“What should we do, Mom? Evacuate? Get people ready to fight?”

  “I don’t know, but give me a minute,” she said as she sat back down at the table. She’d pulled out the Pyromancy book and began to read it, flipping pages abnormally quickly. She must’ve been skimming it.

  I sat down with her, grabbing a bit of rye bread and butter, while racking my brain to think of a way to warn people without spilling my talent’s rank in the process. While I did, I glanced back over to Mom. She still had a bubble, but the need had changed now that I’d already created hers. This new one was… faded. Darkened in a way. I couldn’t use it and had no idea how long it would take before I could.

  So. No gaming the system. I couldn’t just consistently create whatever my closest family members needed to spam skills. That made sense. If I could, my skills would reach the thousands in no time. I had no idea what that might allow me to do, but it sounded preposterous when people using skills above one hundred already looked like magic. For now, I’d have to wait. It could be a time limit, or it was possible I’d have to craft multiple items for other people before I could make whatever Mom needed via my talent again.

  I could see the requirements, though. She needed oak wood, a carving knife, and a gemstone, preferably ruby. I thought this was also a weapon of some sort because she also needed it to fight war trolls.

  Unfortunately, she wouldn’t be getting that right now.

  “We’ll need to contact Korlotom first. He can send scouts out to make sure we’re safe for the moment. Talents all work differently, and this could simply be a coincidence.”

  I nodded. “I thought that at first… but it’s a big coincidence, Mom. At least ten people. You twice!”

  “I’d meant to ask about that,” she said, irritatingly calmly. “Did my need change after you crafted the book?”

  Her calm in the face of this sudden danger was almost irritating, but I kept the scowl off my face. “I can still see your next craft, but the need didn’t change. It’s kind of greyed out, though.”

  “To be expected. Most active crafter talents are like that. I’ve never seen one with such a unique social aspect before,” she said.

  “How does that help with the trolls, Mom?”

  “It doesn’t. Would you prefer I start panicking? Throw my hands in the air, run around a bit?”

  “A bit of urgency would be nice!”

  “Urgency won’t be believed. Panic, and you’ll look like you’ve got the Hysterics. No one would blame you. They’d pat you on the head and demand you get some rest before you start tearing things apart with that talent of yours.”

  I grimaced. Having the Hysterics was the last thing I wanted.

  They weren’t just people with misunderstood mental illnesses as they had been in Earth’s history. Capital H ‘Hysterics.’ Most of the older people in town had a story about when this or that person got them. Though I’d never seen it. People could typically get over them with time and rest and distance, but once the talent started acting strangely…

  Hysterics was a known phenomenon where talents went haywire and acted erratically. The higher the talent’s rank, the more dangerous it could be, but the victims were universally pitied. Those who couldn’t get over the Histerics did not have long to live. Those were the lucky ones. Even common talents could be devastating if they went out of control.

  “I hate it when you’re right,” I bristled.

  “All daughters do,” she said with a smirk. “Now, the way you can help the most with this problem is clear. Your paste…”

  She paused in thought before she reached into a small clay jar. My eyes widened as she pulled out two gold coins. She turned and handed one to me.

  Gold! I nearly dropped it in shock at first. I held it reverently as she placed the other coin back into the jar and returned it to the small wooden cabinet.

  It was difficult to quantify how much a gold coin was worth. I could just say it was worth bags and bags of rye grain, a cow, and three pairs of shoes. I could also say it was worth about twelve hundred copper coins, or a hundred silver ones, and I wouldn’t be lying.

  It was worth those things, but those things were worth astronomically more than they had been on Earth. If forced to make a comparison, I’d say one gold was worth the equivalent of an average two-year-old used car.

  And mom had just handed me one.

  “M-mom? What the heck?” I asked.

  “That’s a significant portion of our savings, honey. Use it to get anything and everything you might need to make as much paste as you can. Get it turned into a liquid if possible. Let me take care of warning the village,” she said as she reached even further up and pulled out a small, delicate sheaf of expensive paper alongside a small quill and a tiny clay pot.

  I blinked, slightly astonished by the show of trust.

  “Don’t you dare go out to that lab of yours without Reid either,” she said sharply.

  “Mom, this is… this is too much!” I exclaimed. I didn’t even feel comfortable holding the thick coin. I couldn’t recall holding anything more valuable than a silver in this life. Now I was holding a hundred of them.

  “It isn’t. Half the town heard me deal with the Lieutenant, and it would almost be strange if I didn’t start spending to make sure you have what you need to make such a useful product,” she insisted.

  “That makes sense,” I agreed. “Still, that’s a lot of money. I think I could get everything I need for a few silvers!”

  “Not in the quantities we might need. Make gallons of the stuff, honey. Barrels. If we aren’t under attack in the next few days, we can sell it to the army. If we are…?”

  Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.

  She left the implications unsaid.

  I gulped and nodded.

  “Go now. Use your talent and create things for anyone you can, but don’t spend too much time on it. People will be curious. Leverage that. Use it to buy what you need from them, and if you get extra skill points with your talent, all the better.”

  She sat at the table, selecting a fancy piece of paper and unstoppering the clay pot to reveal ink.

  “What are you going to do?” I asked.

  She looked at me and sighed.

  “Something that might get us in deep trouble if you are wrong, daughter,” she said.

  I took a moment to think as she stared at me. The question in her eyes was clear. Did I really believe we were all in danger?

  I shook my head.

  “I wish I were wrong, but I don’t think I am. I wouldn’t joke about this, Mom.”

  She nodded.

  “In that case, it’s better if you don’t know. Don’t think too much about it, and go get what you need to make this new weapon.”

  “Okay,” I said.

  I was intimidated by the sudden seriousness in her tone. She’d transformed from my carefree housewife mom into a sharp-tongued captain who would’ve felt more at home on a cop drama show than in a kitchen. When we had more time, I vowed to find out more about Atrinaska Farmer’s life before I came along.

  I stepped out the door, intending to head straight to the bar to ask who’d been growing peppers this year and if anyone had a surplus of oil they’d be willing to part with, when she stopped me.

  “Don’t forget. Get Reid. Don’t go out to your little lair alone. Please,” she asked. “Gather what you need and bring it back here.”

  I nodded and turned. It might be good to get Reid anyway. If I was going to be hauling peppers and oil from my lab, I could certainly use a pack mule. Perhaps, maybe, I would also feel safer with him there.

  It was a fifteen-minute walk to Reid’s house on the other side of town. The gold coin in my pocket felt heavy, weighing me down. Instead of going to savings, or clothes, or something useful, I was dropping a full gold on peppers. But… well. Eighty copper a handful? I could see us selling at least a few hundred of these. It might be worth it after all.

  “I would kill for a food processor,” I thought aloud as I came in view of the hunter’s lodge.

  I didn’t even bother to go inside, knowing that he wouldn’t be there. Instead, I walked around the back of the little shop to find him where he always was.

  “Mera!” he exclaimed as soon as I rounded the corner. He was, predictably, covered in blood. “Wh-what are you doing here?”

  “Oh, you know. Just enjoy seeing you hard at work,” I teased.

  April would’ve been disgusted by the boy at the moment. He appeared to be just at the tail end of skinning a deer, and he stank. I honestly didn’t understand how he could live with the smell, but without him and his dad, we likely wouldn’t have any meat except chickens.

  If people could tolerate my weirdness for stories, I could certainly tolerate his stink for decent food.

  …But god, it was gross. I bet he would kill for a food processor, too.

  “Okay, that’s a lie,” he countered immediately. “I can tell by your scrunched-up face!”

  I snickered. He knew me well.

  As I approached him, my attention was drawn to the golden talent-born bubble just above him. Curiously, his need wasn’t to defend against War Trolls. For him, it was goblins. The need was incredibly simple to craft. Thread, a few scraps of leather or skin, and a fucking stick. Even if I didn’t know him at all, I didn’t think my talent could make the need cost too much more.

  It was a bow.

  Not surprising for Reid Hunter. I couldn’t guarantee that was what would appear if I were to use my talent, but it seemed very likely. Would that be all that useful? I wondered what his highest skill was. He’d always been a bit more secretive about his skills than Hadra.

  “So… Mom insists that I take you to get everything I need to make more of my paste and bring it back to the house. If you have the time,” I said.

  His expression softened.

  “Right. The blinding paste. Did I tell you what we saw when we got to your lab? It was crying, Mera. Bawling like a baby. Snot falling from its disgusting nose, and tears in its eyes. I’ve never seen anything so gross.”

  “I find that hard to believe considering how much time you spend buried in guts,” I said, eyeing the strung-up carcass.

  “I realize this isn’t exactly my best look,” he said awkwardly, as if he’d only just remembered he’d asked me to go steady last night, only to look like a trash heap the next day. “I clean up nice, I swear.”

  I laughed.

  “That I do believe,” I said. “So… will you help?”

  “Of course. Let me talk to my Dad, but I can already tell you what he’s going to say.”

  “Oh? What’s that?”

  “Get me some of that paste,” he said, deepening his voice to impersonate his father.

  I laughed again, but Reid didn’t. “I’m joking, but I’m kinda not, Mera. He is going to want it just in case anything like that troll happens again. A lot of it, and we’re willing to pay in meat or silver.”

  “Oh, don’t worry about that,” I replied. “I’ll be making it by the truckload.”

  He quirked his brow. “You’re… so weird. I’m almost afraid to ask.”

  I blinked before frowning. “Great way to make me more interested in dating you, you prick! I’m not weird!”

  “Oh? Alright, I’ll bite. What is a truckload?”

  I flushed. Fucking son of a…

  “Oh… uh… its…”

  He snickered. “You didn’t even realize you said that, did you? I swear, sometimes it's like you have this whole other life that the rest of us can only glimpse. Weird. But kind of wonderful, too.”

  Well, that was a dangerously close guess. I was pretty sure my cheeks were on fire, but I didn’t have that much to be embarrassed about. I knew what a truck was. It wasn’t my fault that nobody here had ever seen one.

  “It’s… like a cart that drives itself with no ox or horse…” I said weakly.

  “A self-driving cart? What makes it go? Some form of magic?” he asked, seemingly genuinely curious.

  “Fire,” I said. “Well… technically, burning oil. I’m not sure how it works beyond that, though.”

  “Of course,” he said, nodding sagely.

  I rolled my eyes at him. “Are you going to come help me or not?”

  “Of course!” he repeated. “Just… uh… let me get finished here? Dad will kill me if I leave this meat out here to spoil.”

  “In that case, I’ll be right back. Do you have any thread in the shop?” I asked.

  “Thread? What for?”

  “My talent is a crafting one. Lets me make things for people. Want a new bow?” I asked mischievously.

  “Oh, shit! I forgot all about your talent! What is it!?” he exclaimed.

  “Excited much? Like I said, I can make things for people,” I said. “For you, it’s gonna be a bow. Ninety percent sure.”

  “A talent-crafted bow? I’d be a moron to say no! The drawer behind the counter. There should be a spool beside the coinbox,” he said. “A crafter talent. I can’t believe I almost forgot entirely! I shouldn’t be surprised, but I am. I was so sure it would be something to do with stories.”

  I grinned and took off for the shop.

  Thank you all so much for the wonderful reception so far!

  Till Next!

  MB