Eva yelling at me, “Tiffany wait!”

  I blink and turn back towards her. “What?”

  She stammers, “D- Don’t kill him!”

  I look back at the man as his face slowly starts to turn blue. “Oh, okay.”

  I let go and the man fell backward grabbing his neck and panting. The Soldier seems stunned and at a loss on what to do. Eventually he draws a sword and points it at me. “Y- You’re under arrest!”

  I scoff, “No I’m not.”

  Everyone is now looking at me. Pure unadulterated shock filling them. Was that too arrogant to say? No… No it wasn’t, “You want to know why I’m not under arrest?”

  The Bandit shakes his head, “W- What?!”

  I manifest my aura as I stand over the two weak men. They freeze before my Terrifying Presence. “Because you don’t want to die.”

  My aura recedes back into my body and the Soldier falls to the ground next to the Bandit. I walk past the collapsed men and look back when I realize no one was following me, still looking on at what I did with shock. I gestured towards them, “Are you guys coming or what?”

  That seems to snap them out of it as they shuffle past the gate. I fully believe that killing that guy wouldn’t have any consequences, not any lasting ones any way. Would I get in trouble for it? Sure, but I could get away with it.

  Entering the city proper, I notice how the place is built. A medieval city, through and through. With cramped corridors and branching alleyways everywhere as we walk down a main road. We seemed to have entered some sort of side entrance as there weren't any shops or vendors. Maybe a residential area.

  Eva taps on my shoulder, “What the fuck was that back there?!”

  Aubrey glances over, but doesn’t say anything. I frown at Eva, “What?”

  “Why did you almost kill that guy?”

  I scratch my chin, “Because I wanted to.”

  Eva starts rubbing her temples as we walk together. She sighs, “Just don’t kill anyone unless I tell you to. Got it?”

  I grin, “Yep!”

  We continued walking until we reached near the center of the city. The passersby become more and more dense. They look like normal peasants I would see in fictions in my old world. I take note of their souls.

  Almost everyone we come across has souls made from flames, all in varying colors. Not really that interesting to look at until we reached a large building. On the big sign bolted to the front is, ‘-Smithing Guild-’

  Before we even head inside I can sense the souls in front of me. A ball of clear water, a soul flowing with lava, and a spiral of wood. “Interesting. What are we doing here again?”

  Aubrey slaps my back, “We’re claiming the bounty on the Stag-Lattice Abominations antlers. We worked together to kill it, so we’re gonna split the rewards.”

  Eva nods, “Our cut should be about two mythril pieces, we could live off that for almost two months.”

  Atremer walks past me and swings the front doors to the building wide open, “Let’s just get this over with.”

  ---

  “Sorry Atremer, that bounty has already been claimed.”

  (Cook / level 17)

  Surprisingly, the receptionist was a Cook. I mean, I guess a receptionist class doesn’t exist? Imagining ascending to godhood, only to become the first receptionist. I grin at that.

  The receptionist is a tall girl with rounded glasses, similar to Atremers. She stands behind a counter full of strange trinkets, in fact, this entire place is filled with them. What they are is kind of lost on me.

  Off to the side is a board with papers nailed to it. Bounties for various rocks, rare woods, animal hides, and noticeably no sign for antlers.

  Atremer grimaces, “Is there really no smith that wants to take these antlers off our hands.”

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  The receptionist shakes her head before pausing, “Maybe… The ones that posted the bounty for the antlers were Johnny and Bobby. I’m not supposed to say this but they might pay for the antlers directly if you go to them.”

  Atremer gains a rare smile, “Thanks Tammy, you’re a good one.”

  She grinned at that and gave a thumbs up. We turned to leave but suddenly the receptionist called out, “Oh, and Atremer! Colin wanted to talk to you when you got back.”

  “Tell him to fuck off!”

  “Already did!”

  I blinked as we left the guild. That was the first time I saw Atremer’s soul get genuinely angry. I wonder who Colin is? Aubrey seems completely unaffected by her fathers outburst, almost like she expected it.

  It looks like we’re heading to Johnny and Bobby now though. Let’s just hope we can get paid.

  ---

  “I can’t afford this.”

  (Blacksmith / level 57)

  The fat man with a beard sits in a chair, looking over the massive spiked antlers sitting in the center of a large workshop. Johnny strokes his braided beard as he glances at the charred soot covering it. Wiping away some of it to see the pristine antlers underneath.

  “These here are some fine antlers. Some of the best I’ve seen in awhile, but I just ordered some. I don’t got the capital to gain this much of a surplus.”

  That blows… Everyone is clearly upset at that, but what are we going to do? If they don’t have the money for it, then there’s nothing to be done except hold on to it.

  Or… “What if you don’t pay us in money, but work?”

  Johnny lifts his bushy brow, “Oh? What do ya have in mind?”

  “That depends on what can be made from these antlers. You make us something from them and you get to keep whatever's left, free of charge.”

  Johnny grins at that, but Eva cuts me off, “We need money Tiff.”

  “I know, but we can get money some other way. I’m sure there's some easy bounties we could do at one of these guilds to get some quick cash. Besides, I wanna see what kinds of weapons a high leveled Blacksmith can make.”

  Eva tilts her head, before grabbing the staff from her back. She looks down on it inspecting the fine engravings on it. “The enchantments are wearing off, maybe it’s time to get a new one.”

  I grin and look at the other two with us. Aubrey goes first, “I need a new wand. My old one kinda… yeah.”

  Atremer nods, “I could use an extra dagger.”

  Johnny lights up at everyone agreeing, a big goofy smile spread on his face. “Alright! I’m definitely down to work with this if you’d let us. I’m assumin’ you want a new warhammer?”

  I grab the Soul-Sledge from my back and inspect the bandages wrapping it. “Maybe, are you able to improve a weapon that already exists?”

  The man strokes his beard again, “Depends on the weapon, but yes in most cases.”

  “What if that weapon is made from magic?”

  Johnny pauses at that and glances at the sledgehammer I’m holding. “I would be very much interested in trying.” His face billows with glee and his rocky soul is filled with inspiration.

  Eva says, “Uh, are you sure that’s a good idea?”

  I turn to her, “Yes, I just wish I could see his face when he unwraps it.”

  I hand the hammer to Johnny and greedily accepts it. He glances over the warhammer with a sense of excitement. “You’re called a dark soul-sledge, huh? Don’t worry lass, Bobby is the best enchanter in the city. We’ll take care of you.”

  I grin back, getting caught up in the excitement of getting a new weapon. Eva doesn’t seem to be enthused, probably upset that we aren't getting paid money for the antlers. We can make more money by collecting those bounties I saw.

  We start telling Johnny on how we want our new weapons to be made and what kind of enchants they should have. Eva is getting something to improve her fire control and Aubrey has an attunement to lighting so the wand needs to be engraved accordingly. When Johnny asked what I wanted with my warhammer, I gave the obvious response.

  “Surprise me.”

  Johnny laughed at that. Eva is about to leave and I was going to go follow her but I stopped. I turned back to Johnny.

  “Hey, are you able to see the effects of enchantments?”

  Johnny looks up from practically salivating over my soul-sledge. “What’s that lass?”

  “I was wondering if you could check the enchants on my armour.”

  Johnny grunts before placing the hammer on a nearby table. He craned his neck backward, “BOBBY! Get your ass down here!”

  Suddenly a thud is heard from the floor above us. I look up to see a soul seemingly made up from a cloud of smoke jolt upward. I hear a voice echoing from the nearby stairs. “Dammit Johnny! I’m comin’, I’m comin’.”

  After a shuffling and a thud followed by a curse, Bobby makes his way down the stairs. I blink at the man as he looks exactly like Johnny. Same braided beard and everything.

  (Enchanter / level 57)

  “What in my devil's nuts do you want Johnny?”

  He grins, “I need ya to check the enchants on this girl's armour.”

  Bobby glances and looks me up and down. He whistles as he puts a hand down on a table, “That's a fine piece of equipment. I don’t need the whole armour to appraise it, just throw me a shoulder guard or somethin’.”

  I obliged and took off my right shoulder guard and tossed it at him. Bobby extended both his hands and caught it with a clap. He turned it over and peered deep into it.

  He lets out a hearty chuckle, “Plot Armour! Ha!”

  Bobby slowly goes over the shoulder guard, flipping it several times. He furrows his brows as he continues scrutinizing. His mouth gapes as he flips it again. I tilt my head as Bobby’s soul becomes unreadable.

  “Well, it sure does live up to the name.”

  The anticipation is killing me, “What’s the enchant!”

  Bobby’s lips flap as he lets out a sigh, “Resurrection from death. A one time use and its charge is already spent. Other than that, just a basic self repair. Shit lass, where’d you find this?”

  He tosses the shoulder guard back to me. Everyone is now staring at me as they slowly process what Bobby just said.

  “I… Found it in a dungeon?”

  Johnny strokes his beard as he glances at his twin, “Shit, with an enchant like that, you sell it for hundreds of mythril pieces. Maybe even thousands… Well, if the bitch still had its charge that is.”

  Oh, the armour was the reason I’m still alive right now. I guess I should have seen it coming since it is literally called plot armour. I’m also glad that it only had one charge. If it brought me back from the dead every time I died, that would be boring. It would simply be too strong and there wouldn’t be any danger to fighting.

  I still like this armour however, even if the only thing it can do now is repair itself.

  “Welp, that’s one mystery solved.”

  I look around to see everyone still staring.

  “What?”

  ---

  We then left Johnny’s and Bobby’s smithing shop. Our next stop is to the alchemist guild so Atremer and Aubrey can claim the bounty on their chimp excrement. Me and Eva are tagging along to see the alchemist guilds bounties and see if I can find a good one for us to do.

  The alchemist guild building looks a lot more clean than the smithing guild. Large clears window and a glass door juxtaposed the wooden walls of the smithing guild. We walk in and the door rings a bell as we pass through.

  A man wearing a lab coat… wait a lab coat? I double take at the man rising from behind a counter. He was lounging in a hammock before we walked in and he’s wearing robes that are formed in such a way to look like a lab coat, but not quite.

  (Alchemist / level 23)

  “Ahh, Atremer! You’re back!” He tilts his head forward. “You got the stuff?”

  Atremer sighs, “Yes, we have it.” He gestures for Aubrey to approach the counter.

  She walks up and holds out her hand. Five brown bags pop into existence onto the counter. The Alchemist grins wildly as he opens one of the bags.

  “Yes! That’s it! I’ll go get your payment.” He glances at Eva and me. “I’ll be with you two in a second.”

  He hurriedly scurries off with the bags of shit into a back room. I look over at the board full of bounties for materials. Unlike the smithing guild, there are way more bounties posted. Screaming weeds for only one bronze piece a bundle.

  Eyes of the abominable spider for eight mythril pieces, recommended for level 70 or above. The paper seems faded so this bounty must have been here for awhile. Interesting, but I don’t really want to go back to the cursed lands again so soon.

  Ancient undead flesh for fifty gold pieces, recommended for level 40 or above. More zombies? I think I had my fill of the undead.

  Ectoplasm for one mythril piece… Huh, for this one I decided to read more of the details on the bounty.

  Ectoplasm / Reward 1 Mythril

  Recommended level / Unknown

  Ectoplasm can be harvested from the corpses of dead Banshees. Currently there are no known haunted locations within Memphit where Banshees would naturally come into the world. Since there are no known locations, a proper level cannot be informed. This is a bounty without a time limit and any information about any potential haunted locations will be rewarded with five silver pieces.

  The client has chosen to stay anonymous.

  I grin and turn to Eva, snatching the bounty from the wall. “Take a look at this.”

  She tilts her head, “Ectoplasm?”

  “Yep! And I ain't afraid of no ghosts!”

  Eva slowly turns to me as I smile at her. She speaks in the most exasperated tone I have ever heard from her, “What are you talking about?”