An Exciting Franchise Opportunity

  Mrs. Xiang and myself carried heavy backpacks as we departed just after the dawn after meeting up at the Checkpoint wizard tower. Both of us walked in that morning half-awake state where you don’t really want to engage with the world until it has become a little clearer. She walked using her spear as a walking staff, and I used my actual staff for the same purpose, but after brief greetings we began walking in silence.

  Gates had been made in the town walls. It was a fix to one of the stupider oversights I’d had in the recent days. The very first spell I had ever got, Seal Door, also reinforced the walls around it, potentially making them indestructible. So one of the last things I’d done before leaving the town was disseminate the spell among the mages we had and crafting gates in the walls. Well, ‘gates’, really. These were just simple wooden doors made by one of the craftspeople in town that with a simple locking mechanism and hinges were set into a holes cut in the parts of the wall that needed to be replaced.

  So it was when I turned the handle of the door closest to the direction we would have to go to reach Starter Village, the smell of tobacco smoke drifted over me for the first time since coming to the Tower.

  “Shit, I haven’t smoked since high-school,” Artemis said, leaning against the wall on the outside of the town, “I wanted to talk to you before you left, Alex.”

  I had a cold feeling in my stomach that I pressed down. This was Artemis. Wasn’t it?

  “Yeah. What’s up?” I said and she turned around, took a deep drag of a hand-rolled cigarette, blew the smoke away from me by turning her face aside and then looked me in the eye.

  “I get it. I know what happened in the Guild hall. You cannot fully trust me anymore,” she said.

  “I cannot,” I said. It was true.

  “Good. I’ve been thinking about how to convince you to be honest,” she said.

  “Can’t. She knows your thoughts, so anything you could come up with, she could come up with too,” I said, winced and added, “Sorry.”

  “Yeah. So, you think I should step down?” Artemis said.

  “With all due respect, don’t you dare, Ms. Artemis,” Mrs. Xiang said, the first words she’d spoken since we met.

  “Mrs. Xiang is right. You’re too valuable. But you should decentralize. If it’s you, you probably want to do that anyways. If it isn’t, it’ll hurt fewer people,” I said.

  “I’ll try. These franchises will be a good start for that. Maybe bigger council. Or local councils. I’ll have to think about it,” Artemis said.

  “Hey, Artemis? I believe you did it. I trust that you kicked her in the taint and have her locked up in a cell in your brain. Because I believe in you. But that’s not the sort of thing we can rely on in this place, you know?” I said.

  “It is me,” she said, with a degree of sadness.

  “I believe you,” I said, but meant it only in the same way that I believed I could get out of this Tower or help my friends long-term. “Or, maybe I have faith in you. I know you wouldn’t give up in either case.”

  “Alright. Just thought you should know I know you know it could have happened. Good luck, stay safe,” Artemis said.

  “Same to you,” I said. She made a disgusted face after taking a third drag of the smoke then threw it on the ground and stomped it out, and gave me a hug. I hugged her back, any time could be the last one, right?

  And then we left for the Starter Village and Nothing. The journey this time around was much less pressed and eventful, only netting a few wolf monsters worth of experience and a couple of level-ups in navigation related skills. We weren’t in as much of a rush, though there was a deadline, so it took us four days to make the trek back. By the time we reached the rolling hills next to Starter Village I’d restored some of the rapport we’d had with Mrs. Xiang when we first worked together. She was a firm, no-nonsense woman, but there was a rhythm to her strict words that expected a tempering retort. At first she would simply snap at me for things I was doing incorrectly, with strange pauses in her speech, and when I looked at her face, these pauses were filled with a profound grief.

  By the third day this changed. I’d run out of seasoning for my morning porridge at our campsite.

  “Mr. Vorhal, how come you can have that good head on your shoulders but forget to prepare for the most obvious outcomes?” she said, then paused and smiled, “Must have a lot on your mind. He used to get like that during exam season you know, would forget to eat. I wish I could forget to eat, always had to think about my waistline, but some folks can just forget I guess! Here, I have salt at least.”

  I made my salty oats, which were better than I thought they would be, and from then on she’d sometimes remember to soften her own words. It was a sad sort of growth, but made the remainder of the travel more pleasant for the both of us I hoped.

  Rafael came out to meet us when we arrived. The Village had grown nearly as much as Checkpoint had, with a bit of a Shire vibe to it. Many of the buildings were still the same token-made multi-story living blocks that made up the majority of the houses in Checkpoint, but there were plenty of what looked like emergency shelters and storage basements dug directly into hillsides. A sense of foreboding still came from the permanently lodged-open dungeon that led to Nothing, but on the whole the settlement had gained a downright quaint cottage feel to it.

  “Good Afternoon, Rafael, this is Mrs. Xiang, Mrs. Xiang, Rafael de Leon,” I said. She gave him a businesslike smile and a firm handshake, which he returned.

  Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

  “Ah! This must be about that thing we were talking about before you left. Your adventuring guild branch?” Rafael said.

  “That is what I am here for, yes. I can answer any questions you have, but I have to admit I do not know everything yet myself, we did not have an opportunity to test these tokens,” Mrs. Xiang said.

  “Clarence was a real help around here, and I don’t have any reason to take issue with Alex. I suppose we have space for another token building,” Rafael said.

  “If it makes it any easier, if half of you here decide that you don’t want us here, the building will collapse immediately,” I said.

  “That’s rough. I’ll make sure to tell my people that you’re here to help, doubt you’ll be doing anything so bad that it will need to come to that,” Rafael answered, walking to the main settlement, clearly looking for a good space, lifting tools and furniture out of the way, “How big a space do you need?”

  “It should re-size within reason. But at least two rooms, I’d prefer three,” Mrs. Xiang said.

  We found the space eventually, a clearing between two small hills, and Mrs. Xiang removed a small silver disk from her purse. I was amused to see that on one of its sides it had the stylized face of Artemis in profile, and how much she must have hated that. Mrs. Xiang, however, flipped it off her thumb and it flew tumbling towards the center of the clearing where the building was to spring up.

  And so it did, from the dark-wood floors, to horizontal log walls, to circular windows and a sharply slanted green-tiled roof. The building stood two stories high, with wide enough windows that the interior could be seen clearly from the outside and a single green door. The last to appear was a sign above the door that said “Adventuring Guild” and a brass doorbell on the inside.

  “Nifty. Mind if I join you in checking out the inside?” Rafael said, looking up at the top of the roof.

  “I- I don’t see any reason why not. I must admit I am quite curious myself,” Mrs. Xiang said and opened the door with a ringing of the bell. We followed her in.

  The inside reminded me of a mix of an old-timey tavern, the office of someone important and a waiting room. There was a counter separating the rear of the house from the front room, which had a large cabinet with dozens of small drawers behind it, along with a stack of papers near a wall, an inkwell and several quills. There was a large cork board that took up almost all of the left wall with a box of a hundred or so pins, which was separated in four distinct sections. There were coffee tables and comfortable seating around the rest of the room. A wrought iron chandelier set above and it flickered with clearly magical candlelight.

  Mrs. Xiang was reading from her Journal, stepping towards the counter, to the quest board, the stack of papers and checking out several of the drawers behind the counter.

  “Good. Excellent, really, exceeds expectations,” she said.

  “So you have everything you need?” Rafael said.

  “Everything required for smooth running and organization of this branch is here. I will need to inspect the rest of the rooms to see if I have everything I need personally. Alex, would you mind joining me?” Mrs. Xiang said.

  “Guild secrets beyond this point?” Rafael said.

  “Could be. But you have shown trust in us, I do not see it could be anything that the leader of this community shouldn’t know,” Mrs. Xiang said, and opened the door behind the counter.

  We followed her into the next room, which was lined with empty bookshelves, three desks and a staircase leading to the second floor. In the middle of the room there was a circular table that was covered in satin-like cloth. Underneath the cloth there was an obvious orb shape, which was, after all, what I was most curious about. I threw the cloth away dramatically and was rewarded with a clear crystal ball. I had hoped for a green and black, shiny stone-looking one, but I suppose I shouldn’t be hoping for a seeing stone best known for being corrupted by an evil, powerful being.

  I placed my hand on it and felt the activation ‘switch’ in my mind immediately.

  “Mrs. Xiang, would you do the honors?” I said.

  She walked up to the orb and placed her hand on it. She must have felt that same activation switch, as the orb lit up with white light, at first too bright to see through. Soon enough a room materialized inside the orb, severely fish-lensed, but we could see that there was a man working at a desk near it. Clarence must have seen the flash of light as well, as he jumped, and then walked over to the orb on his side.

  “A pleasure to see you, Mrs. Xiang, can you hear me well?” he said. There was a little strange arcane reverb to his voice, but he came through loud and clear.

  “Loud and clear, Clarence. We’ve arrived safely, and I am setting up now. I think I will be busy tonight, but it is good to know we can reach you,” Mrs. Xiang said.

  “That is excellent to hear, I will note you down as active. Alex, you should be pleased to hear that the Guild in Fort Dawn has also come online. We expect to hear from the rest soon,” Clarence said.

  “Okay okay, we can all chat later, I am going to go put my things down now,” Mrs. Xiang said.

  And she went to the stairs, where at the top of the landing there was a door with a key in its keyhole. She turned it and opened the door.

  “My room. And a bath. I will ask you boys to come back tomorrow then,” she said, and closed the door behind her.

  “I like her. Takes business seriously. Nice orb. But what exactly will be the benefit of this Guild to us?” Rafael said.

  “I don’t know all the abilities, but the most straightforward thing is quest rewards. Mrs. Xiang can create tasks, and based on danger and difficulty you’ll get extra experience and other stuff,” I said.

  “I see, I see. Could be good,” Rafael said.

  “Honestly, I’d ask Mrs. Xiang to make a quest for someone to explain to her the challenges and strengths of the area. That way you can see how the system works, and we can learn what you need,” I said.

  “That’s a good idea, I like it. Now, Alex, will you be staying here too?” Rafael said.

  “Just for tonight. I’m going back into the dungeon,” I said.

  “Then you have nothing else to do tonight. Which means we should go drink,” he said, and pulled me towards him around the shoulder as we walked out of the new Guild branch.