But for a Slime

Garnedell stood quickly, embarrassed panic showing on his face as he quickly bowed towards the man, “Please forgive my mast…”

The cleric waved away Garnedell’s concerns even as Joe stood to offer greetings, not seeming too concerned, “There is nothing to forgive. Your master is correct, but there are small men who are unable to accept such statements or assessments.” The man then turned to Joe and inclined his head in apology. “I do apologize, however. I had no intention to ‘take my sweet time.’ Such an interesting turn of phrase; so fascinating! But we do live a goodly distance from the sacristies. We also wish to take some measure of the knowledge seekers before we enter.”

“Ah. I can understand. I was simply offering my frustrations. In my world, seekers of knowledge often are capable of finding their knowledge in matter of seconds. I am simply still… easily frustrated by the slow pace and lack of knowledge here. Please forgive my impatience. I still must learn to curb it carefully.”

The cleric nodded his acceptance of Joe’s apology but showed deep interest in Joe’s comments, “You have temples of knowledge capable of offering knowledge so quickly?”

“My land has no temples of knowledge. We do not bel… have such, but we have libraries open to all. However, the libraries are becoming… obsolete in some ways. We have found ways to store our knowledge digitally… um… on machines and all people can… connect to the machine almost anywhere through radio waves…” Joe sighed at this point, struggling to explain the hundreds of advanced twenty-second century technologies needed to capture the essence of the internet and finally decided that magic was really the only viable explanation. “We have a storage of almost all our people’s knowledge. This storage can be accessed by anyone anywhere at almost any time. Seekers of knowledge can ask questions of the storage and gain answers very quickly, although the seeker is often still required to carefully sift the valid information from the insane.”

“Truly! This is fascinating! This access and storage is free and available to all?”

“Uh. The access to the internet costs, and one can have slow or fast access, although even the slowest of access is enough for most to gain access to everything they could desire for quite a reasonable cost. An average connection speed for a day costs less than half of any meal, and this connection is valid for an entire month, although most ISPs… uh… most services that offer connections ask that you pay for a month or promise to have access for a year and pay each month.”

It was now the cleric’s turn to goggle, eyes wide in shock, “How can any afford to offer such great knowledge for so little! Such access would only cost twenty or thirty tin, yes?”

Joe took a moment, eye’s rolling upward in thought as face tightened in concentration before nodding carefully, “I believe so. Garnedell, how much do we pay for our meals from the inn?”

“Inns are much more expensive, Joe.”

“Ah, true. Then how much would street food cost?”

“Street food would cost about ten or twenty tin, sir.”

Joe nodded quickly. That seems about right. A supersized set is about five bucks. A forty dollar broadband internet service would wind up being a little over a buck… um… Ha! A buck thirty three… gotta love dividing by threes. “Actually, cleric, it would be closer to three or four tin.”

“Impossible!” the cleric interjected quickly, “No service could survive off such meager profits, the process would be ridiculous! You must be making a mistake of such values!”

Time to introduce the idea of the economy of scale. “How many people live on this planet?”

“Planet?”

“Ah… sorry. I believe you call it a plane?”

“Ah, plane. Yes. What a strange word. Planet?”

“Yes, planet.”

“Huh… curious. Planet,” the man murmured to himself, seeming to take a keen interest in the new word, and Joe found himself trying to control an eye roll. He really takes his whole role as a cleric of knowledge seriously. The man continued to murmur to himself for several more moments before Joe decided to interject but found that he had no need to, as the man came back to the conversation of his own accord, “Yes… planet. You were asking how many people were on this plane. I believe that there were approximately a million on this plane.”

“A million!?” Well, crap… that makes the economy of scale a bit worthless…

“Yes, a million. Truly an astounding amount of people, yes?”

“Does that count all sapient people? Or just human.”

“Oh, you mean sapients. Then there close to a hundred million sapients.”

“Would all these desire to have access to almost all knowledge known to sapients?”

“I believe yes. Most would.”

“Then if each sapient paid for access, even at only the most basic of services, such a merchant would make a half a copper each month for doing little more than allowing access. That is only for this plane. I believe this plane and cradle has few sapients, yes?”

The cleric blinked with a bit of surprise before nodding, “Yes, our cradle is a small and weak cradle.”

“How many sapients are living in the greatest of cradles?”

“I believe such cradles host trillions, even more.”

“I would not be surprised if such cradles hosted quadrillions. If each sapient of such a cradle desired access, the merchant would receive,” Joe quickly fiddled the numbers in his head, spending more time trying to figure out the currency exchange than the actual math, “Uh… I believe I am correct, but the merchant would receive half an iron. Or five hundred brass.”

“That truly is a sizeable amount. Most merchants I know do well to reach a hundred brass in their business,” the cleric offered his reply with a slight smile, obviously unimpressed but politely hiding it.

“Each year?”

“Oh, no… in a lifetime.”

Joe chuckled a bit, responding with a smile, “If the merchant offered this at these prices, he would receive five hundred brass each month!”

At this, the clerics eyes boggled, now overwhelmed, “That… cannot be!”

“And if this merchant were to offer his service to hundreds of cradles?”

“He would rival the clans themselves!”

“He could easily rival the clans,” Joe nodded in reply. Same thing happened back on Earth when the merchant classes over took the nobility in Europe and the East.

“Although I believe the values are representative, it seems that the distribution of wealth on this planet… plane is much more skewed.”

“How so?”

“The wealthy here are incredibly wealthy. And the poor are incredibly poor. In my country… uh land, the wealthy and poor are not so much apart, although on my entire plane, there are some incredibly poor people as well. So maybe it’s not so different after all.”

“Truly fascinating. So with this access, one can access this knowledge?”

“One can access the knowledge, communicate with any other who also has access, interact with any merchant or bank who also has access, see or watch any other who as access and shares their videos… uh… shares their images. There are many things one can do once one has access.”

The cleric sat astounded, uncertain how to reply; truly speechless. Joe smiled with some satisfaction. The internet is pretty freakin’ cool if you really think about it… although most of us spend stupid amounts of time just looking at cats and stupid humans… Joe stifled his sigh at the last comment before turning the conversation to his purpose, “I’m sorry, cleric. I would love to talk more, if you wish, but we’re busy today and I really want to get back into the dungeons. Can we ask our questions?”

“Ah, yes. Of course, sir… uh? May I have your name? I seem to have become quite distracted by our conversation.”

“Ha! Of course. I did not catch your name, either. I am Joe. What’s your name?”

“You may speak to me as Kukurnal.”

“It is nice to meet you, Kukurnal.”

“A pleasure, Joe. How may I guide you to seek knowledge today, Joe?”

“I seek knowledge on four things. I want to know how to gain the combat jobs. I want to know the best job or group of jobs to gain a lot of learning stat. And I want to know about any jobs that could teach me about jobs, reveal information about jobs, or learn about jobs. Finally, I would like to know about any job that might help me grow myself, or my jobs.”

The cleric showed surprise once again but waited until Joe’s litany of questions were finished, “Quite an intriguing set of questions. They seem quite contradictory. A scholar, a fighter, and an extremist. It’s quite a strange set of questions.”

Joe said nothing, shrugging, “It is what I seek.” An extremist? What does that mean?

The cleric thought deeply for some time, seeming to become quiet distracted, but Joe offered nothing in return, simply waiting without response as well until the cleric finally responded, “Well, your questions originally necessitated two clerics, but the first cleric was quite unhappy with your observation of our tardiness and refused to answer your questions. A truly excellent example of small minded men. Of course, as your apprentice noticed, you have lost his help because of your words.”

“Truly such a horrible fate,” Joe’s responded with sarcasm.

The cleric raised an eyebrow in subtle shock, “You seem unconcerned. You have been denied help solely because of your actions.”

“In some ways, yes. But if he was so shallow as to offer help only on the basis of those he likes or dislikes, then he would be insincere enough to offer misleading information out of spite or anger. I would rather receive no advice from such a sapient than take my chance that the being’s advice was credible and beneficial instead of a possible attempt to sabotage me.”

“That is … a way.”

Joe shrugged and replied, “I’ve lost nothing from his rejection. I am simply where I was before so I have lost nothing while gaining possible safety from a petty being.”

“But he has no reason to act in such a petty way towards you.”

“That I know of, true. But I have no way to know if I have not accidently offended him unknowingly, either.”

The cleric blinked a few times, “Interesting philosophy.”

Joe replied, “Well, I don’t make my life choices on annoying people to see how they respond. I had no intention of offending, although my words were quite blunt and offensive. My friend was right in this case. My big mouth got me in a lot of trouble.”

“You still seem unconcerned.”

“Like I said, I am simply where I originally was. I have neither gained nor lost.”

“Well, as I said, my knowledge of combat is … limited, but I can give you what I am able to. Combat jobs become available through the scout job.”

“OK, but still worthless for me. What opens the scout job?”

“I believe the explorer job. It can be seen that a scout would be a specialized explorer.”

“OK. Sounds cool. What opens the explorer job?”

“You do realize that each question requires its own payment?”

“Except that you have not answer my question. I wished to open the combat jobs.”

“And I told you, you must have the scout job.”

Joe grimaced but then nodded, “OK. Then tell me, what opens the explorer job.”

“I do not know, sir.”

Joe grimaced, unhappy with the result, but at least he had a starting point. Gotta find explorer, if I can. “OK. What of my other questions?”

“Little is known of stats, although there are some esoteric scholars who claim to have understood and examined the stats. There are only a few that are known. The first two seem to be related to one’s health and magic. The next four seem to deal with a person’s combat capabilities. Other than these, the rest are a mystery. Can you explain to me what you mean by learning stat?”

“You don’t know what… never mind. Of course you don’t. You don’t know how to read!”

“What is… read?”

Joe shook his head and dismissed the question before a smirk rose on his face, “You know, each question requires its own payment!”

The cleric’s eyes rose in shock, “You would blackmail the god of knowledge! You would demand payment for what is due him?”

“If he already knows it, then he can tell you. If he doesn’t know it, then it must not be his due. If you do not know it, your god must not wish you to know it. I do not wish to incur his wrath teaching you that which he does not wish you to know.”

The man simply stared at him, shock settling on his face.

“Besides, if selling knowledge to seekers is good enough for the god of knowledge, then I can also sell my knowledge. I only seek to emulate the god of knowledge, yes?”

The man’s irritation flickered to admiration before he guffawed loudly, “I do not know to take your words as wisdom or sacrilege! But yes, if it is good enough for my god, then it must be good enough for his followers. Are you a follower of knowledge?”

“I seek to learn knowledge everywhere I may.”

The man nodded firmly, “Then you are as I, a follower of Mimir.”

Joe didn’t wish to disabuse the man of his view and simply accepted Kukurnal’s assumption. The man seemed to enjoy the moment of levity before ending his laughter and leaned forward with some excitement. “Then, I shall pay. What do you wish for payment of this knowledge?”

“I do not believe knowledge should be horded or charged for. It should be easily accessed by all. Teaching that knowledge in easy to learn formats; that should be charged. But, knowledge itself should be free.”

“So you will not charge me, then?” the priest smiled with some cunning.

Joe smiled in return, “And you will not charge me?”

The priest’s smile took a hit, a bit of cunning dissatisfaction flickering through his eyes, “I’m uncertain that my superior would be satisfied with this arrangement.”

“Equal exchange of knowledge is only equal if I give my knowledge for free but I must pay for yours?”

“It seems unfair.”

“It is more than unfair. I am able to gain your knowledge from any temple of Mimir and any cleric or priest at temples all over this cradle, yes? But my knowledge is truly mine alone. You will never hear of this knowledge from any but me.”

The cleric blinked in surprise, realization coming to him quickly followed by desperation, “How do you mean?”

“To the best of my knowledge, I am the only being of my plane here. You will find no other of my kind.”

“Then, what do you seek?”

“As I said before, I seek the knowledge. I am willing to give you equal exchange for my knowledge.”

“How would we do such an exchange.”

“A question for a question?”

The priest smiled, laughter and good cheer returning, “You are truly a priest of Mimir. Good. A question for a question it will be.”

“You have already asked five or six questions of me, yes?”

The priest frowned then grimaced in chagrin, “You are a follower of Mimir wrapped in the ways of Plutus, the god of money, merchants, and calculation.”

Joe only smiled and replied, “I believe I asked you three questions, yes?”

The priest nodded, “Yes, but I only asked you five. You have two more from me.”

“Excellent. Then I ask the next question. You cannot help me with the learning stat, but then what is the job that may help me learn, understand, explore, or see other jobs? This is not a job that helps me know about its own job, but one that teaches me to know about other jobs, even those I have never or cannot currently take. It is a job that reveals the truth of other jobs.”